The Sallie House Haunting: A True Story (27 page)

Peter reported that at least three individuals had actually died in the house and there was a medical feeling attached to at least one of them. According to the crew’s research and ours, this was likely Charles C. Finney, who moved out of the house in 1906. He was the son of Michael C. Finney (MC?), who died in the house in 1871. James Finney died there in 1900, and Kate Finney in 1918.

Peter also seemed to speak directly to Sallie. She told him she had a pain in her lung and a pain in her foot or ankle. In relation to this young spirit, we looked at a preliminary list I had put together with possibilities for who she was.

My research from earlier in the year allowed Peter to home in on one little girl in particular. The television crew jumped on this and suggested that it correlated to their own research. At this point, the crew shifted the filming to the cemetery and the next show’s segment showed Peter standing at Plot One, Fourth Row West, suggesting that this was Sallie’s final resting place and that she had died of pneumonia.

We had no reason to believe otherwise until later research revealed the following according to
The Atchison Daily Globe
dated February 23, 1905:

Sallie I. Hall,
colored, wife of Will Hall, who works at the Wolters brick yard, died this morning and the funeral will occur Sunday at 2:00 p.m., from the Sixth Street Baptist church. Mrs. Hall was only thirty-four years of age, but had given birth to fourteen children within the past sixteen years. All had died at birth but three girls and a boy, who survive their mother. The oldest is sixteen and the youngest is two. A baby was born a week ago. Think of the suffering, think of the tragedy crowded into one brief life! Every year there has been a birth and a death at the house, and this year there have been four deaths: an uncle at Christmas, a sister of Will Hall a few weeks ago, the baby a week ago, and now the mother. The family lives in the alley east of second street and adjoining Mound.

More recently, however, there was additional confusion when I was contacted via email by a researcher from the
Sightings
show. She reported that although she didn’t have the records available, she did remember the following:

I found an entry in one of the logs in 1905 of a Sallie (she was 5 or 6) that died along with her mother in an accident. I believe they were riding in something that tipped over. It did not say if they died in your home but the accident was in an area just behind your home on a road that is still dirt. At the time I was also able to confirm the grave location that Peter James took us to, even though it was illegible. I was able to confirm that it was a child’s grave—she was named Sallie and she was 5.

In typical TV fashion and if my memory is correct, when Peter says he found the grave he’s not actually at the grave, I’m not certain of this but it is possible. Visually, it wasn’t a good spot, so they may have faked it and moved him.

This researcher also reported that the information found was given to those in charge of the story. I wonder why it wasn’t included in one of the show’s segments, but the editors often said they had had a difficult job editing our story because there was so much to work with and they hated to cut out any of it just to make it fit into the show.

I regret that we were not with Peter and the crew at the time they were at the graveyard, because we have no way to confirm or further research this information.

The Hall family mentioned in the obituary lived on Mound Street just around the corner from the Sallie house. We have speculated that perhaps this family had worked for the doctor’s family in various capacities. It was thought that the doctor and Mrs. Hall may have had an association beyond business. This was portrayed in the made-for-TV movie
The Heartland Ghost
, made by Paramount several years later.

nineteen

Sightings’ Fourth Visit

Sightings
’ fourth visit began much like the others. I was told that no story the show had done had generated more email and interest than ours and this time they wanted to bring in a ton of equipment to monitor the house and its activity for a twenty-four-hour period.

This, of course, was a very hard sell for me to pitch to Tony and we passed the days arguing over our concerns, fears, and wishes. Tony wanted to be done with it all. He wanted to go back to some normalcy and not have family and friends question him because of what they saw on television. I simply wanted more answers—real answers. After days of heated discussions, fits of rage, and periods of not speaking, Tony agreed to let the crew come back.

