Speaker 1: Welcome to Haunted Road, a production of I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Minky Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 1: During the early nineteenth century, counties across the United States
Speaker 1: created poor houses to assist financially challenged residents. Historically, poverty
Speaker 1: stricken people in most communities could apply for some assistance
Speaker 1: from local government officials, but this system proved very expensive.
Speaker 1: Often officials would order destitute people from the community if
Speaker 1: the people could not change their financial situation quickly. To
Speaker 1: still provide but to reduce the cost of government assistance,
Speaker 1: many counties established poor houses in the early eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 1: Poorhouses provided destitute people with shelter. They also commonly provided
Speaker 1: residents with employment opportunities. Women cared for the houses upkeep.
Speaker 1: All men would take classes to learn a trade or
Speaker 1: work in farm fields to provide food for the poorhouses residents.
Speaker 1: Many rested on optimistic assumptions about the possibilities of reform, rehabilitation,
Speaker 1: and education. Their sponsors believed that institutions could improve society
Speaker 1: through their impact on individual personalities. Because of their environmental sources, crime, poverty, ignorance,
Speaker 1: and mental illness could be eradicated. Yet taking in everyone
Speaker 1: proved to be out of the wheelhouse for many of
Speaker 1: these institutions, and after nearly one hundred years, the campaign
Speaker 1: to restrict poorhouses to the old and helpless finally succeeded
Speaker 1: in the early decades of the twentieth century. In New York.
Speaker 1: By the end of the First World War, the poorhouse
Speaker 1: was being looked upon as an institution mainly for the
Speaker 1: care of the aged and infirm. Here in the gradual
Speaker 1: transformation of poorhouses lay the origins of public old age homes.
Speaker 1: The departure of children, the mentally ill, and the able
Speaker 1: body did not mean that conditions and poor houses improved
Speaker 1: dramatically for those left behind. Throughout the early twentieth century,
Speaker 1: investigations routinely uncovered wretched conditions. In some less populous states.
Speaker 1: Four houses remained relatively unspecialized, mixing children, the insane, sick,
Speaker 1: able body, and elderly. Old age homes paid a price
Speaker 1: for their origins as poor houses. Emerging as part of
Speaker 1: the structure of public relief, they never wholly lost the
Speaker 1: stigma attached to welfare. They were places of last resort,
Speaker 1: dreaded by the poor. However, places like the Lawrence County
Speaker 1: Home for the Aged to began forming. Built in nineteen
Speaker 1: homes like this were meant to turn over a new leaf,
Speaker 1: but this one, known today as Hillview Manor, is said
Speaker 1: to be known as the most haunted site in western Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: So if they were successful with their reforms, why is
Speaker 1: it so haunted? I'm Amy Brunei and this is haunted road.
Speaker 1: In June, the city of Newcastle, Pennsylvania started accepting bids
Speaker 1: to build the New Lawrence County Home for the Aged,
Speaker 1: essentially a poorhouse for the county's mentally ill, severely destitute,
Speaker 1: and elderly residents with no known family. This joint city
Speaker 1: County Home, to be built in Nango Township on the
Speaker 1: Newcastle Elwood Road, would replace the Aging Newcastle City Home
Speaker 1: and consolidate various smaller institutions around the county. The Newcastle
Speaker 1: City Home, a working farm and collection of building, is
Speaker 1: located on Old Pittsburgh Road, near the present day site
Speaker 1: of the Chenango Elementary School. Had been around since opening
Speaker 1: in November eighteen sixty seven. The facility had been built
Speaker 1: on forty four acres donated by Charles Phillips of Newcastle.
Speaker 1: Although there was initially a three man board of what
Speaker 1: they called poor directors. One of them, a man named
Speaker 1: Robert Reynolds, largely kept the home in operation with his
Speaker 1: own financing and tireless efforts behind the scenes. Over the
Speaker 1: next three decades, the home usually maintained only two full
Speaker 1: time staff members and housed about ten inmates as they
Speaker 1: were called at any given time. By nineteen hundred, the
Speaker 1: resident population at its peak had increased to twenty seven inmates,
Speaker 1: but was down to eighteen in nineteen twenty. The institution
Speaker 1: was for Newcastle residents only and was run by a superintendent,
Speaker 1: who was elected to a four year term by the
Speaker 1: city commissioners. Assisting the superintendent was a similarly elected matron
Speaker 1: who personally versaw all the female inmates. Perry D. Snyder
Speaker 1: and his wife Mary A. Snyder, first elected in March
Speaker 1: nineteen thirteen, would serve in those respective posts for the
Speaker 1: next three decades. The state of the art County Home
Speaker 1: also included vocational rooms, a smoking room, several lounges, a
Speaker 1: bomb shelter, a laundry, a four car garage, a large garden,
Speaker 1: a small working farm, and a cemetery. An excerpt from
Speaker 1: an article about the County Home in Newcastle News of
Speaker 1: October twenty nineteen explains that aged people without a friend
Speaker 1: in the world will be able to spend their declining
Speaker 1: years in comfort. Most of the inmates were wards of
Speaker 1: the county and sentenced to confinement at the home. Construction
Speaker 1: was behind schedule, but the facility finally opened on Tuesday,
Speaker 1: October nineteenth, nineteen twenty six. On that day, the Snyders
