Update on Thunderous blast

     I finally found another individual who heard that thunderous blast that shook the windows and the ground I was standing on. A villager who lives about a quarter of a mile from us told me it shook the windows of her house and about scared her to death. Then she said in a very discusted tone; my husband was in the livingroom and when I asked him about the blast he said, "What blast?" He didn't hear anything, so he said, and he is not hard of hearing. She was relieved that someone besides herself  had heard it. We still have no idea what it was or why the majority of people in town have no idea what we are talking about. I'm not kidding when I said the ground shook and my ears rang. My wife said the windows rattled and so did the lady up the street; but nobody but us three heard it. Selective hearing?

Thunderous blast

First of all, keep in mind this town is rather small. Most of the towns residents live on Mainstreet which is less than a mile long and is a part of the Old National Road. The town only has four roads running east and west, but there are many alleys and side streets. In short the village is pretty  much clustered in a small area. Last Saturday night as I was working in my garden, just as the final rays of light were passing into the evening shadows, I heard the first of several volunteer firemen come down the street and hurry into the fire station. Within less than a minute the firetruck, siren blazing, had headed out of the station and west on mainstreet toward the Interstate. The firetruck had had about enough time to leave the village limits when a thunderous blast was heard that was so loud the ground shook where I stood. I wondered if the Firetruck had hit something. My wife came out the backdoor of our house which faces our garage and garden, asking what on earth happened.  I assured her I did not know. Strangely, I did not see another neighbor anywhere. The blast was loud enough to (my wife said) rattle the windows in our house; surely others were curious....wouldn't you think? My wife got into our car and drove around town looking for the source of the explosion. She came back, shaking her head. "I saw absolutely no one" she said. "Nobody in their yard or along the street to ask, nobody." This is strange, the town is small, but usually busy on a week end. Today, I asked around at church and the neighbors.....strangest thing.....none of them heard a thing. You tell me.

An update

We have entered the period that is normally quiet in this house. That is not to say the strange doesn't happen in summer and early fall, but it seems to be far less frequent. To bring you up to date on past events. The "Thumping" sound that plagued us for months, occuring only in the Library until the last month that we heard it (that month it was heard only in the kitchen), it suddenly stopped and has not been heard since. The lightbulbs that suddenly went missing in the diningroom have never, as yet, reappeared. Perhaps the "haunts" have grown tired; we haven't experienced as many episodes this past year that we normally do. But if things occur, I will report it here.

Local "Witch"

     When we first moved here in 79, we heard the story about the local witch. As that was several years before I started this blog, I had pretty much forgotten about it until reading a story about witchs bottles in an old issue of National Geographic brought it to mind. The county history does not mention her. The story is second hand from older residents who supposedly were in on the demolition of the witches house in the mid-1940s, just after World War Two. The "Witch" was a recluse; though she lived near the center of town her house was an old ramshackled log construction and stood by itself in the center of three lots. According to the story everyone in town was afraid of her and she wasn't overly friendly with anyone in town; just staying to herself. Needless top say, anytime disaster struck anyone in town the whispering started that the old witch was probably behind it. Whoever she was, her time in the village took up the later part of the 1800s. Not date of death is remembered, but everyone who knew of her insists it was from natural causes.  Her old house sat, primarily empty, after her death. It was thought that a relative, in a neighboring state, inherited the property and pretty much forgot about it; though they must have kept up with any taxes. Sometime just after WW2, someone new bought the lots and what was left of the log house. The new owner decided to build a new house on the center lot where the log house stood. This necessitated tearing down the old house which was in really sorry condition. Right off the bat, when distruction started, the whole place caved in, almost getting some of the workmen who, luckily, saw it coming and got out of the way. It was just a matter of cleaning up the rotten logs and getting them disposed of. Much of the house had fallen into the basement. One wall that fell into the basement was found to be a falsewall. The wall behind it (they had collapsed together) was found to be covered with horse shoes in different configerations. While clearing out the basement they found sealed jars with nails and human hair in them. That got tongues a wagging. Other sealed jars appeared to have pieces of cloth, needles, and nail parings in them. All of this weird stuff was gathered up and burned or buried. I'm told no one opened any of the jars. I suspect the old girl was just alone so long, she was crazy. But older residents in this village think, even yet, that she was a witch. Think what you like, the time of "The Witch" was over a hundred years ago, even if there are still people around who remember the distruction of the house and what their elders told them about the old "witch" that lived there.

