"Let me out...": One Night At The Grove Park Inn (a true story)

It was August of 2000.  I had been living in Asheville for just over two weeks.  With abandon I had thrown myself into the ways and customs of that curious city in the North Carolina mountains.  And not just for sake of my new job as investigative reporter.

No, it was more personal than that.  Asheville was finally a crack at life on my own, now 26 and a year after an extended season of college.  I wanted to make the most of it.  To make an escape from previous disappointments with the breaking of new ground.

Part and parcel of that was meeting new people.  And being a reporter gave me an edge.  Especially in Asheville.  A town my landlady had described as "a mixed bowl of nuts".  Thirty percent rock-ribbed Christian conservative, thirty percent very liberal, and forty percent anything and everything in between.  Being a journalist there puts one in contact with all the characters.  Already I had met the mayor, the district's representative in Congress, a purple-haired man calling himself Cassandra (after the woman in The Iliad who prophesied about the fall of Troy but wasn't believed), "the Thong Guy" (don't ask), and a number of other interesting folk.  Still to come was covering the massive "We Still Pray" Christian rally, the "We Still Work Magic" rally the local witchcraft community held a few weeks later at the same high school stadium, being called "a--hole" by a future President of the United States, and a photo together with Bill Cosby that I can't show anymore.

As wildly entertaining as that all sounds, it was serious business.  And I still hold dear the lessons and virtues of good and impartial reporting that the editor and publisher shared with me.  However I may go as a writer for the rest of my life, I owe much to each of them.

So even when it came to the "Summer Spook Series",  I was determined to approach matters with an objective eye and a mind divorced from suggestion or duress.  Not to be a prejudiced skeptic, but neither to be overwhelmed with sensation about the supernatural.

It was "for fun," my editor had said.  "Part Scooby-Doo and part The Blair Witch Project". But we were still a weekly newsmagazine toward which there was responsibility to be had.  The readers were owed the facts, whatever they may be, and the opportunity to weigh it on their own.

And so it was, at 9 p.m. on a Monday night, that ten of us - the wife of the editor, a fellow reporter, some high school students, a business owner, and a few others including Yours Truly - met in the lobby of the Grove Park Inn.  Reputedly one of the most haunted hotels in the world.

-----

The Grove Park Inn opened in 1913, after nearly a year of construction.  The dedication address was delivered by William Jennings Bryan.  It has since seen visits by everyone from Henry Ford to Sir Anthony Hopkins to Chuck Norris.  Ten United States Presidents have been guests at the hotel.  During World War II it was the site of internment for German diplomats.  In recent years it has been  revealed that in the event of a nuclear attack on America, the United States Supreme Court would have been relocated to the hotel.

It had been in the final months of the Belle Époque that the Grove Park Inn first opened its doors.  But it was in the decade after the Great War that the place truly exploded to life.  The Roaring Twenties came hard and raucous to this hotel in the hills above Asheville, and even today one without understanding why might expect to see flapper girls and catch the whiff of expensive French cigarettes.  And Prohibition be damned!  The liquor flowed well within the halls and rooms of the Grove Park, with a sly wink and a knowing grin.

Maybe that has something to do with how it is that the name of the young woman who died there around 1920 has been forgotten.  She fell to her death within the hotel, from over a balcony and onto the hard stone of the Palm Court three stories below.  As any large resort or park or fine ocean-going vessel, tragedy can and will transpire amid revelry.  And there was little revelry as that in the wake of the Kaiser's vanquishing.

All that is known today is that she died instantly and that she had apparently been staying in Room 545.

At least, however, we know who had been a guest in Room 441 for a year between 1935 and 1936.  It had been none other than F. Scott Fitzgerald.  The author of the celebrated novel The Great Gatsby had consigned himself to residence at the Grove Park Inn.  Hoping out of desperation that the environment might stimulate his writing.  As well as being close to the sanitarium where his beloved wife Zelda was receiving psychiatric care.

Fitzgerald spent much of the darkest period of his life at the Grove Park Inn.  A few years later in 1940, he died a broken man.

