by Rich Newman
For those who do not know what a deliverance is (and I’m not referring to the movie), think of it as a sort of poor man’s exorcism. There are no grand rituals with priests in robes or chants in Latin. Oh, no. A deliverance usually involves a person flopping on the floor while other parishioners hold him or her down, with a lot of yelling and pleading (by the preacher and the afflicted), and numerous pleas for Satan to leave the possessed person alone. Then, miraculously, the person will suddenly stop fighting, stand up, and declare that he/she is now “free” of the Devil. It was never an extremely believable event from my point of view, but I certainly gave them points for showmanship.
At the time, what I didn’t realize I was being taught, though, was that a deliverance held a certain, specific implication: that the Devil was actively involved in the
everyday life of people and interacting with them in horrible ways. And while I may have had little to no faith that these preachers were actually banishing Satan from the allegedly inflicted, there was certainly some lingering fear that such a thing could be true—that the Devil could be all around us.
But even with all of these bizarre events, the most disturbing thing to me during my trips south was how these same so-called religious people acted away from their church. Whether it was the carefree, racially charged discussions around the dinner table or the general atmosphere of suppression and domination that seemed to exist in every household (especially toward women), nobody seemed particularly pious or holy to me. But, boy, they went to church, so all was well in the world, right?
Because of this hypocritical approach to life (not to mention religion), I quickly became jaded concerning churches and those who professed to be religious—and, as a result, the ideas of “Heaven” and “Hell” suddenly became ludicrous to me. Did we really need some make-believe place to reward and punish people? Wasn’t that happening all the time right here on Earth? Besides, I always thought it was letting too many people off the hook too easy that they could “repent” about doing horrible things and then, in the blink of an eye, be absolved of all the wrongs they had done. How convenient for all the horrible people of this world.
Despite this bleak outlook concerning organized religion, though, my belief in God remained. To me, there is simply too much evidence of a higher power to dismiss such a thing. I mean, look around! And if anything is obvious in life, it is the fact that there are opposites for almost everything. So it seems perfectly logical to me that if we have “good” people on this planet, that we must also have “evil” people. And if we have God … well, there must be something on the other end of the spectrum. Call it the Devil, a demon, or whatever.
In addition to believing in God, I also developed a basic belief in the afterlife. This, too, has little to do with any church or religion. Basic experience—as well as the experiences of others I know and trust—dictate that such a thing is entirely likely. Besides, tales of seeing and hearing ghosts are prevalent all over the world. Literally thousands have reported experiencing them. And what are ghosts if not human souls lingering in some type of afterlife? This line of thinking has prompted me to spend much of my life seeking out haunted places.
Early Ghost Hunting
During my teen years, my family moved to a small town in southeast Missouri called Scott City. It was significantly more rural than St. Louis, but quite metropolitan compared to the area my grandparents lived—though that isn’t saying much. And like most small towns, there are a lot of reputedly haunted places.
As is still the case today, often the biggest challenge involved with researching and performing a paranormal investigation involves figuring out what is really a haunting and what is simply urban legend. Today, computers and the Internet are a significant help. But back then, figuring out a true haunting was not so easy.
Some of the ghost stories that circulated the region were easily debunked with little more effort than spending some time at the location—such as the case of the notorious “Green Eyes” in Cape Girardeau.
This particular “spirit” is said to haunt the historic Lorimier Cemetery and is often witnessed as a pair of green eyes that’s seen peering from behind a tombstone. Over the years, the place (in addition to supposedly being quite scary at night) evolved into a popular make-out spot for teenagers. Though I never made it to the cemetery in that regard, I did make a point of looking for old Green Eyes there. This (technically speaking) was one of the first investigations I ever did with one of my current investigative partners, Mike.
The two of us spent a long night tramping through the wet, dew-covered grass of the cemetery searching for the spirit to no avail. Then, from out of nowhere, there they were: two perfect glowing green eyes staring at us from the darkness. With flashlights in hand, we carefully crept toward the thing … until the eyes disappeared. Then, moments later, we saw them again. So we started toward the spot again … and they disappeared. This went on, over and over and over again.
To make a long story short, the eyes turned out to be nothing more than car headlights from a nearby street reflecting off a green marble tombstone. Quite disappointing actually. But it would be these types of stories and legends that would send me and my friends tramping through fields, rummaging through the ruins of old homes, and hanging out in abandoned buildings. And, other than the occasional cheap thrill, these places never provided any paranormal evidence of significance—with the exception of one trip.
A high school friend, Tim, and I were actually on a double date when we happened to drive through an area that had a reputedly haunted cabin. I say “cabin,” but it was actually the remains of a small, wooden home. When I mentioned the haunted locale to everyone in the car, the girls squealed with delight and wanted to go see this sight. So we found ourselves, four teenagers, roaming the weeds and thickets surrounding an extremely unsafe structure in the middle of the night.
