Highland Park, Michigan is a suburb of Detroit that used to be a shining jewel in the state. It was a small, prosperous enclave where Henry Ford built his first assembly line automotive plant. Unfortunately, today Highland Park has fewer than 9,000 residents and the city recently asked the governor of Michigan if she would allow them to file bankruptcy. What happened to Highland Park?
Author Archives: brayleep
Malicious And Mysterious: St Ann’s Retreat ( Logan Canyon, Utah)
St. Ann’s Retreat—haunted or just harassed? In the 1950s the Catholic Church accepted a generous donation of a retreat from a prominent family. What happened next would lead to decades of legends and myths that persist to this day.
What really happened at St. Ann’s Retreat? Salt Of The Earth: https://amzn.to/3LeTrXl Former Owner’s Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/thenunnerylogan/ Revisiting St. Anne’s Retreat On Tuesdays’ s Access Utah https://www.upr.org/programs/2021-08-10/revisiting-st-annes-retreat-on-tuesdays-access-utah Legends Surround St. Ann’s Retreat https://www.deseret.com/2006/7/22/19964899/legends-surround-st-ann-s-retreat/ Ghost Adventures: St. Anne’s Retreat https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6176554/ Legendary Utah Nunnery, Rumored To Be Haunted, Is For Sale https://kjzz.com/news/local/legendary-utah-nunnery-rumored-to-be-haunted-is-for-sale Utah State University: History and Naming – St. Anne’s (notice the misspelling here) Retreat- USU Digital Exhibits Student Collection: St. Anne’s Retreat- USU Digital Collection http://exhibits.lib.usu.edu/exhibits/show/stannesretreat/legendthemes/stannesretreatlegend
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Deviance: A Sylvia Wilcox Mystery Book 7
Vacations rarely turn out to be relaxing for P.I. Sylvia Wilcox, which is why she initially refuses an invitation to New Orleans. But she changes her mind and jets off to The Big Easy. After a few days of leisure, a body shows up near a popular nature reserve and the vacation is officially over. Sylvia finds herself in the middle of a frantic race laced with politics and supernatural elements to prove a friend’s innocence.
Awakening: Sylvia Wilcox Mystery Book 6
After a nightmare brings clarity to a hazy memory of childhood trauma, Sylvia Wilcox starts to replay the event in her mind. As she digs through the twisted details, struggling to recover lost innocence, she uncovers multiple levels of deception and betrayal. Finally, after decades, the disturbing and unexpected answers begin to appear before her eyes.
Road to Nowhere: A Sylvia Wilcox Mystery Book 5
Sylvia Wilcox takes on a case for an old friend. On the surface, the circumstances seem clear cut. She expects the case to be simple and easy to resolve, but when a body turns up in a barren, desert landscape, Sylvia hits the road and focuses on securing justice for an innocent victim.
True Crime: Hex Murders
Many of you have may have heard of the Nelson Rehmeyer murder that took place in 1928 because there was a documentary called Hex Hollow that came out back in 2015. But have you heard of the hex murder that took place in 1934? I hadn’t until I started going through old newspaper article and I found an entry from 1976. Today, we’re going to talk about both murders and their connection to a larger phenomenon of murders where the killers used the excuse of a hex for cold blooded murdered. The strangest part about this defense, it partially worked.
Before we talk about the cases, we have to go back in time 1820 when a man named Johann George Hohmann published a book called “Long Lost Friend” Hohmann had moved to Berks county in Pennsylvania in 1799, escaping religious persecution in Germany. The book contained incantations and spells that can be used to help both humans and animals. The “plain folk”—Amish, Dunkers, and Mennonites were open to powwowing, but some Lutherans and German Reformed church goers were also open to the information in “The Long Lost Friend.”
Want to know more? Head over to the Braylee Parkinson YouTube channel for the rest of the story: Hex Murders
A Sylvia Wilcox Christmas: A Sylvia Wilcox Mystery Book 4
Sylvia Wilcox closes her private detective agency for the holidays and heads to Utah for a long, relaxing vacation in the Ogden River Valley’s snow-covered mountains. After enjoying a few days on the slopes and the company of Brady Kepler, her assistant, Martin, calls and tells her about a mysterious note delivered to the office that accuses Sylvia of fraud. Disturbed and curious about this note, Sylvia finds it hard to concentrate on vacation and ends up chasing down leads that take her on a painful trip down memory lane. Will Sylvia’s determination to always seek the truth backfire? Or will she end up having a surprisingly pleasant holiday season?
The 1931 Ypsilanti Torch Murders
One of my favorite ways to unwind is reading old newspapers. Yes, I know it is odd, but I’ve always loved history and newspapers. Pouring myself an ice-cold glass of something yummy and pulling up newspaper.com is enormous fun for me! So, I’ve been thinking about all the unbelievable stories I read in newspapers. I should share the weirdness with others, right? And I enjoy telling stories, so I’ve decided to share some of those true stories on my YouTube channel. The first tale is below, but before you watch it, here’s a little background.
I lived in Ypsilanti, Michigan for nine years before buying a one-way train ticket to Salt Lake City, Utah. The graduate school I attended was in Ypsilanti, and I kind of fell in love with the little college town. I rarely drove anywhere, and I was always strolling around town in the dark of night. The place was a little spooky at times because where I lived was surrounded by thickets of trees and farms. There weren’t many street lights, but I’d grown up in one of the most dangerous cities in the United States, and bit of hubris caused me to underestimate the college town. Later on, I would learn that I was living just a few yards from the place where the town’s most notorious murder had happened. Later on, I’d discover that a few other horrific murders had taken place about a quarter of a mile in the other direction. A few years after I moved away from Ypsilanti, another murder took place in the apartment complex next to the one I used to live in. This is also an area that reportedly has had a few sightings of Sasquatch… And yes, a friend and I did once go “squatching” when I lived in Ypsilanti.
It was in that apartment, tucked along the side of Leforge Road that I started to write mysteries. Initially, I wrote stories about a private investigator named Chelsea. In time, Chelsea morphed into Sylvia Wilcox and Who She Was came into focus. At first glance, none of that might seem connected, but whenever I start a new story about Sylvia, I close my eyes and headed back to that apartment where it all started.
Here’s the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_evZohvbWE
Fracture: A Sylvia Wilcox Mystery Book 3
What would you sacrifice for your faith? Where would you draw the line?
A woman disappears during a routine errand. All clues seem to point to the fact that she voluntarily left, something is off. P.I. Sylvia Wilcox reluctantly agrees to search for the woman, knowing that this is more than a missing person case. Traveling to the western United States, Sylvia must navigate an unfamiliar culture and scour the desert for clues.
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