Speaker 1: Welcome to Haunted Road, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky listener Discretion is advised. What
Speaker 1: happens when you turn a haunted building into a haunted attraction.
Speaker 1: I've investigated many a building with a paranormal reputation that
Speaker 1: was also used as a haunted house during the fall
Speaker 1: season for a few hours every night. These locations, already
Speaker 1: buzzing with spiritual energy, are filled with thrill seekers, their nervous,
Speaker 1: terrified energy permeating every crack in the wall and every
Speaker 1: dark corner they turn toward. Their screams echo non stop,
Speaker 1: unending until the last guest walks out the exit door
Speaker 1: at closing time. Then the animatronics are turned off, the
Speaker 1: actors wipe off their garish makeup, hang up the blood
Speaker 1: stained costumes, and head home. And then the space is
Speaker 1: silent or is it? I'm Amy Brunei and this is
Speaker 1: Haunted Road. In Tuwela, Utah, a single story brick medical
Speaker 1: facility sits right next to a graveyard. The rounded entrance
Speaker 1: is covered in glass windows and the words Asylum forty
Speaker 1: nine are scratched over the double doors out front. The
Speaker 1: interior beyond the foyer is largely dark and windowless, with
Speaker 1: fluorescent lighting overhead. The structure has all of the rooms
Speaker 1: that you'd expect to find in a hospital, a maternity ward,
Speaker 1: an er, staff lounges, locker rooms, and a conference room
Speaker 1: that says you might not recognize the conference room if
Speaker 1: you were to visit it today. It's dressed to look
Speaker 1: like a chapel, and I'll cover why later on. The
Speaker 1: main hallway runs from one side of the building to
Speaker 1: the other, but one off shoot corridor dubbed the Green Mile,
Speaker 1: has sterile greenish blue flooring and a never ending string
Speaker 1: of doorways. The building is known alternatively as either the
Speaker 1: Tuela Valley Hospital or Asylum forty nine. I haven't found
Speaker 1: a historical record to verify this, but the hospital might
Speaker 1: have begun its existence as a single residence home. It
Speaker 1: may have been built shortly after members of the Church
Speaker 1: of Latter day Saints first established Tuela in the mid
Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds. It was a small community about forty miles
Speaker 1: southeast of Salt Lake City. It was also already settled
Speaker 1: by the indigenous go Huote people. In the midst of
Speaker 1: bloody clashes between the go Shoote community and the newcomers,
Speaker 1: a Mormon man named Samuel f. Leeb decided to build
Speaker 1: a house on Main Street. I'll note now that Main
Speaker 1: Street is actually several blocks from where the hospital now stands,
Speaker 1: but perhaps in eighteen seventy three, which is when he
Speaker 1: built his house, the roads were named differently. Samuel was
Speaker 1: a major fixture in Tuela's early history. He served as
Speaker 1: the town's mayor, and according to his obituary, which ran
Speaker 1: in the Transcript Bulletin, he helped build the very first
Speaker 1: roads in the city. He did this by using a
Speaker 1: hand plow to dig trenches in straight lines, only for
Speaker 1: those trenches to eventually become the streets. It's said that
Speaker 1: Samuel and his family lived in the house for over
Speaker 1: forty years, with his relatives remaining after his death in
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety four. When they vacated the home in nineteen thirteen,
Speaker 1: they converted it from a single family residence to a
Speaker 1: care home for the elderly, as reported by Tyson Romero
Speaker 1: of ABC News four. By nineteen forty nine, construction began
Speaker 1: on another nearby facility, the Tuela Valley Hospital. The medical
Speaker 1: center cost six hundred thousand dollars to build the equivalent
Speaker 1: of about seven million dollars. Today, it had thirty six beds,
Speaker 1: a maternity ward, and an er. The timeline is a
Speaker 1: bit fuzzy, but for some time the hospital and Samuel's
Speaker 1: nursing home operated side by side. But somewhere along the way,
Speaker 1: the old house had to be demolished and a forty
Speaker 1: bed nursing home was added onto the hospital to take
Speaker 1: in its former residence. So the new building served two needs.
Speaker 1: It provided medical care to the residents of Tuela and
Speaker 1: ensured that their elderly citizens had a place to spend
Speaker 1: their golden years. Sadly, the facilities were underfunded and understaffed.
