The following story appeared in the Kent Reporter on Jan. 15, 2003 and is being used with permission from the Kent Reporter, part of King County Journal newspapers.

By MICHELLE GISI
Editor

Are there ghosts haunting the Greater Kent Historical Museum? Or are they just shadows and coincidences?

Perhaps you should be the judge.

Amateur Ghost Hunters of Seattle, Tacoma (AGHOST) is in the process of investigating the museum on reports of otherworldly activity.

Jack Becvar, former executive director of the Greater Kent Historical Society, and his wife, Mary Lou, have noticed some odd things over the years in the nearly century-old house where they volunteer.

³I believe there is something there because we¹ve had funny things happen,² Mary Lou Becvar said. ³I don¹t know what it is but I feel like whatever¹s there is friendly.²

Examples of the unexplained include hearing the tinkling of bells when there weren¹t any bells kept in the house. Shadows have been seen. Attic lights mysteriously turn themselves on. Certain ³presences² have been felt.

After the city of Kent bought the house in 1996, the motion-detector alarm would frequently sound in the middle of the night. When one of the Becvars drove to the house to investigate, an inside door was found to be flung open an impossible feat by the wind or drafts of air.

Mary Lou Becvar figured this was a way for a spirit to get attention and that it was, in effect, trying to call people over to the house. She told what she decided was a young, female spirit to please stop triggering the alarm after 8 p.m.

It never happened again.

³Of course Jack thought I wasn¹t too bright but evidently it worked because (the ghost) didn¹t call after that,² she said.

Mary Lou Becvar firmly believes that the ghost enjoys a house full of visitors and gets cranky when the museum is empty.

³People can look at me and say, You¹re a little bit nuts about this,¹² she said. ³Yes but I¹m happy.²

The city of Kent bought the house for $236,000, quite an increase over the $10,000 it cost to build in 1907-08.

The 15-room, 3,575-square-foot Colonial Revival house was built by Emil Bereiter, owner of a lumber mill in Covington and later, Kent mayor. In its heyday, the house was a showplace of old-growth fir beams and woodwork, high ceilings and magnificent gardens.

Now that the house has become an historical showcase, news of the spooky events experienced by the Becvars reached AGHOST. The group decided to investigate and has been to the museum three times in search of spirits, or the non-existence of spirits.

AGHOST investigators use special equipment to detect ghosts, such as a portable electromagnetic field (EMF) sensor, a Geiger counter, an instant thermometer and several cameras and videocameras.

Pictures were taken to catch ³orbs,² which are said to be circular, glowing objects that show up in photographs. Many people believe orbs are the essence of spirits caught on film.

The ghost hunters also use a computer program called SPECTRE, or ³special paranormal energy computer tracking research equipment.² Connected to a series of temperature, EMF, barometric pressure and movement sensors, a computer records information and plots it out on a graph.

SPECTRE recorded activity when it was set up in the museum¹s master bedroom on the second floor, where on at least one visit psychics had indicated they felt a presence.

During the third visit late at night on Dec. 28, Charlotte Liggett, a ³sensitive,² or person who can sense paranormal happenings, was intrigued with the house¹s master bedroom.

³That feels like a very heavy air in there to me,² she said during the visit.

Another member of AGHOST, Ethan Richards, said he, too, felt strange in that room, and received a sense of ³foreboding² there.

In a small nursery room on the front side of the house¹s second story, Liggett said she could feel the presence of a little girl who she thought had been sick and died. She said she didn¹t feel any sense of sadness or anger.

³It¹s like she¹s here and it¹s OK,² she said.

Other psychics and sensitives, unknown to each other, have had similar findings on different visits.

Also on the Dec. 28 visit, AGHOST founder Ross Allison captured on an infrared camera a small speck of light shoot from right to left as someone walked up the stairs to the second story, thought to be an orb.

He guessed that about one in 10 investigations resulted in evidence that could be used to support the idea of paranormal activity.

³A lot of it is being in the right place at the right time,² he said.

AGHOST members don¹t claim to be able to prove the existence of ghosts, or even if ghosts exist. But they put their electronic and psychic findings on their Web site, www.theresaghost.com, for all to see. The Kent museum¹s information should soon be available on the site.

³Our basic job is to go into these places, do all the readings we can, get as much detail to what has happened in the past and present,² Allison said. ³We lay it all out on the table and we let you decide.²

Jack Becvar and new historical society president Jack Mergens are both skeptical, though somewhat less so now.

³So many strange things have happened and I can¹t explain them,² said Jack Becvar, who saw a mysterious shadow rush by him a few months ago in the museum. ³I¹m not a believer like those other folks, though.²

Mergens nodded in agreement.

³Many things are possible I don¹t discount anything.²

Mary Lou Becvar could be considered a believer, she said, but leaves the explanation to AGHOST.

³They¹re the experts, I guess, if anybody¹s an expert,² she said. ³I¹ve got to admit it sure does add a lot of interest in the museum.²

<< Back to Media Coverage