Week 8

YES, EXTRATERRESTRIALS ARE HERE;

AND YES, NASA’S COVERING IT UP

By Micheal Clements

For decades and even centuries unidentified flying objects have been reported in the skies but it wasn’t until the race for the moon that man came close to the objects.

In a video interview Buzz Aldrin, the second man to step foot on the moon, said the astronauts saw something traveling along with them on their way to the moon.

“There was something out there that was close enough to be observed, and what could it be,” Aldrin said. “It could only be one thing if not the rocket.”

The S4B rocket, which helped propel them into space, was disengaged from the spacecraft after liftoff into space. The S4B is the third stage of the Saturn V rocket.

“Obviously the three of us were not going to blurt out, ‘hey, Houston we got something moving along side of us and we don’t know what it is’….we knew those transmissions would be heard by all sorts of people and who knows what somebody would of demanded that we turn back because of aliens or what other reasons…so we just cautiously asked Houston how far away is the S4B,” Aldrin said in the interview.

Houston’s space center answered back 6,000 nautical miles away.

“We really didn’t think we were looking at something that far away, so we decided that after a while watching it was time to go to sleep and not to talk about it anymore until we came back and did debriefing,” Aldrin said.

Several online un-credible sources document this as being true, however much other say it’s false.

One man who worked for NASA at the time, confirms the events and goes further to say that two UFOs followed Apollo 11 for several miles in space to the moon before vanishing.

Tony Smith, whose name has been changed to protect his identity, was a contract engineer for NASA during the Apollo years. Smith was stationed in Africa and dealt mainly with communication.

“I didn’t work for NASA, but I was a contract engineer so basically I did all the work,” Smith said. “NASA would not get anything done if it wasn’t for all the contract engineers like me because the rest is just a bunch of politics tossing paperwork back and forth.”

Smith now is a radio engineer. He once owned a technology company in California, then owned a radio station.

“I even owned a radio station but I don’t like to talk, I can do everything but talk because getting on air really scares me,” Smith said. “I used to be concerned with what I would say if I ever got on the topic of NASA, but now everything is so screwed up that I just don’t give a damn.”

While working at a radio station cluster, he came in contact with Cyndee Campbell, a midday disc jockey in St Joseph Mo.

“It’s really hard to get him to talk about what he did with NASA,” Campbell said. “We held an office pizza party over the summer where he was going to tell us UFO and alien stories but he just started talking about politics and screwed up he thinks the government is.”

While working for NASA, Smith had to sign confidentiality contracts, where he could not say anything about what he was doing or what they may have encountered.

“They made us sign contracts and said if we signed anything out of line that they would prosecute us, you know, put us in prison,” Smith said.

But that was 30 years ago, he said. Now Smith is more open to the topic.

Smith still has working equipment in space that he designed for NASA. Smith says that how far behind they are getting, when something he made three years ago is still in space and working.

“The man is a genius, he really is,” Campbell said. “He knows everything about how radio and stuff works and can walk anyone through a problem.”

Smith also has a wealth of knowledge regarding NASA from years of working for them.

“There was two UFOs that followed Apollo 11 to the moon, they followed them for almost a couple of day in space before disappearing,” Smith said.

But you won’t hear NASA saying a thing, he said.

“They won’t release anything and I think its because they are scared,” Smith said.

Some people question if man did go to the moon, and those claims, simply put are “bullshit,” Smith said.

“I know we went to the moon, I helped with the mission on the technical side,” Smith said. “Those people who say we have not just don’t have anything better to do, but with the way the government is running NASA, I can’t blame them for trying to call them out.”

Smith is a firm believer in aliens, too.

“I know aliens exist, the government and NASA know aliens exist, intelligent aliens, too,” Smith said. “I don’t know what kind of actual contact we have made with them but we will probably never know, the government won’t ever tell us.”

Smith hopes someday the truth can unfold about what is really out in space, but doubts anything well ever come out to the public and doubts that the society in the United States would believe much of what the government has to say.

“They are out there (aliens) and the government knows about it, but they won’t say a damn thing, they just keep it all shut up.”

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JENNA’S PREDICTIONS

By MaryLouise Balano

Going out with my girl friends on Friday night has become routine. We do the exact same things at the exact same places and talk about the exact same people every Friday. But one Friday was especially “foreseen.”

My best friend Jenna is always having strange dreams about the future and claiming to have “seen this before” all the time. We laugh at her and take what she says with the grain of salt, but last Friday things got weird.

We were all sitting at the restaurant gossiping when Jenna got this weird look on her face and said I think I’m having déjà vu, “surprise, surprise” one of the girls said because we had heard this all before.

“No I’m not kidding” Jenna said. “I have been here before this exact time and place I feel like Tommy Joe is going to come through the door.”

Tommy Joe being one of our guy friends.

We all poked fun at her laughing about how we come there every week it no shocker she felt like she had been there before. It was about 20 minutes later when the door opened and in walked Tommy Joe all of us looked shocked but no one looked as baffled as Jenna. We questions if Jenna had known previously about Tommy showing up and wanted to mess with us, but they both were very convincing in telling us that they hadn’t talked for a few weeks.

This was not the only incident of Jenna calling things out before they happened that night, it was one of many. Another being when she said, “how funny would it be if the waiter dropped a drink on that girl dancing by herself?” It wasn’t at that exact moment but later in the night the dancing girl was sitting in a booth when all on the sudden the waiter reached for a glass knocking a drink on her and sending her screaming into the air. Its possible all the strange things that Jenna saw in her mind that came true were coincidences but one thing is for sure I’m taking Jenna’s “predictions” a little more seriously now.

