The Old School Spook
They were all Kutztown University students. Al, Dale and Dan remain friends now that they have graduated from the university, and to this day not one of them can find an answer to questions that continue to hang over their heads since their Kutztown days.

At least one of them, Dan, has continued to seek answers. He has done extensive research into the building in which their experience took place. Dale and Al tried a Ouija board.

Nothing.

Only the episodes of fear and mystery they experienced in their junior and senior years at Kutztown are without question.

Al had the first encounter at the 1892 Kutztown Public School building on Whiteoak St., a building which now houses the Kutztown Area Historical Society.

"I took a walk off campus," Al said, "and wound up at the old school building.

"I saw on the front steps and I immediately started feeling really bad about the place. I don't know why. I'm not a psychic or anything, but I said to the friend with me that we should leave. So, we walked away, down the street.

"Well, we walked past a church, and at that point I had a strange feeling. It was like my face was being pulled back. It is difficult to explain. I got nervous and told my buddy about it. He said he felt something, too, but neither of us said much more.

" A couple of weeks later, he and I decided to address our fears and go back. So, we started out on the step and went around the building counterclockwise. We almost made a full circle when I looked up and saw what looked like a lady.

"There were no actual facial details, but it was more like a Hollywood stereotypical ghost. I looked at it, turned to my friend and asked him if he saw it. He said he did and I said, 'let's get out of here.'"

Al and his friend left in great haste. They returned several times to perform the same little ritual and have had no more sightings, not even any strange feelings.

The vision in the window was seen in an instant, but Al remembered well the details. She looked to be young, he recalled, with long hair. She was thing and willowy and dressed in white.

The young men elicited the aid of friends who would hopefully not scoff at their stories and help find answers to their questions.

Those questions were simple, yet the answers were elusive. Did they really see the form of the young woman in the window? What was the strange sensation that swept over Al? What did it all mean?

One friend was Kathy, who, they said, "has the gift."

One evening, Kathy accompanied the young men to the old schoolhouse. She walked to within about ten paces from the window in which the ghostly figure was seen and had to retreat in fear.

She said she felt a wall of icy air and had a bad feeling about the place. Her body vividly reflected the numbing chill, and she was obviously moved by the experience. She claimed that the spirits of children continued to romp in an eternal recess in the yard of the old school.

So confused and confounded by their experiences were the students that they resorted to a Ouija board, which "told" them that the ghost in the window was named "Elaine," and was a young woman who died after losing money on the school grounds. They money was to be used to buy prescription drugs vital to her life. After losing the money at the school and not having the prescription filled on time, she (according to the Ouija board) was doomed to "haunt" the old school building.

The students have mixed emotions about the credibility of the Ouija board, but there is an interesting postscript to the message from the planchette.

Following the consultation of the Ouija, they happened to visit the open house at the Historical society, which maintains a small museum in the old school.

Strangely enough, surrounding the window at which the ghostly woman was seen, is an extensive exhibit of pharmaceuticals and equipment used in drug stores years ago.

As they stood, looking at the display and relating it to the Ouija board's strange conclusion, Al, Dale and Dan each felt a certain weakness and unexplainable pressure on their bodies. They looked at each other knowingly, and slowly walked away.