- I'm Mickey.

- And I'm Ryan.

- [Both] And this is "Hiseerie."

(dramatic music) - [Mickey] We grew up watching paranormal investigators like Zach Bagans on "Ghost Adventures," Ryan and Shane on "Buzzfeed Unsolved" and "Ghost Files," and Sam and Colby on YouTube.

The semi-casual investigations, people just trying to connect with those who are no longer around or something we just can't understand, and diving deep into true crime cases.

All throughout history, different cultures have believed in the paranormal.

Divine gods, spirits, aliens, shaman, and witchcraft just to name a few.

Supernatural occurrences are reported all over the world and have become ingrained into pop culture.

Since the beginning of humanity, people have been questioning the bigger picture of existence.

What's really out there?

Aliens, ghosts, Bigfoot?

Well, we want to try it ourselves in our own backyard.

So come with us and explore the paranormal and macabre side of the great Midwest.

- Tonight, we're investigating at the Warden's House in Stillwater, Minnesota.

- In part one of our two-part season premiere, we looked at the prison history.

Tonight, we're going to be switching to the paranormal side, where we learn the history of that part of the prison, and then we do our own investigation of the Warden's House.

- We're from two different departments at Pioneer PBS and share a fascination with macabre and supernatural side of history.

- There's a rich history of the paranormal in the Midwest, and we're super lucky to be able to show it to you.

If you like this episode, please like, comment, and subscribe down below.

If you wanna see more behind the scenes and extra full-length investigations, check out our Patreon at patreon.com/Hiseerie.

(dramatic music) Before we get into the history of the property, we'd like to give a content warning.

This episode will have conversations and imagery that might be distressing for some viewers.

We'll be covering topics such as murder, assault, and suicide.

(dramatic music) - The biggest hotspot for paranormal activity in the house is in the children's room or the nursery.

Consistently throughout the years, that's been the room that's been mentioned by most people.

And that's been my experience too, as most of the incidents happen up there.

People seem to see from the street a woman.

The long legend of the warden's house ghost, people seem to think that it's Gertrude Wolfer.

And she was the daughter of Henry Wolfer.

She grew up here in the warden's house, and she ended up marrying the prison doctor actually.

And they had a little boy, a baby named Winston.

Sadly though, Winston lost his mother.

Poor Gertrude passed away suddenly and unexpectedly when baby Winston was just a few months old.

She had appendicitis and had her appendix taken out and had survived about a week after that, came home from the hospital and died suddenly that night, probably of an infection that they weren't aware of.

So baby Winston, as was common in those days, came back here to the warden's house to be raised by his grandma and grandpa.

Fathers don't raise babies at home alone in those days.

And the legend is that poor Gertrude followed and has been here ever since.

So we think that maybe the female apparition that's been cited for all these years is Gertrude.

People will say they walk by and look in the window and see a woman looking out the window, looking in the cradle.

I've heard the woman appears to be in pain.

I've heard stories of hearing a woman cry up there, hearing a baby cry.

- I know of several people here who swear they have experienced things they'll tell you about.

The closest I came, about three years ago, I was giving a tour to two ladies up in the children's room.

I was standing in front of the glass case with the portrait of the little boy with one of the women.

The other one was over in the corner where the buggy is.

She came running over to me and she said, "A woman is moaning in that corner."

And so I went right over there immediately.

I couldn't hear anything.

That's the closest I've come.

But again, we have people, board members, former tour guides, and then we used to have a site manager here who was paranoid about these things, almost scared to death.

As a matter of fact, she would not on her own go upstairs to close the place up.

So she would always have one of the tour guides or sometimes she would call her mother who would bring along the sister to help her close things down.

Well, after she left here, her mother told her that on more than one occasion, both she and her sister could hear a woman moaning in the children's room.

They swore they could hear that.

- There's a cradle in the children's room too that supposedly rocks on its own.

I've heard tale of it, and I've seen it written down even in tales from the '40s and '50s when this house first opened as a museum.

- Several years ago, one site manager was giving a tour to a grandmother, the mother and little boy, about three or four years old.

They were up in the room, which is now the convict life room, and which is right across from the master bedroom.

