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The Brewer Center
51 Plays8 months ago
Tonight we talk about the sad haunted history of The Brewer Center. Listen to Adam and I ramble about nonsense and go over scary happenings.
Transcript
Podcast Introduction and First Recording
00:01:09
Eerie Encounters
Okay.
00:01:12
Eerie Encounters
Hi, guys. Welcome to Eerie Encounters with Elle, where every shadow tells a tale. I'm Elle, and I have Adam here with me. I'm Adam. I'm here with me. Okay, Adam. Do I have to take these off? Yeah, go ahead. Okay.
00:01:32
Eerie Encounters
Adam's teaching me how to podcast. He's the professional. um Hold on. Let me bring my notes back up. So this is my first episode. Episode one, starting off strong.
History of the Brewer Center
00:01:48
Eerie Encounters
Yes. um I was just going to talk about the Brewer Center that I wrote about a few weeks ago, um located in Mobile, Alabama.
00:02:01
Eerie Encounters
but it was mobile. Okay. Okay. mobile Whatever, babe. Okay. um I visited it with a few friends back in the day when we were like, you know, babies, like 19, 20 years old. um It was built in 1973. We're going to go straight into the history of it.
00:02:28
Eerie Encounters
Sound good? The history. I love history. okay If there's one thing I love, oh right listen to me. It's history.
00:02:36
Eerie Encounters
Oh, he loves history. Do you love history? That's one thing about me. It's one thing about me. one that i love some history Okay. I love you. I love you. Thanks. Um, it was built in 1973 and it housed over 180 adults with intellectual disabilities. Um, it soon became infamous due to nine lawsuits related to the abuse and neglect of its residents.
00:03:04
Eerie Encounters
That sounds, I mean, I feel like that's how most of those institutions end up. That's not funny. Why are you laughing? I didn't laugh you now you' laugh. You're laughing out loud. Give me the brush. No, if it's my brush. Okay. Well, I didn't laugh out loud. You were um dying loud. We had to cut it out because you were laughing so hard.
00:03:25
Eerie Encounters
to cut that part out okay babe you're the worst um so one summer several of the residents were found covered in fire ant bites that sounds pleasant how did they even get in there and they left out some they spilled a soda and never wiped out okay that's not how fire ants were it says sugar ants They spilled some fire and never wiped it up. oh
00:03:58
Eerie Encounters
um But there was one resident um whose mom came to visit her one day. She had Rett syndrome, so she couldn't speak or walk or anything like that. And she was discovered in her bed by her mother one day swarmed
Closure of the Brewer Center
00:04:13
Eerie Encounters
by a fire ants and covered in hundreds of their bites. That sounds really bad. you can't She couldn't vocalize or you know, that she was covered in ants. Just this excruciating pain. but that no It's like I have no mouth and I must scream. You ever read that story? but Yes, you showed it to me. <unk>s like It's kind of like that. No, it's not. It's a sci-fi horror is it beyond human comprehension. Is it? I think it is. Is it? I would.
00:04:51
Eerie Encounters
just Just imagine, okay, you walk in, your kid's covered in fire ants and hundreds of bites. How long has it been since they have checked on her? At least five minutes. Okay, babe. I feel like it was a little longer than five minutes. Maybe seven minutes or so. Okay, i'm gonna I'm gonna say it was a few days. Probably something like that.
00:05:20
Eerie Encounters
um so i would rather die than be bit by fire ants for days i just want to throw that out there what was the first thing you'd rather what die you'd rather die than get bit by some ants for days straight yeah at least you can recover from the ants you can't recover from death Oh, really? You can't recover from death. So tell me more about this place where ah all the people are coming back from the dead and haunting it. Okay. Well, um it eventually closed down, not because people were getting eaten up by fire ants, but because the conditions of the place fucking sucked.
00:06:06
Eerie Encounters
um
Exploring the Abandoned Brewer Center
00:06:08
Eerie Encounters
residents and visitors frequently navigated around buckets catching rain water from leaking roofs so after numerous complaints an inspection revealed that 14 of the 15 buildings were deemed hazardous to human life that sucks because there's a bunch of people living there so um they didn't be being taken care of
00:06:36
Eerie Encounters
you're so sassy so it's not even it's not even like someone's house is like condemned it's like the place where you're supposed to be you know fine and it's too shitty to even live in yeah well they fixed that problem by doing what? closing it down well it's still shitty and it didn't actually fix it Because they did an estimated cost to remodel each of the buildings. It was going to stagger around $8 million. And the department at the time ah couldn't afford that. Oh, really? The place that couldn't fix the roof couldn't afford $8 million. dollars Imagine that. Who would have thought? Who would have thought?
