'HAUNTED OHIO' Author of ghost tales speaks at Lordstown

Tales of Mahoning Valley ghost sightings made it into the volumes.
By DENISE DICK
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
LORDSTOWN -- A ghost could be haunting your own back yard.
Chris Woodyard of Beavercreek, Ohio, has written several books detailing ghost stories from throughout the Buckeye State. The first "Haunted Ohio" book was published in 1991.
"Haunted Ohio" volumes two through four, along with "Spooky Ohio" and "Ghost Hunter's Guide to Haunted Ohio," followed.
Woodyard reviewed stories of her ghost-hunting with students at Lordstown High School last week. She hears ghost stories from people who write or call her and checks the reports herself. Her travels have taken her to all of Ohio's 88 counties.
Tales of Mahoning Valley leery lore also made it into Woodyard's books. The third "Haunted Ohio" book tells of a Cortland building, known as the opera house. It was built in 1841, moved twice and bought in 1882 by Solomon and Elizabeth Kline, who named it Kline's Hall.
In the 1980s and 1990s, people who worked in the building reported hearing noises and voices when they were alone in the building. They attributed them to the Klines, according to Woodyard's book.
Memorable visit: One of Woodyard's most memorable trips was to the Mansfield Memorial Museum. The original museum, on the building's third floor, was started by Edward Wilkinson. It operated in the 1880s and 1890s.
"I expected to find a veterans museum," Woodyard said.
Instead she found a Victorian showcase with artifacts, stuffed birds and animals and stockings from the Revolutionary War. But one item in particular caught her attention.
"It was a shattered drumhead from Gettysburg," Woodyard said. "I buckled over and started dry heaving and crying. It was like death rays were coming at me."
She pulled herself together and saw a little boy dressed in short pants and a short jacket, wandering around. She doesn't know who the boy, a ghost, was, but he led her to the museum's third floor where the original museum was housed, taking her hand at the top of the stairs.
He looked about 8 or 9 and as if he lived during the 1860s and 1870s, she writes in "Ghost Hunters Guide to Haunted Ohio."
The museum, which was closed from 1955 until its current director and curator reopened it in 1999, was a popular play area for children during its heyday.
Woodyard believes the boy may have been one of the children who had frequented the museum who wanted to share his play space.
Woodyard also encountered Wilkinson, the museum's founder, who museum volunteers have reported seeing. Wilkinson died in 1918.
Her encounters: Sometimes Woodyard communicates with the ghosts she encounters. Other times, they're more like images, enacting an event that occurred in a particular spot, she said.
Woodyard now limits her ghost hunting to public places.
She doesn't call herself a psychic but says she does get feelings about people and objects. She attributes those feelings to being more sensitive or observant and attuned to her sixth sense than the average person.