The little boy went into the master bedroom, and the baby cradle was at that time was in that room.

He came racing back white as a sheet, and he said, "Who is the woman standing by the cradle?"

Kid was just shaking.

And so they went right in there, nothing.

And then we've had construction workers in years past across the street tell us that on days when the museum was closed, they could see a woman walking back and forth in front of the windows up there.

So I don't think everybody's lying.

There are some things you can't explain.

- Heidi and her family, all who share quite a bit of time at this property, all seem to have firsthand accounts in the children's room.

- Heidi was even able to share some evidence gathered by another paranormal investigator on one of her tours.

- Yeah, I have had a few experiences up there.

One night I closed the blinds.

At the end of the night I had fixed the cord and re-strung it through and left the blinds closed and the string intact, and I came back the next morning to find the string out of the runner and coiled up in a perfect circle coil in the windowsill, but the blind was still closed.

There's no way to pull out the cord without pulling up the blind.

So there was, that was impossible and very, very strange.

I think there's a ghost who has heard me give the tour so many times, it finishes my sentences.

I had a paranormal group come through, and they recorded just as I was giving a tour, and later when they listened to the audio, as you heard, I say when I come in this room, "This is the room where the haunted stuff happens."

They've got audio of me saying that, but the last word of my sentence before I could say happens, you hear a ghost, you know, "This is the room where stuff happens."

You can hear a very creepy whisper finish my sentence before I can, so.

Okay, are we ready?

- [Recording Of Heidi] So yeah, so this is the room where the stuff happens.

This is also the only room where there's.

- [Heidi] Do you want to play it one more time?

- [Mickey] That's awesome.

- [Ryan] It's loud.

- [Recording Of Heidi] So yeah, so this is the room where the stuff happens.

This is also the only room where there's.

- [Tom] No.

(Mickey and Ryan laughing and cross talking) - [Tom] Oh, my God.

- [Mickey] This is the first time we brought Tom with the paranormal stuff.

It's awesome, isn't it?

It's so cool.

- Yeah.

- [Mickey] Like what do you do with that?

Like where are you supposed to go from there when you have that?

- Yeah, like I don't know, I don't know.

I don't know.

- What?

(Mickey laughing) - So basically what happened is it was like just me and my sister, I'm pretty sure in here, and we were like kind of making fun of this doll, just like oh, look at this kind of stupid, ugly doll here.

Like look at its stupid face pretty much.

Then like a few moments after that, my phone just started like making these blaring siren noises like it had never made before, and I couldn't turn it on.

It was just like blacked out screen, these crazy siren noises.

And I was like, "I don't like know what to do about that."

So I was kind of freaked out, and I left the house and then like pretty much as soon as I stepped foot out of the house, it turned back on.

And when I turned it back on, there was like a little message on it from like my Siri or like the Google assistant or whatever, and it was like "That's so cute."

That's what it said.

And yeah, that's my experience.

That's what happened.

- So actually when we first got to the warden's house, Heidi brought us on the tour, and we went upstairs and started in the master bedroom and then went into the children's room.

There's like a door that puts them together.

And I walked through that door, and my phone started vibrating and like making a noise from my back pocket.

And if you know me, my phone is on do not disturb 24/7.

I never have it with like any type of notifications, and it's always on silent.

I don't mess around with that.

I find it so annoying.

So it was weird enough that I whipped my phone out even though it was kind of rude.

And I looked at my screen, and it was like glitching out.

- Now when she says glitching out, imagine like you might see a computer hacker that, you know, hacks into a phone on a movie or something and they over pixelate the whole screen, and, you know, the image or the message is moving.

That's exactly what was happening to her phone.

- Which iPhones don't do.

That's not how they break.

And like, and so I just panicked because I was like okay, this woman is giving me a tour, and I'm over here looking at my phone while it's vibrating, making noise.

Like it felt like it was ringing at a funeral.

Like that was the vibe that I was feeling.

So I just panicked, and I fully turned it off, and I was just like wow, that's so weird.

I will deal with that later.

So I put it back in my pocket, and we moved on, and I didn't think anything of it really at the time other than oh, that's embarrassing.

And then we got to meet her daughter, and she told us the story, and it suddenly got a lot more concerning.

