Investigating the Ma Barker House: A Chat with Soul Sisters Paranormal

Recently Kristy Summer from Soul Sisters Paranormal reached out to see if I’d share an article on the Haunt Jaunts Facebook page. It was from the Ocala Star about their investigation of the Ma Barker House in Ocklawaha, Florida.

I remembered having shared something about a paranormal investigation of the Ma Barker House, and at first I mistakenly thought I’d already shared the article. Turns out the first article was about how they were going to investigate. The second article was after they had.

I was pretty excited about it because:

1. They were the first team to investigate there, and
2. The fact it was a first. Did that mean it was a possible new haunted location that might offer public ghost tour and ghost hunting events in the future? (That might be jumping the gun, but a ghoul can hope.)

I was also excited because recently I jaunted to Alcatraz East where they included Ma Barker and her gang in one of their galleries. But I had no idea until this Ocala Star story broke about the Ma Barker House or that ol’ Ma might be a restless spirit roaming around somewhere. (It’s not clear if she is, but, again, that sort of stuff is what gets this ghoul excited.)

I asked Kristy if she’d have time to answer a few questions about it all. To my delight, she said yes! So, without further ado, let’s get to the Q&A, shall we?

Intro: Meet Kristy and Soul Sisters Paranormal

Thank you so much for your email, and for your interest in my group and our investigation of the “Ma” Barker House. As a means of introduction, my group Soul Sisters Paranormal is made up of myself, my twin sister, and our younger sister. We also have two friends that join us to round out our group of five female investigators.

Additionally, I feel that we are somewhat unique in the fact that we all have advanced degrees. My twin sister, Jenny, and I both hold PhDs in Public Affairs; our younger sister Michelle and our friend Cara both hold JDs, and Kim has advanced degrees in teaching. 

My sisters and I are 3rd generation Ocala natives. As such, we grew up hearing the stories of Kate “Ma” Barker and her son Fred who were killed in the shootout in Ocklawaha on January 16, 1935.

We have always had a fascination with the house, its history, and its report of paranormal activity, so I decided to approach the Friends of the Bradford-Ma Barker House, Inc to determine if they would allow us, a local paranormal group, the opportunity to be the first to investigate the house at its new location; they graciously allowed us to do so on the 84^th anniversary of the shootout.

We had two goals for this investigation. We first wanted to validate, if we could, the paranormal claims that have persisted through the years. The second goal was to bring awareness to the Bradford – Ma Baker house, because, paranormally active or not, this house played a historic role in the downfall of one of the most ruthless gangs of the 1930s.

Q: What really piqued my interest about the Ma Barker house is that if I’m understanding correctly, it’s been moved from it’s original location, right? Which makes this an even more unique potentially haunted place than most because some argue ghosts are attached to a location, while others argue they’re not. This could be proof they are. What are your thoughts about this?

A: You are correct that the house was moved from the original land on which the shootout took place. In 2016, the family (descendants from the original builder/owner, Carson Bradford) donated the house and most of its original contents (ie: furniture and décor) to Marion County. It was decided that the house would be moved via a barge that was floated across Lake Weir. (I put together a brief video of that history; if you want, you can view it here: https://www.soulsistersparanormal.com/history-of-the-ma-barker-house.html )

Pertaining to my thoughts on the relocation of the house, I, personally, do believe that the spirits of “Ma” and Fred did relocate as well. As a reminder, the Barkers had no ties to the land; they merely rented the house for a few months as a hideaway from the increased federal manhunt launched by J. Edgar Hoover against the Barker-Karpis Gang.

Additionally, “Ma” and Fred had no formal warning that the federal agents would be engaging them in a gun battle that morning. With the emotion and the energy that would have to have been present during that time, I, personally, feel that their deaths left an imprint within the house itself rather than the land on which the house used to sit.

Finally, there were all indications that the Barkers thoroughly enjoyed their time in Ocklawaha and the time spent within the house. For two people who, in life, had a transient lifestyle crisscrossing the country, perhaps the house offers a stable “hideaway” in death.

Q: What about the original location of the home? Have you ever investigated that property? Are there any reports of activity still in that area that you know of?

A: Soul Sisters Paranormal has not formally investigated the now vacant land upon which the house used to be located. All of our research into the reported paranormal claims associated with the house seem to indicate that those claims were isolated to the house itself.

While in its former location, reports throughout the years have placed unexplained noises and apparitions inside of the house or on/near the porches; we could find very few claims regarding the actual land itself being haunted.

Q: I know the article talked about some of the activity you got with devices (like the spirit box and rempod), but was there anything else you experienced? Will you be working with the house in the future to possibly hold public investigations that may benefit preservation efforts? (Or is this something you’d like to do?)

A: The investigation itself was conducted on two distinct days.

During the first portion of the investigation, we left numerous pieces of equipment to run, unattended, from the evening of January 15^th until the morning of January 16^th; this timeframe insured that our equipment was running during the time that the shootout would have taken places exactly 84 years earlier.

It was during the second portion of the investigation, a little over 1 week later, that Jenny and I were able to sit in the house alone for almost 3 hours during the night. While the house did feel what I would term “restless” to us, it was the Rempod responses (which, to us, seemed intelligent in nature) and the Spirt Box words and phrases (which, to us, were of a variety that would only be associated with the Barker-Karpis Gang members) that were intriguing to us that night.

These indicators, along with the knocks, noises, and EVPs that we captured on our stationary equipment on the first night, lead us to personally believe that the energy of “Ma” and Fred still lingers within the house.

That being said, we do not presume to persuade anyone of our findings in any of our investigations. Rather, we want people to make their own value judgments and conclusions based upon the materials that we present.

Finally, we do not, as a matter of practice, ever claim that a location is “officially” haunted, rather we let the proprietor of the location make that determination based on the finds that we present to them.

We would very much like to remain active in the preservation efforts of the Bradford-Ma Barker house, and, as such, since the investigation I have become a volunteer with the county to assist in any capacity that can contribute to those efforts.

However, I am not a spokesperson or representative for the Friends of Bradford-Ma Barker House, Inc, so I am not at liberty to determine if public paranormal investigations will be held in the future. All current information related to the house and the current tours being offered can be found at: www.mabarkerhouse.org. If such information regarding paranormal tours and/or investigation is made public, I will gladly share the information with Haunt Jaunts