ghosts – Typical Jenn

For Real Ghost Adventures: Presidio La Bahia

Hello, and welcome to another episode of For Real Ghost Adventures. We didn’t use to call our ghost hunting trips this but after the last one at the Magnolia Hotel where we ACTUALLY caught real ghost footage as opposed to the guys on Ghost Adventures who I sent my footage and they ignored it, I decided this name was perfect.

A few weeks ago, we took a trip to a place called Presidio La Bahia. If you’ve never heard of it, it’s OK because I hadn’t either (I’ve never been one for the history lessons and whatnot). Located in Goliad, TX, Presidio La Bahia is “the most fought over fort in Texas history, having seen participation in six National Revolutions/Wars for independence. Spanish, Mexican and Texas soldiers all garrisoned its fortified walls. Here, at the Crossroads of Revolution, was felt almost every attempt to forcibly change the governmental order of Texas”, according to the website.

I tried to write my own description but I found too much information and it began to feel like a term paper. Like I said, I’m not one for the history lessons. If you’d like to learn more about it, here’s the Wikipedia page. Anyway, the fort is closed off and when you rent the room for the night, you get the entire fort to yourself, with no one on the grounds but the bodies that are buried there. It’s actually pretty legit and also, Zack and his boys have never been there.

During the day, the majority of the rooms around the fort are open. Part of it has been converted into a museum where you can watch a film that is a reenactment performed by “actors” from Craigslist, presumably. There are also tons of artifacts as well as a room full of bunk beds where the soldiers stayed.

Right outside the sleeping quarters is a church that is still in operation and next to it, the grave of a woman named Anne Taylor. The fort is walled off which makes it perfect for exploring any time of the day. If you’re into history, particularly Texas history, or just dig seeing places like this, I highly recommend checking this place out.

Me? I’m into ghosts. Let’s get this shit started.

When we drove up I immediately thought it was the coolest building. The fact that the chapel was built in the 1700s creeped me out because anything still in existence from the 1700s is automatically scary, Jesus-y or not. Newer more modern churches are all about money and private jets, like Joel Osteen’s. Older churches are the real deal.

We unloaded our things, went and grabbed dinner, then returned to get the ghost hunting started. The first thing we did was get out the ghost hunting equipment. Becky is slowly amassing the collection of ghost hunting equipment that the Ghost Adventures guys have and I have to say, it’s pretty awesome.

She has everything from a Mel Reader (the thing that reads magnetic energy and makes noises when a ghost touches it) to a voice recorder to this app and device that detects cold spots.

Joanne brought a nightlight that is motion censored, cat balls that she was hoping the ghosts would move, and the free version of a ghost hunting app that played 60-second Candy Crush ads every 3 minutes. I brought my phone and running shoes in case something chased me. Clearly, I’m still pretty green at this.

The first thing we did was sit in the living room and try to talk to whoever (or whatever) would talk back. Joanne’s app included a feature that acted as a spirit box where words from the ghosts would come through. At one point, we were getting pretty freaked out because the words coming through were in another language. But before I put my sneakers to work, Joanne looked at the app and noticed that she had it set to Italian.

So, yeah, we didn’t get anything.

It was dark but still pretty early so we decided to hit up the local cemetery that was about 200 meters from where we were. I drove to it in case we got chased by anything. I feel (kind of) the same way about cemeteries that I do about churches: the new ones weird me out while the old ones I find legit. This was just a regular cemetery – we didn’t really get any ghost activity so back to the fort we went.

By this time it was about 9:30pm so we decided to hit up the courtyard, the same courtyard that at least 13 bodies are buried. Surely, we would pick something up. To the right of the entrance there are some Forrest Gump-like benches to sit down on and talk to ghosts, which is what we did. Becky could see foot prints on her thermal app. My Mel Reader went off at one point, but that was about it.

I don’t know if you’re aware of the weather we’ve got going on here in central Texas but it’s humid AF right now. So, after a while of no activity we decided to go back inside, freshen up, and regroup.

After my shower, I went outside to join Joanne and Becky who were sitting on the step in front of the doors of the church. As soon as I stepped outside the first thing they said was “there’s someone singing in there.” I walked up to the door to listen and sure enough, I could hear a woman’s voice.

