"Sharing
Huntington's History, One Ghost Story at a Time"
Lavina's Story
.
Investigation
Location:
Dr.
Grimes Dental Office (3rd Visit)
Huntington,
West Virginia.
November 2011
*Allows Public
Ghost Hunting*
*NEW INFORMATION*
Information:
The story of Lavina, the
little girl ghost that haunts the office of Dr.
William Grimes has become something that legends are
made of here in our town. A sweet innocent child,
stricken with appendicitis, her life was cut too
short. This child's spirit, perhaps scared and
confused is left to linger in between this world and
the next for eternity...
This story alone sounds
haunting enough, but recently we have discovered
some new and shocking information on the infamous
"little ghost girl" of Dr. Grimes office, Lavina.
Thanks to a little
detective work by HPIR Research Manager, Theresa,
and a visit to Lavina's grave by HPIR Founders
Melissa & Dustin, we have found out much more about
Lavina's life and death.
Below is the information
Theresa has provided in order for us to share
I've always wanted to
write that! Well, I finally get a chance, as I do
have some somewhat shocking news when it comes to a
most well-beloved case of paranormal activity here
in the tri-state.
In 2007, Huntington Paranormal was still a fairly
new group, and was eagerly exploring some of
Huntington's most famous haunted locations. One of
these locations was the dental office of Dr. William
Grimes, located along 20th Street. The story
reported by Dr. Grimes to
WV Ghosts consisted of tales about a little
ghost girl named Lavina who haunted the turn of the
century duplex he had bought in 1973. Lavina lived
in the former duplex with her mother and older
sister. However, before moving to Huntington from
Ohio, Lavina took care of the youngest child in the
family, an infant, while her mother and older sister
worked as waitresses to support themselves, and save
up enough money to leave an abusive father. A house
fire killed the young baby that Lavina took such
loving care of, and the mother moved to the former
duplex turned dental office with her two remaining
daughters.
Shortly after, Lavina, who was about 11-13 years
old, died in the home of appendicitis. It is said
that she never got over the death of her baby
sister. This information came from an informant
known as Mrs. Andre. Sightings of a ghostly girl
matching Mrs. Andre's description have been spotted,
and even been picked up on by sensitives. Data
collected by various groups seemed to support the
story. Dr. Grimes even has a portrait of the sad
looking little girl who appeared to him on the
staircase. After painting her portrait, apparitions
tended to fade away, but she is still said to be
felt in the home, and loves to interact with
children who come to visit.
HPIR did two investigations in 2007 of the office;
the first in
May and the second in
October, when we were called back because
activity had seemingly increased. From my
understanding, at the time of our May investigation,
we were the only group that had been in to
investigate since a group from Marshall in the
1980s. Both investigations did yield a plethora of
personal experiences, as well as EVPs and strange
EMF readings that could not be explained...even by a
fuse box that was later changed due to the high
amount of EMF it was putting out! (Click the links
above to see investigation results and listen to the
EVPs.) The level of activity and the interesting
history landed this location on the number one spot
of our Top 10 Most Haunted in the Tri-State list!
Fast-forward to October 2011.
Clint and Judy of WTCR 103.3 FM decided to do an
overnight investigation, and live broadcast from a
haunted location in Huntington to celebrate
Halloween. Dr. Grimes' office was chosen, and HPIR
was contacted to appear live on the broadcast. I
was the lucky one who was off work that day, and
able to make a guest appearance...but also managed
to set up an additional investigation for the
following month. Since HPIR has several new members
and lots of new equipment that we didn't have in
2007, I thought this would be the perfect time to
contact "Livvie" again, as she was dubbed by a
visiting sensitive.
In order to prepare for the big event, I started
doing some heavy research into the lives of the
former occupants, and found something sort of
shocking: Lavina Wall's TRUE identity!
According to an official death certificate, with
supporting information from various federal census
reports and other sources, Lavina G. Wall was born
on September 7, 1908 in Lawrence County, Ohio to
parents Cyrus Kemp Wall and Bernice Rodger Wall.
She died at the age of 21, on October 28, 1929 at
the Kessler-Hatfield Hospital, which later became
Huntington Memorial. Her occupation is listed as
"dressmaker." The primary cause of death is listed
as "gastro-enteritis acute" caused by "poison
liquor?" This is interesting because during this
time, Prohibition was in full swing, and it was
known that the government "poisoned" industrial
liquors to make them unsafe for consumption...but
they were stolen and sold as drinkable liquor
anyway. I'm assuming that the addition of the
question mark to the cause means that it was not
verified that this was a contributory cause or not.
