Stage Door Theater

stage door theater

1/14/2012

General Information

Investigators: Christy, Gary, Kathy, TJ and the DUST Team.

Equipment used: DVR, (5) IR video cameras, personal audio recorders, digital cameras, geophone, and various EMF meters

Initial Interview:

Girl apparition seen in Ladies room

Adult female apparition seen in costume room on 3rd floor

Door to theater opened while theater staff was working on stage

Knocking heard in walls.

Historical/Factual/Relevant Info:

The Stage Door Theater shares a building with the Yukon Historical Museum in what is known as the Yukon Museum and Arts Center. The building was built in 1910 as the Yukon District School and was locally known as “Old Central.” It accommodated all grades until 1925 when a new junior and senior high school was built. The building continued to serve the public school system through 1991.

In 1992, the building was leased to the city for $1 per year. This allowed the Yukon Historical Museum to become a reality. The Stage Door Theater had already been in production at the school’s auditorium since 1987.

The Yukon Historical Museum occupies six rooms that feature displays from historic local Main street/Route 66 businesses such as a pharmacy, barber shop, doctor’s office and school room. One room is dedicated to Czechoslovakian heritage of the Yukon area. Special displays feature the “Yukon’s Best” flour mill that served the area’s economy for generations.

Local veterans have a dedicated portion of the museum full of artifacts and uniforms from World War I and II. A room on the third floor is dedicated to home and ladies dress fashions of the past. A room in the basement archives Yukon District School class photos, yearbooks, trophies and other treasures from the past.

Urban legend says a former 1940’s high school principal had committed suicide by hanging in the principal’s office. This story could not be validated through local newspapers or other media. However, if the story remains true it could not have possibly occurred at the location of the Stage Door Theater and former Yukon District School since the junior and senior high schools had moved out of the building 15 or more years before the even may have taken place.

Further research of newspapers, internet and the Yukon Historical Society Museum did not reveal any stories of tragedy on the school’s property or other nearby locations.

One person worth mentioning in this report is Mabel C. Fry (1884-1985). She is featured heavily in the Historical Museum on-site as she was a prominent citizen of the city throughout her adult life. Many of her belongings were donated and placed on display in the museum. Mabel was a librarian, piano teacher and volunteer for the school. She was a member of the Ladies Library Club and became the librarian in 1935 serving as librarian for 50 years. A new library was built in 1980 and was named in honor of Mabel C. Fry.

Investigation Report

Client Interview

We investigated this location with our friends from DUST and this location consisted of 3 different levels, a first floor, 2nd floor and a basement. Since the location was quite large, it took us a little while to get the equipment set up on the various floors in the building. Upon arrival, we established a joint base at the ticket counter on the outside of the theater. We established four camera’s on all three floors. Camera’s one and two were on the second (Top) floor with camera one focusing down the expanse of the hallway and camera two focusing into the entry ways to the costume room and the prop room. Motion detectors were placed in each room and also in the immediate area of the camera outside the two rooms of interest. Camera 3 was established in the basement looking down the main basement

hallway with a motion detector at the opposing end of the hallway and the laser grid running from the camera down the hallway. A second motion detector was set up in the “gymnasium” of the school in the basement on an old piano. Camera 4 was established in the back of the theater looking at the whole of the theater, focused on the stage. Motion detectors were placed at the front of the stage and the back of the stage. Later in the evening, three trigger objects (A rocking horse of sorts, a teddy bear, and a horse rattle) were placed on the right center of the stage, marked with chalk for movement. At 2152, set up was complete and the teams prepared for investigation.

While setting up cameras on the 3rd floor in the costume room, Christy and Gary heard shuffling in the costume room back in the corner. This was not captured on their audio recorders as the recorders were downstairs on the 1st floor.

Upon conclusion of setting up the equipment, Kathy was in the theater area setting up a stationary camera and TJ and Christy were at base located on the 1st floor when Christy’s audio recorder captured a female voice that said, "Secret" We do not know what this evp was referencing to since it did not match any conversation taking place at the time. During this set up time and in the front lobby on the 1st floor, Gary’s audio recorder picked up an evp of a male’s voice saying, "Hey, help us"

Sweeps

While sitting at base, at 2155, TJ witnessed a shadow moving in the “open” office to the right of the main doors from the base.

Walkthrough

Christy began her walk-through followed by TJ and Kathy and a couple of members from the DUST team. While taking one of the stairwells down into the basement, audible whispering was heard in the stairwell by several of the members each who claimed

the whispering had not come from them. Unfortunately this audible whispering was not captured on our audio recorders.

Christy’s walkthrough began in the basement hallway by the stairway on the south side of the building. Tonya from DUST team had a K-II spike at the time. It was not determined if this K-II spike was caused by high emf or if it was indeed an actual spike on the meter. While in the basement area, Christy and Kathy were trying to get the flash to come on the full spectrum camera when a strange sound was heard. It can be heard on our audio after Christy said, “It’s not letting us turn it on” while troubleshooting the camera’s flash settings. The interesting thing to note was a DUST investigator had commented about hearing someone say “wow” but nobody had claimed to have said or heard it. Initially this sound was debated by members present. The sound at the time sounded like it was either a “wowwww” type of sound or a “shoe squeaking,” but later after listening to our audio, it was determined that the sound was indeed a low “Wow” and the voice sounded to be low and raspy.