After a few minutes it turned to men singing hymns. It was creepy. Then it kind of sounded like choir practice. And then it wouldn’t stop.

It was way too Ghost Adventures to be true.

I later found out that the woman who manages the church forgot to turn the Church tape off, so the singing we were hearing was a recording.

We then went back inside to talk to ghosts, but because there weren’t any we got nothing. At about 12:30am, we did one more walk through of the courtyard and then it was time for bed, which was very restful until 8am when the recording of the bells began and rang every 15 minutes until we left.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that the place wasn’t haunted. First, there’s a church on the grounds. A legit 1700s church. The kind that didn’t need half your paycheck to bless you. This means the fort is on hollowed ground so, hopefully, everyone buried there is resting peacefully.

Then, I read the guestbook.

That thing read like someone’s diary. “This morning was great! We watched the sunrise and then had lunch. #livingmybestlife”

When we stayed at the Magnolia, every entry was one where people described feeling scared and uneasy the entire night. And everyone had a sighting or paranormal experience like us. Nobody wrote, “had breakfast in the kitchen where the murderer ate – best eggs ever!”

There was one disturbance I experienced at the Presidio, though.

The tourists.

They tried opening our doors thinking that they could go in even though both of our doors were closed and the rest of the doors that you could go through were wide open. And then when our doors wouldn’t open they wouldn’t stop knocking. And then when I tried to leave there were people watching us like they were the paparazzi and a little girl said hi to me and god only knows what my face did because between the diary entries, lack of ghosts, and an abundance of tourists, I was pretty annoyed by this point.

All in all I have to say, the hotel stay was a super fun girls’ night but if you’re looking for ghosts, that place isn’t it.

BUT WAIT.

20 minutes from the Presidio is a little town called Yorktown. And in the town is the Yorktown Hospital, one of the most haunted hospitals in the country. If it sounds familiar, that’s because the guys of Ghost Adventures paid a little visit to it in season 5.

So stay tuned for the next episode of For Real Ghost Adventures where we pay a visit to the Yorktown Hospital and I only report on the for real things that happened.

I took this pic because I thought it was so creepy that the lights were on and we couldn’t open the door. Then we realized it was the street lights on the other side. Yet another not ghost thing.

My night as a professional ghost hunter

As most of you may know by now, I love Halloween. I love horror movies. I love ghost stories. I particularly love when I’m a part of the story. I love Halloween. Every year I try to do something Halloween-ish so I can write about it and every year I fail.

Not this year.

This year, I kicked the season off right by staying in one of Texas’ most haunted locations, the Magnolia Hotel in Seguin. Every paranormal investigator knows (or should know) about the Magnolia Hotel. The site has been featured on Ghost Adventures, Ghost Hunters, and Paranormal Files, just to name a few.

A quick background on the Magnolia Hotel. Built in 1840 by Texas Ranger, James Campbell, the Magnolia Hotel started out as a two bedroom log cabin that included a large basement built under the cabin that was used an Indian Raid shelter and a jail. So already you know it’s fucked. The cabin would eventually be sold to a businessman named Joseph Johnson who would turn the cabin into Seguin’s first hotel. The hotel would then go on to get sold about a billion more times before ending up in the possession of the current owners, Erin and her husband, Jim Ghedi.

Throughout the years, the hotel has been home to some serious shit resulting in its alleged haunting by 13 ghosts (because obviously) ranging from jilted lovers to children as well as the spirits of some that committed suicide in the hotel. But the real story of the Magnolia Hotel (or at least the most popular one) is the story of the murderer.

Back in 1874, a man by the name of William Faust allegedly murdered 12-year-old Emma Voelcker at her home in New Braunfels, then fled to Seguin and hid out in the hotel. I say “allegedly” because Erin believes the man who actually killed her is an individual by the name of MP Deavers. Supposedly Mr. Deavers confessed to the murder on his deathbed, claiming it was actually he who stayed in the hotel that night. So who the hell knows who the killer actually is or who the ghost is.

