Ray County Historical Society Museum & Research Library - Visit 2
Location Information
Date: 13 November 2021 Type: Historic Building
Location Title: Ray County Historical Society Museum & Research Library
City/State: Richmond, MO
Investigation Times: 08:00 PM - 12:15 AM
Status: Analysis
Weather Information
Sunrise: 06:37 AM Sunset: 07:42 PM
High Temperature: 46 °F Low Temperature: 27 °F
Sky Condition: Cloudy Wind: SSW at 15 mph
Humidity: 52% Precipitation: 0 in
Lunar Phase: Waxing Gibbous % disk visible: 70%
Solar X-Rays: Normal Geomagnetic Field: Unsettled
Pressure: 29.12 mmHg
Investigators Present
Becky Ray
Jennifer Sprague
Angela Hodge
Wendy Schindler
Sarah Crowe
Investigators Notes
Wendy, Lead Investigator:
I had two personal experiences:
8:30ish - Hallway outside the Civil War and Native American Indian Artifact rooms. The group went to the 2nd floor first. I was testing my recorder - didn't catch anything - but beyond our chatter and EVP questions.
As we entered the "Indian Artifact Room," I had an almost overwhelming feeling of a presence behind me. I turned to look, even though I was the last of us to enter the room—nobody/nothing there to see except for the creepy hat-man mannequin.
I left my videocam recording a motion-activated ball and artifact display cases that reportedly sometimes move and/or vibrate with no apparent cause. They did neither this time, and the ball remained dark.
10pm - 11ish - Tack/Equipment Room, Basement
We entered the room with lights out. Something was reacting strongly to Angela, and a lot of shadow play ensued. I only saw a more distant shadow pass several times in front of a covered window. They looked to be a good-sized, well-built male shadow but not being cast from outside the window.
No reasonable explanation for the shadow.
Notes from Becky:
During our initial tour of the location, we were shown the areas of several hot spots without details.
A few of the hotspots were:
BASEMENT: the coal miner room, the jail cell next to the coal miner room, mild activity in the storage/refreshment room, and a "Big Guy" at the far end of the storage/refreshment room - the area that was once his cell.
FIRST FLOOR: the hallway by the WWI room, the Black History Room, and Grandma's Kitchen (does not like men).
SECOND FLOOR: There is reported activity in every room. Pettis Parlour is the most active. Other Rooms include the doctor's room, the Jesse James room, the "Bedroom," the Civil War room (cabinet door has opened once), the Native American Artifact room (Indian Relics), the Hallway to the School Room, and the School Room, and the Hallway behind the Fire door.
At 8:15 pm, I set my motion camera by mannequins in the hallway towards the School Room.
Items of note:
While in the Pettis Parlour, I smelled food cooking.
While in the WWI & WWII rooms area, I felt something was attached to one of the uniforms.
While in the WWI room, several of us witnessed the "cat ball" on the cot triggered while talking about our Grandfathers' service records.
At 10:09 pm, while she was alone in the WWII room, Jennifer reported hearing a "click" while no one else was near the room.
At 10:25 pm, while we were in the "Tack" room in the basement, several of us felt a presence, and almost everyone saw movement and unexplained shadows around the door. While we were there, I saw what looked like a flesh-colored face lean in and look at us from the left side of the door. Upon inspection, it was clear there wasn't room for a person to be there, nor was anything that may have moved and given that impression.
While we were in the Coal Miner Room, I felt someone playing with my hair and moving it in front of my face. When I would pull my hair back, I felt like my face was covered in spiderwebs.
Around midnight when we returned to the "Tack" room, I took my strobe light and laser grid. The grid was too bright, so I unplugged it. While the strobe light was going, several of us saw some movement in the doorway; however, the feeling in that room was markedly different from when we were there earlier.
Notes from Jennifer:
In this investigation, I used my audio recorder and motion cams. I placed one of my motion cams on the first floor in the room across from the Native American Artifact room. This room had reported activity of a cabinet opening and closing by itself. At this time, my footage did not capture anything to note.
I placed my second motion cam on the main floor in the Civil War Room. In this room, I set up my motion cam after we seemed to get some reactions to a motion-related object while talking about personal stories related to wartime. After viewing my footage, there was nothing that seemed out of the ordinary.
The reports in the hallway were of shadow figures and a sense of an overwhelming "presence."
I used my audio recorder throughout the night. I did capture a possible EVP on the main floor.