Glass broken inside in middle of the night.

   Our neighbors, not those next door but still in the village, experienced a strange phenomena last night and again early this morning. They live in a house that is modern in design, all on one floor; no basement, no attic. The house rambles a bit; you enter through a large sun room which opens into a roomy sitting room which opens into a small kitchen. From the kitchen is a hallway that leads to a Great Room on the right and the hall continues past the Great Room and leads to the Bath and three normal sized bedrooms. From the middle bedroom the hall continues to a pantry and then a utility room and the back door. From the hallway into the Great Room are French Doors. These doors contain of several panes of glass. These doors have been here better than 15 years. The doors open and close easily. The interior temperature of the house is controlled by either air conditioning or a furnace. The temperature range from summer to winter is between 60 and 75 degrees. There are two dehumidifiers that keep the humidity in the house close to normal. Last night, around 3 am a terrific crash of glass brought both owners out of bed with expectations of someone breaking in. A through search of the house revealed only that a pane of glass was broken out of those interior French doors. An inspection of the doors revealed that the other panes of glass were solidly in place and uneffected. Nerves shattered the owners retreated back to bed, the male of the household trying to convince himself the glass breaking was the result of changing temperatures. This morning when the pair got up, half convinced the broken glass was a fluke, they again went to the Great Room to look over the door in broad daylight. Again they inspected each pane of glass for evidence of why one would suddenly break. Everything was firm and fine. The couple had breakfast and as the lady of the house was going to the bathroom she again passed the French Doors and something didn't look right. Going over to the door she noticed the pane above the broken one was full if fine cracks. Considering the fact they had just checked each of these panes less than an hour prior, this was a surprise or maybe shock would be a better word. Running her finger over the crazed pane, the glass fell out of the center but remained around the edges. They now have two panes of glass to replace, But what could possibly cause such an unusual chain of events?  I know this entire area experiences the weird. I doubt that I hear even a fraction of what goes on in the area of strange occurances. These people are very close friends. I saw the result of this particular weirdness as they had not, as yet, replaced the glass. Anyone out there care to hazard a good guess how such a thing can happen?

A loud click or snapping noise

     Since we moved into this house,  in the summer of 1979,  we have experienced an unusual loud noise in the master bedroom. I cannot say for certain that it occurs every night because we often turn in after 11:30  and the sound usually occurs sometime after 11 but before 11:30. It sounds like a loud snap  which usually repeats, slightly less loudly, a few minutes later. The sound appears to come from the southwesternmost corner of the room where a dumbwaiter used to be located. The dumbwaiter was taken out of service and walled off sometime in the late 1940s. But if we chance to turn in a bit early, we about always hear this snap or click. The dogs do not appear to take notice of it. I tend to think it has something to do with temperature change in the old sealed dumbwaiter shaft. But precisely what????? I have no idea. Nor why the noise is always in that short time window.

Snatched Book?

 It happened a couple of days ago. I've mulled it over and tried some experimentation before deciding to include it here. Monday night, my wife and I turned in early as we were tired and we both had books we wanted to read. Once the dogs settled in, one at the foot of the bed and the other in his bed on the floor, all was peaceful. I read in bed, lying on my back but the wife prefers a side position. I had only read a few sentences when my wife exclaimed,"What?" My response."Whats the matter?" "Something jerked my book out of my hand". "You just dozed and dropped it," I replied. "No, she protested, I was in the middle of reading a sentence". Then bending over the side of the bed she said,"Where is it?" Playing dumb, I asked,"Wheres what?" "Wheres my book, I don't see it?" My suggestion was "Run your hand just under the bed it probably landed on end and flipped under the bed". "No, it didn't,"she replied as she slid out of bed and was looking under it. Then crawling half under the bed she says, "Its here, halfway under the bed." So how did it get halfway under the bed? She says, "I told you, it was jerked out of my hands." I did not persue the matter. But what??? jerked it out of her hands? Why was it jerked out of her hands? And....What was the point of taking it halfway under the bed? Yesterday afternoon, trying to figure out how in blazes that book got halfway under the bed; I went upstairs and laid on her side of the bed, opened the book and dropped it several times. changing position several times as I did so. That book landed in plain sight every time. So, as I think this is a bit strange, I have included it on this journal.