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Real Ghosts - What Are Ghosts
I have chosen to do my book report on a book called... Real Ghosts.
what is a ghost suppose to look like?
First you may think of something in a white sheet with holes for eyes,
you may think of a ragged figure dragging chains and moaning. Or an idea of
a ghost may be a figure you can see through, something that goes in and out
of rooms without needing to open doors. That is the way ghosts are usually
described in stories or shown in movies. But real ghosts come in many
different sizes and shapes. Sometimes they are strange and frightening
looking. Sometimes they look very ordinary. It is hard to tell they are
ghosts at all. Often ghosts cannot be seen, but are just heard and felt.
This book is about real ghosts.
Are ghosts real?
At 3:25 pm an airplane crashes and the pilot is killed. But at the same
time in another city, a lieutenant claims that he saw and spoke with the
pilot.
A judge says that he had a conversation in his home with a reporter at 1:30
the night before. But at 1:30 that night the reporter had died of a heart
attack in his own bed.
In an old mansion in england a photographer actually snaps a picture of a
shadowy figure on a staircase. It is the "brown lady" of raynham hall.
Each of these people claims that he really saw a ghost. In this book
the author (daniel cohen) investigates many strange stories. Sometimes he
uncovers a hoax, but other stories leave puzzling questions...
Do spirits really haunt old houses?
Can a human be transported back into the past?
Are ghosts real?
Return from the dead?
A man named john thorne lived near an old haunted house. In 1958 he had
an odd experience... He woke up in the middle of the night to find a
strange woman in his bedroom. It was dark, but he could still see that she
was wearing a long dress, the kind people wore a hundred years ago. Thorne
turned the lights on, and the figure had disappeared.....
On 1961 thorne's brother, william, came for a visit. On the first night
william heard footsteps outside the door. When he looked out of the open
door... He saw a woman in a long black dress holding a handkerchief in her
hand. Suddenly the room became very cold.....
The real exorcists and others?
The exorcist was an extremely popular book. It was about a young girl
who was "possessed" by the devil. It took a ritual called "exorcism" to
drive out the evil spirit. An even more popular movie was made from the
book. People thought that the movie and the book were true. They were not.
The book was a piece of fiction written by william p. Blatty. But blatty's
book was based on a real case. One of the reasons that the book and the
movie were so popular, is that people thought they were actually a real
case. Here we have to be very careful. "based on" in not "the same as. "
the writer and the movie producers made many changes in order to make "the
exorcist" more dramatic and exciting than the case that inspired it. In the
book and the movie, the "possessed" subject was a young girl. In the real
case it was a boy. And that was just one of the changes made. There were
many, many, many more. A large part of the exorcist was not based on
anything at all. It was just made up. One reason is that we really don't
know a great deal about the real case. Very few records were kept. Not all
of what few there have been made public. Some of those involved in the case
have since died. Many others just don't want to talk about it anymore. Here
is what we do know. The case began early in 1949. The possessed subject was
a fourteen year old boy who was called douglas deen. He lived with his
family in a suburb of washington d. C. The first thing the family noticed
was strange noises coming from the boy's room. They suspected mice.
Exterminators were called in but found nothing. And the noises continued...
The disturbances became more violent. Heavy furniture moved back and forth.
A bowl fell off the top of the refridgerator for no apparent reason. A
picture seemed to jump off the wall. The worst disturbances took place in
the boy's bedroom. His bed shook and trembled all night. The noise kept
douglas and his parents awake night after night. The deen's talked about
events with their neighbours. The neighbours laughed at first. But after
they spent a night in the deen's house they stopped laughing. The
neighbours also began to believe that something very strange was going on.
But what? the deen family then called in the minister of their church, the
reverend mr. Winston. The minister, too, was sceptical. But he decided to
investigate more closely. He spent the entire night of february 17, 1949 in
douglas deen's bedroom. Later, the reverend mr. Winston described what
happened that night to a meeting of the society of parapsychology in
washington. First, the boy's bed began to shake. Then there were scratching
and scrapings from the wall. The minister switched on the lights but could
see nothing that might be causing the disturbances. The minister then asked
the boy to sit in an armchair. The chair began to move around the room
slowly. Then it started rocking back and forth. Finally, it tipped over,
throwing the boy on the floor.