We were told that every available monitoring piece of electronic equipment used in paranormal investigating was going to be used. Our kitchen was turned into a virtual electronic studio able to monitor everything. There was a thermal camera to measure heat changes, an oscilloscope to monitor voltage signals, and closed circuit surveillance cameras to monitor all areas of the house. These cameras were placed strategically in areas where we and the crew had reported activity, namely the nursery, the top of the stairs, and the living/dining area.

The team had counted on Tony and me going to bed at some point that night and for the sake of our privacy did not place cameras in our bedroom. However, there was a frequency counter placed at the top of the stairs to measure the number of cycles in an electric signal during a preset time interval. Multiple cameras from different vantage points were set up on tripods downstairs to gain the best overall view of an entire area. Mobile hand-held cameras were also ready to go.

For this event,Tony wanted to be sure there was no reason for anyone to believe that he might be causing any of the physical injuries himself. He removed all jewelry and suggested that someone constantly be near him to monitor his actions and whereabouts. The crew agreed to this, and as it happened he spent most of his day in a chair in the living room.

By his side for most of the investigation was world-renowned parapsychologist Kerry Gaynor. He arrived mid-afternoon, and right away seemed genuinely concerned for the safety of Tony and our family. For most of the night, he sat on the end of the couch right beside Tony.

For his experience and professional understanding of paranormal situations, Kerry had been consulted for several months about this case and his interviews had been aired during segments of our story. He had already been shown the footage of the initial scratches that erupted on Tony’s stomach and mentioned that it was “exciting that the camera didn’t pull away for nine minutes.” At the end of his initial interview, he reported that he felt there was possibly more than one thing going on in the house. He felt that along with the playful activity that had been reported, there was some potentially more dangerous activity as well. Knowing that he had some knowledge of our experiences and of other malicious haunts, we welcomed his presence and input.

Tony was asked often if he wanted something to eat or drink and someone would bring him what he wanted. If he went to the bathroom, he removed his shirt and the crew took notes on the marks already existing on his body. When he returned, they went through the same ritual to detect any additional marks. There were never any new or questionable marks reported during these inspections and new injuries didn’t show up for close to twenty or thirty minutes afterwards.

When new marks were discovered, they were thoroughly inspected for authenticity and trickery. The scratches were all genuine and there was no magical powder hiding a scratch or waiting to be acted upon in order to bleed on demand, as was later suggested by a fanatical skeptic. I was actually very impressed by the diligence of the team members to ensure that there was no foul play. Although a bit uncomfortable at times, Tony and I welcomed these inspections so that rumors of trickery could be ruled out once and for all.

While the team set up equipment and rearranged our home to suit their needs, Kerry worked with us to gain a more thorough understanding of our experiences and concerns. He had us each fill out a lengthy questionnaire while he talked to the other one. This questionnaire delved into our religious beliefs, our personal traumas, our family life, and our medical and mental status. It also asked about possible past paranormal events, our feelings and thoughts during the ongoing experiences, and specific paranormal events that had taken place to date.

During Kerry’s stay, he witnessed eleven separate attacks on Tony while he sat in the chair next to him. Some of them were pretty brutal, and except for the cold air that seemed to signify something was near, Tony felt nothing. Each successive attack frustrated Kerry more than the last, because no matter how closely he observed Tony, he was unable to detect when they happened or a reason for them.

After nightfall, Kerry requested that the investigation continue under low-level light. I’m not sure why, because we had reported that it didn’t have to be dark or night time for activity to occur. As we sat without any activity occurring, Kerry suggested that Tony make a verbal request to Sallie. I know this was difficult for him, especially on camera, but he did make an attempt. He asked Sallie if she was there and if so, would she please make her presence known. This she seemed to do, but not as everyone expected.

It was not done via an attack on Tony’s person, and nothing moved or flew through the air. In fact, no one recognized it until the crew was back at the studio going over the raw footage. What was very apparent on the review was a low-pitched groaning sound. I can remember getting a call from them right after they discovered it in the edit room at the studio back in California. They were extremely excited to share with us that they had seemingly captured an anomalous sound. As we spoke, the audio in question was being sent to an expert to further analyze it. For almost a week we waited for results.

