Boulder County Paranormal Investigation Report
Location: Longmont
Theatre, 513 Main St., Longmont, CO
Kickoff Time: 19:00
Background:
The Longmont Theatre Company has occupied the building
since the 1980’s. Before that, it was a movie theater, probably the first
one in Longmont, but the theatre people don’t know much about its history. Set
construction happens on-site, and the company dug a pit for the orchestra and struck water.
The pit is now covered up by the stage. Our two contacts, Jennifer and
Micah, related the following stories:
Jennifer’s ex-boyfriend had a friend who was exiting
the stage during rehearsal. All of a sudden, she stopped short, and the ex-boyfriend,
who was behind her, asked why. She replied that a woman in what looked like a
long white dress or nightgown was in front of her, although there was no one matching that description in the rehearsal that
night. When she looked again a second later, the woman was gone.
Jennifer and Micah heard a series of notes coming from
an electronic keyboard which was both turned off and unplugged. Jennifer said,
“If you’re a real ghost, you’d play some Mozart,” and the keyboard promptly sounded several more notes. Jennifer and Micah were scared and fled.
A woman working near the back of the stage reported a feeling
like a bite or a sting on her ankle, and there was no animal visible. The theatre
does not have an active rodent problem, as far as the staff is aware.
Members of the company have observed props lifting into
the air and moving as if being carried by an invisible person. Micah and Jennifer
have had numerous company members tell them that they had “an experience,” but few of these people have elaborated.
That evening before we arrived, Jennifer and Micah were
eating dinner across the street and noticed that the marquee sign, which was half off, flipped itself on. No one was in the building at the time.
Micah often has a “good vibe” about the place,
as if it is loved or cared for.
Initial Observations:
The team, led by Dave, assembled in the lobby at 19:00
to learn about the background from Jennifer and Micah. These two ladies took
us on a tour of the theatre space, and we took some initial baseline readings with Dave’s EMF meter. We all observed widely varying temperatures depending on our location within the building, and EMF readings
all over the place. The dimmer room in particular had extremely high EMF, concentrated
around the dimmer system and extending halfway across the room. The system was
putting out a lot of power. Although EMF levels were high, they were consistent
with the electrical systems in the building – the dimmer, audio, and lighting components of the theatre.
Seth and I both noticed a feeling of unease in the dimmer
room right away upon entering. For me, it was a slight but noticeable pressure
at the temples, front of the skull, and chest. Several other members of the team
reported similar feelings.
We observed a broken pane of glass in the properties room,
which could have caused drafts and allowed street noise in. Seth and I also observed
later in the night that street noise could be heard very clearly through the loading door backstage. A woman in heels walked past as we were passing the door, and we heard her footsteps almost as if we were
outside on the sidewalk.
First Round –
20:45 – 21:20
Dave set up a video camera first in the sound booth (the
former projection room), but then repositioned it on the stage after discovering that the light was too poor in the sound
booth. I placed a digital voice recorder on one of the chairs on the stage, and
set up several props on stage, marked with pieces of paper.
Dave split the team into groups and Seth and I went to
the dimmer room. The feeling of unease persisted throughout for both of us, and
I took the natural tri-field meter and two K2 meters. Seth took some more baseline
readings with a regular tri-field meter, which ranged from .5-1 and went as high as 10 near the dimmer system. I observed no spikes on the natural tri-field. Seth said he
did not have the same feeling with the dimmers when he was a theatre major in college, but those dimmers were in a separate
concrete room, and he did not spend much time there.
We then sat on the floor with the two K2s and tried to
get a response, but if there was anything there, it wasn’t talking to us. We
tried the usual questions, starting with an open, inviting approach, and then becoming more challenging, suggesting that whatever
was there was a coward, and that if it wanted us to leave, it should make the K2s light up.
No response.
Seth and I explored the access to the catwalks, which was
a small room with a “floor” consisting of overlaid wooden planks. This
room, like several others in the theatre, had a low, unfinished ceiling that would make a claustrophobic very uncomfortable. We were not bothered, however.
Sound carries far in that theatre, and the voice recorder
onstage probably picked up the sound of us moving overhead between 20:12 and 21:20, and then the noise of the teams reassembling
in the lobby at 21:20.
Second Round –
21:45 – 22:30
None of the rest of the team had really observed anything
remarkable during the first round, so we had a bathroom and food break and then shifted around. This time, Micah went with Seth and I to the office containing the keyboard and the prop room. We took baseline readings with the K2s and the natural tri-field, and found spikes where we expected to
find them, near computers. I observed no significant events on the tri-field
meter.
We sat at the conference table next to the keyboard with
the K2s and a voice recorder on the table and invited anything present to make itself known.
As before, we started with an open, friendly approach and later tried teasing and challenging. We hoped to provoke a response by telling the presence that this was its chance to be famous, to actually
interact with people, to have its own 15 minutes of fame. We also tried suggesting
that a ghost would draw publicity to a small community theatre, and perhaps it had an obligation to help out the theatre in
which it lived. No response.
During the EVP session, Seth thought he felt a presence
over his shoulder and turned around, though there was nothing there. When I concluded
the EVP session, Micah said that when Seth turned around, she had gotten the impression of a male presence standing behind
him. I felt nothing.
Seth felt drawn to a particular area of the prop room,
where he sat in one of the audience chairs with the K2 on his knee. He tried
talking to the presence for a while, asking if it had been standing near him, but we didn’t get anything on the K2.
Third Round –
23:00 – 23:45
After the second session, the rest of the team reported
very little, so we split off for one more session. Micah, Seth, and I went to
the lower wardrobe room, a long room with a lot of mirrors. Once again, EMF was
consistent with the electrical layout and the natural tri-field didn’t pick up anything unusual. We sat on the floor with the K2s and voice recorder for another voice session, trying the same tactics
as before, and got no response.
Micah thought at one point that she saw a grayish shadow
in one of the mirrors, followed by a dark streak, but she wasn’t sure if it was caused by her shifting her viewpoint
from the lights on the K2s to the dark mirror.
The team convened on the stage to wrap up, and saw that
none of the control objects had been moved. Time will tell if we got any video
or audio footage worth mentioning. The rest of the team hadn’t really observed
anything out of the ordinary. If there was something there, it did not make itself
known to us that night. I personally think that the feelings of unease in the
dimmer room were caused by the high EMF emitted by the dimmer system, and not anything paranormal. I felt comfortable sleeping anywhere we explored. Miranda
reported that she actually did fall asleep at one point!
Report submitted by Investigator Kira Woodmansee