Speaker 1: and their two children, about a dozen staff members, and
Speaker 1: the first twenty inmates left Field City Home and took
Speaker 1: up residence in the nearby Lawrence County Home. The new
Speaker 1: home did not generally take children, although a young boy
Speaker 1: was among the first twenty residents. The old City Home
Speaker 1: was abandoned soon after and was later sold. The new
Speaker 1: County Home worked in conjunction was several other facilities, including
Speaker 1: the Margaret Henry Home and the Almira Home. Orphaned and
Speaker 1: other similarly disadvantaged children were handled at the Margaret Henry Home,
Speaker 1: known as the Holy Family Home prior to nineteen on
Speaker 1: Cunningham Avenue in Newcastle. The Almira Home on East Washington
Speaker 1: Street in Newcastle was a haven for elderly women. Under
Speaker 1: the Snyder's long reign, the number of inmates steadily grew,
Speaker 1: but fluctuated over the years, from seventy two inmates in
Speaker 1: December nine to one d seventy six in December nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty four and one hundred thirty six in December nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty nine. In June nineteen forty four, county welfare officials
Speaker 1: in the Snyders came under fire during a rather heated
Speaker 1: public hearing held at the county Courthouse investigating claims of
Speaker 1: incompetency at the home. The Snyders were both in their
Speaker 1: late seventies at this point and probably not suited to
Speaker 1: operate such a challenging facility. In the wake of the hearing,
Speaker 1: the Snyders were basically retired with pensions, but allowed to
Speaker 1: stay on at the home with produced roles. By late August,
Speaker 1: with Perry Snyder's sick in bed and Mary tending to
Speaker 1: him on many days, the Snyders were given three weeks
Speaker 1: to vacate the premises. That vacate order ended the Snyder's
Speaker 1: run of over thirty years of service to the local community.
Speaker 1: Man Spy Hogue, the longtime director of the county's welfare department,
Speaker 1: took over operation of the Home. The Lawrence County Home
Speaker 1: continued an operation for many years, and in the latter
Speaker 1: half of the nineteen sixties, while under the supervision of
Speaker 1: Director Clarence E. Covert was remodeled and morphed into a
Speaker 1: skilled nursing center. By n seventy the home was facing
Speaker 1: severe overcrowding issues and was housing an average of about
Speaker 1: one hundred fifteen elderly people at any one time. In
Speaker 1: December nineteen seventy four, the county decided to update and
Speaker 1: expand the home by adding a whole new section and
Speaker 1: remodeling some of the existing floors. The new three story edition,
Speaker 1: with an additional basement floor to be built off of
Speaker 1: the woman's department, would allow the home to accommodate another
Speaker 1: thirty or so residence. A new kitchen and dining room,
Speaker 1: and other occupational rooms were also included in the construction.
Speaker 1: The new north wing cost one point seven million dollars
Speaker 1: and opened in mid nineteen seventy seven. Meanwhile, after a
Speaker 1: contest to find a more suitable name for the antiquated
Speaker 1: sounding Lawrence County Home for the Aged, it was renamed
Speaker 1: as the Hillview Manor. On March twenty two, nine seventy seven.
Speaker 1: Due to financial constraints, The county shut down Hillview Manor
Speaker 1: in January of two thousand four. The old home has
Speaker 1: gained quite the notoriety for being touted as one of
Speaker 1: the most haunted locations in all of western Pennsylvania. In
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight, local paranormalist Candy Brandiff began leasing
Speaker 1: the facility and conducting ghost tours for the public. In
Speaker 1: May of Haunted Hillview Manner Incorporated took over the property
Speaker 1: and offers a wide variety of activities on the site.
Speaker 1: Over the years, quite a cast of characters has formed
Speaker 1: around the hauntings at Hillview. Many of the spirits have
Speaker 1: been given names and identities. The following few, while cited
Speaker 1: on the Elwood City website, were not names that I
Speaker 1: was able to connect with any records. But that doesn't
Speaker 1: mean they're not accurate per se. I just can't confirm them.
Speaker 1: Just like some historical websites say that ten thousand people
Speaker 1: pass at Hillview, a number I just can't see possible.
Speaker 1: But again I can't necessarily disprove it. I guess what
Speaker 1: I'm getting at is always take reports and facts without
Speaker 1: back up with a grain of salt, but don't always
Speaker 1: assume they come from a place of malice. That being said,
Speaker 1: let's meet some of these ghosts. One of the most
Speaker 1: notable casualties in the history of the building is that
Speaker 1: of Eli Sorry. Eli was a middle aged man who
Speaker 1: was a resident there during the building's early days as
Speaker 1: a poor farm and halfway house. Eli was a recovering alcoholic,
Speaker 1: which the building commonly hosted. However, alcohol was forbidden in
Speaker 1: the building due to the strict no alcohol policy. He
Speaker 1: decided to get his fixed by leaving the building in
Speaker 1: order to go drinking. Eli was found by some of
Speaker 1: the other residents the next morning laying outside of the
Speaker 1: front doors, passed out drunk, who then decided to carry
Speaker 1: him in and leave him in the boiler room to
Speaker 1: warm and sober up. Unfortunately, Eli never sobered up. He
Speaker 1: passed away in his slumber, likely from alcohol poisoning, and
Speaker 1: now his restless spirit is said to haunt the boiler
Speaker 1: room area. The ghost of Eli supposedly enjoys taunting women.