In 1948, the nearby Highland Hospital was destroyed in a fire.  Stories persist that the patients had been drugged and locked within their rooms, abandoned by a vengeful nurse who lit the match.  Zelda Fitzgerald and eight others perished in the flames.

-----

Late one evening in 1998 a newly-hired security guard at the Grove Park Inn believed he had spotted a guest "wandering around drunk on the grounds, in an old-style costume."  He radioed his supervisor about it and was met with a  screaming voice demanding that he return to the hotel.  Bewildered, the guard looked toward where he had seen the woman, but she was no longer there.

Upon entering the security office the supervisor was shouting threats about immediate termination.  And then the threats stopped when the boss realized that in sincerest honesty the guard, who had just relocated to the area, had never heard about the Pink Lady.

It was sometime in the Twenties that the woman in Room 545 began letting staff and guests understand that she was reluctant to leave so abruptly.  The new guard had become just the latest to witness her comings and goings.

Even today, guests report that they feel tickled during the night, especially on their feet, by "someone else" in their room.  Lights flicker on with no one touching the switch.  Young children tell their parents the next morning about "the nice woman" who came to visit them during the night.  

She is the Pink Lady.  A spectral young woman who has been sighted hundreds of times throughout the Grove Park Inn.  And over the decades many of them have come from guests staying in Room 545.

There have also been stories about Room 441.  About the sound of typing coming from behind its doors when no one was staying within.  And at times, sightings of men and women in period attire who vanish upon a second look.

It is not surprising then that the Grove Park Inn has become the subject of numerous studies by paranormal investigators: some professional, many not.  One respected group, L.E.M.U.R. Investigations, had recently finished an extensive study of the Grove Park.  Their findings: based on the weight and consistency of the reports from so many guests and staff, something was amiss at the hotel.

The team of the "Summer Spook Series" would be the next to investigate the Grove Park Inn.

And the editor informed us that by special arrangement with the Grove Park's management, we would have Room 545 all to ourselves...

-----

Beginning at 10 p.m., we would split into teams and cover the hotel and the surrounding grounds.  Throughout the night on the hour we would meet back in Room 545 to give reports and compare notes.  Two of us would remain in the room itself.

The editor's wife had a couple of cameras, including one loaded with infrared film.  I had a notepad and a micro cassette recorder.  She and I and another team member were accompanied by a guard and given access to the clubhouse, near the Grove Park's golf course and not far from the hotel itself.

We used flashlights to navigate as we walked around the rooms, and the banquet hall had already been set up for a formal event of some kind.  That is where I found myself alone around 10:40.  The cassette recorder was still whirring away.  I had forgotten it was on at all after getting some comments from the guard.

If there had been anything unusual in the clubhouse, we didn't see it or hear it.

A little over an hour later during our group's second meeting in Room 545, as the others were discussing what and where to go next, I rewound the tape to find some bits of the conversation with the guard.  I thought I was close to it but I was wrong.  It turned out to be a segment from the time we were inside the clubhouse.

And that's when we heard it on the tape:

"Let me out..."

-----

As best as we could determine, it was from the time I had been in the banquet room.  Nobody else had been inside apart from myself.

But still, there it was.  A voice, gender indeterminate.  Whispering "Let me out..." followed by something unintelligible.  I rewound the tape and played it back several times, without suggesting to anyone else what it might be.

Every person in our group said that it sounded like someone saying "Let me out..."

-----

Okay, well... it was a bit spooky.  A week later an experienced investigator listened to the tape and remarked that it seemed very much that I had recorded what in the trade is called "electronic voice phenomenon".  And that there had been many such cases reported ever since the invention of the phonograph.  Even today, there are times when I think about that night and I wrack my brain trying to remember if anyone else had come into the banquet room that night.  But I don't recall anyone at all.  And I don't think I was speaking to myself either.  I certainly didn't say "Let me out..." in a hushed but quite audible whisper.

At fifteen after midnight we dispersed again.  Before we did, the editor's wife took a few random photos with the infrared-loaded camera inside Room 545.  Those were the first pictures made on the roll of film.

-----

I was with a group of other people, including my fellow reporter.  We walked a short distance to what was at the time the studios of ABC affiliate WLOS.  A cardboard standup of one of the on-air newscasters looked out from a window, his face beaming a cheery smile.  No doubt a great laugh during the daytime.  At night, strolling from the Grove Park Inn, it was a bit surreal.

