Tamara: The Hauntings of Pythian Castle

So, this post is going to go a little differently from my other posts regarding the experiences told in the Overnight channel's 'Haunted Homies' series. Usually, I write out the experience someone has written in to them, then transcribe the Q&A they do, and then I list activity mentioned followed by my overall thoughts. This is not going to be that, but I can guarantee it will still be very interesting to read. What will follow is an extremely long Q&A transcript of a conversation between the hosts, Elton and Corey, and the owner of the location they are in: Pythian Castle, Springfield, Missouri. Elton and Corey discuss some interesting things with Tamara, most notably the resistance she got from the local authorities while trying to open the location as a business. I will still list my thoughts at the end, but I thought it best to prepare you for the really long transcript that will follow. I hope you enjoy!

Tamara Q&A:

Elton: 

'So, my understanding is you like to stay out of the limelight a little bit about owning this place and, and not only do you own it; you live here...'

Tamara: 

'Yeah, yeah, mhmm... um, yeah, all of the above, so, uh, there's multiple reasons why, but usually I get a lot more work done if you guys don't know; I own the place, so as soon as you know then I might have to tell my staff, like, 'hey now you got to do the job that I was going to do for you' right? I don't know how you guys came across this place, I'm from the same part of the world that you were from, right, I'm originally Californian'

Elton:

'Oh, okay'

Tamara:

'Yeah, go, yeah, but I moved to the middle of the country'

Elton:

'That's what Californians do 'yeah, go, yeah' ' *moves his fist up and down in the air*

Tamara:

'Yeah and the rest of em are like 'go home'. Yeah, um, yeah, they don't like us moving to the middle of the country so, uh, but I don't know about you; how many castles are there in California?'

Elton:

'One'

Corey:

'Oh, the white castle?'

Elton:

'Preston. Preston Castle'

Tamara:

'There's not very many, but you see a stone castle you think you have to go to Europe, you know what I mean, so I found one in America, so...'

Elton:

'And you just bought a castle?'

Tamara:

'Bought a castle'

Elton:

'May, may I ask how...'

Tamara:

So this one guy says, you know, he tries to tell his friends I ditched him from California to buy a castle, and I said 'you told them the real reasons right?' He's like 'no, I don't tell them those because that'd make me look bad.' So now I ended up with, you know, a castle here'

Corey:

'That's pretty cool though'

Tamara:

'Now I personally think, and I don't know how many people buy property, but I think this is, maybe this is my pre-ghost experiences as I think buildings talk to you. Like, if you're gonna buy a building, you're gonna walk in and it's either gonna say, like 'nooo, not my house, not my place', and the other one's gonna go 'oh yeah, this is it'. Right, so the other houses I bought before this were like 'this is it, this ones are definitely no' and when I got in this place, I mean everybody thought I was crazy as crazy, I walked through it for thirty minutes and said 'I take it'.'

Elton:

'Really?'

Tamara:

'Yeah'

Elton:

'Did you negotiate? Did you even, like, try and haggle the price down?'

Tamara

'Not really. Turns out everybody else walked through this thing and was, like, they had an experience and they're running out of here like 'aaah, get me out of here'. Yeah, they...'

Elton:

'Did you know that prior to buying it?'

Tamara:

'No, hadn't the foggiest notion that they were running out scared and then of course it wasn't long after it, how long, maybe a month here, I don't know, I mean, I had my first experience... and it was like 'oh...' so...'

Elton:

'What was your first experience?'

Corey:

'Yeah, what was it?'

Tamara:

'Yeah, okay, well it was in the lobby'

Elton:

'Ah, yes, we know that area'

Tamara:

'Yeah, mhmm, the lobby's very active. I think people come and they go, like you guys remember; you were mixing and mingling for a long time before we got here, right? Right in that area?'