Speaker 1: While the doctors delivered over two thousand babies before nineteen sixty,
Speaker 1: many other patients lost their lives in medical emergencies. In
Speaker 1: their book The Haunting of Asylum forty nine Chilling Tales
Speaker 1: of Aggressive Spirits, Phantom Doctors, and the Secret of Rooms
Speaker 1: six sixty six, authors Richard Estep and Cammy Anderson noted
Speaker 1: that the hospital earned a nick name among Tuela locals,
Speaker 1: the Hospital of Death. It's also said that some Tuella
Speaker 1: residents chose to travel to other facilities, sometimes miles away
Speaker 1: for better medical care. Not only was the hospital poorly
Speaker 1: equipped to meet its patient's needs, they also couldn't reliably
Speaker 1: store all of the bodies of the people who died
Speaker 1: within its walls. Tyson Romero reported that there was no
Speaker 1: morgue on the grounds, so when someone passed, the staff
Speaker 1: would leave the body in an empty room until a
Speaker 1: coroner could come to process the remains. Oddly, in those days,
Speaker 1: there were often reports of screams and cries coming from
Speaker 1: the delivery room, even when it wasn't in use and
Speaker 1: was supposed to be empty. Rather than deal with the
Speaker 1: strange noises, the nurses reportedly set up a television set
Speaker 1: and turned up its volume to drown them out. That's
Speaker 1: according to Jamie Davis and Samuel Queen, who wrote Haunted
Speaker 1: Asylum's Prisons and Sonatoriums. By two thousand and two, a new,
Speaker 1: better equipped hospital had opened roughly three miles away, so
Speaker 1: the Tuela Valley Hospital closed its doors for good. The
Speaker 1: attached nursing facility kept running for over a decade before
Speaker 1: it too was shuttered. However, I do want to tell
Speaker 1: one story from when the nursing home was still running.
Speaker 1: One day after visiting hours had ended, a man dressed
Speaker 1: all in black walked in. He ignored the staff, who
Speaker 1: warned him that he wasn't allowed to see the patients. Instead,
Speaker 1: he walked into one residence room and locked the door
Speaker 1: behind him. The employees grew increasingly agitated as they were
Speaker 1: unable to open the door. They knocked, tried to pry
Speaker 1: it open, and ultimately called maintenance to force it ajar.
Speaker 1: When they finally got into the room, there was no
Speaker 1: sign of the man in black, but the resident who
Speaker 1: lived there was dead. Perhaps rumors like these inspired the
Speaker 1: buildings new owners. After the hospital and the nursing home closed,
Speaker 1: they acquired the facility's old, abandoned medical equipment and numerous
Speaker 1: unclaimed X rays. According to the Haunting of Asylum forty nine,
Speaker 1: some of those pictures were still hanging on the walls,
Speaker 1: while drawers were still stuffed with medical manuals and reference books.
Speaker 1: They put it all to use in a creative way.
Speaker 1: These days. One part of the former hospital hosts a
Speaker 1: shopping plaza called tuwella market place. There people can visit
Speaker 1: local shops and restaurants. The rest of the hospital, dubbed
Speaker 1: Asylum forty nine, operates as a haunted attraction. People can
Speaker 1: book tours there, during which costumed actors jump out to
Speaker 1: scare them. Parts of the building are dressed to evoke
Speaker 1: particular horror tropes, like that former conference room that now
Speaker 1: looks like a chapel. The owners have also added fake
Speaker 1: blood dolls, mannequins, and other props throughout. But one feature
Speaker 1: makes Asylum forty nine different from other haunted house attractions.
Speaker 1: In this one, the ghosts are real. In fact, the
Speaker 1: authentic spirits seem to be more active when the scare
Speaker 1: event is running, like they're drawn to it. But eerie
Speaker 1: reports came from the space even before it opened. While
Speaker 1: the Haunted House was still under construction, there were numerous
Speaker 1: reports of tools and other objects moving on their own.
Speaker 1: In some cases, items would fall without warning, sometimes striking
Speaker 1: workers in the head. There were also reports of disembodied
Speaker 1: voices and inexplicable banging noises, and of doors opening and
Speaker 1: closing even when nobody was standing nearby. During paranormal investigations,
Speaker 1: researchers at the hospital have picked up EVPs from a
Speaker 1: spirit calling himself Peter. He's thought to be a former
Speaker 1: X ray technician. There have also been sightings of an
Speaker 1: apparent former patient named Bonnie. She's in her mid fifties
Speaker 1: and can be spotted walking with an IV dressed in
Speaker 1: a hospital gown. It's believed that Bonnie may have died
Speaker 1: of cancer during her time in the facility. Another patient
Speaker 1: is a man named Robert. He's thought to be friendly,
Speaker 1: but he also likes playing practical jokes. Some reports say
Speaker 1: that he intentionally jumps out at guests to scare them,
Speaker 1: or army crawls down the main hallway to try and
Speaker 1: get to the conference room. The book The Haunting of
Speaker 1: Asylum forty nine describes Robert as a large man. He's
Speaker 1: both tall and broad, and he walks with a cane.
Speaker 1: He's said to be productive of children, and he enjoys
Speaker 1: telling jokes in his EVPs. Jeremy is another former patient.
Speaker 1: He's sometimes nicknamed the clown faced guy due to the
Speaker 1: red streaks that run across his face, but he's not
Speaker 1: wearing makeup. His skin is badly burned and scarred. When
Speaker 1: Jeremy is present, visitors sometimes catch the distinct scent of
Speaker 1: something burning. It's said that Jeremy is less friendly than Robert.
