4. We Can Go on Together with Suspicious Minds

A mysterious shadow figure may be following Ethan and we learn more about a suspicious death... well, at least it's suspicious to us.    Plus, is there a link to Baltimore's favorite son, Edgar Allan Poe?

Check out videos and photos from our trips to haunted hotels and our Scary Stories!
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Transcript

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A fancy dinner… a chance meeting… and a murder.  

A pair of ghosts at the lord Baltimore hotel just want to be left alone… and after what they did in 1929… I can see why.  The low budget ghost squad is in the middle of a new mystery… and about to start a treasure hunt. 

Nat:  welcome to the low budget ghost squad – season two at the lord Baltimore hotel. I’m natalie 

Alison: my name is Alison

Ethan: and I’m ethan

Nat:  thanks for sticking with us for episode four.  we are in Baltimore this season and we’ve already stumbled upon a new mystery of cousrse.  That’s what we do.  We go to haunted hotels and these things just find us.  

Alison: so far, the ballroom is a little out of control.  We’ve had lights flickering, a framed photo that won’t stay on the wall, and that ghost app that we have keeps going off in there.  you know, the emf meter that transcribes what a ghost is saying to you.  yup.  We’re talking to ghosts with an app.

Ethan: and we’ve seen the names – Jonathan and hannah…who we have learned are connected to this hotel.  he worked here and she was his girlfriend… now, I don’t know what her husband would say about that… oh but guess what died  – in the hotel.

MUSIC

nat: last episode ended when we saw a shadow figure in our hotel room when we were standing in the street.  So we have the picture of that shadow figure and you can see what you think it is – it’s on our social media.

Alison: So of course we slowly walk into our hotel room when we get up there.

Ethan: and of course we have our app out.

Brian:  this is brian – the husband and dad of the low budget ghost squad. for the record I was here on this trip… I want it to be known that I went in first .. even though a certain squad member wanted to be the first one.

ethan:  mom?

Nat:  I had to see what was in there.- was it the woman ghost thing I keep seeing in the middle of the night?

Alison: so dad walked in first and seconds later mom came in, finger guns out, as if that was going to do any damage at all. As if she was Charlie’s angels or something.  Very entertaining because if something were to come out she would throw dad in front of her like a human shield.   

Nat: I checked the closet, the bathroom…but nothing.  The shadow figure was gone.

Ethan:  and somehow we went to sleep – or at least alison did.  

Alison:  Like I said in season one, sleep is my soulmate.  

Ethan:  So the next morning when we went downstairs I realized I  my phone charger was still in the room.  and my battery was already dying . and not because I’m always watching youtube…alison…mom.

Alison:  I didn’t say anything!  

Ethan:  anyway I went to get my phone charger.   I got in the elevator – and it wouldn’t go at first.  I just sat there – and I thought this is what happened to mom and dad in an earlier episode, and I went straight up to the 19-th floor. 

Alison: the most haunted – if you remember.

Ethan: I refused to get out..no matter what I just kept hitting the 16-th floor button over and over.  But as I saw the elevator door closed, I got a glimpse of the exact same shadow figure that I saw in our hallway, three floors down.  But I also saw something shiny and it flash by too. I think this thing is following me.

MUSIC

Nat: now ethan was nervous when he came down and he told us about what happened. Remember, from a previous episode we learned that the elevators would sometimes just go straight to the 19th floor without anyone hitting the button.. and at that point Augustus the security guard who we had met earlier walked by.   He asked us – is everything ok?

Ethan: we told him yeah – I mean, I didn’t really want to share what had just happened to me.  So I just said yeah and kept on moving.

Alison: but he motioned toward the elevators and asked – did it give you a little scare?  the elevator company can’t explain it.  and then he said this – I haven’t heard of it happening in a while though… not exactly like that, but he said that.

Nat: I noticed Christopher, the hotel worker, standing in the bar area and motioning for us – Augustus smiled at him, nodded at us, and walked away.  Now, Christopher had told us earlier that he had some things we may find interesting since we were asking about a Hannah and a Jonathan.  He said he had gone to his aunt’s house to get an old family photo album and scrapbook.

Alison: and he told us the hotel has this archive section that he was able to get into  - you know newspaper clippings, guest registries and employee lists things like that from a long ago… we learned , according to the newspapers clippings – the husband, Robert Fielding, died of a heart attack in the lord Baltimore in 1929, soon after the stock market crashed.

Ethan: his wife Hannah was there in the room and the article says they had been eating breakfast and she claimed he had just fallen over.

Alison: hmmmm.  Just fell right over huh.  Maybe just as she planned it to happen?

Nat: you know that where my mind went immediately.

Ethan: It always does. With the both of y’all.

Alison: I mean we were right last time with the Crescent.

Nat: now I thought it was an interesting detail that they put in the article that he had knocked over his bourbon when he died and it was just dripping onto the floor.  I guess that’s what one has for breakfast… in 1929. – when it’s illegal to even have it, remember.  

