HAUNTING ON MANITOU
By: Gerri Graves
Word on the Street Issue 48, October 2024
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I’ve never seen a ghost, nor had the privilege of witnessing a UFO…….
BUT, I have been privy to some strange goings on. I make no claims, I’ll just lay out the occurrences as they happened. You decide if they warrant further conversation.
We lived in this old Victorian on Manitou street, here in Boise. I won’t give the address (for current owners privacy)…. and honestly, when I sought it out a few years ago, there had been so many changes to the exterior, you’d never know it was the same house. You won’t be able to find it from these stories alone.
I must have been 11…12? So….1978 roughly. I had just finished reading a book called ‘The Amityville Horror’. Yeah…..that book.
The old house was still heated by coal, and because it was the days of chores, not child labor, I was the designated coal shoveler. Which meant, I shoveled the coal into the coal room, into the furnace and then removed the ‘clinkers’ every morning.
For those not in the know, clinkers are what’s left after the coal burns through. Like lava rock, almost.
This room was tiny. It had a big bin for the large, once a month, load of coal, a small standing area, maybe 4×4, …and the furnace. It was underground…..and had a small, narrow staircase leading into the furnace room.
Someone …..had painted it blood red. The whole room…..blood red..
I immediately associated it with the pig room in the Amityville Horror book…..and it scared the crap out of me.
Shoveling coal into the room, took hours. Hours alone, underground, in a blood red, claustrophobic room.
The room was dead quiet. Only the sound of the shovel hitting the coal. But on some nights, I heard voices. Heated conversations between a man and a woman, a baby crying and a little girls voice speaking words I didn’t understand. (or dont remember)
I told my parents, but they didnt believe me. I loathed coal duty, not only because of the physical labor, but also because of the voices.
However, the coal room wasn’t the only affected part of this house, mysterious events took took place inside of the house as well.
We’d wake up to find all the cupboards in the kitchen wide open. We’d hear footsteps upstairs….like on a hardwood floor, but the whole upstairs was carpeted. We’d smell perfume in isolated pockets…..meaning, two steps forward, and the scent would disappear. Things went missing, never to be found again. Knocks on the front door, and no one was there..
Typical creepy stuff. Which actually, I was intrigued by, not scared.
Only four things scared me. The red room and the following three instances.
My parents were often out, and left me to babysit. Because I was the oldest , I was in charge. Any mischief they got up to…..was my fault. No pleading my case, no begging for leniency…..my fault. Period.
I watched them closely, but my little sister was a smooth operator that often gave me the slip. I always knew where to find her- on the narrow staircase that lead upstairs. Pen or marker in hand, drawing on the walls. Always the same thing……. three stick figures. A man, a woman……and a child.
It made me upset. I was the one that had to scrub it off before my parents got home. I had no intention of putting myself in the path of my stepfather’s wrath……and so, I scrubbed as if my life depended on it.
After dozens of incidents and months of scrubbing, I asked her in frustration, “Why do you keep drawing these figures on the wall? Who are they?”
It was a sensible question, as our family had 6 members, not three. What I didn’t anticipate, was her reply…….”They’re the people that live in the walls.”
The third incident happened in the garage.
I’m pretty sure the garage was a barn at some point in time, as it had a loft and was a separate, stand alone building.
The plank boards that made up the floor of the loft, were obviously very old. They had shrunk with age, leaving gaps between the planks. The only access to it, was a rickety old step ladder that led into a tiny hole of an entryway. It was the only access to that room, as there were no windows or doors, just the hole.
I went into the garage one day to retrieve something (probably the cursed coal shovel) and while in there, something crashed onto the floor of the loft above my head.
It made me jump out my skin! I immediately looked up….. and there, in the space between the planks, was an eye looking back at me!
I screamed the highest little girl scream…..and ran out of there like my hair was on fire.
My parents immediately looked in the garage, poked their head through the entry hole in the ceiling, and proclaimed all was safe. What or whoever it was, was now gone.