Another interesting side note: on an HPIR
investigation, the overwhelming smell of peaches was
observed in Lavina's former bedroom. After
searching in vain and finding nothing to account for
the smell, it died away as quickly as it had come.
During this time of Prohibition, cyanide was one of
the poisons added to make liquor un-drinkable.
Peach pits contain cyanide.
In any event, Lavina was buried in Locust Grove
Cemetery in Lawrence County Ohio. Her death
certificate states that she was buried on October
30, 1929. However, her death notice in the
Huntington Advertiser, dated October 31, said she
was buried on THAT date, after a funeral at
Pilgrim's Holiness Church, on the corner of 20th
Street and 9th Avenue. A death notice from the same
paper the day before (October 30) states that Miss
Wall died following a brief illness, but another
notice, from the morning edition of the paper on
October 30 stated that Miss Wall died from
complications following a fall two weeks earlier.
Strange, huh?
Various death notices also listed Miss Wall as being
survived by both parents, two brothers, and two
sisters. There is no mention of the death of a baby
sister. However, there's no record proving that a
baby DIDN'T exist, either. The 1910 census shows
the family living in Windsor Township, in Lawrence
County, Ohio. By the 1920 census, the family is
living in a rental property in Wethersfield,
Illinois. By this point, 11 year old Lavina has two
younger siblings...a sister named Irma who is six,
and a brother Carter, who is 9. Older siblings
include Alice and Virgil, both present on both the
1910 and the 1920 census.
By the 1930 census, the father seems to have
disappeared, and the mother is living in Huntington
with Carter, Irma, and a boarder named Alice
Holley. She is working as a seamstress to provide
for her two teenage children. The Social Security
Death Index indicates that Bernice Wall died on
October 6, 1972 in Los Angeles, CA, after presumably
moving there to be near her son, Virgil. (At the
time of Lavina's death, Virgil was listed in the
death notice as living in LA).
Further research is still being conducted on the
home itself, on the Wall family, and of course, on
the death of an infant in later years. As
additional information is found, cross-referenced
and verified, it will be added. We are still
exploring the possibility that there was another
Lavina who lived in the house, but at that time,
there is no death record for her listed at the state
archives. Thanks for reading, and please visit
HPIR's site to find out more about our
investigations into this case!
UPDATE: November12, 2011: Information HAS been
found that may lend some integrity to the original
story! Full details will be disclosed at a later
date!
UPDATE November 28, 2011: Additional information
has been compiled and it seems as if we were in fact
able to debunk the story related by Mrs. Andre. For
part 2 of Lavina's True Story, please see below.
Several weeks ago,
Theresa's Haunted History of the Tri-State brought
you the story of Lavina G. Wall, the girl believed
to be at the center of the Dr. Grimes' dental office
haunting. Lavina G. Wall was said to have
died around the age of 11 from appendicitis, not
long after the death of her baby sister in a fire
while living in Ohio. This information regarding
the little ghost girl named Lavina was related to
Dr. Grimes by a family member of Lavina's named Mrs.
Andre. Apparitions, EVPs, and even psychic
impressions over the years by staff, patients, and
paranormal investigation teams have all
seemingly backed up this story. The presence of a
little girl thought to be Lavina, and another little
girl, believed to be her sister, and named Sarah,
according to a psychic impression, have become so
well-loved and prevalent at the site, that a shrine
to them has been set up in the upstairs bedroom
where she was believed to have died. Visitors leave
toys and other trinkets in the closet for the girls,
because it is believed that is the area where they
feel the safest.
Since that original story, there have been a few
more breakthroughs in the quest to find out the
truth of Lavina's identity.
On November 7, 2011, I conducted a title search on
the property, which yielded very few new pieces of
information. There is no record of a house being on
the property prior to 1909, but we do believe it
could have been there as early as 1901, and its
first sale was recorded in 1909. The former duplex
was ALWAYS a duplex, until it was purchased by Dr.
Grimes in the 1970s...but it was also always a
rental property owned by one owner who rented it out
to two different families. In 1929, the year Lavina
died, the owner of the home was listed as a Thomas
Mannon. Thomas Mannon, who lived on 6th Avenue,
passed away on March 27, 1929. He willed the
property to his offspring, which was "managed" by
son, Homer Mannon. Homer Mannon was the owner of
the property at the time of Lavina's death in
October of 1929, and interestingly enough, was also
a dentist! The 1930 census, which lists Lavina's
mother as head of the household, has the Wall family
(minus the father and older siblings) and a boarder
living at 1125 20th St. An elderly widow, Mrs.
