Poltergeists (9 page)

Why then did the phenomena cease when the Beairds moved from one house to another if the entities expressing themselves through Andy and Mrs. Beaird had not found satisfaction? There was no need for them to simply leave off just because the Beairds moved from one house to the
other. There must have been something in the atmosphere of the first house that in combination with the untapped psychic energies of Andy and Mrs. Beaird provided a fertile ground for the phenomena.

Apparently some disturbances have continued in the former Beaird home, while none have been reported by them in their new house. The current owners of the old Beaird home, however, refused to discuss such matters as psychic phenomena in the house. They are fully convinced that their fundamentalist religion will allow them to take care of these occurrences. To them psychic phenomena
are all the work of the devil
.

And so the devil in Tyler, Texas, may yet erupt once again to engulf a family, if not an entire community, with the strange and frightening goings on which, for three years, plagued the Beaird family to the point of emotional and physical exhaustion. The Beairds themselves are out of danger. Andy has grown up and his untapped powers will unquestionably be used in more constructive channels as the years go by. Mrs. Beaird has assumed her rightful position in her husband’s house and has closed the door on her unhappy past. Howard Beaird, the main victim of all the terrible goings on between 1965 and 1968, is satisfied that they are nothing now but memories. He has no desire to bring them back. His sole interest in my publishing an account of these incredible happenings was to inform the public and to help those who might have similar experiences.

P
AUL
L
EUTHOLD IS A MAN
in his late forties with a pleasant personality and reasonably good educational background, perhaps better read than most farmers in other countries but, certainly, far from sophistication or knowledgeability in areas of philosophy or the occult. He has a wife and two children—a son, now in his seventeenth year, and a daughter, a few years younger.

Life on the Leuthold farm—a modest-sized establishment consisting of a house, stables, acreage, and perhaps two dozen cattle housed in stables directly across from the farmhouse on a narrow street in the little village of Maschwanden—was normal and routine year after year. That is, until the year 1960 rolled around. In the cold, moist fall of 1960, the Leuthold family and their homestead became the center of a poltergeist case unique in the annals of Swiss psychic research.

The “cast of characters” at the time consisted of Paul Leuthold, forty-eight; Mrs. Leuthold, forty-seven; daughter Elizabeth, ten; son Paul, thirteen; and a maid named Elfi, age eighteen, who was somewhat mentally handicapped, a factor not to be overlooked in cases of this kind. There was also an Italian handyman named Angelo, who was at the farm only a part of the time during which the uncanny happenings took place.

Next door to the Leuthold homestead stands the house of the Eichenberger family. Mr. Eichenberger, fifty, was an active spiritualist, a rarity in Switzerland. His wife, forty-five, is a simple woman without any interest in the subject, and there were four children ranging in age from three to nine years at the time.

At first, the strange events only puzzled the Leuthold family, and they did not suspect that anything unusual was happening. But when no human agency could be found responsible for the moving of objects, disappearances and reappearances and other obviously mischievous actions in and around the house and stables, it dawned on Leuthold that he was the victim of a poltergeist and he began to take notes.

Between November 12, 1960, and August 20, 1961, no less than 104 separate entries were made by him in his “diary of a poltergeist.” They were brief, to the point, and without any attempt at a rational explanation. That he left for others to ponder over. His first entry dates from November 12, 1960:

November 12, 6 p.m
. The large metal milk can has moved 3 yards to the west. At the same time, stones are thrown against the window—no one there.

November 13, 6 p.m
. The milk container with 18 liter milk in it has disappeared. We find it again at a far corner of the stables.

November 14, 6 p.m
. Neighbor Eichenberger’s umbrella stand disappears and the scraper, usually at the staircase, is found outside against the wall.

Same day, half an hour later
. Two boots disappear from the stables and are later found in the feeding area behind the potato rack. Mrs. Eichenberger, the neighbor, brings our pig bucket which she found in the cellar next to their umbrella stand! My wife had fed the pigs barely ten minutes before and left the pig bucket in the stables. How did it get to the cellar?

Every day now, something disappears, moves from its accustomed spot and reappears at a strange place. Such things as milking accessories, very necessary in the daily work of a farmer, are not where they should be and this interrupts the normal life on the farm.

Two bicycles are suddenly without air in their tires. Another inconvenience, since the Swiss use bikes extensively. Most of these events take place around 6 or 7
P
.
M
.
Leuthold examined all possibilities of pranksters. His own family and household were always accounted for at the critical times. The village is small and strangers lurking about could not escape attention, certainly not that often.

As I carefully examined the written notes of poltergeistic or other uncanny activities in the Leuthold house, I realized that it was certainly worth looking into. Consequently, I telephoned the farmer and we arranged for a visit the following afternoon. The Swiss television network had evinced great interest in my work, although they had never heard of the Maschwanden case, or, for that matter of any other psychic investigation. It took an American to bring the entire area to their attention and reluctantly Jacob Fischer, the production head, agreed to send a crew with me.

“But we won’t pay for this, you understand,” he added with careful Swiss frugality.

The next afternoon, my wife and I joined two news-reel reporters, one handling the camera and the other the sound equipment, in a station wagon. We rode along the outskirts of Zurich, over a couple of hills and out into the open country to the west of the city. It took us more than an hour to get to Maschwanden, a village very few people, especially Americans, ever visit. When we reached the Leuthold farmhouse, we were expected. While the television people started to set up their equipment, I lost no time asking Paul Leuthold about the most memorable incident in the haunting of his house.

