5/10/2008 - Old City Cemetery and “School Four”


This investigation took us to two of the most classic and infamous Jacksonville locations, Old City Cemetery and “School Four”!

Each, honestly, was a bit of a let down in it’s own way, but we did get a couple of things worth sharing!  While Old City Cemetery was disappointing because of the noise, the homeless, and the decline of that part of the city in general… Annie Lytle Elementary School, a.k.a. “School Four” has proved to be a colossol “urban legend” run amuck.  In fact, every Jacksonville resident would be well served to read my location page on “School Four”! It’s amazing how a little digging can “enlighten you” about many of the things you’ve believed for years!

Old City Cemetery:

Old city cemetery, as I described on the location page, isn’t an ideal place to get evidence.  It’s frankly too busy during the day, and it would be insanely dangerous at night.  Also, it’s fallen into a bit of disrepair, which is typical of many things in this part of Jacksonville.

It’s too bad… I haven’t seen that many Civil War soldiers buried in one spot in this part of the Southeast.  There are also some notables buried here, and this is one of the most historic spots that Jacksonville has to offer.

We learned an important lesson here though.  Yes, this is obviously a person walking down the streets outside the gates, but the point is… I was LOOKING for people in the background, and I still missed him! 

True, I would have probably noticed him if he was inside the gates, but you get my point… we, as humans, are subject to missing things and making mistakes.  This shows the importance of always video taping your investigations so you can have corroborating evidence to help prove or disprove something!

Oh, and no, that’s just sunlit leaves in front of a shadowy, statuesque tombstone… not a tall vampire from an old movie standing there on the right, facing the camera! lol… Don’t you just love this stuff?!

Infrared Pictures...
I must say that with all of the graves of confederate soldiers, I was hoping that I would catch some Gettysburg-like apparitions, but we didn’t get anything…

“School Four”

As you know, although ghosts and spirits could literally be anywhere… we don’t feel “School Four” is really haunted very much (if at all), or at the very least it is quite un-deserving of the title “the most haunted place in Jacksonville”.  Please see the location link at the bottom of this page for much more in depth information, as well as why we feel sorry for the besmirched reputation of what would be a beautiful building!

Of course -as you do with taking any flash pictures in a pitch-black dark, dusty area- we got a ton of what ghost hunting amateurs and charlatans refer to as “orb photos”.  If you are wondering what I’m talking about, you may want to check out our Hot Topic entitled “Our Thoughts on Orbs”. This page reveals the mysteries behind this very explainable phenomenon that occurs with flash photography, slightly reflective particles, and the shape of the camera’s aperture.

Now, I will show you some of the more interesting (and more funny) ones, though!

Here is an orb that somewhat resembles a face!  And not only does it resemble a face, it would be roughly be the height of a very young, elementary student that would have attended School Four!

Unfortunately -with some of the forums I’ve seen- people would have already given this orb a BACKSTORY! ...Like that he must have, as a child, had some of his best memories here and wanted to return after death. lol… UGH.

We know that this is not the case, however, and very explainable.  Also, when you zoom very closely on the orb, you can see that the “facial features” are actually graffiti on the wall behind the “orb”.

This second one is particularly interesting, and the pictures were taken about ten or 15 seconds apart.  Not only does it appear to have movement (going up the stairs away from us), the first “orb” has a very weird shape… and, of course, it would be about height of an elementary school student! lol…

Now, although this is interesting, you can’t ignore that fact that two of the sides of the weirdly shaped orb are taking on the shape of the black spray painted lines in the background.  I don’t know the reason for this, but I’m sure there IS one.  As far as the second orb… well, like I said, we got a TON of pictures with “orbs” in them, and it just so happened one set makes it look like motion is occurring.

EVPs
Well, we did get a couple of interesting things, despite what I think about the place!  These are pretty subjective, but I wanted to share them anyway.  As always… you need headphones to be able to hear these, so don’t even TRY without them!

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-“Yeah, I’d hate to do it”-


Investigation Link: 5/10/2008 - Old City Cemetery and “School Four”

While I don’t think “School Four” is a very haunted place… this one is weird, what can I say.  You can hear the sound of the highway in the background -our sensitive recorders LOVE to pick up passing cars… it seems to be right in their preferable frequency range- but the other sounds we picked up are pretty unusual.  It does sound like a kid or kids.  It starts out with barely audible sounds, and then ends with something that sounds like “Yeah, I’d hate to do it” after I ask “Anybody that can speak with us?“‘

There is no doubt that we are stepping on a board or something during the clearest part, and the sound somewhat matches the pattern of this, but not exactly (for instance… it starts a little BEFORE the snapping sound).  I can’t rule out that these sounds aren’t some strange artifact produced by that, but there is still the first part that has the same sounding “voice” without the snapping noise, and I didn’t hear these anywhere else in the entire audio.  Also, those sounds were only on this recorder… not both.

You’ll have to decide for yourself on this one!



Camera beep and snap
EVP: [Sounds like younger voices saying something in the background]
John: "Is there anybody in here?Anybody that can speak to us?"
EVP: "[Yeah,] I'd hate to do it."
John: "I wouldn't mind a picture out front, where it say's 'School Four'".
Katie: "Yeah."

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-“It’s Creepy”-


Investigation Link: 5/10/2008 - Old City Cemetery and “School Four”

This one is only border-line passable, but it does resemble “It’s creepy”, and it certainly is loud, and I had just finished saying that the light on the floor was “creepy”.  There weren’t any other sounds like this, and the other recorder didn’t pick it up.  Sure, there could be a logical explanation for it, but those are the reasons I chose to share this.

That light on the floor, by the way, has been mentioned in some stories and has some sort of silly urban legend attached to it I’m sure.  Basically, it’s just a small spot of sunlight on the floor in a very dark, second floor room.  It looks kind of like an Indiana Jones booby-trap or something!  That room is EXTREMELY DARK… my flash is so bright that most rooms lit up like it was complete daylight in there, but this one was still really dark.  That’s why this light stands out like it does… it really is strikingly bright!



John: "See that little light on the floor that's creepy?"
Katie: "Yeah!"
John: "It'd be creepier if it went out!"
[camera beep and snap]
EVP: "It's creepy"

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Infrared Pictures...
Of course, for infrared pictures you need bright light, so that left us only able to take pictures outside.  I set up the camera only in one spot, and I took several groups of pictures, each with slightly different shutter settings.  We didn’t get any evidence, but here are the pictures:


That’s all of our “School Four” evidence!  If you want to go explore this place… time is of the essence!  It is scheduled to be torn down sometime soon.  I can say that will probably be our last trip there, being that this location is the example of urban legends run amuck verses a true haunted location.

-Lowcountry Paranormal

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Previous Investigation: 4/27/2008 - Bell Cemetery II and Nolan Ridge IV

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