Janet Hodgson

Gather round, this happened.

Janet Hodgson was 12 years old when she started speaking in a man's voice.

It was low and gruff, nothing like her own.

The family called it The Voice, and The Voice said its name was Bill Wilkins.

Oh, an hour to get across the city.

Peggy was raising four children, including her daughters, Janet, 11, and Margaret, 13.

And Peggy called the police that August because she said she'd witnessed furniture just moving around by itself and that Janet and Margaret had heard sounds of knocking in the walls.

Right?

My God.

I guess it was one of those remotes.

So whenever he heard a sudden disturbance or the girl screaming, he'd just be like, oh, click, click, click, click, click.

So there are these amazing colour photos of Janet flying through the air, her face twisted in terror.

It was the kind of neighborhood where folks minded their own business, where the smell of damp pavement and coal smoke clung to your coat, and where the television glowed in every living room window.

Peggy Hodgson, a stout-hearted single mom, was just trying to keep food on the table for her four children, Margaret, Janet, Johnny, and little Billy.

She was a practical woman living a practical life, completely unaware that her unassuming home was about to become the epicenter of the most documented, debated, and downright chilling poltergeist outbreak of the 20th century.

Now, the nightmare didn't start with a bang, but with a whisper.

Just before I died, I went blind, and then I had a hemorrhage, and I fell asleep, and I died in the chair in the corner downstairs, it said.

Now here's the kicker that sends a shiver right down to the bone.

The Hodgson's had no idea about the history of the house.

They'd just moved in a few years prior.

He was a member of the SPR, but more importantly, he was a grieving father Only a year prior, his daughter Janet had died in a motorcycle accident at the age of 22.

When he met Janet Hodgson, who shared his late daughter's name, he found this deeply personal, and a protective bond was formed instantly.

Weeks later, Grosse was joined by Guy Lyon Playfair.

Playfair was not a standard British ghost hunter.

So let's get into the levitation.

Uh-huh.

If you have ever seen an article on the Enfield Poltergeist, you know the photograph, 11-year-old Janet Hodgson in her red pajamas, seemingly floating horizontally two feet above her bed, her face twisted in distress.

Graham Morris and Maurice Gross captured these photos using a motor-driven 35 millimeter camera mounted on a tripod in the corner of the bedroom, rigged to a remote shutter wire that Gross held while sitting downstairs in the kitchen.

It's just a girl jumping off a bed screaming.

Although, apparently, Janet Hodgson did speak with the rasping voice of an old man, which nobody was sure how she did that.

"Hello, I am a sc- creepy, old man."

Oh, my goodness.

There isn't a neat Hollywood villain, there isn't a perfectly timed exorcism, and there definitely isn't a demon nun running around London.

So crack one open and hang out while we head to the Enfield House.

[upbeat music]

What's going on crack heads? Welcome back to another episode of the Crackin' Cans Cast, the podcast where we crack open a cold one and dive into the weird, the haunted, and the straight up cursed.

Uh, tonight it's not weird, it's, it's haunted.

It's spooky.

I'm excited to do it.

Yeah.