00:07:20
Eerie Encounters
Who would have thunk that? Who would have thunk that? um So in 2003, the Brewer Center closed its doors for good. And around 80 of the residents were really relocated to Daphne, Alabama, to a sister center of the Brewer Center. It was called like the Brewer something, I can't remember. Oh, but it was a six. Jinkies. Jinkies.
00:07:47
Eerie Encounters
um But it makes you think there were over 180 adults in there and 80 of them were relocated to Daphne, Alabama. Where'd the other 100 go? They died from fire ant bites. Oh, probably.
00:08:02
Eerie Encounters
um In 2011, after years of urban explorers venturing into the decaying ah facility, but would tea as it became to no the um the state finally demolished the buildings, which sucked because my friends and I actually used to sneak around in there.
00:08:22
Eerie Encounters
um
00:08:26
Eerie Encounters
It definitely was not a safe place to sneak around in. It had a lot of hazardous issues. um I did learn though that there was no asbestos. That was the main thing I was worried about. Apparently there's a guy that went in there and tested the air and other things around it and there was no asbestos. so's That's good. and and They didn't die from asbestos. But you kind of figured that a place that old.
00:08:51
Eerie Encounters
was built with asbestos. was Oh they didn't care about the people so they didn't bother insulating it so that's why there was no asbestos. Oh okay okay babe. So the story of how we ended up there were me and some of my friends were hanging out in the Burlington coat factory. I knew it.
00:09:14
Eerie Encounters
parking lot knew and because we had a friend that worked at Burlington and we went and saw them and then we were hanging out in the parking lot just kind of deciding on what we wanted to do the rest of the night and this random truck just pulls up right and he's like y'all okay because you remember we're in Mobile, Alabama so it's like the big ye ye truck fellas pulling up and then Is that y'all Y'all's tires good. And we're like, we're fine. We're we're just hanging out. And I actually just kind of looking for somewhere to explore. And this guy was just like, y'all ever been to that abandoned insane asylum behind the movie theater? And we were like, um, no, but now we want to go. So, um, he, he was like, it well, if you pull up behind the movie theater on Schillinger Road,
00:10:06
Eerie Encounters
um and go, he's like, there's a a door in the fence, a gate in the fence, whatever. um If you go through there and walk, it's not even a half a mile. It wasn't super far behind that fence. And he was like, now look, there's a barbed wire fence around this place. It's got barbed wire on top. So you can't climb the fence. You can't do nothing like that. He's like, but if you just go around the side and on one of the corners, somebody cut it open.
00:10:35
Eerie Encounters
He was like, you just slide through there. And I was like, okay, that's going to be really hard to find because it's massive. He was going to go one of the sides, just a little spot cutting the fence. You'll find it's really easy. I was like, Oh, okay. Well, um, so we went and we parked near the back of the theater and found the gate he was talking about.
00:10:57
Eerie Encounters
and walked out, it's like, the grass, ugh, the grass is so tall. But he did warn us, he's like, sometimes cops come around there and they'll shine their lights, just lay down in the grass. He's giving you a whole fucking tutorial. Yeah, they won't see you, just lay down in the grass. Yeah, lay down there and they won't crash my stand back up. So that's what we did. When the cop came shining their lights around, you literally just lay down in the grass, they can't see you, it was pretty cool.
00:11:25
Eerie Encounters
Hang on. I'm going to take my drink and I'm going to slide the straw in and out right against the fucking mic. hie
00:11:35
Eerie Encounters
Sound effects. Welcome to the ASMR stream. You're welcome. What if you just sip or drink really close to the mic? Good soup. How you going to make a sound when you're not even sipping your drink? I was sipping it. you said yeah by the straw it was no i was drinking it no let them be immersed in the illusion that i was drinking well immersed in the ah the the story okay you're doing great straw slider um strawson you call me john strawson do they i haven't heard a single person call you some people call me thomas straw not a single person the inventor of the straw
00:12:29
Eerie Encounters
the inventor of this. Well, all right. Yeah, just keep saying the inventor of the straw over there. Just keep sitting over there going the inventor of the straw, the inventor of
Recording and Mysterious Encounter
00:12:40
Eerie Encounters
the straw.
