Cherry Street Northeast
Private Residence
St. Petersburg
October 2000
December 18, 2000
First visit: Published in Bayside News, V. 1 Issue II, slightly augmented from this copy. (In other words, it was a lot shorter!)
By: Brandy Buchanan Stark
Nightmare on Cherry Street
It was a humid night in August when the we, as ghost investigators, arrived at a beautiful two-story home located on Cherry Street. The team, consisting of Shelly Provost, Tom Callahan and I, were there to investigate a potential haunting. We had with us black and white 400 speed film, and 400 speed color film for photographs, (in case the ghost decided to manifest or we could capture its image on film), a tape recorder, and an EMF (electromagnetic field) meter. One current theory about ghosts is that they are comprised of electromagnetic energy and should be detectable by the use of one of these meters. Unusual things had happened at the home and we wanted to find out if these things were of natural or supernatural origins.
"Amy" and "Beth" the owners of the house, greeted us. (Because this ghost investigation takes place in a private residence Bayside News would like to protect the privacy of the women who were nice enough to open their home to us for this investigation). The first part of the investigation is to gather information of the unusual events that had happened.
"The first thing that happened was when we were upstairs sleeping. All of a sudden we heard this 'clank clank clank'. We had a tall candleholder that was by the kitchen. Everyone hit it and it always made that sound. Yet, it was late at night. At first we thought someone else had broken in, but which we investigated we found we were home alone. We don't know who kept hitting the candlestick.
Then, around Christmas we were awaken by a huge crash. We had a mantle over the fireplace made out of glass. It was very unstable - it's not even a real mantle. You can lean on this mantle and the glass will immediately come down. It's easier to knock the glass down than the things on it! Well, we were scared by this crash. Again, we thought someone had broken in. I called the police, while she [Beth] went downstairs to check it out," said Amy.
Upon investigation, Beth found that everything on the mantle had been knocked off. Piles of Christmas decorations lay on the floor, but the glass shelf, which at the slightest touch would fall, was still firmly in place. When the police arrived, they suggested that one of the pets had been loose. However, the pets have special sleeping areas, segregated from the rest of the house, and they were all accounted for.
"We didn't attribute that to a ghost. We thought 'What the heck?' and thought it was really strange. But we didn't think it was a ghost."
The next incident happened about a week later. The roommates decided that they would leave the upstairs and try to sleep in "the Green Room" located downstairs. With the unaccountable activity on the first floor the roommates hoped to see if they could figure out what was going on.
"Well, we were sleeping with the door open. We were both awakened by this sound. I didn't know she was awake and she didn't know I was awake. But it was this 'click-click, click-click" sound. It was very mesmerizing," Amy said.
"It was sort of hypnotizing to the point of being both soothing and annoying at the same time. It had a pattern to it. We listened to it for a long time. It was such a definite pattern," added Beth.
Since Beth investigated the last occurrence, Amy got up to look around. She found one of the two cats sitting in the room, staring at the wall. He was agitated, his tail violently flicking. The clicking stopped as soon as she got to the middle of the room. Beth. began to walk around the first floor checking to see if anyone else was in the house. After investigating the kitchen, which was across the hallway from the bedroom, she returned to the living room. She had found nothing and decided to turn on the living room's main light to get a better look around.
"She [Amy] yelled out to me 'What did you do?'" Beth continues, "and I told her I had turned on the light. She [Amy] said 'That's the sound! That's the noise we heard!'"
A light switch located next to the kitchen doorway, across from the "Green Room" activated the ornate light that illuminates both the living room and staircase to the second floor. There is a short delay between flipping the light switch and the light coming on. The switch can be flipped on and off in a short period of time without turning the light on. After they discovered the light switch was the source of the sound the noises stopped. That was the end of the activity for the night. What is puzzling is that the light switch, which was tested by the team, does not turn easily. It requires effort to turn it on and off. It is also interesting to note that the noise was made into a pattern and that the switch was turned off just before the light came on. These clues seem to indicate an intelligent mind at work.
The roommates also related a similar occurrence that happened with their doorbell. The doorbell would go off but no one would be at the door. Then it started to ring from midnight until early in the morning. Finally, the roommates removed the ringer. The doorbell still rang.
Another hint into the prankster nature of this little ghost might be found in an incident involving a gargoyle. Amy had a gargoyle collection that her roommate, Beth, was not fond of. One day, when Beth came home, she found a gargoyle on her bedside table. Thinking Amy was playing a trick on her she hid the gargoyle in the nightstand drawer. The next day, the gargoyle was back on the nightstand. Upset, Amy confronted Beth about the gargoyle. Beth was confused, for she had not moved the gargoyle nor did she notice its absence. When Amy went upstairs to put the gargoyle back on the shelf, she caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of her eye. She at first thought it was a large rat and called to the other to come upstairs and take a look. After looking around the room and finding nothing, and locating both cats downstairs, they noticed the notorious gargoyle was missing from the shelf. Returning to Beth's nightstand they found the gargoyle. Neither one claims to have moved it. A third friend who was with the roommates decided to end the problem by throwing the entire collection of gargoyles, with the owner's permission, into the garbage.
The final incident holds the greatest clue to who or what this ghost might be. The house has had a lot of remodeling redone. The wooden floors have been redone, the tile floors laid, the bathroom and kitchen remodeled, and a porch added to the front of the house. During one of the phases of remodeling, Beth was laying tile in a downstairs room. She was using a wet saw to cut the tile, which created a lot of dust. Beth tracked a trail of the tile dust between the downstairs bedroom and the kitchen. During one of her breaks, she was walking back into the kitchen through the pattern when she made a startling discovery: two small footprints had appeared in the dust trail. No one was home at the time, the pets were not in the room, and there were no children in the house. Could the ghost have been that of a child?
