The first disturbances began to be noticed by the occupants only after some time, although this was long before the worst of the manifestations began to occur. From time to time Mrs. M would hear the sound of a rustling skirt when there was no one nearby to make that sound. Even worse, sometimes a sad sigh would emanate from the darkened upper-floor middle bedroom.

The first major ghostly occurrence happened late one night when Ms. M was by herself. She clearly heard somebody walk across the upper floor and enter the middle bedroom - the house was laid out in the style of the 20's, 'railroad track' fashion - and sit down on the bed. Of course, nobody was in the room on investigation.,p> The house was big and eventually Ms. M had her parents, her sisters, their husbands and their children milling about the big old brick building. Not suprisingly, not many strange noises were heard for some time. Yet other things happened. One time, somebody sleeping in the middle bedroom woke up late at night and heard a pair of soft, nearly inaudible feet climb the staircase and enter the room - standing right next to the bed!

At one point, Ms. M's sister was undressing in the darkened middle bedroom and, throwing her clothes on the bed, heard somebody sigh and roll over in the bed. The room was unoccupied at the time. Another time, Ms. M's sister and her friend were in the same room when something hit the sole of the shoe of Ms. M's sister. Both girls heard the sound, but only the sister saw it. A strange, green "thing" appeared wriggling in midair next to the poor girl, and nearby it the vague outline of a child's head.

Around this time Ms. M had a young man for a boyfriend and he, too, experienced something unusual in the pre-dawn darkness one morning. He was lying on the couch when the front door - which had just been locked - swung open of it's own volition. Meanwhile, a bell resting on a table began to ring - without lifting off the table.

On another occasion, a door slowly swung open. This door was not only off it's hinges and merely resting in the door jab loosely, but also could not swing open, as there was nearly an inch of thick carpet in front of it. Despite this, the door appeared to swing open quite easily and acted as if it were still on its hinges!

And so it went. But the most spectacular manifestation lurked in the basement, and one time a friend of Ms. M's had to go down there to get some old dresses out of a trunk. While the woman was digging through the old silk clothing, she slowly became aware of a feeling of somebody staring at her. somebody that wanted her out of this dark place. Turning around, she saw behind her a swirling whirlpool of smoke of a vaguely human shape punctuated by two holes where the eyes would have been located. The figure slowly began to drift towards the trunk, and the poor woman felt as if she were suffocating. Eventually she crawled her way out of the basement, gasping for air.

It wasn't until 1962 that the family moved out, and it wasn't until 1967 that they got any answers. A psychic visited the house and got the impression of a woman who had fallen down the stairs to her death, as well as her young boy (it is unknown what he died of in the house). The psychic gave a name which, it was later learned, matched that of a former owner of the house.

Today the house may not still stand, but if it does, I imagine it will stand for many more years. And for that long period of time after Ms. M and her extended family moved out and the house was abandoned, it stood there grey and lonely. And, I had heard, that for many years a curtain on the upper floor was parted where it should not have been, just enough to let somebody peek out.