Shortly after my retirement as a police officer, I went to work for a public safety training agency. They had a satellite location at Glenville State College, on the third floor of Lewis Bennett Hall.

I was the training coordinator, and in addition to assisting with some criminal justice classes, I also brought in training that was available to law enforcement nationwide.

The facilities included several classrooms, a firearms simulator, mini-gym for defensive tactics, and student lodging.

When I first started, the facility had been vacant for some time. I assisted the maintenance staff in “freshening up” and prepared to settle in.

The first unusual thing that happened, was the weekend before I opened up the site.

My wife had come up with me to “decorate” my new office. We had brought our little min-pin, Zoey. while in the office, Zoey, who had been sleeping on the floor, jumped up and ran into the hallway barking. She then started growling and showing her teeth, while backing up, past the door. finally, she lay there, eyes wide and growling softly. I stepped into the hallway but could see nothing. I went to the stairwell door at the end of the hallway and made sure it was locked. I then checked all the classrooms and the mini-Gym. No one had gone past the office door, and the stairwell door was never heard to open or close.

I returned Monday for my first day. Lots of people coming to say hello, etc. Most took the elevator from the first floor. My office sat directly across from the elevator.

Knowing that my wife was going to be late getting home from a conference, I decided to stay after hours to get some files in order. Several times after business hours, and when I assumed I was the only one in the building, the elevator would come to my floor but no one was inside.

Several of the staff on the other floors had casually mentioned that the building was supposedly haunted. Nothing specific, always with a wink and a laugh.

By now the whole elevator thing was getting old. The next time it happened, I went into the hallway and said: “I`m not ready to leave yet”. At that moment, the file drawer that I had been working in, shut on its own. Taking this as a sign that I was now ready to leave, I did.

After that, little things would happen, missing items that appeared later somewhere else, the elevator, again. But nothing that I couldn’t explain away.

Then I was talking to one of the maintenance guys. He said every morning when he came in, and opened up the first floor offices, the people who had photos of dogs on their desks, had them face down on the desk. We both thought this was a little strange, but, there might be a reason. So, one day I asked. The woman I talked to said they didn’t do it. It was always that way in the morning. She laughed a little, and said: “someone here doesn’t like dogs.” I immediately thought of Zoey.

Sometime later, I was asked to do a community presentation on a drug issue that I was familiar with, on a Saturday. Rather than drive all the way back to Parkersburg and have to return very early the next day, I chose to stay overnight at LBH and sleep in one of the instructor suites (a little nicer). I contacted the tech guy who would be setting up the presidents auditorium and asked if he would be there to help me set up my laptop. He would be there early to get things going and would help when I showed up.

I went over my powerpoint for the presentation, watched a little tv and went to bed. No big deal, nothing happened. I got up the next morning, showered, dressed, and was having some coffee in the day room when I started choking. When I recovered I walked back to the room to get my jacket and heard someone coughing, mimicking me a short time earlier. Thinking it was the tech guy (their office was on the second floor) I remember thinking that I would tell him I really had been choking. As I got my coat and laptop, I heard furniture being moved around on the second floor. I thought, good he can’t find something and he’s going to look stupid. I went to the auditorium and waited.

Quite a while later, the tech guy came running in out of breath. He said he would go get his stuff and be right back. I asked, “what did you forget?” He said, “huh?” I said what were you looking for downstairs? He just stared at me and asked what I was talking about. I said, “you know when you made fun of me for choking and then you were moving the chairs and cabinets around.” He just looked at me again and said, “I just got here, my car wouldn’t start and I had to get my dad to bring me.”

Now I felt really stupid. Someone else had been making fun of me and I blamed this poor kid.

Fast forward, a couple of years. I’m now working at the agency’s main office at the old West Virginia State Penitentiary (I know, out of the frying pan into the fire).

Several of us were talking near Halloween. They said, “you must have had a good time at LBH on Halloween.” I said I had never been there on that day. They all went on about it being haunted. Curiosity got the best of me and I looked it up. I found an interview from the school paper with the vice president. She said that she had been working alone in LBH when she heard someone call her name (like mimicking me coughing) then she heard the furniture in the hallway and other offices being thrown around. When she looked, nothing was moved (you can find her interview online under haunted Glenville State College).