Anyway, Erin claims to have made contact with all of the spirits and goes into detail about them during her ghost tours. I didn’t attend her last one but my friends, Joanne and Becky who joined me on this adventure, did. They got the rundown on what spirits inhabited the building and got to check out the bed and breakfast where we’d be staying as well as the connected, unrestored (most haunted) portion of the building. Apparently during the tour, a woman became ill and began dry heaving when she walked in the bed and breakfast as well when she got to the stairwell by the murderer’s room. When Joanne told me this I thought the woman was just a part of the show but whatever. I appreciate theatrics.

The night of our stay, my friends and I arrived, got settled in, and then went to the closed off section of the B&B where all of the paranormal activity is said to take place. We took a look around and got familiar with the place, learning the layout since it was going to be nearly pitch black in there. We also thought it’d be fun to include our side of the B&B in our ghost hunting so we took a couple of balls from the haunted baby’s room and put them in our living room to see if they’d move or fly across the room or explode, whatever ghost balls do.

It was still daylight so we decided to go to dinner and load up before our night started. We headed outside and while Joanne took a smoke break, I took a look at the outside of the building trying to see if I could see any ghost faces in the window like I’d seen in some of the pictures hung up inside the B&B. Nothing. Just the kitchen curtains moving from cranking up the A/C because Joanne likes to feel like she’s in a meat locker.

When we got back, we got Becky’s ghost hunting equipment and the equipment we rented from the hotel and began our search.

3 hours went by and nothing happened. We walked around the sectioned off part of the building looking for ghosts, calling out to ghosts. Nothing. Hey, what’s that over there?! Nothing. At about 11 p.m. we started to figure this was it. Just a self-guided tour of a supposedly haunted hotel.

That was until we stopped in the hallway right in front of the murderer’s room.

Becky had an infrared camera on her phone from an app and a device that plugged into the charging port. While we stood in the hallway calling out to whatever could hear us, the camera was picking up blue specs which Becky said was an entity. Honestly, I had no idea what I was looking at so I kept my gaze on the corner of the room where her camera was aimed while holding my EMF reader.

This same EMF reader that hadn’t done shit all night began going off. Now, here’s how those things work. They gauge electricity (which there is none of on that side of the hotel) as well as drastic temperature changes. Throughout the night we took breaks so every time we switched from our side to the other side and vice versa, I had to turn the temperature gauge off because the difference in temperature between both rooms was nearly 20 degrees. When Becky was talking to whatever it was she could see on that infrared, I could not get the temperature gauge to turn off.

She announced that this thing was coming closer to us (actually she asked it come closer to us and I said no and it fucking didn’t listen) so I took out my camera trying to captured whatever my regular camera could capture. But my live option wouldn’t work and when I hit the button I was prompted to “hold still”. And right as my camera was trying to compose itself, A FUCKING LIGHT ORB FLEW AT ME. As soon as it flew past me, my camera went off.

After that, it was break time.

We went back to our side and started going through all of the pictures that Joanne took. Now, Joanne only used her live feature, so it was disturbing as fuck when this picture showed up, and it was the only still pic in the series.

The next picture was a live picture (taken at the same time as the one above) and it scared the hell out of us. Give it a listen.

We think it’s saying “get off it” but I would love to know if you hear something different.

I was out after that. I was done ghost hunting. Zak Bagans could have it back. My friends were out too. Fuck. That.

There was just one problem.

We needed to put the ghost balls back that we’d grabbed earlier and I sure as shit wasn’t going to do it.

Becky is braver than I am because I don’t think she’s seen as many possession movies as I have so she volunteered to put the balls back. Joanne accompanied her because she’s nicer than me. Clearly, I’m just a terrible person.

Becky and Joanne took the balls back with Joanne taking more live pics of the ordeal. I stayed by the door in case I needed to call 911 or a priest. This would be the last time any of us would go on that side of the hotel that evening. When we reviewed Joanne’s live pics, this is what we heard.

Yup. Joanne and Becky were told to “leave”. The voice says it right at the beginning of the video.

Had this voice been picked up on the voice recorder or spirit box that came in the rented ghost hunting kit, I would’ve called bullshit on it. But those items picked up nothing. Additionally, we didn’t hear anything at the time her phone picked up this voice. We were the only 3 in there.

