Cliché Central

Earlier this year for my journalism 1 class, I had to write a feature story as an assignment. For my topic I decided to choose haunted places, since it was around Halloween. My partner and I wrote about all the usual places around Wichita, like Theorosa’s Bridge and the Broadview Hotel and whatnot, but one place out of all of those really interested me. That was the abandoned (supposedly haunted) house on 159th and 13th Street, in Andover.

It intrigued me frankly because I live close by there and I had never heard of the rumors before, but as I talked to fellow students Nikki and Kayla I discovered that I had been living within a few miles of a really interesting house, and I never knew!

The story behind the house went that the father of the house went crazy, and went on a killing spree, killing the wife in the dining room, the daughter on the swing set, and the son in the basement of the shed, then broke the shed ladder so no one could ever go down there. Rumor has it, according to my friend Kory, that if you go there, there is still a broken ladder in the basement of the shed. Creepy…

Anyway, the story interested me, and after my cross country season was over, I was in need of things to do after school every day, so that I wouldn’t procrastinate doing my homework until the last second, as usual. The Tuesday after I had turned in my feature, I decided that, hey, I live close to that house so why don’t I just go check it out?! That Tuesday I told my friend Tom about it and he double-dog dared me to go up to the house. You can’t turn down a double-dog dare.  You just can’t. It’s a no go.

I left my house at about 4:30, after eating a PB&J (a mistake I would later regret). I decided to leave my cell phone at home, because I don’t normally like to run with it, because it weighs me down (another mistake I would soon regret). I ran down Andover Road, and headed toward 13th, so I could get to the house before it got dark. That day, the wind was blowing pretty hard to the north, so I was getting blown back, and I felt sick from that stupid PB&J. Why did I eat that? To this day, I really don’t know.

I got up to 13th and started to run/jog down the street. Normally, when you’re this far out, there’s no one on the sidewalks. Ever. I can’t say I’ve ever seen someone walking down that sidewalk. But hey, there I was, jogging, making shadows on the sidewalk. I jogged down the street, toward the house, and right before I could see the house, I encountered a fresh skunk roadkill, and, I say, it was definitely not fun running by that. It practically gagged me the stench was so strong.

After I had passed the putrid skunk, I looked to my left, and there it was. The house everyone had been talking about, set back in the field. It felt kind of weird just being there on the sidewalk with all the cars and whatnot. (Just to clarify, this sidewalk is on the NORTH side of 13th. The house is on the SOUTHEAST corner of the intersection, so I am still across the street.)

I went up to the light and crossed whenever no cars were coming, and I went up to the little entrance area: a little paved spot and then a barbed wire fence. I was a little nervous, because I didn’t want to get caught and get arrested for trespassing on this private property, because remember, this was in broad daylight; anyone could have seen me walking through the field.

I heaved myself over the barbed wire fence and as soon as I was across, an eerie feeling came over me. I felt like I didn’t really belong there, and that I should maybe leave. I was considering it, but then I remembered how my friends would say I was chicken for not going up to the house, so I continued on after about a minute. To get to the house, one has to cross a long field, because the house is really set back in the field. There is a tire path though, so you can get through. Strange, because if the house is abandoned, why is there a tire path? I wasn’t complaining though, because the grass was probably up to my belly button beside the narrow path.

I was pretty dang scared walking down the little path with the tall grass all around me. Keep in mind, I do not have a cell phone or anything to let anyone know where I am. I walked in the right tire tread path up there, and I don’t know what it was about it, but all the way up, I was getting ATTACKED by grasshoppers and crickets. I don’t know what the deal was. They were making a point not just to jump around but to jump up in the air on top on me. It was strange. The wind was blowing in my face too, so whenever they jumped in front of me they would float on top of me. Also whenever I would walk by birds would flock away, scaring the living daylight out of me. I must admit, I was really, REALLY freaked out (and it’s only 5:00 PM mind you). I got so scared walking out there that every other word that came out of my mouth was your 4-letter s-word, or the f-word, and I will admit I did say it quite a few times.

I had finally made it through the tall grass (expletives aside), and there was the house. It was creepy looking, like it looked like a picture of decay. There was a stone fence surrounding the place, and for some reason I wanted to find a house number, so I was looking all around the stone gate for a number. When I looked up I was pretty surprised because BOOM, there’s a deer right in front of me. I looked at the deer for a bit, and it looked at me, before it hopped away to the east.

I walked around the completely weed-overgrown concrete and went up to the garage. The brick walls of this house are blackened from abandonment, and all the windows are boarded up. Except, the rumor has it that there is a shattered window in the back that one can get in through. Also, the rumor went that if you go inside, you can still see the bloodstains on the walls and floor. When my friends Kory and Cole went there, they were going to go to the basement but the basement was completely flooded with water, up to the top step. I assume a pipe broke or something? Anyway, I went up to the front door, which was obscured behind a large bush, and on the door and windows someone had written “KEEP OUT” really big. I could be imagining this next part, but at the time I could have sworn I kept hearing a little voice in my head that kept saying, “Get out, get out, get out!” That was probably just me though, but I’m not really sure. After seeing the big “KEEP OUT” on the door, I took their advice. I will admit I was too scared to go around back and see the inside of the house and the shed, but I was too scared without my phone with me, or anyone else to comfort me.

The funny thing was, as I was walking out, along the left tire path, the wind died down and I could have sworn not a single grasshopper was on the path. I maybe saw one or two but they definitely were not jumping all over me like before. No birds either. I got the heck outta there, and got back on the road, crossing over to the 13th sidewalk again. I started to head east and noticed something I had not seen before, and then I was like, “Holy crap! That deer just got run over!”

I’m serious, that exact same deer I had just seen got run over on 13th Street. I didn’t witness it get hit, but as I walked down the sidewalk, the deer started spasmodically jerking around, trying to get up. I was shocked, because I thought it was dead. I stopped in my tracks. The cars stopped on the street and stared, as did I. My mouth was literally wide open. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do, call the police? Too bad I didn’t have a cell phone. Somehow the deer got up onto its feet, and obviously its back right leg was crippled. The deer limped itself off the street, across my sidewalk, and then vanished over the hill, out of sight. I was kind of stunned, like, who would have expected that?

After that, I was like, I wanna get the heck outta of here and get home, like ASAP. I still had a good 2 miles to run though, and all the way back I felt really paranoid. I kept looking behind me, because for some reason I had a fear that that deer was going to charge down the sidewalk and head-butt me.

Before I came home, I went into St. Vincents and prayed a little bit for the deer. Corny, I know, but I just wanted to do a little something, I was so unsettled by these events. I got home and didn’t really want to tell the whole story, for fear of getting in trouble for trespassing.

So I would say, the moral of the story is, don’t mess around with things that you shouldn’t. You never know what you’re gonna see.

(Sorry, but there’s one last thing that deserves a mention. I was getting a haircut the other week and recounting this story to my hairdresser, because I just like telling this story to Andover people. After I was done, the owner of the salon came up to me and informed me that the house I was talking about was none other than her high school best friend’s house. The family that lived there was pretty rich, and the dad was a pretty well-known local dentist. This was around 1966, she said. She had been over there many times and reported nothing, absolutely NOTHING haunted about the house. Apparently, after the dentist father died, they didn’t want to live in that house anymore, possibly because it was too hard to do, so they just up and abandoned it. She testifies that there never were any murders there, at least while the house was legally inhabited.)