The Farm Down the Road

The Farm Down the Road

Before my Grandmother Ruth died in '75, I remember her mentioning stories of her childhood on the farm. It was small, only fifteen acres. Her father maintained and worked the land, land which was fertile and produced various crops. All the area farms had bountiful harvests with one glaring exception, the farm down the road.

In 1923 or thereabouts, she remembered a tragic event not talked about in decades. She told me only after I ran across some old photos from her childhood. She stood with her hands behind her back in one picture, smiling at the camera as a young ten-year-old girl. Next to her stood a cute girl about the same age with a pretty smile and long brown hair tied in pigtails. The more she spoke about the tragedy; the memories seemed to come back quickly. She stammered as the memory was something she would rather forget.

Typically, Pennsylvania farmhouses in the '20s had no electricity. My Grandmother and most of her neighbor's farms had no indoor plumbing or phones; those were considered luxuries. If you needed a phone, there was one at the general store about two miles away. Grandma's farmhouse stood right on the road, a brick house with a porch on the first and second floor. Behind the house were the sheds, cold cellar, and a barn for the cows and sheep. I still remember it as a child. There were a lot of happy memories, Thanksgivings, Christmases in that house.

My Grandmother grew up in Paradise Valley, a close-knit village comprised primarily of farmers. Everyone knew the area inside out. They also knew each other's business. Gossip was a common way to spend time at the general store. The locals knew the backgrounds of every family in the valley. Though locals all recount the farm's story-but nobody talks about it. Nobody in Paradise Valley ever understood what happened on the farm at the bottom of the hollow.

The locals knew the house and barn were both built in the early 1800s. The place sat on a hill above Paradise Valley Road with a narrow lane leading to the front porch. The white barn sat next to the road, with a large hex sign painted on the side for good luck. Along the lane was the entrance to the barn, animal pen, and a vegetable garden.

Most speculated who owned the farm? It sat empty for so long, not even the old-timers were sure. However, everyone knew the house and land were valuable. Should the property come up for auction, farmers with lots of money were sure to bid on it. However, at that time, it hadn't gone up for sale in decades.

My Grandmother told the story surrounding a new family who moved in. They came from Eastern Europe, and the parents barely spoke English. The new neighbors were farmers in the old country and remained successful in growing crops here.

Grandma laughs about it now, but everyone in the valley thought the new neighbors were witches or demons back then. They had to be! They were Catholic and spoke some strange language. At the very least, many in the valley thought the new residents weren't considered "real Americans." Most were suspicious of this new family since they were different from the German-speaking Protestants born and raised in Paradise Valley over the past several hundred years.

So, there was quite a buzz around the new family at the old, abandoned farm. Grandma said she was excited to meet them, ones who weren't scared of the creepy house. Everyone knew that's what it was called, the "creepy house." So what if the place looked abandoned and creepy? It didn't matter to her new neighbors since it was all they could afford. Working the land meant a chance for better opportunities here than they had in Hungary. Creepy houses weren't going to stand in their way of making a new life for themselves.

Suffice it to say, Ruth became friends with them and learned their last name was Szabo ("Taylor" in Hungarian). Despite warnings from the neighbors in the valley, she became close with Irene, the Szabo's oldest child. Irene picked up English quickly and was used to translating for her parents.

On the mile-and-a-half walk up the road to the main schoolhouse, Grandma and Irene talked a lot, exchanging gossip about kids in school and life in the valley. Most of their talk centered around who was the most handsome boy in school. Grandma never got into any deep conversations with Irene (after all, the neighbors had her convinced Irene was probably a witch). However, the stories told during those school trips were all about to change after Halloween.

On a cold, sunny November morning, Irene walked up from their farm on Paradise Valley Road, but Grandma Ruth could tell her new friend was not herself. Ruth could sense something wasn't right and asked if the kids teased her about something since the Szabos weren't a wealthy family. The other kids teased Irene about what she wore or how her brother's pants didn't fit right. Irene assured her schoolmate that wasn't the case. Finally, Irene had to tell someone. However, before saying anything, Irene begged her not to tell anyone what she'd seen. Both my Grandma and Irene knew they would be the laughing stock of the entire third grade if they talked about anything like ghosts. Grandma could sense the urgency and panic in her voice. Irene never spoke like this. The story slowly opened up; the problem was with the house. Something extraordinary was happening there frequently.

At first, Irene thought she was the only one experiencing the events since her parents and brothers never seemed to be near when these things happened. As a result, she was scared to say anything since her mother would punish her for scaring her brothers and "making up stories."

However, odd occurrences started happening more frequently to each family member. Before long, they all talked about what was going on. They had to face reality; something was not right with this place, something they could no longer ignore.