The fourth incident took place on my birthday, April 28, 1978. I begged and pleaded to have a slumber party. For the first time (and the last)….. they acquiesced.
The big day came. All 7 of my friends showed up. We ate pizza, played games and laughed until it got dark……and then, we took turns telling ghost stories by the glow of a single candlelight.
It began to rain outside, which lent to the spooky atmosphere.
It was my turn and I told the story of a scared little girl, in bed…..who petted her dog’s head everytime she got scared. The dog licked her hand, consoling her.
I’m sure you all know this urban legend story.
Right, as I’m getting to the part where she wakes up to find her dogs head impaled on a bedpost……a huge crash of thunder sounded, lightning lit up the sky…….and a window that had been painted shut, slammed open.
A crescendo of little girl screams filled the air……and when, it died down…….tick, tock, tick, tock.
I flew to the lightswitch, and flipped it on. And there, on a shelf mounted mid wall, was an old Victorian clock that had been passed down within the family…..happily swinging its pendulum, and ticking loudly. It echoed within the room.
I stood there, mouth agape, frozen in place. The clock was well over a hundred years old, and required a key to wind it up. Except, the old gears were locked and the key wouldn’t turn.
As long as we’d had it, it had never worked.
Every single girl called their mom and promptly left. Some never spoke to me again.
Fast forward 30 years later. I happened across the word ‘Manitou’ at a pow wow meet up in Indiana. It was held in a park, next to the White river. Just so happened, it was two blocks away from my house. I took Julian there every year, as his great, great, great grandmother was Cherokee…..married to an Irish pastor, on his father’s side. (They must of truly loved each other, as they had 12 children together.)
Long story short, the word was mentioned. I looked it up again, when i got home …..and here is the meaning:
Manitou- (Among some North American Indian peoples) A good or evil spirit as an object of reverence.
A WINTER DRIVE
By: Julie Loomis
Word on the Street Issue 48, October 2024
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The car window keeps icing up and the road is slick with frozen snow. Hanna keeps telling Lori. Lori is wondering if they should have stayed at the cabin, at least wait till morning. Hanna was too worried about not running off the road to see Lori gripping the handle. Suddenly Hanna jerks the wheel and they start spinning out of control. The car slides off the road into the side ditch.
Hanna peels her hands from the steering wheel and checks on her friend Lori who is hyperventilating.
It is okay Lori, we just need to push the car back on the road. Lori screams, it is not okay we almost died and where the hell are we? Hanna looks around and sees only snow and trees. Hanna says, we must be still on the road to the cabin. Lori says, isn’t this near where those girls disappeared? Hanna shakes her head no but wonders if it is and says, let’s just push the car out.
Hanna can’t believe the back tires are flat and hopes she can still drive on one flat tire. Lori says from the trunk, I don’t see a spare tire. Hanna remembers taking it out so they could take more bags. We can just call my parents at the cabin to come rescue us. Lori gets back in the car because she thought she saw something moving in the trees. Hey Hanna can we turn the heater on when my toes are frozen. Hanna, can you hear me? The door jerks open and Hanna jumps in and frantically tries to start the car. The car engine starts to sputter and dies.Hanna starts saying no no no and starts looking around. Lori yells stop freaking me out what the hell .
They hear something make a strange growling noise. Lori starts to yell and Hanna says be quiet. Hanna looks at her friend and her eyes are huge and her face is pale. Okay Hanna keep it together she whispers to herself. Hanna says in a shaky voice, we need to stay in the car and grab the sleeping bags to keep us warm. Lori whispers back, the ones in the trunk?
No way am I going out there, Lori says. Hanna replies, one of us has to go or we will freeze to death. What about calling your parents? Hanna looks down and mumbles, I dropped my phone in the snow. Just great huffs Lori cause mine is dead. We have some coats and food in the car and you wrecked the car Hanna so you should go out and get the sleeping bags. “Thanks,” said Hanna, feeling guilty she made her friend leave the cabin early.