Needless to say, it wasn’t a very restful sleep. In fact, I slept with the lights on. We did go back in there the next day but by then, whatever was in there the night before was gone.

In the living room there’s a guest book where you can write about your experiences. I sat and read through just about all of them and for the most part, the experiences were pretty light. A couple of people claimed to have heard voices but the majority of the entries claimed they’d been visited by the spirits of the little girls, Itzy and Emma.

I don’t doubt their accounts. My opinion, however, is that there are no kids in that place, or at least not on the side of the hotel we stayed. Whatever is in there is dark and not happy. And it’s probably getting angrier. I will say that there’s a sign on the door warning people that there is a heavy spirit in that place, but heavy might be putting it lightly.

We sat in the kitchen and must’ve listened to these live pics about a hundred times, and while we did I kept thinking of the girl who kept getting sick in the exact place we picked this voice up. I stared at the curtains in the kitchen as we listened, and I noticed they were motionless which was weird because the A/C was on full blast. I looked up above the curtains, then the rest of the ceiling in the kitchen. There were no vents in the kitchen.

I don’t know who or what was fucking with the curtains earlier that day, but I do know that 100%, the Magnolia Hotel is absolutely haunted.

Halloween season has officially begun.

Here are a few more pics from the hotel

As seen on bad sitcoms

It all happened one day about a week before my father-in-law returned with Covid and a new girlfriend to give it to. I’m sitting in my office pretending to work before I need to head out to an event. As I’m reading god knows what, I hear a loud crash in the living room and immediately know what I’m about to walk into.

The loud crash was our very large clock. A large clock that hung above our mantle. The mantle that held my mother-in-law’s ashes. Or use to hold her ashes.

That’s right: use to. As in no longer was. As in, the cute glass Hobby Lobby canister that we placed her ashes in was now laying half broken, still in its decorative holder that contained the canister, on my dog’s food bowls.

Me, my lab, and my two min-pins stood there, staring at my MIL’s ashes piled up in their bowls and on their food mat.

I was supposed to be leaving my house in an hour. Typical.

After a few minutes of debating if this happened because my house is haunted or because my husband didn’t anchor the clock like he was supposed to, I grabbed a mask, some gloves, and began the process of picking glass and dog food out of my MIL’s ashes.

Oddly enough, this is something my MIL would’ve thought was hilarious.

I did not.

I stood there for an hour sifting through human remains like I was gold mining. I actually considered using our spaghetti strainer to expedite the process however, I had already racked up a good amount of items to throw out so I just kept digging. Also, I didn’t have anything to strain her into which led to my next conundrum: where would I put her until the next day when I could buy a new urn?

I’m a bad hostess so I don’t have random glass jars that can double as urns just lying around. And I couldn’t just leave her out, that would’ve been a little too B-movie for my liking. So I put her in the only place I could think of where she’d be safe and would prevent any sort of poltergeist activity:

A zip-lock bag.

The next day I squeezed in an extra errand into my schedule and purchased a new canister/urn to put her in – a plastic, shatter-proof one. I also placed her in an area that, if she were to fall again, would let me know our house is FOR SURE haunted.

But before I placed her in her new spot, there was the matter of pouring her ashes in the new canister. When I did, I noticed that some of them were clumped together, making them look like actual kitty litter. My OCD and conscience wouldn’t let me just leave them like that so I grabbed a butter knife (another casualty of this incident) and broke up the clumps.

I sealed the canister, gave it one more look-over, and that’s when I noticed it.

There was still a piece of dog food in the ashes.

I left it there.

I’d done all I could do and had thrown away all of the kitchen utensils I cared to throw away.

And so it remains because my husband won’t get it out either.

I’m pretty sure part 2 of this story will happen just in time for Halloween season.

Ghost Stories: Part 3

In the winter of 2011, my husband and I moved into our very first grown-up house: a duplex. It doesn’t sound grown-up but our rent payment nearly doubled so that was pretty mature for us. The duplex was fairly new so the thought of it being haunted never crossed my mind. Also, I don’t believe “being haunted” is something someone thinks about when moving into a new place.

