Unknown: The Trans Allegheny lunatic asylum is now a national historic landmark that is utilized for as a tourist attraction.

We delve a lot into the history of mental health treatments throughout the years, and we also feature a lot of paranormal activity.

Originally, they say that this building was built to house 250 patients.

It was not built to house 250 patients because of its size.

It was built to house 250 patients because the superintendent believed that that's how many patients he could visit with and manage their care daily.

Now in the later years and around the 50s and 60s, our population became about 2400 with the patients with severe staff shortages, there were beds all through the hallways.

Rooms that were designed to hold two beds could be have three or four across the room.

So obviously not ideal for for the patient treatment and for the progression of their mental health treatment.

Pretty much everyone in this room would have been a patient at this asylum.

A lot of times, women could be admitted here by their spouses for excessive reading.

Sometimes women were committed here because their husbands had taken a mistress, and they needed a way to dispose of their wife, and at the time, if you were put in here by a male relative or your husband, they were the only person who could come back and get you out.

You were never able to be deemed sane enough to be released on your own accord.

So lobotomy, where it seems pretty barbaric to us now, is a pretty common practice to combat symptoms, again, of mental illness, they took an ice pick like tool, and they pushed it into the corner of your eye, and they moved it in a windshield wiper type motion, and it would separate the parts of your brain that controlled personality.

A lot of people considered that murdering of the soul.

So we don't have an exact number of lobotomies that were performed that would require records for many, many years to be able to tally those up.

We just, we just tell people that there were hundreds of lobotomies.

Being a lunatic asylum the trans Allegheny has many stories and assumptions about its past patients.

Some of the most commonly told stories are about a girl named little lily.

Seemingly the most common version of the story is that she was born to a woman in the asylum who was a victim of Civil War soldier violence.

Her mother is said to have died in childbirth, and Lily was left to the nurses of the ward.

She is said to only have lived there for a short time, contracted pneumonia at a young age and then died.

And she's kind of playful.

People bring her toys and balls.

We do have some spirits that don't seem to like to interact with a lot of people.

They may prefer some of our guides over the other ones.

Sometimes they may not talk to some of them at all.

We have a couple really playful guys on the fourth floor, Frank and Larry.

They like to play cards.

They really interact when people tell them dirty jokes and things of that nature.

You know, I think people kind of assume that things would be really negative here, but we really try to be respectful and approach the paranormal from a place of curiosity and respect.

We don't have a lot of angry things.

We like to say that if you have a slightly negative experience, it may just be somebody aggressively trying to get your attention, as opposed to aggressively trying to hurt you, of something that they call or an entity that they call, the creeper up on the fourth floor.

Now, our staff doesn't necessarily have negative interactions with him, but he kind of crawls across the floor, and they've seen him like clinging to doors and crawling up walls, which definitely would be very unsettling to anyone that would come in here, we believe that that is just his way of telling people to leave him alone.

The stories that are often told about ghosts and other folklorist tales stem from its storied past.

It's only natural that from the historical necessity of women bringing their children to the facility with them, would stories like little lilies come to our imaginations.

The Asylum story comes out of two centuries of incredibly transformative history for West Virginia and the field of psychology and mental health.

Its purpose in the region was to provide moral treatment, but what that means was subjective to the time and understanding of treatments, the legacy of its ghostly figures points to the history and the morality of the place and its inhabitants.

Treatments.

Often, these narratives tend to attempt to draw attention to the wrongs, to find the rights the narratives are meant to evoke the evolvement of human experience, personalizing.

History The place to learn from the tragedy.

The last public hanging in West Virginia took place on December 16, 1897 in the town of Ripley.

The individual involved was John F Morgan, who was convicted of murdering Chloe green and two of her children in the grass lick area of Jackson County.

The events leading up to the execution began on November 3, 1897 When Morgan, a local handyman, an acquaintance of the Green family, attacked them with a hatchet.

He killed Chloe green and her two children, Jimmy and Matilda, another daughter, Alice, survived the attack and alerted neighbors, leading to Morgan's swift arrest, John Morgan was a local man, a farmhand, and up until this time, no one really thought much about him.

There just really wasn't a lot that made him stand out post Green family.

He worked on on the farm there Mrs. Green's first and second husband had both this been deceased.

Well, what, what eventually made John Morgan famous was he murdered.

It was a triple murder, and he murdered the mother, Chloe green and two of her children, and one was the daughter, and then a young son, Jimmy, and she he seriously injured one of the other daughters.

She could identify who he was to the sheriff, very brutal.

Oh, we'd never had anything like this happen in this area before.

He did the murder with an ax and a hatchet.

But one of the daughters survived the attack, so she could tell her name was Alice.

