Written by: Janet Pope

Photography by: Donald

A Tale of Two Lodgings

Choices, choices, choices! Aren't we lucky that in our world of multi-options, we as travelers have so many more choices than in years passed. The travel industry has broadened to include something for everyone. Recently, while touring Connecticut, we had the opportunity to experience two distinct accommodations, both of which, were wonderful and worth the trip.

About 10 minutes from the lure of slot machines at Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut, is a Bed and Breakfast (B&B) vaguely reminiscent of the cottage of the Seven Dwarfs. With lots of exposed wooden beams, smaller-sized doors and intimate nooks and crannies, Homespun Farm hearkens the guest back to another time and place.The house, built in the 1700s, is filled to the proverbial rafters with antiques and knick knacks, forming a collage of sights and memories. Every wall and every corner has been transformed into an artistic display through the decorating touches and hard work of the innkeepers, Kate and Ron Bauer. They purchased the colonial-era farmhouse in 1996 and did an extensive history of the property, discovering that they are in essence only the second family to occupy the home. Originally built in 1740, by Simon Brewster, a direct descendant of The Mayflower Brewsters, the home stayed in one family for over 250 years! Now that's a legacy worth preserving. The property had a large fruit orchard and a dairy farm for more than 200 years, but unfortunately the farm was sold at an auction in 1991 by the Brewster family. After five years of abandonment, the Bauers moved in and began to work their magic.

When walking through the house, the first time visitor literally doesn't know where to look first. Like a candy store to a child, this home is an adventure for those who love history and antiques. It was a treat just to roam around looking at old books and unique items of interest.

The attention to detail is everywhere. Kate has a special knack for combining found treasures and adding them to a room. Our bedroom had a fantasy quality, with its huge four-poster-canopy bed and fireplace. In the corner was a spinning wheel fit for Sleeping Beauty. The atmosphere whispered "relax" as we discovered little treats of candies, candles and books to read - one of which was "Love Poems" - was this a subliminal hint?

In our room, The Orchard Room, was also an antique cradle filled with period dolls, books and a silver rattle. Every corner seemed to tell a story and, of course, the house is a story in itself. There are doors everywhere you turn! The dining room alone has eight doors, and for those who are curious like myself, it's cool to check out what room or nook and cranny they all lead to, as you put together the puzzle of the building's growth through the years.

Homespun FarmPersonal and thoughtful touches were also in abundance. I got a kick out of finding little notes all around that Kate would leave for her guests. In the bathroom were not just the standard shampoo and cream rinse, but every other personal care item that you might need, including plush white robes.

In the dining room, beside the note explaining how to make yourself coffee or tea, were little extras like fresh honey for the tea and mini marshmallows for the hot cocoa.

Included each day, was a delicious full breakfast, featuring fresh eggs from the backyard hen house or French Toast served with fresh fruit. Homespun Farm is a working farm with goats, chickens and sheep and a lush garden in season.

We got a chance to retrieve some warm eggs ourselves - a fun experience for any city slicker.

If the house and the surrounding farm weren't enough of a draw on their own, this B&B is in a central location for many neighboring attractions. It is across the road from a golf course and 10 minutes away from Foxwoods. Homespun Farms is also easily accessible to Mohegan Sun, Mystic Seaport and lots of shopping! When we wanted to venture out, the innkeeper provided plenty of maps, suggestions and directions near the back door. We had a wonderful weekend taking in all of the sights and we loved the unique history and warm hospitality offered at Homespun Farms.

On our way back to New York, we discovered another great place to stay and to eat. This is where choices come into play. Though Don and I love the atmosphere of a B&B, we have many friends that look for a little more privacy, yet don't want a big slick hotel. The Bee and Thistle Inn is in Old Lyme, Connecticut and we headed for their Sunday brunch. This is an Inn with 11 guest rooms, though simpler and more austere in style, the rooms have an old world ambiance in this home dating back to 1756. We checked out a few rooms for a future stay and each was differently designed in period, with four-poster beds and some fireplaces. There was a distinctly elegant atmosphere here.

