The Syracuse and Lake Wawasee Journal, Volume 13, Number 42, Syracuse, Kosciusko County, 17 February 1921 — Page 3

A GHOST STORY FROM A HALF CENTURY AGO IN OLD SYRACUSE (Cow hided from Page One) one evening, as the lights were of course extinguished before they retired, it was quite dark in the house, and for some time after going to bed they were engaged in conversation about their domestic affairs and felicitating themselves greatly upon the happiness in store for them in the future. Up to this time, excepting the noise caused by their conversation, there was the most perfect silence and quiet in the house, when all at once Sloan says he heard a noise under the table, which was sitting in the southwest corner of the room, which he says sounded to him as if their shoes were being tumbled over and over each other, the shoes having been left in another corner diagonally across the room; thinking that perhaps his wife had put the shoes where he thought he heard the noise, he asked his wife why she had put the shoes under the table and not in the usual place. She replied that she had not put them under the table but in the corner where they usually kept them. He said to her-then that he supposed the cat had been left in the house and she was tumbling the shoes around under the table. After a few minutes a loud cracking noise was heard on one side of the room below, which was followed by a similar noise that sounded like a heavy person walking slowly and deliberately i to and fro across the floor with long measured strides. The noise in the room below would sometimes cease for a few minutes and suddenly be heard in the room or loft over head, and when heard over head, would invariably commence with a dull, heavy thud, like the noise that would be made by a person’s naked heel being brought down on thd floor with a good deal of force this, as when heard below, would we followed up by the cracking noise, only very much louder, and which Mr. Sloan says, sounded almost exactly like the cracking of thin ice when a person is walking over it slowly. These noises were continued night after night for nearly two years. Shortly after these mysterious noises were first heard to add variety to the ghostly manifestations, strange lights would be seen at intervals in the room below, shooting up from the floor at times very much like the Northern Lights and then fading away. These lights, Mr. Sloan says, were invariably preceded by the heavy, dull thud and cracking noise on the floor above, after which, in a few minutes, a faint light like moonlight reflected from a mirror would appear in the room, usually upon the walls of the house, and nearly always in the same place, although it would occasionally appear on the opposite side of the house, and would shoot up the walls sometimes to the ceiling. These lights, however, would

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’not always assume the same' shape; sometimes it was a mere streak, another time a spot, and a few times had very much the j shape of a human figure. These■ strange and unaccountable phen-| omena, repeated night after night, were of course very annoying, and Mr. Sloan says, for a considerable length of time after i they first made their appearance, disturbed them so much as to prevent them from sleeping at times, but after awhile they became used to it, and paid no attention to it and slept as soundly as though there was nothing the matter. There was one peculiarity about the noises that were heard. Mr. Sloan says that .at first he would sometimes get out of patience and scold at the invisible disturber of his rest, using such language as, “Why don’t you make a loud noise?” “A little louder;” “Do your best, now,” etc. In every such instance the noise would be very much louder, seemingly thereby to intimate to Sloan that ’his ghostship understood what he was about, and proposed to run the show after his own fashion whether it pleased anybody else or not. Not long after these strange phenomena made their appearance at his house, Mr. Sloan says for fear people might say that these things were all imaginary, he thought he would have his father-in-law come and stay a night at his house, and without letting him know anything about the mysterious lights and noises, invited the old gent, to come and ! stay all night with him which he accordingly did. The noises on that night seem to have been pitched on an unusually high key, for the old man’s especial benefit; the noises were that night unusually loud and frequent, and at one time during the night, Mr. Sloan getting a little out of patience requested his ghostship to do something a little extra for that special occasion, whereupon one of the posts of the bed upon which they were trying to sleep seemed to be split from top to bottom, with a report like that of a pistol. The>old man, his father-in-law got all the supernatural entertainment that night that he wanted and I believe never stayed over night there again. These mysterious noises were invariably heard at night, and after Mr, Sloan and wife had retired to bed for the night, the light extinguished, and all had become quiet, their ghostly visitant would commence his vexatious serenade and hold high carnival the live long night. These strange and peculiar noises and lights so persistently continued, without any apparent cause and susceptible of no reasonable explanation, it would seem, would have caused almost anybody to abandon the house in disgust, but Mr. Sloan and his wife were not so easily frightened. The idea of leaving their cozy little house and giving it up to a harmless, though somewhat noisy ghost, never entered their heads, and they clung to it