She could tell the sheriff who it was and how it happened.

It was a very quick trial.

So from the time of the murders till the actual hanging was only about a month.

It was, it was very, very quick.

And there was a small Indian mound on the property right where you had to pass it.

And the sheriff always said that he thought that was a perfect place for a Gala's because it was raised and people could get around it and and see it real well.

And so that's where they and that was out of Ripley, the main part of Ripley, then was down where you see the courthouse.

Now, this was almost kind of out of town a little bit, but it's it was on that property, close to where the high school is now last public hanging in West Virginia.

Received extensive media coverage at the time, including national newspapers from New York, Baltimore, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh.

The covers highlighted the sensational aspects of the crime, the execution, contributing to the spectacle surrounding the event.

The public hanging drew a large crowd of about 5000 spectators, creating a carnival like experience.

According to the newspapers, it was almost a carnival type atmosphere leading up to it.

They sold a variety of things, food and things like that, and even said there was some out of town people that came in, like a little troupe of actors that, the night before, put on a little skit that included a hanging folklore also tends to romanticiz.. sometimes portraying it as a community event with a festive atmosphere.

In contrast, historical accounts emphasize the chaotic and appalling nature of the spectacle, which led to significant public outcry and legal changes.

Well, there was a delegate that was there at the hanging from Jackson County, and there was enough of an outrage about how the trial and the hanging was conducted, and that it was such a carnival atmosphere that he proposed legislation the next year to ban public hangings.

And the legislature did that.

And from that point on, they still had hangings as capital punishment in the state, but they moved it to Morgantown to the state penitentiary.

So that's why this was the last public hang Lake Shawnee amusement park in Mercer County, West Virginia, is a site with a deep history that dates back long before it became an amusement park.

Before the amusement park was established, the land was the site of a violent conflict between European settlers and the indigenous in the late 18th century, the clay family, who were among the first.

Settlers in the area were attacked by the indigenous, leading to the deaths of several family members.

The tragic event is often cited as the beginning of the land's troubled history.

Mitchell Clay was.. on this land.

Two his kids were massacred here.

One was taken to Ohio, burned at the stakes.

The chief lends him a horse to bring his child back, and they're all three buried on the other side of the park over there.

The most well known stories are that of the clay family's brutal slaying by indigenous people of the area, and the subsequent vengeance Mitchell clay rained down on them after this happened, Mitchell clay left and never returned to that homestead, leaving it empty for many years, the amusement park was first opened by Conley Snyder.

He ran it from 1926 to 1966 Conley T sneido purchased the land and transformed it into Lake Shawnee amusement park.

The park opens and was a popular location.

Also the swimming pool and paddle boats were popular, but also were rumored to have contributed to some of the accidents that led to the closure of the park there is tell of a boy who drowned in the pond.

The mother drops her son off that morning.

She retu.. time for the lifeguard to blow the five o'clock whistle.

Her son's nowhere to be found.

She thinks he walked on.

She goes to the house.

He's not there.

She comes back to Lake Shawnee.

They find him at 7pm that night in the bottom of the pond with his arms stuck in a drape.

Any unfortunate accidents may have occurred throughout its years as an amusement park, the swing ride was another favorite, especially among children.

It consisted of several swings that would rotate around a central tower.

Tragically, this ride is associated with one of the park's most infamous accidents, where a young girl reportedly died after being struck by a delivery truck while riding it, and two twin boys fell out of the Ferris wheel from the top of the ride and plummeted to their deaths.

So one of the storie.. the swing as the swings going around.

They so did delivery trucks deliver, and so did a concession stand.

Whenever it goes to leave, it backs up into the path of the swing, the little girl hits the back of the truck and it kills her.

The land was thought to be cursed after Mitchell Clay's family was slaughtered, prompting him to go on a murderous rampage against any and all indigenous people he could find in the area.

This set the course for ghost stories to flourish, but with several reported accidents and deaths occurring on the premises.

By 1966 the park was closed.

So whenever the park was open from 26 to 66 My father worked here.

Whenever it closed in 66 his dream was to buy Lake Shawnee.

So we all pitched in together, we could buy Lake Shawnee, open it back up, and we opened it up in 1985 the way we found the burial grounds, we was doing some bulldozing to move the mud bog.

And whenever we was bulldozing, we started finding arrowheads, pottery, Native American stuff.

So that's when my father calls Marshall University.

The archeologists come in from Marshall University in 1990 that's when we found the burial grounds.

They was here for two years.

They dug in 1990 and 1991 they uncovered 13 bodies.

So after they're done, they ran out of funding, so they didn't have funding anymore.

They covered the bodies back over.