The Bee and Thistle Inn serves breakfast to their guests and is also open most nights for dinner and two days a week for afternoon tea. Our brunch was delicious and filling from start to finish. We enjoyed sipping our Mimosas as we looked out onto the extensive grounds, with a backyard trail leading to a river. We both chose the New England clam chowder, which was chock full of clams. The chef, Christopher Rydell, has a flair for both artistic presentation and combining tastes. I sampled the almond encrusted french toast with raspberry syrup and the combination of crunchy almonds and moist toast was different and delicious. Don had the beef tenderloins in a baked pastry shell, but as a side dish, loved the pistachio and raisin sausages. Again, an offering of something a little different, but flavorful. Though full from our meal and the warm sticky raisin buns, we ended this great meal with a baked pear good enough for one of Don's famous pictures. Most people take photos of scenery, Don loves to take pictures of food, displayed in such a way as to cause you to "aaahhh!" This was one of those times.

We roamed around the four diningrooms downstairs and the inviting living room area and made a mental note to come back again. The area has many art galleries and museums, as well as quaint stores in which to shop. Most guests we were told, just come here to relax - sounds good to me. So there you have it - two very distinct options to experience in Connecticut. Oh, so many places, so little time.

Published on 2/12/2001

Griswold: Once renowned for its ageless apple orchards and working dairy farm, the Brewster homestead on Route 164 was a historic local landmark long before Ron and Kate Bauer bought its colonial-era farmhouse in 1996 and turned it into a popular bed-and-breakfast inn.

Thanks to the efforts of the home's industrious new owners, its historic value has been certified. The National Park Service placed the 260-year-old farmhouse and 135 surrounding acres on the National Register of Historic Places on Dec. 28.

For the Bauers, the designation marked a triumph after more than four years of toil and expense dedicated to preserving the architectural treasure at 306 Preston Road.

"We decided to call it Homespun Farm Bed & Breakfast because we did everything here by hand," Kate Bauer, 42, recalled. "We taught ourselves how to do everything. The only work we paid someone else to do was the roof."

Located across the street from the new River Ridge Golf Course, which covers much of the rest of the original farm, the Bauers' bed-and-breakfast looks much the same as the Brewster home looked over the last 21/2 centuries. The couple bought the home and two acres in August 1996 from the Rustici family of Pawcatuck, who bought the entire farm at auction in 1991 for $695,000 and built the golf course. The home had been vacant since Laura Brewster, its last occupant, moved out shortly before the auction.

Plaster and wallpaper were peeling away, squirrels had infiltrated the walls, and the house needed a new roof. Nonetheless, it charmed the Bauers, who visited the site after the owner of another local bed-and-breakfast told them it was for sale. The couple was living in Gales Ferry at the time.

"The very first day we walked in, we knew we absolutely had to have it," Kate Bauer said. "It was in pretty tough shape, but it had this incredible feeling."

Her parents had run a bed-and-breakfast in Hawaii, and she and Ron had talked about running their own one day. They decided the Brewster farm was the home they had envisioned.

"We bought it scared to death," she said. "It was a risk because that could have been the new Home Depot for all we knew," she added, pointing across the street to the golf course. Griswold officials had sought to rezone much of the land along Route 164 for commercial use, a move that the Bauers actively opposed, and some residents had hoped to lure into town big-name stores like the Home Depot that recently opened at nearby Lisbon Landing.

Kate Bauer largely credits her husband for their decision to buy the house, despite the risks, and to take on the challenge of restoring it. Ron Bauer is 44. "He's never been afraid to do anything," she said. "He's always told me that there's nothing we can't recover from."

The couple had benefited from that attitude before, living in different parts of the country and making a living in various offbeat professions. They met in California in 1979 and worked together as truck drivers. Later, they moved to northern Idaho, got married, and hauled lumber. After Ron joined the Navy, he and Kate moved to Groton. When he was transferred to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, Kate worked at an auto parts store, and the couple earned enough from restoring and selling a British sports car to put a down payment on their first home. Ron also helped build the bed-and-breakfast that Kate's parents ran on Maui.

