Location: Grove Cemetery, Pleasant Hill Road
City: Brunswick/Freeport
On Monday October 6, 2008 MaineGhostHunters Tony and Kat took a drive to a location neither had previously been to before, for a short investigation with a primary purpose of using our Ghost Box for the first time. This is what Kat has to say about the day's events.
The drive to this particular location was somewhat unplanned. I knew about this cemetery because I had been by it before, but I hadn't actually gone inside it or anything, so while I knew it was there, it was still virgin ground for us as investigators. Our reason for being out that day, at this cemetery in particular, was to test out our new ghost box. Tony had modified the Radio Shack am/fm model 20-125 a while back and we hadn't gotten around to using it yet so we wanted to take it to a location away from our house where spirit activity might be prevalent.
Now, I'm a firm believer that spirits don't stick solely with their physical bodies once they pass one from this life, but I also believe that we, as people, know our loved ones visit graves from time to time to pay homage to those people who may have affected our lives in some way or another. If we know they they're probably going to be visiting where we're buried, and we know we can't make contact with them at other "normal" locations they'd be at, like in their homes or in their cars, or what have you, then what other place would make sense to try and make contact? At least at a graveyard they're more likely to be wanting to make contact, why else would they go to a place to visit someone who's been deceased for however-long? People go to burial grounds for a few reasons; to make peace, to show respect, to pay homage, to grieve, and sometimes, to receive some sort of sign from the other side.
So anyway, we made our way into the cemetery, and I have to tell you, it was really not at all a creepy place. The cemetery is wide open, bright and airy, and there's even a couple of new glossy stone benches to sit on. There are some fantastic monuments to be seen in this cemetery, and the overall area is pretty expansive. There are old burials as well as new ones throughout the grounds, so you really get a strong mix of time-periods, and in some cases you get a strong sense of family because there's quite a few generations of similar names and heritage lines buried in close proximity to each other.
When we started our ghost box session we decided to ask for the older generation to step forward. We had never really done this before so we weren't entirely sure what we should be doing or how we should be going about it. After we asked the older generation to communicate with us it seemed we were getting "possible" responses from the box, but being realists we also admitted that those sounds and words coming from box could be just as much "random" as "purposeful", so we let them go. We considered our ghost box session up to this point to be uneventful and unsuccessful.
It was after this failed attempt at making contact with the older, wiser, crowd that we asked them to step back and we appealed to the lesser number of deceased population in the cemetery (at least we hoped that was the case). We asked the younger crowd to step forward, anyone under the age of 20 was invited to make contact with us. Here's how it went:
GB: Five (5)
Tony: It just said 5?
Kat: 5? Under the age of 20?
Tony: can you tell us what your name is? your first name?
GB: TIMMY
Kat: Timmy, did you hear that?
GB: Matt
Kat: Matt?
Tony: Judy
Kat: [Heard it]
GB: 3 of them
Kat: It just said 3 of'em, and then ... then it just said Three of'em.
One of the more significant events we experienced while at this cemetery and while using this ghost box is that we continued asking questions about the kids, and learned that "Timmy" (as
heard in the above session) was 14/15 years old when he died and no matter where we looked we couldn't find a "Timmy" anywhere on the grounds. We chalked this up to a sort of failure, and a learning experience for future sessions, letting this be a reminder that we need to be careful of what we really
are hearing and what we're really
not hearing.
Later on in the ghost box session we had received messages from the device which led us to believe we should be looking for something "red" beside one of the headstones. There was nothing "red" within site so, always within site of Tony, I set off on a solo jaunt through the cemetery to see what I could find. While I was walking the grounds Tony was holding the ghost box and began to communicate with it. When I returned I noticed he was walking around in the center of the cemetery while holding the ghost box out in front of him so he could clearly hear what was being said from it. He told me the ghost box had told him to look for "Curtis" in the "middle" of the cemetery. Apparently, "Curtis" was a name that was said repeatedly and Tony couldn't deny it any more, so he went searching for a headstone by that name. He hadn't yet found it when I arrived, so when he told me what he was looking for and how he came to understand where to look for it, I took the direction as well.
From our perception, the box was giving us directions on where to walk. "Middle", "back up", "look", etc... by the time we were finished we were standing among a family plot area with a large number of "Curtis" headstones. It was a strange experience and from a skeptical point of view, I suppose it could have been one that started with a subconscious noticing of the headstones as we walked into the cemetery. It's a stretch, but I suppose it's almost as reasonable as thinking a radio could throw out random words and lead us to a cluster of "Curtis" headstones. At this point, I didn't know
what to think.
During another section of this ghost box session Tony had told me, a couple of times, that he kept hearing the word "Frank". He was sure we should be paying attention to this name but it wasn't enough to find
A Frank, he needed a last name to put the "questionable" nature of this "random shot in the dark" possibility, to rest. Here's how this portion of the session went down.