Elton:

'Yeah'

Tamara:

'I heard a female's voice just say 'hello'. Naturally I start looking around the building for anybody who's talking to me. There's nobody here. I look in the parking lot for cars, I literally spent fifteen minutes looking for somebody I couldn't find. Then of course everybody else comes into work a little bit later, I'm like 'so...' then you try and tell them what happened to you and people are like' *twirls her finger beside her head*

Elton:

'Yeah'

Tamara:

'Right? You know, they're all like 'right someone's been uh...' but I think that was my first, I think that's my first ghost experience, but I don't know'

Elton:

'When you bought this place, did you have any desire to open it up for paranormal investigations?' 

Tamara:

'No, not at all'

Elton:

'Was that ever a notion?'

Tamara:

'No, I mean, no, no. People kept wanting to come here for it and we're like, we're like 'you wanna what?' I'm like 'okay' um, but then the city went crazy because there's ghosts here. So anyway, it's...'

Elton:

'The city went crazy, like in a bad way? Or the city was like 'we all want to get in here'?'

Tamara:

'No'

Elton:

'Oh, they did not? The city, oh, the city hate...'

Tamara:

'It took me seven years to get a license to use it'

Elton:

'Whoa'

Tamara:

'Seven... and three out of the seven closed as a dangerous building. I basically owned a pet Rock for three years and the big deal was the ghost. I couldn't say it. People wanted to be on TV, I was like 'no, no, don't mention it, don't mention the word ghost' you know what I mean, so...'

Elton:

'Really?'

Tamara:

'Yeah, they, it just sent em in a tailspin'

Elton:

'You know what's so wild about that? When you, uh, go to Expedia or like any kind of travel site to book something to Springfield; this is what pops up as a thumbnail. Like, when I booked his flight into Springfield, like it just...'

Tamara:

'Don't tell the city, just kidding'

Elton:

'Yeah, just it's pic, like this is like, I think, like the number one notable site in the city now according to, like, every like, Google search engine'

Tamara:

'Yeah, funny, yeah, well, but, yeah, literally if it, because we... from other people coming'

Elton:

'Yeah'

Tamara:

'They, they don't like ghosts. I don't know, they don't like em, I don't know what's wrong with them. Maybe you guys had some nice experience with some ghosts?'

Elton:

'Have you invited them? Have you invited, like, city Hall over? Like, the mayor or anyone like that?'

Corey:

'Oh yeah, for a seance!'

Tamara:

'Don't laugh, don't laugh... to try and get my license I actually tried to run for mayor'

Elton:

'Wait, really?'

Tamara:

'Yeah'

Elton:

'Wait, you wanna do it again and we'll, we'll help you? We'll run your campaign'

Tamara:

'If you haven't run for office, it's a very fun experience, I've never did it before but I feel very American that I tried... but it was very funny. It was, it was funny because it was a... I was running out of options of how to get my business license, you know, I was like 'man, what do you got to do around here to get a $25 business license?' You know what I mean? I was really standing on my head, but it was a, it was an interesting tactic. They thought they had beaten me down, then I show up, was like 'hi'. There's no money to run for office, you just got to get some signatures right? And so there I was like a minute before the deadline *inaudible* was like boom, and then I, I got to tell my story like I was a happy 'I chose to move here to Springfield' candidate, you know, for all the wonderful things'

Elton:

'Was that a lie or did you...?'

Tamara:

'I lost miserably. There was a woman who was literally dressed as a cat, like, cat ears, a cat tail, I had barely beat her... barely beat her!'

Elton:

'What?'

Tamara:

'But it made my point. They finally said 'oh my god, we got to give this lady a business license at some point', you know what I mean? They had to give me a business, like no matter, I mean, I was on a radio with three city attorneys who were trying to block it and I was like the lady they hated, anyway, so um, but eventually they sort of had to deal with it. So, so far we've been open since 2010'

Elton:

'So we literally just spoke about how we feel like it's very forbidden to talk about paranormal stories, and here you are having an entire city, you had to run for mayor, you had to buy the castle, and they blocked you for seven years'

Tamara:

'You have three attorneys, the top three attorneys on the radio trying to talk me down, yeah...'