Those years forged the self-reliance they would need to make their new home and business in Griswold a success. It took little time for the couple to realize they had their work cut out for them.

When they moved in, the old Brewster home had no hot water and the toilet didn't flush. "We basically lived colonial style for awhile there, except that we did have electricity," Kate said. Determined, they got to work refinishing the original hardwood floors, painting the walls, fixing up the kitchen, and, of course, installing new plumbing.

"At one point, we found drain pipes that went from lead to galvanized to steel to cast iron," Kate remembered, laughing. "It was that old Yankee frugality; they made do with what they had."

Shortly after their first Thanksgiving in the house, the Bauers one day found 18 inches of water in their basement. They soon installed a sump pump.

"You really need to have a healthy sense of humor to live in a house that's 250 years old," Kate said.

In March 1998, a year-and-a-half after they bought the home, they opened the first guest room at Homespun Farm, the downstairs Orchard Room. They later opened a two-room suite called the Pear Room, in the space once used as quarters for the farmhands. The bed-and-breakfast will contain four or five rooms eventually.

The Bauers' oldest son, Nate, 20, lives in Louisiana, but Jake, 17, and Zach, 14, still live at home. "As they move out," Kate said, "we'll steal their rooms."

Throughout the house, the Bauers have preserved the original floors, walls and ceilings, the double-hung sash windows installed in the late 1800s, and antique hardware like hinges and doorknobs. They've even matched paints to the colors that years ago graced some of the walls.

Ron has built new guest beds in between his stints at sea. He fashioned one from the oak beams of an old barn on the property. Kate decorates each room, stencils the walls, and makes pillows and curtains by hand.

"It's allowed me to stay home and take care of my kids," Kate said, "but there was a time when I spent two months without leaving the house. You have so much work to do, and you don't want to miss any calls. When I finally went to the store, all I wanted to do was go back home."

During the first year of work, "in between the basement flooding," the Bauers started researching the Brewster family's history, preparing information to apply for the National Register's historic designation. The task seemed somewhat overwhelming, so they enlisted the help of a Middletown consultant and preservationist, Jan Cunningham.

In the brief history she sent to the National Park Service after 18 months of work, Cunningham traces the Brewster farm back to 1740 and its original owner, Simon Brewster, great-great-grandson of William Brewster, a founder of the Plymouth Colony who arrived on the Mayflower in 1620.

The document tells the story of each of the farm's six generations and points out the significant role the family played in the history of Griswold and dairy farming &emdash; including Elias Brewster, Simon's son, who served as Griswold's first selectman after the town separated from Preston in 1815, and Simon Brewster III, a director of the New London County Agricultural Society and a member of the Jewett City Creamery, who started the family's apple orchard in 1910.

"Through most of the twentieth century," Cunningham writes, "milk from the award-winning Brewster farm consistently ranked among the best in the county for fat content. By the 1960s the herd exceeded the capacity of the Brewster barns, and a new milking parlor and free-stall barn were constructed across the road." She writes also about Simon Brewster V's decision to retire from farming and the 1991 auction of the 252-acre farm.

The history records the architectural changes of the post-and-beam farmhouse as well, most notably the addition of a kitchen ell in the early 1800s and the removal of the center chimney some time before 1860. The woodwork of the original fireplaces remains intact, and the great nine-foot hearthstone of the kitchen's original firebox still punctuates the room.

The Bauers have found several artifacts in the house that are on display in the dining room, including pottery, yardsticks, buttonhooks and a doll's dress that had been stuffed in a chimney to stop a draft. They also found pages of newspapers from the 1890s that had been stuffed between floorboards and painted over. And Kate proudly displays a pair of blue jeans patched until it could be worn no more and salvaged for patches itself, before finally being stuffed in a chimney to stop another stubborn draft.