Our dogs were the first to let us know something was up. Our bed faced the bedroom door so you could see straight down the hallway. On several occasions our dogs would stand in the doorway and bark at the hallway, but would never leave our bedroom. One time, when my husband was out of town, I was in bed watching TV, about to dose off when I noticed both of our dogs turn their heads to face the hallway. They just sat there and stared. It creeped me the fuck out.

Then there was the time me and the dogs were home alone watching Celebrity Ghost Stories (side note: I’m pretty sure a couple of those celebrities were liars). While sitting on the couch with my oldest MinPin, I felt someone walk in back of the couch, and I wasn’t alone. My dog sat up, stared behind me, and began growling while turning his head toward the door, as though he was growling at someone until they left.

The occurrences were non-stop. Every single day I could hear someone walking in our attic. At first I thought it was woodpeckers, then I thought a tree branch was low and hitting our roof. It was neither of those. The duplex had 3 bedrooms, 2 of which we used for storage. The one my husband used was the creepiest. Like my cousin’s old room (in the house we used to share), I could never walk in there by myself.

But the worst was when I got locked out of the house. I had just returned home from dropping off my husband at the airport. I stuck my key in the lock, turned it, went to open the door, and then heard another click. It was the deadbolt, which meant someone was in the house. I immediately called the cops, then my boss who sent someone to wait with me while the cops searched the duplex. They were able to get in easy and of course, they found nothing.

I never found out what or who was in the house. My mom thought it was a little kid but who knows. I also don’t know if the tenants after us experienced anything. What I do know is, the day we moved out a couple of college guys moved in next door and as I was leaving, asked me if the landlord was “cool with people having parties.” So I’m pretty sure if the ghost didn’t get to them, that shit probably did.

Photo by: vox.com

Ghost Stories: Part 2

Ever since the incident at our grandma’s house, my cousin and I have been obsessed with ghosts and all things horror. Fun fact: for one of our regular horror movie nights we watched the B-rated movie Doctor Giggles and from that day forward, my cousin wanted to work in the medical field. She was 5. Today, she’s an emergency room trauma center nurse for a major hospital. The point is: no one would be lost if they watched horror movies.

The night we heard those footsteps would be just one of many occurrences for my cousin and I, both together and separately.

When I was 12, I saw my first apparition. I was with my parents and we were headed out of town to visit my great grandmother as she wasn’t doing very well. I was lying down in the back seat of my dad’s truck; I looked up from messing with my portable CD player to see my great grandmother sitting on the other side of the seat. I froze. It was only a silhouetted outline of her but it was her. I sat up and let my parents know what I had seen. Sure enough, when we arrived at our destination we were told she had passed away about an hour prior to our arrival.

Other times it would just be feelings. My mom and I used to spend Christmas Eve night at my godmother’s mom’s house and I was always terrified of her stairs. I would have to brace myself every time I walked passed them. It was like there was someone up there that wanted to make sure I had zero desire to go up those stairs – and I never did.

There are many more stories I have that are like that but the one I’m going to tell you today includes my cousin.

While in college, my cousin and I lived with her then-boyfriend (now-husband) in an older home. We didn’t know the history of it but in our early twenties, it’s not like we really cared. We had a house and it wasn’t a frat house; nothing else mattered.

The first time I discovered something was off about the house, I was in the process of switching bedrooms and needed to buy some new curtains to match the wall paint. I’d been watching Kathy Griffin comedy specials on my laptop and as I made my way out, I shut my laptop because I was too lazy to simply pause it. When I returned, I could hear something playing in my bedroom. At first I thought I was hearing things. As I slowly walked up the stairs I could hear that it was Kathy Griffin’s comedy. “What the fuck?” I thought. I ran up the remaining steps and right when I reached the top, it stopped. I walked into my room and there was my laptop: open and at the end of the special.

I told my friend Joe who lived in the house before I moved in and my story didn’t surprise him. He went on to tell me about a time when he had a friend over who also had a strange encounter. His friend had been upstairs using the bathroom when Joe heard his friend calling for him, asking if Joe needed something. Joe didn’t know what he was talking about. His friend came downstairs and told him that he heard someone running upstairs and then slam the bathroom door, but it happened so fast that he just thought it was Joe because he didn’t see who shut the door.

