(Event Canceled) Search for spirits during fundraiser at abandoned Linn County school

Update: This event has been canceled.

VIOLA — With Halloween just around the corner, two Linn County women are teaming up to host a haunt-filled fundraiser as part of an effort to fix up the abandoned school building in Viola, an unincorporated community in eastern Linn County.

Heidi Liegl, who purchased the 94-year-old school building in 2015, is partnering with Sarah Hyatt, a paranormal investigator with the International Paranormal Society, to offer nighttime tours of the building from 9 to 10 p.m. Saturday and again on Oct. 29.

Participants must be age 18 or older and sign a waiver. They are invited to bring any paranormal investigation equipment they want, but Hyatt plans to conduct her own investigation with her equipment during the event.

Tickets cost $30 each.

Regardless of whether you choose to believe the old school — built in 1922 and closed in 1998 — is haunted or not, the building itself is certainly creepy.

Nearly all of the windows are shattered.

The names of former students remain visible on strips of masking tape above hooks on the third floor.

Mounds of dirt that blew in over the years combines with broken wood, trash and crumbling plaster and drywall to cover many areas of the building.

A few old shoes are scattered about.

The word 'boo' has been spray painted on a window near the cornerstone.

The old stage in the gymnasium has been covered by a wall, but the large red curtains remain in place.

An empty school chair sits alone in the middle of one room.

The concrete floor in the boiler room is cracked into many pieces and a lone desk sits in the corner.

The old vinyl blinds whistle and rattle when the wind blows through.

Yet, in the midst of the destruction, a colorful mural in the foyer remains unharmed by the elements.

'There are a lot of different emotions that are left here,' said Hyatt, who conducted an initial paranormal investigation in late August, at which time she believes two 'entities' named Steve and Eddie made contact through a contraption called a ghost box, which Hyatt explains is a modified radio that scans multiple stations each second.

' ... Almost everyone in the community has been here at one point,' Hyatt said. Also, who didn't want to run around your school and joke around when the teacher isn't looking? That's why they come back.'

Aside from the ghost hunting, Hyatt said she and Liegl have been contacted by community members who would like to see the building restored.

'A lot of people are really eager to share their memories about what the building used to look like, where the classrooms were. And they're really excited that there's someone like Heidi to fix it up,' Hyatt said.

Liegl said she paid $10,000 for the school and the four acres it sits on and envisions the building becoming some type of community center. She met Hyatt at the Marion Psychic and Paranormal Expo in August and the idea for offering tours as a fundraiser soon followed.

Liegl said she plans to use money raised from the upcoming tours to remove the rest of the debris in the building. She hopes to continue to raise funds for a new roof, which is estimated to cost $10,000. The existing roof has gaping holes, which is adding to the problems inside the building.

Located about 30 minutes northeast of Cedar Rapids and near the small community of Springville — population 1,000 — the Viola school building has had various owners since it was closed.

The Anamosa School District first sold the building to a private owner, but plans to turn the old school into apartments fell through. The Stone City Art Foundation was the previous owner and officials had expressed interest in creating an artists' colony.

Hyatt, whose equipment also includes electronic voice phenomena recorders and K-II readers that measure electromagnetic fields, said the goal of the tours isn't to make believers out of paranormal skeptics. Still, she encourages those who attend to come with an open mind.

'There's proof of it if you're open enough to taking it in,' she said.

l Comments: (319) 368-8516; makayla.tendall@thegazette.com