Speaker 1: Richard as step In Cammy Anderson wrote that he's been
Speaker 1: known to harass female visitors. He's also a notorious liar
Speaker 1: with the history of impersonating other spirits. The maternity ward
Speaker 1: is thought to be especially active. There are countless reports
Speaker 1: of a shadow figure that's been sighted there, as well
Speaker 1: as a woman who attempts to communicate via sign language,
Speaker 1: a little girl, and a surgeon dressed in scrubs. The
Speaker 1: nursery is also where people have frequently cited a ghost
Speaker 1: known as Nicholas. He's thought to be a former doctor
Speaker 1: who's still trying to care for his long gone patience.
Speaker 1: At least once, he was caught on camera during a
Speaker 1: scare event. While actors pretended to perform a surgery, Nicholas
Speaker 1: stood behind them, observing the mock operation. A pair of
Speaker 1: girls known as Sarah and Tabitha also frequent the nursery.
Speaker 1: Sarah looks to be about six years old. She wears
Speaker 1: a white dress and has long, dark hair, while Tabitha
Speaker 1: has a yellow dress. On It that Sarah died of tuberculosis,
Speaker 1: while Tabitha passed of some kind of head injury, possibly
Speaker 1: a brain tumor. While Tabitha can be shy and elusive,
Speaker 1: according to the Haunting of Asylum forty nine. It seems
Speaker 1: that Sarah likes attention and wants to be part of
Speaker 1: the Haunted House attraction. She apparently enjoys hiding just to
Speaker 1: jump out at visitors and scare them, just like the
Speaker 1: actors are paid to do. Another spirit, known as either Wesley,
Speaker 1: Wesley or West, frequents the maternity ward, particularly patient room six.
Speaker 1: He looks like a shadow figure when he spotted leaving
Speaker 1: the room. Many believe that Wes was an Alzheimer's patient
Speaker 1: who lived in the nursing home after his death in
Speaker 1: the nineteen nineties. His ghost was just as confused and
Speaker 1: frightened as he had been in life. Wes doesn't like visitors,
Speaker 1: and Richard Estep and Cammy Anderson claim that when people
Speaker 1: walk into his room they often feel an intense sensation,
Speaker 1: as those if someone desperately wants them to leave. Others
Speaker 1: receive scratches and shoves from Wes's unseen hands. There are
Speaker 1: also reports of Samuel f Lee, the man who may
Speaker 1: have initially built his house on the property. He's said
Speaker 1: to appear with his seven year old son, Thomas, except
Speaker 1: there's no record of Samuel having a son named Thomas
Speaker 1: or of any of his children, dying at the age
Speaker 1: of seven. While we can't verify the ghost's identities, it's
Speaker 1: said that the man often speaks out loud so visitors
Speaker 1: can hear him without EVP equipment, and the boy enjoys
Speaker 1: moving objects around, including flashlights and bed sheets as a
Speaker 1: practical joke. In general, visitors at Asylum forty nine see
Speaker 1: many strange things doors that open and close on their own,
Speaker 1: mists that appear out of nowhere, and strange anomalies that
Speaker 1: are shaped like circles and lights. But there are a
Speaker 1: few reports that set the hospital apart from other haunted locations. First,
Speaker 1: there seems to be a dark entity in the er.
Speaker 1: Visitors have dubbed him the Guardian. Jamie Davis and Samuel
Speaker 1: Queen wrote about the Guardian. They claim that the Guardian
Speaker 1: looks like a shadow figure, but rumor goes that he
Speaker 1: once was a hospital employee. Even then, he was rude
Speaker 1: and made life miserable for his coworkers. There are also
Speaker 1: many reports of a portal somewhere in the hospital. Some
Speaker 1: feel like it could be a gateway to the afterlife.
Speaker 1: It's said that a ghost named Maria guards the portal
Speaker 1: and sometimes encourages spirits to pass through it. According to
Speaker 1: reporting from Tyson Romero of ABC four, when the retirement
Speaker 1: facility was still operational, elderly residents sometimes saw visions of Maria.
Speaker 1: They always died a few days after spotting her. That said,
Speaker 1: there's no guarantee that heaven waits on the other side.
Speaker 1: Some claim that Maria has also warned people not to
Speaker 1: go through the doorway because, according to her, whatever waits
Speaker 1: beyond it is dangerous. When it comes to the Tula
Speaker 1: Valley Hospital, it can be difficult to separate fact from
Speaker 1: fiction or reality from artifice. But today we're gonna have
Speaker 1: some help from my dear friend Richard Estep, who, as
Speaker 1: referenced before, wrote a book on the location and he's
Speaker 1: been there many many times. So Richard is coming up
Speaker 1: after the break. All right, my friends, I am now
Speaker 1: joined by friend of the show, frequent guest, mister Richard Estep.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the program.
Speaker 2: Sir, Always a pleasure, Amy, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 1: Of course, I feel like normally have we ever done
Speaker 1: one this way or have you always been a live guest.
Speaker 2: We've always been live in front of one of those
Speaker 2: great strange escapes crowds.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, so this is this is all new. So
Speaker 1: I really do appreciate this. Now I was talking to
Speaker 1: you usually like so for listeners, Richard has written eight
Speaker 1: books on the paranormal, I would say, well on locations,
Speaker 1: and like even before we started, I brought up or
Speaker 1: he brought up a location and I said you should
Speaker 1: write a book about that, and he said, I did.
