Huneycutt & Co. Furniture and Undertaking 


The downtown Albemarle area is a city that dates back to the mid 1800's. During the turn of the century Albemarle boomed nearly doubling in size within a few years. If the buildings could talk they would tell you over 110 years of history!! The building that is now occupied by the Stanly County Arts Guild (One building toward the square from Starnes Jewelers) was built in 1907. The first company that occupied the building was Huneycutt & Co. Furniture and Undertaking.  Back at the turn of the century a lot of furniture stores were also undertakers. The reasoning for this is because the furniture shop's had all the materials needed to build caskets. Between the fall of 1917 and spring of 1918 the Spanish Flu swept the nation and like many other communities Albemarle was severely affected.This caused bodies to back up in the building. In early 1918 there was a door way cut between the adjoining Opera House so bodies could be stored in the cool theater. According to insurance records the opera house was used by Huneycutt's until late 1929. After Huneycutt closed the building was then occupied by Belks which moved from there location where the current courthouse is today. The building has also been occupied by Purcell Drugs, Davis-Little Drugs, Davis Drug and it's current tenant The Stanly County Arts Guild. The building has a unique layout with stair step levels. Counting the basement the building has five levels. To look at it from the exterior you would think it only had three above ground levels. After the flu epidemic tenants have said to hear unexplainable sounds and see apparitions that are spine tingling. The most recent unexplainable event happened in late January 2010. A customer came into the Arts guild building with her older son to purchase a piece of art work. While the mother was paying for it her son told her that  a man walked across a set of windows that look into the second level. After an employee told them that no one was up there the boy left and said he would not return. He was sure of what he had seen!! We will be reviewing evidence and keeping you up to date on what we find! If you have every had an experience in the building please email us your story!!      



Claims

          Hearing someone walking in upper levels when there is no one up there

          Seeing people in upper and lower levels when no one is in the other levels

          Hearing conversations in all levels when no one else is around

          Feeling like you are being watched or followed by something or someone unseen

Investigation

The team arrived around seven o’clock to set up equipment. We sat one infrared camera on the second floor beside the door at the top of the stairs covering the entire room back to the corner across the room where the old staircase to the upper level had been removed. The next camera was set up on the third level at the staircase going into the forth level. This camera pointed back to the corner on the opposite side of the room. The next camera was set on the fourth floor on a shelf pointed toward the hole cut into the Opera House. The last camera was placed on the fourth floor in the middle room at the stair case that has been taken out. The camera was pointed to cover the middle section back to the wall adjoining the Opera House. There were digital recorder’s set with ever camera. We also carried a digital recorder with every group that went up in the area to investigate. We split into three teams. While one team went up the other teams took turns watching the DVR and investigating the main street level. We rotated throughout the evening. Each team had a digital recorder, infrared thermometer, handheld infrared camera, digital cameras and also different types of EMF meters (electromagnetic detectors). Each team done a sweep of each floor recording the temperatures, the electromagnetic field and looking for anything that could debunk any of the claims. For example we looked for any duct work that could carry noises or voices from the lower to the upper floors. After the end of the investigation we packed up and left the building in the same condition we found it.

Review

We had four infrared cameras with five hours of video on each camera. We also had five digital recorders with over five hours of audio. The team took turns rotating the IR footage and the audio around the group. Every camera and audio device was listened to and watched at least twice. The reason for listening and watching it twice is because if one misses something it will be caught by someone else. Some of the evidence was reviewed multiple times to make sure nothing was missed. We reviewed every digital photo several times also. When taking a still shot with a digital camera we always take two back to back shots. That way if something appears in one photo and then appears again then it is probably something in the area. If it shows in one and not the other then it may be worth looking further into. If any kind of evidence is thought to be found we have multiple investigators to review it. If there is any way that it can be explained or if it is contaminated by anything normal, it is tossed out. For example if we hear what we think is a voice on an audio recording that we can’t match with any investigator or anyone else but we can hear people in the lower level talking to one another then we can’t use it. It would be hard to say that it was paranormal because voices change as they carry from one level to another and it could be a conversation going on in a lower level. This is just a brief summary of what we do during the review process.

