Last Exit takes a ride through the graveyards, interviews death merchants, visits some looney tombs and relates tales of what dying in NJ is all about. There are some great epitaphs, unusual interments, ghosts, famous deathstyles, forgotten cemeteries, bodies that show up in unusual places…and of course great stories of vandals, vermin and graverobbers—all here for your enjoyment.

Order Your Copy

 HERE

MAILING STARTS ON JANUARY 4, 2010 on this limited edition (i.e. it’s going to be a LATE holiday gift, which is somewhat fitting. Late. Get it?).

If you live in Washington State you have the choice of visiting two Haunted Houses hosted by two local radio Stations and  in addition to those choices ( you lucky Devils ) you can also opt to go on  Ghost Tour and learn about Seattle’s real life haunted past.

The first house is in King County- it’s put on by KUBE and is being held at

“ The Legendary Georgetown Morgue.”

Visit the site

HERE

What looks like fun this year is that on the site there wil be a live webcam  that will be operational during  the evening hours so you can get a taste of  Morgue fun.

The KUBE 93 Haunted House is going to scare you senseless this year at the creepy, insanely authentic location at the former Georgetown Morgue south of downtown Seattle.

The Second house is being run up here in Snohomish County

by KISSFM

and it’s called the

The House Of Terror

It also happens to be located across the street from the Tulalip Casino

-just saying-

Here’s the House of Terror link

The House Of Terror will also be running a live Terror Cam during operational hours

HERE

Of the three  I must say that my personal favorite is

The Haunted Seattle Tour

I happen to love a good story and I love the ones with that taste of reality in it. Unlike the Haunted Houses, which are fun and you should do at least one in your life time, tours like the one Jake will take you on will leave  the ‘what if’ door in your mind’s eye wide open.

And do you know what walks into doors that are left wide open?

Anything that wants too.

For me that’s scary

(from the website)

                                Jake, a local ghost enthusiast, takes you on a van tour visiting haunts like:

The Elegant Hotel
The Mortuary
The Market
Gambling Den
Poor Farm
The Voice
The Castle
Old Burial Ground
The Basketball Player
Haunted Theater
Notorious Rooming House

Seattle Ghost Tour Link HERE 

Jake Your Seattle Ghost Tour Guide

UPDATE:

FOR INFORMATION ON THE 2009 GEORGETOWN MORGUE

AND OTHER LOCAL HALLOWEEN ATTRACTIONS

GO

HERE 

Today I read an article that debunks the story about The Georgetown Morgue.

 I don’t do the haunted house tour thing ( you know, after you’ve worked in a Funeral Home and had to visit real morgues and years later all you can remember is the taste of McDonald’s French fries because you were consistently assigned removals in the afternoons- just before lunch)- Morgues don’t exactly scare me-

 the thought of them now just makes me hungry.

For French Fries.

The super-sized serving.

Anyway.

I thought the setup for the Georgetown Morgue was a fun idea, a very neat story and the building the “morgue” is staged in is way over the top and looks the part.

Most funeral homes, let’s face it, were supposed to blend because they were either near churches or in neighborhoods and people actually lived in them. 

However subtle- some of them are they are weird if you know what to look for the weirdness- take a look at the garage doors and back doors which are wider then normal to accommodate you know, things which require a lot room to move through, and though the writer of the above mentioned article does toss in the small smoke stacks at the Evergreen Washelli Funeral Home and how unscary they are but he fails to mention the actual creepy thing is the mirror mounted on the roof and tilted upwards towards the smoke stack.

The Funeral Directors use this mirror to make sure the smoke doesn’t turn dark during the cremation process…see CREEPY.

You just need to know where to look to find it.

However- there’s always an however isn’t there?

 On a visit Dubque Iowa, I saw this amazing funeral home called Behr’s- which looks scary by any measure.

So what do I think about the ‘debunking’ of the Georgetown Morgue?

Well.

I’d say the writer who did this didn’t prove anything other then the only story he could come up with was the deconstructing of another writer’s work.