Speaker 1: There are several reports of women saying they were touch, grabbed,
Speaker 1: and pinched by who they believe is Eli. Many residents
Speaker 1: of the Manners spent nearly their whole lives there, and
Speaker 1: many did not have any family. Mary Virginia, a cerebral
Speaker 1: palsy patient and resident of the home, was one of
Speaker 1: these residents. She spent most of her time playing dress
Speaker 1: up and listening to music, and her room is still
Speaker 1: set up similarly to how she had it when she
Speaker 1: was a resident of the manner, complete with toys, dolls,
Speaker 1: makeup costumes, jewelry, and a music player. Many of the rooms,
Speaker 1: and specifically the basement, are filled with personal belongings to
Speaker 1: many of the past on residents. According to paranormal reports,
Speaker 1: Mary's ghost is friendly and responds well to her trigger
Speaker 1: objects her former belongings, showing her presence by swinging the
Speaker 1: necklaces that hang above her bed, moving her dolls, and
Speaker 1: faintly playing her favorite music tunes into investigators recording devices.
Speaker 1: Again that's direct from the Elwood City website. Another favorite
Speaker 1: spirit among ghost hunters is a child spirit supposedly named Jeffrey.
Speaker 1: Jeffrey is supposedly a nine year old boy who lived
Speaker 1: in the manner with his eleven year old brother, and
Speaker 1: according to investigators, his eleven year old brother was adopted
Speaker 1: while Jeffrey was not. They did not know Jeffrey's name
Speaker 1: until he said it in one of their digital recorders.
Speaker 1: There is no record of the exact room Jeffrey lived in. However,
Speaker 1: there are child toys scattered throughout one of the second
Speaker 1: floor rooms for his spirit to interact with. George, a
Speaker 1: spirit that lives in the basement, is said to be
Speaker 1: a former maintenance man. He has also said to be
Speaker 1: a Pittsburgh Steelers fan, and he has reported to be
Speaker 1: very distasteful to the idea of visitors rooting for other teams.
Speaker 1: People have claimed to be smacked in the back of
Speaker 1: the head for mentioning another team. Sounds like a lot
Speaker 1: of New England or sports fans I know. Philly ghost
Speaker 1: dot com also has some reports listed on their website.
Speaker 1: Two brothers reportedly visited Hellview because their grandmother used to
Speaker 1: live there. An e V P was captured with a
Speaker 1: woman using a family nickname that no one else would
Speaker 1: have known. Another relative stated that her grandmother used to
Speaker 1: play the piano every day at the facility. Now a
Speaker 1: spirit can be heard tickling the ivories late into the evening.
Speaker 1: One woman who worked as a nurse had numerous experiences
Speaker 1: while working. On one occasion, while walking from the east
Speaker 1: wing to the west wing. She claimed a very cold
Speaker 1: and cloudy form passed through her. It did not frighten her,
Speaker 1: only gave her an incredible chill. On other occasions, when
Speaker 1: on the second floor near the break room, it would
Speaker 1: not be uncommon for her to see what appeared to
Speaker 1: be someone walking down the hall, but upon checking things out,
Speaker 1: nobody was ever there. So to get to the bottom
Speaker 1: of these reports and hear about them firsthand. Up next,
Speaker 1: we're going to be chatting with Melissa Keen. She is
Speaker 1: a tour guide at Hillview and she has been investigating
Speaker 1: this site for over a decade. That is coming up
Speaker 1: after the break So I am sitting here with Melissa Keene,
Speaker 1: who is one of the tour guides at hell View Manner.
Speaker 1: So welcome Melissa. Thank you Amy, it's a pleasure to
Speaker 1: be here. Yeah, thanks for taking the time. Now, how
Speaker 1: did you get involved with hell View? How long have
Speaker 1: you been there? Tell us all the lowdown. Well, I've
Speaker 1: actually been investigating actively for about eleven years, and my
Speaker 1: very first investigation was at hell View Mannor. I just
Speaker 1: instantly fell in love with the place and went back
Speaker 1: as often as I could, And then about three years ago,
Speaker 1: a friend of mine called me and he said, Hey,
Speaker 1: the owner is having an informational meeting. She wants to
Speaker 1: hire a bunch of new employees. Are you interested? I said,
Speaker 1: of course I'm interested, and came to the meeting and
Speaker 1: here we are three years later, and it's just it's
Speaker 1: the best job in the world. That's amazing. So tell
Speaker 1: me what is hill Views kind of? Um, what is
Speaker 1: their mission at the moment? What is there kind of
Speaker 1: what's the idea for the building right now? We're trying
Speaker 1: to preserve the history and preserve the building itself as
Speaker 1: much as we can. Um. It's a very large building.