The Brewster family donated a 1975 aerial photograph of the farm and apple orchard. The Bauers hope to produce a book about the farm and to collect enough artifacts to open the house eventually to the public as a sort of museum.

These days, Homespun Farm books more than 150 stays each year, drawing visitors from all over the United States and as far away as Germany, Australia and South Africa. The Bauers are turning away more people than they take in. Among the couple's favorite visitors, however, are the Griswold natives and former residents who show up each year looking for the apple orchard.

"We still get people coming through here, knocking on the door, wondering when the apples will be ready to pick," Kate said. "I don't mind, though. I love the people, and I love the stories. Some of them have told us that they used to come here every year to pick apples. We've met women who said they dated Simon Brewster (IV). He was THE bachelor around here for awhile, because he didn't get married until later in life."

Only 47 of the old orchard trees remain at Homespun Farm. The Bauers have cared for the trees in the hopes that they'll keep producing apples and pears well into the new century. They think the trees &emdash; just like the farmhouse &emdash; are a piece of history worth preserving.

Homespun Farm's Web site is http://www.homespunfarm.com. Its phone number is 376-5178

About.com- Elizabeth Arneson, Bed and Breakfast guide-

 Historic Bed and Breakfasts

Homespun Farm B&B in Jewett City, Connecticut

This is the first in a series of articles about bed and breakfasts which are more than 200 years old -- built in the 1700s or earlier. As more inns are featured in this series, they'll be listed in our free About Bed and Breakfasts email newsletter.

Tell us a little about the history of your bed and

breakfast.

The Brewster Homestead was built in 1740 by Simon

Brewster. He was the great, great grandson of William

Brewster of Mayflower fame.

The farm stayed in the Brewster family for more than

250 years. They farmed fruit (apples, peaches, pears,

etc.) and had a beautiful dairy for more than 200 years.

President Reagan awarded the farm the bicenntenial farming award for 200

consecutive years of dairy farming. In 1991, the farm was sold at auction due to the

boys not wanting to farm any longer.

We purchased the home and 2 acres in 1996 from the brothers who bought the

entire (250 acres) farm at auction. No one had moved into the house during that

time, so we are the second family name to ever live in and own this homestead. We

call it Homespun Farm Bed and Breakfast now. The home and property was listed on

the National Register of Historic Places on December 28, 2000.

When did you become interested in historic properties?

Ron and I have always loved old homes (200 years old and older). There's a certain

feeling and spirit about a home that has been around that long. The life of the

building can be felt when you walk in. My mom and dad were always dragging me to

auctions and tag sales in New England when I was young so I had exposure to old

homes from a young age. Guess it's in my blood. :-)

When did you first visit this specific property?

In the spring of 1996. We stayed at a B&B in 1995 for our anniversary and told the

innkeeper we always wanted to live in an old home. She told us this property was

available.

What made you interested in purchasing this property?

We drove by several times. The house just spoke to us even though it was obviously

unkept (empty for 5 years). After a lot of searching for the real estate person (there

was no for sale sign on the property), we finally got an appointment to meet her

there.

My husband was due to go to the North Pole in April (U.S. Navy Submarines), and this

viewing of the house was in March. We met, and she was trying to open the door but

the key wouldn't work. She said she was sorry but the key was bending in the lock

and she didn't want to force it and break it off.

I asked her if I could please try it because if we couldn't get in the see the house we

weren't going to be able to make an offer if Ron left for sea duty. She said no, she

didn't want the key to break off. I told her I would pay a locksmith if I broke the key,

so she handed me the key. I slipped it in the lock and it turned like butter, opening

the door to this home for us.

As we walked in (I had goose bumps on my arms), the paint on the ceiling was

peeling, and the dirt of the floor was visible as were nuts and branches from small

animals that had moved in over the years. The steam was visible from our mouths

as we walked through looking at this gem. There was no heat, no water. One

bathroom in the ell only, and that one was bad.

But when I looked at Ron and his eyes met mine, I knew that no matter what we had

to do we were going to live in this house. It had been a family home for 250 years,

never a B&B, never open to the public, never updated, split into apartments or

messed up.

