Ghost Stories - Galena, IL

One Eleven Main is a restaurant in Galena, IL. David and I ate at this restaurant during our trip to a couple weekends ago. We saw a picture hanging in the restaurant, the one shown to the left. It looks like white streaks or something in front of the back entrance to the building. We thought it was interesting, but didn't really think anymore about it at the time.

The next night we were scheduled to go on a Ghost Tour of Galena. The tour was designed to tell the history of Galena through the spirits left behind. It was collection of stories from the Townspeople and tourist's paranormal experiences over the years. I of course was excited. David was not so excited, but was a good sport for going with me. For those of you that don't know me well, the Paranormal has always been a great interest of mine, especially when connected with history.

Usually I'm disappointed in these tours (I've been on several similar tours in other cities) and although this was just as cheeky as the others it was interesting to learn of the history of the city and would could be left behind. The restaurant that David and I went to the night before, and the one mentioned above (One Eleven Main) turned out to be the town's first mortuary and funeral home back in the mid 1800's. In fact the ceiling in the restaurant was the original ceiling. The photo that was hanging on the wall was taken by the restaurants Executive Chef. They had just moved into the location (from a different one up the street) and so he took a picture of the newly finished building.

Other employees had reported strange occurrences as well, things being moved, cabinets opening and closing on their own, voices, and even witnessing apparitions. One of an older woman and the other of three children. Not to mention several employees said they felt someone tap on their shoulder, walk by or even bump into them, but nobody else would be around. They had several paranormal teams in to investigate and run tests, etc. In fact, in July or August the owner said they were going to be featured on an A&E show though he wasn't sure which one, so I'll have to keep an eye out.

Anyway, the owner let us go upstairs to where most of the sightings and strange occurrences have happened. When we first walked in, I was immediately drawn to this one corner of the room, not in a psychic kind of way, just in that way when you feel someone enter a room so look to see who is it or turn in their direction, it was like that. I snapped a picture in that direction and that photo is seen below. In the corner you see what looks like small ball. It's actually an Orb. Now, I personally don't put a lot of stock in Orbs because they can be explained away as many other things such as dust in the air or on the camera lens, reflections from the flash, water spots, etc. But what I thought was particularly different about this orb, that leads me to believe it *could* be something paranormal is it's color. It's bright blue and when you zoom in on it, it's got some purple and pink marbling. Definitely not dust or a water spot. There was nothing in the area to create a reflection from my flash so I'm just not sure what it is. You can decide what you might think...