Our Findings

During the investigation there were several personal experiences. A personal experience is when an investigator has something happen to them and no one else. Also there is no video or audio to back up the experience. During the investigation several investigators felt something strange in the fourth level. They sensed that something or someone unseen was following them around that level. Every time Chellie approached the stairs to the top floor her digital camera would quit working. It would not work at all in the top floor but when she came to the third floor and walked away from the stair case it worked again. This happened every time she would go to that floor. Also when Kenny went up the first time the hand held camera he was using had a fully charged battery. When he reached the bottom of the staircase that went to the fourth floor the battery light went to nothing and his camera cut off. Something had drained the battery to nothing. About two hours later Todd came up with his hand held video camera. Todd came in late and did not know anything about Kenny’s camera dying or where it had happened. Kenny was with them when they entered the upper level. When Todd came up to the bottom of the stair case to the top floor his camera battery also went to nothing and the camera cut off. Todd’s camera was also fully charged. Both of their cameras had only been on no more than ten minutes when this occurred. The battery life on these cameras usually last around 120 minutes. This is something that we can’t explain. After recharging the batteries we have used them since with no problems.

      During the investigation we used EMF detectors (electromagnetic detectors). High amounts of electromagnetic fields sometimes can cause skin rash, hallucinations, mood swings and other health problems. In all of the levels the base readings all were in normal range. Spirits are said to give off an electromagnetic field. Along the back wall of the second level (which would be the back of the building) there are power lines that run along the windows of this level. We did detect them inside and they did not exceed the extreme limit. It radiated out about 10 to 15 feet from the back wall of this level. One team did have a spike that seemed to be around the center of the room. We could not find a source of this EMF spike. On the second level Michael had a high EMF that seemed to move around. He would get the reading and it would go away. When he would move the meter from side to side he would find it again and move to that location. Then it would dissipate. He followed it around for a few minutes and then it seemed to have disappeared. Michael seems to think that maybe something was present but was a little startled by all of the equipment. In the upper level we also had some interesting readings. Nichelle went to the upper level with an EMF detector. She sat to the side and left the meter in the middle of the floor. The meter she was using would light up when the emf field would go up around the meter. She would ask questions and get a reaction by the meter lighting up. Also when we took a group of ladies from the gallery up at one point. They also had some strange readings on the emf meter that they had. Whatever was in that level seems to like females more than males. We had more activity when the females tried to interact with them.

        During the review we had a lot of audio to go through. We had a little more people talking in the lower level than we would have liked. This contaminated a lot of the audio in the second and third level. There was enough floor space that it had little impact on the third floor. The problem we had on the third floor was the vents to the exterior of the building. This allowed the passing vehicles, which echoed severely between the close buildings, to come straight into the upper level. We were looking for EVP’s. EVP is short for electronic voice phenomena. EVP is a voice that is not heard by anyone but is caught by the digital recorder. It is in a frequency that cannot be heard by the human ear. We can hear frequencies between 10 and 20 hertz. Usually an evp is lower than 10 hertz. If you hear an unexplainable voice then it is considered a disembodied voice because it is audibly heard. We did hear quite a few EVP’S. There were several caught on the second and third level. We cannot use them because it was contaminated by the conversations downstairs. Our saying is “When in doubt, throw it out!” We have included some of them in our CD for you to listen to. We just cannot use them on our website. We do not publish anything or tell anyone that it is paranormal activity unless beyond a shadow of a doubt it cannot be debunked. We did catch a class A EVP in the fourth level. We could not hear any voices from downstairs and it doesn’t sound like anyone in the room. It also answers a question that Michael is asking so it is a direct response. EVP’s are classified in classes A, B and C. A is very clear and can be heard without amplifying it. Class B needs some amplifying and noise reduction. Class C is very hard to hear and most of the time after noise reduction and amplifying you can hear something being said but you can’t make out what it is saying. The EVP caught on the fourth level seems to be saying “Its Sinda” or possibly “Lucinda”. We have not come across this name in any of our research. We have talked with everyone in the group that was in the area at the time and no one heard this. This may be a lost soul from the flu pandemic. It could possibly even be a customer or worker of a past company that occupied the location. We would like to do some more research on this to see what we can uncover.

 

Click on the speaker below and open to listen.  Let us know if you have problems accsessing the file. Also let us know what you think it is saying! Thanks For listening!!!!!!!!!!!

DTA001EVP1.mp3 DTA001EVP1.mp3
Size : 0.273 Kb
Type : mp3

Then and Now 






 

( SPECIAL NOTE )

To the best of our knowledge, there has not been any person harmed by any paranormal activity at this location.

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