Halloween Episdodes

Ella Zane was young, talented, and beautiful. In September of 1903, she was found in the Ohio River, not far from her family’s mansion on Wheeling Island. There was no water in her lungs, and murder was suspected. Before the investigation could begin, her influential family had the case closed as a suicide by drowning. There was a rumor of hereditary insanity in Ella’s family. When her distant cousin Lila Zane killed a friend, her lawyers used it for an insanity defense. The mystery of Ella’s death was never solved. If it had been, it would have exposed the impossibility of Lila’s defense.

On our latest visit to Sleepy Hollow, New York, we researched the village's second most popular ghostly resident. Isaac Van Wart Buckhout killed his wife Louisa and neighbor Arthur Rendall on New Year's Day in 1870. He was hanged and has become a part of the region's haunted folklore.

For our Halloween episode, we went to the historic Sing Sing prison in Ossining, New York to find a ghost. Despite the prison being secretive about the supernatural, we were able to find one. William Caesar killed his common-law wife Mary Martin in 1894, and his blundering of the cover-up lead the police to him.

Martha Grinder was a serial killer who was hanged in Allegheny County in 1866. Known as the "Pittsburgh Poisoner", her ghost is still seen wandering around town. Despite all folklore to the contrary, I don't believe she did it. In fact, I think she may have been a good person who was targeted.

In 1858, Charlotte Jones was the first woman to be executed in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. She did anything for love...even that.

What possessed Bertha to murder her mother? Apparently, her dad. He was the local butcher with a thriving business. Right before Christmas in 1897, he died of a heart-attack at the breakfast table. After that, his ghost followed Bertha around to complain about how lonely he was.

In 1898, Michael Ruminski murdered his wife in Allegheny City, Pennsyvania, and almost got away with it in style.

The Old Allegheny County jail in Pittsburgh has been haunted for over a hundred years by William Culp. There's a real person behind the ghost: Willliam Culp who was arrested in 1907. He never belonged in jail to begin with. Now he can't leave.