The house was three stories and looked like any other typical nineteenth-century farmhouse. Most all the homes in Paradise Valley looked pretty much the same; most all built around the same time. However, there was something not quite right about how this house stood on the hill with its weathered black shutters plastered to whitewashed pealing clapboards. Ancient gables stuck out of the roofline trimmed in gingerbread fretwork that was cracked and rotting. The front door didn't face the road, almost as though it was built that way for a reason. Nothing about the place looked welcoming.

Not only did the house look abandoned (even after Irene's family moved in), it looked as though it carried a grudge. The house itself looked evil as if it possessed negative, foreboding energy. Everyone in the valley felt that about the place, but nobody admitted it. After all, ghosts didn't exist.

Irene's family were hard workers. Operating a farm meant chores day and night. Mornings meant getting up before dawn to take care of the animals, ironing school clothes, and rushing to breakfast. In the winter, the kitchen's wood stove needed tending by one of the parents. Someone had to keep feeding the fire, ensuring the house stayed warm. The house was so old and drafty. It seemed a million woodstoves could never keep it warm.

In general, farm life left little time for play. Every family member took part in making sure things ran smoothly. Some chores were significant events and usually involved the whole family at once. For example, after the harvest, canning was a big job. Ball jars had to be boiled and sanitized. After canning was finished, each jar contained fruits and vegetables that would get the family through most of the winter. The whole family also helped Irene's father, Gabriel, to make wine, especially dandelion wine.

In the '20s, alcohol was illegal. However, Irene's dad was known throughout Berks County for his wine and made a decent amount of money selling it during prohibition. So long as there were enough bottles for the local Sherriff and his cronies, no one said a word about Gabriel being a bootlegger.

Farm life is physical, exhausting, challenging work. So, Irene was happy to spend any time away from the farm. She was delighted to go to school instead of staying at home with lots of chores.

Then Grandma remembered another detail. She recalled Irene was happy because her Aunt Elizabeth was coming for a visit.

Elizabeth came down from Maine but soon after she arrived, the house didn't seem to like her. Irene knew how crazy that sounded, but it was true. Elizabeth asked her niece if she noticed any strange events around the farm or the house itself.

Irene said yes, but never told her parents and brothers. She told Elizabeth how she noticed doors would open by themselves. Personal items would go missing and then appear in a completely different place--all these occurrences happened without any logical explanation. Each family member tried to pass off the weird happenings with some excuse or another; each too scared to admit what they just witnessed. Doors would slam, items disappear, and strange sounds in the walls happened all the time. Irene was almost getting used to it.

At first, my Grandmother thought Irene was making it all up. She believed her friend had a great imagination, but her stories couldn't be real. After all, kids liked telling ghost stories; she was just better at it than most.

However, as the weeks and months passed, Irene's tales became even more vivid, elaborate, and bizarre. Grandma Ruth was getting drawn into the daily drama and became worried about Irene. Things seemed to get even stranger when Irene's aunt pulled her aside to confess something. According to Grandma Ruth, nothing up to that point could compare with Irene's latest tale.

It turns out Elizabeth confided something that happened over the past summer. She came down from Maine to help look after the children since Irene's mom expected to give birth any day.

Elizabeth said she was in the spare room on the third floor. It was late, around three-thirty in the morning. The air was so thick and humid that she tossed and turned, typical august weather for Berks County. She sat up, praying the rosary, hoping that would help her get to sleep.

Suddenly in the distance, she heard the tops of the trees rustling. "Finally! She thought, "It sounds like a storm is coming. Some rain should cool off the valley." She was looking forward to a break in the heat.

The winds continued as the sounds of the rustling leaves became louder, closer to the house. The wind was gusting as though a storm was just about to pour rain by the bucketful. She expected cool air to blow in, and finally allow her to get some rest. Winds blew the branches wildly as they raced over the ridge and onto their farm fields, almost as though it had its own point of focus - rushing to the house itself. The wind gusts turned into a roar! She couldn't believe what was happening next. She heard the air getting sucked up into the house's inner walls but not into the room! The winds were blowing from the lane then into the lower clapboards at the foundation.

Loud gusts of air were pumping into the walls like a balloon. Elizabeth heard parts of the brown coat crumbling off the latticework behind the plaster walls. The air pressure in the room was becoming increasingly intense. The house's wood frame and its joists were creaking and groaning as though the entire house was going to explode. She was terrified! She prayed to Mary, the Mother of God, to spare them all. She was never so scared in her life. What was this? What was happening? She prayed hard, screaming above the sounds. She noticed dust falling from the ceiling. No, not dust, it was plaster! This is it! She got on her knees and prayed for God to spare the family and take this evil from them.

