HAUNTED: Bellaire House

When Kristen Lee bought a new home in Bellaire, Ohio, she had no idea she was purchasing one of the most haunted houses in the country. What started as odd noises and footsteps in the attic soon became ghostly apparitions and violent attacks. Eventually, Kristen learned more about the dark history of the home by conducting séances with the spirits who once lived there – and found the home may be sitting on a portal to another plane of existence.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Speaker 00

  I spend way too much time looking for answers to things. Answers I may never get. And when you're in my line of work, you have to sort of be okay with that. If I let every unsolved cold case or every supernatural mystery keep me up at night, Lord knows that I would get even less sleep than I do now. But, there is one mystery I would love just a teeny tiny clue to. Ghosts. Are they just residual energy? Are electromagnetic fields to blame? Is it really that our souls get left here to wander the planet if we have unfinished business?

• 0:42Speaker 00

  Well, when I started looking into today's topic, I found one theory that really stuck with me. That some places may act as portals between the spiritual and the physical world. And that's what many people think is happening at the Bel Air House. Built in 1847 in Bel Air, Ohio, it is said to be sitting on a ley line, a supernatural highway of magical energy that runs across the globe, which might be what makes it one of the most haunted locations in America. And, a portal for spirits to come and go. But that got me thinking.

• 1:25Speaker 00

  If we could nail down these entry points, really locate them, define them, tap into them, imagine what that could mean for humanity? Would we get to see lost loved ones again? Or would we be opening up a floodgate for more evil spirits to come pouring in? I'm Ashley Flowers, and this is So Supernatural.

• 2:20Rasha Pecoraro?

  Aloha and welcome to So Supernatural. I'm Rasha Pecoraro.

• 2:25Yvette Gentile?

  And I'm Yvette Gentile. And today, we're talking about the Bel Air House in Bel Air, Ohio.

• 2:32Rasha Pecoraro?

  Okay, so speaking of haunted houses, there is one house that I lived in with my dad and stepmom. And I was convinced that it had spirits in it, but good spirits. Because I never felt bad energy in that house, but I would see little footprints, like on the carpet that didn't match mine, didn't match my dad's. I swear they were Manihunis, which are these mystical people in old Hawaiian folklore. That's the only house I ever remember being haunted. But didn't we live in a house together when I was really little? That either a murder happened before we lived there or after we moved out?

• 3:13Yvette Gentile?

  Yeah, it was in Hawaii Kai and I was going to Kaiser High School. And the murder happened before, but we didn't know that when we were living there. But I do remember weird things happening in that house, like doors closing, lights coming on. I never liked spending a whole lot of time in that house and especially by myself. I was always either outside or, you know, with friends. But we didn't find this out until after, because I know for a fact, if mom would have known that this murder had happened in the house, you know, she would have had shamans there, people there blessing the house and whatnot. So yeah, we did live in a haunted house. But most of the time, when people feel like their house is haunted,

• 3:57Yvette Gentile?

  you know, hearing creepy sounds late at night is usually nothing. Like you think it's a ghost, but it's just some old pipes creaking, right? Or floors settling, or it's just our minds playing tricks on us. Though I know that's not the case for everyone. And no one understands that better than 30-year-old grad student, Kristin Lee.

• 4:18Yvette Gentile?

  See, in 2005, a flash flood in the wake of two hurricanes destroyed Kristen's home in Quincy, Ohio. And after the incident, Kristen is just trying to survive with her two young sons. So they start crashing in random places, like on friends' couches or in a camper. But on other nights, they have no other choice than to literally sleep on the porch of where their former house used to be. That is just devastating, and of course, it's no way to live long term. But Kristen doesn't let this get in the way of finding stability again. She starts actively looking for what could be their forever home.

• 5:00Rasha Pecoraro?

  And one day, Kristen meets with a real estate agent, and they go to view this house at 1699 Belmont Street in Bel Air, Ohio. It's a lot closer to her work, so Kristen is actually pretty excited about it. And when she first lays eyes on the so-called Bel Air House, it's like she's fallen in love. It's two stories with four bedrooms. It has a yard for the boys to play in and a cute little attic for extra storage. Plus, it has these cozy features that make it feel just like home. I'm talking hardwood floors, a functional fireplaces, and yeah, sure, it's a bit of a fixer-upper, but Kristen can picture how homey it will feel once it's all set up and they're all in there.