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THE GHOST OF ‘LITTLE TICO’

By Logan Campbell

On a night when you’re ready to get out of work and go home, you never think that there might be someone else in the room that wasn’t there earlier.

Courtney Campbell was working at Taco Tico and it had been a busy night. The crew was behind so they were in a hurry already to get done.

“I didn’t believe in the ghost that everyone was talking about,” Campbell said.

She had heard stories about a ghost that would sometimes make noises or sounds in the restaurant at night. She didn’t think that those noises were from something of the paranormal.

She was washing the dishes and the other worker was cleaning the food line. They were listening to the radio to pass the time so it wasn’t silent around the restaurant. They were both busy working when suddenly the radio turned off. Campbell was surprised and thought the plug in might have fallen out of the wall, but when she looked back it was still plugged in. She thought that it might have been the ghost so she tried to talk to it. Everyone at Taco Tico had a name for the ghost; they called it “Little Tico.”

“Turn that radio back on Little Tico,” Campbell said.

Nothing happened for a second. Then they both turned toward the radio and the radio suddenly turned on a continued with the same song they were listening to. They were both scared stiff after see this happen. Courtney said she even felt a cold spot after she said that.

People at Taco Tico think that the ghost might have been someone from the school that used to be across the street. The school has now been made into apartment complexes. There wasn’t much information about anyone that had been killed or died around the area, but the Taco Tico employees know that someone was there that night.

From that night on Campbell started to believe that there might be a ghost that appears while they are cleaning down the restaurant.

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SECOND CHANCE

By Joel Epley

She was legally dead for three minutes when they started to detach all monitors. The heart monitor is always last, and it’s a good thing.

The 50-year-old patient had suffered a massive gastrointestinal or GI bleed during surgery. CPR was unsuccessful and the surgeons and nurses all thought they had lost her.

“She ended up coding,” Saint Luke’s Hospital RN Rebecca Maassen said. “When that happens, everyone goes on autopilot.”

Two and a half hours of CPR had been unsuccessful and the woman lay on the bed lifeless.

“The doctor said, ‘Call it,’ and everyone just let the failure wash over them. The worst feeling I’ve ever experienced,” Rebecca said. “The other nurse and I were putting all the monitors away and I heard her say, ‘Oh my God.’”

The room was silent with the melancholy feeling of loss when a distinct “beep” was heard from the heart monitor.

“The doctors rushed back in and they said she just woke up like she had been sleeping,” Rebecca said. “She woke up with a smile on her face.”

The patient described what she thought was a short dream.

Her mother, uncle and grandfather were all waiting and out of focus. They were telling the woman to come with them and her pain would be over. She began walking towards them when a giant arm grabbed her around the waist and told her, “Your husband and children still need you.”

“The doctors said it was one of those situations you can’t medically explain it and you just have go with it,” Rebecca said. “The lady had thought she was dreaming.”

After the excitement had calmed in the room and the woman was stable, Rebecca had another chance to talk to her about it.

She had explained exactly what happened in a way that nurses do without using all the medical terms and confusing jargon doctors use. The woman quietly listened with a gentle smile on her face and softly replied, “It’s true, my family does need me. I love them so much,” and she drifted off to sleep.

The woman was kept a few days for observation and then returned home to her family.

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MIND YOUR STUDIES

By Jeremy Werner

Rachel was already out of her comfort zone; a dumpy motel in New Jersey and not visiting for fun or vacation. Rachel’s sister-in-law had died not too long ago and Rachel was paying her last respects. Rachel sat in bed reading a book on psychic abilities attempting to keep her mind off of the week’s events.

“I had been reading from Sylvia Browne right before going to sleep. She was talking about astral travel while sleeping and how people experience that,” Rachel said.

Mean time in Rapids City, S.D., Jolene was up late studying for an exam. After a few years in college she already had a routine down and was far from home. “What are you doing?” a voice called to Jolene.

Jolene freaked out because she was studying alone; no one else was in the room and the voice sounded like her mother, Rachel. This led Jolene to believe she might be dead and immediately called Rachel who was sound asleep until the ring of her phone woke her up.

“I don't remember going to visit her but thought it was funny that I had and I do believe I did,” Rachel says laughing.

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THE PHANTOM GIRL IN THE HALL

By Jackie Walter

Iowa has been the site of much paranormal activity in its more than 200 year history. It is the home of the Villisca ax murder house, where a stranger murdered a family one Sunday afternoon in 1912. The Pottawattamie Jail is said to have employees and prisoners who still live there. So it’s no surprise that Clarinda Academy, a school for delinquent children is rumored to have regular haunts.

Underneath Clarinda, there are tunnels locals say were used for the Underground Railroad. Its long past also contains a stint as a mental institution before the academy formed in 1992.

Katie Harmon became a counselor at the Academy in summer 2009. One night, Katie traveled to the boy’s wing to make sure everyone accounted for and asleep in their beds. In the middle of her checks she noticed it was so quiet her footsteps were all she could hear clicking against the concrete floor. She stopped, sat on a hallway couch, and all sound stopped. Then she saw something out of the corner of her eye and when she turned to look, a figure was standing at the end of the hallway.

“She had long dark hair and she was dressed in some sort of nightgown,” Katie said. “Her hair covered her face, so I couldn’t really see what she looked like.”

Katie automatically assumed her eyes and mind were playing tricks on her, for it had been a long, stressful day, and the hallway was dark except for the moonlight coming in from the windows. So she looked away for a moment and turned back around to see if the girl was still standing there, or if it was all in her head.

“She was still there when I turned around,” Katie said. “She didn’t move or say anything, but she was definitely still there.”