Elton:

'Wow'

Tamara:

'And when we got open, I had to pay fire marshals time and a half to ticker tape people coming into the building because they, you know, if we're dangerous, right, you know what I mean? They wouldn't let more than sixty people in the building'

Elton:

'Wow'

Tamara:

'And I'm, like, laughing, like, you know, I could fit the plane that you flew in on into my lobby, you know what I mean? It's just like...'

Elton:

'That's why, so it's that taboo here?'

Tamara:

'Yeah, it's that taboo'

Elton:

'How, how many of you are from Springfield, people that are here? Make noise por favor'

*Audience cheers*

Elton:

'Okay, and here you felt that, has anyone felt that it's like taboo to, to talk about the paranormal in this town?'

Audience member:

'We're in the bible belt'

Elton:

'Oh, the bible belt, that makes a lot more sense'

Audience member:

*inaudible* 'people are suspicious'

Tamara:

'I didn't know that, but I mean I now know'

Audience member:

'Yeah'

Tamara:

'Yeah, you get, they let you know, um, but I, you know, what did I know? I thought that what you guys were doing was, looked like good clean fun to me. I was like 'I don't know, it's better than those frat parties' I was like 'come on, I'm gonna go with these guys' you know what I mean? Yeah, they were, the, the ghost, I mean, I don't know about your ghost experiences, but the ones in here have been pretty nice, um, I've had the lady saying hi to me, we've had some little kids, I, they tell me the guys who founded the place kind of are okay with me and protect me because I kept their building from being demolished, it was literally that close to being grazed. I don't think we have demons and things, I don't really like that talk, but if you like that, okay'

Elton:

'That's his response too' *points to Corey*

Tamara:

'I like Casper the ghost. I like the ones, you know...'

Elton:

'Yeah, yeah, yeah, well even though you're saying that you don't have anything evil, demonic, here; are there any, is there like a one particular story that stands out that you've heard or experienced that's just like that typical horror movie scary encounter, like has that happened here?'

Tamara:

'I do live here, so things happen at that 3am hour of the day, I've come to realise that, uh... oh... probably one of the most scariest things I had is when I went to bed and I heard the sound of gunshots, like *imitates the sound of gunshots* like, sounded like silencer gunshots. I don't know what you people would do, but I stood, sat up in my bed, like my eyes opened up wide as saucers, and then I saw this giant man at the end of my bed dressed in army fatigue staring me down'

Elton:

'Whoa'

Tamara:

'And I don't know what you people would do, but I was like 'oh no honey, I am way too tired for this tonight. You are not gonna, nuh uh, you're just...' '

Elton:

*turns to Corey* 'that's your new tactic dude, next time we're talking to some people you're like 'no, no, no honey, hm mm, honey, no, I am too tired, and I look too fucking good tonight. I am not...' '

Corey:

' 'Not today' '

Elton:

' 'I'm not dealing with you tonight Satan' '

Corey:

' 'Not today, off' '

Tamara:

'Yeah, I don't know if I wasn't tired what I would do, would I run scared? I have no idea, but I was way too exhausted. I'm like 'oh no, not...' you know'

Elton:

'And did it work, or was he like 'no wait'?'

Tamara:

'Apparently somebody says that's what you can do, you can kind of stand up to them, say they're trying to intimidate you, and if you just kind of say 'hey, back off, hey', and I, then I thought I'm in one of those rooms that the military folks used to sit in... so, maybe I should clean it up. Maybe it's not military clean, so the next day I was like *impersonates fast cleaning noises* you know what I mean, maybe they were a little grumpy about it, so I thought...'

