Haunted Houses

By Corinne May Botz.

Flipping through this gem and marveling at the photography and the spooky narratives.  If this isn't on your bookshelf, I highly recommend it.  And there are tons of used copies on Amazon (just sayin').

Click here to buy.

Ghost Journal

In the early 1990s we started to keep notes about the ghost happenings. [He begins reading the notes.] This happened to me on the 7th of September, 2006, 1:26 a.m. I'm a very light sleeper, and it was a musical chime like you'd have on a jewelry box. It played for ten seconds straight. Saturday, November 10, 2001: It sounded like somebody took a chair and dragged it across the kitchen floor. We all heard it, but when we got into the kitchen the chairs were all where they belonged. This is one of our daughter Angie's notes from August of 1993. She used to work as a dentist technician and her lab coat had been ironed while she slept. This is the second time she said it had happened. On June 12, 1991, there was a very strong scent of perfume. I don't have a sense of smell so I wouldn't know. Louise said to me, "It's unbelievable how strong it is.

Text by Corrine May Botz, from her book Haunted Houses.

Sweetheart Hotel

This beauty by Charles Wysocki is currently for sale.
For $12,500. We have a print of this hanging in our dining room.

If I win the lottery on Wednesday, I'm totally buying it.



More information here.

Seaside Spookhouse

So you're old and tired. You own a boardwalk Haunted House which sees very little by way of patrons. As you sit outside the main entrance in a tiny ticket booth reading a favorite book, you're thinking this might be your last season.

But you say that every year.

Click below for a soundscape I made this morning with that in mind:

Kitchen

I was looking for my husband and I thought he was in the kitchen because I could see this big man with a white shirt moving around. I'm saying "Dom, Dom" and I'm following something and then it's gone. He's in the other room saying, "What? What?" His mom was behind me with her jaw open. Another time, I was in the kitchen and I heard something fall over and I saw this white thing. I looked and thought "What is it?" and then poof! It was gone.

From Corinne May Botz's, Haunted Houses



Image by melody hansen.

Notes

In the early 1990s we started to keep notes about the ghost happenings. [He begins reading the notes.] This happened to me on the 7th of September, 2006, 1:26 a.m. I'm a very light sleeper, and it was a musical chime like you'd have on a jewelry box. It played for ten seconds straight. Saturday, November 10, 2001: It sounded like somebody took a chair and dragged it across the kitchen floor. We all heard it, but when we got into the kitchen the chairs were all where they belonged. This is one of our daughter Angie's notes from August of 1993. She used to work as a dentist technician and her lab coat had been ironed while she slept. This is the second time she said it had happened. On June 12, 1991, there was a very strong scent of perfume. I don't have a sense of smell so I wouldn't know. Louise said to me, "It's unbelievable how strong it is."



Text and image by Corrine May Botz, from her book "Haunted Houses."

Alice

And we've seen her ghost coming through the yard. Just telling the story I get chill bumps from the memory of seeing her. The night my mother and I saw her ghost, our family dog ran under the couch and refused to come out for two days.



Text and image from Haunted Houses, by author (and photographer) Corinne May Botz.

Never Alone

The book Haunted Houses by photographer and author Corinne May Botz. The image on the cover is below. Her photography is amazing and the pages contain accounts by the inhabitants of haunted homes. Subtle and chilling, like ghost stories for darkened rooms or dying fires. I was thrilled to find the author's site, which includes the actual recordings of some of the tales found within the book. Click here to listen to them (the last one is my personal favorite). And click here to see some of the photos contained in the book. And click HERE to order Haunted Houses.