Too scared to move, Katie turned her head once more and prayed the figure would be gone when she turned back. The third time, the girl had vanished by the time Katie got up from the couch.

“It was really, really scary. I hope that never happens again.”

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WHEN GRANDMOTHER LEFT US

By Bethany Rowell

Julie Quick was there with her family the night her grandmother died. Quick and her two brothers, sister, aunt and cousin were staying in her mother’s house, knowing their loved one did not have much time left. After an emotional evening, Quick decided to get some rest.

“Before I fell asleep, I felt someone very lightly petting my hair. I opened my eyes and no one was there, but I still felt it,” Quick said, “It was a loving feeling. I sensed it was a female and she was there to take my grandmother home.”

Quick says she knows she was awake and thinking logically about what she was feeling. She rolled over to see if it was a breeze.

“After a short moment, I felt it again; light stroking on my head. It was so emotionally intense. I whispered out loud, ‘I feel you. I know you are here.’ It continued for another minute then stopped.”

Quick’s mother was in the room with her grandmother when she passed in the middle of the night. The rest of the family had fallen asleep in separate rooms and Quick’s mother had not woken anyone to tell them about her passing.

“My brothers and sister and I all woke instantly and met in the hall of this tiny house. We were sound asleep at this point, but all woke up at the same time and met my mom; all without a word or sound.”

Quick also learned of another story later on from her mother that had happened a few days prior to her grandmother’s passing. Quick said that, at the time, her mother thought her grandmother had been hallucinating, but after Quick shared her story, she thought differently.

“My mom said Nin kept smiling and holding her hand and saying ‘We’re all together.’ Nin was saying she could see her mom in the room with her mom and my mom.”

While this didn’t ease the pain of losing their family member, Quick was comforted by knowing someone was taking care of her grandmother.

Week 7

A NEW HOME

By MaryLouise Balano

When you move into a previously owned home you have all kinds of potential problems. Did the previous owners take care of it? Is the house up to code? But no one really wonders if they are moving into a home that’s all ready being occupied.

Joanna Smith, 55 of Kansas City, Mo., was recently divorced with three young boys when she thought she found the perfect four bedroom home for a perfect price. No one had warned her that her new perfect home had an ugly history. Eleven years prior to the Smith’s moving in, a man hanged himself in the garage of the two-story, yellow house. Johanna and her boys were not aware of this when they moved in but soon realized they were not alone.

One day after school the three boys Sal, 13, Nick, 11, and Michael, 7, were playing basketball on the driveway when Michael started to scream and point to the garage. Sal and Nick looked to where Michael was pointing but saw nothing they ask what he was screaming at he said, “A man was hanging in from the ceiling.”

Scared, all three boys went inside and told their mom. Johanna ignored the boys’ story due to the fact that they always had “stories.” After a few weeks of being in the house Joanna began to feel “eerie, I couldn’t explain why but there was just something off, I thought I might have been coming down an illness or something but I just felt uneasy.”

It wasn’t until the first night Joanna spent the night alone in the house did she understand why she was feeling they way she was.

“The boys were with their dad and I was watching TV in the living room right above the garage when I heard a crash below me, I didn’t feel like heading downstairs at the time so I just let it go but as I was sitting there I began to hear and feel a scratching from the floor on my bare feet, like down was taking a rake and was going across the garage ceiling. I went down there and turned on the lights absolutely nothing was wrong with it and I couldn’t even explain the large crash I heard.”

Throughout the night Joanna heard many unexplained sounds that she was up all night scared. She finally called her Realtor and told her something was not right with the house and demanded an explanation. Her Realtor told her she would get back to her when she had answers.

Within those two days of waiting for the call from the Realtor, Joanna knew the house was haunted. Things in the kitchen would move around and fall of the counters. Her youngest Michael would wake up in the middle of the night screaming about a man in his room. Joanna had had enough and when the Realtor called her to tell her a man had committed suicide in the house. She packed up her sons and went to her mother’s and never went back into that house again.

She now lives in a smaller but less “active” house in Kansas City and will never forget her experience with the unknown.

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PALM READER

By Joel Epley

Walking down the still hurricane mangled shoreline of Galveston, Texas the four girls couldn’t find a good reason not to get their palms read.

Liz Barnstead, 22, Nikki Hurt, 22, and their two friends had been drinking beer on the beach for a few hours now and decided to walk past all the mini bars, tattoo parlors and gift shops along the tourist strip.

The year was 2006 and it was the girls first ever spring break together. The town was still battered and awaiting repairs from Hurricane Rita.

“That little palm reading place was one of the only places open at the time,” Liz said. “There were tons of shops and stuff but they still weren’t fixed yet.”

The girls stumbled into the palm reader’s shop (they couldn’t remember the name) and Liz was eager to see what her future had in store.

“The lady was surprisingly tolerant of our drunk asses,” Liz said. “She started with a short little hand massage or something to get my blood going and I remember wanting to go to sleep.”

The woman began with where they were from, the Midwest. Not hard to tell considering their accents. Next she said it was their first trip together, two for two.

“When she said that I instantly began to sober up,” said Liz. “I starting paying attention because she was more or less reading my face and just holding my hand to look down every once in a while to think of something else to say.”

The woman began to make a couple of incorrect assumptions such as coming in an airplane, and meeting up with some guys, both false.

The woman then became frustrated and said she needed to realign their minds.

“That’s when I thought she was full of crap,” Nikki, Liz’s roommate said. “She was just buying time or something.”

By this time the other two girls had become bored and went next door to a tattoo parlor to browse for future regret.

