It was reported by the other two boys that one of them accidentally depressed the call button when Douglas was not completely inside the elevator; the elevator suddenly engaged trapping Douglass body halfway out and severing him in two at the waist. The tragic developments were later discovered and many believe the two boys were paid to kill young Douglas.

Some have reported seeing the ghost of Douglas lurking about in the basement area. Some say that only the upper portion of his body and his head can be seen, the lower portion is of course, missing. While on one of my personal visits to the Baker, I must admit, this location, where the young boy died, was the one that just gave me a very uneasy feeling.

In a discussion with a local psychic, then later with a distant relative of Douglass did I learn the true story of the death of the hard working young man. Douglas apparently was never a part of a prostitution ring. Actually he was a 15-year-old boy who came from a poor family. He never drove a fancy car, which some have said and didn't make a lot of money.

Douglas and his friend, Logan Shoemake, were horsing around one evening as teenagers do. Logan was operating the service elevator. As the elevator had no guard on it one could hop aboard, as it was moving. The elevator operated by Logan was going up. As it raised about four to five feet above the floor level, young Douglas attempted to jump in. His friend Logan saw he couldn't make it and attempted to pull him in. Douglass body was crushed at the waist. He died within half an hour of the accident. The Baker Hotel paid for all funeral arrangements. It was a tragic event and one, which, the family never fully recovered from.

A young woman who worked at a local drive through bank in the early to mid 1990s reported she and the other girls in the office faced the huge Baker everyday from their workstations. During slow times they began to notice windows opened on various floors of the Baker. Then later they would notice them closed and others would be opened. After a while they began to take note and count, which were opened and closed. They seemed to move around.

One of the girls told the others it must be the man who lives in the building and takes care of it. After that, the interest ceased and they stopped noticing. The strange thing is, no one has ever stayed in the Baker at any time since its closure in 1970. There never was a caretaker living in the Baker so just who was opening and closing the windows?

In the spring of 2000, I spoke with a local Mineral Wells woman who claimed to be a psychic. She has wished to remain anonymous for fear of ridicule in such a small town. I for one certainly understand.

She told me, ever since she was a young girl; she has had the ability to see spirits. She said she had been in the Baker many times and even ran a shop on the outside first floor back in the early 1980s. She said the stories are true. The Baker is very haunted but not like we think. It is mostly occupied with ghosts who didn't necessarily die there but who returned because the Baker was a place of wonderful times in their lives.

She went on to say that most of the spirits in the hotel do not want to be seen nor heard with the exception of a small child. A little boy, about six to eight years old, who has been the only one to communicate with her. He told her he died in the hotel in an apartment back in 1933 when his parents moved there to seek medicinal treatment for his leukemia.

She reported a large shaggy dog always accompanied the child and he was always bouncing a ball, which he would do to get her attention. She said, he was watched by an older woman who was unknown but was always near him.

The psychic went on to tell me the spirits don't necessarily look the age they were when they died. Some were employees of the building. One she said, for reasons she doesn't understand, was a helicopter pilot who attended basic flight training at Ft. Wolters in the 1960s. He was killed in a helicopter crash while at Ft. Rucker, Alabama. He had returned to the Baker with his body in the same traumatic state as resulting from the crash.

With so many sightings in such a landmark, it was time to see if any of it could be proven. In October 2000, two Paranormal Investigation teams, DFW Ghostwatchers from Dallas and Lone Star Spirits from Houston were contacted to perform a full-scale investigation of the facility.

With about $100,000.00 worth of high tech audio-visual and other scientific instrumentation the teams began a full-scale research mission on the Baker that took three visits to complete.