Speaker 1: It came out six months ago, and so I felt
Speaker 1: like a very bad friend for a hot second. But
Speaker 1: then I realize you've written so many books. I can't
Speaker 1: keep track anymore. Richard.
Speaker 2: I'm at like forty four right now. So I get it.
Speaker 2: I have a hard time.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you're going to give Hans Holzer a run for
Speaker 1: his money.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Hans Holzer. And you know Brad Steiger and the
Speaker 2: great Rosemary al and Guiley on My Role Model.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Rosemary was a lovely woman. Well, that being said,
Speaker 1: you did happen to write a book about this location
Speaker 1: we're discussing today. Now, I know people call it asylum
Speaker 1: forty nine. How do you pronounce the town? Is it?
Speaker 2: This is the great Most people say tool and that
Speaker 2: will get you thrown out. It's tuilla, like there's a
Speaker 2: will in it the tuilla.
Speaker 1: To willa, like it's three syllables, exactly. Okay, good to
Speaker 1: know because I was like, is it touley? Is it tool?
Speaker 1: But now you've okay, so Tuela. So this was previously
Speaker 1: its previous incarnation, it was Tula Hospital, correct.
Speaker 2: It was actually it was the local valley hospital, okay,
Speaker 2: Willa Valley Hospital, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, perfect, And then it became this Asylum forty nine,
Speaker 1: which makes sense. And I love your relationship with this place,
Speaker 1: which I did not know. When I reached out to you.
Speaker 1: I asked if you knew anyone who knew who I
Speaker 1: could talk to about it. And you're like, well, I did,
Speaker 1: of course write a book on it, and then you
Speaker 1: actually go there and you participate in the hunt right
Speaker 1: every Halloween.
Speaker 2: So I wrote a book years ago called the World's
Speaker 2: Most Wanted Hospitals, and I'd heard so much about Asylum
Speaker 2: forty nine, and I went, and I went early in
Speaker 2: the year. I made the mistake of going in like March,
Speaker 2: and it was just quiet, and the owner said, you
Speaker 2: need to come back over Halloween because this place builds
Speaker 2: and over the Halloween season amy they have literally thousands
Speaker 2: of people coming through all of them trying to get scared.
Speaker 2: That's why you go to a full contact horn right right,
Speaker 2: And so the act you're very familiar with cyclical hauntings.
Speaker 2: Of course, Well, this is dormant over the winter period,
Speaker 2: and then it builds as they start building the main
Speaker 2: haunt for the year. They do construction, and of course
Speaker 2: construction leads to increased paranormal activity, and then Halloween week
Speaker 2: it all comes to a peak and the hospitals and
Speaker 2: it's most active.
Speaker 1: Oh, I believe it. You know, it's funny because it's
Speaker 1: kind of controversial in the paranormal field, like having haunted
Speaker 1: attractions in haunted locations, but the reality is some of
Speaker 1: these locations don't really have a future other than something
Speaker 1: like that, and then us kind of ghost hunters coming
Speaker 1: in as well. But like you said, I've investigated many
Speaker 1: of these places that have these seasonal haunts, and it
Speaker 1: is most active right after the haunt has closed down
Speaker 1: for the season. And I have been in at least one,
Speaker 1: the Scarehouse in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They were in an old
Speaker 1: mason's hall for a long time, and so I went
Speaker 1: in one or there. Rather I investigated there like the
Speaker 1: night they had the haunt open that night, and then
Speaker 1: once they closed. It is the creepiest feeling to be
Speaker 1: in there. When it's closed for the night. It's almost
Speaker 1: like it's got a buzz in it. Did you experience
Speaker 1: that there at all?
Speaker 2: Every year consistently? And I think that you know, where
Speaker 2: one finds strong emotion, I've always believed one finds are haunting.
Speaker 2: The kind of fear you get in a haunt, though,
Speaker 2: isn't the bad kind of fear. It's but it is intense.
Speaker 2: I mean, they actually give cash prizes to the cast
Speaker 2: of Asylum forty nine if they can make a customer
Speaker 2: soil themselves. I saw this happen.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the best bonus scheme I ever heard an employer do.
Speaker 2: But it's still a fun kind of fear. And I
Speaker 2: think that the hospital's haunted reputation adds to that. And
Speaker 2: you know, regarding the propriety of this, I definitely get
Speaker 2: those people that say, you know, maybe this isn't in
Speaker 2: the best taste. But on the flip side, these places
Speaker 2: would be a parking lot if it weren't for the
Speaker 2: revenue brought in by the haunts. And they wouldn't be
Speaker 2: there for us to enjoy. They would be demolished.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. You know, it's a revenue stream to keep these
Speaker 1: historic locations open, and quite a few of them do that.