• 5:45Rasha Pecoraro?

  The best part of all, it's in her budget. The former owners abandoned it, and then the bank foreclosed on it, so luckily, it's surprisingly cheap. Like $46,000 cheap, which even back in 2005 is pretty darn good for a piece of real estate, especially a house that's almost 2,700 square feet. You can't find that nowadays.

• 6:10Yvette Gentile?

  Kristen does not hesitate. Would you? I mean, $46,000 for a 2,700 square foot home? That's like insane. So of course she buys it, and she moves in with her sons and her partner, Vinnie. A few weeks go by, and at first, things are really good. They get unpacked, settle in, get to celebrate Christmas and New Year's in this new house. But by early 2006, things get not so good. Kristen says it's mostly due to Vinnie. He begins acting a little off. In some evenings, instead of going to bed, he walks up to the attic and just stays there

• 6:50Yvette Gentile?

  for hours on end, to the point where he doesn't come down until the next morning, when she's actually getting ready to head to work. And Kristen has no idea what he's up to. And to make things even stranger, Vinnie starts having some serious mood swings. It's like, all of a sudden, little things are setting him off, and nobody knows what's going to trigger an angry outburst from him. Sometimes, he even crosses a line, becoming verbally abusive with Kristen. Now, keep in mind, she's never seen him like this before, so it's gotta be confusing and disturbing for her.

• 7:30Yvette Gentile?

  And especially because there are other times where he's just not there. Like, he just stares off as if he's looking at something in the distance. Like, yeah, he's there physically, but when Kristen asks Vinnie what he's looking at, it's like he doesn't even hear her. I mean, there's just no reaction.

• 7:50Rasha Pecoraro?

  At first, Kristen assumes there's a logical explanation for all of this. Vinnie does have a history of substance abuse. He's been sober for a while, but Kristen fears that this new erratic behavior means that he's possibly relapsed. To her, it's the only thing that makes sense. Though things get really tense between her and Vinnie when she gets a call from work one day. It's her boss telling her that she's in trouble for a text that she supposedly sent. So, for some background here, Kristen is in the middle of doing her internship, which she has to finish before she can get her master's in psychology. Every day, she works at a rehab clinic where she's around vulnerable people, people who are battling addiction.

• 8:35Rasha Pecoraro?

  And it's really important for her to have good boundaries with her clients. Except her boss thinks that Kristen sent a text to one of the patients. I don't know exactly what it says, but the point is, this sort of personal contact from Kristen would be incredibly inappropriate.

• 8:54Rasha Pecoraro?

  And Kristen knows that, too. She would never message a patient like that. She doesn't even like to text. Kristen's kids would know better than to contact this patient, too. But it's hard for anyone to believe her when she says that she didn't do it. And since it came from her phone, it just doesn't look good.

• 9:13Yvette Gentile?

  Well, whatever the message said was apparently so bad Kristen gets fired over it. And of course, she blames Vinnie. She doesn't particularly trust him anymore. And she knows he's the only one to have access to her phone. So he makes the most sense. I don't know if Kristen ever confronts him or if he tries to defend himself. Either way, I do know Vinnie eventually moves out and they break up. But even with Vinnie gone, there's still a lot of weird things happening in Kristen's world.

• 9:47Rasha Pecoraro?

  For example, she keeps hearing weird sounds in the house that she cannot explain, especially in the attic. It was easy for her to ignore the noises when Vinnie was around because he was always up there. But now Kristen hears footsteps upstairs, even when she's home alone, or when she and her boys are all downstairs. And everyone who sets foot in the house, Kristen, her kids, her friends, her kids' friends, they all agree, there's just a bad vibe.

• 10:23Yvette Gentile?

  One of Kristen's buddies says the feeling is especially strong in the attic. And when he climbs up there, it's extremely cold. On top of that, this guy feels instantly nervous. He doesn't see anything out of the ordinary, but still, all of his instincts are screaming at him to get the hell out of this house and that he is in danger.

• 10:45Rasha Pecoraro?