Speaker 1: Its eight square feet and you know it, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of upkeep for a building that isn't used on
Speaker 1: a day to day basis. And you know, we have
Speaker 1: problems with the route, from problems without everything, every problem
Speaker 1: you can imagine with a building that large. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: and we're just trying to, you know, preserve it and
Speaker 1: preserve all the history that came with it. And well,
Speaker 1: I mean it's a noble cause, I will say it.
Speaker 1: I don't know that people realize how quickly these buildings
Speaker 1: kind of start to deteriorate once they are empty. It's
Speaker 1: really weird to think about how it just takes humans
Speaker 1: being inside on a regular basis to kind of keep
Speaker 1: a building together. But once a structure stops being regularly
Speaker 1: climate controlled and maintained, it starts to fall apart pretty quickly, exactly.
Speaker 1: I never realized that. And the facility closed, I'm sure,
Speaker 1: as you mentioned in two thousand four, so it really
Speaker 1: hasn't been that long, but it's been enough to really
Speaker 1: have some damage in the building that we're trying very
Speaker 1: hard to get repaired. I'm trying to think back. So
Speaker 1: I was there with ghost hunters investigating, and admittedly, at
Speaker 1: this point in my life, I have been in so
Speaker 1: many old, abandoned type hospital buildings that they just run together. Well,
Speaker 1: I said, I'll be visiting a location like, Okay, this
Speaker 1: hallway looks frighteningly familiar. The structures starts to look the same,
Speaker 1: So I understand they do. But I don't think we
Speaker 1: were there very long after it closed. It had to
Speaker 1: been five or six years. I do remember it being
Speaker 1: one of the first investigations. We attempted to bring a
Speaker 1: dog along with us. That's really what stands out to me.
Speaker 1: But I do remember it being very active. So you
Speaker 1: said that was your first place that you investigated, So
Speaker 1: that could have gone two ways. That could have been like, Wow,
Speaker 1: this is the scariest thing has ever happened to me.
Speaker 1: I'm never doing this again too. I guess, Wow, this
Speaker 1: was scary and cool and now I'm just going to
Speaker 1: do this for eleven more years. So what happened that
Speaker 1: first time you were there that made you want to stay, Well,
Speaker 1: it was pretty much NonStop activity. When we were just
Speaker 1: leaving the foyer for the tour, we're saying now it's
Speaker 1: still day. When the tour was starting and I turned
Speaker 1: around because I heard footsteps coming up behind me. It's
Speaker 1: sounded like a woman's high heels clicking. And I turned
Speaker 1: around and the hallway was completely empty, and I looked
Speaker 1: over at my friend with these big eyes and he
Speaker 1: just nodded, went yep. I many times. So it was
Speaker 1: right out of the gate. Then when we were on
Speaker 1: the third floor, I had a shadow figure like manifest
Speaker 1: in front of me. I was just happen to be
Speaker 1: standing there taking pictures at the nursing station. It was
Speaker 1: kind of, you know, doing the three pictures and turning
Speaker 1: a little bit and I literally watched the shadow like
Speaker 1: form up in front of me and then dart out
Speaker 1: to the left and was gone. I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: so that's interesting, and that's actually like a perfect example.
Speaker 1: So I used to be really big on taking photos
Speaker 1: and like you did, taking you know, three in a row.
Speaker 1: I always tell told people to take three in a
Speaker 1: row so that if there was something anomalous, you could
Speaker 1: kind of say it in each photo and see where
Speaker 1: it comes from or if it moves or that kind
Speaker 1: of thing. Now I'm not really big on spirit photograph.
Speaker 1: I think that's a whole other program. But one of
Speaker 1: the reasons I tell people to kind of shy away
Speaker 1: from taking tons of photos is that you might miss
Speaker 1: something walking right in front of you. And so you
Speaker 1: were exactly so you were really lucky. Yeah, I was
Speaker 1: very lucky, I said, not, I'm very much like you.
Speaker 1: I've moved away. I'll take some photos, but I'm much
Speaker 1: more I've moved away from taking as many photos when
Speaker 1: I'm investigating. Yeah, I mean, obviously flashes it kind of
Speaker 1: messes up with your night vision. Two if you're investigating
Speaker 1: in the dark, you know. Also, so now I've just
Speaker 1: gotten to the point where so many photos are explainable
Speaker 1: that I want something else, you know, But that's still
Speaker 1: that's very very cool. I've heard so many stories come
Speaker 1: out of there that doesn't surprise me at all now
Speaker 1: I've heard and just kind of going through the history
Speaker 1: and going through a lot of the reports, it sounds
Speaker 1: like a lot of the spirits there have been given
Speaker 1: names over the years. Is that still the case? It
Speaker 1: sounds like there's a lot of you know, different names
Speaker 1: and identities. I read about a spirit that doesn't like
Speaker 1: to talk about football, or he's a big Steelers fan
Speaker 1: or something that is George he is a big Steelers fans,
Speaker 1: So I mean makes sense, you know, geographically speaking, it
Speaker 1: very much is. And it's funny because he mainly likes
Speaker 1: the I hate see the old school Steelers, but the
Speaker 1: Terry Bradshaw, the Jack Lambert at the Jack cam days.
