It was 1983 and I was a starving student attending the
University of Oregon in Eugene. I was a single Mom
and money was very tight. I had been living far from
campus in a little town called Springfield because the
rent was so much cheaper there. I couldn't afford a car,
and the bus ride was about an hour each way to and
from school. I always looked in the paper and on the
bulletin boards at the college to see if I could find
something cheap closer to campus, but never found
anything.
One day my sister Cathy and I took the bus from
campus to West Eugene to go to an inexpensive
restaurant she had heard of. On the way there, less
than a mile from campus, we saw a sign that read:
"House for rent, 3 bdrm, $150.00 per month." This was
hundreds less that any one bedroom apartment I'd
seen in the area. We took down the number and called
as soon as we reached the restaurant. The landlord,
Mr. Richey, said he'd meet us at the house in an hour.
The house was on West 11th street. West 11th street
has huge old homes. The kind with 3000 square feet
and five bedrooms, most of them are a little run down.
The house for rent was actually a guest house behind
one of these large homes. It was a great little house
with a small yard, 2 bedrooms upstairs and 1
downstairs, a sunny kitchen and large living room with
beautiful hardwood floors. All for $150.00! We didn't
ask why it was so cheap, we thought maybe Mr. Richey
was out of touch with the going rates. My sister decided
she would share the house with me as it was so large,
and our rent would be $75 each!
We rented the house on the spot., signed a 6 month
lease and moved in 2 weeks later.
It took us about 24 hours to find out why the rent was so
low.
At first it was little stuff. In house you could hear a small
child crying out in the yard, but if you went outside you
couldn't hear it any longer. As soon as you stepped
back inside, you could hear it again. There was also
the sound of someone walking up the stairs when
there was no one on the stairs. Other little things
happened that scared us, but we could explain it away.
After about a month, things stepped up a bit. My sister
and I woke up 3 mornings in a row and our furniture
had been rearranged. Couches, chairs, nicknacks and a
three hundred pound entertainment center complete
with T.V. and stereo moved to entirely different walls,
without a sound. My daughter was about 6 months old
and had the downstairs bedroom, so I slept with my
bedroom door open. I would have heard the slightest
noise. One day I was going from my daughters room,
where I'd just put her down for a nap, to my room
upstairs. As I walked through the livingroom, I felt
someone behind me. I turned around and there was
no one there, but there were wet bare foot prints. They
looked like the foot prints of a five year old.
A few days later, my sister and I were watching T.V. and
the room suddenly got freezing cold, so cold there was
ice on the inside of the windows. It was May and about
70 degrees outside. Later that week, my sister was
washing her hair in the bathroom sink and felt someone
push her. When she turned around and there was no
one there. As she looked around the room, bewildered,
the door slammed shut and it got icy cold. The door
would not open and she felt a very evil presence.
Luckily, the bathroom had a window. she broke it and
cut herself quite badly crawling out.
When I got home from class, she was waiting for me
one the front steps. She had already called Mr Richey
(from the neighbors house) and given our notice. We
went in to pack our things and the air was absolutely
thick. We could feel hatred and anger, and
hopelessness. It took us about 2 hours to pack up.
Nothing happened except those dark feelings.
We didn't know what to say to Mr. Richey when we went
to turn in out keys. We had signed a 6 month lease and
were breaking the lease and moving without notice.
What if he insisted we pay for the remaining 4 and a
half months.
Mr. Richey took the key's without a word and when my
sister asked about the lease, He said "Don't worry
about it". I said to him, "You knew. You knew it was
haunted and you rented it to us anyway." I also said a
lot of things that they won't print on this web-site. I was
very angry. I felt that he had put our lives in danger for a
measly hundred and fifty bucks.
He admitted that he did know that the house was
haunted. He had purchased it about a year earlier and
it had been vacant for years. He fixed it up and was
renting it for $600.00 a month, everyone wanted to rent
it, but no one stayed longer than 6 weeks. He told us
he thought we would be safe because we were girls
and he'd only rented to boys before. I never understood
that logic. He also told us that right before we moved
in, the boys he'd been renting to came home and found
everything they owned in the front yard and their key's
would not work in the locks. Thinking they'd been
evicted unfairly, they called Mr. Richey. He came over,
told them it wasn't he that had thrown their stuff out and
helped them move it back in. As they were moving it
back in, a chair they had just brought in came off the
floor and crashed through a window back outside. The
boys decided to stay evicted.
I graduated college 3 years later and moved to
Portland. I visit my Aunt in Eugene less than I should,
but when I do go I always drive down West 11th. You
have to pull into the driveway of the big house to see the
guest house. It's been boarded up for at least 15 years.
I guess even $150.00 is too much for that place.
Thanks for reading.
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