Joe’s first questions was, “why were you using the bathroom with the door open?” Then it was, “what the fuck shut the door?” They’d been the only 2 in the house at the time.

Not long after the laptop incident, my cousin’s boyfriend left for AirForce bootcamp, so for the next 6 weeks, she and I had the house to ourselves…. or so we thought.

One night we were watching TV in the living room when the light just turned off. We thought the lightbulb had gone out but when I went to hit the switch, it turned back on. It might not sound weird, but we used to have lights that were controlled by a remote so the only way the downstairs lights could’ve turned off was if someone turned the lights on upstairs (they were supposed to be energy savers). Not surprisingly, the lights upstairs were on but nobody else was home with us.

My cousin’s room used to scare me. Every time I walked in there I always felt like there was someone in there watching me. One night we had a slumber party in her room and while reminiscing, her bedroom door began to open. Not all the way, but enough to scare the shit out of both of us.

We never did find out who was in that house, and the occurrences never quit. Eventually I would move out, only to find myself in another an even more active home just a few years later.

Ghost Stories: Part 3 to be published next week.

Photo: Caltech.edu

Ghost Stories: Part 1

I used to be a fan of the show Ghost Hunters. Then it turned into America’s Got Talent: The Dead Do Tricks. Every episode you’d see footage of spirits dancing and moving things on cue, as though they knew they were being recorded. It was all a bit too strings on a skeleton for me.

Also, I personally happen to know that it doesn’t work like that. You don’t just say “show yourself!” and then they launch a glass at you or knock a bookshelf over. No. They do things when you don’t think they will or before you even know ghosts are a thing.

As a kid, my favorite thing to do was have sleepovers at my cousin’s house. She lived next door with my aunt, uncle, 2 brothers and our grandmother and no matter how much time I spent over there, it was never enough. Birthdays and Christmastime were particular favorites as we would combine our new toys and stay up until all hours playing with them.

The first time we realized our grandma’s house was haunted, we were in bed playing the obnoxious board game Don’t Wake Daddy. At some point during the night, we thought we’d failed the game and real life when we heard footsteps walking down the hallway. Like any little kid, we laid down as quick as we could and pretended to be asleep. The footsteps made it all the way to our grandma’s room (right across from us) and stopped.

Naturally, we assumed it was our grandma so as soon as we no longer heard the footsteps, we put the game up and decided to go to bed. When you’re Mexican, waking grandma is WAY scarier than waking dad.

The next morning, we joined my aunt and grandma for breakfast and because little kids can’t keep their mouth shut, we told them both about the footsteps we heard.

My grandma laughed. “That wasn’t me, that was your great, great grandmother.”

She then went on to tell us that her grandmother had passed away in the home but never really left. Apparently, when my cousin was younger (like infantile), she used to sit in the corner of her room, looking up and just talk for hours. My cousin’s room was the room our great, great grandma had passed away in.

Then my aunt chimed in. A couple of years prior to our encounter, my aunt had had her own. She’d been in the bathroom (the house only had one and it was in the hallway) getting ready for work when, in the mirror, she could see someone walk from my cousin’s room into her room (which was right next to my cousins).

It happened very quick and based on the frame of the person she assumed it was our grandma just looking for something. She finished getting dressed and left as she was running late, but when she got home she checked-in with our grandma to see if she needed anything.

Of course, our grandma didn’t know what she was talking about.

My aunt: “yes, I saw you walk into my room so I thought you needed something.”

Grandma: “was the person you saw wearing a blue sweater?”

Yeah, it was great, great grandma.

Our grandma said it was nothing to be scared of.

You know what doesn’t help little kids quit being scared? Telling them there’s nothing to be scared of.

We’d seen enough horror movies to know how ghosts works. It would be a while before we’d have another encounter except the next time, we were grown ups living in a house that we, unfortunately, didn’t know who was haunting it.

Ghost Stories: Part 2 coming next week.

Photo: falconrest.com

Are All Insane Asylum’s That Were Built in the 1800s Haunted?

