August 26, 2009
The Ghost of Mr. Elwin
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Paula - Elkland, Missouri - Late 1970s
I was approximately 3-4 years old when my family and I moved into this
beautiful rock house outside of Elkland, Missouri. The house was old, but
very well maintained. It had wood floors throughout. The laundry room was in
the basement, my sister and I had a bunk bed on the main floor, and my
step-sister had her own room upstairs. Many strange things occurred on a
regular basis. First of all, late at night, when everyone was in bed, you
would hear heavy footsteps walking up and down the hallway. My sister and I
would wake up crying because our "ghost" was shaking our bunk bed. My mother
would yell from her bedroom, "Mr. Elwin, leave the girls alone!" The bed
would immediately stop moving.
Other times, when my mother was in the bathtub she would suddenly feel
someone watching her. She would tell the ghost to get out and the feeling
would disappear. Most often, our ghost, who we believed to be our landlady's
deceased husband and therefore was named "Mr. Elwin," was more ornery than
scary or dangerous. He would pull the phone off the hook, or twist the knob
on the washing machine several times. But there were two particular
circumstances that clearly made him very angry.
My stepsister was 16 at the time so she had her own room upstairs, away from
the rest of the family. Apparently, Mr. Elwin didn't want her sleeping in
what was his daughter's bedroom. He would often come into her room at night
and yank the covers off of her and shake the bed to scare her off. The other
circumstance that seemed to anger our ghost involved a small closet
underneath the stairway. This door had been locked when we moved in and we
weren't provided a key to access it. However, my parents and a number of
visiting relatives had occasionally attempted to force the door open. Every
time anyone messed around with that closet door a horrible, undeniable odor
filled the house. It was such a bad odor that we would have to air the place
out. Eventually, someone did get the door open and inside was a dark stain
on the floor. Nothing else. Many relatives refused to come back to our house
because our ghost would taunt them so much while they were there!
