Sightings - Our Favorite Ghost Story: The Black Forest Haunting

Episode Date: December 1, 2025

Join Brian and MacLeod as they revisit the most chilling ghost story we've encountered on Sightings. When a television producer used to faking hauntings encounters a house that's the real deal, he comes face to face with something more terrifying than his smoke and mirrors ever could be. Thanks to this week's sponsor, QUINCE. Visit quince.com/sightings for free shipping and 365-day returns on high quality clothing, home goods, and more. Sightings is a REVERB and QCODE Original. Find us on instagram ⁠⁠@sightingspod⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Some might say they have a tendency to over-dramatize or even fabricate their scares outright. But what happens when a jaded camera crew actually encounters the real deal and comes face-to-face with a haunting that terrifies them more than their smoking meal? mirrors ever could. Welcome to sightings, the series that takes you inside the world's most mysterious supernatural events. I'm MacLeod. And I'm Brian, and today we are going to be revisiting my very favorite haunting story that we've told. It's happened in my hometown of Colorado Springs, and it is probably the most chilling ghost story that I have ever heard.

That's right. We're heading to the darkest pockets of the black forest, where in 1990s, an unwitting television crew learns the true meaning of the phrase real-life haunting. Find out how on this episode of sightings. How's it going there? My name is Micah Pullman. I live in Los Angeles. I work in TV.

I like surfing. And I promise this isn't a call in dating ad. It's just how things work in my business. You enter other protagonists, drop in fun facts that make them feel like a neighbor or even a family friend, then dive into their story. And this story, my story, happens to be a hell of a thing. But I'm probably getting ahead of myself. For this to make any sense at all, I've got to set up the world, by which, of course, I mean, the world of the void. I'm sure you've heard of it, the paranormal investigation show that sends camera crews to investigate supernatural phenomena.

The ratings juggernaut with the catchy theme song? That's the one. And I was its lead segment producer, which meant I chose the jump cuts and music cues that creeped millions right out of their seats. Because that was the point, you know? Entertainment and chills every week at 9 p.m. Eastern, even if it was all. all smoke and mirrory bullshit. At least it usually was. See what I did there. It's called a teaser. Now, most of my weeks at The Void usually started the same way. I'd come in, drink my coffee, then roll the dice with that week's submission tapes. We always had a boatload of mailed-in videos

about how such and such house was haunted or how so-and-so creature lived under the town bridge. One guy even accompanied his tape with his teeth that fell out after he was allegedly abducted by aliens. Of course, he wasn't, and it turned out to be a drunken lunatic, but he still made for a hell of a convincing segment. Oh yeah, we shot it. But this particular Monday morning, there was an entire box waiting on my desk. Now, I have expected to find a dead animal inside, because yes, that that happened once before, too, but was relieved when I found that it contained only videotapes and a handwritten note that I didn't even bother reading. Instead, I picked up the top cassette, the one with the watch first sticker, and popped it in my bay, vowing to give it

just 30 seconds to determine if the entire box was worth my time or not. Then I pressed play. And 30 minutes later, I was still watching. The tape started off as so many do with a cabin in the woods, though in this case, cabin might be a bit of an understatement. The place was a well-appointed log home with a four-car garage and green trim that echoed the pine trees looming above of its gabled roof. It was gorgeous. Dave Jones, a middle-aged man with a great face for TV, stepped into frame and said that his family in Black Forest, Colorado, had been besieged by non-stop paranormal activity, and he was turning to The Void because his dream home had become a nightmare. I liked that turn of phrase. It could even work as a segment title. But I needed to see

the goods, and the clock was ticking. So as the video cut to a wide shot of shadowy forest at night, I searched the frame for anything ghostly or eerie, but no, saw nothing at all. I checked my watch, 30 seconds was almost up, my finger was just reaching for the stop button when I noticed it. A wisp of light traveling across the frame, shoo! I leaned in close and realized that it was a pale orb of some kind, streaking through the forest with a ghostly tail following it. A second shot revealed two more orbs moving.

