It’s official: Old Decatur Courthouse haunted
Bob Espy, treasurer for the DeKalb History Center, listens to mysterious voices caught on tape during a paranormal investigation at the Old Courthouse.
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by Andy Phelan
andy@dekalbchamp.com
Security guard Gerry Danzy sometimes works alone at odd times of the night in the Old Courthouse on the Square in Decatur – home to the DeKalb History Center.
She’s heard so many strange, inexplicable sounds over the years and felt such wild temperature swings that she told center officials, “You need to do something about these ghosts.
“I’ve heard the banister squeaking, skidding noises and what sounds like someone creeping around,” said Danzy. “It got so strange one night, I leapt from my chair.”
Danzy and the dozens of others who have seen or heard strange things in the courthouse don’t need to speculate any more.
A group called GRASP – Georgia Research of Apparitional Sightings and the Paranormal that conducted a four-hour investigation Nov. 15 – told officials Dec. 6 the courthouse is haunted.
“There is a significant amount of paranormal activity here,” said GRASP’s Field Director Jim Tate. “We’ve got stuff [audio and video recordings] we can’t explain or ignore. There’s nothing here that will hurt anyone or is harmful. But this is a very interesting place.”
The old granite courthouse, built in 1898 and damaged by a fire in 1918, was once home to the county Superior Court. The top floor is a large open space used today more as a meeting hall or for weddings. The main floor holds an Anne Frank exhibit and the History Center’s offices. The basement rooms store artifacts not on display.
Ironically, GRASP got no hits from an old marble staircase in the back of the building that has been the focus of many paranormal experiences over the years. “We recorded paranormal activity in every room but the staircase,” said Tate, who has been a part of 25 investigations in his 16-year ghost-hunting career. “As far as investigations go, this one has been pretty substantial. We gathered a lot of data.”
Tate and his cohorts Jason Schultz and Chris Bauer played back audio recordings – mostly fleeting whisper-like sounds – that GRASP said were not made by a living human being.
Most of the strange voices were difficult to hear, but in one case as a GRASP investigator approached a water fountain something unidentified clearly said “water.” In other tape recordings, investigators revealed something saying “get out,” “I am Maguire;” and in one case a woman’s voice asks – “got a dollar?” then the sound of a large coin being flipped through the air pings on the tape.
“These voices or sounds don’t belong to anyone in the investigation,” said Tate, who later showed a grainy video of what appeared to be misty haze floating in the corner of a room.
Building manager Larry Serra said he’s never heard anything but in one back room he sometimes gets the chills. “It’s like ice water in my veins,” he said.
Serra said he was curious whether something haunted the place after he heard stories of workers making emergency repairs during off hours who heard other people in the building.
“There was no one there but them,” said Serra.
GRASP and the History Center might work together in the future to look deeper into the mystery. “We’re all ghosts,” said Tate. “Some of us happen to still be wrapped in meat.”
For more on GRASP, log on to www.grasptheparanormal.com. For more on the History Center, click here.
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