While in an area of the basement that appeared to be an old bathroom, Christy had picked up on a little boy by the name of Timmy who was 6 years old. During this time and while still in the old bathroom, TJ stated he saw a quick glimpse of an apparition of the little boy.

Sweeps

Our team began the sweeps phase of the investigation. The sweeps phase of the investigation is where the team collects environmental data such as temperature and electromagnetic field (EMF) baseline values and/or fluctuations along with photographs of the environment. EMF and temperature readings assessed and no changed from the baseline readings were noted on the second investigation.

While taking baseline readings in the kitchen area, Christy’s audio recorder was sitting on the kitchen countertop when it captured an EVP of a male’s voice saying, “Watch that shit.”

While walking down from taking readings in the upstairs loft, the sound of running footsteps can be heard from Cyrena's recorder which was sitting in the back bedroom.

The team had moved into the area of the basement that was formerly the school’s gymnasium. A member of DUST was attempting to communicate with what is believed to be a young boy spirit. A child’s voice can be heard saying, “No” seemingly in response to a question being asked. This clip may also require headphones to hear.
About 15 minutes later, the team decides to take a break and step outside. As the team is going up the basement stairs on the south side of the building, a whisper apparently saying, “It’s mine”

was picked up on a recording that it seems only Christy was able to hear.

While upstairs on the 2nd floor in one of the rooms, Christy had made a comment about how she was glad she lived in modern times and was not subject to wear some of the garments females had to endure back years ago. It was during this time that her audio recorder picked up a male’s voice that stated, “No.”

Thirty-seven minutes passed and the team was on the 2nd floor continuing Christy’s walkthrough. We had just entered the hallway and were preparing to deactivate the motion sensors so we wouldn’t activate them while in the area, when an evp of a male's voice was recorded saying, "Hey." About 10 minutes later, the team was in a costume storage room on the third floor. Christy had picked up on a female spirit and was describing her. Further into the conversation, a "Female whisper" was captured on Kathy's audio recorder but the voice is unable to be deciphered. This voice was not acknowledged by anyone on the team.

After the walk-through, team members decided to take a short break and several members were by the base area watching the stationary cameras through the monitor. One DUST member stated that he had heard an audible voice say, “Hey” and he asked those present if they had heard the voice too. Christy’s audio recorder picked up a “Exhale & hey” during this time. Shortly after this was recorded, Christy’s audio recorded also picked up another male voice that said, "Bass tracker" We do not know what this evp was referencing since there was no matching topic of conversation going on during this time. At this time Gary’s audio recorder also picked up on a male’s voice saying, “Help” coming from the base area located on the 1st floor of the building.

Both OKPRI and DUST were ready to start their investigative sweeps so both teams broke up into two groups with members from both teams working together. TJ lead a group up to the top floor while Christy took the second group downstairs to the basement where the teams would rotate floors. While conducting the sweeps in the basement, at approximately 1:15am, Jamie from DUST saw a shadow block out the light of the laser grid. Unfortunately this occurrence was only witnessed by Jamie and no further occurrences were documented during our investigation of the basement area. While conducting investigative sweeps in the basement with members from the DUST team, Kathy was discussing use of the Mel Meter when a male voice seems to repeat her and says the word, “Point zero.” During this time at base on the 1st floor, Gary’s audio recorder picked up a loud “Knock.” The loud knock was not heard by Gary.

While on the 2nd floor investigating, the team was in between the two rooms upstairs, the costume room and the storage room when an audible voice was heard by several group members from both OKPRI and DUST. This audible voice sounded like a male saying, “Want Out.”

Once our investigative sweeps were finished, we headed back to base and began to prepare to get ready to conduct our sit-down in the theater area located on the 1st floor. While at base, Christy’s audio recorder picked up a male’s voice that said, “Cross in here” however we do not know what this evp was referencing to.

Before we started our sit-down in the theater area, one of the motion sensors on the 3rd floor shooting into the hallway between 2 rooms activated. No one was on the 3rd floor at the time of the activation. OKPRI and DUST investigators went upstairs to the 3rd floor to shut off the motion sensor and check around for causes of the activation but no causes were found. The motion detectors have a radius of around 7 to 10 feet and after recreating the activation, it was determined that the activation

was caused by something moving in from of the sensor either entering or exiting out of the two rooms in front of the sensor or walking right by the sensor in the main hallway area.