Speaker 1: Quite a few of them do ghost tours.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: It's kind of along the same level. And I feel like,
Speaker 1: as long as you're doing it respectfully than by all
Speaker 1: meets please and haunts are fun. I absolutely hate them,
Speaker 1: but yet I subject myself to them every year for
Speaker 1: some reason, Like, you know, like I would love to
Speaker 1: check this place out in person, I have not been there.
Speaker 1: That's the theme this year on Haunted Road. I've done
Speaker 1: so many episodes now that I'm running out of places
Speaker 1: I've actually been to, So I'm kind of discovering these
Speaker 1: new locations. And then when I got to this one,
Speaker 1: I was like, I need to go check this place out.
Speaker 1: But anyways, I am terrified when I go through those haunts.
Speaker 1: I do Halloween hor every year and I'm just screaming
Speaker 1: and laughing the whole way through. They could probably win
Speaker 1: their competition with me. It's not hard to make me
Speaker 1: pee my pants these days.
Speaker 2: Well that's a challenge accepted. If you're ever out in Tuila,
Speaker 2: I'll make sure you get to put your nerves to
Speaker 2: the test.
Speaker 1: Okay, So now you how many years running have you
Speaker 1: had this tradition?
Speaker 2: Well, gosh, since I wrote that book. I took COVID
Speaker 2: off because I'm a paramedic and that was a busy
Speaker 2: year for all of us. But so twenty twenty I
Speaker 2: didn't do it. But beyond that, I've been going since
Speaker 2: I want to say, it's twenty seventeen. And you know,
Speaker 2: partly it's because the family community atmosphere in this place.
Speaker 2: Tuila is a small town. The cast stars are mostly teenagers,
Speaker 2: and you know, without a place like this to bring
Speaker 2: them some community, I fear for what would happen to them.
Speaker 2: And instead I see a lot of parenting, big brother,
Speaker 2: big sister and things like that going on. The atmosphere
Speaker 2: is just unbelievable. They've taken ghosts and hauntings and they've
Speaker 2: made it such a positive thing for the community. I
Speaker 2: wish more people would see it. Well.
Speaker 1: I love that, And what a cool job for a
Speaker 1: teenager too. I would have loved to have been able
Speaker 1: to do something like that. Now when did you know,
Speaker 1: like you're like, oh, there's something to this. This place
Speaker 1: is actually very haunted. When did you know it was?
Speaker 2: You know, we talk about as paranormal investigators, we talk
Speaker 2: about seeing an apparition, being kind of about Holy Grail,
Speaker 2: right amy, And yes, we can all well lucky if
Speaker 2: we see one in a career. I'm at thirty years
Speaker 2: in and the only one I can absolutely tell you
Speaker 2: I'm convinced I saw was of Asylum in forty nine.
Speaker 2: And how fitting that it would be over a Halloween night.
Speaker 1: Hmmm, Well, tell us the story. I need to know.
Speaker 2: More absolutely well. Rather than working the haunt the first time,
Speaker 2: I usually just go through like a customer would, so
Speaker 2: I get that experience, you know, I like to see
Speaker 2: what fresh horrors the cast is planning for the year.
Speaker 2: So I went through this one night, and I saw
Speaker 2: about halfway through a little girl and she looked kind
Speaker 2: of like little Red riding Hood, you know, or Goldilocks,
Speaker 2: that kind of dress, that kind of age as well,
Speaker 2: And she was tugging a lady into one of the rooms.
Speaker 2: And this girl looked like she was having so much fun,
Speaker 2: and this lady looked like she wasn't. The lady I
Speaker 2: remember was dressed in a very contemporary way, you know, jeans,
Speaker 2: and a sweater. Obviously of our time. The little girl wasn't.
Speaker 2: She was wearing kind of one of those flowing dresses
Speaker 2: or nightgowns. But I just thought that's that's a costume, clearly,
Speaker 2: you know. It was only after I got to the
Speaker 2: end that I thought she was kind of young for
Speaker 2: a full contact haunted house, Like it would almost be
Speaker 2: irresponsible to have a kid that young working this harnt.
Speaker 2: So I went to the owners and I said, doesn't
Speaker 2: it bother you that you have adults lumbering around in
Speaker 2: the dark, you know, and a child this young. And
Speaker 2: they just both looked at me, and they said, there
Speaker 2: is no girl that age working here tonight. And I said,
Speaker 2: there is. I saw her, and there's no way she
Speaker 2: came through the ticket booth. There's no way anyone would
Speaker 2: sell a ticket to someone with a kid this young.
Speaker 2: So they took me to the cast hall where the
Speaker 2: cast is taking off their makeup, and I went and
Speaker 2: looked at each and every one. I talked to each
Speaker 2: and everyone. The girl was not. Nobody in the ticket
Speaker 2: booth had allowed admission to a kid that age either,
Speaker 2: And they said, yeah, you saw Sarah. She's one of
Speaker 2: the little girls that is well known to haunt this hospital.