From looking through the cabin’s windows, it was obvious that the floors had fallen through, so nobody went inside the place. Instead, we broke off into pairs and slowly circled the property looking and listening for anything that might indicate the presence of a ghost. Within minutes, boredom set in for everyone but me and conversation started to intrude on the ghost hunting (a situation that still happens to this day). Then I heard something. It sounded like low, male moans coming from inside the cabin.
I shushed everyone and called my date over. She strained to listen and soon heard the same sounds. Tim, along with his companion, circled to the other side of the house and quickly decided that they, too, heard a strange sound coming from within: a set of female wails. Now everyone was suddenly not quite so bored.
We would listen to the strange sounds for about an hour before leaving. As we drove back into town, we discussed the event. The final consensus was that we had either heard the sounds of spirits trapped in the cabin or that there was another couple there on a date somewhere we couldn’t see—and they were doing better romantically than we were!
The strange cabin, though, was definitely an exception to what usually happened during my nights of legend tripping. And while these adventures may not have given me the ghostly experiences that I craved, these trips did manage to stoke the fires of my paranormal interest. Around this time, more and more documentary-style programs about ghosts were appearing on television, too. As a result, I began to learn more about ghost hunting and how to discern a true haunting from simple legends.
So it seems only natural that I would eventually get bored with life as a casual ghost hunting enthusiast and get involved with a more formal paranormal investigations group.
Paranormal Incorporated
After high school and college, life would intrude upon my desire to chase ghosts. It would be many years before I would discuss my intention to research the paranormal again with my original ghost hunting buddy Mike. It all began by looking at area ghost hunting groups in Austin, Texas (my home at the time)—and, not
finding investigators that seemed to have the same line of thinking as us (no psychics, no religious extremists, etc.)—I brought up the idea of us forming our own paranormal group. Like me, he was enthusiastic about the idea, though neither of us knew exactly how to approach such an undertaking.
In the end, I decided to co-create the group Paranormal Inc with Mike for several reasons: I was interested in the paranormal, I wanted some kind of confirmation of life after death, and I was bored. The undertaking of hunting ghosts seemed like a logical cure for all these afflictions.
Along with my brother Brandon (who joined with us a few years later when we relocated to the Memphis, Tennessee, area), Mike and I have since investigated many of the region’s most well-known haunted locations. The three of us are pretty much the entire group, though we have no problem with working with other area paranormal organizations—and have, on occasion, teamed up with other investigators in large locations.
We approach an investigation with a scientific slant; if we can’t capture and document an occurrence, it didn’t happen. Personal experiences are great—they’re the very things that motivate us to keep exploring the unknown—but in the end, if we do not get any evidence of the activity occurring, then we cannot support the theory of that location being haunted. Of course, that doesn’t mean the place is not haunted. We have learned the hard way that ghosts don’t perform on command and even the most active locations can go belly-up on you during an investigation.
Sticking with this scientific method of investigation, we also do not use any psychics. Though many investigators swear by them—and a select few individuals may actually have these abilities—there simply is no way to know what is truth and what is fabrication when a psychic provides information. To this date, I still have not found a single psychic willing to submit to a true challenge of their abilities. Not one. Until that happens and a psychic is proven to be authentic, Paranormal Inc will not be using them.
On the religious front, I am pretty much an agnostic. There is a built-in conflict of interest with organized religion/churches; mankind is supposed to avoid sin and the things that lead to sin, such as money and power, but these are the very things that most churches are founded upon.
I also cannot patronize an establishment that blatantly refuses to recognize facts that have been established by the scientific community—such as evolution and the creation of the universe. Until organized religions are able to reconcile their belief systems with science, I believe that more and more people will turn to other avenues to satisfy their spiritual needs (like investigating the paranormal). So, needless to say, we do not involve ourselves with anything of a religious nature during our investigations.
But, as I said earlier in this book, I grew up a Christian and attended a multitude of different church environments, and as a result, I still have a built-in fear of the Devil and Hell. It angers me that it’s there, but it is, indeed, there—good old Christian guilt and fear! At any rate, the point here is that my goals and methods concerning the paranormal are all scientific. This is an important fact to know as you read the details concerning the cases in this book.
Loving a Good Scare
As you’ve probably figured out by now, I have had a close association with ghosts and hauntings from a very young age, and I have always been interested in great, scary stories—especially those that are about ghosts. And since I have been hearing ghost stories since I was quite young, it’s no wonder that I would turn to the paranormal for answers to life’s biggest questions.
Whether it was my urban relatives in the north or my rural ancestors to the south, they all had one thing in common: they, too, all loved a good, scary story.
Many a night in my youth was spent huddled by the fireplace whispering tales about things like family curses, a “friend” who once was haunted, or even creatures who stalked the night. These hushed yarns were always purported to be “true” and they always happened to somebody that was personally known to everyone.
