Sleeper Mortuary: The Spirits That Stayed, Part One | Grave Talks CLASSIC

0:00McDonald's is putting value back on the menu. Whether you're craving a Big Mac, McNuggets are sausage egg and cheese, McGrittle's, make it a meal, and save. Your favorite is now your wallet's favorite, too. Extra-value meals are back. Get a big something extra. With a Big Mac or 10-piece McNuggets, fries and a medium Coke all for just $9. Limited time only, promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing. Ba-da-ba-ba-ba! There's rewarding, and then there's remarkably rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve, like earning three times points on dining and access to Sapphire Reserve exclusive tables. Learn more at Chase.com-S Sapphire Reserve. Cart's issued by JPMorgan Chase Bank and a member FDIC, subject to credit approval, terms apply. One sweet, melty bite of a Hershey's bar, and suddenly I'm right back sitting on the front porch with my grandmother on a slow summer afternoon. She doesn't say much, just breaks the bar in half and hands me a piece. I open my mouth to say whatever a nine-year-old wants to say,

1:01and she replies with a low... Listen. So we sat there listening. That was the first time I learned that quiet can feel full. Hershey's, it's your happy place. Today on the Grave Talks, on location at the Sleeper Mortuary, a conversation with owner Tori Westoff. Some places don't just hold memories. They refuse to be forgotten. I recently took a drive to Iola, Kansas, to visit the Sleeper Mortuary, a building that stands frozen in time, untouched since its days as a funeral home. But a hold more than just the echoes of the past, it pulses with an unseen energy, eerie relics, and whispers of the unknown. Paranormal investigator, author, and now owner of the Sleeper Mortuary, Tori Westoff, knew the moment she stepped inside,

2:03the building had chosen her, as much as she had chosen it. We discussed the haunted history of the Sleeper Mortuary, where ghostly encounters, hidden artifacts, and eerie phenomena paint a picture of a place where the past is very much alive. To tell you about the story, it's been a very, very much alive. Today on the Grave Talks, on location at the Sleeper Mortuary, a conversation with owner Tori Westoff. Tori, here we are in the Sleeper Mortuary, Iola, Kansas. How long have you owned this building? I purchased this January 9th of 2025, so we've been open for just a little over a month, right around. Why? Why did you decide that? Because I think this is interesting. You said something downstairs that sometimes the building picks you. Yes. Were you looking for a haunted location? Yes.

3:03I've been involved with the Paranormal for roughly 20 years, I've been investigating. I don't even know. Like a long time I used to go out to old cemeteries and things like that. I'm a published author, I've written eight books. I saw that. What kind of books do you write? What I do is I take a deep dive into haunted locations. I go in and I find every documented death that I can find on the property. And then I put it in the format. So each person has a page, so each person that passed away on the property has a page. And on that page is everything related to them. If I have pictures of them, I'll put that on there, death certificates, death announcements, obituaries, basically anything I can find, find agreement information. All of that is on the page. And it's an alphabetical order from first name all the way through. And then you have indexes in the back that put an alphabetical order by last name, month of death and year of death. So that if you get like a date when you're communicating,

4:03then you can look and see who died in like 1923. And then have access to what page number they're on. Was this something that you were always interested in like from a newer kid? Yes. Yeah, how did that start? I grew up in a haunted house. Me too. I am the only one that had any experiences in the house. My father, he is a big supporter of mine, but he does not believe in the paranormal at all, which is fine. Like I completely respect that. But I remember talking about it. My siblings never had any experiences. My parents. Nobody ever had any experiences there other than me, but they were very real. What kind of experiences did you have? I remember things calling my name that were not there. Distinctly, I remember my bedroom at the time was right outside of the car port. And I heard my mom pull up in the car.

5:04I heard the door open and shut. I heard footsteps go in the front door. The door open and shut. And then I heard her call my name and I said what? And I was still in my room and nothing like I never got a response. So I looked out the window and there was nobody there. So what did you hear? I don't know. I don't know. I think so maybe you were just more open to it than the other people in your family house. I think that's, you know, some of us are just born. Yeah. With a little bit more sensitivity are your kids because you do have a child with us today. Yeah. Into go-sense stuff. She's like, yes, yes. I don't know that my children are sensitive, per se. But we definitely have fun with it. We have fun with this. It's a lot of fun. So you grew up in the haunted house where you're having weird experiences. And then at some point you start investigating and did you just kind of like was it that sort of what is out there?

