Opinion

A life's story

I like hearing people's life stories. I lose myself in the detail, the asides, the hindsights, the twists and the turns, and when I talked with Jan Brown this week the poltergeist activity in their Mayfield home in 1977 was really just the excuse. You may recall that a few days ago I wrote of a Sydney author's search for Jan and George Brown so he could include their Mayfield experience in his book about poltergeist activity in Australia. Poltergeist activity has been explained to me as more tangible than the shadowy ghost, usually noises and moving objects that leave little doubt about the presence of a certain energy, whatever it is.

Well, I found Jan Brown living in an old stationmaster's house in Kurri, aged 63, a foster carer and a babysitting grandmother, and, unfortunately, a widow. George died at age 66 last year - over many years he'd had, Jan told me, cancer in the tongue, the eye, the bowel and, finally, the lung. He'd also suffered from depression, and it was only in recent years that he'd been diagnosed as bipolar and successfully treated. Jan didn't renew her driver's licence many years ago to encourage George when depressed to leave the house to drive her about - aren't women resourceful! - and she's thinking now of trying to get it again.

In my column in The Herald today I write of the Browns' life as they moved from Mayfield to Morpeth, where they ran a very successful pottery business, to Spion Kop in the Coalfields and to Kurri. If you've already read that column you'll know, for example, that Jan Brown's father, Henry, won the $500,000 lottery in 1977, then, and still, a huge amount of money.

I write also of the Browns' encounters with ghosts and visitors from the other side over those years, and in her home today Mrs Brown has two. One appears to be the stationmaster's daughter, Miss Muriel English, and the other is George. Mrs Brown feels him turn over in the bed at night. And recently when she took her mother to see Andre Rieu she'd had to return to the house hurriedly because she'd forgotten the tickets, and they were sitting prominently waiting for her, obviously put there by George for her return.

Whether or not you have anything to offer about the other side, how about telling us of your life so far on this side? It may seem humdrum to you, but I assure you it is not to me.

Posted By: Jeff Corbett on 9/09/2010 5:00:00 AM | Comments (121)

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That is an interesting story! Weird coincidences - I have them all the time and have an active mind that likes putting stories to them - I hope i keep doing that as its part of a creative way of thinking. Real or not ? Who can be the judge of that when most of what we read and see is overspun, oversold and sometimes just untruthfull?

Posted by interesting story, 9/09/2010 7:17:09 AM, on The Herald

i have had a pretty good life with lots of great experiences. however, a long time ago I learned not to talk about a lot of the stuff that has happened to me during my life as hardly any bastard ever believes me.....

Posted by judgedredd, 9/09/2010 9:34:41 AM, on The Herald

We will, we promise, Judge.

Posted by Jeff Corbett on 9/09/2010 9:49:07 AM

I'm sure your readers would not want to hear about me, as according to an expert on local knowledge my life is generally very boring. Back on the topic of poltergeists and ghosts, I strongly recommend anyone troubled by them should install a CCTV system in their house. Apparently they are remarkably camera shy, in spite of their physical manifestations. One might ponder as to why they would be that way, given their supposed desire to get the attention of the living.

Posted by Directeur Sportif, 9/09/2010 9:38:25 AM, on The Herald

Scott Hillard had a song written about him: "I was born in a cross-fire hurricane!"

Posted by Ghostwriter, 9/09/2010 9:44:31 AM, on The Herald

15 years ago, I bought and old home and had it moved onto my block. I spent years renovating it. The back/3rd bedroom had been an add on, before I bought it. There had been an old couple living in it. The back room always had noises at night, like someone shuffling about in there. I slept in it, in case it scared the kids. I really thought that maybe someone had died in the room and their sprit was still there. It never seemed to be a problem, so it didn't bother me. I eventually took all the walls and roof off and rebuilt the room, with the original frame, but after that I never heard anthing - maybe the spirit escaped, when the room was stripped? Unfortunately I had to sell my "dream" after being made redundant, last year. After all that effort, it was pretty devastating. But I am determined to get at least another little modest home, as soon as I can find full time employment again. It will be pretty basic tho. I'm past doing another "reno". I have an open mind to spiritual things. Some stories are pretty unrealistic tho.

Posted by Rose- Lake Macquarie, 9/09/2010 10:02:51 AM, on The Herald

That's one of the downsides of the golden handshake, isn't it, Rose? Finding another job, especially when you're older, can be very difficult, and the longer you're trying the harder it gets. What sort of work do you do?

Posted by Jeff Corbett on 9/09/2010 10:21:06 AM

30 years or so ago I wanted to set up a pottery studio somewhere in a rural environment. I found an empty house on a dairy property in the Dungog area and approached the owner who agreed to rent it to me ($7 a week or a dollar a day!) The house needed cleaning out after having cows wander through it so over a number of weekends I went up cleaned, fenced etc until it was ready enough to move in. I arrived at the house to be greeted by the landlord's wife and daughter who were scavenging some firewood. The daughter, who didn't know I hadn't actually slept there yet, asked me straight up if I had seen the ghost yet. Her mother immediately said to her, and me, "You know the ghost is long gone". Next day I asked my landlord about this and he told me there had been a ghost and that there had been an official church exorcism held and the ghost was long gone. The story went that the original builder/owners of the house had died at the house, the husband first - he was buried across the river in a cemetery but came to visit the wife and sit on the end of her bed. after she died she was buried in an unmarked grave on the side of the hill on which the house sat & he still tried to visit her.

Posted by zuluclayman, 9/09/2010 10:50:00 AM, on The Herald

Did you stay long, zuluclayman? And why did you leave? Living in the countryside of Dungog would be a pleasant way to spend a few years.

Posted by Jeff Corbett on 9/09/2010 11:04:28 AM

continued from previous post: a number of people who had lived in the house had said they could feel his presence and heard noises etc until some time in the late 70's the landlord applied to the church to have an exorcism to be carried out to rid the house of the ghost. The weird thing was that the night before I went up to stay permanently, my then girlfriend and I had watched a very scary and believable ghost story on television.

Posted by zuluclayman, 9/09/2010 10:53:55 AM, on The Herald

Absolutely everything! Admin - Office - computer - customer serv - then have got my white blue and yellow cards, for traffic work as well - mate I'll do anything - currently have casual work, customer serv - but - I need full time to get a small loan again. Job seeking really sucks! I never give up tho - just get very frustrated along the way. And I gave up smoking - dammit! There are lot's of moments when I would luv a durri! But I won't crack now.

Posted by Rose- Lake Macquarie, 9/09/2010 11:03:01 AM, on The Herald

I see alive people - I thought they were actually dead but found out that I am actually deceased !

Posted by spectre, 9/09/2010 11:37:28 AM, on The Herald

Back in the 1980s I lived in an old mansion in Mayfield that had once been owned by the Arnotts family. It had been chopped up into flats but still had a bit an air of grandeur about it. It was built before the days of the steelworks when the top of Mayfield was where all the well-to-do people lived. The flat I had was once the main dining room and still had the ornate marble fireplace. Just after moving in and making the aquaintance of the other tenants, I was asked if I had seen the old lady wandering around yet. I replied no, and was told don't worry, you will eventually. Apparently, it was the ghost of a woman who was murdered by her husband in the main bedroom upstairs. I lived there a couple of years and never did see the ghost, but it was not unusual to go outside and be able to smell the pungent aroma of whoopee weed. mmmm, was there a ghost, or was it just the imaginings of a stoned hippee?

Posted by Dastirum, 9/09/2010 11:46:22 AM, on The Herald