Wooooshh! Air slowing escaped from the walls, back into the fields just as the plaster walls were about to bust open and crack apart.

Now there was only silence; no sign anything happened. By this time, she was kneeling and shaking as she thanked the Lord over and over again.

Elizabeth told Irene that the house was quiet and dark; nobody else woke up after all that noise and her screaming. The bedroom was pitch black. The oil lamp on the bedside table had blown out. Elizabeth could make out the faintest blue light in the distance as the dawn was breaking. She didn't say anything to anyone about what happened the night before. After all, no one said anything. Not one person mentioned it the next morning. Perhaps she was the only one who witnessed it? Could this have been simply a nightmare? Could something like that happen again?

Once in the old country, Irene asked her Grandmother if she believed in ghosts. She told her many people did believe in them. Most thought these were souls who lost their way after death but would someday reunite with God. She told Irene, if you see or hear of a ghost, pray for them. Pray that they make the journey back to heaven, back to God. Each night, Irene would pray for spirits as well.

As the weather turned colder in late November, my Grandmother, Ruth, decided to head to the Szabo's farm and walk with Irene to school. Before she got there, she saw Irene running towards her as fast as she could, tears streaming down her face. She called out to Irene, "What happened? Why are you running?" She watched as Irene sprinted down Paradise Valley Road; something terrifying just happened a few hours ago, something very traumatic.

Since Irene's aunt confirmed what she'd been seeing, she knew ghosts weren't just her imagination; they were real. Irene caught her breath and told the whole story:

After the harvest, the family would dry beans on newspapers laid out on the attic floor. The attic is where the spare bedroom was, but also an open space for storage.

Like every school day, Irene lit the lamp by her bed. Before she opened attic the door, she heard crunching. The footsteps were coming from upstairs. She looked up. Above, someone was walking on the newspapers, stepping on the beans. It couldn't be a raccoon or an animal. These were human footsteps. So, Irene thought one of her brothers was playing a prank. She'd ruin their fun by rushing up the stairs with her trusty oil lamp and screaming, "Ah HA!"

She slowly, quietly opened the creaky attic door and walked upstairs to surprise her brothers. She couldn't wait to scare them; they'd been pulling pranks on her for the past few days. She reached the top of the stairs and lifted her lamp. When she looked around, the crunching stopped; the attic was empty.

Terrified, she quickly rushed downstairs. She looked in their rooms; her brothers were asleep. When she got to the living room, in the far corner stood a man. The room was very dark, but she could see his silhouette from the kitchen stove's light in the next room. He was tall, around six feet, with a black cape and an old uniform of some kind. She saw his shiny black leather riding boots and could make out a triangular type of hat.

"Hello?" there was no response.

She wanted to run to the kitchen. She tried to speak, but nothing came out. She couldn't take her eyes off the soldier; she didn't dare. He stood there, silently watching her. To run by him would put her within arm's reach, so she stood at the base of the stairs. The alternative was to run upstairs, but her legs wouldn't move. She couldn't see his face because the brim of his hat was shading it. Her hands were shaking as she slowly turned the wick up. The lamp's glow shone brighter, illuminating his boots and the vest of his uniform.

She cried out, "Who are you? What are you doing here! You'd better leave! Mom! Who is this -," she cried out to her mother in the kitchen, but no sound came out of her mouth.

He moved as though he was about to start a military procession. He lurched forward with one mechanical step. His boot hit the planks of the bare living room floor with a loud, heavy thud. Irene turned the lamp as bright as it would go and lifted it to see who it was. She screamed!

There was no head, no face!! The soldier took another step towards her. THUD! He slowly got down on one knee and aimed his musket at her then vanished into thin air!

Irene said she ran hysterically, screaming into the kitchen. Her mother had no idea what just happened; she didn't hear a thing. Irene held onto her mother so tight it took a long time to calm down. She assured Irene it was just a bad dream and told her to lie down on the bench while she finished making breakfast. Her mom assured Irene everything was going to be OK; just rest.

Irene could tell by the look on her mother's face that she was just as worried and scared for both of them. For month's Irene said she was terrified of the house but especially the attic. It took her months to go back up there. One thing that never went away was the feeling of being watched by the soldier.

After that incident, life seemed to go back to normal; no strange sounds, no decapitated soldiers, no terrifying events. Months had passed without anything out of the ordinary. It was fall, harvest season again. Irene would help her mother canning the fall vegetables. Stephen helped his dad with a new shed as Joe managed the animals. Life was back to normal. It seemed whatever spirits were there had finally gone.