Elvira Reffitt, lived in the adjoining apartment,
1125 1/2 20th. St.
On November 12, 2011, even more information was
uncovered as HPIR president, Melissa Stanley, and
Dustin Stanley, located Lavina's tombstone. Lavina
is buried in Locust Grove Cemetery in Lawrence
County, Ohio. Along with Lavina, several other
tombstones were found. The first one belongs to her
father, Cyrus Kemp(er) Wall, aka C.K. Wall. He died
in 1952. Another tombstone was for Lavina's little
brother, Irvin F. Wall. Irvin Franklin Wall was
born on September 28, 1912, and died on December 29,
1913.
The next grave that was found is the most
interesting. The grave of Shirley V. Wall who died
in 1917 at the age of 7 months lies right along with
the rest of the Wall family. At the time of this
infant's death, Lavina would have been around nine
years old. The two younger siblings found here were
born and died in between census years, and records
for them have been hard to find. At this point, it
is unknown if Shirley V. Wall died in a fire as
stated by the Mrs. Andre discussed in an earlier
post or not...research is still being
conducted. Initially it was thought that this piece
of information regarding Shirley could lend
credibility to the Mrs. Andre story. The baby would
have died when Lavina was approximately the right
age listed in the story, and she did have an older
sister. The information regarding the father not
living with the family in 1930 also lends
verification to the part of the story concerning the
idea that he was an alcoholic that the family was
trying to get away from.
HPIR conducted its third investigation of the
property on November 26, 2011. While setting up our
equipment, the information we had gathered thus far
was presented to Dr. Grimes. Dr. Grimes believed
that the Lavina we found was a DIFFERENT Lavina than
the one that is haunting the property and who was
discussed by Mrs. Andre. However, he did provide us
with a copy of Mrs. Andre's obituary, which provided
some excellent genealogical clues.
The Mrs. Andre who originally told the story of
Lavina to Dr. Grimes was born Harriet Lay Foreman.
If we could find a link to Mrs. Andre and the Lavina
G. Wall that WE found, then we could possibly debunk
the original story...and yup---we did find the
connection. Mrs. Harriet Lay Foreman Andre was
related to Lavina, but only by marriage. The
information we were given by Dr. Grimes stated that
Mrs. Andre had an aunt who's daughter died on the
property. The truth is......Cyrus Kemper (C.K.) Wall, Lavina's dad, had a
sister named Ruth. In 1900, Cyrus was living with
his older sister in Lawrence County, Ohio. Two
years later, Ruth married a man named Loren Wilson
Andre in Huntington, WV. In 1910, Ruth and Loren
had a son, whom they named Loyd W. Andre. Loyd W.
Andre would go on to marry Harriet Lay Foreman. It
is unknown exactly where Harriet received her
information, presumably from her husband or her
mother-in-law, Ruth. It is also unknown as to how
and why exactly the information got so mixed up
along the way.
At this point, we cannot say there couldn't be
another Lavina. However, there is no other Lavina
in Harriet Andre's genealogy that I can find, and
since the property was a rental where records of
tenants were scarce, we cannot verify that there was
never another Lavina who lived on the property,
despite the unlikelihood. We do, however, believe
that there is potentially a little girl ghost or
two, as well as several other entities, as there are
plenty of personal experiences, EVPs, and other
circumstantial evidences pointing in that
direction. As serious investigators, though, we
must look first and foremost at what evidence can be
gathered through use of the scientific method and
backed up by historical documentation.
Unfortunately, the historical research, nor hard
science have been able to prove that the girl in
question IS Lavina...she could simply be some other
lost soul, completely unconnected with the original
story, trying to make her story be heard.
HPIR is continuing its research into this case, and
will announce when updates are added. We are still
looking into further information on the Wall family,
but also into several other deaths that are said to
have occurred in the house. Also, as soon as the
footage and data analysis from our investigation is
complete, we'll be adding any potential evidence to
the HPIR page. Melissa Stanley, group president and
founder, has created a hauntingly beautiful video
compilation for Lavina and possibly the unknown
little ghost girl seen and felt by so many. The
video can be found on our investigation page, linked
to below, or on our YouTube page, also linked below.