Creating a world and a story and legend for you to follow isn’t easy, placing it in terms that invite readers to want actually walk ( or drive ) to  that door is actual work, bringing a building and people who never existed to life, takes effort, writing a vindictive little hit pieces to ruin the moment for people who wanted to visit the “Georgetown Morgue” ?

Geeze- now that’s just mean spirited.

So visit the setup site for the Georgetown Morgue, it’s actually well done- I thought the way they wove bits of Seattle’s real history into the ‘legend’ was pretty clever - the earthquakes, the hint of the Wa Mee Massacre, the death of a famous local musician wrapped in media hype- made it possible for present day for local residents to ‘relate’ to this building and to the story.

So no- I wouldn’t visit the haunted house- I couldn’t even be bribed with French Fries…however…if someone were to tell me more stories about the Georgetown Morgue- they would have my undivided attention.

After all, this is what we do during Halloween- we spin yarns, tell tales and for one night not only do we get to face the monsters-

we get to face them down.

It’s all part of the fun.

So.

Try.

A few of you, more then others…

to have a

Happy Halloween.

Kube93FM Haunted House

The Georgetown Morgue: Gruesome true story or fabrication?

A few days ago someone sent this to me-

it’s one of those Urban Legend stories about a ghost

that shows up on a security camera.

It made me think because

I have an elevator ghost story.

We have an old freight elevator at work

and the repair men who run the inspections- and its always a different inspection team from year to year- tell the same story about a building just two streets over from where I work.

This is a story ( it’s just a story I’m sure ) about a woman who was murdered on a service elevator that wasn’t used very often (she was moving boxes from her apartment to the basement ) over a holiday weekend and her corpse rode that elevator for three days.

Her remains were discovered after the long weekend was over when someone in the building complained about the service elevator running up and down all night long without stopping.

Nobody could get the elevator to stop and apparently the people in the building had a hard time finding a service crew to come in because of the holiday weekend.

So everyone had to listen to those gears and that motor humming and hissing and running up and down on that last night.

 Finally the repair crew made it in and when they finally got the elevator  stopped they were able to open the doors there she was.

Her neck was broken and her eyes and mouth had been sewn shut.

That was done, I learned before her neck had been snapped.

The elevator always had problems after that and no matter what they did they couldn’t fix it, so eventually the elevator was taken out and the shaft was turned into a staircase.

And sometimes, the people in the building say you can hear clicks and hums all night long coming from the stairwell.

So this story may just be an Urban Legend, like this video.

But the fact is as a writer I know that stories, all stories, were inspired by something or somebody

that was alive and real

That is,

until one day….

I should have been writing last night.

Instead I spent a lot of time staring at a picture that  I have hanging on  on my wall.

It’s a print of some fruit (grapes, bananas, plums) in a fancy fruit bowl, but when you look carefully at  you can see that the bowl is actually a hand and the stem under it is an arm.

It’s a subtle drawing with soft lines and it’s full of colors and shadows and all of it works together to hide that macabre message  ( as I think of it )

in plain sight.

Less then subtle in the foreground, where it’s not hiding at all, is something that looks like rose peals scattered on the beige colored linen table cloth below the bowl.

My Great Grandmother- we never called her Granny Or Grandma or Gran- she wasn’t into having her age addressed – we called her Nan- bought that print back in the 1920’s and nobody knows where it came from- it just showed up above her sideboard one day- so the story goes.

Over the years it seemed some of us realized what that was a picture of but no one ever pointed it out- it was sort of like a test- if you saw what was in the picture and told someone who already knew, you were in the club.

That’s what it felt like anyway.

Nan passed away when I was about 6 years old and when I moved out of my Mom’ and Dad’s just before I turned 19 my Mom gave me my Great Grandmother’s sideboard and the picture above it.

I thought it made my new place perfect- and when I invited my friends over I set my house warming buffet on top of it and watched to see who would notice or see what was in the picture.