However, the following spring, Irene's mom sat on the porch at dusk. She listened to her mother, talking to her dad in the barn. She told Gabriel how she was on the porch, busy peeling apples for a pie. As she looked out over the field by the garden, something caught her eye. Out of nothing came the form of six couples. They went from misty translucent outlines to fully-formed bodies. The couples all dressed in antique, formal clothing from at least a hundred years ago. They looked so real! Each pair bowed to each other, then started to dance silently. She watched for ten minutes as the dancers whirled, then each slowly faded into the mist. They vanished! It appears whatever force they'd encountered was still very much with the land.

After overhearing her mother, Irene now felt compelled to tell her mom the whole story of what aunt Elizabeth witnessed the previous summer. Irene and her mother didn't know what to do. They could have a priest come by the house for a blessing. For the moment, they both said a prayer for these lost souls. They also prayed for God to protect them from whatever evil had found its way back to the farm.

A few days after, Irene and her family went missing.

My Grandmother said the last she saw of Irene was a few days after her father and brothers widened the lane. They had a hard time maneuvering the wagon onto Paradise Valley Road because the lane was too narrow. They spent the morning shoveling dirt and digging at the side of the hill bordering the lane. As they cut into the hillside a few yards away from the road, they soon uncovered a steamer trunk-rotting and damp. As they pulled at the trunk, the lid busted off, and the plank holding the lock crumbled. They pulled out the contents to examine what was inside and perhaps a clue why it was there.

Inside, they found a book written in old German text (or what they assumed must have been German). They didn't understand the words but at the end of each chapter were detailed drawings of how to murder and dismember people. The illustrations outlined each step in the process. Each picture gave the most graphic instructions on how a person could be dismembered, starting with the abduction through to death.

Gabriel said under his breath, "Jaj Istenem!" (My God!). There was also a bloody knife and bones but not human bones. These were more like the bones of some small animal. Irene said never before had she seen her father and brothers turn grey. They were speechless and terrified. Who made this? Even without knowing what the words meant, the drawings were gruesome, cruel, and demonic.

They were scared out of their wits. Irene said her father quickly buried the trunk again, saying "Jaj Istenem!" over and over.

That was the last time Grandma Ruth ever saw Irene and her family.

The teacher asked Ruth where Irene was, but neither my Grandma nor anyone else had seen her. After school, she went to the house, hoping to find Irene. Upon reaching the farm, her eyes grew wide. She clamped her hands to her mouth in disbelief. The place looked empty. The windows were all open; curtains flapped in the breeze. The animals and vegetables were all gone. It's as though they just vanished. Perhaps it was too much for them? Maybe they moved back to Europe? Why would Irene leave and not tell her? In all the years since, no one could explain where they were or what happened to them.

The next week, a little after one a.m., someone saw smoke and flames coming from the farm. People ran to see what was happening? They all heard about the Irene Szabo and her family vanishing. Now their place was burning down? All the neighbors from miles around came to see what was going on. Everyone stood there watching as the house became engulfed in flames. A few men tried running up the lane attempting to rescue those still in the house if there was anyone.

The men only got a few steps onto the property when, from inside the house came this amazingly blinding white light shooting out of every window, even the attic! The men ran back across the road with the other onlookers as they witnessed the bright white light seeming to grow brighter and brighter from the gables on the third floor. Then it hit! The ground under their feet started shaking; some people fell over, and some held onto the trees. From the house came what sounded a crowd of people all screaming in unison. These weren't just a few individual's voices. It sounded like groups of people as in a packed theater. The onlookers could hear hundreds of voices all screaming and shrieking, the sound rising in volume and pitch. She remembers people covering their ears, their jaws wide open, looking on in disbelief. The roof exploded! Pieces of glass, furniture, floor beams all rained down on them. Grandma remembers everyone screaming and running in all directions! The house collapsed in on itself, and all that was left was a pile of bricks and ashes. By that time, the local fire department arrived and quickly put out the remaining embers.

Years later, we still never found out what happened to Irene, her family, or the house. No one talked about it for a long time, not at church, the general store, not anywhere. It was a forbidden topic.

For a few years, the barn stood there. In the 1950s, a young couple bought the land. The new owners finally tore the barn down after planning to build a home near where the barn once stood. Contractors installed a newly paved driveway over the original lane. However, a week before work was supposed to begin on the house; the owners backed out. The realtor was a friend of the family; he couldn't figure out the reason. My Grandmother knew.

The land is now overgrown, but nothing grows where the house stood. It's just rocks and dirt. To this day, the property stands vacant. My Grandmother gets chills, just talking about it. She misses her friend Irene and hopes wherever they are; they're safe from whatever evil lurks on that land.