Welcome To Queenie's Paranormal Playhouse!: Today's Trippy Tales..."Homeless Shelter Phantom" and More!

"Homeless Shelter Phantom"

The following was submitted August 2001

"I work at a homeless shelter in Hamilton, Ontario. At the beginning of summer this year, I had a very interesting experience...

I was waiting for my bus at around 5pm it was a bright sunny day and this elderly man passed by me. He had a very distinctive and familiar gait, and he also wore a blue ball cap with some kind of logo on it.

This man walked slowly past me (about one ½ meters in front of me) and people were going around him as they hustled and bustled about (this is rush hour after all). This man seemed very familiar to me.

I watched him for a few seconds, until I looked away at something across the street. It was then I realized that the man I was just watching stayed at the shelter I work in about two weeks ago.

While staying with us, he had terrible stomach pains and one night, we found him on the floor doubled over in pain so we sent him to the hospital. This man passed away the next day (I’m not sure what the official cause of death was).

So I looked back and I saw him walk behind the bus shelter, out of sight (I was about 12 meters from the bus shelter). I walked toward the bus shelter knowing there was nowhere for him to go but the road and I would be able to see that.

He was not there!

I even walked down the block, knowing he was going way too slow for him to have gotten that far or for me not to have seen him.

He just vanished....

This man had no family as far as anyone knew, and he lived on the streets and in shelters...he refused to be put in any home of any kind.

As I was not his case worker when he stayed at the shelter, I had only talked to him three or four times, and as far as I could tell, he was very secretive about his life.

He was around 70 years old and always wore a ball cap with a logo of some kind on it.

I truly believe it was his spirit walking the area it knew best.

It amazed me how people just walked around him, aware of him but not really noticing him.

It was also interesting no one touched him, even in such a big crowd.

There was no "glow" or "light" around him. He looked as real as you and me.

I haven’t seen his spirit again since that day, but I hope I do."

Webmaster’s Note: The above account is similar to others reported by health caregivers the world over. It is also interesting to note that the ‘apparition’ appeared solid to the witness, which is more often than not, the case.

"Peek-a-BOO! I see WHO?!"

A Ghostly Apparition At The River Street Junk Yard

Hide-N-Seek was definitely our favorite outdoor summer game, and we had many great places to play it, but the best place was "The Junk Yard"...

It wasn't really a junk yard, it was a fenced in place on River Street with a couple of dilapidated old wooden buildings full of holes that housed giant bales of cloth that were soon to be turned into felt. It was a busy place and the bales were changed regularly creating an always changing maze of tunnels and holes to hide in. After the workers left it was our turn.

One day George, Gary, Jimmy, Ricky and me were playing there. George was a small kid with bright red hair and there was no mistaking him for anybody else. In hide-and-seek, if you spied someone and identified them wrongly it was called a false spy and you were "IT" again.

We all spied George at least once when we were it and he'd pop up somewhere else yelling "false spy, you're it again". So after four or five false spies on George we decided something funny was going on. It was pretty dark in there except for a few beams of light coming through the holes in the walls. We now started to get a bit scared and decided to get out quick. We all scrambled for the exit hole trying to be the first one out.

Unfortunately, the hole was very small and we had to exit one at a time in single file. Gary was behind me and I heard him say "Come on George, hurry up". So I turned around and noticed that George was crawling along behind us but quite a bit back. However, when I got to the hole and looked out I saw George standing outside. Well let me tell you, I almost tore the skin right off my back getting out that hole!

Gary popped out next and just about dropped dead when he saw George there! We took off like scared cats. Later at Gary's house we told his mother about this and she told us a young kid with red hair suffocated there years before.

Well, I leave it up to you. Was it a ghostly apparition or some kid that had a lot of moxie? If it was another kid, he was pretty slippery because after the first few false spies, we'd all rush over to where the phony George was and he would simply not be there. Needless to say, we didn't go in there too much after that!

"Ghostly Neighbors"

"About six months ago, I was renting an apartment in a remodeled bank building that had been renovated into apartments...

The building was built around 1865 as a bank, and then was a book store, and now apartments. The building had two entrances, one that lead into the first floor apartment, which was still being renovated.

At the other entrance, there were around ten steps that lead up to the second floor apartment, and then another six or seven steps that lead up to the third floor apartment. I was the first renter so I was able to get the top floor, which I thought would be good so I wouldn't be bothered by a lot of noise.

I attended night classes at college so my 16 year old son was there in the evenings alone. Immediately he began to tell me that he would hear people talking out in the hallway, someone walking up and down the stairs, and strange banging noises.

I called my landlord to verify that I was the only one to have keys to the building, and to ask if she would call when showing the other apartments. I thought this would put my son at ease.

After two weeks, we had a major water leak which forced me to move down one level to the second floor.

Now, I knew I would be the only one in the building since the first floor wasn't done, and the third floor would need some work.

The very first night in the new apartment I heard walking, talking, and banging coming from the upstairs. I went up to check it out since I still had a key. To my surprise there was no one there, I locked it back up and went back downstairs.

The next morning when I was leaving, the upstairs apartment door was wide open; even though I knew that I closed and locked it. This was an ongoing event for several weeks.

My daughter had some friends over one evening and we were talking when we heard someone walk up the steps go in the upstairs apartment and the door slam shut. We all went upstairs but there was no one there.

One of my daughter's friends started making comments about how he did not believe in ghosts and that he wasn't afraid, acting tough. Later as they were leaving, I heard a loud crash and ran outside and there was the boy lying at the bottom of the stairs, swearing that someone had shoved him down the stairs. He said he was the last one coming down the steps when he clearly felt someone shove him hard on the shoulder and push him. He was not hurt, thankfully.

My sister was visiting from Pittsburgh one weekend, and asked me to go upstairs and ask the people to be quiet and stop slamming doors. I informed her that no one lived there; I was the only renter in the building.

I finally decided to get a voice activated recorder and place it on the steps at night. I would check all the doors to make sure they were locked, make sure that the upstairs apartment was locked, and then record.

I was amazed at the recordings, clear footsteps, the sounds of balls being rolled down the steps, doors slamming, and inaudible whispers.

Needless to say, I do not live there anymore, but, I am still troubled by the things that happened there."