McPike Mansion, Alton, IL
McPike Mansion is a 135 year-old home located in Alton, IL. It has not been occupied for over 50 years and is in need of considerable restoration. Sharyn Luedke, the owner of the mansion, also believes the house is haunted.

Impressions from McPike Mansion by a sensitive investigator:

While sitting outside of the house, John and I went into a meditative state and got some very similar visual images of the house and its inhabitants. Neither of us knew, at the time, that the other was even trying to "get anything." We both saw the house as it would have looked in its prime. We were greeted at the front door by a young girl and, from the descriptions we each gave, it seemed to be the same girl. She had her hair pulled back tight on the top and sides, with bangs in the front and ringlet curls in back. To me, she looked to be about 12 years old. We both saw her dressed in a white, high-necked blouse and dark-colored jumper-type dress. She took me into the house throught the front door and showed me around a parlor/sitting room off to the right of the entryway. She was the only person I saw inside the house, but I could hear others in other rooms and upstairs. I got the impression that there was at least one servant in the kitchen and one or more people upstairs. I asked the girl her name and heard what sounded like Amy.

John had a very similar experience except that he saw another little girl who was younger, as well. John heard the name Emily, but we don't know which girl that name belonged to. I asked "Amy" if there was anyone outside in the backyard and she took me to a back door and said her Grandfather was out there. She said, "That's Grandpa. He's always out there!" There was an older gentleman there. He was dressed in white shirt, black pants and some type of black vest. Nothing fancy -- he was carefully tending to plants and bushes along a section of white picket fence. I saw a beautiful garden area with many different types of plants - bushes, flowers, trees, vegetables, etc. It was gorgeous. Later in the evening, I was told that the original owner had been a horticulturist.

I got another very strong impression when people were telling stories about past paranormal experiences in the house. Someone was talking about a mist that would appear in the cellar and that a smell was always associated with this. As soon as that was said, I picked up a very strong lilac smell and said "lilacs" to John. Just after I said it, the person telling the story said that they would smell lilacs and that, because of the smell, they thought this must be a female entity. I was immediately struck with the thought that it was not a female at all, but that it was the original owner and that he was trying to "give" the lilacs, which he had carefully tended and grown, to the ladies. I felt that there must not have been any men present when this mist and the lilac smell would show up. Later, I asked Sharyn and the other ladies about this and they recalled that there had been only women present each time this had happened. As Sharyn and I were discussing it, she picked up a very strong wave of the lilac smell again, right then. We were out in the woods behind the house at the time and a few other people picked up on the smell as well. There had been no floral smell at all, until I presented my theory about the lilacs being presented to the ladies by a somewhat flirtatious Mr. McPike. There were no flowering plants nearby, that we could see. Within a minute or two, the smell was gone. To us, this seemed like a confirmation of the impressions I was reporting to Sharyn about the origins of the lilac smell in the cellar.

The overall impression that we got is that the spirits present in the house are not there due to any trauma or tragedy, but that they stay because it is their home and they are quite happy there.

back