It was about an hour into the party when I was standing next to the buffet talking to my cousin when I heard someone laugh and then yell, ” Hey Anita…think fast “…

and then this soccer ball buzzed right by my ear and smashed right into my Great Grandmother’s print.

The frame splintered and the glass cut the 60 plus year old print to ribbons and in less then a minute there wasn’t  enough left of the picture to hang on the wall.

I looked across the room to my friend

and

the first words out of my mouth were “What have you done? “

He cleaned up the remains of the picture and I watched him take the ruined frame and print out to the trash.

But instead of walking all the way down the path to the parking lot where the dumpster was I saw him walk to the flower beds and bury it- and when he came back upstairs he told me, ” that was one weird picture you know. “

He said some more- only I wasn’t  listening because I was thinking to myself the entire time he was talking  to me, ” It’s a good thing Nan is dead- because she’d kill you for that.”

My friend died a week later, he ran his car into the back of a parked truck- he was going over 80 miles an hour when he hit it. 

It happned just down the hill from my Parent’s house.

“ He was racing another car ” one of the Police Officers told my Mom. ” One of the witnesses thinks the other driver was a woman. “

What my Mom said will stay with me forever.

She said, ” I wouldn’t count on that.”

So how is it I was looking at that picture last night ?

Was it the same one from my childhood?

Of course it was.

Ten years ago we bought this house from my Mom and Dad and after they moved out she asked my husband to go up into the attic and pull down some furniture that she had room in her new place for after all.

He was up there for just a few minutes when I heard him call down to me, ” Hey, this would look great above your sideboard “

I remember walking to the trapdoor and reaching up and he handed me down the print and I took it, without looking at it and hung it above the sideboard…

where it is right now.

And to this day some people notice it for what it is and other people never do.

Just like this story.

Sometimes on  my way to Whopperville ( that’s what I say when I’m working on a story…I’m heading out to Whopperville ) I’ve run across some true stories that haunt me-  they give me nightmares or creep me out for days.

At the moment I’m working on a story about a Hanging Tree and in my research I found out that the slang name for these trees were ” Dancing Trees “

I’ll let that visual sort of sink in there.

At first blush some of my friends with more refined literary tastes thought I was making a poetic gesture when I floated the first draft for this story out to them.

You can stop laughing now.

The image that came to my mind about Dancing Trees came to me one night and woke me from a dead sleep.

And there was nothing poetic about it.

I saw a group of people sitting under a large shady tree on a hot day  having a picnic. They were dressed in their best summer clothes and as they laughed softly and admired the beauty around them I knew they are blissfully ignorant to the fact that

…many years ago someone danced…

for their lives

right above t their heads

And when I looked up I could see…

they still were.

I found this article at BBC

It’s about a Hang Man’s Tree

That’s located in…

  Kings Mills, Wrexham Wales

Let The Danse Begin…

Hang Man’s tree

Last updated: 31 December 2007

 There is a mill by the river but to get to the really spooky part you have to walk under a bridge. It belongs to the National Trust. Anyway, by the bridge in Biniki there is a tree where events have occurred for centuries.

We normally go there during the summer months and sit on the side by what is called Hang Man’s tree for obvious reasons. There has always been a presence there and I can sense paranormal activity quite easily. That’s why everyone comes with me.

This one night though it got very scary indeed, so much so I told everybody to get up and make for the road. My niece, myself and my husband got across the bridge in time but as we turned to scream for the others they had been blocked off with what can only be described as a distorted shape of mist. It was just floating there and when they moved, it moved.

We screamed for them to run but it followed. They ran through the river but it didn’t cross. As we ran nearly a mile to get out of there it was on the other side of the river along side of us every inch of the way back to the mill where it stayed in the woods. Quite an experience.

I spoke to someone many weeks after that and I asked them when they were younger did they ever experience anything there. They described the same shape even though I had not mentioned it. We have been back there and it has happened a few more times at the same time around about 2.25am.