But it's not only recent experiences that are recorded.

Paranormal occurrences are recorded all the way back in "The Prison Mirror," the newspaper created by inmates in the late 1800s.

- Here at the warden's house and the old Minnesota State Prison, there's a long history of hauntings and paranormal activity from even back in those days.

The paper starts in 1887, and in one of the very first issues, one of the headlines said, "Was It Supernatural?"

And there's a wonderful story written by an inmate that details how he saw a ghost.

He had a good friend who was dying of tuberculosis, and he visited him every Sunday until one Sunday he wasn't allowed in to see him.

Later, when this inmate was in his cell, he looked out the window and saw his friend George Curren standing in the prison yard, and he thought, oh good, George is feeling better, and they're letting him out.

And he looked and waved at his friend in the yard and then his friend was gone.

And he heard later, the inmate heard later that day that George had passed away that afternoon.

And so he was convinced that he saw a ghost.

- The legends continued in the community, even into recent years.

- We were lucky enough to sit down with a Stillwater native who had his own experience with friends while exploring the prison before the last of the buildings was demolished.

- I think it was kind of a forgotten piece at that time, late '90s, early 2000s.

Nobody, the elder folks really didn't come down here much or it was more popular with the younger kids, the high school kids, but it was just basically like an abandoned place that nobody.

Trees were growing up high, you could almost not even see the prison, the old twine shop.

So all my classmates, we all talked about it.

We all knew that it was the old prison obviously.

We had the new prison at the time.

We knew about the Youngers that were in that prison and were all aware of Jesse James and his gang and the robbery in Northfield.

So yeah, it was a big, it was something that we talked about a lot, and it was very spooky.

I grew up here.

I went to Stillwater High School.

I grew up here in the late '90s, and my pals and I, we always liked to come down to this property and investigate.

And, you know, oftentimes we'd come in the winter time, and it was just very, very eerie.

You'd hear a harmonica playing up and down the twine factory.

You know, we went inside a few times and just heard a lot of creepy things, saw some unique activity.

You know, we would come with cameras, and it would be three or four of us and just kind of walk around the exterior of the twine shop property, pop inside once in a while, and we'd start kind of on that third level.

And we'd walk into the western side of the twine shop, so like as far back as it goes on the third level.

And there's a area that says positively no admittance.

Just really, really strange feeling up there.

It was completely empty.

There was like a chair in the middle of the room and my buddy picked up the chair and just kind of moved it, and you hear these sounds that sounds like maybe pigeons or birds, but I just remember that night it was really cold.

It was like 20 below zero.

So I'm pretty sure it's something else.

- [Narrator] Get down and take a nice picture with that, nice smile with the chair.

How long has that chair been there?

- Bloody nails there.

(beeping) - After that, you know, we didn't hear that at the time, but when we watched our film, we heard it.

So after that, we kind of walked towards the western side, the deepest part of the western side of the third floor and there was some stairs going up.

So we went in there, and then there was a little attic, and we kind of looked out this way and we saw a noose hanging down in like a little window and an attic with a bunch of junk in there.

All the hair on my arms like stand up, like it was really, really freaky.

Just, just some weird things.

You just kind of felt, you felt different, like there was somebody or something there with you at all times.

- And now, our own investigation of the property.

- We started upstairs in the master bedroom with the Estes method.

Tools of the trade: Flashlight, if set between on and off, it's believed to enable spirits to communicate through the light.

Spirit box, scans radio frequencies for spirits to communicate through the white noise and words.

Estes method.

Uses a spirit box, then one investigator wears an eye mask and headphones while the other investigator asks questions to help eliminate bias.

(dramatic music) Hi.

That was me.

It wasn't, didn't say hi.

- [Ryan] Okay.

- Okay.

- Thought I heard someone walking in the hallway.

- [Mickey] Today at something.

- [Ryan] Is there someone here with us?

- I've never seen.

- Can you talk through the spirit box with us as well as the flashlights?

Is there anyone here with us right now?

- [Mickey] Something from experience.

- What kind of experience are you talking about?

Who is this?

Can we have a name?

- [Mickey] Not bad, violence.