THE SYRACUSE AND LAKE WAWASEE JOURNAL

land continued industriously to work and improve their little farm for nearly two years after i these manifestations commenced, 1 when being offered a fair price for the property, they sold it and bought another not more than half a mile away. When they moved out of the house, the ghostly manifestations ceased altogether, and were never heard or seen afterwards. The people who lived in the house after Mr. Sloan and his wife left it, never saw or heard anything to disturb or annoy them in the least; the change of ownership seeming to have acted like a charm in putting a stop to the operations of the mysterious stranger, who for so long a time had been flashing his lights and rattling his noises about the house. After the change above mentioned, Mr. Sloan and his wife were permitted to enjoy as great a degree of quiet and domestic happiness as usually falls to the lot of people of their condition in life and their efforts to lay up a competence for old age was crowned with success and a subsequent change* to a larger and better farm, so much bettered their condition as to render them practically independent. Mr. Sloan still lives on the last named farm, blessed with all the comforts of life that he could reasonably desire, but his wife, Sallie, did not long live to enjoy their new home. Some four years since she completed her allotted task in life, and passed away to the land of shadows. The foregoing statement of the strange and mysterious phenomena that for so long a time were witnessed almost nightly at Mr. Sloan’s house, are given just as they were detailed to me by Mr. Sloan, and thfy can be substantiated by many of the old neighbors still living who saw and heard them, and who were quite as much puzzled over the matter as Sloan himself. I would add here- that many persons who have witnessed the rappings and other strange and peculiar noises at the so-called “Seances" of modern spiritualists, will doubtless recognize at once'a very great similarity between the noises heard at Mr. Sloan’s house and the so-called “spirit rappings,” and if they had happened a few years later, they would have been claimed by modern spiritualists as a very remarkable instance of spiritual manifestations, and’Mr. and Mrs. Sloan would have been set down as first-class “mediums." There was one peculiar fact connected with these strange noises and lights at Mr. Sloan’s house, that I must admit would seem to confirm to some extent the spiritual theory, and that is, they were never heard nor seen excepting when Mr. Sloan or his

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wife were in the house; when they were away the house, was as quiet and noiseless as a tomb. If Mr. Sloan and his wife were! mediums, and could "call spirits j from the vasty deep,” they were : in blissful ignorance of possess-| ing this peculiar faculty,, and | also very unfortunate after hav-1 ing called up the spirits in not I knowing how to lay them again.l I must say for myself, however, that I do not believe in the Spiritualist theory of the case at all, but am firmly of the opinion that these phenomena were the result of some other agency than that of disembedied spirits. I give the foregoing as one of the instances in which there were some facts upon which to predicate the story that a certain house was haunted; that the facts as stated are true is beyond all question. What the cause may have been that produced the phenomena, I must leave each and every one of your readers to figure out and settle for himself, and if any one can give a rational and logical explanation of them, I must confess they are better posted in the supernatural world than I am. Having thus given your readers a specimen of a genuine “spook,” I propose at some future time, to give a few instances of the bogus article.— (By Wilks Micawber, Esq. o GOOD SYRUP YEAR . Reports from over Indiana indicate a big maple yield. A dispatch from Columbus says camps in that locality are in operation and that the yield will likely be the largest recorded in 20 years. The sap is running more freely and in larger quantity than for many years. Alternate freezings and thawings have brought about this condition it is said. Frank Oberlies of near Columbus, with a camp in which there are 325 trees, already has made twentyfour gallons of syrup, and estimates that the yield will be many times that amount. Last year his camp produced only twenty gallops the entire season. Several camps that have not been in use for several years are open and all report the same unusually large flow of sap. Maple syrup is being sold at $2.50 a gallon but there is little on the market because the demand for it is so great that it is sold to individual purchasers as fast as it is produced. Camps are in excellent condition, it is said, in Kosciusko county. PARAGRAPHIC BITS I Mrs. Gertrude Weaver and ; daughter of Elkhart spent Tuesday in Syracuse visiting with Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Mishler. Mrs. Preston H. Miles and Mrs.

