Personal Experience: Balsam Community Center

     A close friend and longtime resident of Balsam provides the following account:

The old Balsam School, now used as a community center.

     Several years ago, probably in the mid-90's, a friend and I had taken a late night walk out to the Balsam Community Center. At the time, the building was almost completely unused, and plywood covered the doors and windows. It was not unusual to find ourselves there at night, sitting on the steep concrete steps around back, looking out over the basketball courts and maybe sneaking a cigarette or a can of beer. Balsam was quiet at night, with almost no traffic, and very few houses nearby.
 
     This particular night the two of us sat there in the darkness, leaning against the boarded up door at the side of the building. As we talked and laughed, loud, heavy footsteps sounded out inside the building. Someone was running to the boarded up door! Before we could react, a huge thud sounded out as the person inside slammed their foot into the door. Without even thinking, we were both up, scrambling down the stairs and away from that horrible noise. We had to skirt the building to get back to the road, and those 50 feet were probably the hardest I have ever run.

The door, boarded up at the time, where we heard the noise.

     Was it someone inside? Probably. Maybe some drunk who found a warm place to spend the night and didn't like us making noise outside his door. But years of living here and experiencing several other unexplainable events has made me wary. This also ignores the fact that the place was very well boarded up. We had tried on several occasions to sneak in and had found no weakness. Whoever or whatever was in there wanted us gone, and I was happy to oblige.