Rick Wilson, president of Digisonics, was a forensic audio specialist who had worked with the CIA and FBI. He had also worked on black box recordings with the FAA. His findings ruled out any electronic, mechanical, or human sounds. The frequency of the sound was too low to have been produced by a human body. Rick ruled out any natural reason for the sound, but suggested it might be magnetic. He was unsure how this would have been introduced into the audio in question and because he was not experienced in the paranormal had no way to say for sure that it was a ghost.

The sound file was then taken to Sarah Estep, who is often referred to as the mother of Electronic Voice Phenomena. At the time, she had taped and studied recordings from numerous haunted locations for over eighteen years. She reported that in all her years, she had never heard anything quite like the sound captured in our home. She referred to it as an “energy sound, perhaps put out by the other side.” She found it quite interesting that the sound came right after Tony asked the spirit to make its presence know.

We recorded the show when it aired, and watched that particular segment of the audio and video several times. One thing I noticed was something I had seen many times before. When Tony asked Sallie to do something for him, Taylor looked up at the ceiling and seemed to track something flying back and forth above his head in the darkened room. We had witnessed the baby doing this many times, and felt it was a sign that he could see what we could not.

In reviewing the footage, it was determined that there may have been some sort of activity or reaction upon one of two oil lamps that were being used to illuminate the room. Any draft in the room should have had no effect on the short wick within the glass chimney of the lamp. However, there was a distinct flicker and movement of the flame within the one sitting between Tony and Kerry. Soon Tony felt the familiar cold presence in front of him and his midsection.

Kerry bent down to look at Tony’s stomach, and as he stood up, said, “Yeah, we have a new scratch!” Viewing it with in better light, he went on, “Yeah, we have fresh blood. This wasn’t here two minutes ago!” This type of thing continued several more times through the night.

I tried my best to make things as normal as possible for Taylor and took him upstairs to the nursery to play for a while. At the top of the stairs, the team had placed a frequency counter, and when I went past it, the digital readout jumped from 399 to 575 MHz. This happened several more times through the early morning hours of the all-night vigil.

The closed-circuit camera recording the hallway and stairwell from the top of the stairs distinctly displayed interference and then returned to normal, all while no-one was in the vicinity. Likewise, several times throughout the night the camera in the nursery was overcome with a fuzzy sort of interference and drifted so badly at times that it would completely lose the signal before returning to normal. It was explained to us that being on a closed circuit, the cameras were unaffected by interference from nearby appliances or wiring.

Although we had planned on going to bed that night as usual, it was a little nerve-racking to know that virtual strangers were monitoring our house from within. Tony, not being the night owl that I am, gave in and went to bed about 2:00 a.m. I, on the other hand, was incredibly interested in what the equipment might pick up and didn’t want to miss anything.

I watched the monitors with the skeleton crew of television staff that remained through the night, and talked about the experiences in the house. We tried to come up with ways to get activity or gauge a reaction. One of our ideas was to leave a few shiny objects as gifts on the living room coffee table. We then sprinkled the table with baby powder, so that we could detect any movement of the items that might occur.

Throughout the rest of the night, however, our attention was focused on the activity that took place with the oscilloscope and cameras at the top of the stairs. By morning, after the rest of the team had returned to the house, we had all but forgotten about checking the coffee table and the items we had left there. When we finally remembered to check the table, we noticed that one of the items had slid slightly in the powder. We were unable to confirm that this discovery was paranormal, though, because others had been in the house and may have moved it themselves.

Morning had come with no more significant activity, and after the final interviews were done everyone went home. I remember Kerry’s interview; the things he said were a little startling. He claimed that in his twenty years of experience and the 850 cases he’d been involved in, he had never come across anything quite like the activity in our house. He spoke of the fourteen straight hours he had just spent in the house and that the some of the attacks on Tony were quite frightening. He referred to our case and the experience as “interesting, exciting, and potentially dangerous.”