6:05There's something I don't know about and I'm very curious. Yes. And it was kind of a love-hate relationship, so to speak. You know, like in my younger days, like it was super interesting. And I think we all, you know, experimented with like wege boards when we were growing up and whatnot. And you'd watch the scary stories. It would scare the tour out of me, but I was so interested at the same time. It was kind of a kind of a love-hate relationship. Over time, you know, you get disensitized to it and you become used to it. And I mean, I still get spooked every now and again. Don't get me wrong. I'll get like jump scares or whatever. But it's just like at that point where you just have that carnal fear. And then you're like, I'm done with this. I am doing this no more. And then you just can't leave it alone. It's sexy back, doesn't it? Yeah, it does. It's just one more. Because I think, you know, there's something going on. You know, you can't dismiss everybody's experiences and just say, oh, that didn't happen to you when you were growing up.

7:06Obviously, that was in your head. That's not, there's just too many stories and too many things that have happened. Yeah. And I think with the paranormal as far as experiences, they're very subjective. And, you know, I hold space for that with people. It's hard for someone that isn't a believer per se or somebody that doesn't have any kind of experience with it. It's hard for them to take me coming to you and say, hey, I just saw dude standing down in your bedroom like it was weird. You know, and they're like, no, it's hard to accept that information. A, because I think people have a fear of the unknown. And to acknowledge it would have to be like you would have to address it in your own head. And I don't think some people are ready for that. And that's totally fine. But they're very subjective. And that's the one thing that I say, you know, like on when you're doing investigations

8:08and you're live streaming and you have naysayers and things like that. And that's totally fine. I'm totally fine with all of that. Because it's hard to put in a camera what's actually going on because there's so much more to the paranormal than what you see. A lot of it is what you feel. You can hear things on video, sure, but that doesn't, you know, smells. You can't, you can't transfer smells on video and you can't transfer feelings. And you can't, whatever's not recorded is not on video. So if you saw a shadow over there, like it's just hard to relay it. So I'm a big, I'm a, I'm a big cheerleader for people to go out and experience it on their own. And that's, that's the point. And that's why we're here today. At some point, you're like, okay, love paranormal investigating. I think I'd like to have a haunted location myself. Is that kind of how that went? It's just always been, I don't know, a draw of mine. I ticked off the writing a book off of my bucket list.

9:13Oating a location was on my bucket list and making a documentary film was on my bucket list, which I'm starting. Are you making the documentary on this building? No. Okay. No, it's totally unrelated. But I search, I've been looking for probably five years before I found this building. As you can imagine, the market is very, very small and limited on what is available and what, you know, I mean, the point is to have ghost and not every property has them. So your, your market is very, very limited. And I had found probably seven properties prior to this one. In this area? No, all over. And it just always kind of fell through and it just never worked out. And I'm like, you know what, this is just never going to happen for me. I'm just, I'm done. I'm not doing it. And then I'd be like, oh, well, there's this one. And I'll go look at this one. This one, sleeper mortuary actually happened by accident.

10:13I was just kind of perusing the realtor websites and I saw this building. And it said nothing about it being a funeral home in the past. And I thought to myself, that looks familiar. That looks similar to a funeral home that we have in town, that, and the town that I'm from. And I searched the address because I'm a nerd and I do a lot of research. I searched the address and, well, and behold, it was a funeral home. And you're in your own town? No, you live close by. I live about an hour from here. Oh, okay. Yeah, I can be so close. Yeah, yeah, it's not bad at all. So I contacted my realtor and this was a huge shout out to Stephanie Aurelie, who is the owner of McIntire Villa. She is. Oh, yeah. I've talked to her before. She's great. She is. She's great. Yes. And she is a realtor.

11:13Excuse me while I break my chair. She's a realtor and she, I called her and she's one of my best friends too. She's super cool. I called her and I'm like, we gotta go look at this. And she had us in not long after that. And my offer was based off of a disembodied voice that I heard when I was looking at the building. I also heard it as well. She was here too. So what did you hear that day? I heard like a... Coming up those stairs right there. Did you both hear it at the same time? Oh, yeah. Yeah, we all looked at each other. I looked at Stephanie and she was looking at me and I'm looking at her. We're all just kind of looking at each other because we knew what it was. And, you know, we weren't saying like at the time what we were buying it for or wanted to buy for. And it was so loud that the seller's realtor was on property with us and he also heard it.

