A ghost called my name, or at least, a ghostly voice in the darkness of a quiet winter night called out something that sounds like "Aee-mee". And it did it twice. This happened back in 2014 during 2 separate investigations of a very old building on the property of the Shaker Heritage Society, and they're both (thankfully) on audio recording. For more information on the Shakers and their history in New York State, check out this website. The building these audio captures occurred in is a Meeting Hall of the Shakers from the 1800's. It's made out of wood, rendering it incredibly creaky with every step after decades of wear and tear and nearly constant use. This site is particularly uncanny for these EVPs to have happened, because the Shakers, who thrived during the 1800's and early 1900's, were Spiritualists who regularly believed they could communicate with the Other Side, even supposed Native spirits. Do a little light research and find out why they're even called the "Shakers" - it's pretty astounding! They regularly held public religious services and séances in the very Meeting Hall these EVPs came from. Perhaps someone from a previous time was reaching out across some dimensional distance to invite me to a spirit-raising dance. I wish I knew.
Today the building serves as the main offices of the Shaker Heritage Society, whose mission is to preserve and restore the buildings on their property. When the investigations were going on back in winter of 2014, multiple static recorders would be left in the buildings as everyone went to other ones to investigate. During audio analysis, I recall going through the timestamps of the recorded files and making sure no one (living) was present when these two EVPs were captured. The clips themselves have about a minute of silence and empty static air on either side of the recorded words. That alone leaves me to ponder this phenomenon even further. How, why...and why me, of all the myriad people who walk in and out of the Shaker's buildings nearly every day?
Even now, these recordings baffle me, and I am still fairly sure they say my name in the same female voice both times. She seems slightly desperate, a little hurried maybe, as if she's asking after me in a crowd but I've slipped out the door too fast. Not surprisingly, I couldn't reach her either; I never knew she was there until after the evenings were over. No cameras ever captured her image, and no one else who was present and intently investigating seemed to have any specific interaction with her either.
Whoever said my name on these two mysterious EVPs never left another message, and to this day I've investigated in the building several more times, and received nothing further. Maybe I no longer hold the spirit's interest, or what was so necessary for her to get my attention the first time has long since passed. Take a listen to these audio clips in the video and decide for yourself if you think both of them say my name, "Amy," in a ghostly woman's voice.
Thanks for reading,
The Shaker property, 1920's. In this photo, the Meeting Hall is the building on the right. That structure, and the garage at the back/center of the photo are all that remain standing of what is pictured here.