moving through space, seemingly dancing among the tree trunks. Then a third shot showed four of them, undulating through the air like ghostly serpents. And to my eye, yeah, they looked good, real even. I mean, I'd never seen anything like it before, and trust me, I'd seen everything. So I kept watching, only to find the orbs give way to something much more chilling. A new shot panned across a well-appointed bedroom. Strange thumps rattled my speakers as though someone stomping on the ceiling above that bedroom. Then the frame settled on an old mirror situated above

a dresser. A voice said, wait for it. So I waited on the edge of my seat. I mean, shit, this was good. Then? Then the mirror changed. It grew foggy, as if a smoky haze had swept across it, and then through the haze, I saw the faces. Six ghostly faces. had filled that mirror. At first, I wasn't sure I was actually seeing what my eyes were registering, but as I paused the tape and enhanced the image, my jaw drop, do you see what I'm doing? It was literally my mouth hung open. I immediately took the tape to the guy who does our special effects. He's the real deal and has worked on movies you'd know, big ones. So I sat him down, showed him the footage, and asked him what he thought. He sat in silence for a long time.

then said that most of the anomalies would be difficult, if not impossible, to reproduce. In fact, many seemed to defy the laws of optics entirely. So it was a great fake, I thought, an excellent fake even. And I was the only one who had it. Within 48 hours, I was on a flight to Colorado Springs, joining me were Clay, my camera, op, and Nicole, my PA. They were as ruthlessly efficient as I was, so I suspect, we'd be in and out within 24 hours.

As the flight attendants did drink service, I ran through my game plan. We'd get interviews, of course, and would try to replicate the anomalies that the family had already caught on tape. Naturally, I didn't expect that to happen without a bit of TV magic, but that happened to be my specialty. Perfect example, we did an episode on the Jersey Devil, this monster from the armpit of the armpit state, and at one point someone on camera said they heard something above us. So we panned up and spotted this spooky shadow set against the full moon.

And while I'm not saying the shadow was a cardboard cutout, I'm not exactly saying it wasn't. Hey, don't judge. I mean, Christ, we weren't 60 minutes. Soon enough, we were on the ground in Colorado where the final member of our team was already waiting for us. Gilly was a psychic medium and dressed for the part. Ethereal dress, heavy makeup, wide eyes, you know the deal. And while she claimed to have actual metaphysical abilities, all I cared about was her talent for putting on a damn good show. So we all piled into a rental car and began the trek to the black forest. As we drove, Nicole gave us the rundown of her research on the area.

The story of how a powerful lumber hub in the 19th century gave way to a quiet bedroom community, how it was Native American land before that. Soon the foothills gave way to an expanse of ponderosa pines, so dense they nearly blotted out the sun. This was the black forest all right, and I beamed with anticipation knowing the place would look incredible. credible on camera. But as we rolled up the family's long and lonely driveway, I began to feel something else. A sudden chill, as if the air conditioner had just blasted on. And, uh, you know,

even stranger, I felt an odd sense of, oh, I'm not sure how to describe it, uh, malaise, melancholy, or, uh, hmm, or was it fear? Nah, nah, couldn't have been. I've been all over the world and was renowned for never shuddering. Never. So I sucked back the odd feeling, mentally justifying it as an adverse reaction to the altitude. Then, out of nowhere, Gilly set her hand on mine. It's not the altitude, she said. Dave and his wife, Paula, waited on the front porch as we pulled up to the house. They were perfectly pleasant people whose all-American charm would surely win the hearts of our audience. We said our hello's, and before I knew it, Dave was leading me around the five-acre property,

gesturing wildly as he explained his family's history with the supernatural. He said he was a truck driver by trade and moved here after being charmed on his drives through the state. He thought this was the place he was destined to settle down and raise his children. And when he stumbled upon this property, he knew it was the one. It seemed serene, peaceful, perfect. And it turned out to be anything but. Soon after he moved in, strange sounds, lights, and smells began to plague his family. But you didn't think about that, smells.

