Casino Ghost

I recently got a job as a cage cashier (breaking large bills for patrons, cashing in blackjack chips and cashing in coin payouts from slot machines) at a casino in Wisconsin. I won't say which one just in case. Further more, I haven't had any direct contact with the ghost or ghosts but sometimes you just "feel" him. Anyhow, I have only been working there three weeks and here are a few stories I have heard about "Ira" (For those of you who don't know, casinos in Wisconsin are only owned by Native Americans)

One night one of my fellow employees, Tanya, was rolling coin and stacking it for the patrons to purchase. In a "brick" of nickles, there is 100 dollars (50 rolls of 2 dollars each). She was finishing up her last brick and could not find the last 2 rolls. Not all that unusual as the rolling machine is old and likes to spit rolls all over the room as opposed to the bucket it should. She looked everywhere for them. SHe took the machine apart, looked under the storage cages,but could not find them. Another one of the cashiers came and did the same. Nothing. Well, at this point it was closing time and they decided they would get the closing duties done and look again later. The door was locked (very important!) and only the first employee had the key. Closing duties were finished and Tanya went back to look one last time. She UNLOCKED the door and immediately noticed the 2 missing rolls of coin sitting on the coin machine, in plain view, a place she had looked at a hundred times. Then she heard a chuckle coming from the direction of the rolling machine, but there was no one there. She still refuses to roll the coin in that particular room.

Another one of our employee's, A supervisor, was finishing up her paperwork in her office when she heard someone approaching her desk. She looked up and no one was there. Suddenly she heard a voice ask her for some candy. She choked out that she didn't have any. She then heard a deep sigh and the voice said laughingly, "If you bring treats, I'll play nice!" And then she saw footprints on the carpet walking away from her desk.

For some reason, the cage people have named the ghost Ira in honor of one of the founders of the casino. Apparently he is not scary, just playful. Hiding newly rolled coin, stuff like that. He particularly likes our 5 dollar tokens which have the circumference of about a campbell's soup can and are gold and pretty hard to miss. But you can look and look for those suckers and not find then until a few minutes later they appear, in plain sight.

Now, we bring ourselves treats one in a while. Hard candy miniature chocolate bars, chips, stuff like that. We always leave Ira his own pile and everyone is VERY serious about NOT eating it. But it is always gone. Then he will leave us alone for a little while. But if he feels its been too long since his last treat, he'll become pesky again.

My personal experience is just a strange feeling I get one working in the northern cage area. I'll be out by myself, late at night and the cage door will rattle. Now the only way in the cage to by a security code programmed into your license and swiped through a machine. Only cashiers and the cage and security super's have those. A guard comes by every 45 minutes (scheduled, not random checks) to make sure the door is locked. They grab the the handle, pull twice (thunk, thunk - so we know its them, they only pull twice, no more, no less). Well, sometimes it will get yanked at irregular intervals 5 or six times. And it can't be a patron because they don't have access to the door. And you just feel like some one else is there and on occasion, you hear laughing. Not patron's laughing, but a playful chuckle...then you find some coins or tokens missing. It always shows up again. 5, 10,minutes or hours later. But at one in the morning, when there are only like 2 patrons in the casino, the thunking of that door being pulled scares the hell out of you.