It somehow welcomed us by opening for me and it called to us to save it. (I know it

sounds weird but it really is how it felt.)

Was a lot of renovation work required?

Ron and I don't consider what we've done "renovation" I guess if one considers fixing

some wiring and plumbing renovation then yes we did a lot of that.

What we did not do was bring the house backwards by "redoing" things to make it

look "old" again, like stripping wood or exposing posts and beams that were covered

more than 200 years ago. We feel what we have done is preservation.

The house was never changed to add a lot of modern additions. The lights in the

rooms are turned on by pull strings, there's one plug in each room. There was no

plumbing in the main house; the ell had two baths, one working and one rotten and

falling in. The roof needed a total redo. We preserved what is here by fixing it and

putting new in. We didn't make it 2001, we just made it safe and up to code.

The doors are all latch hook and L/H hinges; there's only one door knob in the whole

place. The floors are wide board -- chestnut, tulip, and heart pine. The posts and

beams are covered with hand-planed wood and the paint we redid matches colors

that we found underneath after cleaning them up.

Ron and I have done all of the preservation work ourselves with the exception of the

roof. That took a pro as both the main house and ell had to be stripped down to the

original planks. (We left the original planks and they can be viewed from the attic --

I take lots of guests up there!)

It's an ongoing process in a house this old. There's always something that needs

tending and caring for. I feel we aren't owners of this property, but we are caretakers

of it.

What's your favorite room in your bed and breakfast?

My favorite room is the Orchard Room. It's a south facing room and gets lots of

morning light. Ron hand-crafted the beds in our inn and the Orchard Room has a

gorgeous four poster pencil post bed. The bathroom is very large and is lit with

period lighting that is so romantic and shoots you back in time with the flip of a

switch.

What makes a stay at Homsepun Farm unique?

A stay here is peaceful and private. The feeling that this home infuses in each guest

is universal with everyone. Every guest has mentioned how nice it "feels" while they

stayed here.

I really take no credit for this, it's the age and experience of the house. The history

of the home itself is unique, with a direct lineage to the Mayflower and a family that

participated in every war and conflict of the U.S., as well as starting the very town that

the home is built in.

In fact, this home was a home before the U.S. was the U.S. That in itself is unique.

We provide bathrobes, aroma therapy soaps, lotions and shampoos for our guests. I

have a wonderful selection of candles available as well. We have a gift shop on site

that stocks antique reproductions, candles, pillows and fashions that our guests can

purchase and bring a piece of Homespun Farm with them when they go.

I also offer to help with decorating tips and gardening help for those that request it.

Being a master gardener, I give lots of tours through our gardens and suggestions to

guests on how they can add this or that to their own gardens. We love trading plants,

too. Staying here is like going to great-grandma's house, except you don't have to

clean up!

Please tell us a little about your area. What would you consider to be "must-see"

attractions?

Foxwoods Casino of course is the biggest thing around here, the largest gaming

facility in the world. It is a great thing as far as night life.

Also, our antiquing is world class. Route 169 goes from here to Massachusetts, and

along the way are some of the best shops I've ever found.

Mystic Aquarium has had a multi-million dollar upgrade and is a lovely thing to do for

the day. I always suggest that guests take a trip to Stonnington Village. There are

wonderful shops there and a great little lighthouse museum at the end of the town's

one way street right out on Long Island sound.

The Ghost Story

What's the strangest thing that's ever happened to you as an

innkeeper?

Because of a guest we have a confirmed ghost story. My husband and I

both experienced the same "feeling" and vision while outside working the

orchard and blueberries -- the funny part is I didn't tell him about it when it

happened (mine happend first and I didn't tell him, then his occurred some

months later and he came in and told me).

My husband came in one day (about a month or so after I had my

experience) and told me of his experience. Same man, same "watchful"

feeling. We both "saw" this figure in our side vision -- a man watching us

as we worked. It also was a "feeling" of this voice telling us where to

prune, how to do the job we were doing. A "guiding spirit," we call him.