“My wife and I were inside the house. Suddenly, there was a knock at the door which sounded as if it was made by a hard object. My wife was in the kitchen. She left her work and went to look outside. There was no one outside. Shortly after, there was another knock. The maid was downstairs in her room and she didn’t see anyone either. My wife went back to her work. Soon there was a third set of knocks. This time, she was alerted and kept close to the door. As soon as she heard the knocking, she jumped outside.”

“Did she see anything or anyone?” I asked.

“She saw a piece of wood, about a yard in length, hitting the ground from a height of about a foot.”

“You mean a piece of wood moving through the air by itself?”

“Yes. The wooden stick was there in the air, all by itself. Nobody could have thrown it and run away. It was plain daylight, too.”

I examined the wooden stick. It was a heavy piece of wood, weighing perhaps half a pound.

“How did the whole thing get started, Mr. Leuthold?” I asked, and he brought his diary and showed me an entry:

November 18, 5:15 p.m
. The cover of the milk can is found inside the barn, on the grassy floor. Fifteen minutes earlier I had left it in place in the stable.

“The next day,” he added, “the cover was again found in the ash can.”

“Charming,” I said. “May I see the book?”

The entries followed each other in the orderly, clinical manner of a medical history. Only, the patient was invisible.

November 19, 5 a.m
. I plug in the motor of the cider press and leave it to do my milking chores. Suddenly, there is a singe boot in the middle of the barn. The milking pail floats in the water trough. I decide to check on the cider press. I hear the motor sputtering as I reach the cellar. I find the plug pulled out and the cable pulled back about four yards.

That day was a particularly busy one for the ghost. At 7:30
A
.
M
. Leuthold finished his first meal and returned to the stables.

I turn the light on and fetch a container full of unthrashed corn, which I place inside the barn, in front of the door leading to the stables. Elfi, the maid, is busy washing milking equipment at a considerable distance in the feed kitchen. I leave for a moment to go to the bathroom, when I return, I find the light turned out and the container of unthrashed corn gone. I find it upside down, in the middle of the barn, and next to it, a broom, which had not been there before either.

But that wasn’t the end of it by a long shot, that busy morning. Half an hour later Mrs. Leuthold appeared in the barn and asked where his watch was.

“Where it always is,” Leuthold replied, somewhat cross, “on the window latch where I always hang it when I clean the cattle.”

Not so, his wife replied, and dangled the watch and chain before his eyes. She had just found them in front of the stables on top of a milk can.

That very evening one of their cows was due to give birth. Consequently it was necessary to have all the help available present for the occasion. But the poltergeist was among them.

9 p.m
. The following are present to help with the birth: schoolteacher Strickler, Max Studer junior, Werner Siedler, my wife, Elfi the maid, my son Paul and myself are in the stables. The spout of the milking machine disappears under our eyes! We search and finally find it tucked away in the aluminum shelf that holds the rubber nipples. My wife sends Elfi to lock the house while we are all over here. The maid returns, the key is gone. Later we find it on the window sill outside. We had left it in the lock on the
inside
.

By midnight it was all over. The calf had come and the Leutholds went to bed. But the uncanny phenomena did not cease. From the direction of the pigsty there was a loud whistling sound. It changed direction from time to
time. There are people in front of the house still up, who hear it too. Elfi, the maid, complains about the noises. The moment she is out of the house, the whistling stops. By 2
A
.
M
., all is finally quiet.

I asked Mr. Leuthold to show me the ash can in which the milk bottle cover was found and the potato bin where it showed up next. The lid of the potato bin weighs perhaps twenty pounds. Anyone placing the aluminum cover of the milk can inside it must have had considerable strength. Two people had to pull it to open it.

All was quiet now for a few days. Then the mysterious events started up again.

December 1, 6:30 p.m
. I open the door to the stables to do my milking chores. Everything is normal. My wife arrives a few moments later and opens the same door. This time a hay fork is leaning against it from the outside. “Where is the plate for the cat?” my wife wants to know. “Next to the milk can, as always,” I reply. It isn’t. My wife finds the plate on top of the refuse. The light goes on and off by itself.

Flickering lights going on and off by their own volition are old stuff with hauntings. In the Rockland County Ghost case in
Ghost Hunter
I reported similar happenings which drove to distraction a certain Broadway composer then guesting at the Danton Walker home.

Evidently, the Swiss ghost had discovered the usefulness of the lights in the stables, for a series of incidents involving the electric installations now followed.

December 2, 5:15 a.m
. The light goes out by itself for a short time. The plate for the cat disappears again and is discovered on top of the refuse, like yesterday. I put it back on the refuse. Suddenly, the light goes on by itself in the barn. There is no one there who could have turned it on.

That day turned out rather significantly for the Leutholds, since it brought the first visual phenomena to their tranquil midst. The incident with the knocks at the door and the subsequent discovery by Mrs. Leuthold of the stick of wood suspended in the air, described earlier, took place that day around 10:15
A
.
M
.

Saturdays are usually quiet periods in the small towns and villages of Switzerland. But not this time. Leuthold’s diary continues:

December 3, 7:35 a.m
. Suddenly the light in the barn goes on. I go to check on it and notice that the light is also on in the hayloft. I turn out both lights and go to the stables. Just then, I clearly hear knocking in the hayloft. I go up to look, but there is nobody there. Since it is getting lighter outside, I turn off the light in the stables, but suddenly it is on again. I am busy distributing the fertilizer. I go inside, turn the light off again. Shortly afterwards it is burning once more. Werner Frei, a tractor driver, was passing by at that time. He saw the light. There was, of course, nobody about who could have done it.

December 4, 8 a.m
. The lights go on by themselves in the barn. Elfi is in front of the stables and asks if everything is quiet. It is now 8:30. I reply, in jest, “The ghost is gone.” Within seconds, the light is on again in the stables, although no one could have gotten in to do it.