00:12:41
Eerie Encounters
I'm going to be like, I'm going to be like mid-story. I'm like the inventor of the straw. Okay. um okay So anyways, we find the gate and the fence and we go through the gate. The hole someone cut is what she means. No, no, no. The gate and the wooden fence behind the movie theater. Oh, there's two fences here. One's a big wooden fence. One's a big chain link fence with barbed wire at the top.
00:13:10
Eerie Encounters
It wasn't like nobody out. Double fenced up. And um so we walk around the edges of this massive fucking... Was it facility? And we're like just looking for the part where people cut the chain link fence. We finally find that it's near the back like left corner, I believe.
00:13:35
Eerie Encounters
And, uh, we go through and then like, as soon as you get through, there's like this giant hole in the wall of one of the buildings. So we just go through that hole and, um, it led into like, um, is it like a reception area? I guess where people were like sign in and stuff like that. How are people signing themselves into this place? No, like visitors would sign in to visit.
00:14:03
Eerie Encounters
Don't look at me. okay and um so i'm like searching around and i found like a big i didn't touch it or like mess with it because i don't want to be haunted too late that's for another podcast i guess yeah we could talk about michael in a different podcast um so i find this like big like uh what's it called like ah visitation book where everybody signed in and that was pretty cool low-key wanted to take it but I didn't taking it okay that would allow you to talk to the dead and be double haunted well probably triple or quadruple at least depends on how many uh how many ghosts come from those fire ants how many fire ants are haunting that place
00:14:58
Eerie Encounters
what the ghost The ghost of a thousand fire ants comes into your house at night. Could you imagine being haunted by fire ants?
00:15:10
Eerie Encounters
Would you know? like Like, if it was the ghost of a fire ant, would you even know? Phantom bites. Oh, you think it could bite you still? Yeah. I feel like fire ants have enough hateful energy in their tiny bodies. Maybe that's what's happening to me. Maybe I'm just haunted by a fire ants.
00:15:34
Eerie Encounters
That's it. I'm going to tell, we're going to tell the doctor. That's what, that's what it is. That's what it is. haunted by fire Like you guys don't have to do anything else. No more tests. No more tests. He's haunted by firing. Get us some sage. We're going to burn some sage. It's going to be fine. What if Sage doesn't work on firing ghost? What does work? Raid. You just spray a bunch of raid.
00:15:57
Eerie Encounters
blow up a bottle over trying to light it like say it's just blow up a bottle of rain you do a whole ceremony with a bottle of rain and blow it up
00:16:10
Eerie Encounters
um sorry anyways back to the topic of not ghost fire ants fire ant ghosts whatever um so we ended up in that reception room where anyone call it front desk area and like there were some rooms off to the right if i could remember down like a little hallway where there was like beds with straps on it and stuff like that wild i bet homeless people slept in there it probably wouldn They did say there was a bunch of homeless people in there at one point or something like that. So they would probably sleep it on them old beds. That's terrible. um So anyways, ah we found this really long like breezeway and we followed it down. And there was like a set of double doors at the end of the breezeway. And my friends and I were like, well, let's go into this room.
00:17:07
Eerie Encounters
And when one of my friends, he tried to pull the door open, it's like something kind of pulled it back.
Technical Glitches and Nostalgia
00:17:14
Eerie Encounters
Because it was a push on the door. But no. Oh. It wasn't. I was trying to tell it them the, does that know what happened? No. I thought you told me it was a push on the door and that's where. You're a little liar. I did not tell you it was a push open. Yeah, you said it wouldn't, it wouldn't pull open because it was push. Now you just make us, Adam likes to lie for fun.