12:13And he turned around and he goes, well, I don't know who that would be where the only one's in the building. And he actively turned around and went and looked for the noise. And obviously he didn't find anything. So everybody had it. I also have an experience of a... Scootchup just so we will be here. I also have a... You're fun. A haunted person here. Because my mom was backing out of the garage. Oh, yeah. And then I heard like, Tori! Tori! Can you hear me? And then I hear like running in the chapel stomping, opening doors, shutting doors. And so I run out and like, Mom! Mom! Someone's going your name and it's like a man. And she's like, what? That's crazy. Because you know you're just... Like that kind of loud. I was moving my car. Wow. And I had her standing in the garage and she come out clutching her eye pads with her mouth geping open.

13:15I was like, oh, something's wrong. That was the night the haunted nights came. They were moving their car. And when they pulled up, I'm like, did you guys come back in looking for me? They're like, no. And I'm like, well, that just happened. Did you find it scary? It was kind of surprising at first. Yes. It was a dealing. An actual person. Yeah. But then I'm like, oh wait, this is a haunted building. This is what my mom has gotten me into. I am getting out of here. Nope. See you by... By lemon. By a yard. By drone. Yeah. Out of here, something's going from my mother. Yeah. When that happened, then you're like, aha. I think I got me on a building possibly. Yeah. So it was a very long process with trying to figure out how we were going to go about getting acquiring it.

14:18And I placed... We looked at it the first time in June. I placed my offer October, like 10th. And we got it on January 9th. Oh, so that did take a while. It takes a long time. Because with the way that when you're purchasing a business, you have to get a business loan. And there's a lot of requirements as far as that goes. So once you found this location, did you dig into the history right away? I mean, probably before buying it, right? Yeah. And was this built to be a mortuary? Yes. So the original building was built in 1886 by Lyman Sleeper. And he was actually a furniture maker. Which actually, I'll interrupt, is very common back in the day that funeral homes and furniture making went in together. Yep. And it was called... Which is interesting. Sleeper furniture and undertaking. That's what it was called. That's so friendly. Yeah.

15:18So the point, I think, is they made their own caskets. Yeah, exactly. That's speculation on my behalf. But I imagine that is the whole point of having the furniture store and mortuary services. So they experienced two fires in this location, or did it get moved? Well, yes and no. Okay. So the original building was built right next door to this one. Okay. And it actually burnt down in January of 1915. And it was a complete loss. So back in 1915, the total loss was estimated to be $20,000. So that's... Which was a lot of money. That's a lot of money back then. This building was built to replace it. So the original was right next door. It all has been on the same block. Now, I'm starting to find that I think between 1915 and 1920, there was basically a temporary building, which I think was located down here. That makes sense.

16:18I'm not completely sure yet. So I'm still looking into that aspect of it. Why men sleeper passed away in 1915 as well. He passed away in the fall of 1915. I'd have to fact check actual dates. I have them. I just have it memorized them. But his son, A.R. sleeper, also known as Allen, took over the family business at that point. And he was in... He was a business partner with his father for a long time prior to that. But he took over at that point in time. So then, Allen's son, John. I love that what's happening that people can't see is that your daughter is holding up pictures of these people as you're telling them. And it's all on the website as well. John sleeper went in to work and was a business partner with his father. And they operated the funeral home from the time that Lyman died up until 1960.

17:20A.R. sleeper passed away in 1958. He was an older gentleman. And John sleeper was running the mortuary at that time. There was another entity, Porter Kinser, that bought into the business. But it was still known as sleeper mortuary. They didn't own it. They were just business partners. And then John sleeper was on his way back from transporting a body to Kansas City and fell asleep at the wheel. And he rolled the hers and he passed away in that accident. Which is such a kind of ironic death for somebody who is in this business. And to be that's how you die is the 49 years old when you passed away. Yeah. And so that's when you see the name change to Porter Kinser because they bought it from the sleeper state. The sleeper mortuary. It was realizing. So if you look at John's tie, that looks like the tie that we found in the basement.

18:22Oh, it kind of does. I don't know. So it might be John's. It might be. And I also have. So we found this picture in the basement. Oh, that's interesting. Doesn't it kind of look like John? It could be John as a young kid, couldn't it? Yeah. Yeah, I don't know who that is, how old that is. No. It's pretty old. I'd say what would you say 30s or 40s probably? 19. I mean, I do believe it's a sleeper child of some form because they look very similar. Whether that's John, I have no idea. Yeah. They do look similar. You could see that being the same person. Yeah. His eyes are kind of shaped the same. Yeah. No offense to John, that kind of looks like Elvis Presley. Kind of does, doesn't it? No offense would be taken if you look like Elvis Presley. Now, so interesting, weird coincidence or something. So my friend Emily is with me today and Luca. So last night, Emily and I were talking to our friend Brandon.