Speaker 1: And we can occasionally even get him talking about hockey,
Speaker 1: but like all the rest of us long suffering Pirates fans,
Speaker 1: if you bring them up, he's just like, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about that. So, you know, isn't that
Speaker 1: so funny though? That he will go into a location
Speaker 1: and they start trying to talk to these spirits we start.
Speaker 1: I think sometimes it's our inclination to just start asking
Speaker 1: the very hard hitting questions like you know, do you
Speaker 1: know you're dead? But if you come in and bring
Speaker 1: up something that a lot of people like to talk about,
Speaker 1: like sports, like that is a really good way to
Speaker 1: get a response. And so I think that's so cool
Speaker 1: that that's working for you. Guys. Yeah, we've discovered it
Speaker 1: help you that if you're much more conversational, you get
Speaker 1: a lot better responses. I sometimes feel like, you know,
Speaker 1: people come in, like you said, and they asked the
Speaker 1: same questions. The spirits are like rolling their eyes, like
Speaker 1: are we doing this interrogation again? Right? But we've discovered again,
Speaker 1: if you're much more conversational and almost try and let
Speaker 1: them lead the conversation if you know what I'm talking
Speaker 1: about and see where it goes, that makes sense. And now,
Speaker 1: so the spirits that you're encountering, what do you think
Speaker 1: their mindset is? For the most part, you know often
Speaker 1: wonder that ourselves. The question we keep asking and we've
Speaker 1: never gotten an answer, is what does the building look
Speaker 1: like right now? Like we're trying to figure out do
Speaker 1: they see it as it is now? Or do they
Speaker 1: see it as it was then, like when they were here,
Speaker 1: and we haven't got an answer. We're wondering if they
Speaker 1: don't understand the question, because for them, their reality is
Speaker 1: what they're seeing, So what do you mean what does
Speaker 1: it look like? And we don't know how to phrase that,
Speaker 1: Like we've tried a bunch of different ways, and so
Speaker 1: we don't know whether it's just they don't understand or
Speaker 1: they just aren't going to answer us, right. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's a very compelling question and we've actually asked that
Speaker 1: before too. It kind of raises the idea to like
Speaker 1: why do you go disappear wearing clothes? It's got to
Speaker 1: be some sort of kind of interpretation of themselves. And
Speaker 1: I mean that's just my theory. I don't claim to
Speaker 1: know any of this. With that, yeah, and it makes
Speaker 1: you wonder are they projecting a reality or is there
Speaker 1: some sort of reality aided in their existence that mirrors
Speaker 1: what was there when they were alive. It reminds me
Speaker 1: years ago when we were doing Ghost Hunters at the
Speaker 1: Mount Washington Hotel and Jane Grant, they were in the
Speaker 1: Princess room and they asked her, Princess, are you here?
Speaker 1: And she was like, of course I'm here, where are you?
Speaker 1: And so it's like that might be it the like
Speaker 1: why are they asking these ridiculous questions? Right exactly, you're
Speaker 1: thinking like, Okay, great, the spirits think that I'm stupid,
Speaker 1: just move on, right, Yeah, I mean, who knows. I
Speaker 1: kind of feel like what I like about what I'm
Speaker 1: seeing with hill View right now, just kind of going
Speaker 1: through the history and stuff, is that you guys are
Speaker 1: really moving away from like this is a really scary
Speaker 1: asylum type thing. It seems like they're really trying to
Speaker 1: put a positive spin on the location because really what
Speaker 1: it used to be with that is that the case? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it really is, because we think again, I don't know
Speaker 1: whether it was still at the name out or they
Speaker 1: just honestly thought that. I honestly don't know. I know
Speaker 1: a lot of our spirits got a really add rap.
Speaker 1: The one I always think of was Eli. Oh he
Speaker 1: was this violent drunk and this that the other thing.
Speaker 1: And we have never come across Eli being violent at all.
Speaker 1: But we've also really like sat down and talked to him,
Speaker 1: Like I said, I had these conversational moments with him,
Speaker 1: and he's actually a pretty fun guy. You know, this
Speaker 1: was in nursing home for the majority of its life,
Speaker 1: or a poor farm. This wasn't a prison, this wasn't
Speaker 1: an insane asylum. Did they take in mentally patients, Yes,
Speaker 1: they did. But we actually got lucky enough last year
Speaker 1: and the year before we had a whole group of
Speaker 1: previous staff members visit us, and oh, we followed them
Speaker 1: around that building. I felt like the paparazzi filming them
Speaker 1: and taking their pictures. And it was great for us
Speaker 1: because they worked there in seventies, eighties, nineties. There was
Speaker 1: one woman there her great grandmother worked there in the forties.
Speaker 1: We had everything covered and you could see how much
Speaker 1: they loved the facility, and every one of them said
Speaker 1: that that was their favorite place that they worked in
Speaker 1: their entire careers. Well, that's a really great frame of
Speaker 1: reference too. I think it's really easy to go into
Speaker 1: these kind of older buildings and get scared and get spooky.