Reverend Winston thought it would be best to get the boy off the
furniture that seemed to move. He told the boy to take his pillow and
blankets and sleep on the floor. While reverend winston watched, the boy
and the bedding began to slide across the room. Reverend winston was then
convinced that something very odd was going on. But he didn't know what? he
felt that the events were beyond his understanding and control. The boy was
taken to georgetown hospital for both physical and mental tests. The tests
turned up nothing. Visits to the psychiatrists did not make the
disturbances that centred around the fourteen year old disappear. The deen
family became desperate. They finally depended on a drastic cure. They
called in a priest to perform an "exorcism. " exorcism is a very old ritual.
Its purpose is to drive out demons. It is not used very often in the modern
world. Many people do not approve of using it at all. But the family didn't
know where else to turn. They believed that exorcism was their last hope.
The priest who performed the exorcism remained with the boy for over two
months. During the period he performed the long exorcism rite thirty times.
While the ritual was going on, the boy would tremble violently. Sometimes
he would begin to scream. Then the voice was not at all like his normal
voice. In may 1949, the priest went through the entire ritual again. The
boy did not react violently as he usually did. The priest assumed that the
demon had been driven out. After that the boy was no longer troubled by
shaking beds or moving furniture.
What does all of this have to do with ghosts?
Perhaps a great deal. Psychical researchers found the details of this
case very familiar. The unexplained noises, the shaking furniture, and the
rest of the things that happened to the deen's boy had troubled many others.
Usually these disturbances were not blamed on demons. They were said to be
due to activities of a "poltergeist. " poltergeist is a german word, which
means "noisy ghost" or "noisy spirit. " but in a poltergeist case, people
don't usually see any figures at all. What happens is just what happened
in the deen's case. There are all sorts of unexplained disturbances in a
house. Often these disturbances are blamed on a unseen spirit... A
poltergeist. Hundreds of poltergeist cases can be found in the records of
different psychical research organizations. Reports of such experiences go
back to the ancient times. New ones are reported every year. Usually
psychical researchers hear about the case after it is over, that is, after
the disturbances have stopped. But occasionally they are able to
investigate while the disturbances are still going on. That happened in
1958. We like to think of ghosts or spirits haunting crumbling castles or
ancients houses. This ghost began causing trouble in a modern ranch house.
The house was located in the very ordinary suburban community of seaford,
long island. In the house lived mr. And mrs. James hermann and their two
children. The children were a girl lucille, thirteen, and a boy jimmy,
twelve. Most of the disturbances seemed to centre around the boy. When he
was around things began to happen. The disturbances began on february 3.
First, the family heard what sounded like popping bottles. When they went
to see what was wrong, they found bottles in several parts of the house
that had been mysteriously opened and spilled. A few small objects had also
been broken. Strange noises and bottle openings continued for three days.
The family became very concerned. They called the police. Patrolman j.
Hughes came to the house. He too heard some noise. He looked in the
bathroom and found that some medicine and shampoo had been open and spilled.
He could not explain how it happened. No one had been in the bathroom. Some
of the hermann's relatives also had strange experiences. A cousin of mr.
Hermann saw a statue move around a table. Then it flew two feet in the air
and landed on the rug. Some of the bottles were taken to the police
laboratory. The electric company checked the house to see if anything was
wrong with the electricity. Building inspectors and the fire departments
also examined the house. Everything about it seemed normal. They could not
find nothing to account for the disturbances. The hermann's family was very
upset by these going©ons. The appealed to the public for help. Naturally
the appeal got into the newspapers. The long island poltergeist became
famous. News of the poltergeist reached dr. J. G. Pratt in north carolina.
Dr. pratt is one of america's leading researchers on the subject of
haunting, ghosts, and other unexplained events. He came up to long island
to investigate the case in person. He interviewed everyone connected with
the case. He checked over the house, and examined all the objects that had
been disturbed. By the time dr. Pratt arrived, the disturbances had died
down considerably. He didn't see any objects fly across the room. He did
hear a few strange thumps coming from jimmy's room. He was not able to come
up with any explanation for the case. He just left as puzzled as he was
when he came. The case has never been solved.
About the author
Daniel Cohen is the author of over a hundred books for both young
readers and adults, and he is a former managing editor of science digest
magazine. His title include supermonsters, real ghosts, ghostly terrors,
science fictions greatest monsters, the world's most famous ghosts and
monsters you never heard off, all of which are available in archway
paperback editions. Mr. Cohen was born in chicago and has degree in
journalism from the university of Illinois. He appears frequently on radio
and television and has lectured at colleges and universities throughout the
country. He lives with his wife, young daughter, one dog and four cats in
port jervis, New York.
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