Nothing happened between then and 1 a.m.  Neither did anything remarkable transpire between 1 and 2.

And nothing happened between 2 and 3 either.  That was when I decided to visit the fourth floor: completely empty of guests and staff at the time due to renovation.  Sheets of canvas and paint buckets and lengths of lumber and table saws were throughout the floor, up and down the hallways.

I was alone for almost the entire hour, sitting with my back to the wall.  Room 441 was within eyesight to my right.  The plaque on the door noting that it had been F. Scott Fitzgerald's residence during his time in Asheville reflecting what dull light came down from the upper floor.  There was not a sound from either above or the atrium three stories below.

At 3 a.m. I returned to Room 545.  The fourth floor had not yielded up anything unusual.

-----

The editor's wife wanted to see Fitzgerald's room.

I returned to the fourth floor, bringing her along.  We came to the outside of Room 441.  Again, not a sound apart from our own quiet voices.  Nobody had told directly us to stay off of the fourth floor, but neither did we assume that it would have been permitted had we asked.  We were being discreet about it.

The editor's wife took some photos with both regular film and the infrared-loaded camera.  Including one infrared shot down the hallway, with Room 441's door situated in the left of the picture, the floor immediately in front of it clear in the scope.

We saw nothing with our eyes.  But there was one curious incident that occurred.  She had brought a small magnetic compass with her.  We had been told beforehand that sometimes compasses would act odd in places supposedly haunted.  Not far from Room 441 she brought the compass out.  The needle was spinning.  Not far, but certainly not at a snail's pace either.  It would turn one way, then veer toward the other direction.

Why it did that, we could never explain.

-----

4 a.m.  The group met in Room 545 once again.  Nothing else to report.  And by 6 a.m. and the sun beginning to rise we all decided that we had done our part and that at least there was a ghostly voice to show for it.  We each went on our way.  I returned to my apartment and crashed for a few hours before going in to the office.

-----

"Okay, Chris, this is going to make your jaw hit the floor."

It was Friday morning.  Three days after the end of the first "Summer Spook Series" investigation.  The night at the Grove Park Inn was already falling behind in the rear-view mirror of my brain.  Yes, there had been the weird sound from the tape recorder but... heck, that could have been anything.

Then my editor showed me the photos.

It had taken a few days to get the infrared film developed.  They had received the pics the previous afternoon, after I had left for the evening.

The first two that he showed me were from inside Room 545.  The photos were a grainy black and white, but otherwise were not much different from pics taken with standard film.  However, in each of the photos and especially remarkable in one of them, there was a very clear "artifact" in view hanging over the bed.  It seemed very much to be not on the wall, but in the air itself.

What it was, we couldn't figure out.  There were two of our team in the photo and they seemed oblivious to it.  But there it was, right between them.

It was odd.  But otherwise, not something one's mind might linger upon.

The next photo however was absolutely disquieting.

It was the one his wife had taken on the fourth floor, aimed down the hallway and with the door to Room 441 in view.  Again, a grainy black and white image.

Yet very visible, in the center of the image, there was someone standing in the hallway.

Someone with a face.  Looking toward the camera.  It seemed to be the face of a woman.  Wearing, perhaps, a long dress.

She was smiling.  And eighteen years later, long after the most recent time I've seen the photo, those eyes still haunt me, for lack of any better term.

Nobody else had been on the fourth floor with us.  But there it was.  A third person, who had only turned up in an infrared photograph.

-----

The same professional investigator who examined my audio recording told us that he believed we had captured a legitimate image of... well, something.  And it is a testament to his objectivity that he could not suggest what it was.  Only that it was empirical evidence, along with the apparent voice on the cassette tape.

No one in our group saw anything with our own eyes, or heard with our ears alone.  But by at least three different means the equipment we used, we had detected some very, very peculiar "signatures" around the Grove Park Inn.  I still have the audio recording somewhere.  The photograph is in the possession of my former editor.

-----

So... is the Grove Park Inn haunted?  More to the point: are there such things as ghosts?

