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The Real Phantom Of The Opera

 

This story actually has no ties to any of my other ones as they usually do, but its still pretty interesting and chills me to this day. I was in fourth grade and we were living in Salem, the Capitol of Oregon, and its a town that's pretty rich in history, especially the historic old downtown section that houses the Salem Opera House (I think that's its name), and that's where this takes place.

We were doing a week long tour of the city and this day was Music Day, and we were studying music history courtesy of the music hall. After learning about Beethoven and Mozart (basic fourth grade stuff), we all gathered in the main auditorium to learn the history of the hall. As soon as the lecture was over, the topic of a "ghost" that haunts the hall was brought up and I don't remember the story well but it pertained to someone who used to work there dying a sad death and thus sticking to the hall.

Well, we all got pretty into that as kids would, but as we lined up to leave one kid pointed out to the stage and yelled "look!" Turning round, sure enough you could see the curtain pull aside and there was a black figure, hunched over as in a peeking round the corner stance, and it swished a bit then the curtain fell aside and it was gone. As you could imagine, a nervous atmosphere came about and amidst the chatter, another boy pointed to the upper decks and sure enough there it was again! In a minute it was gone, and as the adults scrambled to keep everyone under control we were hustled out.

Outside everyone was still hyped up but the adults denied everything that happened and hurried us out-still another hour left in the itinerary but it didn't matter.

My teacher, Mr. Sherman I remember, avoided any and all conversation and inquiries about the event, as did every other teacher who was there and even some who weren't, and the rest of the week, a day or two was left, never happened, and future field trips to the hall also never happened.

I can't believe I almost forgot this story, its so fun.

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The following comments are submitted by users of this site and are not official positions by yourghoststories.com. Please read our guidelines and the previous posts before posting. The author, AndreaRC, has the following expectation about your feedback: I will read the comments and participate in the discussion.

rookdygin (24 stories) (4458 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-26)
AndreaRC,

Thank you for returning and defending your experience, you feel it is true and are figting for it. Bravo, well done. While I can not vouch for the cancelation of 'Art Week' I can address parts of your experience.

You have countered some of our points concerning this as a possible prank by stating (quoted so there is no misunderstanding...)

"One,the amount of tine between sightings-upper deck and lower stage-was too short for the same exact thing to be there and then there."

Now you described the sightings like this...

"Turning round, sure enough you could see the curtain pull aside and there was a black figure, hunched over as in a peeking round the corner stance, and it swished a bit then the curtain fell aside and it was gone. As you could imagine, a nervous atmosphere came about and amidst the chatter, another boy pointed to the upper decks and sure enough there it was again!"

One of two things may have happened here... Either a single individual was pulling a prank, and knowing the Opera House well, was able to move from the stage to the upper deck while the tour group talked about what had been seen on stage... With no one looking at a watch does anyone know how much time between sightings ther actually was? Or a more beliveable scenario is that there were two individuals... One wanting to pull a prank and the other a Opera House working looking to see if the tour was gone so they could continue working. Either way that is two resonable explinations, both of which are non-paranormal.

As I said One of these 'sightings' could have been of a working checking to see if the coast was clear and the other may have been a Spirit... But without more evidence there is no way to tell.

Again I can not speak for why Art week was canceled... Nor for the reactions of the Teachers... Though I will say this, if I had been a Chaperon on that trip and I thought someone was watching the 4th graders I was responsible for I would have been nervous (which explains the teachers actions/reaction) and reported it to somebody... If that report led to the event being canceled... Well then perhaps there was a good reason for concern...

Respectfully,

Rook
Nysa (4 stories) (685 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-25)
The thing is that field trips are not just planned & carried out by the teachers. A teacher might plan something small for an individual class & simply get approval, not actually that simple anyway. But big trips, involving several locations & the entire grade of a school are a big deal, even for very small schools. Things are coordinated months ahead of time by a school administrator, sometimes involving the school board or superintendents office. Very few teachers would be willing to go to the administration & say "we can't continue these trips or go to any of the other locations planned for this week because several students & some teachers saw ghosts at the opera house." And even if they felt strongly enough to do that the odds that the administrators would be willing to throw away months of their own work & cancel with the other locations (where nothing was seen) which would have put many hours of work preparing for the students is so minute as to be inconcievable. The only way the field trips would be stopped half-way through the week is if there was a verified threat. Say the school found out that the figures seen were found to have guns on them & arrested but their motive was unclear. So either something happened that the students were not made aware of or you are blowing smoke up our rear ends.
geetha50 (15 stories) (986 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-25)
Some options here:
(1) Like Rook said, a prank was pulled by the staff there. (But one problem with this is that: why would the teachers not talk about it and cancel the trips?)

(2) I think the teachers saw what the students did but got scared themselves and didn't want to show it to the students. Also, about cancelling future trips, I think they wanted to prevent it from happening again and at least from have the seniors talk about it to the younger ones and have them look for the ghost.
AndreaRC (12 stories) (31 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-25)
Salem Mass. Would be what you're thinking about peter. Salem OR is kind of unknown though we do have quite a bit of history also. I figure most people would lean toward the prank idea but a few things rule that out that I should've mentioned;
One,the amount of tine between sightings-upper deck and lower stage-was too short for the same exact thing to be there and then there.
Two, the adults, its difficult to explain, but the reactions they had were genuine. Which is heresy but nobody was calm and joking. It was pretty serious.
Three,those art weeks were annual in the fourth grade classes, but now they aren't. They were cancelled after that day, we didn't even get to finish the rest of our art week at that place as was planned.
rookdygin (24 stories) (4458 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-25)
anneke8,

I the Salem you are thinking of is in Massachusetts. I believe the O/P experience takes place in an Opera House in Salem Oregon.

Respectfully,

Rook
Petersspirit (4 stories) (144 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-24)
Hello AndreaRC,

What does sound strange to me is that the teachers wouldent even talk about this while atleast some of them had seen what you guy's saw! Or perhaps they were not able to see it since I understand you were all still very young at that time, and they being adults not longer possessed the ability. Anyway, thank you for sharing.

Greetings:
Peter
Nysa (4 stories) (685 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-24)
I would lean towards believing someone at the opera house got a good laugh scaring the students. I wish we went to such fun places when I was in school.
anneke8 (10 stories) (274 posts)
 
12 years ago (2012-01-24)
I agree with Rook, it could have been a prank someone pulled. But then again, it could be not...
I heard a lot about Salem. It is one of the most haunted places on earth as far as I know. With a history of witches and other legends. Can you tell us more Andrea?
rookdygin (24 stories) (4458 posts)
+2
12 years ago (2012-01-24)
I enjoyed this story but I must admit if I had been an Employee of the Opera House and I saw and heard that discussion with a tour group of children it would have been really hard to not pull a prank on them... I know that sounds mean but there is a much better chance that this was one or two individuals that did just that.

On the other hand maybe one of them was a prank and the other the Spirit of the Opera... Without more evidence there is no way to tell one way or another.

Respectfully,

Rook

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