HORSHAM, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — Some ghosts can be scary (see: Poltergeist). Some ghosts can be friendly (see: Casper). Other ghosts, apparently, can even play a role in preserving pieces of history — at least at Montgomery County’s Graeme Park.
Back in 2008, when the country was in the middle of a recession, the park was in danger of losing its funding due to state budget cuts.
“We needed money,” said Beth MacCausland, president of the Friends of Graeme Park group. “A [reporter] called me and asked me what I thought of the park closing, and I had no idea what they were talking about.”
Not long after that, MacCausland had another memorable conversation — this time, with an investigator.
Not just any investigator, but a ghost hunter who, with MacCausland’s blessing, had been searching for paranormal activity at Graeme Park for a while. He had an idea: use the park’s spooky reputation to raise money.
“We jumped on it,” said MacCausland.
Sure enough, the plan worked. Money started rolling in when Graeme Park tapped into its spooky spirit with haunted lantern tours and mini paranormal investigations — which are available this month.
“It was like a windfall for us,” she said. “It really did help.”
All these years later, the Halloween-themed activities at Graeme Park have generated about $37,000.
“We don’t get paid to do what we do here,” said John Levy, one of the investigators who works with MacCausland and Graeme Park. “One hundred percent of the proceeds always go back to the park, but I can sit here with a smile on my face knowing that yeah, I did help save a piece of American history.”
‘A haunted place’
In the daytime, there is nothing frightening about Montgomery County’s Graeme Park. Tucked away on a peaceful plot of land off of bustling County Line Road, the park boasts idyllic features across 42 acres — a pond, a tiny waterfall, a barn, some sculptures.
So how did the only national historic landmark in Horsham get such a spooky reputation?
According to MacCausland, the legend dates back to 1801, following the death of Elizabeth Graeme. She inherited the Graeme Park property from her father, Thomas Graeme, who was a founding member of Pennsylvania Hospital.
“She had a tragic life,” said MacCausland. A few days after Elizabeth Graeme passed away, her best friend, Liza Steadman, visited the Keith House, the colonial mansion in Graeme Park where the Graeme family lived.
In her diary, Steadman wrote that while she was standing on a set of stairs in the Keith House, which connected the second and third floors, she felt a cold rush of air pass over her body. Steadman didn’t know what it was, but she felt it was more than just a breeze.
“That was the first [evidence] we know of that a tale was told or written down” about the Keith House and Graeme Park being haunted, MacCausland said. “It definitely has been labeled a haunted place.”
And wouldn’t you know, as Levy was walking through that very same part of the Keith House during a recent visit to Graeme Park, his hand-held modified K-II meter — the instrument paranormal investigators use for electromagnetic field and temperature readings — started going off.
“What could that be? [Maybe] a phone?” Levy asked.
He scanned the area another time. “Sometimes,” he said, “you get false positives.”
But Levy was pretty sure this reading was no false positive. When he positioned the K-II meter near cellphones and electronics close by, it didn’t beep. Only in an unobstructed area of the stairwell — where there were no other bodies or devices — did the K-II meter make a sound.
To Levy, this was a noteworthy development. So too was the one-degree drop in temperature he noticed on the K-II meter when he walked from the second floor up to the third.
Typically, hot air rises. Not in this case.
“Remember,” said MacCausland, who was walking through the house with Levy, “Liza Steadman, Elizabeth Graeme’s friend, was on the steps when she felt the cold whoosh of air go by.”
Together, the readings from Levy’s K-II meter and the entry about the cold whoosh of air in Steadman’s diary could be combined to constitute evidence, depending on a paranormal investigator’s interpretation.
“When spirits communicate, sometimes you can hear them with your ears, but a majority of the time, you really can’t,” Levy said. “This is why we do it. We do it to investigate the paranormal.”
Paranormal devotee
Levy has been working as a Philadelphia police officer for nearly 25 years. He only ended up falling down this paranormal rabbit hole, innocently enough, when nature called.
About 15 years ago, on an evening patrol in his old neighborhood, Levy needed to use the bathroom. He decided to make a pitstop at his childhood home around the corner.
Levy’s mother grew up in the house, too, and still lived there. But on this night, she was out of town and no one was in the house. Or so Levy thought.
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Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his grandfather walking across a room — the very same room where his grandfather slept.
“It was him to a tee,” said Levy, which would have been perfectly explainable if his grandfather had been alive.
“It didn’t startle me,” he said. “I wasn’t afraid. But it was my grandfather.”
Levy called his mom, who was vacationing down the shore, and told her what happened. She replied with a chuckle, “What are you talking about?”
He didn’t find it so funny.
“Then she goes, ‘I’ve felt your grandfather’s presence in the house, too,’ ” Levy recalled.
After that, Levy’s passion for the paranormal took off. He jumped into the field in 2008, then, along with a friend, formed Olde City Paranormal in 2009.
The group, which includes other Philly cops, including John’s wife, Amanda, has been investigating ghosts, spirits, haunts and other unexplainable phenomena ever since.
“I’m an investigator by trade,” said the 49-year-old Levy, a Northeast Catholic High School alum who graduated from the police academy in 1998, “so I feel this may have been a calling for me, being a paranormal investigator.
“I wouldn’t give this back for the world.”
Graeme Park is offering lantern tours and mini paranormal investigations this month to help raise money for operational costs.