00:17:37
Eerie Encounters
I didn't know. I thought it was push only. He knows. Don't let his... um What you call it? Go ahead. Little white lies get to anyway he pulled on the the double doors and it's like something kind of pulled on back and we kind of figured maybe it was like locked from the inside or maybe there's like a chain you know right because it's like the big yeah pull handles pull handles not push right that's what i'm saying i well we pulled it right and something pulled it back yeah it was big pull from each way obviously
00:18:21
Eerie Encounters
You were trying to open it at the same time your friend was on the other side trying to open it. We were on the same side! No, your other friend had walked around. We were all together! No. Okay. Were you there? I know what happened. The guy in the pickup truck followed you all the way around. He was trying to fuck with you. Yep, that's what happened. No! No, that'd be really funny though, if that was actually true. But it's not.
00:18:51
Eerie Encounters
So, true no, it's not. So anyways, pulled it on the door and they wouldn't pull open. So, um, he held them open and then my other friend like reached their hand inside to see if like they could feel like chains or anything blocking it. Cause like it would open up wide enough for you to stick your entire like arm up to the shoulder. Oh, that's safe. The door that keeps slamming close. Well, the whole arm in it we're children. We weren't smart.
00:19:20
Eerie Encounters
we We're stupid. Okay. Fine. Excuse me. Yeah, you're excused. So anyways, um so we obviously assumed the doors were not locked from the other side and it literally felt like something didn't want us in that room, right? So we just kind of gave up and we went to go walk back and we decided to record and so I whipped out my little handy dandy. You know the phones that used to like slide up? Oh, like the LG chocolate?
00:19:58
Eerie Encounters
I don't think it was a chocolate. Man, those things were cool. I don't remember what this one was called. It was like the little slidey up phone. You had the keyboard hidden underneath, you know? The razor. It wasn't a razor for sure. I don't remember the razor. You can't listen to this shit. Don't remember no razor. OK. I don't remember no LG chocolate. I don't know, no, no, no, no, LG chocolate. OK. Nobody remembers the LG chocolate. Only you. OK. Well, it was a good phone. That's all I'm going to say.
00:20:27
Eerie Encounters
So I'm recording on my little slider phone and and um we're just walking back up the breezeway and literally I shit you not. At the same time, we all hear footsteps like run up behind us. So we just take off instinctively. We just run away from that. Um, probably nothing. Nothing. It's probably just the wind. Okay. Shane.
00:20:56
Eerie Encounters
Who's that? I'm Ryan. You're Shane from We Are Watchers. Yeah, it's probably just the wind. Okay, Shane. You're right, you know what? Ghost exists. We just haven't had any proof ever. I have proof and I'm telling it to you right now. It sounds like a story. Yeah, it is a story. It's not a proof. Of something that happened to me and my friends. That's not a proof though. I have Michael. that's just That's just a story. Michael's proof.
00:21:26
Eerie Encounters
Michael's um michael is a manifestation. No, he's not. Of your imagination. See? Is he what he is? A manifestation of my imagination? Yep. Okay, babe. Anyways, we run away from these footsteps. I want to be the skeptic. Can I be the skeptic on this? You are the skeptic. Can we make this a thing? So we're Ryan and Shane. So everything you say, I just go, huh?
00:21:55
Eerie Encounters
ah No matter what, and I have no rebuttal, I just go, it probably didn't happen. It was the wind. Everything was the wind. ah Yeah, I'll tell you what happened when I wasn't there. but ah It was probably a slight change in barometric pressure and that's why the door closed. I love you. I love you.
00:22:20
Eerie Encounters
Give me. Thanks. Anyways. It was a slight jig and barometric pressure and that's why they didn't close. So we run. Okay. I believe that part. Don't say okay at the same time as I say okay. Thanks. Okay. And we get back to the little reception room and we all stop and just kind of you know look at each other. Yeah because the ghost probably ran out of breath by now so it can't it can't chase you all the way to reception. Of course.
00:22:51
Eerie Encounters
What kind of logic is this?
00:22:57
Eerie Encounters
Adam Joseph. I'm gonna, nah, my head butt shit. Your head butt man. I'm a damn. Okay, go on with this ridiculous story. Ridiculous? You're ridiculous. Go on. So we stop in the reception area, and we just kind of, you know, look around at each other, kind of confirm that we all heard that. And I'm still recording. So I'm like panning the, you know, the camera around to like each of my friends. Yeah. And we're just kind of like,
00:23:29
Eerie Encounters
you know, we were dramatic like 18, 19 year olds. So um anyways, so I'm filming blah, blah. We get back in the car to leave and um me and one of my friends are sitting in the back seat watching the video and you can't hear the footsteps, which kind of sucks. Weird. Cause they weren't there. Go on. Yes they were. Okay.