  He's pretty friggin' certain that this house is haunted. But Kristen, she's like, absolutely not. She does not believe in ghosts, never really has. She jokes about the possibility with her friends and family, but at this point, it's just that, a joke. She thinks there must be a more logical explanation for everything. Like maybe the stress of her breakup is getting to her. I mean, who's to say she isn't just imagining it all? Until one day, something happens that she cannot explain away.

• 11:22Yvette Gentile?

  Kristin's bathroom in her basement doubles as the laundry room. And it's always cold. So Kristin's in the habit of tossing her chilly towel into the dryer before she takes a shower. And then she pulls it out when she's done, so it's nice and toasty. One day, per usual, she throws in her towel and takes a shower. When she gets out, Kristin opens the dryer. Only, there's no towel. Now Kristin is pretty damn sure she put it in there. So as she's scratching her head, she turns around, and that's when she finds it. Hanging on the hook of the bathroom door. A clean towel, still warm from the drying cycle.

• 12:05Yvette Gentile?

  One she definitely did not put on the back of the door. Kristin is literally confused and more than a little bit freaked out now. She's getting to a point where she can't just chalk all this up to some forgetfulness or stress. Especially as things just keep getting spookier.

• 12:27Rasha Pecoraro?

  Like one night, Kristin's winding down after a long day of making repairs around the house, including in her bedroom. I'm not exactly sure what she was doing, but I feel like maybe she had been painting, because she can't sleep in there. And to me, that means maybe there were fumes in the room. Instead, she goes to sleep on the couch in the living room. Well, anyway, she wakes up suddenly in the middle of the night, and the house is silent. She doesn't see or hear anyone else, but she does have this eerie feeling, like something intentionally woke her up from a very deep sleep. And she can tell something just isn't right. She can't put her finger on what's wrong, though, until she sees it.

• 13:13Rasha Pecoraro?

  There's someone sitting right next to her on the couch, literally watching her sleep. The figure looks like a slim man in a hat. He has facial hair and every inch of him, his clothes, his skin and his hair are all gray, almost like he just stepped out of a black and white movie. Except he's also transparent. Kristin can actually see right through him. So of course she sits up and she screams. But the guy doesn't leave. He just stays there, watching her freak out. Eventually, she straight up asks him, "Who are you?" Only the gray man doesn't reply.

• 13:59Rasha Pecoraro?

  He doesn't have any reaction at all. His expression is completely blank. Literally, zero emotion. He just gets up and walks to the front door. But before he can turn the knob, the guy vanishes without a trace, right before Kristin's eyes. She's almost willing to write the whole incident off as just a bad dream. Except a few seconds later, she looks at the couch where she was sleeping and she notices there's two impressions on the cushions. One is from her and the other is from the gray man.

• 14:38Yvette Gentile?

  It's at this point that Kristin's finally ready to admit the truth. Her house is haunted. And now that she's beginning to accept it, she starts questioning all the other strange things that have happened in her house too. Like Vinnie's time in the attic and the footsteps, the towel incident and the weird text. She starts wondering if it's possible that all of that could be the result of some supernatural force lurking in her home.

• 15:10Yvette Gentile?

  And it isn't long before Kristin realizes that she may have bigger problems than just some text messaging laundry doing ghost. Because whatever's in that house is turning physically violent.

• 15:29Rasha Pecoraro?

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• 16:09Rasha Pecoraro?

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• 16:50Yvette Gentile?

  In 2005, Kristen Lee bought what she had come to believe was a haunted house. Sure, at first, Kristen was very skeptical. She thought there had to be a rational explanation for what was going on. But somewhere along the way, Kristen could no longer deny it. There was something supernatural happening inside her home. And that's when she became open to more occult explanations. And I'm not just talking about ghosts. She also comes to believe in witchcraft, to the point where Kristen even joins a local coven in Bel-Air. She's hoping she can use magic to get rid of whatever's lurking inside her house.

• 17:37Rasha Pecoraro?

