The Phantom Lady of Kennedy Hill Road

Originally posted in August of 2008.

This story was told at a family gathering on Sunday, August 10, as we were all having breakfast. Several members of the extended family were present, including Jarrett, who was born moments before this story takes place.

I am always ready to jump on a good ghost story or unexplained event, which is why I think it is so interesting how honestly unenthusiastic Libby is about her own story. She told me several times before sharing it that she finds the story "boring," and doesn't see why anyone would be interested. One of her sisters mentioned to me, later that morning, that Libby never shares the story. She always seems reluctant. Even I hadn't been told this, it was obvious from the story itself. Libby's disinterest, to me, the biggest mystery of the story.

I worked in a restaurant in Rockford, IL, with my now husband, he was my boyfriend. He was a bartender. I was a server, and I was called by somebody to let me know that I had a nephew. My nephew, Jarrett Heintz, was born. It was January 4, 1981, and I was very excited. It was... my whole night was just, you know, I couldn't remember a thing else besides that, and Mark was excited for me. He knew how important this was. And I closed that night, so who knows if it was... It was the wee hours. We made have stayed afterwards; I'm not sure, but on my way home... I remember it being six below zero.

On the way home, I was on Kennedy Hill Road, going towards Byron, where I lived, and I saw a very tall woman with long blond hair walking on the left with my, you know... on the opposite side of the road that I was on. Coming... Going... my way. In fact, I'm trying to say that I was looking at her backside. It appeared that she was wearing nothing but green underwear, but it was one of those flash moments where I questioned what I just saw. I thought am I dreaming? Am I too tired? What is going on here? And a few seconds later, it dawned on me that this person could be in trouble. Maybe she was raped. It dawned on me that it was January 4, and how cold it was.

So at the next possible road I turned around. I wanted to go see if there was anything I could do to help, because this was in an area that I was very familiar with. It was in between my old boyfriend's horse farm and one of my best friend's dairy farms. I just didn't feel that there was any danger to me, so I wanted to help. This was before cell phones. And I turned around and nowhere was she to be found, and I felt really guilty, so I continued home, told my Mom and Dad the story, and said, "Don’t you think I ought to call the police?" And they said, "Yes."

So I did. I called the Byron police, and I said, "Just have to tell you who I am. I'm not some weirdo that's making up stuff. I'm not mentally ill. I'm Doc Jarrett's daughter. This is what I saw, so I thought you just might want to know in case you want to go check things out."

And I don't know how I found out, if they called me the next day... They never found a thing, and that was the end of it, until I'd say... a few weeks later when my friend Kim, who lives on the at dairy farm, saw the same person, and I don't know if there were any other sightings.

But all of a sudden, Kim and I started getting phone calls from radio stations. How it got through Byron, I don't know, but it got in the Byron Tempo. Dianne Motes was probably what? The Editor? We were getting calls from San Diego, out east, Boston, I'm not sure. She got calls from different? What?

One of the sisters chimed in, "No Money?"

No Money. No one offered. And I said, "Oh please, this is yesterday's news. We don't need to talk about this," and I didn't tell any of them my story. They really wanted it. I mean, it was a slow news day, I guess.

So there were several other sightings, and she became the phantom lady at Kennedy Hill road. I believe I was the first. I was the first to report it probably.

Jarrett asked if the green underwear were a constant factor as people reported seeing the woman.

I'm not sure, Jarrett. See it's all foggy to me: was she naked? Was she... blah blah blah. Anyway, then we heard it could be the weird guy that lived on the Jacobson's... in the Jacobson's tenant home, that was tall and thin. Cause this... And then as I thought back, well, this woman really did have some thin... a real thin build. Not your hourglass figure. Long blond hair. It almost... I thought of Lady Godiva, you know, I thought of a blond... maybe a long blond wig.

And then there were all these stories about how, "Oh yes, there was this girl, there was a death, blah blah blah," and I was so not into it. Not interested, so to me it's a non-story.

But the other day, I was thinking about how everyone has a story in their life to tell. And I was going to have my patients write a little paragraph about their life that they would think a stranger might be interested in. And I thought, "Well, what could my story be?" And I thought, well, I could always tell that one.

And so I looked it up on line, "Phantom Lady of Kennedy Hill Road," and up comes this story, and it's fiction. Dianne Motes had to have written it, because she was from Illinois, and this fictional story was not anything about phantom lady the way I saw it. It was totally redone, but the main character's name was Dianne, and it took place at the gatehouse on Slingerland Farm on Kennedy Hill. Why would anyone call it Slingerland Farm? It was bizarre.

I found, moments ago, the story that Libby had found while searching for the phantom lady of Kennedy Hill Road. It was posted on a blog: http://raginmom.blogspot.com/2006/10/deerfield.html. I plan to contact the author (or at least poster) of this story to see what their connection is. Perhaps there is more to learn about this series of sightings.