Doggies and Orbs

Sean was taking some video of our doggies sleeping and caught some incredible orbs! 

Ghostly Marbles

Last night in our ghost hunting we tried the marble flour test. We lightly sprinkled a tray with flour, set out 5 marbles in a star shape and left it alone...a few hours later one of marbles was moved 1 1/4 inches. If you look closely you can see the track of marbles path in the flour and also see a flour stripe on the marble. With only one marble being moved, this eliminated the chance of an accidental  moving of the tray (when all the marbles would have been moved). In further analyzing the whole situation, there is no humanly way a finger could have rolled the marble in the way it happened; i.e left a track in the flour and also have the flour adhere to the marble...

A Night at the Theater

Beardstown Opera House Investigation

Beardstown, population of approximately 8,000 people, lies on the banks of the Illinois River. Just a couple blocks away from the river the Beardstown Opera House was built in 1872, but its doors never did open. Mother Nature had other plans. She just about destroyed the place, which delayed the opening, to provide joy to all that entered.

However, the owners and volunteers were determined to rebuild it bigger and better than ever. And once the opera house was rebuilt, it played host to the thousands of people who were destined to see lives shows in the structure. These shows consisted of numerous circuses, theater troupes, vaudeville acts, community theatre groups and traveling evangelists-namely Billy Sunday on his Kerosene Circuit and lasted for over 140 years until the building fell into disrepair. During a period of time it was the largest opera house and the first theater to have been lighted with the electric bulbs west of Chicago.

One of the stunning architectural  features of the theater is its soaring grand dome towering 2 stories over the seating area. The first troupe to play the theater was General Tom Thumb, of P.T. Barnum fame. Its large freight elevator on the first floor was used to haul elephants and other animals to the second floor where the theater is actually located. The opera house also had a restaurant and speakeasy that was frequently visited by Al Capone. Tragedy also struck the theater in the early 1900’s when a young stage hand, high upon a ladder, tried to catch an apple that was thrown to him. The poor guy fell to his death.

In 2004, the opera house was purchased by the Beardstown Heritage Preservation Foundation, and the Foundation is restoring the building to its former grandeur. The building is currently being used for local productions, receptions/meeting and paranormal investigations.

Sean and D.W. spent the night in the Beardstown Opera House, and our investigation was led by Loren Hamilton, a very experienced paranormal investigator. Loren has been a paranormal investigator for over 10 years and does multiple investigations a month associated with the American Hauntings Tours. He has written one book on his experiences, with another in the works. Loren was also featured on the SyFy channel’s My Ghost Story Caught on Camera for his investigation of the Eldred House, in Eldred, Ill.

Our night at the Beardstown Opera House started with Loren and his partner, Jen, providing a tour of the building before letting us explore the maze of staircases, hallways and curious rooms on our own. Even without the standard paranormal activity, the structure is very creepy and unnerving, especially with a chill in the air-with no heat in the building. In addition to the theater on the second floor, there were also numerous dressing rooms and storage for the theater. The third floor above the dressing rooms is the site of the restaurant that was once housed in the building. The basement is now deserted, but it once housed the speakeasy.

Upon starting our investigations, we headed up to the stage area as this is reported to be one of the more paranormally active areas. We had quite active K2 readings up to orange for about and half hour; with the K2 responding to miscellaneous yes and no questions. The Ghost Box and K2 were also in sync, both spiking at the same time. On Ghost Radar, we also got the words: “circus” and “Sunday.” Sean finally discarded his ever-questioning skepticism when those two words appeared on the screen. It should be noted the in the over 2 years we have been using Ghost Radar, this is first time we have ever had the word “circus” pop up, or for that matter “Sunday.” Additional words that appeared on our Ghost Radar were “prepare” and “food.” At that point, we wandered through the rows of seats and hurried up the stairs off the main theater.  

Bare studs and holes in the floor held the area where the small restaurant used to be located, but it is now another storage room. Our flashlight responded with such accuracy to our yes and no questions. Our guides, who were sitting in the chairs below in the theater, could not believe the responses we got. D.W. also was able to detect a tingling sensation in his body right before the mag light turns on.

We descended down the leaning concrete stairs to the basement where the speakeasy was housed. Once there, beneath our feet was crumbling rocks and dirt and the rafters skimmed above our heads. As we set our equipment down on the gravel floor something happened for the first time ever — we heard someone breathing behind us. The K2 meter simultaneously lit up, reaching to the red light, the highest level possible. And, at the exact same time, the K2 and the breathing stopped in unison.

After flurry of activity, we took a rest on some couches in the back of main auditorium with Loren and Jen. They were pleased with the results we had been achieving. In the main auditorium we set up our mag light and digital recorder and just as we sat down to take a break, mag light came on and we heard an audible sigh. That made the second time that night. The next day, as we reviewed the digital voice recorder, we were so excited that we caught that sigh, our very first EVP! After further review, it seemed to actually be more of a gasp than a sigh. Before the end of the tour we decided to head back up to the stage.

