Rockledge Mansion

The sound of footsteps on the stairs when no one else is around and swirling candle flames are among the unusual occurrences Gloria Rouse has experienced at Rockledge Mansion in Occoquan.

For the first time — and for one day only — Rockledge will be included Sunday in the town’s ghost tours so others have the opportunity to experience the unexplainable.

While Rouse has not seen the Confederate soldier believed to haunt the 250-year-old building that looms over Mill Street, she believes he — or something — is there and means no harm.

Read complete article here. {via Insidenova.com}

Artist Rendering of the Pontianak (World Horror Stories)

There are many kinds of beliefs in this world about the types of ghosts. One of the more popular types of ghosts in our local culture are the Malay ghosts. Of course, there are also the Chinese ghosts, English ghosts and even Indian ghosts depending on your religion, race and beliefs. For example, a vampire is an English ghost version whereas Malays simply knows them as “pontianak” and Chinese as “Kiong Xi”.

Malays believe that ghosts are usually only active at night especially during the full moon where it is belief to be the most powerful time for the underworld. Of course, be it fact or just simply another Malaysian Urban Legend, we’ll never know. Below are a lists of the types of Malay Ghosts

1. Pontianak – also known as the vampire where it is belief that they are usually ladies dressed in white seeking for revenge. The pontianak is said to be the spirit of a woman died of childbirth. Most of the time, they can look very beautiful but if you look closely, she would have razor sharp teeth. They usually comes out after the sun sets searching for men or pregnant women (apparently, it is said that she could not bear the thought of other women being able to enjoy motherhood) to suck blood. Sometimes, they even eat the flesh of babies ripped out from their mother’s womb.

2. Toyol – these are actually ghostly kids that people adopt for the objective of stealing other people’s money. It is believed that this spirit is kept and preserved in a jar in a form of a foetus. Because the toyol is kept by people to do bidding, you have to feed it with blood everyday.

3. Polong – unsen ghost that can be used by black magic practitioners (bomoh) to harm someone

4. Pelesit – a ghost in the form of grasshopper used by bomohs to possess someone

5. Hantu Air – water ghost found usually in rivers, lakes and swimming pools. They are usually the victim of drowning

6. Kum Kum – an old witch who attacks young virgins to restore her youth and beauty

7. Hantu Raya – ghosts that acts as a double for the bomoh

8. Hantu Tetek – translates as Ghost Breast. This ghost is a female with huge breasts which is said to use it to suffocate her victims

9. Bunian – good ghost or jinns (genie) that is usually found in the jungle. Loves to help humans in trouble or in need.

10. Hantu Bungkus (Pocong) – ghost jumping around wrapped in white shroud

Read complete article here. {via SpookyCorner}

Mills hall, home to many possible ghosts. (Lisa Berguist)

Imagine it’s a cold, gray night. The moon has cast a pale glow on the tree-lined paths of the Mills College campus, and you’re walking alone. As you walk, you go over the events of the day: that midterm you aced, the homework you didn’t do, your cute new crush.

All of a sudden, you see a glimpse of something out of the corner of your eye that interrupts you. It might be a shadowy figure, a mysterious woman in a red nightgown, or a horse-drawn carriage disappearing into the night.

You wouldn’t be the first to see or hear things on campus that you cannot explain. With buildings like Mills Hall as much as 140 years old, it is no surprise that Mills has collected a bevy of spooky legends over the years that even the bravest student might find unsettling.

Read complete article here. {via The Campanil}

The Spectral Sock Swiper (credit: Fortean Times)

Fortean Times has posted three creepy excerpts from Volume Two of their It Happened To Me! True-life Encounters with the Paranormal series. Check out the Spectral Sock Swiper below. Definitely sounds like a great Halloween read.

In 1959, when I was 19 years old, I visited Alnwick in Northumberland to see a friend. One afternoon, at about 2.00pm, I was waiting for a bus in very bad weather, with thick snow everywhere. Standing to my right was an elderly lady. She wore a long black dress and shawl around her shoulders, her hair pulled back in a bun, her face very thin with deep, tired and sunken eyes.

She commented on the cold day and then asked me if she could have a couple of pairs of socks. It was only then that I noticed that her feet were bare. I took off my socks and handed them to her. She thanked me, put them on and as I stood there watching she simply vanished into thin air! Needless to say, my socks went with her. I presumed she had died in or near that spot and that other people had seen her; perhaps many pairs of socks were now in her spirit possession. I was glad to help this poor unfortunate lady and maybe ease the pain of this earthbound soul. Throughout the encounter, she looked as real and as solid as a living human being.