We found out later that it was Old Man Simon. How did we find out? We

described this man to a guest (a relative of the Brewsters, who owned the

property before us) that brought pictures of Simon. She showed us the

picture only after we described him. It was one of the original owners of

this 260-year-old home!  

Advice for Aspiring Innkeepers

What advice would you give to aspiring innkeepers considering the

purchase of a historic bed and breakfast?

Read, read, read -- and ask, ask, ask.

I would never buy an old home without talking to the owners. Get a

complete history on what was done and redone with the home. The best

advice is to have patience and remember that there isn't anything that you

can't recover from.

Side note and funny story -- we were moving the dryer and hence moving

a 220 outlet. My husband is laying under the dryer and yells for me to go

to the basement and turn off the 220 power. I open the basement door,

turn on the light and see water. Lots of water. I say, "Honey, I can't turn

the power off -- there's water in the basement." He says, "What do you

mean 'water'?" I said, "Honey, it would be to my knees kind of water."

Turns out the water table rises every winter and sometimes the basement

fills with about 18 inches of water. Now, most people might freak out

about this, but we looked at each other and said, "Hey, this house is 250

years old. This isn't the first time the water has come up. So we put in a

sump pump (longer, funnier story) and now the water comes up, and goes

out!

Be patient, smile a lot, and roll with the things that occur. (Being handy

doesn't hurt.)

Hartford Courant Newspaper

1 Ghost Houses Said To Be Haunted, But Owners Remain Undaunted

October 28, 2001

By CHERYL CRABB, Special to The Courant

The specter of Old Man Simon appears out of nowhere.

Dressed in a plaid shirt and overalls, he hovers over the

orchards he once tended at Homespun Farm in Griswold.

Simon Brewster passed away decades ago, but his

"guiding spirit" lives on at the homestead his family

founded 260 years ago, according to current owners Kate

and Ron Bauer. The couple purchased the property in

1996 and said they first came in contact with Brewster's

ghost when they began working in the fields.

"I was out there pruning blueberries, having this feeling of

someone telling me, `No, no, no not there,'" Kate Bauer

said. "I guess he was trying to make sure we knew what

we were doing and not cutting too much off the trees or

hurting anything."

Homespun Farm is one of a handful of houses in towns

throughout Connecticut whose owners say are inhabited

by haunted spirits of various shapes and sizes.

There's the "Little Red House" in Madison, a Cape-style

home dating back to the mid-1700s, where the apparition

of a little girl standing by the kitchen sink is one of several

ghostly sightings that have startled residents over the

years, say the owners.

At the historic Chart House restaurant in Simsbury, the

feisty spirit of Abigail Pettibone is still said to spook

employees and guests in the upstairs room where she

allegedly was murdered by her husband after he caught

her in the arms of her lover, according to the restaurant

folks.

And at a rambling farmhouse in Deep River, the fun-loving

ghost of a previous owner - Pultizer-prize winning artist

C.D. Batchelor - likes to host parties in the living room and

has been seen on nocturnal visits to pet the family dog,

say the residents.

Some homes, such as the historic Benton Homestead in

Tolland, reportedly have been haunted for centuries,

according to one of the supernatural tales told in the book

"Legendary Connecticut" by David E. Philips. In others,

such as Homespun Farm, the spirits are relatively new

residents.

Some homeowners, unaccustomed to periodic visits by

the spirits of past residents, have a hard time trusting their

senses at their first ghostly encounter. Bauer said she

never told her husband about her visit from Old Man

Simon until after he described having a similar experience

about a month later.

"I thought I was just being silly, but when it happened to

Ron and he came in and told me what happened it was

so weird," she said.

The Bauers, who have three sons, said they also have felt

the presence of Simon's wife, Laura Brewster, in the

house as she walks up and down the stairs at night. "It's

not a scary ghost if you want to call it that," she said. "I

don't think I could live here if that was the case."