Speaker 2: And I kick myself amy because for years, you know,
Speaker 2: I've listened to people talk about seeing an apparition, and
Speaker 2: I just thought, why did you not reach into your
Speaker 2: pocket and pull out your phone and take a picture
Speaker 2: or take some video? And they tell me it never
Speaker 2: occurred to me. I didn't realize what I was looking at,
Speaker 2: And that's exactly what happened to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I say that to people a lot. How when
Speaker 1: you see an apparition, you know so many five maybe
Speaker 1: more than that, your first instinct is that it's an
Speaker 1: actual living person. I mean, unless they're like a weird
Speaker 1: partial apparition, but like when you see a full bodied apparition,
Speaker 1: your instinct is who is that? How did they get
Speaker 1: in here? And it would be awkward for you to
Speaker 1: immediately like pull out your phone and start recording and
Speaker 1: Murphy's law half the time, probably more than half the time,
Speaker 1: that's not going to show up anyway. Like you know,
Speaker 1: I've had my camera's pointed straight on to anomalies plenty
Speaker 1: of times and it didn't see anything, but you had
Speaker 1: the experience, and personal experiences are powerful. So who do
Speaker 1: they think that little girl is? Who are these kids
Speaker 1: they think are haunting the hospital.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are three children that are most active there
Speaker 2: that are known to have died in the hospital. A
Speaker 2: researcher named Torri Westoff has written a series of books
Speaker 2: about actually those who died in Asylum forty nine. They're
Speaker 2: called We Are Asylum forty nine and they believe that
Speaker 2: this is a young girl that died there. I think
Speaker 2: it was about forty five fifty years ago, and seems
Speaker 2: to be a happy ghost. In fact, the children are
Speaker 2: very playful, you know when when they're around. There seems
Speaker 2: to be a lot of pranking, a lot of touching,
Speaker 2: a lot of practical jokes in humor. Nothing negative from them.
Speaker 2: And I can only imagine that if you are the
Speaker 2: spirit of a child, a hospital that is also a
Speaker 2: haunted house is a playground to you, especially if you
Speaker 2: get to scare adults.
Speaker 1: Well yes, and you know, be seen and people don't
Speaker 1: realize that a ghost, you know that you can kind
Speaker 1: of have this moment to appear and play and that
Speaker 1: would be so interesting, Like I wonder what it would
Speaker 1: be like to be a spirit, and you know, know
Speaker 1: that for like a time each year you can just
Speaker 1: completely terrify people, and I imagine the energy is something
Speaker 1: that you kind of exists on, you know, according to
Speaker 1: many theories that we have out there. So you were
Speaker 1: kind of saying that things peter out like when the
Speaker 1: haunt is not happening, but I imagine things have to
Speaker 1: happen when people are working there year round. Like what
Speaker 1: do you think are kind of the more prevalent paranormal
Speaker 1: experiences that people have in that building?
Speaker 2: I think that. So firstly, they've started doing seasonal haunts,
Speaker 2: so they do Valentine's Day haunts, now they do horn
Speaker 2: I noticed that demonic rabbits take over the asylum. It's fantastic,
Speaker 2: so you know, it's dormant for less of the year.
Speaker 2: I think Also, for the longest time, the back half
Speaker 2: of the building was a nursing home and so it
Speaker 2: was off limits quite rightly so. But since they moved
Speaker 2: that facility out and turned it into a community center,
Speaker 2: that's opened up a whole new dimension to the haunting
Speaker 2: because you have this back half that was completely off
Speaker 2: limits for many, many years. And there seemed to be
Speaker 2: a little crossover between some of the shall we say
Speaker 2: more traditional, you know, the older haunting that's gone in
Speaker 2: the hospital itself and what was once the nursing home,
Speaker 2: and I stayed there. I was the first investigated to
Speaker 2: spend a night on the psychiatric wing of the old
Speaker 2: nursing home, and it was one of the creepiest feelings
Speaker 2: in my life. One of the rooms, which is now
Speaker 2: a store shop. The nursing staff told us that they
Speaker 2: would not put people in there anymore because they all
Speaker 2: woke up telling a very similar story of a dark
Speaker 2: figure towering over their bed with glowing red eyes.
Speaker 1: And that was when it was an operation.
Speaker 2: An operational nursing home. In fact, they stopped putting people
Speaker 2: in that room.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's how it's going to say. I was going
Speaker 1: to ask about, like, what did people report, you know,
Speaker 1: when it wasn't operating. I imagine you've talked to past employees,
Speaker 1: and the owners have talked to past employees. I mean,
Speaker 1: there had been some inkling that there were ghosts there
Speaker 1: before it ever became abandoned.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, you know, and there was the classic figure in
Speaker 2: black that was seen going into rooms hours or days
Speaker 2: before somebody would pass. This idea of a harbinger of
Speaker 2: impending death is something we see quite often in the
Speaker 2: paranormal realm, and they would talk about that. They would
Speaker 2: talk about paranormal activity ramping up in the nursing home
Speaker 2: right before somebody died. And what impresses me is most
Speaker 2: of these employees they don't want publicity, They don't want
Speaker 2: their names or faces to be put out there. They
Speaker 2: just want to share the stories. And they're still coming
Speaker 2: forward to this day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I wonder that, like you obviously you
Speaker 1: wrote a whole book about haunted hospitals, of course, so like,
Speaker 1: how common is that that employees and patients and things
Speaker 1: report activity happening in these little locations.
