(Blair County)

      Those who read my first book will be familiar with the story of this house in Blair County, but in case you  couldn't find the book, here is a brief run-down.  One caretaker was supposed to have lived in the house prior to Samuel Royer, the builder,  taking possession of it when his first home was destroyed by fire.  Mr. Royer lived there with his first wife who later died there, and he would die in the house many years after taking a second wife, Sarah.  There have been dramatic or tragic events associated with this field stone mansion ever since the first family lived there.  I chronicled the early stories of the house including an infant and his mother who were murdered there in the early 1800's.  A woman in a long red dress who is reputed to come down the main stair case and answer the front door.  The tenant house was haunted until it was torn down over forty years ago by a man who committed suicide by shooting himself .  There is a story attached to a pond behind the house, and the stone spring house which has been shrouded by rumors that a man hung himself inside that small building.

     I have long had a strong personal connection to this house.  As a child I once went through the house.  I could have been no more than eight years old, but I felt like I was home.  The feeling was so strong that I was a bit frightened by it.  I could not understand how I could feel such attachment to this house.  Through the years I would often ask my mom to drive past "my house." 

     As a teenager I worked in the Williamsburg Heritage Society and was trusted to have keys to the house by the director, Bill Cramer.  Mr. Cramer allowed George, another person who loved this old house, and others along with myself to go there to clean.  One winter we pulled long strips of discolored wall paper from the walls of the rooms.  We picked up sheets of peeled paint and other debris left behind by a motor cycle gang which had used the house as a crash pad several years earlier.  It was cold work and our fingers grew numb, but we had a good time and I know I loved just being in the house.

     Through the years the house has passed through many hands.  The last owners to live there were the Hartman's.  Mrs. Hartman passed away as an elderly woman in the smallest upstairs bedroom with steep, narrow servant stairs which led to the kitchen.  She was known to be a kind woman who, though she never had any children of her own, had loved other children.  She enjoyed having her many young relatives over to stay.  She is even today remembered very kindly by some of those young family members who once enjoyed Carrie and her hospitality.

     After Mrs. Hartman died the house was let go.  Eventually the Pennsylvania Fish Commission purchased it and they decided to tear it down.  They wanted to put a fish hatchery where the spring house is, but they would give up that plan.  A group of people including George and Bill Cramer decided to stop them.  I joined them as a teenager.  Through petition drives and a great deal of smoozing with the public they managed to get the Royer house listed on the register of historic places and that meant that it had to be preserved.  The Fish Commission graciously sold the house to Blair County Historical Society for $1. 

     Of course, this was only the beginning of a long journey for the Royer House.  There were countless hours put in by many people who worked to secure funding to restore the old house.  Other folks volunteered time and talents to help the house along.  Now the house is shepherded by the Friends of the Royer House which George now heads.  He has cared for and loved this old house for many years now, and he has been a good steward of this lovely home and it's history. 

     For most of the many years since Carrie passed away the house set empty.  Work on restoring the house finally reached a point where a caretaker could be offered a home at the Royer House.  An apartment was created on the second floor and a couple named Jim and Gretchen  moved in.  The young couple are well aquatinted with the Royer House and local history.  They are members of the Friends of the Royer House, and they looked forward to their move into the historic mansion.

     I met Gretchen only a few months after they first moved into the house and we instantly hit it off.  About ten minutes into our first conversation we both knew that we would be friends.  Gretchen told me that she and Jim had experienced a few interesting things since moving into the house.  She and Jim had read my first book and were fascinated by the accounts, but through the months that have followed Jim and Gretchen have added a great deal to this story.

     Gretchen told me that on the night that they moved into the house she left Jim alone there while she went to pick up her brother who had volunteered to help them arrange the furniture.  It was late and they were all tired from the heavy work of moving.  Gretchen thought she'd find Jim either unpacking or most likely resting when she returned.  She was exhausted and couldn't wait to get home and get settled down so that they could fall in bed.

     Gretchen's brother told her that he could not come, so she turned around and drove back to Royer.  She hoped that Jim had at least let lights on for her at the house.