00:23:57
Eerie Encounters
And so, but when I go to pan the phone, when we get back in the reception area, when I go to pan the phone to the last friend, literally as soon as it moves, like this woman's face appears in front of the camera and you just hear this high shrieking sound, but we didn't hear that in person. Only could hear it on the video. And we obviously didn't see her in person. It was literally only on the video.
00:24:24
Eerie Encounters
So we were gonna like post it to whatever was back then. How old were you? Like it was like 2012. You know? Facebook I guess. But my phone stopped working. You're gonna put it on MySpace. MySpace was not even a thing anymore in 2012. Yeah it was. When did it end? After that, I was in college when it ended.
00:24:55
Eerie Encounters
Well, it's like still a thing, but it wasn't like a thing when we were younger. It wasn't a thing thing is what you're saying. Yeah, like ah the website itself. Yeah, you can still post on the, what was that thing called? The Bolton board where everyone can see it. Yeah. Did you have like a top eight or did you do like a top five friends? friends Yeah, I didn't have enough. I had two friends and one of them was Tom. I would have been your friend. Yeah, but.
00:25:22
Eerie Encounters
You weren't there
Episode Conclusion and Future Stories
00:25:23
Eerie Encounters
yet. You're really, you're really technologically smart. Did you have like a really cool profile? Did you like code up your profile? Yeah. I did too. What was your MySpace song? I can't remember now. It changed a lot. Mine was that fucking for sure song. I was like, for sure, maybe for sure, or not for sure. No, one but no one knows what you're talking about. The drugs on the dashboard.
00:25:50
Eerie Encounters
look at them Never heard of it. ki off still it kick off still so anyway fuck me in the backse fuck me in the backse I youre still had a player that played multiple songs. kicked off your st ittos And it was usually just Fall Out Boy or something I have going on my profile.
00:26:08
Eerie Encounters
um up boy
00:26:11
Eerie Encounters
For sure maybe, for sure not, for sure, eh, for sure, bah. Pulled up at a stoplight, did drugs on the dashboard. Anyways, um so that is what happened. A lady appeared, there was a very loud shrieking sound. Women do that sometimes, babe. Well, it wasn't any of us. When do I shriek? All the time. When? Just freak out. When? When?
00:26:43
Eerie Encounters
Well, when have I ever done that? Every day. At least once a day. I do not. You do that. I don't. Yes, you do. I don't go in. Yes, you do. I've heard you do it. Um, but yeah, my new phone, newish phone just stopped working after a week and.
00:27:07
Eerie Encounters
Oh, really? The phone from 2012 didn't last very long. and this well It was 2012. It had the slide-out keyboard. It didn't last. It must have been a ghost. Okay, babe. We went back several more times and had other haunting stuff. How many phones did you go through if the ghost kept killing your phone? Okay, babe. Every time you go back, you got to get a new phone. Your mom's like, you're going to stop going back.
00:27:36
Eerie Encounters
um
00:27:39
Eerie Encounters
You've made me lose. You're trying to thought you never had one of those. Yes, I did. Until you made me lose it.
00:27:51
Eerie Encounters
Like this out of that pencil. hit It's going to pick up. That's fine. That's going to be great. Yeah, that's that's just OK. But so that's the story of the Borough Center. It's my story. They stick into it. They demolished it and they think they turned it into like a ballpark or like something like that. I can't remember.
00:28:12
Eerie Encounters
That's creepy. But whatever they built on top of it, it's fucking haunted now. Great. But that's the story of the Brewer Center. um This was the first episode of Eerie Encounters with Elle. Episode one. Episode one. It's always the worst episode, so it's only uphill from here. So you're saying this is a bad episode? No, I'm saying it's going to only happen. Wow. Play the outro music.
00:28:39
Eerie Encounters
Get me out of here. Get me out of here. Get me out of here. Get us, get us out of this joint. Don't do it. Well, I want to use this one. Are we using this one? Let's use it. iphone Goodbye guys.