I'm inclined to say that there is something at the Grove Park Inn.  And that's just based on the testimony of people I interviewed personally, along with the mountain of documented reports over the past century.  It's more than enough to discount any mass delusion going on.

As to what precisely it might be...

I'm skeptical of the existence of ghosts as entities of a spiritual nature.  However, I have held to a theory for quite a long time now, even before that night at the Grove Park Inn.  It is this: that we still don't understand everything about the realm of electromagnetism and quantum physics.  There may be more than two dozen different dimensions to the universe, according to string theory.  But that's just conjecture based on math and bits of evidence from high-energy particle experiments.  That "grand unified theory" remains as elusive as ever.

Maybe what are known as "ghosts", are like a signature on a local environment.  Something analogous to a recording on a VCR (a "video cassette recorder" for millennials and younger who are reading this).  And every so often the recording "plays back" on its own or because of a stimulus.  Or maybe that's too wacky an explanation.  It's the only one I possess to my own satisfaction, however.

-----

And with today being Halloween, and it's been awhile since I've been able to post something on The Knight Shift (lots of stuff has been happening on my end keeping me from much writing at all) I thought it would be good to make up for it.  By sharing a very true story of what happened when I and a group of others spent a night doing what we thought was light-hearted paranormal investigation at one of the most famous - and most haunted - hotels in America.

On my honor, I can attest that the preceding account is a true and accurate one, as best as I can possibly convey.

And that's my ghost story for this Halloween.

 

 

 

 

Read More

Father Dowling, mystery no more: Priest of Missouri accident comes forward

I could not resist having fun with that title.  It was just too punny!

One of the more intriguing stories last week was that of the mysterious priest who arrived on the scene of a vehicular accident in Missouri.  19-year old Katie Lentz was on her way to church when a drunk-driver smashed her car.  Emergency workers tried for more than an hour to get Lentz clear of the wreck and it looked like she wasn't going to make it.  Just then a Catholic priest appeared, anointed Lentz with oil and prayed with her.  It was very soon after that firefighters and EMTs got Lentz out and flown to a hospital.  And the priest?  He vanished before anyone had a chance to thank him for being there.

Curiously, he didn't turn up in any of 90-some photos that were made of the crash site.  Between that and the effect he seemed to have on everyone involved, many have wondered if it was an angel who came to Katie Lentz's assistance.

Father Patrick Dowling

Father Patrick Dowling (right) of the Diocese of Jefferson City came forward today, identifying himself as the priest who attended to Lentz.  Father Dowling spoke with Catholic News Agency about the incident, and elaborated on the part that he ended up playing...

Though the highway was blocked off, “I did not leave with the other cars,” Fr. Dowling commented. He parked as close as he could, “and walked the remaining 150 yards. I asked the Sheriff if a priest might be needed … on checking, he permitted me to approach.”

“When the young lady asked that I pray her leg stop hurting, I did so. She asked me to pray aloud and I did briefly … the rescue workers needed space, and would not have appreciated distraction. I stepped to one side and said my rosary silently until the lady was taken from the car.”

Once Lentz was removed from her vehicle, he explained, “I then shook hands with the Sheriff, and thanked him, as I left. I have to admire the calmness of everybody involved.”

Something I couldn't help but appreciate: Father Dowling reported that he administered the Catholic sacraments of Anointing of the Sick and Absolution to Katie Lentz.  Which would be routine for a priest "except that there was something extraordinary it sounds like, in the sequence of events that coincided in time with the Anointing.  You must remember, there were many people praying there, many, many people... and they were all praying obviously for healing and for her safety.”

The thing is, according to news articles from the past week, Lentz worships at an Assemblies of God congregation.  She isn't Roman Catholic.  Neither does it sound like the denominational background of anyone involved was ever questioned or commented upon.  It was one person who happened to be a follower of Christ being at the scene to minister to another follower of Christ when she needed it most.

There are no doubt some who are going to be disheartened to discover that it wasn't a real angel who came to the side of Katie Lentz and those working to save her life, but rather a very human priest.  But that doesn't mean that it wasn't a miracle.