19:24And we said, we're going to Iowlet at GoToA, haunted mortuary tomorrow. And he's like, who or what mortuary are you going to? We're like sleeper mortuary. So he tells us this story of how, and this is going to circle back, and you can fill it in on the other side. So he tells us a story of when he was a little kid about five or six. And he said, he was like five or six years old. And there was five kids to adults, I think, in the car. And they spent the day with them. They get in the car to leave. And he said, like minutes later, then the car got hit by a train and everyone died. And so I'm like, could this be the mortuary that that family owned? And you said, yes. Yes. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. That just randomly last night, one of my good friends whips that story out. And I'm like, I've known him for years. I never heard this story before. I mean, how traumatizing to be a young child in these people just came to visit you.

20:26So that family owned this mortuary. He was here. He didn't travel with the family. Right. So that was Paul Friscoe and his wife Pat. That was their children and grandchildren. He owned the mortuary, I believe, from like 1960 all the way to 1998, is when it stopped operating as a funeral home here. It was his, there are two daughters and there are five grandchildren in the past. And I imagine either. And now I do know that they still have living siblings that live local. So I like to try to censor as much. Absolutely. Yeah. And I'm going to be respectful. Like I don't, I don't, I just don't want, I owe it to look at it as a bad thing. You know what I mean? My, my goal is to preserve the legacies and the memories of people that are no longer here. Yeah.

21:26And we're not saying that any of those people are haunting this location. We just, it was a weird coincidence that we'd heard that story last night. And a horribly tragic story. Yeah. I can't imagine. And I like, when they say that the building picks you, I 1000% believe that. And how do you feel like the building picked you? So I've been looking for a haunted property for probably five years to buy sleep or mortuary. And I, they all fell through. It just never worked out. And, you know, I was heartbroken a lot. I will say that. But I actually found this building by accident. And when I was looking on the realtor website, I, like I think I said this already, that it looks similar. So when I started digging into the history, I've been in healthcare for a long time. I'm an e-arner. I have, I worked on an ambulance prior to becoming an e-arner.

22:27And my old boss took the, he took the spot of his father who had passed away on a call that he was on. And it was the same accident from Paul Friskles children and grandchildren. And it was over, like I live an hour away. And so it was just, I don't know. And then, like all of the pieces just kind of fell into place. And everything went as it should. I had no hiccups. Now it was a long process. But there was no hiccups. And here we are. Now I had this building set empty for quite a while. Because I know in a town this size, it's hard to keep the downtown businesses going. I appreciate like what they've done here. They're bringing back a lot of these storefronts. But a lot of them, you know, they've set empty for quite a while. And was that was, that was not the case for here anyway.

23:29So one of the first entities to come into this building. And by entity, do you mean entity? What do you mean by entity? Business type. Type things. The first one in the building after it closed as a mortuary was a co-ed living dorm for the local college. This was? Yes. So speculation. I know for sure that it was a co-ed living dorm. But I believe it was just an upstairs portion. Because the downstairs portion has remained intact from the old funeral home. Yeah, because you walk into that little alcove kind of area where they would place the casket for services. And I can't imagine that would have been the co-ed dorm space. So I do know for a fact that the co-ed living dorm was the first entity in here. And I wanted, it was early 2000s. I want to say 2004 ish.

24:29I'd have to fact check the dates if you go to the sleeper mortuary website. All of the history is outlined for you. And it tells you times and like dates and things like that. So I, here's a story. So I was talking to the former owner, the person that I bought it from. Now he lived here for just five, ten years. He lived up here. It's got a really nice apartment. I mean, it's in really good shape. Each floor is 5,000 square feet. And three floors then, right? Yes. So you get the basement first floor and second floor. So you get a total of 15,000 square feet right around. It's a little smaller than that, not much. But up here is the living quarters and it's four bedrooms, three bathrooms. You get a full kitchen, two living rooms. And all of that is, you guys have access to. But when I was talking to the previous owner, I was telling him that a group one night had heard voices coming from the elevator shaft.