The palm reader then began to talk about Liz and Nikki’s home in Saint Louis, Mo.

“She stared saying weird sentences that didn’t make sense under her breath. I was ready to leave,” Nikki said. “Then out of nowhere she said, ‘green’s no good.’”

The two girls had been arguing with Liz’s dad’s choice to paint the house green while they were away. Both disliked like that particular color green.

“All I was thinking was how hot my face got and how I had just wasted an afternoon of drinking, because I was suddenly sober,” Liz said. “She didn’t look at my face anymore and I was totally creeped out and wasn’t having fun anymore.”

The two watched straight-faced and pale to see what the reader was going to say next.

“The lady was biting her lip like she was confused,” Nikki said. “It was like she thought she was seeing it or hearing it or however they take it in wrong.”

The woman looked up confused and told the girls to watch out for bad “sparkplugs” in a questioning tone.

Liz pulled her hand away and the two left immediately. The reader was asking if something was wrong as they both exited without reply.

The two girls had just received two puppies from the same litter as early graduation presents. Nikki’s was named “Spark” and Liz’s named “Plug.”

“I know she was just trying to scare us with some bullshit about driving home and the sparkplug in the car or something but it was still too weird,” Liz said. “I called my dad and made him drive over to check on my dogs right then.”

“She was wrong about a bunch of stuff before that,” said Nikki. “I guess she just got lucky or something.”

The girls regrouped to tell their story and as it turns out the puppies were in good care. The rest of the trip went well but Nikki and Liz still get a weird feeling when talking about the palm reader in Galveston, Texas.

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IT’S COMING RIGHT FOR US

By Jesse Shipp

The moon was full in the autumn sky, illuminating the Chariton Valley, U.S. 24 and the open farm land of Randolph County. As Trey Rexroat and Jason Keeven made their way across county lines, Jason saw something that made him roll around in the passenger seat as if he was a kid trying to escape his seatbelt.

Trey, of Keytesville, Mo., and Jason, of Salisbury, Mo., were cruising down the highway in Trey’s new, apple red Toyota Prius to Moberly, Mo., to meet up with Johnny Lazar, Jesse Kirkendoll and Travis Harvey at their house. Trey and Jason crossed over into Randolph County, making it 20 miles in; they come upon the city of Huntsville, home of the Westran Hornets.

The Toyota Prius pops over the last hill, the off-ramp and over-pass to Huntsville begins to rise from the horizon and runs over the long straight away that leads into Moberly. They start to ride parallel to the off-ramp, Jason, looking straight ahead, sees a greenish light coming at the car and he thought nothing of it until it continued coming at the car. As the light came closer Jason started to squirm and twist in his seat, Trey looks over at Jason, concerned and asks what’s wrong

“You don’t see that light, it’s coming right towards us,” Jason replies in a confused yet lively manner.

Trey, still confused, thought that Jason must be joking, so he just continued to concentrate on the road. The light still came closer, with no intention of stopping. As this light goes up and over the car, Trey looks over and in the blink of an eye Jason releases a worried “whoa,” ducks out of fear of hitting the light and looks behind him though the back window expecting to see this green light again. Jason looks over at Trey and questioned the odd light appearance, with Trey not seeing the light green light, Jason cannot confirm what he saw that night.

“I didn’t see anything and I was looking at the same space he was, he might of saw something, I don’t really know,” Trey said.

A while after the incident, Trey and Jason try to explain what Jason might have seen. The most logical idea that they could come up with was that it was light reflection from a mile marker or some sort of sign.

“I swear something was headed right towards us, It happened so fast, I guess it could have been anything really, but it was just strange because I’ve never really been scared like that before,” Jason said.

After many more times of traveling U.S. Highway 24, Jason has yet seen the greenish light again.

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JUST ANOTHER HOME OWNER

By Jeremy Werner

History thrives at Loose Park in Kansas City where more than 150 years ago a part of the Battle for Westport during the American Civil War took place. Around the park are houses and landmark tourist traps that have history and age of its own. One house in particular still has a very fuzzy past and only general things are known about it from the owner. Stan has owned the house for almost two decades now and still does repairs on the old house, but still remembers the nights he spent in it.

“I had been there a couple of weeks,” Stan said. “I woke up sometime in the night, after being asleep and felt this presence in the hallway.”

Stan was a 100 percent sure something was in the hallway and the eerie feeling of that presence confined him to his bed for the moment. He wasn’t scared of an intruder or burglar, but something in him had told him it wasn’t any of those.

“Who’s there?” a terrified Stan yelled

No response and minutes later Stan would get out of bed to investigate. Everything was where it was suppose to be, nothing was moved and whatever was there was gone. No outline or bodily image had shown itself, but only left Stan with a little bit of fear of what was in his house. Luckily though he would never feel that presence again, but whatever was there would make itself known.

“The other experiences were noises – clanking noises – I could never get closer to the noise or tell where it came from in the house,” Stan said. “There was no pattern to them at all; they were always sporadic and random.”

His attic was made to be separated into four rooms in each corner of the house. During remodeling of the house two doors in particular would always open. He would eventually buy latches and make sure the doors were latched every night when he was done working for the day. That didn’t stop the doors from being wide open every morning or afternoon he headed back up to work on the attic.

Stan eventually accepted that his house could possibly be haunted, but that whatever was there had no malicious intent or brought about any truly bad feelings.

“Things started happening less and the more comfortable I got in the house,” he said.

A sunny afternoon to one of the largest and historic parks Stan turned to look back at the house for one quick second crossing the street and saw the image of a woman looking out from the attic window. His girlfriend had saw the same thing and asked if he had seen it.

