The Gill House is at 342 Harding Way W in Galion Ohio. It’s a historical landmark that has been visited by famous names like Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and Harvey Firestone. The Gills, the family who built the house were well connected in the automotive industry and may have used their connections with family friend Thomas Edison to make Galion one of the first cities with a power grid. Their influence is felt in Galion to this day. The house was designed by Louis Kamper and may be the last example of Neo-Classical residential style in the world. The Gill House is currently undergoing renovation by Preserving Galion Inc.
Three families called the house home. The Gills, Bloomer, and Nellie Gill and their many children, the Talbots, Dean and Bonnie Talbot with their mother Eva Talbot, and The Hesbys, which not much is known, except they took off the gorgeous columns and porch and almost sold the mansion and land to Taco Bell in the late eighties. Of the three families, the Talbots are said to haunt the house the most, although there have been voices calling themselves “Jimmy” also known as James Cummins Gill has been spotted, along with other Gill children.
The main haunted hotspots of the house include the dining room, said to be haunted by Dean Talbot, a professional baseball player, the attic, plagued by shadowy figures and the infamous “grumpy corner”, and the basement, home to always active mischievous spirits.
I listened to all of this while waiting for the tour to begin. Jane was the resident restorationist who followed us throughout the tour, except the attic where she refused to go. She was a fountain of information as we waited for the other ghost hunters to arrive.
A few minutes late and apologetic, Joe Campbell and Bill Squires of Newark Paranormal Society arrived, bearing large cases for carrying delicate ghost hunting equipment. They were the experienced ghosthunters leading the hunt. They’d been to The Gill House before and Joe said The Gill House was one of his favorite places to investigate. “The Gill House is an awesome place,” Joe explained The Gill House is great for both experienced and beginner ghosthunters. “There’s nothing bad here… Every time you come you get really good evidence.” Besides me, there were two other people on the hunt, one of whom was there before. They were from The Gideon Paranormal Research Society in Columbus, and they were as excited as me to get hunting.
After letting me borrow a recorder and a cat toy to sense movement, we moved into the front sitting rooms. The rooms included a Christmas tree, two portraits of the architect and his wife, and an old ledger owned by the architect, donated by his family. As we set the cat toys and recorders down, one of the cat toys went off, along with an EMP reader. We wasted no time in asking questions to get the spirit to respond. As we listened to the recording, we heard a man’s voice responding, especially in response to a question asked about the ledger. “That’s his book” came through quite clearly in response to a request to touch it. He repeated this phrase a few times before its voice faded out and we were left alone again. However, this was only the start of our ghost hunt.
We made our way upstairs to the second-floor hallway. It connected all the rooms, one of which Eva Talbot passed away, the only person to ever die in the house. The kid’s room was also a known hotspot for activity, so we started by setting up in the hallway. The Gideon Society set up a REM Pod to detect movement, and after sitting for a second or two, it began going off. One of the cat toys also reacted, and REM Pod continued to act crazy as if someone was so close they were touching it. Finally, Joe walked up to it to turn it off and back on to make it was working correctly. As he went to grab it the EMP reader went off and everything went quiet. After setting the REM Pod back down, Joe backed away and apologized. However, the ghost did not return, and we concluded that we made it angry. Packing everything back up, we made our way to the next hotspot: the attic.
Jane refused to go into the attic, having been frightened there before, so our small party of five made our way up the stairs without our restorationist. We walked into the attic where the steady squeaking of the vent was the only noise. Tales of shadow people and little girls haunted the attic, which certainly looked the part. The center was roped off with yellow tape to keep us from falling through the weakened floorboards. Junk littered the rest of the attic which was filled with odd corners and sloping shadows. A lone chair stood in the “grumpy corner”, known for its ghostly activity. The ghosts in the attic were said to dislike women, but I walked alone around the attic anyway. We set up the REM Pod, cat toys, and recorders near the grumpy corner and began our questions. At first, it seemed as though we were unlucky and wouldn’t get any activity. Then the Gideon Research Society snapped a picture of an apparition standing near our equipment. After gawking over the photo, we packed up once again to move to the final hotspot.
After a short break in the heated dining room, the four-hour public ghost hunt was coming to an end, with one more stop on our list. The basement. Ghost sightings include Johnnycake, the last Native American in Crawford County, and Jimmy Gills. We made our way with Jane to an especially active corner of the basement. Jane set a flashlight on the ground and asked the spirit to turn it off. The spirit, obliged and proceeded to turn the flashlight off and back on at her request. After struggling to turn the flashlight off again, Jane took a cat toy and put it far back in the corner. The spirit had a lot of fun playing with it before answering our questions, like responding that it liked Jane and was a part of the Talbot family. Some of its answers were contradictory, and as we continued asking it became sluggish and tired, eventually responding yes when we asked it if it wanted us to leave. After it stopped, we waited around to see if it would come back. Eventually, we decided to call it a night and went back upstairs.
To say our venture had been fruitful would be an understatement. To me, I’d seen with my own eyes, ghosts move objects, say things, set off motion detectors, appear in a photo, and communicate with us. This incredible experience was nothing I’d ever forget, and I would encourage everyone to go on a ghost hunt at least once. And The Gill House was a great place to start. While the activity we’d gotten was exciting and spooky, I never once felt genuinely frightened or fearful. The experience of the Newark Paranormal Society was evident, and they helped me through the basics of ghost hunting.
If you want to experience ghost hunting for yourself and live anywhere near The Gill House, I recommend you take a visit. It’s an experience I won’t soon forget, and the setting makes it all the better. The Gill House is also available to visitors 11-3 pm on Saturdays and check their paranormal Facebook page for the price and time of the next ghost hunt. Happy travels and I hope you’ll put The Gill House Ghost Hunt on your bucket list.
Written For U 