Speaker 2: It's so common, you know. When I do the TV
Speaker 2: show Haunted Hospitals, the tagline is every nurse has a
Speaker 2: ghost story, and it's pretty much true, so do so
Speaker 2: many patients. But hospitals and nursing homes and asylum forty
Speaker 2: nine was both. That's the key thing. And right next
Speaker 2: door its neighbor is the cemetery. So you have this
Speaker 2: kind of trifecta of components of a haunting. But yeah,
Speaker 2: so many hospitals have their ghost stories. Not all of
Speaker 2: them like them to get out there or to be publicized,
Speaker 2: but they do exist and they're more common than people think. Now.
Speaker 1: We sometimes in these kind of locations where there's this
Speaker 1: high energy level abeit now or when it was an operation,
Speaker 1: we kind of have theories and ideas that we might
Speaker 1: be creating some of these hauntings, kind of in the
Speaker 1: sense of like an Agrigor writer a Tolpus. So do
Speaker 1: you think any of these hauntings can be attributed to that,
Speaker 1: like things that were actually created by the energy of
Speaker 1: people going there.
Speaker 2: I think it's entirely possible, especially as you're dealing with
Speaker 2: a lot of fictional characters. The members of the cast
Speaker 2: actually create their characters, you know, there's almost like a
Speaker 2: role playing game element to it, and then they audition
Speaker 2: in order to be selected. So they create these characters,
Speaker 2: and it's kind of like the Philip experiment, which I
Speaker 2: know you and your listeners are going to be familiar with,
Speaker 2: but they breathe physical life into these characters. They create makeup,
Speaker 2: they dress up, they assume the guys, and then they
Speaker 2: go out there and terrify people. So it would be
Speaker 2: remarkable if some of that didn't bleed over into the
Speaker 2: paranormal realm.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, I'm always super interested in that I'm
Speaker 1: not as familiar with their business model there. Is it
Speaker 1: just the hunt or do they allow investigations. I believe
Speaker 1: they have investigations right.
Speaker 2: They actually have stopped the investigations because they have a
Speaker 2: crime museum right now as well. That's going on. It's
Speaker 2: a part of the hospital that is containing memorabilia from
Speaker 2: through crime serial modes, things like that, and they found
Speaker 2: that people coming in to investigate, by no means all
Speaker 2: of them, but have been disrespectful enough to the spirits
Speaker 2: there and also have been stealing things and things like
Speaker 2: that that the owners have kind of put the kibosh
Speaker 2: on that they've stopped doing that for the time being.
Speaker 1: Oh man, that's so unfortunate. And it's like it's sadly,
Speaker 1: it's not a completely unfamiliar tale, you know, it's I
Speaker 1: always tell investigators that when a location trusts you to,
Speaker 1: you know, climb through their halls almost unsupervised, and you know,
Speaker 1: some of these places are too large, Like there's this
Speaker 1: level of respect that you have to have, and like
Speaker 1: I would say, ninety nine percent of the time, people
Speaker 1: are super respectful and they know that like this is uh,
Speaker 1: you know kind of I don't want you know, this
Speaker 1: is something that they're being trusted with and that what
Speaker 1: they do reflects on all of us as a whole.
Speaker 1: But then I also think sometimes there's people who don't
Speaker 1: really have a lot of knowledge of the field and
Speaker 1: they're just excited to kind of get in there for
Speaker 1: a ghost unt and like you know, joe around and whatnot,
Speaker 1: depending on what they watch on TV. And then and
Speaker 1: then they end up doing things like that. So that's
Speaker 1: so sad. I hope at some point they can kind
Speaker 1: of reopen it again.
Speaker 2: Me too. I do organize ghost ms there, usually once
Speaker 2: a year or so for charity, so I'm always happy
Speaker 2: to do those and show the place after people. And
Speaker 2: you know, it's one thing to be gifted something from
Speaker 2: a location, it's something else to take it. Sitting in
Speaker 2: my office is the Board of Life from the old hospital,
Speaker 2: which was gifted to me by the owners. It's the
Speaker 2: whiteboard that has the names of which doctors, nurses and
Speaker 2: techs are working on any given night for each department
Speaker 2: who's on call for obe labor and delivery. I brought
Speaker 2: that into my home and then had to have my
Speaker 2: home blessed by a Catholic priest, so that may not
Speaker 2: have been the smartest move, but I do really yeah,
Speaker 2: which is serious for am agnostic.
Speaker 1: I did not know that story. Your wife must have
Speaker 1: loved that.
Speaker 2: I was. I was in the doghouse for quite a while.
Speaker 2: Fortunately I'm very happy around the dogs.
Speaker 1: But yeah, there you go. No, I think that's interesting.