No one mentions smells, do they? One evening, they came home to flashing lights in their living room and loud booms that rattled their ceiling. Another night, they heard the sound of rattling chains, and on another, a full-blown orchestra. Untraceable chemical smells began to permeate rooms burning their eyes and throats, and their two children regularly complained of frightening, unexplainable shadows looming over their beds. Soon, every night brought a new terror, and Dave vowed to get to the bottom of what was happening. So we bought some top-of-the-line cameras and motion detectors, and over the next two years, recorded over 60 so-called break-ins with no clear explanation.

Eventually, the police have been called to the house so many times that they just stopped coming altogether. So now Dave knew of nowhere else to turn but to us. Truly, I felt for the guy. Even if I was certain this was just a case of paranoia fueled by some admittedly weird but ultimately explainable incidents, I mean, I'd seen it countless times before. And yes, I'd managed to make a killer segment out of every one of them. So we got to work. As night fell, we set up advanced camera systems in the three places Dave and Paula said

were most prone to unusual activity. the exterior wall by the satellite dish, the living room, and the master bedroom. But as we set up the last system, Gilly pulled me aside and whispered that something was happening in this house, something unlike anything she'd ever experienced before. I couldn't help laughing, and I told her to just cool her jets until it was her time to shine. Seriously, the cameras weren't even on yet. But soon we began rolling, and not even five minutes later, a loud boom shook the house. To my ear, it sounded like a giant had stomped on the roof.

But when I ran outside to check, there was nothing visible out there and nothing inside, at least nothing visible to the naked eye. So I decided to check our footage, which was easy because we only had a few minutes of it. And indeed, a few seconds before the boom, all three camera systems picked up anomalies on tape. It was those ghostly orps, the same ones from the tapes Dave sent me, The ones I'd dismissed as great fakes. But I could tell you, 100% these weren't faked. I'd been sitting right by one of the cameras myself.

And you know what happened? As I realized what was happening here might actually be real. I shuddered. and more importantly, holiday parties. And since I like to make a good impression, I went to Quince for some simple but sharp new clothes. Oh, Quince, how I love thee. Quince partners directly with ethical factories and top artisans

to deliver premium clothes at half the cost of other high-end brands. I mean it, I got a red shirt and green pants from them, so I am set for holiday parties. Ooh, holiday outfit. That was a good call, Brian. I got some mainstays. I got like a navy blue V-neck. That is, like, awesome.

It's 100% cotton. The weight of it is, like, thick. You know, this thing's going to last for a long time. It is, like, luxury thick. It's luxurious. And you know, McLeod, Quince pieces also make great gifts, and they don't just have clothes. They've got you covered with home, bath, kitchen, and travel goods, too. So give and get timeless holiday staples this season with Quince.

Go to quince.com slash sightings for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada, too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com slash sightings. Free shipping and 365-day returns. Quince.com slash sightings. On December 12, Disney Plus invites you to go behind the scenes with Taylor Swift in an exclusive six-episode docu-series. I wanted to give something to the fans that they didn't expect. The only thing left is to close the book.

The End of an Era. And don't miss Taylor Swift, the eras tour, the final show, featuring for the first time the tortured poets department. Streaming December 12th, only on Disney Plus. We left the three camera systems rolling as we set up our mobile unit follow Gilly and the Jones is on the walkthrough of that. house as Clay, you remember Clay, he's my camera guy, slid a camera onto his shoulder, and Nicole clipped a Lavalier mics to everyone. I asked Gilly if she was ready for this. I should pause here.

I should pause here to quickly explain how things worked with psychics on The Void. We never told them what to say on camera, but we also never tell them to hold back at all. We wanted them to milk each location for everything it was worth, and they were usually, oh my gosh, they were usually fantastic at it. Gilly, especially, was one. of the best. She reveled in her job and could find a ghost in a shoebox if she had to. But tonight, she seemed to have an unbearable weight on her shoulders. And that P.T. Barnum-like glimmer in her eye was noticeably absent. But she nodded that she was ready and began her walk through the house. The Joneses followed close behind, pointing out this or that while she proceeded in silence,

pausing periodically to touch something as if the gesture had some profound meaning. I mean, I knew this routine well, and eventually Gilly would indicate that a supernatural entity was present. Of course, it was all smoke and mirrors, but right then, in that house, I wasn't so sure. As we entered the living room, we were assaulted by a powerful chemical odor. I mean, I couldn't either locate nor identify the smell. All I knew was that it burnt the hell out of my nose and throat. At one point, I even had to stabilize Clay's camera as he tried as damnedest to hold back a cough. Gilly, Meanwhile, held a hand to her head and told us there was a spirit in the room with us, a male named Tom, who said that this was his home.