Approximately 25 seconds after the 3rd floor motion sensor was activated, the basement motion sensor was also activated. No one was downstairs in the basement. Recreations of this activation were attempted and it was determined that the activation was caused by something moving in from of the sensor either entering from the stairwell or leaving the hallway area of the basement. We believe that since the 3rd floor motion sensor activated first and then the basement second, we feel something triggered the 3rd floor motion sensor and then ran downstairs to the basement area through the stairwell then activating the basement motion sensor located not to far from the stairwell entrance. After deactivating the alarm in the basement, Christy and Kathy had heard a shuffling noise coming from a side corridor that leads to the old school gymnasium. Kathy’s recorder picks up a male voice saying, “Hello” right after Christy said, “yeah, it sounds like it was right down here.”

Both groups decided to conduct a sit-down in the theater area. Before starting the sit-down, photos were taken of the theater area. While Christy was taking photos, she happened to catch an interesting shadow photo. While shooting towards the left side of the theater, she happened to catch a shadow figure of what appears to be that of a small child. A head, shoulders, with arm extending upwards and a leg or bent knee can be seen with the shadow as if the child was slightly leaning left as if he/she were peaking over to see what was taking place. What’s interesting about this photo is that you can actually see through the shadow in various areas and it is well defined against the theater surroundings. This photo was taken with a Nikon digital camera that is 12 mega pixels. A flash was also used when the photo was taken. The comparison photo was taken at a slightly different angle so the comparison for this photo is not a valid comparison. We had this photo analyzed by a professional photographer who gave us the following response:

“To be honest I cannot tell you what it is. All of the pixels match. The outline area is transparent and the center mass is not. It is definitely something in between you and the chairs because some of it is further away. It has no known structure and based off of the recreations I have attempted. I do not have a logical explanation for it. The chairs are still visible through it. If the object was two or three feet away it may be something in frame that is just fuzzed out due to the depth of field.”

While conducting a sit-down in the theater area, 3 flashes of light were seen coming from the room next door. These flashes of light looked similar to a camera's flash but upon inspection of the room next door, no one was in the room next door taking any pictures and there were no cars that drove by to cause the light flashes. There was also a heavy black curtain that separates the stage area from the adjoining room as well so the source of the light flashes would have had to of come from the inside of the stage area in between the heavy curtain and the stage.

Conclusion:

Our team feels like this location has a mild haunting taking place haunted by one possible female from its past, one male spirit and two children spirits that we do not know if they are connected to the building’s history or not. We feel one of the male spirits is a bit aggressive in nature but not one that would cause physical harm to anyone who occupies the building.

Psychic Investigator’s Comments

The first spirit I picked up on in this building was that of a little boy named Timmy. I met Timmy in the basement area and after he told me his name, he also told me he was 6 years old and he was looking for his mommy. Before I saw Timmy, I saw a set of railroad tracks which I assumed were connected to Timmy some how. I wasn’t sure if he was trying to show me that he had died on the railroad tracks or if he had once

lived near the railroad tracks. Timmy had dark brown hair and was wearing a light blue with light tan pants with brown shoes as if he were dressed for school. Timmy stated that he had a friend named Jenny who was also there at the location. He said Jenny hid a lot because she was afraid of the mean man who was there in the building with them.

I encountered Jenny when I was on the 1st floor by the back stage area. Jenny told me she was 7 years old. Jenny had long strawberry-blonde hair which she wore in low pigtails and she had freckles on her face. She appeared to be a very sweet girl who was very afraid of people, especially men. She told me that her parents did love her anymore. When I asked her why she thought that, she told me that her dad left her and her mom and he never came to see her after his departure. She told me that her mother had a boyfriend who used to hit her and one time he hit her so hard that she died. She said she had gone to her house but her mother wasn’t there anymore and she is now very confused as to why her mom didn’t try looking for her so she assumed her mom didn’t love her anymore. She said Timmy was her best friend and she wanted to leave the building and find somewhere else to go but she didn’t want to leave Timmy there by himself.

Upstairs on the 2nd floor, I encountered a woman who initially gave me her name as Emma. At least that was the stage name she liked to be called by. She stated she enjoyed the theater shows and that she often took part in them but no one ever seemed to notice her. When TJ questioned her about being Mabel Fry, she told him “Smart boy.” We took that as an indication that she was Mabel who had been associated with the old school many years back. Mabel kept insisting that she would like her purple hat that had an off white feather on the right side of it. Myself and the other investigators present

searched for the hat she was describing but could not find it present anywhere in the building. This female however appeared to be content and did not seem to be in any disarray.

I felt the presence of a man on the 2nd floor initially but he refused to talk to me and when we came around he disappeared. While going up to the 2nd floor to do our investigative sweeps, I heard him say, “Don’t even bother” and “Go to hell.” The female Emma or Mabel had told us the grumpy man there went by the name of Jim McPherson and said that he probably wouldn’t be willing to talk to us. From the brief encountered I had with this man, he didn’t feel like he was connected with the building. The child spirit Timmy, told me that this aggressive man liked to mainly hang out downstairs in one of the offices on the 1st floor. One can’t help but wonder if that is why our team collected so many recorded evps on the 1st floor area.

evidence collected

There were 9 EVPs that was recorded during this investigation and 2 audio clips.

There were positive photos and 1 video clips showing a motion sensor activation.