ANDERSON — Growing up in Madison County, Nicole Kobrowski liked to visit some of the area’s creepier places, such as Moss Island Road just west of the city.
Now she hopes to come back to revisit some of her favorite spots and, this time, bring a few other paranormal enthusiasts.
Kobrowski and her husband, Michael, will host a bus tour March 27 through Madison County, stopping at sites where suspected paranormal activity has occurred, in Anderson, Elwood, Alexandria and Lapel. The Kobrowskis own Unseen Press, which has led ghost walks and tours around Indiana since 2001.
“When we take people on our bus tours, normally we take them to different places that are supposed to be haunted and have a look around,” Nicole Kobrowski said. “We tell the history of the area and talk about what kind of hauntings could be there.”
The Kobrowskis plan to take tour participants to businesses, homes, cemeteries and other places that have been known to be haunted.
“One of the places is Moss Island Road; that was always creepy as a kid for me anyway,” said Nicole Kobrowski, who graduated from Madison Heights High School. “It was just very dark and very creepy and kind of mysterious. I always used to drive through there when I got older and it was kind of cool. I just got a very creepy vibe off of it.”
Nicole Kobrowski said past tours by Unseen Press had turned up ghost sightings and other supernatural events, including once when a woman in the group described a soldier she saw standing in a cemetery and a man who said he was shoved by an unseen presence and showed a claw mark on his arm to prove it.
“In another case there was a man who was a skeptic,” Nicole Kobrowski said. “I saw something in one of the buildings and asked him if he could shine his flashlight into it. He described the same thing I saw: a man standing, and you could see a wisp of hair on his forehead and the crook of his nose.
“He said I’ll never look at these things ever the same way again.”
The Kobrowskis aren’t out to change anyone’s mind about the presence of ghosts, however. They get a variety of people on their tours, from true believers in paranormal activity to those who are skeptical.
“We want to find different opinions,” Nicole Kobrowski said. “We love history and we put a lot of history with it. We have our own idea of what the paranormal is. Nobody knows; nobody’s been able to prove the existence of a ghost.
“If they come on tours and walk away thinking it was nice but they’re full of hooey, that’s OK too.”
Nicole Kobrowski said she was a true believer in ghosts, but she didn’t always feel that way. When her family moved into an old farmhouse in Madison County when she was a child, ghost sightings occurred that made her believe, including an incident in which her older sister felt someone come into her bedroom and kiss her.
Other incidents occurred when Nicole Kobrowski or her sisters or friends saw a man in a cape in the house.
“It’s been years and years and I’ve had other experiences,” she said. “Some people may think I’m a crack pot, but there’s a lot of us out there.”
Michael Kobrowski said he was surprised at the positive response when he and his wife, married since 1996, asked businesses in downtown Indianapolis whether they had ghosts in their facilities.
“I’m not as sensitive as some people are, but when you feel something and later you compare notes with other people, it’s kind of neat to have that experience,” Michael Kobrowski said.
Madison County ghost bus tour participants have signed up from Anderson, Greenwood, Indianapolis, New Castle and other places around the state, he said. The Kobrowskis likely will plan another Madison County tour in May.
“It seems like this one has been pretty well received so far,” Nicole Kobrowski said. “We have almost a full bus.”
Contact Aleasha Sandley: 640-4805, aleasha.sandley@heraldbulletin.com.
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Anderson native to lead county ghost tour
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