Wayne Lee
Appearances
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It was very scary for me. I stopped, I looked around, I'm like, Am I going nuts? Nobody wants to think about that. But the thing that has happened for me by using the divining rods, it has strengthened my faith. It has told me that just because you don't understand something doesn't mean it's not real. And there's so much in this world, I think, that we don't know and we don't know about.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It's told me that we all have a creator. No matter what you want to call your creator, whether you want to call it God or Buddha or whatever, we have a creator that's in charge. And there are miracles that happen every day. Just because we don't always know it. I've had several miracles happen in my life. This being one of them, that I've gained this ability to do this.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
So we're going to walk over to this first series of graves here.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
First of all, I'm just going to ask God to help me use these divining rods today. Please let your Holy Spirit work through me and let me do a good job with this today. So when I step over a grave, the rods will cross over. When I step off, the rods will open up.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I was told by a dowser a few years ago, when I first started dowsing, that he could determine the depth that the person was buried. I've never dug anyone up, so I don't know that to be a fact. So first of all, walk to the grave. Crosses over. I wait for it to reopen. When they cross over again, that's how deep the person is. So the distance from here to there, which is probably around six feet.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Father, can you direct me to the head of this person? Father, can you direct me to the feet of this person?
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I'm going to place one rod over her. If it's a woman, the rod will turn toward her feet. If it's a man, the rod will turn toward the head.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Let's ask for Mary Louise. Father, I'm looking for Mary Louise. Can you help me find Mary Louise? And it's not going to cross over again until I get to Mary Louise. Mary Louise. But I have the confidence and God has revealed to me that I can find people only to know who they are.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
When I found my grandfather there at the cemetery, and they hadn't started exhuming bodies yet, That was the beginning of some closure for me. It's like, maybe you forgot about him and maybe you didn't put up a marker that's still there, but I'm going to put up a marker.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I've shown several people. Some people can do it. Some people can do it a little bit. Some people can't do it at all.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And back up and come forward again. Hold them just a little more level. A little more level? Just barely bent, so it's not... The rods barely moved.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Well, you know what? Like I said, this is between me and God. And I said, God, you know, help me. And I always pray before I do it.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Halfway there. Maybe I'm the problem. Maybe it's not you, it's me. All right, let's try it over a headstone.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Now come toward me and get straightened up with me. Now walk toward me
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
You can. Ask where the person's head is. But like I said, I pray and I ask God to help me do this. Can you ask where the head of Mary Louise...
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
You got it. You're the first person that I know of that has done this well.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It's not an exact science. Some people will say, you know, it's not real or you're making it happen. I'm not, but I can foul it up, you know. It's real and it works. but I can file it up. I don't do it for money. I just do it to help people. I'm doing it to try to show some respect for those people that are buried out there. Not just my grandfather, but for everyone that's buried out there.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It's like another realm out there. This is just temporary. Because I know when this voice told me, do this, do that, you know, is real. But anybody wants to believe it or not.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
The only thing I knew was our granddaddy was put in a mental institution and that they said he was crazy. I didn't have all the diagnosis and all that. I didn't know him, but then you wonder, you know, was there a problem? I feel like even though the hospital did all they could to help take care of him, I feel like they did. They should have kept better records, you know.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It shouldn't be that years go by and people say, well, we didn't even know they were there. We just built over them. You know, it's not important. They're dead. It doesn't matter.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Well, since he died in 32, and I wasn't born until 52, I didn't know a lot about him. I hadn't met him. All that I knew was what our mother had told us. When she was 18, they were very poor sharecroppers in Mississippi. There were five children. They didn't have any food to eat, and he basically gave them his food. He got really sick. He got very delusional. He had sores on his hands and feet.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And they didn't know what was wrong with him. They were so poor they didn't have a car. They couldn't take him to a hospital. And so the story that we were told was that a neighbor contacted the sheriff and said, you need to take this man to the hospital. Said he's delusional. He's very paranoid. He thinks someone's coming to get him. So the sheriff came. And my mother was the oldest. She was 18.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
She signed the paperwork for the sheriff to take him to the mental hospital. According to my mom, they didn't know he was going to a mental hospital. She thought they were just taking him to a hospital. And the story that we always heard was They didn't find out until like six months later that he had died.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It affected her a lot, and it also caused some risks in the family, from what I understand, because she supposedly signed the paperwork for the sheriff to take her father. The youngest child was 10, and my mom always said that some of the younger ones held it against her, that she'd send her father off and he'd come back.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