What better day than Friday the 13th to talk about insane asylum’s? I’ve spent the last week researching a local state hospital that was built in 1892, a hospital originally known as the Southwestern Insane Asylum, with a goal of delivering on the assumption that places like this are haunted. Here’s what I discovered:

First, the back story. The rumored haunted asylum was established in 1892 and in 1925 the word “asylum” was dropped from the title and the facility became the San Antonio State Hospital. The hospital accepts patients with mental illnesses regardless of the severity or the patients ability to pay. So, as you can imagine, with any state-funded facility come the usual problems. They are severely understaffed and because of this had to turn away patients in 2014, causing some of these individuals to be jailed. Former and current employees complain of poor working conditions, a lack of training, and low pay, according to comments I found on Indeed.com and Glassdoor.com. Patient deaths are not rare and in some cases have led to lawsuits, two of which I found transcripts for. Additionally, the facility itself isn’t in the best condition. While it’s had its share of expansions and renovations, some of the buildings are the original buildings from 1892 and are in total disrepair. The fence surrounding the facility is falling apart as well, aiding in the escape of patients, with the most recent being a paranoid schizophrenic who dismembered his wife back in the 90s and was found not guilty by reason of insanity.

I first found out about this place about 8 years ago and began researching it immediately. I did a really shitty job because I didn’t even know it was still open and at the time, found documents stating that it had been abandoned in the early 90s, with equipment and patient files being left behind. There are even pictures and YouTube videos of the facility that people claim to be haunted. Here’s one of them from onlyinyourstate.com.

DSC03529-700x469

Here’s the problem: this isn’t the insane asylum turned state hospital. It’s close to the state hospital but this is actually the old Bexar County Juvenile Facility for Boys and from what I could find it was abandoned because of all of the asbestos it housed. How true that is I don’t know, that was a comment from someone on a forum and I couldn’t find any evidence to substantiate it.

I searched all over the Internet and it’s important to note that some of what I may be looking for may be documented at the county library or something other than an online database. I wanted so bad to scare the shit out of everyone with stories but here’s what I was able to find.

First, if you look this place up there are a lot of false reports about this being the original insane asylum. I found one girl on a forum who said she actually did some amateur ghost hunting and that’s how she discovered it wasn’t it. Unfortunately I can’t tell you if this building is haunted because I could not find A THING on the place. Again, I’m sure I need to dig deeper than online but I was surprised that nothing came up. Also, it’s owned by the county so if you trespass and get caught you will get ticketed and also this is Texas so you’ll probably get murdered by snakes. You never know.

I found a website that talks about the state hospital, it’s origins, and stories about some of its patients. I researched the stories but couldn’t find anything to substantiate them either. I’m not saying they’re not true, I just couldn’t find anything on the ol’ interweb and would probably need to do some offline research. The website also features a few comments from an employee and people who have children at the hospital. Two of the comments I found and are paraphrased, and one I couldn’t find. I read every employee review I could find but unfortunately none of them mentioned the place was haunted. One day I’ll interview some of them because I’m sure Indeed.com isn’t trying to scare potential employee away by letting other people terrify them with ghost stories. Here is the link to that website. https://ghostcitytours.com/san-antonio/haunted-places/san-antonio-state-hospital/

Now, here’s what I did find that creeped me out a little. The actual state hospital has two cemeteries around it; one is called East Mount Calm Cemetery and the other is South Mount Calm Cemetery. South Mount Calm Cemetery has over 1000 individuals who were abandoned and passed away between 1892 and 1924. The majority of the graves are marked with only a block and no information. A few have numeric ID’s and fewer than that have actual headstones with their information. I actually found an event that took place on the 5th of this month that was a re-dedication for the cemetery. However, I couldn’t find any information on who was hosting the event and there was no way to contact anybody. And yeah, I wasn’t going to try because that was a little creepy. East Mount Calm Cemetery has individuals who passed away after 1924. Apparently it’s incredibly hard to get on the grounds, even if you believe you have a relative buried there. Out of all the research I did, finding out about these cemeteries was one of the most unsettling pieces of information I found. If it’s haunted I don’t know. In all of the sites I found about the hospital not one person mentions the cemeteries. But with its back story, what do you think?

