Jan Bryant Bartell

Jannis (Jan) Bryant Bartell (December 20, 1918 - June 18, 1973), was an American author, poet, lecturer, and off Broadway actress.
Biography
Born in New York City, Bartell was best known as the author of Spindrift: Spray From a Psychic Sea. She also appeared in off Broadway plays, which included Bell, Book and Candle and Night Must Fall. Her poetry was published in several magazines.
Her book, Spindrift relates the experiences of Bartell and her husband Fred G. Bartell (d.1990) while living in apartments in the buildings at 14-16 W.10th Street in the Greenwich Village section of New York City. According to the book, the apartments were haunted and Jan, at first a skeptic, underwent a series of unpleasant experiences that led her to modify her views on the paranormal.
The book chronicles Bartell's psychic development and the toll this took on her life. Bartell attempted to address the paranormal activities surrounding her, going so far as to contact Hans Holzer. Holzer, a ghost hunter and writer on the paranormal, proved to be of little use in quelling or interpreting the experiences, and according to Bartell, his unsuccessful intervention only added to her distress.
The Bartells had no children. However Fred, and especially Jan, were strongly attached to the dogs that shared their lives during these difficult years. The story of the acquisition of one of these animals, Contessa, a Hungarian vizsla plays a prominent part in the book. Bartell worte that the dogs also reacted negatively to the ghostly presences and provided Jan with validation as to the reality of her experiences.
In 1973, troubled with the social and economic changes affecting their neighborhood, Bartell and her husband left Greenwich Village and moved to suburban New Rochelle where they bought a home. There Jan Bartell died, of an apparent heart attack on June 18, 1973 prior to the publication of her book.

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