  And it's during that next full moon, when her kids happen to be staying with her parents, that Kristin performs a simple ritual on her own. It involves burning some herbs, lighting some candles, and praying to a goddess for the ghost to go away. After that, it's just a matter of waiting to see if the spell worked. A few nights later, Kristin's home alone again, and she's realizing she hasn't had any activity over the last few days. Like, maybe the spell worked? But just to be safe, she figures, hey, let's try another one. So she does another spell to make sure she can get rid of any negative energies that might still be in the house. But then, she comes out of her room

• 18:22Rasha Pecoraro?

  and notices her sweet pit bull Bella is nowhere to be seen. She starts calling out for her all throughout the house. Only Bella doesn't come running like she usually does. Kristin starts to panic as she rushes around searching for her. But when Bella comes trudging down the stairs, she's moving really slowly, almost like she's hurt. And her eyes are completely bloodshot. Right away, Kristin looks Bella all over, and she sees that her collar is on super tight. So tight that it's almost choking her to death. She loosens it so Bella can breathe again. But clearly, Bella didn't do this to herself.

• 19:06Rasha Pecoraro?

  Which is when Kristin starts to think, not only is this spirit still in the house, it's also trying to kill her dog.

• 19:16Yvette Gentile?

  And y'all, you know that is the last straw for Kristin. She's ready to bring in her whole coven to get rid of this thing. They walk through the Bella house, waving brooms around, chanting, sprinkling salt everywhere, anything they can think of to try and keep evil spirits away.

• 19:34Rasha Pecoraro?

  Yvette, that totally reminds me of that scene from Practical Magic.

• 19:39Yvette Gentile?

  It does, but unlike in the movie, this spell doesn't seem to work. Just days after the ritual, Kristin has a guest over to her house, and he tells her that he's certain that something just bit him in the leg. Something that he cannot see, which to Kristin means, the ghosts are still there.

• 20:01Rasha Pecoraro?

  By now, Kristen feels hopeless. The spirits are too powerful for her magic. And if she wants any peace and quiet, she has to be the one who's going to move out. Game over, they win. So she puts the house up for sale. But of course, not without some mixed feelings. On the one hand, Kristen feels incredibly guilty at the thought of anyone else moving into this haunted house. She doesn't think anyone should have to go through what she's been going through. But on the other hand, Kristen is also a broke grad student, so she can't afford to get a new place while she's paying off the mortgage on the Bel Air house. For her, this is a lose-lose situation.

• 20:45Yvette Gentile?

  As it turns out, nobody wants to buy this house anyway, because it's really run down. The paint is peeling, the plumbing is ancient. It's just not cute. So even if buyers never learn that the Bel Air house is haunted, it doesn't seem like she's going to be able to get rid of it. And by the way, there's no legal requirement for Kristen to disclose the fact that the house is haunted to any potential buyers. Russia, remember at the start of this episode how we thought the $46,000 price for this house was a good deal? We'll think again.

• 21:18Rasha Pecoraro?

  Totally. And after a long time with no offers, Kristen makes a decision. She can't sell the house, and she can't live there. So she'll rent it out. That way, she can at least make enough money to pay for a new home for herself and her kids. But this doesn't work out too well for her either. Every time she lines up a new tenant, they move in, get their things unpacked, and that's when the trouble begins.

• 21:45Yvette Gentile?

  Over the next few years, this cycle continues. And Kristen gets used to panicked phone calls from people begging to break their leases. Someone reports that a ghost literally beat them up. And someone else claims that a chandelier fell from the ceiling, missing his head by inches.

• 22:03Rasha Pecoraro?

  But as time goes on, she starts hearing from a different kind of renter. Apparently, word on the street about the Bellaire House has spread to paranormal circles, and people who've heard about the hauntings want to experience it for themselves. Paranormal investigators ask to stay there and see if they can make contact with the ghost. So do documentary crew TV shows like BuzzFeed's Unsolved Supernatural. And here's the thing, these are professionals. They definitely know their way around haunted properties. So Kristin sees this as a new opportunity.

• 22:43Rasha Pecoraro?

  Not only can she finally rent out the house, but she realizes she can up her prices a bit. And get this, she charges these mediums and ghost hunters $500 a night. You are never going to see me paying that amount of money to stay in a haunted house. Real, you're never gonna see me pay any amount of money to stay in a haunted house. But somehow, it actually starts filling up Kristin's rental calendar.

• 23:09Yvette Gentile?

  Though as expected, her new clients have a lot of questions, like, whose ghosts are haunting this house? What is their backstory? How many are there? I mean, Kristin doesn't know any of these answers yet. But in 2011, she brings in some paranormal investigators, hoping to find all of this out. And one afternoon, they try to capture electronic voice phenomenon, or EVPs. You've probably seen this happen on ghost hunting TV shows. People can use various different devices to try and capture EVP audio.