Corey:

'Wow'

Elton:

'Yeah, this place has like a wildly hybrided history and like, this room in particular, if I'm not mistaken, was a funeral parlour at one point'

Tamara:

'Well, it's one purpose'

Elton:

'Well, at one point'

Tamara:

'I mean, you guys are sitting in a building that was built by a the turtle order called the knights of Pythius. They built it to house children and old folks, and they wanted to be fireproof so it's a castle, it's fireproof, and of course it was part of their imagery to be a castle; so that's why it looks like this. The military took over in world war II and they oper, they owned it for fifty years, and then there was that social service organisation, you guys might know ocac who operated here for a good thirteen years, you can actually come to this building for your annual exams during that time'

Elton:

'Wow'

Tamara:

'Yeah, so we got people from the original time period we think, the military time period, and then, this was their, uh, I would say they did a lot of church services in this room originally because you had to believe in some sort of faith to be in the knights of Pythius, you also had to be a white male back then, so that was part of stipulations. Um, and then they did Christmas parties, birthday parties, but they did the funerals for anybody who died here'

Elton:

'Got it'

Tamara:

'So there was over a hundred people, they were just mostly old people, died of old age, and got a few kids'

(...)

Tamara:

'They actually installed those metal detectors when I ran for mayor, in the city council'

Elton:

'Wait, because of you?'

Tamara:

'Yeah, yeah, they thought I was...'

Elton:

'Did they not know ghosts can just go through it?'

Tamara:

'Well right before I, right before I did this, somebody shot up a bunch of council members in the town called Kirkwood'

Elton:

'Oh'

Tamara:

'So the town was like 'oh, we kind of passed her off, what's she gonna do?' You know what I mean? So I thought 'man...' '

Elton:

'Oh...'

Tamara:

'Yeah, then I just try to sell them 'I'm just one of those people from California who's a little bit of a Liberal, so no, I don't have any guns people' so you know what I mean, like, you know, so, I just literally, I just want a $25 business license, that's all I'm asking'

Elton:

'And you got it, and you got it and now people here all the time, right?'

Tamara:

'Well yeah, I mean, yeah, we've actually, it's, it's big, well ghosts has taken us over I would say, but we get a lot of ghost people coming here. You know, like I said, they're fun people, what can you do? You know they're, yeah, they're good folks'

Elton:

'That's really cool...'

Tamara:

'We had some weddings but, you know, sometimes the ghosts show up'

Elton:

'Wait, wait, what?'

Corey:

'You have to tell me about that'

Elton:

'Hold on, ghosts have shown up during weddings?'

Tamara:

'Well, you know, things happen, so I don't know for the best wedding venue if you want, you know...'

Elton:

'Alright, you're not selling your business very well right now...'

Corey:

'There's just a pillow with the rings floating down'

Tamara: 

'Yeah, you know, we can't, yeah, I can't tell they're gonna show up or not show up'

Elton:

'Wait, hold on, so something actually happened? Something paranormal's happened during a wedding here?'

Tamara:

'Well, some of the people that come here probably are those kind of people so stuff happens to them, you know, so...'

Elton:

'Ah, okay'

Tamara:

'Yeah, like one kid's like 'yeah mummy, there's a lady in white in the bathroom' you know, and...'

Corey:

'That's the bride'

(...)

Tamara:

'I know they did wear white for the wedding, and yeah, the bride and the kid were wearing the white, but also the old people here, the ones back in the original time period wear white dresses, so...'

Corey:

'Oh, okay, okay'

Tamara:

'They're like 'yeah that's our kid, she sees people' you know'

Corey:

'Dude, a lot of, a lot of kids do be seeing ghosts'

Tamara:

'Kids have a special sensitivity'

Corey:

'They do'

Tamara:

'We have the cutest cute ghost story in here, like a little kid, like four year olds all comes in a ghost tour, you know you don't really want them on your tour, right, because they're, they're noisy, and they make a lot of noise, so the parents took the kid outside because he was getting a little noisy, and so the mum's out in the lobby just like in a moment like this, and then the other tour person walks by, the kid's like 'do you see ghosts?' And we like to be nice to kids because they see people'

Elton:

'I don't. I don't like, I don't like em. They're annoying'

(...)