Did I have a run in with the LBH ghost? I don’t know. But when I read her account, it gave me chills.

About 3 to 4 years ago, my best friend Brittany, her mother Shannon, Shannon’s best friend Shina, and myself decided to take a trip to Moundsville State Penitentiary for Halloween. I wasn’t expecting anything too major other than the normal creepy clowns dressed up, people jumping out at you, just the normal haunted house, I was wrong.

Before even getting to Moundsville we got lost twice. Eventually, we made it. The staff made us stand in a long dark hallway with our hands on our heads. They were picking people out of the lines to stand in the center of the hallway, hands still on our heads. And of course, they pick me. I wasn’t too concerned when they took those of us they picked to jail cells and locked us in them, and left. It was dark. I figured, of course, they are going to try to mess with us a little, try to scare us. So I decided to take my flashlight and shine it all over the cell looking around for wires speakers anything. All I found was the sink, the toilet, and the metal bed frames to hold the mattresses. No speakers no nothing.

As I go to face the bars of the cell waiting to be released and reunited with my group, I heard a deep man’s voice behind me saying, “why are you in my cell? Get out of my cell.” That is when a flash of lightning from the strobe lights they had set up outside in the hallway started flashing and I could see a shadow standing behind me. I was freaked out. I knew this wasn’t a joke. I could feel his presence and he was angry. Thankfully they let me out of the cell before it escalated.

I have never experienced anything before going to the penitentiary. It sent chills up my spine. That place is seriously haunted.

My encounter happened in the winter of 1983. I was a senior in high school during this time. I was picking up a friend of mine who was visiting her boyfriend who lived on Hurricane Creek Road in Putnam County, WV. It was early evening and already completely dark outside. In 1983, Hurricane Creek Road was not as populated as it is now, and certain parts of the road were dark and narrow, with many curves. After picking up my friend we traveled back down Hurricane Creek Road toward the interstate. Not long after picking her up we both experienced an odd event. As I was driving along the road, we both were rather quiet, making meaningless conversation when all of a sudden, on the right side of the road, the side I was driving on, appeared two, completely white, well-defined apparitions just standing there facing us as we approached them. One was a woman wearing a country type dress, the other was a small child standing beside her. The woman was holding the child’s hand.

I was driving approximately 45 mph. My friend and I said nothing to one another during the quick encounter. We both turned our heads at the same time and looked over our right shoulder and there was no one standing on the side of the road. We both turned and looked straight ahead again. I looked at my friend and said, “Did you see that?” my friend responded, “yes,” I said, “Did you see that they disappeared,” she responded, “yes.” We just kept driving to our destination and never said another thing about the incident ever again.

I am now 50 years old. This particular incident is one that has stuck in the back of mind ever since 1983. I have never experienced anything like it since. I am not one to hold onto memories or sentimental thoughts, I am not a paranormal enthusiast, I am a “have to see it believe it” type person. I am 100% positive that my friend and I saw two ghostly apparitions on that dark road that winter evening in 1983.

While growing up in Richwood, West Virginia, I had always heard local tales of the paranormal. There was a couple of friends of mine who had been visited by a Sasquatch-type creature in the Cranberry backcountry. There was the tale of the nearby Braxton County Green Monster. Ghost stories too many to count were told in every hollow in the hills. Of course, no West Virginia native has gone without hearing a tale or two of the Mothman. However, I never would have expected that I would have my own run-in with any such phenomena.

The first part of my story, which at the time I didn’t even realize was part of any story at all, goes all the way back to high school. It was the fall of 1991. My high school sweetheart and I were parked on top of Fork Mountain, just outside of Richwood, to, um, “watch a meteorite shower.” Yeah, that is what we were doing.

We had found a very secluded location on top of the hill, surely not to be disturbed by anyone. We killed the ignition to my father’s truck and started… “watching the night sky.”

Within minutes, a very eerie feeling came over both of us. I clicked on the head lights, feeling as if something or someone was watching us. There was no one there. I killed the lights and we… “went back to where we had left off.”

Only a moment later that same feeling returned and I clicked on the lights again. This time as well, there was no one there.