     As Gretchen eased to a stop at the Royer House, she was very surprised to see that every light in their second floor apartment was on.  She couldn't imagine what Jim could be doing which would require that all of the lights be on.   She got out of the car and stumbled into the house.  She climbed the stairs and pushed open the door to the living room.  To her surprise Jim was not unpacking; he was sitting in the middle of the floor looking around. 

"What are you doing sitting there," Gretchen asked as she collapsed into a chair to pull off her shoes.

"Gretchen, there's something weird here.   I saw someone pass the doorway."

Gretchen could see that even though Jim was trying to make a joke of the situation, he was really rattled.  Later Jim would confide to Gretchen that he had been very uncomfortable that first night while he had been left alone. 

That night Gretchen had a difficult time falling to sleep.  She kept hearing a man and woman talking and laughing.  That was the only night that she experienced those voices.  Though Jim did not know it, he was only the latest man to feel uncomfortable in the house. 

About fifteen years earlier my own husband, whom I have labeled "Mr. Skeptical," had a bad experience in the house.

When we first started dating I was still associated with the Williamsburg Heritage Society.  The Society had arranged to have the roof of the house repaired.  Bill Cramer mentioned to me that the roof had been repaired and he wanted to know if I'd stop by the Royer House, which was on my way, and check to see if the roof had leaked after a bad thunderstorm. 

Of course, I was more than willing to stop at the house and I asked my then boyfriend, Gary, to stop before we went out late that afternoon.  Gary said he'd follow me inside in a few minutes.  I gave him directions on how to locate me and I went inside.  I hurried to the attic and was inspecting the roof.  No leaks.  Great!

I heard Gary calling for me so I hurried back down to the second floor to answer him.  He climbed the stairs and joined me.  I offered to show Gary around the old house as he was not from the area and had never been there before.  For most of our tour Gary was a bit nervous, but I did not really pay him much attention. 

I led Gary to the section of the house which was added on and is made of wood, not field stone.  This was where Samuel had conducted his business.  Now it was really only a dirty old room with some broken furniture in it.  The room and the stairs were in disrepair, so I did not plan to stay in that part of the house for long.

Gary had grown quiet as I led him into the old office space.  Suddenly he looked panicked.  "It's the place in my dreams.  I've got to get out of here.  I've got to get out of here."  He bolted down the stairs.  "Let's go!" he shouted.  I had stopped to stare at him.  His reaction was totally out of proportion in response to what was going on.  It was just an old room with a broken rocking chair, an old sewing machine case and some old rod iron legs that had belonged to the sewing machine case.  There were some pieces of wood, some stone and old brick strewn about, but nothing frightening.

I more calmly followed Gary outside where he was waiting impatiently.  He hurried to his car as soon as he saw me come outside.

"What was that all about," I demanded as I slid into my car seat. 

Gary's knuckles were white as he gripped the steering wheel.  He explained that for several weeks he had been having horrible nightmares about being lost inside that house.  He had dreamt of stumbling into that room where he felt something very evil.  Something which truly frightened him.  To this day, more than sixteen years later, Gary has not gone further into the Royer House than the entryway.  He has always insisted, "That house is haunted by women and they don't like men." when I press him to visit my friends there.

Jim, however, would not feel uncomfortable in the house for long.  He would, though, come to know more about Carrie Hartman and the haunting at Royer.  Jim and Gretchen have a chair in front of the fireplace.  The chair is very close to the fireplace in the second floor living room (the former master bedroom) so that it is closer to a stand Jim likes to use.  They don't use this fireplace, so it is not dangerous, but the couple have noticed that the chair seems to move away from the fireplace by itself.  Many times Jim will get up and go into another room or leave for a little while only to return and find the chair pulled out away from the fireplace.  He and Gretchen have spoken about this and Gretchen is not moving it.  In fact, this even happens when only one of them is home.

The couple have little doubt that their spectral visitor is Carrie Hartman.  In fact, on at least two occasions Jim  has seen her. 

Their kitchen is next door to the small bedroom where Carrie spent the last part of her life, and where she died.  This room is now going to be their new baby's room.  One evening (before the baby was born)  Jim and Gretchen were having supper when Jim suddenly froze.  He was staring into the little bedroom where Carrie had died.  He whispered hoarsely.  "I see Carrie.  She's in there in front of the mirror and the dresser!"