Overall, this house did exhibit many signs of a haunting. Ghosts often become active if a home is being remodeled, as this house was. Animals are often able to sense ghosts and supernatural activity sooner than humans are. The agitated nature of the cats is not unusual in a haunted house. Ghosts sometimes have the ability to interact with mechanical items. Reports have been made of disconnected phones ringing, unplugged televisions emitting static, and so on, in the presence of a haunted area. It is possible that the ghost was able to ring the doorbell without the doorbell being activated, nor the ringer on. Catching a movement out of the corner of one's eye is also common to ghostly activity. Though the tape recorder revealed no new information, slight images did appear on two of the photographs. Upon closer inspection, however, the image may be that of a pet hair pressed against the camera lens. It is not conclusive proof of a ghost. However, during the investigation, the EMF meter detected a strong electromagnetic presence around the couch. The second time we checked the presence had moved to the middle of the living room floor, and the meter did not react at all over the couch. The field once again returned to the couch and no other activity was recorded that night. The owners of the house were not aware of any electrical wires in or under that area of the house. There was no electronic equipment nor any electronic plugs in the vicinity of the activity, either. Could the ghost have been sitting with us, listening in on what we had to say?
The possibilities that the ghost is a child also seem evident. The light switch is at a level a young child could reach. The creation of a noise pattern without turning on the light might be something a small child would find entertaining. The items on the mantle, which were knocked down, were also the level where a child, if he stretched his arm up, could possibly reach. The game with the gargoyles would gain a child the adult's attention and the gargoyles, with their unusual appearance, may have attracted the attention of a young curious mind. The footprints in the dust may be the eeriest clues of all to this ghost's identity.
"At the Cherry St. house, I didn't feel anything overwhelming or threatening. If anything, the entity has now become a protector of the family," Shelley said during our post-investigation discussion.
Since the addition of a baby to the household, the ghostly pranks have stopped. The baby, described by the women as "happy but not giggly" can be heard on the monitors laughing heartily. Though she is too young to describe who or what she finds so amusing, the absence of ghostly pranks may mean that this ghost has found a friend in the child. Or perhaps she is simply laughing at the adults as they scratch their heads in puzzled wonderment at the strange things that happen in their home on Cherry Street!
Note: No images or reports saved from first investigation. Scroll down for the recheck.
eing watched.
Recheck:
FACTS:
House inhabited by two adult females, "Amy" and "Beth", one child female, "Brittany".
Pet dog & cats in house.
House is a two-story home with attic area.
House is 73 years old
A lot of construction been & being done. Openings in walls & ceilings.
OBSERVATIONS:
Did not observer any unusual orders or visions during investigation. No unusual
Markings on walls or ceilings during the walk through. During the first walk through I
sensed a feeling of a presence in the upstairs bedroom closet. When viewing the
digital pictures there were rainbow effects, shadows or light spots in 10 of the 28
pictures. The rainbow effects were present in the living room ceiling, behind the living
room couch, on the wall in the upstairs bedroom (between the bed area and closet), in
the closet in the upstairs bedroom. There was also a light shaped like a small head on
the wall to the right of the bed in the upstairs bedroom. There was a light orb on the
living room floor. One shadow was next to Beth's leg when she was standing in the
living room.
When viewing the video there were three areas with a rainbow effect in the living
room & upstairs bedroom. But the most unusual effect on the video was the
presence of three different light orbs fleeting across the screen in the attic area.
There were fluctuations in EMF (electric magnetic field) readings throughout the entire home. The biggest was in the living room floor from in front of the entrance door straight back to the play area in front of the stairs. Residents were not aware of any electrical under the flooring.
OCCUPANTS INPUT: Beth shared several incidents with us all of which were
confirmed by Amy. (See Cherry Street for original incidences)
Door Bell Incident: Several times the doorbell has rung and no one was at the door -
yet the button was depressed. They removed the button and the batteries from the door
bell - yet it again rang and when they looked for the button, in a table draw, it was
depressed.
Things were quiet until Halloween Night and again when both went on a three day weekend and a
friend, "Gem", babysat. These two occurrences were the only two times others except
the residents have been in the house. On both these occasions the doorbell rang,
no one there, no doorbell button mounted for pushing and no batteries in the doorbell.
IMPRESSION & CONCLUSION:
I did not sense any evil or dangerous situation at the home during the investigation. I did however feel a presence in the upstairs bedroom closet, bed area and the attic. Felt I needed to keep looking and filming and I would see something. But I didn't see anything until I viewed the pictures and video.
I feel there is a spirit of a young child (2 or 3 years old) that is residing, very happily in this home.
Cherry Street
I believe our original analysis was correct: a child's ghost is present at this home. Most of my original notes can be found in our first visit to Cherry Street.
I did feel that there was more of a presence this time. I also had a hunch about the corner of the closet which produced rainbow effects on film.
Note: High EMF in closet, and in area on first floor. At one point I stood with my arms locked in my hips, holding the EMF meter. The meter's needle kept fluctuating during our investigation, and rarely dipped below a 1. It hovered at 1.5, and often spiked to 2, 2.5, and even 3.0 on a 1-3 setting. As I stood with my arms locked in the middle of the first floor, hands unmoving, and within eye shot of the infamous switch that alerted the women to the ghost's presence (see first report). Even though I did not move, the needle on the EMF meter began to climb steadily from 1.5 to 2.0, 2.5, 3.0 and then 3.5 (or off the scale). That was interesting. There are no power lines underneath the house, but evidentially I was over the area that held an old heating drum. However, the heating drum is disconnected and nonfunctional. It should not, according to Lee, produce EMF.