We have only ever managed to stay there once through the night. This is only one area that has activity. Coming back from there another night we couldn’t stay because it was getting a bit uneasy there. We started to walk back though and got out safe and sound.

However as we passed through the gates on the opposite side of the old mill me and my brother saw a man walking straight at us, we moved apart so he could pass between us. We said ‘hello’ to him but he ignored us.

Anyway we turned to make sure my husband was OK because he was straggling behind. As we turned the man just walked straight through him. I looked at my brother and he looked at me. My husband was oblivious to it all and said he saw no-one there. All I can say is there are many discssions about Biniki but you have to be there at the right time and the spirits seem to love being there when I am. 

King’s Mill Wrexham, Wales

LINK

LINK

Iowa county board gives initial OK for ghost hunters to investigate asylum built in 1855

By Associated Press

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) – County officials have given their informal OK for ghost hunters to check out a one-time insane asylum to see if any spirits are lurking about.

for more ” Weirdness ” visit

Weird New Jersey

Tomorrow, Saturday, November 3, WNJ’s own Joanne Austin and Ryan Doan will be signing their book Weird Hauntings: True Tales of Ghostly Places, at the Barnes & Noble store in Howell from 2 to 4 PM. The store is located on the northbound side of Route 9.

NOW HERE’S A TASTE….READ THIS BOOK…IN THE DARK…I DARE YOU

amm

“Did you hear something?” “Is someone there?” “Did you ever get that feeling you were being watched?” Sometimes, fellow readers, there are no answers to these questions. At least no answers that make sense in our real, tangible, predictable world. Because there is another world out there – one that’s full of weird hauntings.And who better to bring otherworldly nightmares to you than Weird NJ’s own Joanne Austin, who has compiled the eeriest, strangest, most hair-raising, and true (as far as we mortals can tell) stories of ghosts that haunt our neighborhoods, battlefields, restaurants, roads, hotels, schools, and.….homes. All the dead are beautifully illustrated and brought back to life by long time Weird NJ artist Ryan Doan (RyanDoan.com). Whether it’s the specters that traverse Zombie Road, the Nob Hill Ghost, the spirits of weary soldiers at Antietam, or the antics of little Sarah who invisibly moves objects in an Ohio inn, you are about to encounter specters who will startle you, sometimes make you smile, and, more often than not, scare the living daylights out of you. Weird hauntings are everywhere. And, good people that we are, we even include their addresses. Sleeping with the lights on tonight? Don’t forget to check under the bed.

“Anita, you write stories about ghosts and the living dead…you worked in a funeral home so tell me…what’s the scariest thing you’ve ever seen? “

To be honest, I’ve seen lots of strange things but I’ve never seen anything that ever scared me. So I’ll laugh, joke and blow the question off.

Ask me the right question though and you’ll get a different answer- you’ll get THE answer

and here it is:

To let you know right off- I’ve never SEEN anything that frightened me but once I felt something that did.

I was working alone in a basement and for once I had the radio off and it was quiet, just still and calm. It was a nice feeling, sort of a ’sitting by the lake at sunset’ feeling.

I was reaching for something up high on a shelf when I felt something tug at the bottom of my plaid work shirt- I always wear oversized plaid shirts when I’m down there because the dust is so bad it wrecks my clothes. I thought I’d caught my shirttail on something so I reached back and pulled it down.

Then I walked to the next shelf and just as I reached up I felt that tug again and I stood there with my arm halfway up in the air when I felt the same tug- up higher this time- under my shoulder blade.

 I knew I wasn’t alone.

And I knew if I turned around there would be nobody standing there.

Now, when I’m in trouble, or stressed out I give myself these pep talks and it’s always my Grandfather’s voice I hear.Only this time it was my Great Grandmother I heard- and let me tell you she was ’snap your spine if you made her angry’ type of a woman.

 Comfort was not a word that springs to mind when I think of Nan.

” Don’t you dare turn around ” I was hearing, ” You keep those eyes forward and don’t turn around.”