Tamara:

'We don't want to, if they feel spirit we want them to, we're not going to tell them 'no, you're crazy kid' right? So, like, there's one person, who actually was my mum 'no, everybody else sees them but I don't' you know, which is a lie because she's seen them here, but the kid says 'well, there's one right over there' and so she just goes 'well, is it saying anything to you?' Amd she, he's like 'oh yes, mine's your mother'

Summary of activity:

1. Female voice saying 'hello'

2. Gunshot sounds

3. Soldier apparition

4. Lady in white apparition?

5. Kids being sensitive

6. Sound of birds hitting glass

7. Telepathy with spirits

My thoughts:

In regards to the activity discussed, I want to start by discussing one of the things you didn't read about before the summary: the birds. I haven't included the full transcript as towards the end it got a bit messy with a number of jokes being thrown in, and with them going off topic. One thing they discussed though was the idea of birds hitting glass being an omen of death, and Tamara briefly discusses that they had been hearing birds hitting windows at the castle, but then they couldn't find any dead birds around the building. I would assume wildlife in the area probably carried away the bird before they found it. 

As for the other bits of activity she discussed, there isn't that much. You can't tell if the lady in white was an actual thing someone had seen there, or if it was just a made up example on the spot, and aside this all that was discussed was her hearing someone say 'hello' and the gunshot-soldier combo. I find the 'hello' story particularly interesting as this isn't the first time I've heard this experience happen at a haunted location. During my post about Athelhampton House, I write about a more recent haunting they've experienced there which was thought to have occured due to the spirit being stirred from rest after furniture was moved in a particular room. Members of staff have reported hearing a disembodied female voice say 'hello' when they are in there alone. I'm curious on how many people report this phenomena across haunted locations, and if there is a scientific explanation for it. 

The other point of big interest for me in this interview is, as mentioned at the start of the post, the hassle Tamara went through to get her business license. For me, this kind of attitude towards the paranormal is exactly why I think there is more to it all than just nothing. People seem to have an innate fear, or at the very least resistance, to the idea of the paranormal regardless of how much they believe it exists. I know people who say they don't believe in it at all, but the moment I mention to them that I've used a ouija board, you can see unease wash over them and they ask if I'm scared of the board or say to be careful: a sudden U-turn from their non-believing stance. 

Granted, the location of Pythian Castle, as pointed out in the interview, is in the bible belt: a highly religious area of America. It makes sense why the highly religious would be at the least wary of the afterlife given all of the mythos on the demonic. However, to deny someone of a business license for seven years because of something which hasn't been proven (or disproven) seems more than a little extreme; and this is why I wanted to discuss it. They even mention that the same thing happened elsewhere in America, where a location struggled to open because it was said to be haunted. Even here, in the UK, people are really funny about it and businesses tend to not want anything to do with the paranormal. It's all very strange given, as Elton points out with the castle, there is huge potential for tourism if you've got claim to a haunted location. 

Another thing which was briefly discussed which I didn't transcribe which was Tamara discussing that the ghosts in the castle help her to solve problems, such as fix things. She says that she will ask for a solution and that one will just pop into her head for nowhere, and that she doesn't give herself credit for that thought, but instead credits the spirits. I do think this is possible. I need to do a post on it discussing it in more detail, but I definitely think some sort of telepathy between the living and spirits is possible.

The only other thing mentioned of note was a story Corey says about his time in the Stanley Hotel, but as that is its own experience not related to Pythian Castle, I'm going to put that into another post even though it will be very short. If you want to watch the entirety of the second episode of Overnight's 'Haunted Homies' you can click the link below:

Haunted Homies: Episode 2

Thank you for reading to the end of this post! I really hope you enjoyed it. If you have any comments whether that be about the blog, experiences of your own, or even places you would like for me to investigate, then you can comment and follow on here, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, or Reddit, and you can email thetrueparanormal1@gmail.com for a quick response to any questions.