“Yes,” Stan calmly said.

Stan is the third owner and the house was built in 1910. The original owner built the house with the intent to sell it to his daughter. The owner had only lived two years in the house before selling it to her where she would raise four sons. Outside of that the history is slim pickings in a historically-rich neighborhood. One thing we know is that whoever the fourth owner is won’t have to worry about anything serious. Maybe an eerie first few weeks and some noises that can’t be explained and doors that refuse to stay shut.

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THE GREEN HEAD

By Jackie Walter

It was the hottest day of the summer in Okoboji, Iowa. Campers lined up to greet the approaching van. They day they had been waiting for all summer was finally here. The men stepped out of the van, found the area for the new pool and began digging. After the initial excitement had worn off, the campers dispersed and returned to their cabins. Work was steady, but slow, and the men were eager to finish quickly. So eager, in fact, that they almost missed it. One of the men felt his shovel hit much more than dirt. When he dug around the object and finally unearthed it, he discovered it was a human skull.

Camp Foster is known for its fun, the camaraderie and its history. Sioux Indians murdered an entire camp of settlers in 1857, leaving only one survivor. One family’s murder was especially brutal. The Sioux tribe murdered the infant and played tetherball with him. They scalped and raped the mother and daughter. They cut the father’s head off and destroyed his body. The family’s ghosts are rumored to haunt the camp in the areas where they were killed.

John Torten managed the grounds at Camp Foster for more than 25 years. He had really seen it all, with new campers coming in and out he was constantly walking back and forth between cabins through the woods at night. He became so good at it, he didn’t need a flashlight. One night, not too long after the instillation of the new pool, he was walking to fit a clogged toilet in the boy’s camp. Almost to his destination, he saw a light out of the corner of his eye. When he looked up, there was father Howe. However, it wasn’t all of father Howe. After a few seconds John realized: it was just his dismembered head.

The next day, finally able to form words, he told a seasoned and trustworthy camper about the previous night’s ordeals. He felt good about getting it off his chest and went about his day’s duties. The camper spread the news around the camp, and everyone was eager to talk to Mr. Torten about the floating head. Stories of “the green head” had been around the camp for years. That night, after telling of father Howe’s appearance, John went into a sudden cardiac arrest and died.

“The green head” is rumored to be seen at the intersection of three cabins at Camp Foster. The only person to have seen it in the last decade was Torten.

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THE SPRIT FOLLOWS ME

By Bethany Rowell

It began three years ago. Jake Sinclair was 18 and living in Springhurst, Victoria, Australia with his parents. He planned to soon move in with his bandmates in Melbourne and continue working on his music career. Life was going well, but Jake was not expecting an unseen being to begin following him.

“I have a ghost that follows me. For some reason it never followed me to Melbourne, but when I’m at home or at a friend’s house in town, it will follow me there,” Jake, now 21, said.

His first experience with the entity occurred while he was in bed one night. The same activity repeats itself sporadically.

“It sometimes tucks my blankets up on me, it’s crazy,” he said. “It’s not like a scary thing now, but the first time it was scary as fuck. It’s kind of comforting in a way.”

Jake says that he will see the blankets move and feel them tighten around him. Along with being tucked in, he says the spirit will wander around the house.

“If it goes past a stack of papers, the papers will move in the wind. It can also seem to just fly through walls.”

Jake is unsure of why the activity started when it did or why it only follows him to certain locations.

“My only theory is that it’s my Nan from my mum’s side. I never met her and she never met me. The ‘tucking in thing’ makes me think it’s that, but I’ve got no clue.”

Jake isn’t the only member of his family who has experienced a ghost. His brother, Travis, was 20 when their grandfather passed away. Travis had been struggling with his dream of becoming a musician and, according to Jake, had only been able to sing in the shower. Soon after their grandfather passed, Travis woke one night to see the spirit standing at the end of his bed. He began to speak.

“Pop told my brother not to worry about what people think of him; Travis is very shy and self-conscious. He said Travis should let people hear him sing, so he did.”

Travis is now a multi-award winning artist in Australia with two albums. Jake is following in his footsteps and tours along with Travis as his guitarist. Jake does not believe that the spirit following him is their grandfather and has since moved back home to Springhurst.

Week 6

LADY ON THE BALCONY

By Ashley Hartford

A father and son share similar sightings while staying at grandma’s house in Cameron, Mo. Northwest Missouri State University student Christian Grady and his father, Harry Grady, recall being spooked by much more than the creaky floors and squeaky stairs in his grandmother’s aging home.

“Her home is old,” Christian exclaims. “It used to be a nunnery.”

Sitting across from a Catholic Church and Catholic school, the three-story house has undergone remodeling in the years following the closing of the nunnery, mainly to remove the stairway to the balcony. However, the interior layout hasn’t changed much.

Walking up the stairs leads to a long hallway with bedrooms on each side.

“My father’s bedroom is at the end of the hallway,” Christian explains.

Looking from the top of the stairs to the end of the hall, Christian describes how a closed door and small window that stays “winterized with plastic” year-round opens to the stair-less balcony.

One winter night when Christian was 11, he began to view the balcony in a different light.

Shortly after midnight, Christian approached the stairway. After creeping up half the stairs, he felt a cold burst of air overtake him.

“It felt like I stepped outside,” he explains.

Suddenly, a bright glowing blue light lit up the dark hallway.

That’s when Christian heard a voice.

“She kept repeating ‘No, no, no, no,’” Christian says.

Frozen in place, Christian continued to listen carefully until he spotted an apparition.

“I saw the upper torso of a glowing figure outside the balcony window,” he says.