At first I thought this was part of the act. Gilea's hand-to-head thing was kind of her signature move, but Nicole soon tapped my shoulder and proved otherwise. She'd been tasked with holding a handheld thermal imaging device, and its screen revealed a large, human-shaped mass standing in the corner of the room where no physical body was present. But as quickly as it appeared, the shape vanished, and Gilly proclaimed that it was on the move,

so all of us followed her up the stairs to the house's vaulted second level. We rounded a corner past a line of doors and finally reached the master bedroom. Taking in the room, Gilly warned that it was not a restful space and that more spirits lurked there. That room, in fact, was likely the hub of their activity. Finally speaking, Dave and Paula confirmed that more had happened to them there than in any other room in the house. I looked around, but saw nothing with my own eye.

Nicole's thermal imaging device caught nothing either. But Gilly stared intently at the large mirror hanging above the dresser, the same mirror I'd seen in Dave's first videotape. Up close, I saw that the thing was ancient, at least a hundred years old, and hazy from age. Was this the haze I'd seen on the videotape? And were the faces I'd seen within it just simple optical tricks?

They had to have been, because right then, I couldn't see anything in the glass but our own reflections. But Gilly leaned in closer to the reflective surface. This is the source, she said. A gateway to the other side. Ooh, damn that woman was good.

Get me chills even telling you about it now. Suddenly I felt Nicole's hand on my shoulder. She nodded to her thermal imaging device, and I saw that strange humanoid shape had reappeared on the screen. And this time it was standing right behind Gilly. Clay noticed the figure as well and locked nervous eyes with me. I mouthed, don't you dare stop. And he kept rolling.

Then what appeared to be an arm, extended from, from the dark thermal mass, which of course was impossible, but I couldn't pry my eyes from the thermal screen as a dagger-like shape extended down from the arm and seemed poised to attack Gilly. I tried to say something. I did, I tried to say something. But my voice felt frozen in my throat,

so I braced for the worst, when Nicole suddenly shouted out what I couldn't. Stop! As soon as the sound, left Nicole's lips, the entity vanished from the thermal imaging screen. There was a loud bang! And the camera system we'd set up earlier suddenly crashed to the floor on the other side of the room. We all stood there, dead quiet, struggling to grapple with what had just happened. All I knew was that this job had just become unlike any I'd encountered before. And I can't

believe I'm saying this, but I think we'd pissed off an actual ghost. After the master bedroom incident, all of us gathered in the kitchen to regroup and prep for an interview segment between Gilly and the Joneses. I could tell that Clay and Nicole were unsettled, but they were professional, as always. We'd get what we needed and get out. So the camera started rolling again, and Gilly began to question the homeowners. Dave and Paula were great talkers and tried to explain how they couldn't even admit that anything paranormal was happening to them until a few months ago. Gilly asked what had changed, and Dave answered sheepishly that his bank account finally smacked him in the face one day. He'd spent $40,000 and two years trying to get to the bottom of the events here,

and after all that money, all that time, he was further from answers than ever before. That's why he finally turned to our show. Gilly continued her line of questions, but as the couple talked, I noticed Paula was looking more and more uncomfortable with each passing moment. but before I could even say anything she gasped that she was having trouble breathing and that it felt like someone was holding her down Nicole rushed in to help only to fall to the floor and cry out in terror

that something went inside her and as she screamed bloody murder that her arms and legs were going numb all Clay and I could think to do was get her out of that house as fast as humanly possible so we carried her outside and once we reached our car she finally finally calmed down. Clay decided that she needed to go to the hospital, and I felt I had no choice

