Dawn Briggs epitomizes everything that I love about Irvington. She is one of the kindest, most compassionate, civic-minded individuals I have ever met. If there is a cause or chance for volunteerism in the Irvington community, you can rest assured that Dawn Briggs is at the head of the line to help out. Dawn is clever and quick witted and never fails to inform, educate and entertain in whatever setting or venue she is cast into.
The Briggs House was built in 1921 as a single family residence on Oak Avenue in Irvington during the years that Butler College called the neighborhood home. The Briggs family purchased the house in 1983 and immediately began renovations on the property that would last the next 25 years. The first sign that something was amiss in the house was the distinct lack of trick-or-treaters at Halloween. The next unsettling experiences in the home centered on the mysterious footsteps on the central stairway of the old home coming at times when Dawn was alone in the locked and secure home.
This led Dawn on a mission to discover the source of the disembodied footfalls by asking her new neighbors if they knew anything about their new home. Dawn was greeted with polite smiles and the friendly admonishment, “oh, you live in the old Johnson place. It’s haunted you know.” Not exactly what you want to hear about your dream home.
Dawn continued to notice that much of the activity seemed to be centered around the afore mentioned stairs in the old portion of the house, the landing at the top of those stairs and the small upstairs room above the front doorway. Dawn continued to coax information from her neighbors and soon a story emerged about one of the families that lived in the house during the 1950s that involved the ghostly Mrs. Johnson. This family had 2 small children, one of whom suffered from a childhood disease that made it impossible to walk without the aid of heavy braces on his legs and the other a toddler. While the mother was outside hanging laundry one day, a small but very smoky fire was started in that upstairs room of the house. It was a few minutes before she noticed the smoke billowing out the windows and several anguish-filled moments before she made it back to the house. Frantically she threw open the front door to dash up and retrieve her poor children only to find them both seated on the bottom step, rubbing their eyes — the toddler who could neither walk or crawl and the sickly child whose bulky metal braces required several minutes each day to attach. She quickly brought them out of the house. After she extinguished the fire, she asked the children how they got downstairs and they replied, “Mrs. Johnson brought us down . . . then she left . . .”
Dawn believes the Brigg’s house ghost is a happy, protective spirit. However, Dawn insists that Mrs. Johnson will not be denied. Dawn’s husband was a non-believer in ghosts early on, but he quickly changed his mind after he witnessed every light in the house turn on and off again, room by room, on both levels, one light at a time.
During the late summer of 2003, I spent some time touring the house, collecting the stories of the home with my friend and fellow author Russ Simnick and my wife Rhonda. While our small group was gathered at the top of the stairs, I used a simple tape recorder to gather these stories for future transcription. Later, when I sat down to transcribe the stories, I heard young Gardner Briggs walking past his mother as she asked, “Hi Honey. Homework done . . . Where are you going now?” To which Gardner replied that he was on his way to play on his computer and walks past our group and closes the door behind him. At that moment, a ghostly whisper said “Hi, Mommy” so plainly audible that I nearly fell off my chair.
Chills ran up my back and my arms and hands started to tingle. I hit the rewind several times to be sure of what I heard. It was so clear that I needed a second opinion to be sure that I was not imagining things. I played the tape for my wife, daughter Jasmine and son Addison — they freaked out worse than I did. Rhonda was at the meeting, so she too remembered the scene as it happened. But my kids were just plain spooked.
I then played the captured ghostly recording for Dawn. This was the first time Dawn had heard it, and she immediately began to cry. That was not the reaction I was looking for. Then Dawn relayed to me a story from the Brigg’s house that she had not shared with us before. When Gardner was still a toddler, Dawn reported how Gardner often spent hours alone in his upstairs room having long conversations with an imaginary friend. So the childish voice from the past hit very close to home for Dawn as confirmation that her son’s little friend was indeed real and obviously held her in high esteem.
I have often described the Brigg’s house as the most active house I’ve experienced in the Irvington area. Not only have we seen evidence of spirits in the form of photos and voice recordings, we have also experienced odd happenings every time we’ve visited on our tours. I recall that during our first tour season, the Brigg’s security system kept going off for no reason during the night. More recently, Dawn reported that while working inside the house tearing out a wall in the guest bedroom in the old part of house, the family dog had been nervous and didn’t sleep well. “I have felt like I see and hear “things” in the hall, like one night while in a deep sleep thinking I heard Gardner get up to go to the bathroom but when I got up to check on him (remember he is a sleepwalker) he was sound asleep. Somehow it just came to my mind to say ‘I am sorry if all this construction mess is bothering you.’ The next morning when I got up I went to the old bathroom at the top of the stairs after I looked in to the guest bedroom to see how the paint color looked in daylight. As I walked out of the room I offhandedly said, ‘well, I hope you like it” and the blowdryer in the other bathroom turned on….I was the only one home, lights were on and there were clearly no power surges . . . not sure if that means they do or do not like the color!”
Gardner continued to experience odd goings-on in the house as well. He said “Wow — tonight I had the weirdest experience. I was in my bathroom at the top of the stairs and was down under the bathtub putting tape on the wall ( to start painting) and I heard Mazy (the family dog) growling, I kept putting on tape thinking she heard a person outside. A few seconds later I hear her bark so I turn around and she is jumping, and growling/biting at the wall towards the ceiling next to the cabinet at the top of the stairs. I thought maybe she was having a bizarre seizure (she has a seizure every few months) but after a few seconds of it she heard me calling her name so she stopped and ran over to me and just sat down, no seizure at all. She has never done anything like this at all. You can even see marks on the wall. Mom said it coulda been mice but they normally do not come upstairs and we haven’t seen anything that makes us think we currently have a mouse… Weird huh?”
Yes, Gardner, it might be weird to anyone who hasn’t experienced the wonders of the Briggs house. However, it sounds just about right to me.
Al Hunter is the author of “Haunted Indianapolis” and “Irvington Haunts. The Tour Guide.” and the co-author of the “Indiana National Road” book series. His newest books are “Osborn H. Oldroyd: Keeper of the Lincoln Flame”, “Thursdays with Doc. Recollections on Springfield & Lincoln” and “Bumps in the Night. Stories from the Weekly View.” Contact Al directly at Huntvault@aol.com or become a friend on Facebook.