This case is another example of how Huntington
Paranormal just doesn't tell Huntington's history
one ghost story at a time...we also give a voice to
those who can no longer speak for themselves.
Information above has been backed up and
cross-referenced wherever applicable. Supporting
documents, including, but not limited to, birth
certificates, death certificates, census records,
and newspaper clippings can be made available upon
request.
Up until just recently, I had
only really concentrated on
Lavina, as she was the main
suspected entity and there was
so much controversy surrounding
her death. However, I've
recently also started exploring
some other aspects of the
original history we were told.
One such example is the story of
a baby girl drowning in the
bathtub at the house. We were
originally told that Dr. Grimes
had spoken to a woman who lived
nearby who told him the story of
a mother who had left her baby
in the bathtub, and returned to
find the infant dead. She took
the infant across the street to
a doctor's office, but it was
too late.
We weren't sure of an exact
year, but thought it happened in
the 60s. Luckily, a neighbor
who witnessed the event was
found, and said this event
happened in 1955. Going on just
that alone, I searched
individual death certificates
through the WV State Archives
website until I found one that
matched the description.
Ten month old Carla Dianna
Taylor drowned at 1121 20th
Street in May of 1955. A
newspaper article confirmed the
story, and provided additional
details that matched the
original story. However, the
main concern was the
address...1121 is next door to
Dr. Grimes' office, but its too
big of a coincidence not to take
note!
I have transcribed the newspaper
article for future researchers
through GenDisasters, and will
post a link to it below. Now,
comes the daunting task of
trying to find out if there is
any substance to the alleged
newspaper article about a man
named John hanging himself at
the location!
After HPIR's third
investigation here, is safe to say that Dr. Grimes
Office never disappoints us. This building by far
has been the most consistently active place we have
ever investigated. Our team has some of the best de-bunkers
(if we do say so ourselves), and when our hard-core
skeptics start scratching their heads, then
something really must be up.
On our third
investigation, thumps and bangs coming from empty
rooms was fairly frequent throughout the night. At
one point it sounded like one of our fellow team
members was walking toward us from down the hallway.
We heard several distinct footsteps coming our way,
when they stopped, we called out to ask who was in
the hall and our question was met with complete
silence. While sitting in the "Music room" as we
dubbed it due to a collection of musical
instruments, two investigators heard a clear male
voice speak in a loud whisper in two separate
instances.
Other team members
reported feeling uneasy in Lavina's room, and
several reported getting cold chills. The team
members who were investigating in Lavina's room also
reported hearing footsteps and hearing an
unidentifiable voice. The normal EMF levels in
Lavina's room would light up the first two green
lights on the KII, in certain spots of the room. While
the meter was sitting in front of the closet with a
steady single light on, we had
several full KII meter spikes that appeared very
random. This closet has basically become a shrine,
of sorts, to the children that are believed to haunt
the house. A medium once told Dr. Grimes that the
little girls would hide inside, so toys and such
have been left inside the closet for the children.
We also used the
"Singapore Theory" quite heavily on this
investigation, we brought a number of items we felt
were relevant to this investigation and the period
of time in which Lavina and her family lived in the
home. HPIR has incorporated this theory into a
number of investigations. If you are unfamiliar with
this theory, Theresa has an excellent write up of
the
Singapore Theory on
her website.
We also were able
to successfully re-create an alleged paranormal
occurrence that was captured by another team who
previously investigated this location. Our exact
replication of this occurrence really proves the
importance for paranormal investigators to always
double check, analyze and when possible attempt to
debunk your own findings. You should always be your
own biggest critic.
Investigation
Results:
This is the first disembodied male
whisper heard by two investigators and
caught on audio, you will hear it
immediately as the audio begins to play
simultaneously while one investigator is
speaking . It is very soft, use
headphones to
listen
This
is the second time we hear a male
whisper that was caught on
audio, around 5 seconds. It is very soft, use headphones to listen.
This
is a loud bang that was heard while we
were investigating, this happened with a
a couple of minutes after the second
time the male disembodied voice was
heard. The bang happens at the exact
same time one investigator beings saying
"I don't", she stops speaking as she
hears the bang.
This
whisper was picked up while we were
discussing Lavina and the possibility of
a child haunting the building. The
whisper can be heard about 3 seconds in.
Additional Investigation
results are also pending review of audio and video
recordings. Be sure to check back soon! Also
check out our two previous investigations at Dr.
Grimes Office.
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Paranormal Investigations & Research. Please
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