Looking for FrankTony: Ok, I'm gonna ask again. Can you tell me the first name
GB: Say What
Kat: Say What?
GB: I'll Keep talking
Tony: Can you give me the first name of the spirit I am looking for?
GB: [not clear in this recorded audio session]
Tony: did that say Frank?
Kat: Did it say Frank? Again?
GB: Frank
Tony: You need to make it
very clear
GB: Daniel
Tony: Danielle
Kat: Okay. Whe- Daniel? or Danielle?
Tony: Danielle
Tony: Can you tell me the last name now?
Kat: 3 of'em?
Tony: You need to say the last name
very clear.
GB: Byrom
Kat: -
Tony: Byrom
Kat: Oh my god, I'm gonna start to freak out if that was - that was sooo. What was the name?
Tony: Maybe it was Isaac we heard instead of Frank
[we're walking toward the Byrom headstone, looking at all names of headstones that are in the immediate vicinity. we meet up on the left side-edge of the Byrom headstone just as Tony finishes saying "maybe it was isaac we heard instead of Frank"]
Kat: That's Frank Byrom
Tony: Oh my god. 1957, and his wife Mary, we heard Mary over there.
I find that particular sound file to be a little challenging, but the information is there, and hopefully you can understand what's being said in it. We weren't planning on doing anything with the audio file, in terms of the ghost box session, so we didn't record for the purposes of replaying the session later. We were mainly recording for EVP's and admittedly, some of the lower toned sounds and words spoken from the radio are a little difficult to hear.
At one point during our time in the cemetery Tony decided he needed to hunt down a name the ghost box had said. Since I had already gone on a solo jaunt through the grounds I decided to let him take this one himself, which left me standing alone with the ghost box in my hand. In a laissez faire sort of way I asked the ghost box to say my name, and this is what transpired.
"Can you say my name?"Kat: Can you say my name? My name's Kathy, can you say it?
GB: Kat
Kat: Thank you...tha-that's....that made-that's great
GB: And Michael
Kat: What? What did - wh- ...
I have a brother named Michael. As you might be able to tell, I was a little thrown aback by the fact that my brother's name was said. In fact, when I heard it, I was genuinely speechless, and like I've said before, that rarely ever happens.
After the "Frank" & "and Michael" incidents happened, our time there was quite limited - by choice. We were getting pretty anxious to head out of the grounds and to put this box away for another time. A time when we could really come to terms with what did, or what did not happen there in that cemetery on this day. Did we really hear what we thought we did? Did the ghost box send us to the "Curtis" memorials? Did it tell us to look for "Frank... Byrom". Afterall, when it said the name "Byrom" I was certain it was saying the name "Byron". Byron is n't a common name, but it
is a name. And while I was trying to bring some sort of order to all that was running through my mind about how we could justify that what we thought was happening, wasn't happening at all, I had to be honest and admit that "Byrom" is extremely
close to the name "Byron", especially when you hear it on a radio, outdoors, and have never heard the name "Byrom" before. You're far more likely to translate a word you haven't heard before, into a word you are more comfortable with hearing. Hence, the reason "Byrom" was heard (or even said) as "Byron".
We were discussing all of this, and much more, as we made our way back to the car and came upon a large family monument with the name "James" Small on it. The man had lived into his 80's or 90's and had a grandson who was also named "James" who had lived only to the age of 14 or 15 (we didn't actually take note of the months of birth/death, so we aren't sure if he was 14 or 15 when he died). And on the younger James' small square individual grave marker was written ... "JIMMY", which brought us back to the very start of our ghost box session when we reached a boy by the name of "Timmy". On our way out of the cemetery we had heard the name "James" a couple of times, which is the name of a dear and close relative of ours, so we weren't sure what to do with the information. In this very same sequence we had heard the words "Oh - Seven". Young Jimmy Small lived to the year of 1907 and died a young boy under the age of 20.
Our final conversation with the ghost box ended like this:
Tony: This is where you need to stay, this is where you were buried after you died.
GB: We're Buried? or You're Buried?
Kathy: ?What?
Tony: We're Buried?
Kathy: Oh my gawd Tony... I'm sorry but yes, you are, you're buried.
GB: Moved On?
Kathy: Moved On? Did it just say "Moved On"?
GB : (faintly) Make it stop.
Kathy: Make it stop?
GB: Save(d) Us.
Tony: This is graveyard, this is where people are buried when they've died.
GB: (faintly male voice) SO cold
Kathy: So Cold? Did you hear that?
Tony: Uh huhh. You need to move on, you shouldn't stay here if you don't like it here.
GB: (Female voice) We need your HELP