Alison: it doesn’t mention an autopsy, but it does go into the incredible amount of stress he was facing because his company was losing so much money.  He had made his fortune in construction after the great fire of 1904 that we’ve mentioned… I mean the city had to be rebuilt otherwise it’s just a pile of ash.

Ethan: you guys guess what.  he’s buried in the same cemetery as Edgar Allen Poe

Nat: it’s called the Westminster Hall and burying ground.  

Ethan: isn’t that the place that had body snatchers?

Alison: every place that old has body snatchers.

Nat: this is an old cemetery – originally called Westminster presbyterian cemetery – and it dates back to 1786.  But then in 1852, they built a church there… and some of that church was built over the graves.

alilson: this not like a poltergeist situation where you only removed the headstones and not the bodies.

Nat: so yeah – –they built the church on arches that were over the graves… so there are catacombs that you can go see with all these old graves in there.

Alison:  but beware – according to legend – they had problems at one point with some body snatchers way back when, who would steal newly buried bodies and sell them to medical students.  

Nat:  all in the name of science.

Alison: people didn’t like that – and when somebody got caught doing it… allegedly the locals formed a mob, and that guy was killed.  Like ugh.

Ethan:  but his ghost is still said to be there.  plus, according to the stories out there... there were some people who may or may not have been dead when they were buried.  That means they were buried alive.

Alison:  yeah, they were in coma but at the time they didn’t have all the fancy equipment to figure that out.  So, they’d bury them.  And in some places they’d have a bell outside the grave and the string would be inside the casket and if they woke up underground they could ring the bell and the night patrolman at the graveyard could come dig them up.

Nat: and then one teenager is seen kneeling over her own grave – with long hair and a white gown.  

alison: like every horror movie in existence.

Nat: now, the most famous person there is the legendary author Edgar Allen Poe – and his death is still a mystery to this day.

Alison: he was missing for about five days…and was found outside a bar.  He didn’t appear to be wearing his own clothes and he was going in and out of consciousness.  Andallegedly was saying the name Reynolds.   Now, we’ve heard that may have been the bartender’s name… but not everyone agrees with that. And he later died at the hospital. And we still don’t know why.

Nat:  here’s one theory you see, he was found on election day.  at the time, people would go around and get men drunk and have them go vote illegally…and sometimes they would put them in different clothes so they could vote a second time and probably a third and fourth. So maybe he just got left on the street afterward.  He couldn’t really drink alcohol – may have been allergic to it or something like that .if they had gotten him drunk that could have been a problem.  Or he was under the influence of something else.

Ethan: but he’s buried with his wife…who’s also his cousin…and his aunt is there too…who I guess is also his mother-in-law.  Which is a weird thing to say.

Alison:  it was a little more normal in the 1800’s.

Nat:  fast forward to 1949 a man started going to Poe’s grave every year the night before his birthday with some liquor, three red roses and would make a toast.  They called him the Poe toaster.  That went on until around 2010 or 2011 I believe.  But no one knows who this man was… I guess no one ever asked them because people would sit and wait for him.  but others have taken on the role since then– and some refer to them as the faux toasters.

Alison: but now we know that Robert fielding was buried at that cemetery after dying of a heart attack…at the lord Baltimore hotel.

Ethan:  Christopher suddenly said he had to leave but he would let us look at everything and get it later.

Alison: enter Clovis… seconds later.  She came over to us in her little scooter… you could hear her coming a mile away, I think.  she’s louder than you think she’d be at 102.  

Nat: So, we shared with her and her granddaughter what we were looking at.  Jonathan…now who clovis had already told us that he worked in the dining room but she says she remembers he also worked in the laundry area. 

Ethan: I think that is where the penthouses are now.

Nat: yeah, they turned it fancy. and in one of those penthouses… there’s a handprint that won’t go away.  doesn’t matter if you wash the wall or paint over it.  It just comes back. What went on there?

MUSIC

Nat:  back to Jonathan – sorry we got off on a tangent there about laundry and haunted handprints.

Alison: it’s what we do…it’s what we live for.  Sorry Ursula from little mermaid took over.  continue.

Nat: Jonathan’s name was Jonathan Hill and there was an old photo of him.  quite handsome I will say.

Alison:  can you sound any older?

Nat:  oh yes I can – just give it time.  What until you hear me try to get up off the floor.

Alison:  we’re looking at Jonathan’s picture... I asked to see it again because I thought I had seen him before.

Nat:  Alison had us all go up to the ballroom level and over to that framed photo that wouldn’t stay on the wall – from an earlier episode.  It was from the nurse’s alumni group that was from the university of Maryland.  

Ethan: and there he was.  In the background.  He was off in the corner – he had been working that dinner.

Alison:  so I pulled a nancy drew and I figured it out.  Anyway, clovis said to us – let me pull out my old lady. “remember I told you all that they had met when she was here for a dinner.  And it was probably that one.” Clovis had said that She had been there by herself and it makes sense because it didn’t look like there were a lot of men in that room. 

Nat:  clovis remembered hearing the story years later that Hannah was a nurse when she met Robert – the husband. see, she had helped him at the hospital at some point because he had this heart condition. And I guess they fell in love.  At least for a little while.  the dinner photo was dated May 1929… and Robert Fielding died – in December of that year.  Just enough time to start up an affair… and decide to kill your husband.

Ethan: Especially if you knew about medicines.

Nat: clovis said – at least what her mother told her years later… because it was a great scandal among the staff… Jonathan loved Hannah the minute he met her.  He was the server at her table that night.  He got so nervous whenever he went to her table, he would constantly drop things and eventually spilled water on her.  now, the other servers told everybody… and you know the gossip was going crazy - the other people at Hannah’s table were horrified – lots of gasps I assume.  But, but not from Hannah.  She  just laughed and said – it’s ok. And allegedly winked at him.

Alison: It was all over then.  And probably all over for Robert too.  Hannah was much younger than Robert, like much younger.  And I’m guessing she fell in love with his bank account more than his personality. 

Nat: not that uncommon through the course of history, I must say.

Ethan: Clovis was looking closely at the picture – her granddaughter was holding it up close so she could see it.

Alison: like mom does with her phone.  Now, clovis said - I think that’s Hannah – it was one of the women at one of the back tables… in all white.  I mean, it looked like most people in that picture were dressed in white.  And don’t most ghosts seem to wear white? 

Ethan: But wait we’ve heard of a ghost guy in a blue sports coat with shiny buttons…. So, who knows what the ghost dress code is.

Nat:  Anyway, we had found a photo from the hotel archives that Christopher had given us.. and it was wedged into a folder.  It appeared to be from the night of the nurse’s dinner. And it showed the moment Hannah and Jonathan were dancing in the side parlor… just as clovis had described.  

Alison: they were smiling at each other – they looked like really happy. 

Nat: but what took me aback was Clovis’ reaction to seeing the photo.  She was touching it very lightly and gently.  And at first, I thought she was smiling.  But then her lower lip began to quiver, and she pointed to a figure standing off to the side.  You could hardly see who it was.  And she said... very quietly as her 102-year-old voice cracked… mama. And she rested her head against her granddaughter who had kneeled down by her side.

Alison: oh my god.

Nat:  so alison and I are in here crying right now.

MUSIC.  

Nat:  clovis wanted to leave after that… we were all a little emotional and tearing up, just watching her reaction to seeing her mom.  But she did turn to me and say – be careful in that ballroom.  I don’t think they want you in there.

MUSIC

Nat: so, at this point whatever was going on in the ballroom we were pretty sure was related to Jonathan and Hannah – they died outside the hotel in a trolley accident, actually a few weeks after her husband Robert died.

Ethan: close enough to haunt it, I think.

Alison:  and if that’s where they met… that’s where they might haunt. We need to go back in there.

Nat:  and we need to bring some cat balls.

Alison: don’t start that again.  now if you don’t remember from season one… these cat balls are used to show if a ghost is around.

Nat: in theory the ghost could touch or move it or whatever it wants to do…and it would light up.  but you see, we are the low budget ghost squad, and I didn’t bother to go get any of those before we came here.  

Alison: that sounds more like an underprepared ghost squad.

Ethan: So, we found a pet store not that far away and got a few cat balls.

Alison:  so, we went back into the ballroom… no one else was in there.  No one else is fool enough to go into a room where ghosts don’t want you.  well, except us. 

Nat:  yes, except us.  so after a few minutes the overhead lights start blinking again.

Ethan:  but this time I figured it out.  it was morse code.

MUSIC

Nat: before we get to that message let’s share what happened with the cat balls, shall we?

Alison:  this is not my fault…. I repeat.  This is not my fault, contrary to the belief of one other member of the squad. so I put one of the balls on a table and I had the video camera.  And at this point Ethan was trying to talk to Hannah and Jonathan or whoever else may be in there. 

Ethan:  we were getting words on the app that I didn’t like… and I was asking, do you want us to leave, but I called out the names Jonathan and Hannah.  And that’s when a cat ball went off.

Alison: and I turned the video camera off by accident trying to see what he was pointing to.  Now I will say, that cat ball had gone off when I set it down on the table, but I swear it had stopped blinking by the time Ethan saw it.

Nat: ok we’re going to stick with that story.  So, Ethan that morse code that you deciphered.

Ethan: so I was trying to write down what I thought they were saying…but I didn’t translate it right… so it first came out as “demand” – or so I thought.  But then it started blinking faster …and I realized they, it, whatever it was, was saying “diamond.”

Alison:  now you have my attention.

 Nat: coming up on the next low budget ghost squad:

 Alison:  I mean, now there’s a diamond involved here so….

Nat: yeah and clovis knows a lot more than what she’s telling… like what else she saw first hand in 1929 when Robert Fielding died.

 Nat:  The Low Budget Ghost Squad is part of Spellbound Productions.  Created, written, directed, produced, edited and whatever else by yours truly.  Lucinda Peterson did the awesome art work.  And thanks to Brian, Alison and Ethan for playing along with this because it’s not as much fun to ghost hunt and solve mysteries by yourself