Speaker 1: And we can thank horror movies for that. We can
Speaker 1: thank you know, shows like I was on Ghost Hunters
Speaker 1: for that. When we were on it was all about scary,
Speaker 1: being scary, and I do love kind of seeing this
Speaker 1: evolution of you know, let's take a step back and
Speaker 1: just imagine for a moment what this actually was, and
Speaker 1: then treat the spirits accordingly. And I bet the staff
Speaker 1: being there that was probably did that do anything to
Speaker 1: the activity levels in the place. It did. The whole
Speaker 1: time we were in there, it like the building felt happy,
Speaker 1: if you know what I mean. It was just this
Speaker 1: wonderful feeling. And then for the next couple of days,
Speaker 1: the activity was through the roof and it was all
Speaker 1: this like super positive, like uplifting communication on stuff. It
Speaker 1: was like they were really really happy. Yeah, I bet
Speaker 1: they recognized some of them, or at least their energy
Speaker 1: or their voices. Absolutely absolutely. And then it was because
Speaker 1: you know, they're walking us through, they're telling us stories
Speaker 1: that we'd never heard. They were verifying stories that we
Speaker 1: had heard. You know, it was just oh, yeah, I
Speaker 1: remember this guy who was in this room. Like I said,
Speaker 1: I think I wrote a notebook full of notes. It
Speaker 1: was just an amazing experience. Well, that's gonna be really
Speaker 1: good to have to for future investigations. And now you've
Speaker 1: got names you can bring up to. I always feel
Speaker 1: like names are a really powerful thing to have in
Speaker 1: your arsenal when you're investigating because like that's a triggering
Speaker 1: thing that like, oh, we have someone in common. Do
Speaker 1: you know this person? Like, let's talk about it now.
Speaker 1: That aside, though, I am curious to know, Like, have
Speaker 1: you ever at any point been scared in the building
Speaker 1: or been frightened or freaked out? Yeah, it has happened
Speaker 1: once or twice. Yes, we know that something had been
Speaker 1: opened up, whether it was a portal or a doorway
Speaker 1: or whatever opened up. And we've been having some problems
Speaker 1: with it from time to time. We try and bring
Speaker 1: people in who can maybe help address it. But you know, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: I guess there's no way to shut it down. I'm
Speaker 1: in no way an expert, and I could be completely
Speaker 1: incorrect on this. We have had some problems and what
Speaker 1: we call Amanda stairwell. That's the stairwell that goes down
Speaker 1: into the basement. When we go around the lock up
Speaker 1: at night, you just step in there. Half the time,
Speaker 1: I don't even turn the light on right there, there's
Speaker 1: enough ambient light from the hallway. And the one night
Speaker 1: I stepped in there to lock it up and I
Speaker 1: heard something and looked over in the corner and I
Speaker 1: could see a dark figure in the corner hissing at me,
Speaker 1: and I was just like, okay, you can take yourself
Speaker 1: right back down to the basement. I'm just locking the
Speaker 1: doors and I I finished locking and I got myself
Speaker 1: out of there. Yeah, I mean, but she came back
Speaker 1: to work after that. I did. I'm not gonna let
Speaker 1: them scare me out. And we do have something that's
Speaker 1: been less than friendly keeping around on the second floor.
Speaker 1: It's been coming in and out of Jeffrey's room. Jeffrey
Speaker 1: is the little nine year old boy. We had been
Speaker 1: discovering that Jeffrey either wasn't in his room or was
Speaker 1: being essentially bullied into not talking. And we figured out
Speaker 1: whatever this say is. It's squatting in there, and it
Speaker 1: won't really tell us its name, but it has come
Speaker 1: down the hall at us a couple of times, and
Speaker 1: you'll look up into the window in that hallway and
Speaker 1: you'll see red eyes looking back at you for split second,
Speaker 1: like we've even sent somebody up all right, who's up
Speaker 1: there with a laser grid or who's up there messing
Speaker 1: around and there's nobody in the hallway. It sounds like
Speaker 1: a job for Kindred Spirits. It does, It absolutely does.
Speaker 1: We need to get in there, that's right, because you know,
Speaker 1: we don't want it out there, bullying our bullying, our
Speaker 1: spirits and you know, and necessarily scaring people off. It
Speaker 1: doesn't show up very often, but when it does, it
Speaker 1: it's it's pretty aggressive. I mean, it hasn't touched anybody,
Speaker 1: it hasn't harmed anybody, but you know the feeling when
Speaker 1: something unfriendly is blaring at you. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean
Speaker 1: I think sometimes in these places that either have a
Speaker 1: lot of energy or spirits in them or have people
Speaker 1: investigating frequently, you know, sometimes other energies or other entities
Speaker 1: come in. They can tell like oh wait, they can
Speaker 1: see and hear them over there, you know, or things
Speaker 1: kind of form from that energy. It's really strange. Just
Speaker 1: the last few years, I've really started putting more stock
Speaker 1: in the idea of like our intentions and what we
Speaker 1: can do to a space. And so who knows, but that,
Speaker 1: I mean, it sounds very interesting for sure. Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: And that's that's funny. We were discussing that too. Is
Speaker 1: is that something that happened here? You said, from all
Speaker 1: of the urban legends or the history, and you know,
Speaker 1: we've heard a lot of them about things that went
Speaker 1: on there that we can't prove or disprove, and we've
Speaker 1: often wondered if that wasn't the ill intentions taking form, right,
Speaker 1: it's not even just ill intentions. I think sometimes people
Speaker 1: come in and when we have public investigations, which I
Speaker 1: do a lot I do. I take a lot of
Speaker 1: groups into places. I know how I felt when I
Speaker 1: first started investigating, and how kind of like nervous. I
Speaker 1: was not really even nervous. I was just like a
Speaker 1: ball of like I don't know what's about to happen.