Gretchen turned and there was the transparent, but perfectly detailed form of Carrie Hartman.  She was in a house dress from the 1960's and was simply looking in their direction.  She gave no indication that she noticed them, except that when Gretchen turned to see her, Carrie slowly faded away.

They have also noticed that Carrie likes her doors sensibly closed.  Every time they let the doors to the various rooms open, they will return to find them firmly shut and latched.  The only exception is the room where Carrie died.  This room's door is always found open despite their closing it repeatedly.

Gretchen also reported that she has found some of the little stuffed animals on the bed in "Carrie's room" are moved around, although no one lives in that room yet. 

I have always felt comfortable, safe and as if someone gentle is accompanying me in the Royer House, and Gretchen has that same feeling.  She believes that Carrie Hartman is haunting the house and is excited to know that a child will be living there.  Carrie's gentle personality is still felt throughout the second floor.

My thirteen year old son, Daniel, accompanied me to the house on a visit and he left much less skeptical about ghosts than he had been when he entered.  Throughout our visit Daniel kept saying that he was cold.  He even put on his coat because he was so chilled.  The rest of us were quite comfortable, but Daniel was truly cold.  He also kept sliding his chair closer to me.  One of my friends reached out to touch Daniel on the side because he said was so cold, and encountered a cold spot.  This was not a breeze or stray draft.  This happened in November of 1999 and all of the doors and windows were closed.  The house had been insulated and there was no rational reason for the cold which enveloped the one side of my son.

He also felt very uncomfortable.  He later said it was as if someone had invaded his body space and was staring at him intently only inches from his face.  Perhaps the most unusual thing which happened to Daniel was when something began turning off and on the light above his chair. 

While I visited with my friends Daniel did what teenage boys are so good at, he ate.  Suddenly the recessed light above him blinked off.

Nonchalantly Gretchen told him not to worry about it.  That light turned itself off and on all of the time.  She explained they had an electrician look at the light, but the wiring is fine.  Jim then had switched the light with another identical one in the kitchen.  He figured that if the fixture itself was bad then the light would still blink.  It did not matter.  The light in the same area still blinks off and on.  (Now it is important for you to know that the Royer House never had electricity until about one year ago.  The lighting and the wiring are both new and have never been used until Jim and Gretchen moved in.)

About twenty minutes after the light first flashed off, Daniel once again felt very uncomfortable and the light blinked back on.  About half an hour later the light once again went off and on.  By now poor Daniel was very frightened and was quite glad to get out of the upstairs of the house.  (Incidentally, the area where Daniel was sitting and where this blinking light is are only mere feet away from the door to Carrie's room.)

Through the Jim and Gretchen's tenure at the house they have learned a lot.  I personally believe that both Gretchen and Jim have some psychic abilities.  Jim has encountered spirits in their church, in Gretchen's family home, in Baker's Mansion where he works, and at the Royer House.  Gretchen has also encountered spirits in those places. 

The stories of the Royer house would be compelling if only Gretchen and Jim had encounters but another friend, Becky, has experienced feeling very uncomfortable in the office area where my husband had been so badly frightened, outside of the part of the house where the office was, and at the spring house where a suicide reputedly occurred.  (Becky has an uncanny knack for catching unusual spirit energy on film.  Most of the photographs of spirit energy, including the photograph featured on the cover of this book, came from Becky and were authenticated.)

Gretchen has always felt uncomfortable around the spring house and she told me that she and Jim have a friend, Darrell, who came to visit them during the summer.   Darrell had a very frightening experience at the spring house.  The spring house and the yard area around it has always made Gretchen uncomfortable, but she could give no reason why until after their friend's experience.

According to Gretchen, Darrell and his wife visited them late in the summer of 1999 after they first moved into the house and he went outside to walk around the property.  When he returned, he was quite upset.  Darrell's wife as well as Jim and Gretchen knew that Darrell has an ability to psychically pick up things sometimes, but that night ghosts were not the topic.  Darrell had come to visit his friends in their new home--at least that was his intention until he walked outside.