Many investigators had personal experiences throughout the night. We also had group experiences. This included seeing multiple shadow figures, responses to motion-activated objects, hearing disembodied voices and footsteps, and being touched.
The basement area was where I had the most personal experiences.
Times of interest of activity:
10:00-10:45PM- Tack Room: Basement
Multiple people in the group, including myself, saw what seemed to be an odd shadow figure manifesting at different times at the doorway entrance to this room. This was happening so often that it was difficult to keep track of the times. There were also multiple temperature changes. At this time, other members also reported hearing footsteps. Other members reported feeling touched. I also heard what seemed to be movement behind Becky while sitting by her.
We had a motion-triggered object placed by the door, but it was never triggered. Sarah also had her camera facing the door.
We ruled out that it was the position of the door and its frame that was causing any odd shadow movement.
We later returned with a strobe light to see if it could enhance what we were seeing, and we still saw similar things, although it was less active than before.
10:45PM- 11:25PM Storage/Refreshment Room/Basement
After we left the Tack Room, we entered another area of the basement. I experienced so many odd shadow movements in this room and noises from the hallway, while others reported hearing odd noises. The strange thing was that every time I would see what looked like somebody walking by and blocking out a light source, Becky would see only light at that specific moment. I did my best to see if I could find a logical reason for what could be causing shadow movement. There were no shadows of trees outside that would mimic movement. I also had Sarah stand where I was standing, and I moved to the other side to see if we could correlate or recreate what I was seeing.
Notes from Sarah:
Upstairs
We started the evening upstairs in the Native American Artifact room. Honestly, I didn't feel anything there, so I left the room so others could set up and do what they wanted without me in the way. The Civil War room had felt off to me, so I went ahead and stepped in there. Jennifer and I both commented that we heard random stuff in that area. After being in there for a while, I think all the weird feelings I had were because all the flags and stuff hanging on the wall made the space seem extra dark and more claustrophobic. Also, it's full of confederate things, which always feels yucky. My videos audio picked up a humming sound at 8:12.
We went down the hall that has the schoolroom and band room at the end. Jennifer and I stopped in the area behind the fire door for a few, but it felt pretty calm. Jennifer and I both heard tapping sounds during our time in this room, but it may have been other people clicking their flashlights on and off. My video's audio did pick up what sounds like two whistles before Jennifer said flash while in this space.
We decided to meet back up with the rest of the group down the other hall. Stopping in the rooms as we went. Angela felt drawn to either the parlor or the doctor's office room. I will say I felt like I didn't want to go into the doctor's room. It could be a tiny room, but I didn't want to be there.
We spent some time in the parlor room as a group, and nothing seemed to happen. Most of the group walked out, and I was in the room with the smiling mannequin lady. Angela was the last one to leave the hall area. She came to us saying that she felt like something was chasing her out of that area, so she rushed out. This made the rest of us want to go back there. I walked down to the end of the hall, and Jennifer commented that she saw a light go past. She had me walk back the way I had to try and see if we could recreate what she saw, but it didn't happen again.
When walking back towards where the halls meet up, near the Morman room, I felt like something touched the front part of my hair. Like it was being pushed back.
First Floor
Grandma's Kitchen had a comfortable feeling. The only strange thing that happened there was that Jennifer felt like something touched her ponytail. She didn't appear to be standing close enough to the items behind her to have bumped them.
The WWII room was interesting. I was there with Becky, Jennifer, and Angela. I placed a motion-activated ball on the cot. We were talking about our grandfathers and their time in the military. I started to feel pressure in the middle of my chest, which I commented on, and a couple of seconds after, the motion-activated ball lit up. We could not get it to do this again, and this is the only time it lit up the whole evening. In my opinion, whatever is in the room is attached to something there.
Stairs
I set up my camcorder, pointing to the main stairs later in the evening. I didn't capture anything of interest visually. The audio picked up pops and clicks throughout the time it was running. I was even able to hear the back door being opened once. Twice there were loud bangs near the camera. It sounds like the sound is coming from right behind the video camera.
Basement
The Tack Room was the most interesting. I kept seeing a dark figure peak around the in from the doorway. I saw it on both sides of the door frame.
At one point, I saw what looked like a tall, dark shadow standing between the horse statue and Angela. Almost like it was standing over Angela. Angela said she felt like someone was standing over her, and she was visibly uncomfortable. She even put her hoody up and moved her body closer to Becky. She also said it felt like someone touched her shoulder blade area and was messing with her hair. I continued to see shadows peaking around the door.