Miracles don't have to be shimmering demonstrations of supernatural wonder and glory.  Do I believe that God allows miracles to happen?  I absolutely do.  Even today.  And some of them are of the sort that one can't readily explain away.  Believe me, I've tried.

But that isn't what most miracles are.  A miracle is God letting things "click" into place, at precisely the right time.  And Father Dowling's being on the highway that close to the accident is as much a miracle as any miracle out of the New Testament.

Personally, I take great comfort in knowing that it was Father Patrick Dowling who came to Katie Lentz's aid.  Because if God can use one of His mortal flock to work a miracle through, He can do the same with any other.  Including you.  Perhaps even me...

Read More

Who was that priest? Miracle and mystery on a Missouri highway

He was there.

Everybody at the scene, from firefighters to police paramedics to the victim herself, saw him and heard him.

His calming words and peaceful demeanor are being credited with saving the life of a 19-year old young woman.

But he is nowhere to be found in any of the nearly 70 photographs taken at the site of the accident.

Neither can anyone figure out how he could have been there to begin with, since the road was blocked for two miles by police on both sides of the wreck.  There were no parked cars.  There were no pedestrians seen approaching the site, either walking along the road or coming across the fields along Highway 19 near Center, Missouri.

He disappeared before anyone could thank him.

And yet he was there.  His presence is being called a miracle.  And many are wondering if the person - who seemed to be a black-garbed silver-haired Catholic priest in his fifties or sixties - might have been an angel.

Katie Lentz: Attended by an angel?

Katie Lentz (right), a student at Tulane University, was on her way to church this past Sunday morning when her car was hit head-on by a drunk driver.  Lentz's Mercedes was a mangled heap and by the time help arrived, the situation was bleak for a happy ending.

Firefighters and paramedics struggled to free Lentz from the twisted metal.  Despite her circumstance, Lentz spoke with her rescuers about her church and her plans to study dentistry.  But after an hour and a half of desperately trying to get Lentz out, it was clear that her vital signs were rapidly fading and that there was very little that could be done.  It did not appear that she would survive.

That is when Katie Lentz asked the emergency workers around her for a moment of prayer.  And that's when he appeared.  Out of nowhere.  Literally.

The priest approached Lentz and anointed her with oil he was carrying.  He prayed with her and with the emergency workers and apparently anointed at least two of them as well. Chief Raymond Reed of the New London, Missouri Fire Department later said that "a sense of calmness came over her, and it did us as well.  I can't be for certain how it was said, but myself and another firefighter, we very plainly heard that we should remain calm, that our tools would now work and that we would get her out of that vehicle."

Lentz was soon afterward finally extracted and evacuated by helicopter to a hospital.  She has suffered several broken ribs, a broken wrist, and both legs have multiple fractures.  But she is alive and poised to make a strong recovery.

And the priest?  He vanished.  No one saw him leave, just as no one saw how he could have possibly arrived.

Of all the photographs taken at the site of the crash, the priest is found in none of them.  Neither have inquiries with the Catholic churches in the area turned up anything about who he could have been.  Lentz's family and the rescuers at the scene would like to find him and thank him for his prayer and encouragement.  But whoever he is, he has not stepped forward.

It is an absolutely fascinating and beautiful story and there is plenty more at the Mail Online's article about it.

So... could it be that an angel came to the aid of Katie Lentz and those attempting to free her from the wreck?  Hebrews 13:2 tells us that we have sometimes "entertained angels unawares".

Perhaps it was a messenger of God who brought divine assistance to Highway 19.

Personally, it wouldn't surprise me in the least.  I've seen more than a few things along the way that I can't possibly explain.  Things which defy all notion of a rational basis.  And I've had to learn - some would add "the hard way" and not without merit - to stop looking for a rationale behind any of them.  "There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy," the Bard observed.

There are some things which one has to stand back and accept them for what they are, without any expectation of answers or understanding.  This mysterious priest, I would remark, is one of those.

And no matter one's faith or even lack of one, it has to be said: our lives are all the more rich because of them.

Read More

The Gray Man of Hatteras: Hurricane warning system from the Great Beyond

Hurricane Irene should be thrashing the coast pretty hard come this time tomorrow. As of this writing it's a Category 2 storm: weaker than it had been a day ago but still capable of tremendous devastation. Thoughts and prayers going out to those in the eastern part of North Carolina and the rest of Irene's projected path.