I’m bummed that I couldn’t deliver more. What I found justifies calling this place scary but I’m not sure it’s for the paranormal. However, if, god forbids, it were to ever close down, I would like to request the Ghost Hunters investigate. And I will probably decline their offer to join them.

Happy Haunted Monday!

I’m still doing some research for tomorrow’s blog post so today I thought I’d post the latest 2 videos from the YouTube Channel: Top5s. Enjoy!

A Ghost Story

I have been wanting to tell this story since I first unofficially started my Typical Jenn’s 31 Days of Halloween – I say unofficial because I meant to do this a long time ago but this is the first year I’ve actually gone through with my Typical Jenn’s 31 Days of Halloween. Now, I’ve had my own paranormal experiences but this one belongs to my dad and happened during my senior year of high school.

Every small town has that one house that’s rumored to be haunted and my home town is no different. This house, however, doesn’t come with a “this is why it’s haunted” story. It was built in the ’40s but the house didn’t start earning its reputation up until about 20 years ago. I could go on for days about this house but I’m saving all of it for the book I’m writing. My dad’s story, however, is one I’m incredibly eager to share now.

My dad was a police officer and at the time of this encounter he was working the night shift with his partner and a rookie cop who was out patrolling with them. That night at around 2AM they responded to a breaking and entering call. They arrived to find a couple and their baby standing outside of the house; the wife holding the baby and the husband with a gun in his hand pacing back and forth. My dad and his partner go inside the house while the rookie tries to calm the man down and question them.

After doing their search my dad and his partner emerge from the house – they’ve seen no signs of forced entry, all of the windows and the back door are locked from the inside, and there’s absolutely no one in the house or, as far they can tell, near the area. My dad walks over to the man, who has calmed down a little, and begins talking to him. He tells my dad that him and his wife were asleep, when he woke up and saw a man standing over the foot of the bed staring at them. The man grabbed his gun on the nightstand and thought the intruder ran out of the room because he was gone by the time he aimed. He got his wife and kid out of the house and while she called the police he went back in to look for the intruder. He repeatedly told my dad “I know what I saw, I wasn’t dreaming, I don’t sleep walk. He was standing there.”

Because this is a small town all of the neighbors were standing outside watching the whole scene unfold. My dad and his partner began questioning the neighbors, just in case the intruder was able to escape, maybe somebody had seen something. My dad makes it over to a man he knows well, as this man used to be one of his teachers when my dad was in high school. My dad explains what happened and then asks “did you see anything? Did you see anyone run from the house or anyone out of place walking around the neighborhood?” It was the middle of the night so of course he hadn’t, but his response wasn’t one of shock or even fear that a possible burglar was in the neighborhood. He looked at my dad and with a smirk said “I didn’t see anything, but you should ask them if they’ve seen the little girl too.”

It was a strange response to a intruder question so my dad asked him what he meant, and that’s when my dad learned that this wasn’t the first time an owner of the home had witnessed something like this, however most of what others saw was usually by the well that was located in the backyard. My dad and his partner continued questioning possible witnesses and double-checked the house and its surroundings but never found any sign that there was anyone other than the family in the house.

My dad was incredibly curious and, right before they left, asked the family if they’d seen a little girl around their house. That’s when the wife said “a few weeks ago I woke up because I could hear noises in the backyard, and when I looked out the window I saw a little girl playing by the well. I got up and was going to take her back home but by the time I got outside she was gone. I figured she saw me looking at her and ran off.” She then told my dad that she did ask a few of the neighbors if they had a little girl, just so she could explain to them what happened but when they all told her they didn’t she dropped it. Her husband had never seen a little girl in or around their house and at the time of that particular incident he was working out of town.

My dad has since retired but has said that during his 25 years on the force that was one of the eeriest calls he’d ever responded to. One thing my dad makes sure to clarify about that night is that he can’t say for sure that something paranormal happened because he didn’t see anything, but he 100% believes that the owner of the house did – he’s never forgotten his demeanor or the look of frustration and fear on his face. The couple moved out of that house a few months later and since then the house has had over 10 owners (I don’t know the exact number), each lasting only a couple of years. My dad still keeps in touch with some of his officer buddies and said that to this day they still get calls to that house, with the most recent being last December when and a member of the family of the current owners was found deceased.