As we left this room, we saw a nickel on the ground next to Angela's chair. No one remembers seeing it earlier.
I placed my camcorder on the main stairs right before we headed to the basement, so I don't have any video to review this area.
Next, we went to what they call Jim or John's room with a comfortable couch. It is mainly used for storage now. I heard a rustling sound to my right while sitting on the sofa. It was loud enough that it startled me. Angela heard it too. I checked and couldn't find an explanation for the sound. While I was standing up, scanning the area for the sound, I heard what sounded like someone sitting down on the sofa. Several times while in this area, I thought I heard someone talking. Hopefully, someone has audio of these sounds because my recorder was not recording.
We then went to the coal mine room. Who doesn't love a room that has been made to look like a coal mine, complete with an armless miner and bats? Besides our sweet singing, the main thing of interest that happened there was that Becky felt like something was messing with her hair, and she felt like cobwebs were brushing her face. She said it felt like someone was pushing her hair in front of her face. I felt like my hair was brushed a couple of times, but not as much as Becky, whom it was happening to so much that she seemed annoyed with it.
We ended our time at the Ray County Museum by going back to the tack room in the basement. I tried to set up my video recorder, but the battery was almost dead, and the IR light was utterly dead. We experimented with a strobe light. I still seemed to see some movement around the doorway but didn't feel the same as the first time we were there. After we finished there, we collected our equipment and left the building around 12:30 am.
Overall it was a great place with some interesting activity. I want to go back at some point and do another investigation.
I find it interesting that 4 of us felt like our hair was messed with there. For the most part, it felt like whatever was in the space was curious about us or enjoyed messing with us.
If I get the chance to go back, I would like to set up a video camera in the tool room on a tripod while down there. And I would want to spend more time in Jim/John's area and the WWII room. The rooms are small for the most part, so breaking up into groups of two or three and going to different floors would work well.
Notes from Angela:
We started on the 3rd floor in what is the Native American artifact room. At first, I felt drawn to the room, but at the same time, it could have been the civil war room. We stayed in each room for a bit doing an EVP session and taking photos.
We went back to the area twice and I never really felt or noticed anything that alerted me that made me feel like the rooms had anything in them.
We moved onward and took a look at a few other rooms on one side. Then we went to the other side and checked out the Mormon room, post office room, doctor room, and parlor room.
As we were ready to move, we left the hallway. I was the last to leave the hallway, and I immediately felt like someone was pushing me out of the way. The others walked back down there to see if they felt anything, and I don't believe they did.
We decided to move to the 1st floor and check out each room. We went into the first military room, and after a few minutes, one of the motion-activated balls lit up while we were talking about our grandfathers being in the military. We laughed and joked about things when I felt maybe something was also in the room with us. We couldn't fully tell.
We moved on to the basement and went to the tool room or tack room. Once we were settled down, we acknowledged that we could hear the clicking of the pipes, but within 5 minutes, I started to feel anxious and like something was in the room with us. My back was to the door a bit. I felt as if something was in the room with us. At that time, I felt something brush up against my hand holding my recorder. Within about 2-3 minutes later, I felt a little bit of pressure on the back of my armpit area. At that moment, other people saw a dark shadow behind me.
I already felt anxious, and I felt like I needed to curl up and away from the side area. The temperature in the room felt like it had dropped. I had my recorder going. I'm hoping I caught something.
I exchanged seats with Jennifer so that she could maybe experience what I felt in the same seat. Once we changed seats, my experience went away. The room temperature changed slightly, but not like it was before. After a while, we decided to stop and check the door area since a few people saw shadows, and we needed to check a few things.
My experience there was pretty good. I haven't been to a place that gave me all the thrills and excitement and feeling slightly scared.
I recommend checking out the museum and helping them out by donating when you visit.
LOCATION HISTORY
The Ray County Museum building was built as a county home (poor farm) in 1910 at the cost of $19,491, which included wiring, plumbing, & heating. Built in the shape of a "Y" with 14,424 square feet of floor space, the building has three floors with 54 rooms, eight masonry walls that are 14″ thick up to the roof, and fire doors at the wing entrances. The side porches are approximately 200 square feet each. The building rectangle would cover 1/3 of an acre. It was used as a Poor Farm until the 1960s and was used as a nursing home until the early 1970s. In the 1970s, the building became the Ray County Museum.
from https://raycountymuseum.org/
Previous Investigations at this Location:
EVPS
PHOTOS
photo by Jennifer
The team, minus Angela, for this investigation.