Then I felt something tug at the end of my braid and I bit my lips really hard and tried to not yell. But I didn’t turn around and as I walked away from the shelf I didn’t look back.

If you can imagine it- worse then that tug on my shirt was that feeling that something was just behind me. Whatever it was wouldn’t go away and it followed me up the basement stairs.

When I got to the top steps and crossed over the threshold I turned around and pulled the door closed. And then I opened it again reached in and snapped the light off.

 This time I kicked the door shut.

That’s it; those five minutes are the one thing that scared me. You can make what you like of those minutes- after all I still wonder about them myself.

I’d advise you to not consider them when you’re alone though, I don’t.

I not only write ghost stories

I’ve lived some.

enjoy 

About 10 years ago my husband and our three kids moved back to Mountlake Terrace. When we moved to Terrace we moved into a brand new Apartment Complex, I think there had been less then a half dozen renters in the place.

So it was new and spiffy and energy efficient.

About two weeks after we moved in I was in my bathroom brushing my teeth before bed.

It had been raining and thundering all evening, so when I started to see flashes of lighting it wasn’t exactly a surprise.

Anyway, I was looking into my bathroom mirror- I saw myself, I saw my bedroom window over my shoulder and then I saw blinding white light in the mirror and then my teeth slammed together and there was this deafening roar and all I could think was, ” I’m in trouble. “

I wasn’t in trouble- but the tree outside my bedroom window was.

 The next day we found out it had been hit by lightning and you could see the scorch mark down one side and two of its limbs were blasted off and another was left dangling.

The kids played and tugged at the damaged tree limb until it came off. I remember them dragging it around for a while and the maintenance man broke it up and threw it away.

It was shortly after that  when the ghosts came.

My youngest son is a social animal.

At the age of  7 and after only a few weeks of living in our new place he knew everyone. By that I mean he knew names and who lived where and what they did and their pets names and millions of other little details.

Don’t ask me how he did it.

Then he changed.

It was a gradual change-  my son started to sleep a lot during the day,  he started getting dark circles under his eyes and when he started hiding his favorite toys around the living room I thought that maybe the move had affected him after all.

One day I was pulling his collection of Ninja Turtles from out of my bookcase (he had hidden them behind the books) when he went walking by with his skateboard under his arm and said he wanted to take a nap.

It was about 2:00 in the afternoon and enough was enough.

I asked why he was so tired and he said, ” this little boy comes into my room at night and plays with my toys and he’s keeping me awake.”

” Is that why you’re hiding your toys? “

” Yeah. “

 Is it working? ” I said trying to play along.

My son shrugged and went into his room and took his nap.

It was a little while after the toys in the bookshelf incident when my Sister came over for a visit.

My kids had insisted on a pet hamster because not only did their Mom have a cat she had pet rats and the boys decided pets shouldn’t be something only Moms got to have.

They named  their new pet Scooter.

My Sister and I were alone in the apartment- the kids, my husband and her husband were all out buying pizza.

We were in the kid’s room playing with Scooter.

We put him into one of those little balls hamsters  can run around in and I remember my cat was sitting in the doorway and I was going to push the ball with the hamster in it towards him.

My cat had been raised with my rats and he had this thing were he wouldn’t go for rats or hamsters and my Sister didn’t believe it.

So we both look up to where Wolfgang had been sitting when this little boy ran right passed the bedroom door and down the hall towards my bedroom.

” Who’s that? “ my Sister asked.

” Probably a neighbor kid. They walk in all the time. “

I went to get the kid when my cat sort of slinked around the corner and he looked up at me and growled.

I don’t mean that cat growl- it was big and deep and his ears flattened against his head.

I went to push him out of the way with my foot and he reached forward and grabbed my ankle with his teeth. Then he started to  jerk backwards with these little snaps to his neck and the entire time he’s doing this he’s looking up at me and growling.

Then he sort of turned without letting go and tried to pull me back into my kid’s room.