• 23:48Yvette Gentile?

  That could mean anything from a normal smartphone to a high-quality device called a ghost box. Those are designed to detect multiple radio frequencies at once, in hopes of capturing some supernatural noise, like something, anything.

• 24:05Rasha Pecoraro?

  And if you're lucky, sometimes you can even hear voices coming through on these recording devices.

• 24:11Yvette Gentile?

  Well, sure enough, once a ghost box is used at the Bellaire House, researchers claim to hear a bunch of voices. Some of them are literally cursing at Kristin, using misogynistic slurs against her, and others are clear phrases like "get out" or "I'm gonna kill her."

• 24:32Yvette Gentile?

  When one of the researchers tells the voices, "You can't have Kristen," words come out of the static and they say, "We already do."

• 24:43Rasha Pecoraro?

  By the end of the investigation, researchers conclude there are three or even four spirits in the house. They also think the entities in the home are targeting women specifically.

• 24:56Yvette Gentile?

  Which might explain a lot in Kristen's case. But to understand how it came to be like this, Kristen is dead set on doing everything she can to learn about the home's history. She starts poring over old newspapers and census records. And she also starts performing séances with caution. And Kristen always does protection rituals before and uses the buddy system. She never does a séance alone, and I can just say, "Good for her." She hosts a ton of séances. And in some of them, she supposedly connects with several spirits, including one named Edwin Heatherington.

• 25:41Rasha Pecoraro?

  Now, that name must have sent chills up Kristen's spine when she heard it. Because thanks to all of her research, she learned that the Bellaire House was built in 1847 by a man named Jacob Heatherington. He was an immigrant from England who moved to Bellaire while it was still a poor mining town. Every day, Jacob went to work in the coal mines. And he was incredibly successful at it, to the point where he turned a $500 land investment into his own coal mine. So far, those details are all supported by the historical record. But during her séances, Kristen learned a little more about Jacob that couldn't quite be confirmed.

• 26:24Yvette Gentile?

  This is where it gets really interesting. So apparently, after Jacob bought his coal mine, he built the Bellaire House near one of the shafts and moved in with his wife, Elizabeth Armstrong Heatherington. The actual coal mine entrance was far enough away that the house didn't interfere with any of the operations. But Jacob wanted to ensure that every morning he'd wake up with the knowledge that people were working in the tunnels right beneath his home. As for Elizabeth, there were a few rumors about her as well. Supposedly, she wasn't the most popular lady in Bel Air.

• 27:04Yvette Gentile?

  She hated Bel Air so much that she wanted to move somewhere else, but she never did. She was still a Bel Air resident when she died at the age of 80 in 1896.

• 27:17Rasha Pecoraro?

  And maybe she never left because she always wanted to be close to her children, especially her favorite son, Alexander. After his parents died, he inherited the family business and ran it for a while. The home and the business were eventually passed down to his daughter Lyd. She lived at the Bel Air house with her younger brother, Edwin Heatherington. Ring a bell? Well, it should, because that's the ghost Kristen made contact with during her séance. Now, as the story goes, the two were incredibly close. So close, they actually lived in the house together for Lyd's entire life.

• 27:55Yvette Gentile?

  But that comes to a tragic end on April 6, 1947, when 85-year-old Lyd has a fatal heart attack. It's said that she dies in the Bel Air house, in the dining room on the floor. Now, Lyd basically raised Edwin. Their actual mother was very distant and neglectful, so Lyd was supposedly the first person to make him feel loved and cherished when he was young. All to say, Edwin is devastated by her loss. He wishes there was something, anything that he could do, to be able to talk to Lyd one last time, to see her smile, or at least make sure she's okay in the afterlife.

• 28:40Rasha Pecoraro?

  And that's when Edwin gets a pretty dangerous idea. Why not perform séances to try and summon Lyd's ghost? There's just one obstacle standing in his way. He has to break down the barrier between the living and the dead.

• 29:06Rasha Pecoraro?

