Creepy! Haunted Tales From Brossman's Bar

If you don't believe in ghosts, that's OK -- the folks at Brossman's Bar are used to serving folks who don't believe that paranormal activity exists.

But, if you do believe in ghosts, the stories bar owner Ron Brossman, his employees and even customers offer up will make the hair on your skin prickle. According to them, Brossman's Bar, 3241 County Highway H, in Franksville, is very haunted.

Ron's grandparents bought the property in 1899, but he knows the property existed even back in the 1840s before Wisconsin was a state. Helen, Ron's mother, grew up there. And before it was a bar, the property had served as a stagecoach stop and hotel.

"There are sightings all of the time -- a little girl in a red dress, a woman in a white gown, a man wearing a cheap suit," he said.

A number of customers and employees have reported seeing a number of odd things happening inside the bar -- spinning chairs, a flying pilgrim hat, the sound of people walking upstairs, doors shutting and paper towel dispensers randomly spitting out paper towel.

Even Helen Brossman, Ron's mother, saw the ghosts and may have decided to stick around the bar after she died in 2010. Ron and several of his employees say the television on which she spent hours watching old westerns would mysteriously turn on -- seemingly by itself -- for over a year after her death, he said.

Cassie Christoplis, a bartender who has worked at the tavern for four years, was working one night and her brother Peter came into the bar. Cassie said it was busy that night and he said he saw a little girl in a red dress standing in the door way twice.

"My brother came up to me and he's shaking. He said, 'OK, I've seen her twice. Who is she?'" Cassie said. "And she was as solid as you and me, he couldn't see through her."

Just after the sighting, several other customers had seen what they said was a ghost. Another bartender, Dale (who didn't want his last name used), also saw the little girl in the red dress. He said a woman saw a little girl standing staring out a second story window and had a photo of it.
 
Dane Passehl, a customer, also said he's heard the doors upstairs opening and closing, and people walking upstairs, which Ron keeps locked. He, too, reports having seen the shadow of a man walking behind him when no one was there and Dale said he and Helen both saw a man coming into the bar wearing a cheap suit.

With so many sightings by so many people, Ron said it's hard to discount them.

"We've tried to make logic of it all, but boy, I'll tell you it's been hard to explain all of this," Ron said. "We've always struggled trying to explain this stuff. It's something we've always tried to play off, but there have been too many unexplainable things that have happened."