My sister was yelling, I was screaming  because my cat was holding onto my ankle and the blood was starting to run and no matter what we did or how loud we yelled he wouldn’t let go.

Then his ears went back up; he let go of  my ankle and he walked out into the living room.

” There’s no one in the apartment except us…is there? ” my Sister asked.

I remember I couldn’t answer because I didn’t know.

I’ll leave you with this final ghost story-

Out of a dead sleep I woke up at exactly 1:45 in the morning and standing beside my bed was my Grandfather.

I was really glad to see him- it had been about 14 years since he had died. He’d missed my Wedding and my High school Graduation and a million other great things.

Now I was going to get the chance to tell him all about it and I remember trying to wake up more so that I could get my husband to wake up and meet my Grandpa.

I was surprised- but not that my Grandfather was there but that he looked so young.

He looked like he did in his late 30’s- I’d only seen pictures of him in those days and I wasn’t sure why he looked like that and not like the man I’d known.

But that was okay- all that mattered was that he was here now.

This went on for a week- I’d wake up at the same time and there he was standing by me looking happy and relaxed and pleased to see me.

At the end of the week my Grandfather’s sister passed away.

I was heartbroken- she was a great lady and she use to tell this great story about performing in a childrens choir ‘back in the day’ for Prisoners in an honest to goodness Prison.

They were singing for genuine convicted killers and robbers.

I use to ask a million questions about what it was like inside of a Prison and she was happy to tell me.

Plus she could whistle through her teeth.

She had a great life if you ask me.

Anyway, I never asked what time she died- I was sure I already knew.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

So there are my stories- are they true?

Did they really happen?

Did they?

From The Guys At

Weird New Jersey

watch this alone…at night…with the lights off

 go one…give it a try

it’ll be a scream.

amm

This is 2nd Ave in Seattle, Washington.

It’s more then just a street…

I find stories here all of the time.

Strange ones.

a.m.m.

Second Avenue Before The Fire

During The Fire

 after the Fire

and what lies beneath

Photographer’s notes: “Mineral palace Great Northern Celebration July 8 1893″ “Pavilion Pioneer Square. Celebration of Completion of the Great Northern Ry July 3 1893″.

I put this here because my Grandfather told me that a man was buried under those steps alive (of course) in vault after he was caught cheating in a game of cards that didn’t involve money.

 Grandpa told me he was sure the man could probably hear the construction going on above him but that no one could hear him screaming-

so my Grandfather claims.

 In 1903 The Ringling Brothers Circus came to Seattle and elephants walked down  2nd Ave.

That’s another story I grew up on because some of my family members were there that day and they saw those elephants and the Circus Performers walking down the middle of the street that I now cross every day to catch my bus.

100 years almost to the day I hear a story from who woman sees the Ringling Brothers train come through Seattle.

 The train is pulling empty animal cages and travel cars and Big Top rigging on flat beds. She remembers lace curtains in the private cars and the faded circus logo painted on anything that could hold paint.

She says she still doesn’t know how to explain the feeling she got when she realized she didn’t see one person moving around in the passenger cars or in the engine car or getting on or off the train the entire time it was stopped right off her loading dock.

Not a Soul.

True story.

( Luna Park )

The Luna Park Fire- if my Grandfather or Aunt told me a good ghost or murder story they always tied it to the Luna Park Fire and DIRECTLY to the Famous Looff  Carousel.

After years of being scared out of my mind by those stories I was glad ( in a very malcious way ) when they came to the part when the Park burned down- but the part that always haunted me was the part about how the Carousel gets away.

        Specifically, how it always seems to get away.

The Carousel’s Weird Story starts when the famous Carousel craftsman Charles Looff built it in 1906. The Carousel was supposed to be sent to an amusement park in San Francisco- but it was re-routed to Seattle because of the Great San Francisco Earthquake and Fire.

(Escaped was the word my Grandfather used) 

It was installed in Luna Park in 1907 and it was the only thing to survive the Luna Park Fire in 1911.