Ernest C. Smith spent Tuesday in Elkhart' visiting at the Dr. B. F. Kuhn home. i According to the United States , Bureau of Statistics, 84 percent ; :of the business concerns which . j failed in 1920 were non-adver- . i tisers. ( Lots of people who have been , I objecting to food prices this ! winter will not blister their own < Jiands on a hoe handle next 1 summer. > ' ] One way to pay the expenses of the government for the next ; four years would-be to levy a ’ tax on applications for federal j offices. 1 While everybody is making such a fuss about the oil supply 1 giving out, we wish to state that < there is also an aw’ful shortage 1 of elbow grease. 1 Sometimes it seems to us that more notice is taken of a typo- J graphical error in Our Home 1 Newspaper than there is in a ‘ whole column that is correct. The South has determined to : reduce the cotton acreage to onehalf that of last year. We will ‘ just have to continue wearing our silk socks, that is all. Lenine is quoted as hoping for an early shipment to Russia of raw material from the United 1 States. Certainly we sent him 1 some in that shipload of deportees. NORTH WEBSTER The North Webster basket ball teams scored two victories here last week. The high school team ! defeated the Cromwell high school five Friday evening. The city team here won the game played with the Atwood e Independents on the local floor Saturday evening. On Wednesday evening of last week, however, the city quintet met defeat when they played at Larwill. Mr. and Mrs. G. N. Druley entertained Mr. and Mrs. Ross Rodibaugh and son George at dinner Sunday evening. Mr. and 3 Mrs. Glen Whitehead spent Saturday with his parents south of town. Mrs. Nat J. Kline has been very ill the past week but is much improved at the present writing. The M. E. ladies aid met at the home of Mrs. Carrie Druley last Thursday afternoon. Ten or more members responded to roll call and discussed the business at hand. Mrs. Glen Whitehead, Mrs. Charles Gerard and Edith Hontz were guests. , A community meeting was held at the Brethren church Sunday afternoon. The regular j

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minister, who comes from North ■ Manchester college and Mr. Keifer, county chairmad of the Near ; East Relief Fund, spoke to a large crowd. The local band furnished several selections at j the opening of the srevices. Over one hundred thirty dollars were given toward this fund. Mrs. Ivan Kline and little son of Elkhart has been spending the ; the' last few days at the N. J. j Kline home. Mr. and Mrs. Harry Breading and children, Helen and Kenneth were guests of Dr. and Mrs. G.i N. Druley at a six o’clock dinner ’ Friday evening. Carl Bockman Was taken to a hospital in Warsaw Monday evening where he will receive treatments for his teeth which has been causing his rheumatism. Miss Eva Bates, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. H. Bates of this I place,, and Mr. Otto Miller of Aetna were quietly married at the home of Mr and Mrs. Merle Bause Friday-evening with Rev. V. L. Clear officiating. They left at once for the home of groom’s parehts at Aetna. The bride is ' a teacher and an accomplished, young musician. She" has been , i ■i ■■ hiii L . J_±L ■gIIBJSMW

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I prominent in the church and social circles since moving here a few months ago with her parents. Her many friends wish her a long life of happiness with her chosen partner. - NORTH SIDE Don Strock was home from Stroh to spend over Sunday here with his family. Mrs. Benj. F. Hentzell has returned from Goshen after spending two weeks there visiting with her daughter. Frank Bailey spent a day in on business. Heber Parker of South Bend came Saturday to visit with his wife, who is staying at the Don Strock home. We understand that some of our neighbors are going to leave i town, Ed Darr, Bert Cleland and 1 Fred Statler. Mr. and Mrs. S. L. Outland have returned from Detroit, where they have been visiting for some time with their son and family. Mrs. Simon Bell visited Tuesday with her parents, Mr. and , Mrs. Benj. Hentzell.

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