We have had enough interaction with the Other Side –spirits both familiar to us and some yet unnamed – to suspect that there is more science than superstition to hauntings. In many cases, though, it’s simply not the science we fully understand.
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We try to emphasize to our guests that hauntings are less about Heaven and Hell – up and down – and
more about the intermingling of dimensional frequencies.
We have had hints of it for thousands of years: Pythagoras called it The Music of the Spheres …
Cosmologists, naturalists, anthropologists … while religion either elevates or condemns the unseen, the sciences, hopefully, will help us fine-tune our understanding of the invisible.
Our city’s motto is “Keep Austin Weird.” We at Austin Ghost Tours try to do the best we can to uphold that reputation. But we also place great emphasis on the truth as to WHY our city is so delightfully haunted. And we’re anxious to share those stories with anyone who will listen.
They get our attention by affecting our electronics, borrowing power from our physical bodies or even sometimes influencing our thoughts.
For a tour guest to experience the paranormal on cue is… extraordinary. There are a LOT of distractions for the brain to filter out in a city that prides itself on weirdness. People show up with high expectations! (Thanks, cable TV)
But we get our fair share of the extraordinary for a couple of reasons:
- We go to these locations on a regular basis so that the spirits there accustomed to us, and
- we try be as truthful as we can in telling their stories.
I often refer to it on tour as “the cocktail party effect” on the Other Side. They hear someone mention their name and talk about them.
Think about what is happening scientifically at that time. We, as tour guides, are telling their life story. Our guests’ imaginations are activated on that story as well. And those combined thought particles hopefully pulsate to their frequency and resonate with ours – and interaction takes place!
Sometimes that interaction can manifest in different ways to different people: as an out of place aroma, a flicker of light, an odd thought, a song from out of left field, a voice, a tug on their ponytail or coat.
ALL of these interactions happen on a regular basis on our tours and investigations. It doesn’t have to be quiet. It doesn’t have to be 3AM, the lights don’t have to be out – all of that drama that gets played out on those cable TV shows – it doesn’t happen that way.
And most importantly – and astonishing for many –when the Other Side interacts, 9 times out of 10 it isn’t frightening.
One hundred percent of the time, though, it is intriguing.
We’ve collected a number of ghost stories through the years. Some are our personal experiences, some first-hand accounts. We’ll share the facts, the conditions, the photos, the audio and even some video evidence.
The three distinct phenomena that are a haunting. This applies to the Driskill, the Texas Capital, Oakwood Cemetery and more. Neill-Cochran Museum served as a hospital for Union soldiers after the Civil War. Sometimes, former patients become restless. Or they want quiet. Or they lash out in pain.
Three Most Common Forms of a Haunting
Movement of Objects
Not just physical objects such as keys, bar stools and the like. Easy things for spirits to manipulate are plumbing and electricity. Common stories we hear about involve flickering lights, unexplained power outages or fresh batteries drained to empty…toilets flush by themselves or faucets turn on and off on their own.
- Phantom Aromas
An out-of-place aroma. A floral scent that wafts past you … tobacco in a non-smoking facility … or the smell of decay – all are signs of possible ghostly activity.
- Dimensional Shift
A creeping sensation you get when the hair on the back of your neck or your arms stands up. Oftentimes, that sensation signifies a dimensional shift is about to happen or is happening.
Other ways:
Sometimes an example of the way spirits work through you is if you find yourself coughing unexpectedly, or if you have a pain in a certain part of your body that doesn’t make sense. This house used to serve as an infirmary and surgery for Union soldiers, so oftentimes on our investigations, participants will begin to exhibit sympathy pains for what the men went through, perhaps when they were at death’s door.
As we wrapped up an investigation with everyone sitting around the dining room table one night, a guest whined that she was disappointed that she wasn’t presented with PROOF that the Neil Cochran House Museum was haunted, when a powered-down camera 2 feet away from her suddenly jumped back to life, turning itself on and adjusting the focus on its own. She quickly changed her mind.
Pay attention at that point because something extraordinary is taking place. Heighten your observation skills, listen carefully to what’s going on around you, and be aware of any unusual out-of-place aromas. Use all your senses – and you may surprise yourself. Despite what Hollywood, TV shows or even Stephen King novels may describe, you may find yourself experiencing a haunting – and facing it with absolute calm and curiosity.
History of the Neill-Cochran Museum:
This building was built by master builder Abner Cook. Many of Abner’s buildings still stand today. The restaurant along 5th street formerly known as Carmello’s… the entire 900 block of Congress Avenue … Pease Mansion… the Governor’s Mansion. In fact, where you stand now? It’s a somewhat miniature replica of the Governor’s Mansion.
Here is the home’s history – a listing of who occupied it through the years. Abner designed and built the house in 1855 as a suburban estate many years before the surrounding area was settled by other homes and businesses. It was built for Washington and Mary Hill, although they never occupied it. In 1856, it was leased to the Texas Institute for the Blind, currently known as the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, to serve as its first home until Abner Cook finished the school’s campus across town.[1]
Subsequently, the House was leased by Lt. Governor Fletcher Stockdale and, it is believed, former Provisional Governor Andrew J. Hamilton. At the end of the Civil War, Federal troops converted the House into a hospital. General George Armstrong Custer was stationed in Austin during Reconstruction, occupying the blind school and, no doubt, visit the Neill–Cochran House.
In 1876, the home was sold to Colonel Andrew Neill, a Confederate veteran. Neill lived there with his wife Jennie Chapman Neill, who stayed on after Neill’s death and in 1893 rented the home to Judge Thomas Beauford Cochran.
Cochran purchased the home outright in 1895 for his family and expanded and modernized the home. In 1958, the Cochran family sold the property to The National Society of the Colonial Dames of America in The State of Texas. The NSCDA operates the home today as a historic house museum. The Neill–Cochran House Museum is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Texas Historical Commission landmark.
What this history DOESN’T tell you – are the spirits who remain today.
The spirits whose disembodied voices still whisper behind ordinary conversation. Who was it who chided a groundskeeper moments after he bragged to another volunteer that he didn’t believe in ghosts. Then they heard a crash, and rushed inside to find a mirror that had hung over the hearth, had been flipped right-side up and smashed in the center of the room. If it had simply fallen, it would have landed closer to the fireplace and landed face down…would it not?
Which mischievous spirit waits until someone is in the basement, then rings the back doorbell, forcing that person to leave the basement, find no one at the door, then finds the basement door locked?
Bells, knocking – you may hear these things tonight. Something may drop from a shelf, or going through any photos, you may see balls of light, streaks or a dark mass.
A great many of Abner Cook’s buildings contain paranormal activity.
Here at the Neil Cochran House,
We count knocking, disembodied voices and Electronic Voice Phenomena or EVP’s as “movement of objects” because in a way, the spirit is manipulating sound energy to communicate.
Ghost Tours try to do the best we can to uphold that reputation. But we also place great emphasis on the truth as to WHY our city is so delightfully haunted.
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