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Burleson has been growing by leaps and bounds, and people are moving to the community in droves. They attracted by the schools, churches and peaceful rural atmosphere.
The problem, however, is some of them overstay their welcome.
Recently, a group of Southern Paranormal Investigation and Research Intel Team, or SPIRIT, members conducted the second in a series of investigations into the afterlife of Burleson.
They’re not talking about late-night partying.
The first stop on the team’s agenda was Old Town Smokehouse, on the corner of Main and Ellison streets in the heart of Burleson’s oldest area.
“We call him Fetchy,” the barbecue restaurant owner, Dee Ann Odom, said of the spirit she believes haunts her establishment.
Odom owns the eatery with husband, Delbert, and son Derek.
The building housing the restaurant dates back to 1893, when it opened as a dry-goods store owned by the Taylor brothers. Over the years it was a bank, grocery and pool hall named, Whitey’s.
The Odoms started their chapter in the building’s history in 1993.
Fetchy the pesky ghost
Fetchy is mischievous, Odom said.
“He likes to move things around and hide them,” Odom said. “Once he hid a hammer on a second story window ledge, while the only access to that ledge is from the bottom floor, straight up.”
The Odoms recently lost a set of keys.
“We looked all over for those keys and couldn’t find them,” Odom said. “Finally, I went up into the attic and told Fetchy how important those keys were and how much we needed them. The next day we found them sitting on the microwave, in plain sight.”
It is believed that Fetchy spends most of his down time in the attic of the 114-year-old building.
“He seems to do okay with women,” Odom said. “He isn’t too fond of men though. I never feel afraid at night by myself, but my husband and son are never at ease in the building after hours.”
A past episode with Fetchy by some of the SPIRIT members led the group to set up their paranormal equipment in a corner of the attic. SPIRIT members William Johnson and Nathan Sheckels have experienced a little of Fetchy’s lack of fondness for men.
“We were just sitting in the attic monitoring our equipment when suddenly a stack of chairs in the attic corner came tumbling down,” Johnson said. “Then a cooler went sliding across the floor. I guess Fetchy didn’t want us there.”
The group uses a variety of the latest digital thermometers designed to monitor the slightest change in air temperature, an infrared film camera, several video cameras, digital and analog audio recorders and electromagnetic frequency meters to measure magnetic fields.
They combine their equipment with a fearlessness to confront the unknown. Their aim is to “provide professional investigations to clients and a better understanding of the paranormal,” according to their Web site, www.ghost.meetup.com.
Sheckels is the SPIRIT assistant lead and technology manager. William Johnson is the group’s assistant organizer.
More than one
After setting up at the Smokehouse, the group headed across the street to the second floor of the Antique Emporium, a building that was once known as Bailey’s One Main Place. It houses the Emporium, Babe’s Chicken Dinner House and Abernathy & Frittz.
It has long been believed that a spirit also inhabits the building, which is also more than a century old.
“We think it might be a Mr. Pearson,” SPIRIT member Pat Dexheimer said.
Dexheimer is doing research for an upcoming book on the paranormal life in Burleson and surrounding areas.
“Or it might be a suicide victim who is believed to have hung himself in the building,” she said.
The upper floors once housed a casket company that doubled as a mortuary. Floorboards stained and warped by embalming fluid can still be seen in a back corner upstairs.
The night at the Emporium turned out to be less than quiet. The group had more than one encounter with the supposed spirit in residence. Johnson and Sheckels felt the force of a “presence” rush by them as they entered a back closet.
Dexheimer said she was also greeted in a less-than-friendly way as a wrought iron fireplace decoration seemed to move into her leg, causing a severe bruise. It seemed as though the SPIRIT group wasn’t welcomed. A handheld digital audio recorder picked up a raspy male voice that seemed to say “stop doing this.”
It generally takes the team several days to go back over all the readings their instruments might have picked up during a night with afterlife inhabitants. Their findings may or may not prove that the afterlife is “alive and well” in Burleson.
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