On the Ghost Radar the name “Edward” appeared and we assumed that was the name associated with the stage hand’s death. For about 30 minutes we were able to carry on conversation with Edward, through the mag light. We also experienced a 10 degree drop in temperature in the area around the mag lite. Just 10 foot away from the flash light, the temperature was 10 degrees higher; 51 degrees vs. 41 degrees! As soon as conversation ended, the temperature in the area went back to 51 degrees. It was an exhilarating, but also draining experience. While up on the stage we also confirmed, through a series of yes and no questions, that he did indeed fall to his death trying to catch an apple.

After a while, things got grew silent in the building where there was no activity through any one of our devices or senses during the remainder of the night. Loren stated that the first few hours of a investigation are usually the most active, which could be attributed to amount of energy level being expended. Overall the evening was a huge success and we look forward to return trip to the Beardstown Opera House again. 

Lemp Mansion Investigation, St. Louis

The Lemp Mansion, purported to be the “most haunted place in America”,  was built in 1868 by St. Louisian Jacob Feickert. His son-in-law, William J. Lemp and his wife, Julia, moved into the mansion in 1876. In 1911, the house underwent major renovations including conversion of some space into offices for the Lemp Brewery, just next door. Before prohibition, the Lemp Brewery was one of the largest breweries in the country and is where the Falstaff beer brand originated.  Someone from the Lemp family lived in the house until 1949, when Charles Lemp committed suicide. His suicide was the last in a series of many tragic Lemp family events and the 3rd Lemp family suicide at the mansion. Here is a link for more info on the mansion’s history:

http://www.legendsofamerica.com/mo-lempmansion.html

We had the pleasure of ghost hunting in the Lemp Mansion on Sean’s Birthday! We had about an hour and a half in the mansion, with some pretty incredible events happening. The first occurrence happened to Sean while we were waiting for our tour to start; Sean was having an adult beverage and he felt a strong tug on his shirt, like he had spilled his drink on his shirt. But upon feeling his shirt, it was completely dry.  At the same time, words on Ghost Radar came up: may, dropped, highest, mean and toy. Some of these words would also seem to make more sense as we learned more about the mansion’s history and haunting activity. 

One exciting part of our investigation was that it included an infrared video camera for each of us to use. Our tour started with our guide, Rivika, taking us up to the 3^rd floor, which was originally the servants’ quarters and attic. The 3^rd floor is also the most active part of the mansion.  The 3^rd floor reputedly also housed the illegitimate and mentally handicapped son (named Zeke) of William Lemp Jr. for his whole life. Rivika told us that Zeke is the most active entity of the mansion and is very mischievous-he likes to “mess with guests.” He also likes to move objects around, especially toys. On the 3^rd floor we were able to capture with the infrared camera: lots of orbs, an audible moan, and a couple of shadow apparitions; one of which we believe to be Zeke, since the shadow appeared after we asked for Zeke to appear. Zeke was quite active for a few minutes with lots of orbs present, Zeke’s shadow apparition also floated across a painting, peaked out from behind door and danced up down.

On the 2nd floor we were able to see the blood stain from Charles Lemp’s suicide on the floor with the infrared camera.  On the second floor we saw lots of orbs; they seem to be very attracted to Sean! We also recorded a low moan in William Jr.’s room. Maybe just coincidentally,  but when we asked for any entity to show themselves, an alarm went off in one of guest rooms and we recorded orbs floating around the alarm. Also on the second floor, Rivika and D.W. both experienced a perceived change in the barometric pressure-with both of us getting a headache or shortness of breath.

Going down to the 1st floor, the K2 meter and the ghost box immediately went off at the same time when we reached 1^st floor stair landing. We checked, and no electrical outlet or wires were causing the K2 meter to light up. As we then moved down to the basement, the K2 continued to be lit up, as if the entity was following us around.  At one point, the K2 stopped any reading of activity. The basement was basically pretty quiet except for the K2 going off again on the stone steps leading to the outside. It is interesting to note that when we went back up to main level stair landing, the K2 did not light up in the same spot it did previously.

Overall it was a very exciting investigation and we would go back again. It was very cool to purchase the infrared video and review our investigation. And we are now looking into purchasing our own infrared video camera for our next investigation; November 1 at the Beardstown, Ill Opera House!  As side note, when I started to write up this VAPR blog post, I had the Ghost Radar turned on and the word “vapor” appeared…. 

This Summer on Virginia Avenue

Our home continues to be a hot spot of activity. There are times both Sean and I just feel the presence of activity around us. Back in June we had a kitchen fire and we wondered how our “house guests” felt about the situation and also about having a cleaning crew around for 3 weeks. Words on the Ghost Radar were: fire, kitchen, floor, new, smoke, stove, clean, work and slow (which describes how fast they worked…). We also had a very active K2 reading outside on the patio a few weeks with the light indicators hitting orange and red for over a 30 minute period. We basically had conversion with an entity and discover he was a male, worker from years ago. We also had the flashlight turn on last Saturday night at the same time when we noticed a lot of activity on Ghost Radar…just letting us know we were not alone.