  After his sister Lydie dies in 1947, Edwin Heatherington is obsessed with summoning her spirit in a séance. And we know this because Kristin Lee learned a whole lot about his efforts when she connected with his ghost during her own séance. According to Kristin, he began by studying every occult document he could get his hands on, hoping to find some way to bring Lydie back from the dead. He also tracked down professional psychics and mediums to pick their brains, you know, just to figure out what they knew. The problem was, he was very impatient. He learned just enough to perform a basic séance,

• 29:48Rasha Pecoraro?

  but he didn't actually learn how to do one safely. Still, Edwin wasn't wasting any time. He performed the rituals in the living room, the very same room where Lydie was when she died. Supposedly, Edwin's rituals actually worked, and he managed to open a doorway between the living and the dead.

• 30:11Yvette Gentile?

  According to Kristin, it's not something you can see with the naked eye, but portals like these are very powerful regardless. And according to Edwin, once this entrance was open, anything could come through it, not just Lydie. But here's the major issue with that. While Edwin knew how to open these doorways, he didn't know how to close them. And to be honest, I'm not sure he ever even managed to contact his sister. I mean, it's possible he didn't, because Edwin kept doing these séances over and over again.

• 30:50Rasha Pecoraro?

  By the time Edwin dies in 1962, there are something like 11 active portals inside the Bel Air House. And you might think that those 11 portals are what made the house so haunted. But that doesn't seem to be the case, because Kristin's research actually suggests that the land the Bel Air House sits on was supernaturally active for at least 100 years before Edwin even began his séances.

• 31:18Rasha Pecoraro?

  Can you even believe that, Yvette?

• 31:20Yvette Gentile?

  I saw something coming because Edwin had done so many séances. Like, there had to be a reason, right? And you just don't play around with that, especially when you don't know what you're doing. Because remember, he didn't learn how to do these séances safely. So when you start calling in all these spirits, you're gonna get good and you're gonna get evil.

• 31:44Rasha Pecoraro?

  So clearly, it seems like a supernatural force was at play well before the Beller House was even built. But as far as where that energy came from, what it's doing there, and what it wants, well, there are several theories Kristen believes.

• 32:00Yvette Gentile?

  The first theory is about a ley line, which are basically invisible lines that stretch between important supernatural locations. So think the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge. Some people think ley lines have these magical properties. If this is the first time you've ever heard of them, I definitely recommend going down a rabbit hole because it is truly fascinating, especially when you talk about exploring the intersection of spirituality and scientific. You know, when you talk about ley lines, people think of ley lines as these spiritual portals, right? But then when you talk about the science behind it and you think about magnetic energy,

• 32:45Yvette Gentile?

  so you have the combination of both. And I think it would be an incredible episode to explore the spiritual ley lines as compared to the scientific, the electromagnetic energy fields. But anyway, the first theory is this idea that the Beller House is sitting on a ley line. But Kristen leans into an alternate definition.

• 33:09Yvette Gentile?

  According to her, a ley line is kind of like a spiritual power outlet. It draws mystical energy in from a bunch of different places and gathers it into one location. And all a spirit needs to do is connect to the ley line, and it can use that location like a portal, or gather energy from it, either of which can have explosive consequences.

• 33:37Rasha Pecoraro?

  Earlier, we mentioned that the original owner, Jacob Heatherington, built the Bel Air house right on top of one of his coal mines. Well, Kristin says that one day in March of 1893, a mine exploded. Specifically, the mine that ran under the home. Forty-two workers died, but the house survived the blast. It's believed that the force of that eruption might have opened the home's first portal. Either that, or the power of that portal could have caused the explosion. Sort of a chicken or the egg situation, I guess.

• 34:17Yvette Gentile?

  But according to an article by Kenny Biddle of Skeptical Inquirer, there's no record of any mine explosion in Bel Air. But there was a small fire about a quarter mile from one of the mines in 1893. And from what we can tell, nobody was hurt or killed in that fire. So, nothing like the type of blast that could have created a supposed portal. Which, by the way, in his article, Kenny strongly implies that Kristin may have made up the whole explosion story. After all, she's written two books about her house's history. And she charges people $500 a night to stay in a rundown rental.

• 34:58Rasha Pecoraro?