25:36And he's, we were talking about that. He goes, huh, that's weird. He goes, did you know that this used to be a college dorm? And I said, yes, I did. He's like, do you know why they close? Now this person that I bought it from, he is corn fed Isle and I born raised. Very prominent here. So like he's got the tea. You know what I mean? And I was like, well, I saw that it opened in a close, but I don't know why. Like, and he goes, well, you know, these kids up here, they were reporting paranormal activity. And they were telling their, the people that ran the place. And I guess like, not everybody was listening really. Or if they were listening, there was nothing to be done. I guess I should say. Not that they weren't necessarily not listening. But what can you do? I mean, honestly. But then they said that one of the college students, one night, jumped down the elevator shaft

26:37and ran down the street. And they were saying, rumor was that he was possessed. All of the college students moved out that night and never came back. I cannot verify that story. There is nothing in a newspaper or an article or anything that I found that can verify that story. That is local lore, I guess. But what I can verify and say without a doubt that this was only a college coed dorm for three months. Which they went to the trouble to open it up as a college dorm. And they spent money. They spent money. They remodeled it. And maybe you can connect with this living in a haunted house. But when I was a kid, there would be times I would just be so afraid I would run out of the house. Because I'm like, it's right here. And so you could have even had one of those experiences. But to jump down the shaft, it seems like that could result in a broken bone.

27:39Yeah, because I do know from, because we just put stairs to go into the basement. So everybody has access to the basement. I do know from the floor of the first floor down to the basement is 11 feet. I can actually show you. I don't know if they jump from the second floor to the floor. And like I said, I can't verify the story. So, you know, we all know that whenever stories are told they tend to change. I'm not saying he's wrong or he lied or anything like that. I mean, it very well maybe the story he was told. But there's a reason they all left so suddenly. I don't know if anybody would. Okay, y'all, I'm a little, I got, I'm a little afraid of heights. And so just opening this made my heart start racing. Oh, it's really, and it's so dark. Like you can't see anything down here at all. I can actually go turn on the light. Oh, hey. You don't have to do that. We can.

28:39I'll stay in the only empty group. Oh my god, look down there. It is so dark. That is creepy. Yes, that's one of the scary, scary, but this is one of the most scary stories I ever heard of this building, except the one that I personally... You had a very scary experience. Yes. Yes. Because it was like my mom. Well, and you heard the running. Yeah, it was stopping opening, shutting doors. And he was looking for my mom. Yeah, he was looking for my mom. Oh, look at that. It goes way down there. Yeah. I get like, I haven't had me feeling here. Oh, yeah. I'm not worse. And then looking down there, I got even worse. Luca, you picking up on anything? I mean, I get the heavy feeling that you're talking about. I get dizzy because it's like, wha-hey, down there. Because really, this is like looking three stories down almost, right? Not quite. Wow. So this was an old cargo elevator,

29:40and they sort of caskets down in the basement. Well, here I'll get a little closer to you. I was going to ask you about that because it was a mortuary and a furniture store that probably was used for caskets coming up and down. Yeah. And I do believe that original building was bigger than what I have here. Because this fireplace right here, it covers up a door that goes to the extra room. Oh, that's interesting. Like warehouse space. Yes. So I believe this building was much bigger than what it is today. Oh. So did that college student jump all the way down here? I don't know. Because that would be- that would result in injury. Yeah. He was not specific in what he, like the story. He was not specific. And I don't know that he even knows specifics. But mainly for people that want to analyze the story, just know that it's local lore. I cannot verify. I'm not- I'm not going to sit here and, you know.

30:41But we can certainly say all the college kids moved out quickly. But we can't say that- There's a reason. There's a reason. Yeah. I can say that the college students moved out in three months. And it was no longer associated with the college after that. Which is weird that you say that because I was thinking. Like you said the college student moved out in three months and it took you three months to acquire the place. Oh, yeah. Oh, coincidences. Are there really coincidences? And it was a post of other things. Like I remember there being a basket store at one point. There was- what else? Just like a flea market type thing was in here. I remember seeing an article in the newspaper about it like, you know, you can rent. If you- Oh, I can remodel. We would do- We would do a different- Nobody ever-

31:42Nobody ever remodeled, which worked out for me. I would like to think that maybe the universe knew that I was always going to own this building and that's why it's intact. And that wraps up part one of our conversation with Tori Westoff about the sleeper mortuary. For more information you can find a link to their website in the show notes or find them on Facebook. If you'd like access to all of our episodes including the archive and advance episodes, everything commercial free, become a Gravekeeper. Sign up on Apple Podcast where you can try it for three days free, or you can go to patreon.com slash the Grave Talks and find everything there. I'm Carol Hughes and for all of us at the Grave Talks. Thank you very much for listening. Thank you.