Shocked and scared at the sight, Christian ran back downstairs to tell his grandma. Deciding to investigate, the two climbed back up the stairs to see only a dimly lit, empty hallway. The figure had vanished.

“The air flow completely stopped,” Christian says.

The next morning, Christian shared the story with his dad, learning some insight on what exactly this apparition might be.

“My dad saw a similar figure by the balcony,” Christian explains. “He felt the coldness penetrating the house, so that’s why the windows and screens are covered in plastic.”

Christian says his dad told him a story of a Catholic woman getting locked outside in the winter. She attempted to get her sisters’ attention by knocking on the balcony door, but ended up dying in the cold.

Christian believes the figure is the spirited remains of this woman.

“The feeling has stuck with me,” Christian says, “like a bone-tingling chill.”

Even though Christian claims to be skeptical of the subject, he states that, “the thought of spirits lingering with unfinished business is intriguing.”

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LIGHTS IN THE SKY

By Mary Balano

Victor Meca of Kansas City, Mo., saw an unidentified flying object in the sky on a summer night in June 2008 while he was out with his girlfriend Lauren. While they were driving back to Lauren’s house after dinner, Victor got lost on the dark roads that lead to Lauren’s farmhouse. Lauren’s father owned a large potion of property where they built their home so there were no other houses in a 10-mile radius and they found themselves in the middle of nowhere with the only light being from the car. Frustrated and annoyed Victor pulled over and tried to get some idea on where he was using his GPS, at that time Lauren was fixated on the sky and telling Victor to “look.” When he looked he saw something he could not grasp.

“It was a huge red light with four small yellow lights circling it in motion. ‘What the hell is that?’” Victor questioned; to which Lauren had no answer.

They both knew what they were seeing was not a plane however the sound it made was similar to what you would hear from a plane close by. They watched the lights for what seemed like 15 to 20 minutes and then all the sudden they just died out “like someone just flipped a switch and turned them off” Victor said.

Victor woke the next morning expecting something to be on the news, he thought that everyone would have seen what he saw, but nothing was ever mentioned about mysterious lights in the sky.

“If it wasn’t for Lauren seeing the exact same thing I would have thought I was going crazy because it just seemed like this would be a huge deal and all over the media,” Victor said.

Victor still to this day has no idea what him and Lauren saw in the sky that night, and probably will never know, but that experience completely changed his mind on earth being the only place for intelligent life.

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SHADOW PEOPLE IN 3D

By Joel Epley

Still fidgeting with his three-year-old son’s 3D glasses, he realized that someone had finally sat in the otherwise empty movie theater.

Joseph Rehagen, 23, girlfriend, Allie Gunning, 23, and son Landon had just about settled in the back row of the enormous movie theater when Landon began to throw his 3D glasses around.

“I’m just glad we didn’t piss anybody off,” Joe said. “I hate being the guy with a crying baby in public.”

The three had sat in the back row on the last day showing of “Up” at AMC West Olive 16 in Creve Cour, Mo. a suburb of St. Louis.

“We walked in and there was nobody,” Allie said. “That’s why I wasn’t too worried if he (Landon) was going to start crying or not. It’s slightly less embarrassing when no one is around to hear it.”

As Joe kept his glasses on to show Landon that everything was OK, he noticed a man sitting in the front row of the theater.

“My first instinct was that I didn’t like this guy,” Joe said. “I only took one glance at him but I stereotyped him as the creepy guy going to see kids movies alone.”

The man sat hunched down in his seat with what appeared to be a skinny frame and long slick-back hair.

“I tried to mention it to Allie so we could trade creepo/pedophile jokes but Landon wouldn’t stop throwing those damn glasses,” Joe said. “I finally got him to calm down and the dude was gone.”

Joe mentioned the lone viewer in the front row but Allie hadn’t seen a thing.

“Dude, I was fixed on the previews. I had already dealt with Landon’s fuss all day,” she said. “I was watching the screen without my 3D glasses because they were giving me a headache and I didn’t see a thing.”

The three continued to watch the movie in 3D as Landon fell asleep in the first five minutes. The figure in the front row was not seen by either the rest of the film.

Joe still swears he saw a “shadowy” figure sitting in the front row of the theater. Allie on the other hand doesn’t believe what her non-3D eyes didn’t see for themselves.

After explaining to them the possibility of Shadow People, they were not amused and suggested we talk about something else.

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A FEW ROOMMATES

By Jeremy Werner

Callahan dropped out of school before he graduated and realized how big of a mistake that was because a few of his co-workers were all going from a family-owned grocery store to working a warehouse for a nationwide company. He had finally decided to get his G.E.D. and was able to get a job that wasn’t stocking groceries at night.

“I was moving up the ladder and was going to stock for eight dollars more, “Callahan laughed, “finally could move out of my boss’s basement, too.”

Callahan lived in the basement of his boss’s rental house where his other co-workers lived. He slept in a cold damp basement on a mattress he picked up and “bulk item” trash pick-up day. His bathroom was a chipped toilet and smashed sink from a night of heavy drinking.

“I will never miss that place, but I had to move back.”

Callahan moved back after less than a month in a cozy new apartment. A low-income apartment where Callahan had everything to himself and no longer worried about roommates dumping failed food experiments in the sink to rot and fester throughout the week. The stocking job was at night and Callahan didn’t want to lose this job since it would be the first job he’s ever had that paid more than ten an hour.

“Sixteen dollars an hour changes someone like me fast…more money for drugs and alcohol.”

Callahan didn’t trust his neighbors after the first day he managed to witness a drug deal, a woman beating her child, teenagers throwing firecrackers at joggers, among other things.