Mrs VA Martin, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, 1998 {source: Fortean Times}

Read Water Plant Ghost and Night Bombers. {via Fortean Times}

Peterborough Museum (Queensgate)

Have you ever wanted to go ghost hunting?

Do you have what it takes to spend a night in the most haunted building in Peterborough?

With Halloween approaching and ghosts on our minds, Children Today is inviting you to take part in what promises to be a night filled with paranormal activity at Peterborough Museum on Friday 16th October 2009.

Our ghost busting team is starting to take shape but we have some places left so you can join them! Lisa, Penny and Angela are all looking forward to hunting ghosts, so much so that Angela is coming all the way from Bournemouth to join the team and David is doing this for his birthday gift! The Peterborough Museum is such a thrilling venue, it has featured on Most Haunted and even made their team flee the cellar when a door inexplicably slammed shut on them. You can join the ghost hunting team for only £10 plus sponsorship so this really is a fantastic opportunity to face your fears and find out what really happens behind the Museum facade at night.

Read complete article here. {via peterborough.net}

Mount Road (Chennaionline Archives)

There were not many buses in those days in Chennai and even the buses that were plying were relatively smaller. The other alternatives available for the commuters were the hand-drawn-rickshaw or the horse-drawn-cart, popularly known as kai-rickshaw and jutka. There was a belief in those days – I am talking about 40 or 50 years back – that ghosts would follow anyone who travels by a rickshaw through Mount Road. Yes, I am talking about the present Anna Salai.

My friend used to describe how a ghost would look like. ‘You know a ghost is not white in colour. It is jet black. It should be around fifty to sixty feet tall and its legs would be as red as burning coals.’ He was travelling the Mount Road for years together in ‘kai-rickshaw’ followed by apparitions and died when he was sixty.

Read complete article here. {via chennaionline}

St. Anthony plagued by demons (wikipedia)

Read complete article here. {via The Examiner}

Paranormal Events

One can’t help but turn their thoughts toward autumn once the children return to school, and, if you’re a ghost hunter or enthusiast, then you can’t help but dream of Halloween.  Nashville and the surrounding area are blessed with a wealth of events during the Halloween season, beyond just the usual commercial haunted houses, and many of them are suitable for the entire family.  Here are just a few of the events that have already been announced.

American Paranormal Society Meeting and Open House– On Saturday, Oct. 10, at 10:30am, the American Paranormal Society will be hosting an open house atCosmic Connections,  1701 Portland Avenue in Nashville.  Join one of Nashville’s oldest paranormal organizations for presentations ranging from the most haunted sites in Middle Tennessee to identifying ghosts in photographs and more.

Read complete article here. {via The Examiner}

September 11-13, 2009 – Angel Fire, New Mexico

Three-day weekend event featuring a variety of headline speakers discussing UFOs, aliens and abductions, Area 51, ghosts, mythical monsters and Native American legends, as well as psychics and other paranormal experts.

You’ve seen them on TV. You’ve read their books. You’ve followed their investigations. Now meet the paranormal experts in an informal arena where you can ask them questions, discuss their research, activities and experiences and see their artifacts.

Participate in mini-seminars, schedule private readings, enjoy cultural ceremonies and music, learn about your past lives, view a variety of paranormal videos in the film festival room and visit vendor booths offering Symposium memorabilia and other paranormal-related products. If you didn’t registered, you have do that soon!

[via aspefiles.org]

A small but growing buzz about what is said to be the next great horror film has been floating around hard-core horror fan sites on the Internet. Due to an overwhelmingly terrified audience that was lucky enough to get a sneak peek at this brand new horror film at festivals across the US, news has spread that “Paranormal Activity” will be this generation’s “Exorcist”.

Dreamworks quickly picked up first time directorOren Peli’s film Paranormal Activity in 2007 for distribution on DVD. Dreamworks also acquired the remake rights to the film with plans to re-shoot the movie and deliver it to a theater near you.

The film is a paranormal suspense horror shot to look like real footage. This is not quite like your “Blair Witch Project” with three kids running around with supposed real documentary footage, this is more like something you would see on Youtube, or on one of those paranormal TV shows like “Ghost Adventures”.

Read complete article here. {via The Examiner}