“Let’s get out of here,” my girlfriend said.

“Good idea,” I concurred. We headed off of the mountain never to return to that particular spot.

Two years later, while deer hunting in the same location with my father, he wanted to show me something he had found in the woods several months before. I followed him off of the trail, only a few yards into the woods, and could not believe what I saw. There were at least eight unmarked graves.

The earth was sunken in where each grave was located. They were about six feet long and two feet wide. There were triangular shaped stones at both the head and feet of the graves. They were facing east to west, proper burial fashion.

My father, as well as the old man who owned the land, well into his eighties now, if not nineties, had no information on the graves. Who was buried there? How long had they been there? Did anyone know? After years of research, to include talking to many of the local old timers, in their nineties themselves, nothing has turned up.

All these years later, nearly twenty to be exact, the mystery still haunts me. One night on a recent trip to visit my hometown, I decided I would spend the night, camping by the graves. I have always been curious about the paranormal, though, other than that night of parking with my high school sweetheart, I had never had an experience with it.

On this night, I got to the top of the mountain about two hours before dark. An Airborne Infantryman in the Army National Guard, I had packed my rucksack with all that I would need and hiked up the hill, about three miles above my parent’s house. And the hill is straight up!

After reaching the location, I took my time setting up a proper, Army bivouac site. I had taken only a mosquito net instead of a tent (the more you carry, the more it weighs). I had with me as well my Army sleeping bag and enough food and water to last for the night and the next day.

I carefully cut poles from which to hang my net, using my Leathermen Wave multi-tool. I made sure that everything was perfect, right down to my small campfire ring constructed of large sandstones. It was such a picture perfect site, having taken more than an hour to construct, that I pulled out my digital camera and began taking pictures.

While reviewing the pictures of the campsite, I noticed that a couple of them appeared to have orbs in them. Convinced it was nothing more than smoke or ash rising from my small campfire, I thought nothing of it. I then made my way to the graves, thirty yards above me, and began taking pictures as well. One of these pictures also came out with a perfectly formed orb just above one of the graves. There was no smoke from the fire here. As the rest of the picture revealed, there was no rain or other forms of moisture in the air. This made me curious and a bit nervous.

After heating up and eating a can of Chef Boyardee Ravioli just as it was turning dark, I made my way into my mosquito net. I stripped down, got into my sleeping bag and began listening to the sounds of the night. The tree frogs were so loud I wondered if I would ever be able to get to sleep.

Five minutes later, the tree frogs stopped chirping. My fire that had been burning brightly went out. I had thrown a log on it before retreating to my mosquito net that should have burned for a couple of hours. The fire was gone.

I then heard what sounded like a dog whining, coming from the graves. As I listened, I thought that it also resembled the sound of a child crying. I quickly grabbed my flashlight, turned it on, and shined it toward the graves. However, the light did nothing more than reflecting off of my net, blinding me.

As I was trying to see past my light’s glare, something, a rock perhaps, came whizzing in my direction from the site of the graves.

“Screw this!” I said. I began getting dressed. I jumped out of the net and poured the rest of my water on the hot coals where the fire had been and began taking down my net. What took more than an hour to set up, was taken down and packed in my sack in only five minutes.

Just as I zipped the zipper on the small pocket I put my final item in, my camera, another object came flying in my direction from the graves. My fire now burst into brilliant flames. I put my backpack on, stomped out the fire, and began heading off of the mountain, armed only with my flashlight.

At one point, just a little bit down the trail, it felt as if an overhanging limb caught my backpack. I jerked hard, leaning forward, and almost fell down. I looked back at my light and saw that there was no limb or other obstruction there. The trail was completely clear.

I made it home at eleven o’clock, to the laughter of my mother who had left the front door unlocked.

The next day I told my father and several friends about the experience. My father took my nephews hiking up there a couple days later. When they returned, my father told me they had found a séance ring in the woods below where I had camped. It was a flat rock, circled with coins that had obviously been there quite a while. He knew what it was because he had found one a year ago on the mountain behind the Cranberry Wilderness Visitor’s center. That particular ring had been lined with candy, feathers, AND coins. He had reported it to a local Forest Service employee who explained to him what it was. Evidently, they are common in these old, West Virginia hills from where people go out from time to time and try to communicate with spirits.

