Paranormal activites investigated

The Fairfax Station home that the Virginia Ghosts &

Hauntings Research Society recently investigated looks nothing like

the traditional haunted house of fiction. The immense two-story,

11-room wood and stone dwelling has nary a Victorian nor Gothic

beam in its contemporary body. But to the family who lives there,

what the house looks like is irrelevant. They are sure the place is

spooked, and they want proof.

Jane, 45, who shares the house with her husband and two

daughters, said strange things began happening soon after the

family moved into the newly built home two years ago. The family

agreed to tell their story if their address and last name were not

published, to protect their privacy and property.

“It started with just really unusual things,” Jane

said. “About 10 minutes after we took a shower, the shower

would come on by itself, just for like 15 seconds, and then shut

off.

“One night my husband and I – it was the middle of

the night – we were sound asleep, and all of a sudden we hear

a click, and the VCR turned on and started rewinding. We

hadn’t even been watching a movie that night.”

At times, members of the family said, they have witnessed

phenomena such as phantom footsteps, voices whispering from the

surrounding woods on the five-acre lot, unexplained knocks on

walls, doors opening on their own and a front porch swing moving

violently from side to side in the still night air.

Clifton, 22, the oldest child, who lives in a Fairfax townhouse,

said he has seen and heard much of the ghostly stuff when he was

spending the night in the house – something he now refuses to

do. One night in the finished basement was particularly harrowing,

he said.

“In the middle of the night, I woke up,” said

Clifton, a student at George Mason University. “It sounded

like it was about five to 10 voices all at once saying,

‘We’re going to get you.’ It started off quietly

… and it got louder and louder. It was pitch black, I

couldn’t see a thing, and I jumped up swinging … trying to

protect myself. I felt threatened. I popped on the lights; nobody,

nothing.”

Jane said she turned to the Internet for help only after her

youngest daughter, 7, started playing with an unseen friend whom

her daughter claimed had come out of a wall in the basement.

Enter the Virginia Ghosts & Hauntings Research Society,

which agreed to look into the Fairfax Station house. The society

also has investigated such Virginia sites as Gadsby’s Tavern

in Alexandria, a Circuit City store in Woodbridge, private homes in

Leesburg, Herndon and Alexandria, and a historic inn in Fairfax

City.

Overall, the society has investigated about 75 claims of

hauntings in Virginia; such reports usually increase as Halloween

approaches.

The society was founded three years ago by Bobbie Atristain, 27,

of Richmond, an Internet systems administrator with an interest in

the paranormal. Growing up, she said, “I experienced a lot of

unexplained things. I saw things like shadow people. I just wanted

to find out why this happens and what exactly it is.”

A society investigation typically begins when a person solicits

the group through its Web site www.virginiaghosts.com, Bradley

said.

If the story sounds credible, Bradley said, the society conducts

what it calls a “pre-investigation” of the location by

studying land records and satellite photos, the history of the area

and whether there are high-tension power lines nearby that might

interfere with the group’s electronic equipment. Bradley, a

site planner with an architectural firm, said the society then

sends investigators to the site.

C. Woodrow Irvin
The Washington Post

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