The priest famously took a piece of chalk and drew a line across the threshold of the basement door. He then placed a blessed medal of St. Benedict on the frame. His instruction was simple: "Do not open this door. Do not go into the basement. Ever."
Initially, the entity behaved like a bored teenager. Pictures flew off walls. Bedsheets were ripped off sleeping bodies. Dishes stacked themselves into precarious towers in the middle of the night. Jack tried to rationalize it—settling foundation, faulty wiring, pranksters. But then the shadows started moving. Dark, human-shaped silhouettes would dart from room to room, seen only in the periphery.
This is the story of 1754 Pennsylvania Avenue. Jack and Janet Smurl moved into the duplex in 1973. It was a modest home, but it was theirs. For the first 12 years, life was normal. The only oddity was the basement—a dark, damp pit that gave visitors an unexplained sense of dread. But the Smurls weren't the type to believe in boogeymen. the smurl family
For most people, a “fixer-upper” means peeling wallpaper, creaky floorboards, and a stubborn water stain on the ceiling. For the Smurl family of West Pittston, Pennsylvania, it meant something far worse. It meant a doorway.
For the Smurls, Pennsylvania Avenue was just the address. Hell was the passenger. The priest famously took a piece of chalk
The family began sleeping in the same room. The television would turn on to static at 3:00 AM—the "Devil’s Hour." Janet developed scratches on her arms, three parallel lines, the classic calling card of a malevolent force.
The family claimed to see an old, gnarled woman with black eyes standing in the corner of the basement. They also saw a tall, man-shaped beast with matted hair that smelled of decay. The house had become a spiritual war zone. By 1986, the Smurls were desperate. They called in the Warrens, who brought a team of priests, psychics, and parapsychologists. Using electromagnetic field meters and thermal cameras (cutting edge at the time), the team recorded massive fluctuations in the basement. Lorraine Warren claimed she saw a "portal" in the foundation—a spot where the soil itself felt corrupted. His instruction was simple: "Do not open this door
For a year, the Smurls lived upstairs, terrified of the door at the bottom of the stairs. The activity died down significantly. But the curiosity was too much. Jack, wanting to retrieve Christmas decorations, eventually opened the door. According to his testimony, as soon as he stepped onto the top stair, the lights exploded, and he was hurled backward into the kitchen, landing with a broken wrist. The Smurls eventually moved out in 1988. They sold the house at a massive loss. The new owners? They reported absolutely nothing unusual for decades. The house on Pennsylvania Avenue stands today, quiet and unassuming, with a basement that is now a finished game room.