Thinking my father was trying to play a trick on me, I went back up the next day, leaving in time to be out of the woods before dark, and indeed found the ring myself. It was not a trick. It was obvious that the coins had been there for years. They were so weathered that I could only make out the date on one of them, the fifth coin I attempted, a penny dated 1985. To make this tale even creepier, the site of the ring is where it felt as if something had grabbed me from behind.

I’ve mountain biked and hiked on top of Fork Mountain several times since this most recent event. I’ve listened to the owls at dusk, seen many deer and bear, but I have always made sure to get out of the woods before dark. I have fought terrorists in Iraq, jumped out of planes and been to many places in third world countries were few “white” people go. However, I have never felt fear like I felt that night I attempted to camp by the unmarked graves.

The story that I am going to tell is true. I know because I was the one who saw it. One morning the alarm went off at four o clock like it always does to get my wife up for work. I had to get up also because it had just snowed and the roads were slick and my wife will not drive when the roads are bad.

I made some coffee to help wake me up while she was getting ready. I was wide awake and ready to go, so we got in her jeep, started it up, and took off. The drive to her job was like any other snowy morning, it was the drive back home that got me. So I pulled up and let her out and was on my way home.

We live in the country so I had to put it in four wheel drive to get up the hills, but it was when I got to what we call the church hill is where I had my encounter. As I was going up the church hill, out of the corner of my eye I saw what looked like a green spark. I thought to myself “what in the world is that?”

I turned my head and at first I thought ” is that a deer or maybe a dog?” But as I got a better look I could see that is was neither one. To be honest, I don’t know how to describe it but to just say it looked like a black shadow with neon green eyes glowing in the dark. It had the shape of a human but with a long black hooded cloak on.

I took my eyes off from it so I could see the road and when I got to the top of the church hill I stopped right above where I saw it and took a look to see if I could see this thing and try to figure out what it was. There was nothing there, nothing at all. So I went home and didn’t tell anyone for a day or two because I thought they would think I was crazy.

When I was a little girl I had pets, a black cat and a mixed German Shepherd dog. They didn’t get along very well of course. The dog always just wanted to play, but the cat wouldn’t have no part of it. She would sit on the footstool in the living room and the dog would wine trying to play with her, she would growl and swat her pawls at him. But as all old cats do, she grew ill and passed away.

After she died everything seemed normal for the first few days. One day I was in the kitchen, which was next to the living room, and my dog started whining like he used to do when he was playing with the cat. I swear I heard my deceased cat growling, it wasn’t the same as when she was alive. But there was no other cat in the house.

When my parents and I would leave, we would have to leave him outside because he would tear up the house while we were gone. We lived on a hill and when we would leave he would chase the car down the hill and stop, he done this every time. He was eventually poisoned by a neighbor who thought it was cool to poison animals (our dog wasn’t the only victim). After he passed, every time we would leave, I could see him out a corner of my eye running beside of us. You may think I’m crazy, but I know I saw him. I would also see my cat from time to time running across the bathroom floor. I have heard of things like this happen before, but now I know it really can. Crazy or not, I know it to be true.

This story took place in the 1980’s. We were out partying one night, but before we could enjoy it, something huge started walking around us. The guys we were with decided to check it out. They all started walking around the perimeter. I could hear it, but never could see it. I don’t know what it was but according to legend, near the spot was a hanging tree.

While my cousins were raccoon hunting in that spot, they turned the dogs loose. They ran a few feet away and came back whining, jumped back into the truck and wouldn’t get back out.

My brother-in-law was going one night to show us that we were all crazy. We pulled up and got out, the music was on. We were there for about 10 minutes and you can hear it. Than all at once the radio started changing stations. He turned the car off and he kept playing.

About 4 miles away from that spot my dad was rabbit hunting, and the lights kept going on and off on the truck. There was nobody around but my dad.

Legend has it that at the top of the hill there was a woman that was taken up there long time ago and brutally raped. They bit off certain parts of her anatomy. She got away, ran down the hill, and hid under a rock cliff. When the men found her, they poured battery acid over her and killed her. On rainy nights you can smell the battery acid and hear her screams.