”Every day when I’d go to bed I’d lock the door…and every afternoon I’d wake up the door would be unlocked,” Callahan said reassuringly. “I just kept passing it off as if I couldn’t remember if I locked it or not.”

After a few weeks Callahan came home from work, beginning to get use to his new schedule, already having a McDonald’s breakfast in hand and saw the woman who lived below him outside the door.

“Apparently she had been waiting for me, she wanted to know if I had the night off…apparently she heard people walking around my apartment all night and was only able to get a few hours of sleep.”

Callahan checked the door when he got to and saw it was locked. No one could have gotten in and most of his friends didn’t know where he had lived so they wouldn’t bum at his apartment or his other group of friends worked with him that night.

“Luckily I didn’t have that much to move,” Callahan laughs, “I’m also lucky my boss let me love back into his rent house basement.”

A few weeks later Callahan would move into another apartment and life went on.

“I spent enough nights watching bad horror movies…to know if something weird happens, get the fuck out quick.”

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RALPH NEVER LEFT HOME

By Jackie Walter

Lindsay Irving is no stranger to paranormal activity. In her grandparent’s house growing up, the resident spirit “Ralph” would walk around the upstairs all night, and shake your bed to wake you up. He has always lived there and always will. Growing up with it in your grandparent’s house is one thing. That is a place she would visit for a few days-maybe a week tops- but eventually her family would leave and return home. Growing up with it her own house was another thing altogether.

When her grandparents died, they left Lindsay’s mother their beautiful farmhouse in Bedford, Iowa. This was always Lindsay’s dream growing up.

“I have always loved that house,” Lindsay said. “Ralph was just a part of it and for some reason, it didn’t scare me.”

As a 22-year-old girl, “Ralph” definitely has a different effect on Lindsay today. After they moved into the house, her mother bought a bell to put on the front door at an antique fair. For years, Lindsay thought the bell hung on the outside of the door. She rarely used the front door and when she did, she never paid attention to where the bell was hanging. Almost every day, the bell would ring.

“It would ring really loudly, kind of like someone was shaking it,” Lindsay said. “I just assumed it was the Iowa wind.”

Late one afternoon, Lindsay was moving a few things out of the house, preparing for college, when she noticed something odd. The bell was hanging on the inside of the door. Lindsay later found out that the bell had always hung on the inside of the door. When she asked about it ringing all the time, her mom simply replied, “Ralph.”

“Ralph is just another member of the family for my mom. She has lived with him all her life.”

Lindsay’s mom Joe has always believed that Ralph liked her more than the other members if the family. He would leave things in her shoes all the time, and she was the one he woke in the middle of the night. Before Lindsay was born, none of the other family members had any “Ralph” experiences.

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NOISES IN THE ATTIC

By Bethany Rowell

It was November 1989 and the Rowell family was moving into their new house in the countryside of Missouri. The family had five members: Dave Rowell; his wife, Kelley McLaughlin; their six-month old daughter, Bethany; and Kelley’s twin 10-year-old sons, Chris and Adam Love. They were nestled 10 miles from the nearest cities of Kearney, Liberty, and Smithville with few other houses in the area.

For the first weeks, the family experienced strange occurrences, but attributed them to not being use to the house. Most of these incidents occurred in the attic and loft area on the second floor.

“I often thought that out of the corner of my eye I'd see someone up there, but there never was anyone there when I looked. There were always noises coming from the same area; we joked that there was someone living in the attic,” McLaughlin said.

Dave Rowell never saw anything, but does admit to hearing an out-of-place noise in the attic.

“There was a ‘clunking’ sound that we heard a few times. There was nothing up there that could make that noise; no furnace, no water heater and no way for an animal to get in. It sounded as if something was being dropped or banged on,” Rowell said.

Aside from the attic, the basement was also home to a phantom smell that led to the discovery of a serious problem within the house.

“When we moved in, I kept getting whiffs of cigarette smoke, not stale, old smoke, but like someone was smoking in the house. The basement was the worst place, but it was still only once in awhile that I smelled it. It was strong and then it was gone within seconds,” McLaughlin said.

After a few months, McLaughlin called the gas company, even though she wasn’t certain that it could be gas.

“The man came in and used his detector and told me that we had a lot of carbon monoxide in the house and I needed to get out. I said that I had been smelling it and he assured me that carbon monoxide has no smell. As it turns out, the vent pipe on the roof wasn't tall enough and the wind was pushing carbon monoxide from the furnace back into the house. I'm sure the pipe had been that way for many years.”

There have been many cases of ghosts providing warnings to those who are still alive for decades. This may be the case in this instance with carbon monoxide being an odorless and tasteless gas. Had McLaughlin not smelled the cigarette smoke, the results could have been deadly.

Months went by and the family adjusted to the noises and ignored the unexplainable happenings, but six months at the house hadn’t made it feel any more like a home. Chris Love, now 30, had his own unsettling experience while doing a daily task of retrieving the mail.

"I walked across the front yard to check the mailbox. On the return trip, I made most of the walk looking downward, flipping through the mail for that day. About 20 feet before I got to the door, I looked up and, upon seeing the house, had the almost-overwhelming feeling that this wasn't our house. It wasn't really a scary feeling per se, just the strange feeling that this house belonged to someone else, and wasn't really ours. It stuck with me for a few hours afterward, and eventually faded away, but I always remembered how odd it felt to truly feel like a stranger in a place where I'd felt very settled into before," Chris Love said.

With no information on anyone who had previously lived in the house dying, they went on with unanswered questions. Over time the activity got less noticeable and disappeared, but a lingering feeling of unease still hung around.