A hurricane is never something to take lightly. But given the current situation, I thought it might be neat to all the same share with this blog's readers something that I've always thought was an intriguing story from the already rich culture of North Carolina's Outer Banks. And it is perhaps the most unusual (some say the most accurate) hurricane warning system anywhere...

The Gray Man of Hatteras is a ghost reputed to haunt the beaches in the vicinity of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. If beaches are haunted then I suppose there are few pieces of coastal real estate with as much merit as Cape Hatteras: more than a thousand shipwrecks litter the waters of "the Graveyard of the Atlantic". Over the past few hundreds of years about as many people have lost their lives to hurricanes that Hatteras - jutting out into the Atlantic like a brawler's jaw daring to be hit - seems to draw unto itself.

One of those who are said to have perished was a sailor named Gray, who died in a hurricane off Cape Hatteras sometime in the early 1900s. And ever since, every time that a hurricane takes aim at the Outer Banks, Gray's ghost comes out of nowhere to warn residents and visitors to leave the island... and then abruptly vanishes right before their eyes.

I heard that the Gray Man of Hatteras was last seen before Floyd, one of the most destructive hurricanes in recent history, struck in 1999. He is said to have been witnessed before the arrival of every hurricane. Dunno if the Gray Man has been spotted ahead of Irene this week but somehow, I wouldn't doubt it.

CreepyNC.com has more about the Gray Man of Hatteras. And if you have met him lately, do the right thing and head for the hills: the dude does apparently have some experience with this sort of thing... even if he is dead :-P

Read More

Is this a photograph of an angel?

I said in my last post that I was taking off until Christmas unless something demanded reporting about. Well, I think this might qualify, 'cuz I can't make heads or tails of this photo. Is it the real deal?

WFMY News 2 is reporting about this strange image caught by a security camera at Presbyterian Hospital in Charlotte. Many people are saying that it depicts an angel outside the room of 14-year old Chelsea Banton, who had just been removed from life support after extraordinary measures had been taken by doctors to keep her alive. The physicians had said that there was nothing more that could be done. Soon after, Chelsea's aunt spotted the unusual "signature" on the monitor screen and alerted Chelsea's mother Colleen. The image was observed by numerous other people including hospital staff.

And immediately afterward, Chelsea Banton began to make a remarkable recovery. She will now celebrate her 15th birthday at home on Christmas Day.

I've gotten pretty good at analyzing pics from years of working with Photoshop. And dog-gone if I know what exactly this photo depicts. WBTV News 3 has the original story about the apparent angel sighting.

What do y'all think?

Read More

Video of alleged ghost at Asheville High School

Asheville High School is not just a great school, it's a beautiful building. I know 'cuz some years ago I did a lot of substitute teaching there. So I'm pretty familiar with the layout of the place and the kind of people there. Which makes this story all the more interesting for me personally...

A video surveillance camera at Asheville High has purportedly captured the moving image of a ghost. Some are saying that it looks to be the size and shape of a child as it darts around the atrium in the early morning hours of August 1st.

Could it be? When I heard about a "haunted" high school in Asheville, the first thing that popped into my mind was Erwin High School, which you would expect to be haunted since they build the place on top of Buncombe County's old "potter's field" (you can still see pits in the ground from where they removed the coffins, and sometimes bits of bone and nail wind up on the surface after a heavy rain). I heard plenty of ghost stories about Erwin, but this is the first that I'm hearing about Asheville High being spooked. It is rather old for a school building: dating back to 1929. Doubtless a building with such a long history has seen its share of haunting experiences, spectral or no.

But I think in this case, judging by the video I'm seeing here, we need not be alarmed. It seems very much to be nothing more than a moth that alighted on the protective dome covering of the camera. You can even pick out its silhouette against the more well-lit parts of the footage.

So I don't think there's any ghost here. But students at Asheville High need not be disappointed: between Helen's Bridge and Battle Mansion and of course the Pink Lady of Grove Park Inn, there's plenty of supernatural delight to be found around Asheville!

Read More