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It sounds like the typical American small town murder: in 1912, two adults and six children were found dead in their beds in Villisca, Iowa, after someone had brutally murdered them with an ax. Nobody was convicted for the crime, it remains unsolved to this day. The crime scene was restored in the 1990s and has officially been considered a historical site ever since: The “Villisca Ax Murder House” is a popular destination for adventurous tourists.
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Around the same time, there were reports of the house being haunted. Visitors said they heard footsteps in empty rooms and that objects moved as if by magic. This led to self-proclaimed ghost hunters traveling to Villisca from around the world to investigate the matter. Darwin and Martha Linn, the owners and restorers of the house, sensed a business and began to offer overnight stays in the Axmord House.
On the evening of November 7, 2014, a middle-aged ghost hunter and his parents arrived at Villisca Ax Murder House. Johnny Houser, the caretaker, checked in the guests and then went home. Only a few hours later, the ghost hunter was found lying on the ground in a large pool of blood, with a hunting knife sticking out of his chest. It appeared that he had rammed the knife into his own body for no apparent reason.
In this article, Houser describes in his own words how he experienced the bizarre night and how it changed his mind about the Villisca Ax Murder House. Incidentally, since the mysterious incident, Houser no longer dares to spend the night there or to be alone in the house.
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When I first walked into the Ax Murder House, I didn’t believe in supernatural powers. In fact, I thought it was pretty stupid. I still remember how I wrote a message to my buddies and made fun of myself, like “Haha, take a look at the website from my workplace, with all the ghost photos”.
I had just moved to Villisca with my then wife when I got the job of caretaker at Villisca Ax Murder House. I went for a walk every day and met Darwin, the owner of the house, who was always out in his overalls and repairing something on the building. Each time I bombarded him with questions: “OK, who was suspected? Can you describe the crime scene to me again?”
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One day Darwin said, “You come by every day, so I can pay you to help out. Do you need a job?” I immediately agreed and have been responsible for the building and website ever since. I really enjoy my work.
The visitors to Villisca Ax Murder House are very diverse, from young women who are totally into true crime to retirees who stop by on their coffee trips and want to solve the riddle of the ax murder, everything is there. There are also many ghost hunters among our guests, these “paranormal researchers” make up 90 percent of our overnight stays.
But that night of 2014 changed everything. The evening started normally. I waited for the announced guests. When they finally drove up, a man got out of the car and walked towards the house. He wore camouflage pants and had a hunting knife dangling from his belt. It’s a completely normal outfit around here, so I thought nothing of it and let him in.
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He seemed totally normal to me. At first I thought it was a bit strange that he was there with his parents, but then I thought to myself: “Don’t be like that, maybe that’s their common hobby.” I would say he was between 50 and 60 years old. Accordingly, his parents were even older. Finally he told me that he was going to really show the house. I wished him a lot of fun and went home to bed.
When I checked my cell phone the next morning, I was tagged on countless social media posts: “Man injures himself with a knife in the ax murder house.” I couldn’t believe it.
I rushed over to the house, where I met some friends, because I didn’t want to be alone in a situation like this. When we entered the house, we found a rolled up blanket on the kitchen floor with the foot of a small teddy bear sticking out of it. Many people bring teddy bears or dolls into the house to leave as presents for the murdered children, but this teddy bear was completely covered in blood. My first thought was, “Not again, not in this house again.”
“I usually carry a handgun with me, but I didn’t know the laws of Iowa. So I just took a knife with me.”
I dumped a bottle of bleach on the floor and wiped the kitchen with a towel, that’s how I did it Die Sopranos seen. Martha, the other owner of the house, came in and said, crying: “People should have fun here. Would it be better to just close?” I told her we couldn’t close because otherwise everyone would think the house was too haunted by ghosts. And then the first burglars would come quickly.
So we stayed open. I later found out that the guy with the hunting knife had been in the house alone examining the children’s bedroom. His parents found him there with the knife in his chest. He was immediately taken to a hospital in a helicopter – and he survived.
I couldn’t find out more. I wanted to contact the man for a long time, but somehow I never made it. It wasn’t until a few years later that I found out the whole truth when a TV show about supernatural activities filmed a feature in the Ax Murder House. In return, the producers had convinced the man with the knife to return to the scene.
When I got to work that day, the production crew had everything set up and the man was waiting. When I saw him, I shouted, totally shocked: “You!” I sat down with him and said I had a million questions. He was ready to answer anything, so first I wanted to know why he had a knife with him back then. His answer: “I usually carry a handgun with me, but I didn’t know the laws of Iowa. So I just took a knife with me.” Then I asked what I wanted to know most: “What exactly happened that night?”
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He said that he went into the children’s bedroom alone and tried to provoke the ghosts. Next he woke up in the emergency room and couldn’t remember anything. As soon as he said that, he really started to cry. The incident destroyed his life: “Everyone thought I was either crazy or just looking for money and TV appearances. Now I finally want to tell my side of the story so that people no longer think I’m insane.”
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When we all went into the house together, the man immediately apologized for yelling and pulling off that whole “come on” act. His voice was trembling and he was looking up at the ceiling the whole time. I just found the situation bizarre.
I haven’t really stayed at the museum since the incident with the knife. And that will probably not happen again. I will never claim that a ghost rammed the knife into the man’s chest, that would be total nonsense. But maybe there is still something in the house that takes care of people who are mentally ill or who are not protected by a lack of religious belief. I don’t want to have anything to do with that.
Anyone looking for something good in the house will find something good. And if you look for something bad, you will find something bad. The house gives you what you expect from it. But is it really bad? In any case, something bad happened there in 1912. And that shapes a place, there is always a certain atmosphere that reminds you of the tragedy.
I definitely want to continue running the house as it is now. Hopefully no one ever arrives, buys the house and slaughters it as a cheap attraction for sensation-hungry people. Once someone actually wanted to take it over, move it to Los Angeles and open a murder museum there. Fortunately, it didn’t get that far. I hope that one day my children will take over the house and continue the tradition.
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