Speaker 1: It was this mixture of like anxiety and excitement and fear.
Speaker 1: And I always think, like, what is happening if we
Speaker 1: just keep bringing that vibe into a place over and
Speaker 1: over and over again, Like what happens to that space?
Speaker 1: I talked about this in my book a little bit
Speaker 1: about how if you think you can infuse your home
Speaker 1: with positivity and you can have a vision board and
Speaker 1: you can make changes that way, then you believe in
Speaker 1: energy manipulating your area and your your life. So we
Speaker 1: I think that has a lot of other applications and
Speaker 1: other scenarios like this one or many other haunted places
Speaker 1: I've been in. But that's getting a little deep and
Speaker 1: it does go that's actually really excellent, and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be giving that a lot of thought. I can tell yourself.
Speaker 1: Let's let kindred spirits get there though and figure it out. Absolutely, absolutely,
Speaker 1: we'll get you guys there. Yeah, it's time for a revisit. Now,
Speaker 1: are there any particular spirits that are your favorite? Are
Speaker 1: there any areas that you that you're fond of? The
Speaker 1: most on the third floor, Actually it was. It's funny,
Speaker 1: but you know, during the early days of the pandemic,
Speaker 1: when everything is shut down and all the businesses had
Speaker 1: to be closed, we still went up a couple of
Speaker 1: times of week a check the building. We did live streams,
Speaker 1: keep the people engaged, let the spirits you know that
Speaker 1: we had forgotten about them, things like that, And we
Speaker 1: started going into random rooms. You know, the building this big.
Speaker 1: We tend to stick to the hotspots, and we're like,
Speaker 1: you know, this building is so big, there's gotta be
Speaker 1: stories in every room. So we just randomly picked rooms. Well,
Speaker 1: we picked one up on the third floor that for
Speaker 1: years the psychic had told us there were spirits of
Speaker 1: children in there. Well there really shouldn't have been. So
Speaker 1: we went in and really started investigating there and we
Speaker 1: started talking to the spirit of a little girl named Ellie.
Speaker 1: And Ellie has quickly become a favorite because of the
Speaker 1: interaction with them. We did a bunch of research. I'm
Speaker 1: sure either the local historical society is going to put
Speaker 1: a plaque up with my name or get me banned.
Speaker 1: I'm not really sure. When the facility first opened, they
Speaker 1: took into merculous patients and if the families didn't have
Speaker 1: anyone to take care of their children, they this particular
Speaker 1: room is a dormitory, okay, which we never knew, so
Speaker 1: now it makes sense. And yeah, Ellie is just She's
Speaker 1: this bundle of light energy. And it doesn't matter where
Speaker 1: I'm out in the building. If I'm walking down the
Speaker 1: hallway on the first floor to lock up, and I
Speaker 1: usually have something running and I'll hear hi Melissa. So yeah,
Speaker 1: she's she's a favorite. She just brings all this positive energy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's great. I love George. George is my buddy because
Speaker 1: you know, Steelers Penguins, what can we say? And and
Speaker 1: probably on the second floor. My other favorite is Mary A.
Speaker 1: L Oh. She was absolutely phenomenal. We've been lucky enough
Speaker 1: to have like her family members and some of her
Speaker 1: nurses come and visit us, and they said she had
Speaker 1: the most wicked sense of humor and she still does.
Speaker 1: Like you could go in there and have entire conversation,
Speaker 1: Go sit down, how's it going, Mary, and it'll be like,
Speaker 1: oh God, you again. What I like about that is
Speaker 1: that this Mary's family and the staff members are you know,
Speaker 1: on board with the idea that her spirit might be there.
Speaker 1: Do they ever come in and like try to interact
Speaker 1: with her or do you do you see a spike
Speaker 1: in activity when they do that. Sometimes her niece has
Speaker 1: come in a couple of times and there's definitely been
Speaker 1: a spike in activity when when she's around. And like
Speaker 1: I said, anytime former staff members come in, that night
Speaker 1: is guaranteed to be much more active than a normal night.