- [Ryan] Were you a criminal?

- [Mickey] It sounded like calling or Colin.

All right.

- Were you in the jail?

- [Mickey] Yeah.

- Okay, I'm gonna ask that one again.

Were you in the jail?

- [Mickey] That's it.

Ooh, that was, ooh.

- What were you in the jail for?

- [Mickey] Something doesn't play as well.

It sounded like a, like hey, but like a, like a man's, like a deep.

- [Ryan] Are you upset that they're talking about the crime?

- [Mickey] You're almost there.

- Are you a warden?

- [Mickey] I would love to.

- Were you a warden of the prison right next door?

Were you a prisoner?

- [Mickey] There's like so much.

Like mama wanted Wilson, yes, mom.

- [Ryan] Wilson or Winston?

Is this Winston?

- Something me.

Menace the entire team.

There's something up to those friends.

We're breaking the calm.

No, don't.

Nothing can stop.

There's like a million voices.

- [Ryan] Can one person at a time come and speak to us?

- Are you coming?

- [Ryan] Is it someone?

- Stop shining the light.

- [Ryan] Do you want that light off?

- [Mickey] They're here.

- [Ryan] There's some.

I'm hearing a lot of voices coming through.

- [Mickey] He's super.

- Is he a warden?

Who are we?

- [Mickey] Seriously, lame.

- Who are we speaking to right now?

- [Mickey] It'll just be a minute.

- Are we speaking to someone whose picture is in this room?

- [Mickey] Something this.

Something recording.

Crap.

I need you to hear me out.

Hear me out.

- Tell us, tell us your message.

- [Mickey] Listen, just.

Listen, please.

- We're listening.

What's your message?

- [Mickey] Something business.

History.

Uh.

- Speak clearly so she can understand.

- It's like, it's saying like, like long sentences, but like.

- Can you try again?

Can you speak clearly to make?

- I'm ashamed of what I did.

D-D-D, stop interrupting, D. Huh?

Wait, give me the mic.

Yeah, wait, there's an aspect.

Okay, come in.

Okay, I'm trying.

- We're listening.

- In the flesh, something, but it said something, not I'm saying something.

Men.

Goes up, says something, but that sounds insane.

Well, speak and be heard.

- We're trying to listen.

- [Mickey] A little.

- Are you a prison guard?

A criminal who's ashamed of their past?

- Rumor.

Hundred.

Or Henry Diaz?

- Henry Diaz, is that a name?

- Through the neck.

- Were you lynched?

- Home run.

Brain.

- Shot?

- [Mickey] What's left?

I mean, whatever's been pre-op, whatever.

Incidental.

- We were really lucky to have Heidi as a resource after going through the investigation.

She was very knowledgeable about the history of the warden's house.

She was able to take some of the information we had gathered during our investigation and apply it to the recorded history.

- So after editing this section, I sent the name Henry to Heidi, and she was able to send me back information about the inmate Henry Sussman, number 2016.

Henry was in prison for shooting his wife through the head and killing her.

He would end up committing suicide within the walls of the prison by wrapping a cord around his neck and strangling himself.

(dramatic music) - Yep, I absolutely do believe in the paranormal.

- Do I believe in the paranormal?

I'd have to say ultimately, yes.

I am a skeptic, and I'm very curious, and I have found a lot of noises and things have explanations, especially in an old house like this, especially on a busy street.

You might hear and see things that might not make sense or things might be different the next day, but I have had a few experiences here that are pretty eye-opening that I can't, that can't be explained, that just can't be explained.

- I have an open mind, let's put it that way.

If I see one, I'm a believer.

I'm trying to think back over my many years if I've ever seen things.

I'm sure there have been things that you can't explain.

Well, this thing with the, that noise from that one group, that's a cane.

It has to be hitting that floor.

Nobody was here.

So how do you explain that?

- Thank you for watching part one of the Warden's House in Stillwater.

Tune into our next episode to hear a little bit more about the paranormal and watch our investigation.

- If you like this episode, please like, comment, and subscribe down below.

If you'd like to support us or our station, you can find full length investigations and behind the scene content on our Patreon at patreon.com/Hiseerie.

(dramatic music)