“It took years before the house felt like our home. The house always felt to me like I was living in someone else's house; never comfortable,” McLaughlin said.

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WHISPERS IN THE HALLWAY

By Aaron Smithmier

Matthew Miser on Kansas City, Mo., is religious, but never expected contact when he began working at his local church. When Miser first started working at First Christian Church doing custodial work, most nights were pretty dull. He had his routine – vacuum the corridors and chapel, arrange the classrooms and put away various items in storage. It was that last task that changed the job for Miser.

“There is kind of this middle hallway thing where we stored stuff in between the first and second floors. That’s where I heard it. A whisper and then footsteps running away,” Miser said.

This isn’t a new occurrence by any means to Miser family, or to other members of the congregation. Both of Matt’s parents claim to have similar experiences around the church.

“We’ve all heard it; Matt was just the first one to say anything about it,” Becky Miser said. “It’s just something you don’t like to bring up in a house of God.”

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THINGS JUST FIX THEMSELVES

By Jesse Shipp

It was a normal hot Missouri summer day. The sun was shining, beating down on the people who dare to be outside. Like most people on days like this, they are pool side, getting tans, reading books and swimming, much like how Stephanie and her friend Rachel were doing, until Rachel’s cousin came running outside.

Last year in the middle of July, Stephanie McDonald went over to her friend Rachel Brennan’s two story, brick home in University City, Mo., just outside of St. Louis, to hang out and to enjoy the day by Rachel’s pool.

Some time has passed; Stephanie and Rachel were lounging peacefully by the pool until Rachel’s cousin Allyssa came sprinting outside, screaming, to warn them and to get gather help because the dishwasher was overflowing and if they didn’t clean up the water in time, it would buckle the floor. Stephanie and Rachel look at each other confused and shocked and grab beach towels and rush inside. The floor is flooded with warm water; Stephanie and Rachel threw down their beach towels to sop up the water. Rachel’s brother, Derek Brennan and their cousins Amy, Jared and Brie, who were also in the house, came and helped.

The sopping and wringing out the towels went on for about 20 minutes and it was getting them nowhere.

“The dishwasher kept spitting out lots and lots of water, more than it could feasibly hold, we already shut it off when it started overflowing,” Stephanie said.

They opened the dishwasher, which was still gushing hot water, and see that it’s still trying to fill with water, even though it was off. Stephanie went to the basement to find the pipe that leads to the dishwasher and turned off the water supply. The water finally stopped gushing out of the dishwasher and they were finally able to clean up the water. After they were finished, Rachel called her uncle Rick to come look at the dishwasher. Rick found nothing wrong with the dishwasher, nothing wrong with the seals or anything that would jam it and keep it filling when off.

“We started to freak out because Rachel and her family always said that their house was haunted because things break for a period of time and then fix themselves,” Stephanie said.

They ran it again, the dishwasher ran fine. Ever since this incident, nothing like this has happened again.

“We did save the floor, nobody was hurt, we were just a little red for a while after,” Stephanie said.

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NWMSU’S ROBERTA HALL

By Rob O’Doherty

Sisters for life and death. At least that’s what the women in Roberta Hall believe. Many sorority girls that have lived in the ill-fated hall on campus believe that there is a presence lurking within the walls. Years ago, the sorority hall caught fire and student Roberta Steele, became trapped inside the burning building and died from complications a year later.

“It started with noises. You could hear scratching, thumping and strange things at night,” local sorority girl Julie Newlin said. “I know we live in a building with a ton of sorority girls, but these weren’t like regular noises. They were eerie; something isn’t right when you hear scratching on your door at 3 a.m.”

Erin Smith, president of Alpha Sigma Alpha sorority thinks that Roberta isn’t a harmful spirit. Many of the sorority girls have actually claimed to have contacted Roberta through infamous games such as the Ouija board. Julie thinks that provoking the spirit of Roberta will only make her closer to her sisters she once had.

“Nobody deserves to die the way that she did,” Erin said. “I honestly think bringing her back into our lives in any way we can is the true spirit of sisterhood. I’m not sure what her intentions are, but all of the sisters living here definitely still feel the presence.”

Different tales are told about the history of Roberta Hall, and most of the girls living there rest assured that Roberta will always be with them. Sisters for life and death.

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WHAT DID THE DOG SEE?

By Logan Campbell

Man’s best friend has always been a great protector of his master, but what if you couldn’t see what he was protecting you from.

I was playing with my dog around the house about a month after moving into my apartment. I was throwing one of his toys around the house, and we were playing fetch. I threw his toy into the corner of the living room and he ran toward it and suddenly stopped. He started to bark toward the spot where his toy was at, but he wouldn’t go near his toy. I was lying on the floor and he jumped up on my chest and continued to bark toward this spot.

I was freaked out because there was nothing in the corner of the room besides his toy. The part that I was most terrified about was the fact that my dog was acting like he was actually barking at someone sitting in the corner.

I tried to push the dog closer to the corner to see if he would go closer. He was pushing back on me as hard as he could so that he wouldn’t touch the corner. He wouldn’t stop barking, and it was as if someone snuck into the room when he wasn’t looking.

“Please leave this apartment,” my wife said.

My dog started watching something move toward the door and leave. He stopped barking and the entity seemed to have left the apartment.

I haven’t found any information that says there was any person that died in this apartment. But I have read that animals can sometimes sense when entities or spirits are present in the room.

I am still not sure if there was something in the apartment, but I really feel like there was. One thing is for sure, I don’t throw any of my dog’s toys into that corner of the room.