Darrell told them that he had heard children playing in the little yard near the spring house.  He had gone around the side of the house to look and see where they had come from and quickly realized that these children were not real.  They were transparent and dressed in period clothing.  There was a little boy with blond hair who appeared to be between two and three years old playing near the spring.  Though the spring has a fence around it, that fence was not there in his vision.  As Darrell watched, the little boy fell into the water and a woman in a long dress screamed and came running.  She hurried into the water and came out crying and holding the little drowned boy.  Then suddenly Darrell found himself back in reality and he knew that he had witnessed a child dying in the spring long ago.  He told Jim and Gretchen that he thought the fencing had been added to the spring house because of this death.

Though many families have lived in the house through the years and most of them did have children, there are no known deaths by drowning in the spring which are recorded.  Still, it is possible that such a tragic event somehow just was never mentioned again.  The newspaper from Royer has long been destroyed and the records from the house are scattered and large pieces of information are missing.  Perhaps this same incident is the reason that so many people, particularly women feel uncomfortable near the spring house.  I know that I've long had an aversion to that particular building, other women who have visited the house with me through the years have shied from that building.  Becky felt so uncomfortable in that area that she snapped several photographs.  Some of  those photographs contain strange fogs and other spectral images.  Those photographs were authenticated and were taken on a clear, cool fall evening.

To the skeptic much of this story can be written off as imagination and hysteria, but the stories of the hauntings at the Royer House have persisted for many years.  People who have never been in the house and who knew nothing about the spectral history have time and again experienced the same things.

There is one story which came to me from local newspaper owner which is not so easy to explain.  This reporter came to my home to interview me, and during the interview I mentioned my interest in the Royer House.  The reporter told me what he knew about the house.

The gentleman said that about three years earlier he had been teaching a class on local history in an area high school.  Each student was to pick a local place and write a report about that house and it's history.  That year two girls (about 16 to 17 years old) chose the Royer House.  The reporter had okayed the project, and the young ladies made arrangements to tour the house one Saturday.  At that time the house was long empty and it was quite difficult to get a tour.  A person had to arrange for a representative of the historical society to come out and meet them.  The woman who was supposed to take care of this usually did not show up when she said she would.  (I had that experience myself.)

The girls went to the house on the appointed Saturday, but they were surprised to see that no car was there.  The girls sat in their car to wait.  They were not quite sure what to do, but suddenly the kitchen door opened and an elderly lady stepped outside.  The girls were quite surprised to see this woman.  They had expected a young woman in a business suit, but this woman was quite elderly and wore a house dress like those that women wore in the 1960's.  Still, there she was and they had information to gather for their report.

The girls got out of the car and went up to the porch.  The old woman saw the girls and smiled at them.  She seemed genuinely happy to see them.  The woman invited them inside and began to talk to them.  Suddenly she turned and began talking to someone who was not there.  She held a conversation with this invisible person and answered questions they did not hear being asked. 

The girls became unnerved and bolted for their car.  They jumped inside and left.  The girls discussed the strange woman and the incident once they got home.  The mother of one of the girls heard them talking and scolded them for leaving the woman who had come to give them the tour.  She insisted that they call and apologize.  The girls did call but the woman who was supposed to meet them apologized to them.  It seemed that she had been held up and had never made it to the house that day.  The girls were left with a question which they did not know the answer to.  Who had the friendly old woman been?

I spoke to president of the Friends of the Royer House and asked him if he knew of anyone who would have had access to the house keys who fit that description during that time period.  He thought a bit and shook his head no.  "The only old woman who I can think of would be Carrie," he grinned.  But she couldn't have answered the door that day because she had been dead for over thirty years by that time--or could she?

I think that one of the most interesting facets of this latest story of the Royer House is that the newspaperman did not realize that the odd little story he told me was a ghost story.  I did not know it either until I spoke with some of those who care for the house. 

I am often asked if I have ever had any unusual experiences since I spend so much time in haunted houses.  In my first book I told one story about a truly evil presence I encountered in a house we once lived in.  I have had a few other experiences which I'll share later. 

If anyone wanted to know what I thought about the Royer House and the many ghost stories attached, I'd say that I believe most of them.  I have never seen a ghost at Royer, and the only uneasy feeling I have is on the stair case.  I always feel as if someone is right behind me trying to hurry or push me along and I get a bit unnerved by it.  I hold the railing firmly and take my time.  Of course, that could well be my imagination because I know the story of the woman who was pushed down the stair case.

     Others, though, have also had experiences at the Royer House.