Speaker 1: It's always a thrill for us when we get family
Speaker 1: members to come in and get more stories. And I'm
Speaker 1: sure you've heard the stories Jimmy up on the third
Speaker 1: floor and his roommate, Lester. We had all of Lester's
Speaker 1: children visit us once and likes the activity that entire
Speaker 1: weekend was through the roof. Usually Lester's the more quiet
Speaker 1: of the two and it was all lester all the
Speaker 1: time that weekend, which was phenomenal. Wow. May I always
Speaker 1: wonder sometimes if that helps them realize too, like, you know,
Speaker 1: whether they want to stick around. I I always talk
Speaker 1: about how, you know, the whole idea of crossing over
Speaker 1: to me, I used to subscribe to that idea, but
Speaker 1: I don't really as much anymore. But I do feel
Speaker 1: like sometimes closure is a thing, and so sometimes bringing
Speaker 1: family members in to talk to them or you know,
Speaker 1: figuring out why they're hanging around. And so I could
Speaker 1: totally see that, and I wonder if that would ever
Speaker 1: kind of instigate them to go to wherever they're supposed
Speaker 1: to go next. But I also feel like a lot
Speaker 1: of the people that were at hell View, especially back
Speaker 1: when it was a poor farm, which I didn't really
Speaker 1: realize until I started digging into the history, is that
Speaker 1: the idea of that was like there were people and
Speaker 1: this still happens today of course, where everyone they knew
Speaker 1: dies or you know, they are left alone and they
Speaker 1: don't have money and they need somewhere to go. And
Speaker 1: so I wonder sometimes because this is what gave them comfort,
Speaker 1: or this is what was home to them, and they
Speaker 1: and in life they had nowhere else that they're afraid
Speaker 1: to go anywhere else, right now. That's I had never
Speaker 1: even heard of a poor farm until I started investigating
Speaker 1: at hell View, and then I did very much the
Speaker 1: same thing, dug into the history of poor farms in
Speaker 1: general into hell View. And yeah, I mean with a
Speaker 1: lot of our spirits, that was the only home they
Speaker 1: ever knew Mary Virginia when Spirit lived there her entire
Speaker 1: life until the facility closed. Jimmy came there in nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty eight and lived there until the facility closed in
Speaker 1: two thousand four. So you know, for a lot of them,
Speaker 1: this may have been the only home they ever knew. Well,
Speaker 1: that certainly puts some things in perspective. So now have
Speaker 1: you guys opened back up now for like public tours
Speaker 1: and things and investigations. Oh? Absolutely So if people want
Speaker 1: to do that, where do they go? While we have
Speaker 1: a Facebook page and it's Haunted Hillview, or we have
Speaker 1: a website and it's www dot Haunted Hillview Manner dot com.
Speaker 1: That's great, and so they you guys are doing actual
Speaker 1: like investigations and do do daytime tours as well? We
Speaker 1: do we do now we are that's grist for the season,
Speaker 1: because you know, the ambient air temperature right now is
Speaker 1: four degrees which means it's about eighteen degrees in our building.
Speaker 1: Whatever the temperature is outside, that's what it is inside.
Speaker 1: We do reopen the second weekend of March, so that's perfect.
Speaker 1: That gives people time to plan. I mean, right now
Speaker 1: it is January, but who knows. Whenever you're listening, just
Speaker 1: know they're closed. So more. Yeah, we do day tours,
Speaker 1: we do public investigations, private investigations. We have a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of really exciting events coming up this year, so
Speaker 1: it's going to be a great year. Well that's awesome,
Speaker 1: So I encourage everyone to check out hell View. I
Speaker 1: definitely plan on getting back. I'm gonna pitch it like
Speaker 1: crazy for our next season, and so hopefully we can
Speaker 1: meet in person at some point Melissa. That would be
Speaker 1: fantastic gaming. I would absolutely love that, and I'd love
Speaker 1: to show you guys around hill View again. Great, well,
Speaker 1: thank you so much. I appreciate all your insight. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for having me on the show
Speaker 1: and for talking about hell View. We really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: I have to note that as I did research on
Speaker 1: Hill of View. I obviously found a number of obituaries
Speaker 1: showing it as the place of death for so many,
Speaker 1: but without numbered those newspaper articles were highlights of positive
Speaker 1: happenings there, forage clubs holding cooking classes, youth groups, entertaining
Speaker 1: patients with Christmas Carol's dance troops, giving patients free lessons,
Speaker 1: craft and knitting circles, you name it. And though today
Speaker 1: the building no longer serves its original function as a
Speaker 1: care home, it now has a larger purpose as a
Speaker 1: functioning community center. A documentary film profile from the Westminster
Speaker 1: College News talks about how the space is utilized for
Speaker 1: high school dances, for Halloween programming for kids, and for
Speaker 1: facilitating community events and collaboration with the town police department.
Speaker 1: So while notorious and somewhat ironically known for death in
Speaker 1: many ways, Hill View Manner is still very much alive
Speaker 1: and well. I'm Amy Bruney and this was haunted road.
Speaker 1: If you want to join us on a spooky vacation,
Speaker 1: please check out my company, Strange Escapes at Strange dash
Speaker 1: escapes dot com. Also, new episodes of Kindred Spirits are
Speaker 1: currently airing on Travel Channel on Saturday nights at ten
Speaker 1: ninth Central or streaming on Discovery Plus. Haunted Road is
Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio and Grimm and Mild
Speaker 1: from Aaron Mankey. The podcast is written and hosted by
Speaker 1: Amy Bruney. Executive producers include Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and
Speaker 1: Matt Frederick. The show is produced by rima Ill Kali
Speaker 1: and Trevor Young. Research by Taylor Haggerdorn, Amy Bruney, and
Speaker 1: Robin Miniter. For more podcasts from I Heeart Radio, visit
Speaker 1: the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcasts.