Roxanne Rhoads - Haunted Flint

Published by Haunted America

A Division of The History Press

Charleston, SC

www.historypress.com

Copyright 2019 by Roxanne Rhoads and Joe Schipani

All rights reserved

Front cover: Ari Napolitano

E-Book year 2019

First published 2019

ISBN 978.1.43966.784.2

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019943351

Print edition ISBN 978.1.46714.304.2

Notice: The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. It is offered without guarantee on the part of the authors or The History Press. The authors and The History Press disclaim all liability in connection with the use of this book.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form whatsoever without prior written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

To my husband, Robert, and my children, Robby, Ari and Tim, thank you for all your love and support and for dealing with my obsession of all things spooky. And thank you for understanding all the events I couldnt attend while locked away in my writing cave.

To Ilona, thank you for being my best friend and personal cheerleader; for always being there to listen to me vent and for cheering me on when things would get tough.

Roxanne

To my partner, Phillip, who has always supported me and put up with my craziness by listening to me tell stories about hauntings and murders. Thank you for all you have done and for encouraging me to follow my passions and dreams.

Joe

CONTENTS

PREFACE

Tales of ghosts and eerie encounters have been part of my life for as long as I can remember.

My mother had a tendency to attribute strange occurrences to spirits trying to communicate with us. One of my earliest memories is being up late with my mother one summer night and our alarms going off for no apparent reason.

My father had passed away the December before, so it was just us girls in the house. That was spooky in itself; add weird noises that had no known origin, and I was terrified. It was the early 1980s; our smoke detectors and the security system were not connected in any way like today, when everything is connected through Wi-Fi. Nothing was glitching that could have affected both alarms. The smoke detectors were just round things that hung on the wall operated by batteries, independent of any other system.

There was no smoke, no fire and no one trying to break into our house.

But on that hot summer night, the security alarm and the smoke detectors kept going off. First one, then the other, then they sometimes went off at the same time. Random beeps, blurps and screeches filled the night. My mom swore it was my dad trying to communicate with us. What was he trying to say? I have no idea. The noises made no sense to four-year-old me. When I got older, I often wondered if those beeps and screeches would have translated into Morse code. Long bursts, short beeps, long haunting siren wails.

Whatever the cause of the sounds that night, my fate was sealedmy appetite for all things spooky had been piqued. Since then, I have always gravitated toward the paranormal. I adore supernatural-themed books, movies and television shows. If it features ghosts, vampires, witches, werewolves or unsolved mysteries with a paranormal twist, Im there.

Ive collected ghost stories and tales of Michigans haunted locations for years. But I never thought about putting them together in a book. It was just a hobby. Then my friend Davonna and I were discussing setting up a walking tour of Flints haunted locations. That turned into a book idea, which led me to searching for more haunted stories about Flint.

My call for Flint ghost stories was noticed by Joe Schipani, who had also been collecting stories about Flints history, haunted locations and weird deaths. We decided to partner up, pooling our info and expanding it into one book. Joe is the master researcher. He visited locations, participated in ghost hunts, talked to people throughout Flint and spent countless hours in the library searching for unsolved mysteries, weird stories and whispers of hauntings. I scoured the Internet for Flint ghost stories, hunted through archives of historical documents, interviewed locals through social media, visited locations and put everything we discovered into writing. Together, we found more haunted locations and spooky stories about Flint than we ever imagined we would. The result is this book in your hands. We hope you enjoy it.

Roxanne

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I have to credit the inspiration for this book to my longtime friend Davonna Wallace. Without her putting the idea into my head for a book about Flints haunted locations, Haunted Flint would not exist. I would never have taken my love of Flint history and combined it with all the urban legends and local ghost stories that I had been collecting and put them into a detailed book. I also want to thank all the local historians who helped me find details, dates, ghost stories and images for the book, including Flint author Gary Flinn, historian Daniel Conner, and all those who submitted their personal ghost stories. And a huge thank-you to my coauthor, Joe Schipani, who is the research master.

Roxanne

This book was inspired by the many great people of Flint who have shared their stories and experiences and by many long years of research at the Flint Public Library. I would like to thank all the librarians who have answered my questions, guided me in the right direction and put away all the microfilm rolls I used. The Flint Public Library is truly one of the citys most valuable assets. I would like to thank the owner and staff of Totem Books in Flint for letting me camp out there and use the store as an office away from home. And I cant forget the people who have encouraged me along the way. Ashley, Jessica, Pam, Angela and Jessiethank you.

Joe

INTRODUCTION

In a world where nearly every moment of our lives is photographed, recorded, and documented, the gaps in the past still beckon us. Searching for ghosts can be an attempt to reconstruct what is lost. By sifting through time for stories that have been misplaced or forgotten, we listen to the voices that call out to be remembered.

Colin Dickey, Ghostland

Shadows lurking in corners, voices in the middle of the night, cold spots sending shivers up and down your spine

Every city has ghosts, some more than others. Places that have seen battles, horrible disasters and deadly histories are reported to be the most haunted. Such pain and suffering are sure to leave a mark. From feelings of unease to reports of spooky specters and terrifying encountersthe stories of hauntings are sometimes scarier than the history that created the ghosts. These cities are often considered to be Americas most haunted: New Orleans, Louisiana; San Francisco, California; Savannah, Georgia; Chicago, Illinois; Washington, D.C.; Portland, Oregon; Gettysburg, Pennsylvania; Galveston, Texas; Baltimore, Maryland; Salem, Massachusetts; and Charlotte, North Carolina. All these cities have seen their share of disasters, battles and shady dealings. They are also large, well-known cities that are popular travel destinations.

Flint, Michigan, isnt large and it sure isnt a tourist destination, but it has an extensive history of pain, suffering, crime, hardship andghost stories.