but to concur. But I wouldn't go with them. No, I wouldn't be the producer who abandoned the segment of a lifetime. So a few moments later, I found myself standing alone on the Jones's driveway, dwarfed by those murky, haunting pines. Soon, Gilly appeared on the front porch. She reported that Paula was feeling better and thought it best to perform a smudging ritual to cleanse the house of the malevolence plaguing it. Well, I wanted to get that on camera, of course. So I started back toward the front door, but I caught something in the corner of my view. It was one of those orbs, and this time I could see it with my own eyes. The thing danced among the trees, leaving a luminous tail flowing behind it. I followed it as best as I could, until suddenly,

it flew past me like Maverick buzzed the tower and top gun, and as it danced along the porch the house, I realized that it was taunting me, beckoning me. So I followed it. It moved inside the house where it bounced around the living room, casting an unearthly glow. I called out for Paula and Gilly, but they must have been in some remote corner of the residence just out of earshot. So I picked up Clay's mobile unit and started shooting. I followed the thing up the stairs and down the hall, and as it darted inside the master bedroom, I began to smell that stench again, that unplaceable chemical tang that assaulted us earlier. But I didn't stop. I kept tracking the orb with the camera, following it in my viewfinder as it bounced from wall to wall.

And even though I could barely breathe from the smell, I had to keep going. This, this was the money shot. Then I realized the thing had disappeared. I desperately searched for it, trying to locate it again until my camera viewfinder finally settled on the mirror. That mirror, and this time, there were faces in it, dozens of them, with wide, terrifying eyes and gaping mouths, howling in audible screams. So many that I hardly even noticed as a massive shadow rose in the room behind me. And then all of a sudden, a stabbing pain ripped through the back of my head. And everything went black. This is usually the part of the story that we call an epilogue.

The place where we wrap things up with a nice neat bow and leave the audience feeling satisfied. You know, sometimes things aren't quite so simple. 48 hours after I fell unconscious at the Jones's house, I woke up in Memorial Hospital in downtown Colorado Springs. My head throbbed awfully as though it had been run. ravaged by a sledgehammer. But as I reached to touch my scalp, I realized it wasn't bandaged. In fact, I could feel no physical injury at all.

And before I could fully process that, I heard a familiar voice. They couldn't find anything wrong with you, Clay said. My eyes focused, and I found him sitting in a chair at the foot of the bed. He told me that I was fine, that Nicole was fine, and that the doctors had diagnosed us both with unusually severe cases of shock. nothing more. But as I tried to explain the pain in my head, Clay stopped me. He handed me a sheet of photo paper, and as I stared at it in horror, I realized how naive I'd been about the supernatural and about that house, because it had all been real, all of it. I never went back to work on

the void, of course, and instead found a job producing sports segments. High pressure, yeah, but predictable. Plus, the pace great. Meanwhile, The Void continued on, and even cobbled together an episode about that lonely Redwood house in a deep dark forest. But I never watched it, and never will. It's now been, what, five years since that night, and, uh... Yep, I still get headaches every day. I shudder at the smallest things and have a newfound problem with the dark. I guess you could say that I'm pretty screwed up, but this is Hollywood, after all, so I suppose it's fitting.

and despite all that I still keep a memento from that house in the forest locked away inside a box just in case I ever need a reminder that nothing in this world is a joke it's a single frame from the camera in the master bedroom printed on photo paper an image that shows me staring intently at a mirror with a horrifying shadow looming behind me and it's plunging a shadowy dagger right into my head.

Sightings will be back just after this. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. The holidays are a time for traditions. My family's pretty small, but my partner's family is huge, so I've gotten to see the full spectrum of family events. And with that sometimes can come a little bit of stress, juggling shopping, meal prep, that uncle with the wild opinions. I can say that, because I don't.

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November 27th to December 7th. Conditions apply. Details online. All right, welcome back to sightings. We're going to dive into that story McLeod just read. But I wanted to mix things up this week and take the lead on this one because this story actually happened a few miles away from where I grew up. No kidding. And it turns out that I even knew some of the people involved with it. Really?

