The Ashford Zone Blog

So says the Southern Paranormal and Anomaly Research Society:

The self-billed Strangest House in the World was officially declared haunted by the Southern Paranormal and Anomaly Research Society at a news conference Wednesday, the News & Recod of Greensboro reported.

The organization's Carolinas chapter in May investigated the 19th century Kernersville home of artist and interior decorator Jule Gilmer Korner (pronounced Kerner). The recordings they made revealed several disembodied voices and some mysterious specks of light.

"When you look at the evidence, there may be 1,000 ways to debunk it," said investigator Deonna Kelli Sayed. "And that's OK. You don't have to believe in any of it if you don't want to. But … the evidence we have, we can't really offer you an explanation for it."

SPARS is a family member of The Atlantic Paranormal Society (TAPS), best known for being featured on the Syfy series "Ghost Hunters." The show stars Rhode Island plumbers and ghost hunters Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson. The Carolinas chapter has roughly 30 members, including about a half-dozen in the Triad.

Sixteen SPARS members came together for the Korner's Folly investigation over Memorial Day weekend, bringing with them infrared cameras, digital thermometers, tape recorders and electromagnetic field detectors.

Among the findings revealed Tuesday were the sound of a little girl saying "peek-a-boo;" some wailing noises recorded at the site of the outhouse; and a woman saying "Anne" in response to a SPARS member asking, "Can you tell us your name?"

The group also showed video clips of what looked like dots of light flying across a room.

"Stuff like this, someone might say, 'Oh it's a bug or a moth,"' said SPARS investigator Iris Carter. "But the pattern and the way it goes across is a clue in determining whether it's dust or a bug."

"Yeah, you constantly see dust," Sayed added. "We see bugs, and it's quite clear what they are. This, it just seemed too 'intelligent."'

Having seen and done shows in the Folly (there's a little theater in the attic which was designed for one of the household kids back in the 19th century — see picture at right), I can attest to some of these things. 

There are indeed bugs and dust — things not uncommon in a house that old.  And yes, the bugs and dust tend to move in a pattern — towards the light or along with the draft that blows through the old home's rafters.  I wouldn't exactly call that "paranormal" though.

As for the voices and wailing, well, I don't know what to say about that.

I will say this: haunted or not, I would get creeped out spending a night in there alone.  Not that I have to…..

More from the Winston-Salem Journal:

Tom Mutton was almost certainly among the last unarmed people Monday night to encounter a small black bear that wandered through a neighborhood in northwest Winston-Salem.

As he was getting ready to go out to dinner about 7, Mutton heard a noise coming from his garage. A second rustling sound prompted him to investigate.

"I didn't see anything at first, but when I walked around my car I saw it by the back of the car," Mutton said. "It turned and looked at me, then went out on the lawn behind my house."

Then the bear did exactly what Mutton has been told black bears will do sometimes when they encounter humans: It took a few steps toward him in a bluff charge, an attempt to intimidate.

"That's when I remembered that you're supposed to stand your ground, but look away from them," said Mutton, an experienced hiker who has seen bigger bears in Alaska. "Doing that is supposed to be a sign of aggressiveness to the bear. If you run away, I've been told, they'll chase you."

Whatever he had done worked, Mutton said, because the bear fled into woods that separate his property from the house where police officers killed a black bear about an hour later.

When he heard that bear had been shot, Mutton naturally wondered if something had gone wrong.

"I would have thought that maybe they could have tranquilized it," he said. "I hate that it got killed like that."

Okay.  So that's what you do.  Now we can stop shooting them.

The west end of Winston-Salem, where I live (just over the city line in Pfafftown) is being subjected to urban sprawl.  We've got a few housing communities being built (although God knows why in this crappy housing market); we've got a new shopping complex with a Harris Teeter, etc.

A few years ago, these were all heavily wooded areas.  It wasn't unusual to see wild turkeys or grouse or the occasional deer (annoying though they can be).  But now, with things being built left and right, the wildlife has no place to go.

It all started yesterday, where there were reports of a bear in the neighborhood near mine.

And the Winston-Salem police responded by, well, shooting it dead.

And now it is the talk of the town.

The police are responding to the controversy by claiming that the bear fell out of a tree and they "had" to shoot it to put it out of its misery.  But people aren't really buying that.  I'm not buying it.  Bears climb trees; they're good at it.  This particular bear just happened to fall out of the tree while police were there?  I don't think so.

The question on people's minds is: why didn't they just shoot ther bear with a sedative?

Here's some choice comments from the Winston-Salem Journal, from the bear defenders (many of them sarcastic).

This bear was reported to be armed and dangerous with WMD. Therefore, his invasion into a local neighborhood qualifies as an act of terrorism and will not be tolerated.

"Cunningham said that police would have preferred that a wildlife agency handle the situation, but said officers had to deal with it immediately because the bear was in a populated area." I still can't find where the wildlife agency "refused" the call – just sounds like they couldn't get there fast enough to suit the cops. So, why not just follow the dang thing instead? The cops ARE the ones armed, right? They do still carry radios, right? Follow the bear, keep an eye on him, and keep in contact with wildlife agencies so they can find him – good grief! "We didn't think it was worth it to wait for the bear to become hostile," Cunningham said ~ you're kidding? Sounds like the bear wasn't hostile yet, but hey, let's kill it just in case ~ c'mon guys! Yeah, the cops have a hard job, and a times a very dangerous one. But stories/actions like this do not help the image of law enforcement

oh no! more bears in the area? gosh send out the militia and kill em all before we all are doomed.

Typical police reaction to wildlife of any form. Shoot first. The bears are hungry and foraging for food in what used to be their home. Now its ours. The humane solution would have been a coordinated effort by Animal Control, Police and State Wildlife officials to relocate the problem bear.

Based on what the defenders of the officer here are saying, I suggest we kill everything that's wild and consider no other alternatives. If something doesn't belong, kill it. Seriously, everyone knows that bears are wild, but there were options – unless you want to believe the bear was attacking humans while the officer went to his vehicle to get the shotgun.

And most everybody else was writing: "OMFG!!!  It was a BEAR for crying out loud!!  A BEAR!!!!   Run for the hills!!!"  Here is one of my favorites:

Having a wild bear at large in a suburban neighborhood unaccustomed to dealing with these powerful animals is a recipe for disaster. I would have liked to see the bear captured or tranquilized, but that is probably an unreasonable expectation given the very limited local resources for dealing with an animal that is almost unknown in Forsyth County, which is easily 50-75 miles beyond the normal range for bear in our state. Furthermore, a bear that is seeking food in garbage cans and backyards is already desensitized to humans and more likely to pose a threat in a human-bear encounter.

Right.  The bear was going through the garbage — how gauche.  Obviously, you can't reason with a garbage-trawling animal.  Best shoot it.

The simple facts are that, yes, bears are wild animals.  Yes, they can be dangerous.  Yes, they can — in theory — attack and maul someone.  But, with that said, there needs to be some perspective:

• You are 12 times more likely to die of a bee sting than a bear attack (120 times more likely compared to a black bear)
• You are 10 times more likely to die from a dog attack than a bear attack (45 times more likely compared to a black bear attack)
• 1 person out of 16,000 commits murder but only 1 grizzly bear out of 50,000 ever kills someone and only 1 black bear out of one million does.  
• There are about 750,000 black bears in North America and on average there is less than one black bear killing per year.
• For each person killed by a black bear attack there are 13 people killed by snakes, 17 by spiders, 45 by dogs, 120 by bees, 150 by tornadoes, 374 by lightning, and 60,000 by humans.

People in Asheville are used to this.  Winston-Salem people can adjust as well.