Fine you’re right so I will grab the sleeping bags and try to find my phone Hanna says. Lori feeling bad she said the remark about wrecking the car, lets out a sigh and says she will get the sleeping bags and Hanna can try to find her phone. Both girls look out the windows after wiping the fog off. Lori whispers, do you see anything and Hanna shakes her head no. Slowly they open their doors, listening for any sounds. It is silent and the only sound is the heavy breathing of the two frightened girls. Hanna starts to dig in the snow wishing she had gloves, she finds her phone and tells Lori the phone is broken, which is weird since she didn’t step on it. Hanna starts to open her door when the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She hears something crunch. She yells for Lori to get in the car as her friend holds up the sleeping bags. The bags disappear and Lori screams then it’s silent. Hanna, shaking, gets into the car too scared to look back. Crying she grabs the extra coats and huddles under them. Her wet tennis shoes freeze her feet and she wonders if it hurts to freeze to death as she falls to sleep.
Hanna’s parents leave in the afternoon and are worried because they haven’t heard from the girls. They get half way down the road and see Hanna’s car in the ditch. They run out and notice there are claw marks on the front of the car and the window is cracked. Hanna’s Dad notices the trunk is open and two sleeping bags at the edge of the tree line. His wife lets out a scream and he knows his daughter is dead. As he turns and walks to the driver side he sees his daughter frozen with a look of pure terror. They send search parties out to look for Lori but she is nowhere to be found and they write it off as a bear attack. On cold winter nights people have said they can still hear Lori screaming.
HAUNTED TRAILER COURT
By: Viola Crowley
Word on the Street Issue 48, October 2024
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This is a collection from my neighbors and myself of experiences we’ve had in our trailers. I will not use their names, trailer numbers or even the name of the trailer court to protect their identities. We’ll start with me and my trailer. 1 month of being in the trailer, I was living alone and I woke in middle of the night to the sound of someone walking down my hallway. I was frozen with fear. I was laying with my back to my open doorway and couldn’t move to look. The footsteps got closer until finally they were in my room. Then the sound of a coat zipper unzipping. Then it happened. I felt someone sit on my bed with a heavy plop. It was so real that it moved my bed about 3-4 inches away from the wall and my tablet fell to the floor. That unfroze me. I turn real quick to look and there is no one there. A couple of different neighbors in different trailers, told me about several occasions hearing loud, heavy footsteps walking down their hallway when no one is there. Another neighbor hears water running in her kitchen, but it is off when she walks in there. 2 different neighbors hear people talking in their living room when no one is in there. One of those neighbors also heard her toilet flush in the middle of the night when everyone is sound asleep. Another neighbor has told me about hearing what sounds like the nails of dog paws walking down her hallways when she has no pets and another neighbor hears, from time to time, what sounds like dishes being stacked in the dish drainer and sometimes hearing a stack of dishes crashing down. One neighbor heard a male voice call his wife’s name. His wife was woken up and had never lived here. One neighbor’s wife died in his trailer and he repeatedly sees an apparition that resembles his wife, walk down the hallway or in the kitchen. He hears his wife’s voice calling out to him. He has also woken to someone sitting on his bed hard enough to move the mattress.
WHY I’M OBSESSED WITH THINGS ON THE DARKER SIDE
By: Chris Alvarez
Word on the Street Issue 48, October 2024
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In good taste, images that are on the “darker side” are something I’m fond of. I’m currently beginning a series of paintings of horses. Originally I wanted to incorporate parts of the horses as skeletons but I listened to advice from my significant other and reluctantly but happily decided against it. I love skeletons, skulls and the like, but they’re not for everyone. There’s something to be said about the realization of serious tones in everyday images; ie; drawing a horse with smoke billowing out of its eyes, or a snake with two heads. The symbology of these distorted ideas are throughout history and can mean several things usually referencing the fringe of disguised ideologies; some good and some bad. Finally, art like economics is cyclical and I’ll return to my love of regular, untainted images, but this time with a new spin… a strange spin. We love art. It is endless.