Have you ever walked through the black forest? I've been. Oh, many times. Yeah, my house was just a few streets. from the tree line, or I guess the entrance to the forest. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, and I went to high school with one of the kids from the family that lived in the house and are the subject of this story. Whoa.

Yeah, I was talking to someone I went to high school with and I'm like, yeah, I'm doing this podcast episode. And it's like, wait, that's this person's house. I'm like, what? So this story is true. Verified. Yeah, these people lived in this house. I knew at least one of these people. The person that I knew that I went to high school with unfortunately passed away about 10 years ago.

Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. So I'm not able to get any up-to-date info, and I don't really feel like just dropping in on his family, who I've never met, you know. But it's true that a TV crew went to this house, and spooky things allegedly happened there. And before we go into the actual details, though, I will say for the story, everything that happened in the story actually happened. But I did change some of the names, and I invented the personality of that producer that you read, who admittedly was a lot of fun to write. I wanted to believe this guy was real. He's so fun. He reminds me of, you know, producers that I've met at parties before. I wanted to punch him, but like out of love.

Oh, out of love. As with all producers, right? As with all producers. But anyway, anyway, for now, I want to dig deeper into this apparently real house in this real forest. the black forest. It really is a dense forest, kind of dark, you know, just miles and miles of really dense pine trees. If you look at it in a satellite image, it's basically this pitch black mass amid like a sea of grass that makes up the entire rest of the Colorado front range. And so naturally, people think the spooky dark forest is where I want to live. It's perfect for me. Exactly. I mean, it is pretty. It's kind of charming. It's quiet. You know, most of the plots, land or five acres. Everyone loves giant spiderwebs.

Merkwood. So yeah, it's just a lot of big houses now and horse properties. And, you know, a long time ago, it was Native American land, as much of Colorado was. And I will come back to the Native Americans in a little bit. So once upon a time, in the dark and creepy forest, we have a dark and creepy house. Yes, on the fairy tale name of Swan Road, which it sounds quite pleasant, but it's actually kind of in the middle of nowhere, kind of in the thick of this forest. And true story, this house almost burnt down in a giant wildfire that happened to destroy a lot of homes

of people I knew back in 2013. But this house survived? It did. Of course it did. For better or worse, the haunted house survived. And from what I can tell, the same family still owns it. Which, of course, raises the question, why in the world would you not move your family out of the house. It's the overlook. Why is Colorado full of these haunted buildings? We're going to visit a lot of them, I'm sure, over the course of this series, but there's some doosies here. But yeah, I don't know why they didn't move. Apparently, it was a dream home, so I guess they really, really, really didn't want to give it up. I guess so. But you know what, it's fine. So the name of the family was actually the Lees, not the Joneses, like they were in the story.

But I have to imagine that, you know, they were spooked out by what was happening. But there's these, like, orbs, weird noises, weird smells and, like, people nearly being stabbed by ghosts and they're just like, ah, it's just a Tuesday. That's kind of it. And it gets even wilder than that. It gets wilder than that. This family has nerves of steel. Holy cow. And the patriarch of the family kind of made it his mission to get to the bottom of what was happening here and kind of hold down the fart, so to speak.

He allegedly spent most of the family safe. buying cameras and other stuff to capture the phenomenon. Dad, what about college? Dad, doesn't seem like a very responsible use of the family's funds. No, but it did allow him to get, you know, 3,000 photos and some 400 tapes of weird stuff happening like orbs. So there's like, there are the actual videos and photos of these orbs. Yes, the TV crew that we'll talk about saw them and caught them on camera. and I've never personally seen one in the black forest, but I have...

Would you be more interested or freaked out? Well, I'd be more interested if I just was walking through the forest or, you know, owned a house on the forest. And I started seeing glowing weird lights because there's something less spooky, I think, about glowing lights or, you know, orbs, I guess. Then, you know, there's a ghost in my mirror. Right. Yeah. Yeah, no, I guess the floating orbs could give you a feel of like you're in, like, the good elf kingdom, as opposed to Merkwood.

I don't know why I'm having a Lord of the Rings Day, but... It's okay. I also get like a weird, like, alien vibe from floating orbs, but no aliens in this story, don't worry. None of that. And even after that, orbs, faces, all those things, you know, this guy's like, meh, you know, I don't think it's a haunting. Wow.

