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Big Noise In Scarborough

 

This story took place in Scarborough, a part of Toronto, in the mid-1990s.

We lived in a storey-and-a-half house that backed on to a cemetery. I'm not suggesting that's relevant. It's just a fact. The house was built around 1949.

This happened when we're doing renovations on the second floor and remodeling the kitchen.

I had an office in the basement of the house. My wife worked upstairs. On the main floor between us we had a living room that contained some Mission-style furniture, including a large double-doored glass bookcase. One weekday around 6:30 pm in late summer, I heard a loud crash above me, just where the bookcase was located. More than just an indistinct noise, I heard the impact that a heavy bookcase would make if it toppled over and the resulting crash of the glass vases on top of it. I heard the glass breaking and heard the scratch of glass shards skittering out across the floor in the direction one might expect through the ceiling above me.

Thinking my wife might have been injured I ran upstairs and asked if she was OK. At the same time, she ran downstairs and asked if I was OK. She described hearing the same noise, expecting it was the bookcase, but the bookcase stood exactly where it was expected to.

A thorough search of the house revealed nothing had fallen. There was no room within the lath-and-plaster walls for anything to have fallen there either. Checked outside, checked the roof, checked the knee wall crawlspaces on the second floor. Nothing. We spent probably an hour looking for a cause and found absolutely nothing relevant. More puzzled than frightened, we gave up.

The next day, I drove my wife to have dinner with her mother. Returned home at 6:15 pm. I started working in the basement office and at about 6:45 pm, heard a complete repeat of the occurrence from the evening before. A massive crash, same sound of breaking glass, same spread of glass across the wooden floor. I went upstairs to find everything where it should be. A similarly thorough search of the house, both inside and out, revealed nothing.

I'll admit the second occurrence unsettled me, but we never heard a disturbance this loud again.

There was one additional oddball sound, however. When we walked across the bathroom threshold on the main floor, we would often hear what we called the "Star Trek" noise. It sounded a bit like the transporter from the original TV series. We could not reproduce it at will and we had no idea what caused it. After hearing it one day, I remember being determined to figure out how to reproduce it. I crossed the threshold literally hundreds of times to learn how to make it happen - and it wouldn't. My wife was watching me, and laughing at my effort. I finally gave up and walked across the threshold to leave the bathroom one last time - and we heard the noise once again! I repeated exactly that same footfall in the same direction another 20 times: nothing!

This never unsettled us. It was just amusing.

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Comments about this paranormal experience

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, Squeez-A-Snak, has the following expectation about your feedback: I will read the comments and participate in the discussion.

CrimsonTopaz (1 stories) (239 posts)
 
2 years ago (2022-12-29)
Squeez-A-Snak
Star trek (not star streak) I missed that error. Sry folks.
CrimsonTopaz (1 stories) (239 posts)
 
2 years ago (2022-12-29)
Squeez-A-Snak, I'm not sure if you're still replying to comments, but have you figured out what's making the noise. Could it be possible that the neighbours were moving things around and dropped something. (I can't remember what the star streak transporter sounds like without googling - but I do enjoy watching the odd star trek movie.)
I enjoyed reading about your situation and thanks for sharing.
Manafon1 (7 stories) (722 posts)
+4
2 years ago (2022-12-01)
Hi Squeez-a-snak--I found your account very interesting and have read, in psychical research case studies, of similar loud crashing sounds that have no identifiable source of origin. In some instances, paranormal sounds can be an audial replay of some past event. Many years ago, I lived in a very haunted apartment and once heard what sounded like a bunch of metal parts being strewn just underneath the second-floor porch where I was sitting. When I looked, there was a figure of a heavy-set man wearing a butcher's apron standing there. Long story short, the figure vanished in the time it took me to tell the person sitting with me that I had seen a "person."

It's possible in my case that the sound was there simply to get my attention so I'd see the figure, but unlike me, after you heard the loud crash, you didn't see an apparition. Of course, sometimes spirits are satisfied just getting a person's attention through sound. Thanks for sharing your intriguing account.
Kindly_refrain (16 stories) (196 posts)
+4
2 years ago (2022-11-10)
Similar to the fruit going missing I have an odd experience from 25 years ago.
We live in a rural location and had a large pond dug on our property some 10 years before this incident. Bull rushes (cat tails for some) began to grow at one end of the pond. They had multiplied rapidly over only a few years and I was a little concerned that they would overtake too much of the pond.
One evening, at just about sunset, I attempted to pull out a few of them but could not budge the roots from the clay bottom.
I gave up.
The next morning, as I glanced at the pond, I saw to my amazement that all of the bull rushes (over one hundred plants) had been pulled out and were laying scattered at the water's edge.
I never figured this one out.
lady-glow (16 stories) (3197 posts)
+3
2 years ago (2022-11-07)
Hi Squeez.

It's nice that you're able to give the "boy" a piece of his childhood.

Very strange for the pears to vanish that way. I know that sour fruit makes the best jam and pies, but thieves would have left some evidence of their presence. I wonder what use spirit/s would have for a crop of nasty-tasting fruit. Definitely a "what the heck did happen" experience.
Squeez-A-Snak (1 stories) (2 posts)
+3
2 years ago (2022-11-06)
Hi Rajine,

We had lived in the house for three or four years before the bookcase incident. The threshold noise was ongoing. We lived in the house for roughly 10 years in total. Later moved to a much older home, with an interesting history, and no strange incidents.
Squeez-A-Snak (1 stories) (2 posts)
+4
2 years ago (2022-11-06)
Thanks, lady-glow!

While renovating we actually found a signature of a 4-year-old child on one of the studs behind the sink in the bathroom, followed by his and his mother's name, dated 1953. We located him and cut out that section of the stud to give to him. His mother had passed away years later, but not at that house. No additional deaths reported.

No peculiar feelings associated with the Star trek sound.

The only other odd occurrence in that house occurred just on the other side of the fence at our neighbours' place. They had a pear tree that produced nasty-tasting pears, while our tree, directly beside it, contained sweet Bartletts. Both trees were laden with fruit when we went to bed. The next morning EVERY last pear was removed from their tree - there wasn't a core or a mouthful left on the ground. No broken branches or twigs. Like the pears just vanished. Our tree was completely untouched.

The neighbours blamed thieves, but I have no doubt that if there were pear thieves, they would have taken some of ours. If animals had eaten them, I would have expected a mess. When raccoons occasionally stole some of ours, they would fight over them -  loudly. And they would always leave a mess.
Rajine (14 stories) (904 posts)
+3
2 years ago (2022-11-06)
Hi Squeez-A-Snak

I'd just wanted to find out, how long have you been living in this house before you and your wife started experiencing this? And did it still continue afterwards, my guess is it could be a passing spirit perhaps.
lady-glow (16 stories) (3197 posts)
+4
2 years ago (2022-11-03)
Welcome to YGS.

This is an interesting experience. It is known that renovations to a house can trigger paranormal activity, perhaps it's the way departed residents of a place are making known their disapproval to the changes made to "their" home without asking for their opinion.
Do you know if someone passed away in the house?

"When we walked across the bathroom threshold on the main floor, we would often hear what we called the "Star Trek" noise. It sounded a bit like the transporter from the original TV series."

Did you feel anything while hearing the noise? It is common for people to report a staticky sound during a paranormal encounter.

Perhaps some lost souls moved from the cemetery to your place, maybe a previous resident was trying to get your attention, regardless, I'm sure your wife wasn't the only one having a laugh watching you walk on the same spot over and over again.

Thanks for sharing.

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