There were a lot of these stories, and many of them have stuck with me over the years. But two of these ghost stories have particularly had a large impact on me—and I credit them, as much as my own personal experiences, with pushing me into the field of paranormal research at an early age. Here they are as I know and remember them:
Ghost Story #1
This particular tale comes courtesy of my paternal grandmother. It was related to me when she lived in Webster Groves, a small St. Louis neighborhood. Though the most well-known haunted home in this area was (and is) the infamous Henry Gehm house on Plant Avenue, my Grandma often spoke of another family close by that had their own unique and disturbing haunting.
According to the tale, there was a family living in this nearby house when it was broken into by a burglar. The man of the house, hearing the intruder entering the front door, grabbed a handgun and crept to the stairs from his second-floor bedroom. After peering into the darkness below and seeing nothing that would indicate an intruder was in the home, he started down the stairs. Of course, stairs creak and these were no exception, so the burglar heard the man coming for him.
So the intruder waited for the owner to get halfway down the stairs, and then he leapt from behind the living room couch and promptly shot the man dead. Screams echoed throughout the house as the other inhabitants heard the gun go off, driving the killer out into the night. I don’t believe that my grandmother ever told me the outcome of the entire affair (Was the killer ever caught?), but I do recall the ghost story that followed the horrific event.
Apparently, the current (and altogether new) residents of this particular home were experiencing a reccurring haunted event: each night, everyone in the home would hear the sounds of phantom gunshots, followed by the thuds of a body falling down the living room stairs, and ending with a series of piercing screams. Today, paranormal investigators term this type of ghostly event as a “residual” type of haunting—and most believe it doesn’t always involve an actual ghost.
But back then, when I first heard the story, it was only one thing—scary! I mean, how could these people live in such a house? Weren’t they afraid? According to my grandmother, they simply learned to ignore the ghastly sounds and, eventually, to sleep right through the nightly event.
All of this intrigued me. It sounded like something out of a late-night horror movie, yet I wanted to know more. I think this particular story has stuck with me over the years because it illustrates an important point when dealing with ghosts—there is more than one type of haunting. This was the first time I had heard of anything other than the stereotypical spirit, and it was intriguing to me that there could be multiple reasons to explain why a home is experiencing paranormal activity.
This would specifically come into play during my investigation of the Martin family …
Ghost Story #2
As I previously detailed, my mother’s side of the family lived in rural southern Missouri. By this, I mean they lived out in the middle of nowhere—an area usually dubbed “the Boondocks” by Missourians. And I don’t mind saying that visiting there was a dreaded affair, but not because of my family. It was entirely because of the quality of life they had and the living conditions on the farm. Going to Marston, Missouri, in the 1970s was like traveling back in time to the turn of the century.
A trip to my grandparents’ house meant going to the bathroom in an outhouse, pitching in with the chores (these could, and did, often include chopping cotton, picking beans, and hauling hay), and, worst of all, constantly dodging tornadoes. A visit from a “twister” meant fleeing outside into the windy night and huddling in a damp and dark storm cellar that doubled as a storage area for homemade canned goods. We would all clutch blankets and peer at each other through the oily light of an old kerosene lamp as the numerous Bell jars of canned tomatoes and green beans clattered and clanged around us. We would sometimes endure hours of this until a storm had passed.
> On top of all this, even the “fun” things in the country often involved work of some kind—such as slaving over an ice cream churn for an hour to get some dessert. Or trudging through the yard picking pecans for an entire morning to get a pie that would be hours away from getting into our mouths. This was just how things worked out there. Of course, there was also, as previously mentioned, many a night of tale-telling. Nights spent at the hearth or on the front porch talking of dark things by moonlight.
It was during one of these visits to Marston that my mother, along with one of my uncles, told me a ghost story that I still remember to this day. Just down the gravel road from my grandparents’ home was a neighbor who we would often see working outside in the yard. She was always by herself and seemed a lonely soul out there in the country all alone—but it hadn’t always been that way. At one point, when my mother and her siblings were young, she lived with her son there in the old house. Her husband had died long before, so it was just the two of them there, eking out a meager existence.
Since they were neighbors, my grandparents felt bad for the widowed woman. As a result, my uncles would often spend the night at the house to socialize with the woman and to play with the boy. That is, they did so until the boy drowned just outside the house in a large drainage ditch. As you can imagine, this pushed the poor woman to the edge of her sanity. To attempt to alleviate her pain and loss—as well as to provide her with some much-needed company—my uncles would still, on occasion, spend the night with her in her home. It was during one of these visits that this story takes place …
My two uncles had finished playing for the night and the woman had just tucked them in for some sleep when they began hearing some strange sounds coming from the upstairs hallway, just outside the guest bedroom. These noises began as soft knocks and bangs, but soon escalated to the sounds of footsteps and even an unintelligible voice whispering from just outside the door. Needless to say, my uncles were quite frightened, though they did manage to eventually drift off to sleep. But later that same night, the two of them decided to make a trip to the bathroom together. (Hey, if you have to be pee and be scared, pee and be scared with company.)