Businesses such as hotels and restaurants often find that

having a ghost on the premises helps attract customers.

At Homespun Farm, which is now a small

bed-and-breakfast, there are guests who come

specifically to ghost hunt, Kate Bauer said.

"When people say `I want to see 'em,' I hand 'em a pair of

clippers and tell 'em they have to work awhile."

Abigail Pettibone, Simsbury's most famous ghost, also is

a big draw at the 300-year-old Chart House restaurant,

said Christine Ivory, catering sales manager.

"I would say most of our business asks about it. We even

get e-mails about it," she said. "Sometimes when

customers are here for dinner, we'll show them around

and explain and answer questions."

However, some private homeowners, including Lorraine

Ballsieper of Deep River, are reluctant to tell people that

their house is haunted.

"People think you're crazy if you say you have ghosts in

your house," she said.

Ballsieper said she had never encountered spirits before

moving into the Batchelor home on Kelsey Hill Road in

1986. The "ghostly experiences" began a few months after

they moved in and began doing major restoration work.

One of the most impressive appearances by the late

cartoonist was a 2 a.m. visit to the family dog, she said.

"He was downstairs in the kitchen," Ballsieper said. "I saw

the dog and then a big white apparition with Batch's black

tousled hair."

Haunted house owners often bring in psychics or groups

such as the Connecticut Paranormal Research Society to

investigate the level of supernatural activity in their homes.

Some share their ghost stories on the Internet at sites

such as www.realhaunts.com. Others turn to their local

historical society to determine if any unusual historical

events have taken place within the house that would

explain a ghostly presence.

In 1999, historian Carol Laun of the Salmon Brook

Historical Society traced the history of a Granby home at

the request of an unnerved resident who said she had

seen the ghost of a sad little girl in a Victorian dress in the

bathroom doorway.

"She freaked out," Laun said of the resident after learning

that her fiancé had seen the little girl on a half-dozen

occasions, along with man dressed in black who

appeared to be in his 20s and carrying something in his

hand that looked like a briefcase. "She bought a condo

and moved out immediately."

In her research, Laun found no mention of any children

who died young while living in the house to explain the

ghostly presence of the little girl. However, she did learn

that the second owner of the clapboard, center-chimney

colonial home, Sylvester Barnes, died at 25 in 1842. The

house, built around 1800, was replaced by a medical

office building this summer.

"The question is where will they [the ghosts] go, now that

their home is gone?" Laun said.

Those looking for a rational explanation of a ghostly

encounter also can call the New England Skeptical

Society, which replicates investigations by so-called ghost

hunters by taking and analyzing photographs and

electromagnetic readings and by measuring possible

temperature anomalies. The group, which promotes the

use of science and critical thinking, has investigated

about a dozen "haunted" houses and has not discovered

any evidence of ghosts, said Steven Novella, president of

NESS.

"Everyone loves a good ghost story," said Novella, a

neurology professor at Yale University. "But there aren't

really haunted houses, there are only haunted people."

Many perceived ghostly encounters often can be attributed

to a variety of sources ranging from faulty plumbing or

pest problems to sleep disorders and the side effects of

medication, said Robert Damon Schneck, the director of

the White Crow Society. The Brooklyn-based nonprofit

volunteer group has about 400 members who aim to help

people manage paranormal phenomenon that they find

disturbing.

"We first look into the background of what's going on.

Does this house have a history of haunting and did the

previous owners experience it?" he said. "If not, then

maybe it's an expression of something in a person's life

that's gone wrong."

Sometimes getting rid of ghosts is as easy as fixing

creaky stairs or hiring an animal control specialist, he

said. "We once had a woman who was hearing genuinely

frightening sounds from the attic," Schneck said. "Our

investigators found a raccoon in there."

Yet even Schneck - who once saw a thermometer rise four

degrees in 10 minutes just as a client claimed to be

attacked by spirits - acknowledges that there still are

mysteries.

"Every once in a while, there's something strange going

on, something paranormal or something our investigators

can't explain."