They're estimating over 3000 bodies in that field based on how long they lived here.

According to the archeologists, we know that the Native Americans lived here beginning in the woodland period.

The woodland period, started prehistoric and they lived here all the way up to the 1700s during its operational years.

Lake Shawnee amusement park featured several popular attractions that drew crowds from the surrounding area.

The ferris wheel was one of the park's most iconic attractions, and still stands today, though it is rusted and overgrown, contributing to the park's eerie atmosphere.

I think there's strange things that happen in the park that's hard to explain.

Whenever the right people come in, things might happen a little bit different.

So I'm talking about people that might have abilities Erie history and tragic past have made it a focal point of local folklore and paranormal interest in the Appalachian region.

Its reputation as a haunted site has grown over the years, attracting ghost hunters, paranormal enthusiasts and tourists curious about the park's Dark Legacy.

The park's now abandoned, but it remains a powerful symbol of the region's complex history, where the joys of community life and the shadow of past tragedies coexist.

Although Lake Shawnee amusement park operated for only a few decades, its legacy endures as a significant and haunting part of Appalachian history.

The stories of the park's tragic past and the supernatural tales that followed have solidified its place in the region's cultural folklore.

I Riverview is a historic burial ground with deep ties to the local Parkersburg community and the broader Appalachian region.

The cemetery is home to many monuments and headstones from historical figures, especially political and historical including the relatives.

Of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson.

So there are a number of notab..

There are descendants of general Stonewall Jackson, as well as Peter Godwin Van Winkle, who not only served as the first state senator of West Virginia, but also as a descendant of the legendary Rip Van Winkle tale.

Additionally, Captain George Deming.

He was a famous sea captain from Connecticut, and he was a descendant of Miles Standish, directly the founder of Plymouth.

The cemetery that reflects West Virginia history is in Parkersburg.

His residents call it the birthplace of West Virginia.

The city sits on the Ohio River and serves as the union's very first invasion point into the Confederate states.

The state of West Virginia gained statehood by remaining loyal to the Union.

Many Civil War era citizens are buried in the cemetery, setting the tone for our historical and cultural vibe.

There's a variety of things associated with the cemetery on the paranormal side.

So of course, there are your usual specters, notably the Jackson grave, considered the Weeping Woman is known as one of the most haunted locations in Parkersburg.

The Weeping Woman statue is a focal point in the Riverview cemetery.

It's a headstone with a woman seemingly weeping over a headstone that stretches and watches over the plots of Stonewall Jackson family descendants.

Many people think the figure is a woman named Lily Irene Jackson, a woman who died, a spinster, a descendant of the Jackson family.

There are many tales about the Weeping Woman pacing around and mourning the lost lives during the Civil War, her hands changing positions, or even her granting wishes to women who are pure hearted.

So it's said that if you go leave an offering on her grave, that she will grant a wish.

And this has happened successfully for a lot of different people, but not just that.

People have seen multiple times on nights of the full moon what appears to be the gravestone actually getting up and moving around the cemetery.

People have reported a woman and a long white veil walking around the grounds of the cemetery, and she appears to be crying, which is where the legend of the Weeping Woman comes into play.

But mischievous and rip your shirt or pull your hair.

Her connection, as well as many of his other relatives, has had the potential to spin many tales.

Due to the connections with the Civil War,.. not only the Weeping Woman apparition, but shadow figures.

To this day, if you enter the cemetery after dark, you're most likely to hear some footsteps approaching you, nobody behind it, or see something out of the corner of your eye when you're the only person there.

But it also hosts a variety of folklore from the Irish and the Scottish descendants that moved here, there have been a high amount of orbs photographed at Riverview, which is quite rare because it can be hard to even get one orb on camera.

People have also reported hearing disembodied voices, as well as just seeing apparitions around the graveyard.

Appalachia is very old land.

This area specifically is 450 million years old.

So you can imagine there's a lot we don't understand.

In addition to Irish folklore of the Black Dog, it connects into the legend of the Banshee, which comes from Ireland as well, and this is usually considered an ill omen, so she will appear in times of impending doom for the family or to bring bad news, strangely enough, kind of similar to Mothman, the practices of walks at dusk and night, a tim.. threshold between worlds of living and dead.

Paranormal investigations, grave offerings such as coins or flowers or photos as gifts to the spirits are often meant to blend local superstition, ghost hunting and respectful remembrance, reflecting the complex relationship between the living and the dead.

In Appalachian culture, there's always something strange that happens when I lead a tour by the cemetery.

It seems to be specifically by the captain's grave that shadow figures happen frequently, or I'll be telling a story and my guests will turn around like they're looking behind me and they swear they see somebody in there.