Now, that is a level of skeptical gecko that I can't even... I don't think I can match. This guy's a champion. Eventually, though, it must reach the point where enough was enough. So they called in this supernatural TV show. to get an explanation for what was going on here. I see. And that's where our story picks up.

Yep, exactly. So in the early 90s, this show sent a whole team to the Black Forest to investigate this. Funnily enough, the show was also called sightings. Oh, so we've got our sightings crew. Not Brian and me. Nope. It was a camera team, producers, one psychic named Echo Bodine, who... Great name, by the way.

It is. We need to get a psychic on our team. You should. And they all fly into Colorado Springs, and they head out to this house in the forest. And right away, Echo is like, this house is bad news. Of course it is. I mean, did they not watch the tapes this guy sent of creepos in the mirror with knives? They, just like in the story, the producers from the show, like, hook these tapes to special effects experts. And these experts are like, we don't know how they're doing it. This defies the laws of optics. We have no idea what's going on. Right, right. Well, so, but like, I know these TV shows are notorious for making things up. for the camera, but like, did the crew actually capture anything unexpected? Yeah. I mean, pretty much everything that happened in the story happened while that film crew

was there. From the weird lights to the faces in the mirror to they're doing an interview with the family and the woman gets weirded out and claims that, you know, something entered her body and, you know, just all that stuff was happening. And ultimately, the psychic figured out, like, that there's this spirit named Tom who lives. in the house and he's kind of the ringleader of this band of 20 or so ghosts that happened to also share the space. Even after this, with the film crew, this third person perspective coming in saying, yeah, this place is messed up. The family still doesn't move. Nope. Nope. They're just like, I know, right? This must have been a popular segment for this show because they sent back crews

two more times over the next few years. The psychic who showed up on the second trip even claimed that the spirit of a dead family friend might be in the house and maybe after that the family was like oh well we know this person and we know that that person's family members is dead maybe there is an actual haunting going on like i guess that was the straw that finally kind of broke the camel's back right and so so kind of much like in the story with our producer they were like wait wait we usually fake this we need to go back and uh that's this out again and they're all freaked out. Did they ever get to the bottom of it? Like, did the family ever get a definitive answer for why this was all happening? Nothing definitive. There's

theories. We, of course, have that ghost of a family friend story that the psychic came up with. Right. To be honest, though, that seems a little bit more like smoke and mirrory, like, oh, I'm getting, I'm getting a name. Trying to personalize it. Yeah, because... Psychic intrigue. Yeah. The show got a lot of mileage out of that. Maddwell, I suppose. Right. But another theory is that the family had, well, it's not a theory, but the family had Native American shamans come to the site. And these Native American shamans claimed that the house sat on something called a rainbow vortex, which sounds awesome.

Right. I know. But it's kind of a passageway between this world and the spirit world. That's right. You mentioned Native Americans earlier being all over Colorado. Yeah, and this particular area was settled by Utes and Comanches and then Kiowa and then Arapaho and Cheyenne. So a whole bunch of activity in the area before, sadly, this whole area became five-acre parcels. Right. But apparently this rainbow vortex phenomena that these people are speaking about only exists in two other places in the world.

One is in Arizona. The other is in England. Stonehenge? Not Stonehen. Apparently somewhere in London. I don't know. Okay. But I guess those seem to be the main explanations, you know, this is an actual haunting, or this is a rainbow vortex, which I guess is tangential.

Or it's a straight-up hoax. That's fair to. You know, I remember in the Polaroid ghost episode that you were not inclined to believe that haunting either. Neither was I, to be honest. But do I take it that in a world where ghosts were real, you would not become a ghostbuster and buy into this whole thing? Well, this one's kind of got me freaked out a little bit, if I'm honest. All right. So are you willing to accept that there might be some kind of spiritual or haunted?

haunting type presence on this property. I am willing, or at least to say, I don't know. You surprised me. I know. I can imagine. I think it's because it's so close to home for you and because, you know, you're familiar with people because they kept coming back because I guess it didn't seem like

the owner was necessarily trying to milk it. And because this crew kept coming back and being like, yeah, this place is pretty messed up. And I just can imagine walking through these woods and seeing this stuff, hearing this stuff, and being really viscerally freaked out. No, that's valid. And I have to imagine that if this other sighting show from 1992 had a haunted house that they wanted to keep going back to, they'd pick something a little bit sexier than rancher log cabin in the forest.