(Escaped was the word my Aunt used and she insisted they moved it at dark)

 It was purchased by a private collector in the 1970’s and put in storage in New Mexico- Roswell, New Mexico and I am NOT making that up.

That Carousel is still around- it’s in San Francisco and I wouldn’t go near it for neither love or money.

So there’s my 2nd Avenue in Seattle-

some of these places I’ve told you about are on it

or under it or just a few blocks down

from it.

That Street

 haunted me and inspired me for my entire life and I guess that should make sense because

 I was born in Seattle

and I know she has

strange and weird ways

 of speaking to you

and

of claiming you

and of making you her own.

Which is not a bad thing at all.

amm

When I sit down and get ready to write a story here at the Bridge this scene from the movie Barton Fink comes to mind.

Charlie:

Take a look around…
You’re just a tourist with a typewriter,
Barton.  I live here.  Don’t you understand
that . . .

That scene pops into my head when I start to write a story because as a writer who sits by a campfire under a Bridge between the worlds and tells stories to strangers who happen to be passing by I can identify with Barton (the visitor) being raged at by Charlie, the man inhabiting a world that other people can only catch a glimpse of.

A world that they haven’t been invited into.

I started to go back to that scene in ‘Barton Fink’  several times a day ( what can I say, I write a lot) and I began to wonder -What was it REALLY like down there?

So I asked Regan Vacknitz to stop by and tell me what it’s like to reside, to be an invited guest to end of The Bridge.  I asked Regan because she’s the best guide in town-

Regan, you see, is a real life Paranormal Investigator.

 So let’s make some room for her round the campfire tonight. She has  an interesting story to tell:

My husband, David aka Vinnie, and I started this group roughly two
years ago. However, we have been doing investigations for about four years. Our very first investigation was Thornewood Castle. Thornewood is m known for being the creepy mansion in Stephen King’s “Rose Red.”

Since then A.P.A.R.T  has really taken off.

We have investigated known places like Bair Restaurant in Steilacoom, Old Western State Ruins in Steilacoom, as well as a plethora of private residences and historical societies.

 It was through the investigations at the Historical Societies that
really got us thinking about our direction.

A lot of paranormal groups just want to investigate the larger known locations. We do, don’t get us wrong, but we also like the smaller unknowns as well.

 We love working with the historical societies, because they keep us going. Our support of them keeps them going. We really assist each other.On the private residency side, we discovered that we are the only team, so far, that actually has a follow up “Post investigation family welfare check” form that we use.

We have found through experiences with other teams, that those teams usually do the investigations and turn over the findings in a report form.If you have a family that is calling you for help, usually you’re their resort to ending  their fear and chaos.

It seems a bit one sided if you go in, investigate, turn over findings and never contact them again. Who benefits? Only the paranormal teams do.

We have essentially taken on the role of Sociologist and community service providers. Our team prides itself on the follow up we do. We have shared our form with other teams, who have said, “Wow this is really a great idea!”

On the community service side, we have recently adopted a stretch of
highway for litter control. The stretch is about 1.75 miles, and along
side a cemetery. Can’t beat that!! You can find us on Highway 99, next
to Gethsemane Catholic Cemetery near Fife, WA.

We are also in the process of trying to adopt an older cemetery for documentation and photography, as well as beautification.

We are very into the community that provides us with an avenue to
pursue our macabre, bizarre, and unique hobbies. 

 I’d like to thank Regan for sharing her story. I hope you’ll drop by A.P.A.R.T and check out their site- here. Following ( in part ) is their mission statement as well as their contact information.

amm

We are A.P.A.R.T. of Washington

A.P.A.R.T. stands for Auburn Paranormal Activities Research Team.

We are a non charging, professional, light hearted but serious, fun loving team. We try to prove things scientifically, before ever declaring anything possibly haunted. We are honest if we do not get any viable evidence. We do not, NOR WILL WE EVER, CHARGE for our evidence, investigations, etc. We do, however, accept donations.

Look for us on the web at HERE
or email us at  info@apartofwa.com