To me, that's evidence that something deeper is really going on there.

It's a good way of showcasing the stranger history of the area, and it's also a good way to understand how a lot of the local legends came into play.

Always been drawn to stranger places, paranormal places, but the main part of investigating the paranormal is protecting these historically significant places.

So it has an allure naturally anyway, as does the city of Parkersburg.

Everybody agrees that it's really significant, whether that's historically or paranormally.

People have different views, but everybody certainly agrees that it is a hallmark of Parkersburg.

On January, 23 1897 Mrs. Zona Shu is found dead in her dining room.

By a local young boy named Anderson Jones, better known as Andy in his community.

He was asked that morning by Zona 's husband Edward Erasmus troutshu, to please see to her and see she had been sick recently, and he was concerned, please go see if she needs any chores and take eggs to the market.

He gets there and he finds poor boys, 12 years old, finds Zona dead on the dining room floor.

Her heels are together, her hand is by her side, and her other is over her chest.

And he runs back to his mother, and she sends for trout.

Trout comes running home, tends to zona.

He's very upset, crying all over her.

He won't get anyone get close, not even other community women that come to help tend to her body, which is custom in that time span, trout is alone with his wife's body.

He changes her he takes her out of her day clothes, puts her into her Sunday bath.

He wraps her neck and her favorite scarf and then puts a veil over her head, which is tied under her chin.

The official report noted natural causes and possibly heart failure as the cause of death.

Miss Hester zona's mother didn't believe this, as she had witnessed her young, vibrant, joyful daughter pale in her short marriage to Erasmus, knowing full well, he was brutally abusing her.

Her mother later claimed that after many prayers, she was visited by Zona ghost, who insisted she was murdered by Erasmus, explaining her specific injuries in great detail.

She brings her brother in law to Lewisburg, and they go to county attorney Preston.

They say, my daughter's been visiting me.

Her neck was broken.

The man doesn't believe her.

It's a tall tale, but he's like, all right, there's enough strangeness in the case.

She's young, totally 22 she's dead of natural causes, and this man has a history.

Okay?

So they order, he orders an autopsy.

It took place over the course of three days.

It was attended by Dr Knapp, who declared her death and who attended to her while she was sick, and McClung and Shu himself, over the course of three days, they tried to rule out all other causes of paroled death, which includes an examination of the stomach to rule out poisons, examination of the body to rule out a suicide.

When they got to her neck, it walled side to side, and an examination she had a crushed windpipe and a separation of first and second vertebrae, as Zona had told her mother in a proper autopsy that revealed zona's neck was broken and her windpipe was smashed.

There were also, apparently finger marks on her throat.

Shu was ultimately arrested and charged with murdering his wife, zona.

Everyone that was involved, sort of the authorities kind of did their best to avoid talking about it.

There is no mention of a ghost in the papers before the trial in the late 19th century, spiritualism and belief in the supernatural were widespread, and many people were inclined to accept the possibility that a ghost could communicate with the living.

As a result the public tragedy viewed Mary Jane Hester's testimony as credible, or at least compelling, the trial was covered in local newspapers, which sensationalized the story of the ghostly visitation.

This coverage contributed to the widespread fascination in the case and helped solidify its place in regional folklore.

It was very sensationalized.

Newspaper.. they ran her transcript, the ghost story came out, and it was put in little papers.

People followed this case very closely.

Remarkably, the Court allowed Mary Jane .. daughter's ghost to be admitted during the trial.

Although the prosecution did not rely solely on this spectral evidence, it was nonetheless a significant part of the case despite the unconventional testimony, the jury convicted Shu of murder.

His guilty verdict was likely based on the combination of circumstantial evidence inconsistencies in his behavior and statements and the community's belief in the ghost story.

Well, that's another very interesting thing about this case is there's really not a lot of evidence.

It's all circumstantial, which Edward himself knew, and during the investigation of time, he actually been bragging about how they have nothing on me, like they don't, they don't, and they really didn't.

Without that autopsy, they would have never would have had anything to charge it for you had a dead wife.

A lot of people have dead wives.

It's hard to swallow a ghost I, myself am not a believer.

But then, how do you explain all the people saying that?

Yes, she told me about the neck injury that took place, some of it weeks before the autopsy, the Greenbrier ghost case involving the 1897 trial of shoe for the murder of his wife, Zona Hester Shu is one of the most famous cases in West Virginia history due to the unusual testimony provided by Zona 's mother, Mary Jane Hester Mary Jane claimed that her daughter's ghost had appeared to her after her death, revealing that she had.

Been murdered by her husband.

This spectral testimony played a key role in the investigation subsequent trial, Making it a unique moment In American legal history.

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