What sexier than a rancher in the forest? Yeah, exactly. So I agree with you. Because there's this kind of weird tangential connection for me to this story. I know the area. I knew some of the people. Granted, the person that I knew when high school wasn't walking around telling everyone, oh, my house is haunted kind of thing. I had no clue. But, you know, I have to believe that something was happening on this property, whether it was ghosts or just, all I can say is that now it's become a really pretty famous haunting story because it was featured on TV all these times. Right. And I just have to wonder, I keep coming back to this idea of this TV show that allegedly captured what happened, whether they actually captured it or not.

That might be the big mystery for the ages, because I'm sure that shows like this have NDAs for all the crew members and who knows what's happening behind the scenes. But it's worth noting that the family also had a state senator come to the house and take his own photos. Politicians, that sounds like somebody trying to cash in on some publicity. Maybe. But, you know, the guy took his camera and he went there and he said, you know, quote, there are things happening that defy explanation around this house. Yeah, I don't care about the politician. I don't trust him. All right. Fair enough. Well, I threw it out there because it was a corroborating story. And but here's the one thing, though, still, the family didn't move. And that sticks with me a little bit.

Yeah. That bumps me. Yeah. So this was all happening in the early 90s. I moved into the house in 1991. Apparently, they'd put the house up for sale in 2013. But there is no record that I could find of an actual transaction or sale that took place. And I guess plot twist, the guy who would not believe that the house was haunted until it was smack him in the face practically. It's been reported that he thinks the government is somehow involved with this and testing laser holograms or psychic warfare technology on his. family. That's a left turn. Yeah. That's like a whole other genre. He's like, I don't believe in ghosts, but the government. Again, you know, I just have to try and put myself in these people's

shoes. The fact that he went to like, oh, I don't believe in ghosts, but it's the government messing with me. This speaks that there was something. No, I agree. That he was actually experiencing. It's a killer story. It's really fascinating. It's really cool. And I think that's what makes this so interesting and exciting. But it's just, gosh, you know, like, it's sufficient. I'm spooked. I'm officially spooked. Yeah. So that's the Swan Road Haunting and Black Forest. Listeners, if you also grew up in Colorado Springs and knew me, say hi.

This is not a dating app, Brian. But seriously, though, if you have a theory about what happened here, if you have any new breaking information for us, hit our socials anytime at sightings pod. Back through the time portal, present day, Brian and McClain. Oh, I'm so glad we revisited that one. It remains, I think, one of the spookiest ghost stories that we've done. I mean, really chilling.

Absolutely. And it happened in my backyard, so I love it. Close to home. Well, that was fun. Brian, where are we revisiting next week? Well, we've done our favorite spooky story. Now we're going to do our favorite alien story, and I know for a fact this one is your favorite alien story, McLeod.

Okay. We're heading to Washington, D.C. Okay. And I'm not going to say any more than that. for those who have not heard this story. But it is amazing. It's perfect for the season because it's more warm and uplifting

than a lot of the stories that we do here on Sightings. All right, I'm excited. So get ready for that. Same time, same place next week right here on sightings. Sightings is hosted by McLeod Andrews and Brian Sigley. Produced by Brian Sigley,

Chase Kinzer and McLeod Andrews. Written by Brian Sigley. Story music by Jack Stigley. Jason. Series music by Mitch Bain. Sound design, audio editing, and mixing by McCubbin-Owins. Artwork by Nuno Sarnatus. For a list of this episode sources, check out our website at sightingspodcast.com. Sightings is presented by reverb and cue code. If you like the show, be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform, so you're first to hear new episodes every week. And if you know other supernatural fans, tell them about us. We'd really appreciate it. Thank you.