Speaker 1: I love taking little trinkets home like that from locations,
Speaker 1: but that they're given to me, I certainly would not
Speaker 1: take them by all means, you know, and that just
Speaker 1: kind of makes it even more special. Okay, so we're
Speaker 1: talking a bit about the activity and whatnot. So you
Speaker 1: saw an apportion and that was like a big moment
Speaker 1: for you, Like when do you find that most things
Speaker 1: that people encounter there are of a friendly nature or
Speaker 1: have people had experiences there that they would, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of think we're negative.
Speaker 2: It runs the full gamut of the whole spectrum. So
Speaker 2: on the one hand, you have people like Peter Hansford,
Speaker 2: the X ray technician, who seem to be so happy
Speaker 2: and fulfilled doing his job at the hospital that he's
Speaker 2: still punching a time clock after he died. I think
Speaker 2: that's wonderful. But then you have individuals or entities rather
Speaker 2: like the guardian who is far darker and the Guardian's
Speaker 2: area on the old side of the hospital. He is
Speaker 2: notorious for physically attacking females. In fact, I would love
Speaker 2: to see you go to to toe with this individual.
Speaker 2: He scratches, pushes, shoves, tries to intimidate primarily female visitors
Speaker 2: when they enter his part of the hospital.
Speaker 1: Oh, I have to go visit. I'm more afraid of
Speaker 1: those haunt actors than like dead people. Well, yes, I
Speaker 1: tell people that all the time. I'm like, no, trust me,
Speaker 1: living people are much worse. I'll go toe to toe
Speaker 1: with a ghost any day. No, I really hope to visit.
Speaker 1: I'm going to have to contact the owner and see
Speaker 1: if you know I'm actually going to Utah. Oh, you're
Speaker 1: going to be there too. How far away is this
Speaker 1: place from there? Utah is a big state.
Speaker 2: So I tell you what, if you want to tack
Speaker 2: on a bit of a drive, it's like a three
Speaker 2: hour drive. I can make that happen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I might, It depends I have We're talking about
Speaker 1: Phenomicon in September in Vernal, Utah. Richard and I will
Speaker 1: both be there, and so I'm always trying to think of,
Speaker 1: like how I can parlay these moments into visits to
Speaker 1: haunted locations. So if I can, that would be really fun.
Speaker 1: So I could report back to you Haunted Roadies and
Speaker 1: let you know how it went. Let us know, Richard,
Speaker 1: what are you up to these days? Like how can
Speaker 1: people find you? What's your newest project? Like what do
Speaker 1: you want people to know? What's going on in the
Speaker 1: world in.
Speaker 2: Richard Estep Yeah, writing, writing and writing. Of course. I
Speaker 2: have two books coming out within one day of each
Speaker 2: other at September because my publishers don't talk to one another.
Speaker 2: One is called Mothman, co written with Tobias Whalan, and
Speaker 2: the other is called Ghostly Encounters. So I'm excited about that.
Speaker 2: I'm actually finishing a book on the hauntings of Tombstone,
Speaker 2: another place you and I know well and haunted Rodyes
Speaker 2: know well.
Speaker 1: Also, I'm so excited for that. I can't wait to
Speaker 1: go back to Tombstone. So THAT'SU. You are a machine.
Speaker 1: I tell you. There are some people out there that
Speaker 1: I know and admire in our field that are just
Speaker 1: like just very disciplined when it comes to work, and
Speaker 1: you are one of those people because you're holding down
Speaker 1: a very important full time job as well, you know,
Speaker 1: working as a paramedic, and then you're also just providing
Speaker 1: all this wonderful content for us to consume, and I
Speaker 1: just I love it so much.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much, Amy, You're so kind and right back
Speaker 2: at you.
Speaker 1: Oh well, thanks as I record this in my closets,
Speaker 1: so anyway we can we just make it work, right,
Speaker 1: But I love it so well. I can't wait to
Speaker 1: see you in person again very soon, and I really
Speaker 1: appreciate you taking the time. Everyone out there, I highly
Speaker 1: recommend Richard and his books, and he's just a lovely
Speaker 1: person as long as you can put up with a
Speaker 1: great number of dad jokes. He is the master of
Speaker 1: dad jokes, so just be forewarned. So all right, thank
Speaker 1: you so much, Richard. We'll talk soon.
Speaker 2: Thanks, goodbye.
Speaker 1: It's natural to like being scared. It's one of the
Speaker 1: main reasons why haunted attractions are so popular and why
Speaker 1: we're drawn to real paranormal investigations. But when it comes
Speaker 1: to Asylum forty nine, some may find the chills to
Speaker 1: be a little too real, and the ghostly apparitions can
Speaker 1: be a little too authentic, because the things we're most
Speaker 1: frightened of may actually dwell here. I'm Amy Rooney and
Speaker 1: this was Haunted Road. Haunted Road is a production of
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grim and milds from Aaron Manky. Haunted Road
Speaker 1: is hosted and written by me Amy Bruney, with additional
Speaker 1: research by Cassandra de Alba. This show is edited and
Speaker 1: produced by supervising producer Rima el Kali, with executive producers
Speaker 1: Aaron Manke, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick. Learn more about
Speaker 1: this show over at Grimandmild dot com, and for more
Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.