  But to say Kristin is lying about the home's history is a stretch, in my humble opinion. First of all, lots of people have had supernatural encounters in the Beller House, including people with no incentive to lie. Take this pair of ghost hunters from BuzzFeed, Ryan Bergara and Shane Madei. Ryan and Shane investigated the house in 2018, and these guys actively tried to engage with the ghost. Late at night while the lights were off, they turned on a handheld EVP recorder, and they actually captured something. When they asked if anyone was in the room, a voice spoke through the box, but the words

• 35:43Rasha Pecoraro?

  were a little bit muffled. So the guys ended up asking another question: was this the spirit of a Heatherington? They got nothing. So they asked if the ghost was from a time before the house was built. And that's when an answer came through, clear as day. Sort of. It said, and I quote, "spaghetti." Now, I don't know what that means in this context, and neither did Shane and Ryan. I don't know, maybe the ghost was hungry, maybe it was playing a joke, or maybe it was saying something that just sounded like spaghetti, and maybe part of the message was cut off? The point is, something was talking through the EVP device.

• 36:28Yvette Gentile?

  While it's said that Edwin's spirit still haunts the Beller House to this day, in fact, it seems he's the one Kristin has the most contact with during her séances. She claims that after he spent years opening up a doorway to the world of the dead, he was never able to go through it. Instead, he was trapped on this side as a restless spirit. She also says that Edwin is a friendly ghost, that he may feel bad for opening all of these portals, so now he tries to help psychics and mediums, maybe hoping to undo what he did.

• 37:10Yvette Gentile?

  But every now and then during a séance, Kristin says Edwin's personality changes dramatically. He suddenly becomes very hostile and argumentative.

• 37:22Rasha Pecoraro?

  Kristin believes that when Edwin gets nasty, it's because he's not really Edwin. Maybe another spirit is pretending to be him. Or perhaps he's being controlled by another spirit, a more powerful spirit, maybe even a demon.

• 37:40Yvette Gentile?

  Kristin thinks that all of the spirits in the Bellaire House are locked in some kind of power struggle. She also believes there's something especially strong and malicious dwelling in the attic.

• 37:53Rasha Pecoraro?

  Over the years, Kristin has worked with a lot of professional psychics and mediums, hoping to cast the dark spirits out. But none of them can. Frankly, a lot of people are nervous to even try. Because when you perform rituals to connect with spirits, like Yvette said, you make yourself vulnerable to the powers that lie beyond.

• 38:16Yvette Gentile?

  And you don't have to take Kristin's word for it. Lots of professional mediums warn that if you don't perform a séance exactly right, like we both said, Rasha, there's a risk of bringing evil spirits into the world or of being possessed or getting seriously hurt by one yourself.

• 38:36Rasha Pecoraro?

  An Edwin's story reveals another risk. You could permanently bind your soul to the house, making it impossible to ever leave, even after your death.

• 38:49Yvette Gentile?

  So what's really behind all this creepy activity at the Bellaire House? Is it portals? Is it ley lines? Is it demons? Or is it all of the above?

• 39:01Rasha Pecoraro?

  I'm honestly not sure that we'll ever have the answers, especially if our main source is a ghost. But never say never. Because when it comes down to the supernatural, nothing is for certain. And maybe, just maybe, the Bellaire House isn't only haunted, it's also a doorway, a fragile barrier between us and something we can't quite see, filled with supernatural forces just waiting to break through.

• 39:43Yvette Gentile?

  This is So Supernatural, an Audiochuck original, produced by Crime House. You can connect with us on Instagram at So Supernatural Pod and visit our website at SoSupernaturalPodcast.com. Join Rasha and me next Friday for an all-new episode. So what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?

• 40:08Speaker 03

  I've been having a hard time trying to explain what Midnight Burger is. How about I let them give it a shot?

• 40:14Speaker 04

  Your podcast is amazing.

• 40:16Speaker 05

  It's such an amazing show altogether.

• 40:17Speaker 00

  You guys have actively ruined all other audio dramas for me.

• 40:21Speaker 06

  You can't get people to understand the humaning that happens in this damn show.

• 40:25Speaker 05

  Keep doing what you're doing, because it's awesome. You might not think it, but you are far more important than you realize. Thank you.

• 40:31Speaker 03

  At the nexus of all things, there is a diner. Look for Midnight Burger on your favorite podcasting app, or just go to WeOpenAtSix.com.