My brother, James Lee, we called him Tom, he had polio when he was three. It always made him a little more of a homebody. He had got into studying all of our family history. When he was a teenager, he was riding to the hospital. I've got a copy of a letter that he sent in 77, which he would have been a teenager then, but not far from it, asking about our grandfather.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And he had called down there to the hospital and asked about our father and grandfather. And they said, well, we don't know where he is, we can't send you any medical records, it's against the law, and that he might be buried under one of these buildings out here, under a street, we don't know. And so,
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
My brother was pretty persistent about that through the years and he got me interested probably about 15 years ago. And so my brother passed away two years ago. So I'm trying to kind of carry on what he had started. It was very important. A lot more important to him all those years that he spent on it than it was to me. I was just a kid and I didn't know.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And every step of the way, they were always said, no, no, no, we're not giving out any records.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Well, I don't want to see anyone disrespected. I work in a lot of cemeteries, cleaning up cemeteries. They're not my relatives. They're just people that have been forgotten. And by using the dividing rods, I can help find people. Sometimes their headstones are just under the surface. And I can find them and upright them to show respect for those people. These are just forgotten souls.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
You know, was he? Was he not? Our mom said he wasn't crazy. He was just starving. And so it was great to get the medical records a month ago, which clearly says he has plegra. He had symptoms of that that caused these effects. There was no mental illness in the family. And so, you know, there's some closure with that. Definitely.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And I want to do everything I can to try to right that.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I always knew that my youngest son... had some issues. He was a really sweet kid, good kid, but always had a fear that maybe he had inherited something from his mom. He was a teenager. He started developing mental illness and became homeless when he was like 17, 18. Lived on the street off and on. My first wife had mental problems. Her mother had mental problems.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Her grandmother had mental problems. And one time, she kind of threw it up to me, well, your grandfather had mental problems. I'm like, so anyway.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I knew that she definitely had a mental illness because she would make up all this stuff in her mind. She would believe it. But anyway, I've had to deal with some mental illness.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
He robbed a bank when he was 19. So he walked in the bank, handed him a note, said, I need $85,000. And they laughed and said, yeah, me too. He said, no, I think you might have misunderstood me. I need $85,000. This is a holdup, and I have a weapon. Well, he didn't, but anyway, they gave him the money. He went to prison for three and a half years. It was a terrible experience.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
As somebody walked in a room, a lot of times he would just start laughing. And I couldn't figure out what he was laughing about. And I said, what are you laughing about? Oh, nothing. It would just be uncontrollable. And then in time, one day...
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
It finally came out that if a woman walked in a room, he said the voice would say, boy, she has big... So then it made sense that every time we went somewhere in public, somebody comes walking up, he'd just look, he'd laugh, and he'd put his head down, and sometimes he'd just have to walk out of the room. But he was hearing voices.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
That day, I think 11 soldiers, and they were in a line just like a trench.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Prisons are basically to punish. And so he got out. I got him Section 8 housing and got him more jobs, but nothing ever lasted. Got him medical care. But you can't make somebody take a medication. If they have mental problems, hopefully you can help them, but you can't make them.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And when he died, you know, that night, it was terrible. And I was praying about it, and I couldn't sleep. And I said, God, don't let me go to the dark side. Don't let me be bitter. Help me through this. And I got through it. I had no remorse toward that family, toward the man that did it.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I feel sorry for him and his family, because it could have been my son that could have been the other way around. And so... That's how I have, that's why I guess I have certain feelings about mental illness. It's because I've lived through it with people never in my family other than my son, but with my ex-wife and her family. Mental illness is a tough thing, but I always knew.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
You know, we had been hearing that pellagra was involved in it, but I just never got it official until, you know, reading all these medical records. And just from the research that I had done on pellagra, you know, it said it causes these problems.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Maybe it's because my ancestors had slaves. I almost feel like they're reaching out to me, hey, you know, help us out. I made crosses for every person that I found in that cemetery and marked it and had the names inscribed and the dates they were born and died. And my hope is that someday when somebody's trying to find their ancestors that was a slave, might run across that. That's my hope.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And yeah, and whether he was or he wasn't, I've never looked at it like, well, that's not a reflection on me, but like you said, it could be traced or passed down.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Yeah. And it's like, yeah. But anyway, that's the past.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Just acknowledging that that person you're out of and that... This was their life. This was when they were born and died, and this is where they're living. Showing respect.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I don't think it's doing anything for the deceased. Maybe it is, I don't know.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And I thought, you know, this is a man I never met. You know, I'm not sure about the afterlife. And I'm not sure if he's up in heaven, he's cheering me on. But in the last couple of days, I was thinking, You know, maybe he's just there saying, hey, you guys, this is my grandson. He's trying to tell the world that we're here and where I am. And I love him for that.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
I can walk around the room and say... Father, can you direct me to Larison? Father, please direct me to Larison. Father, please direct me to Larison.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
This is the first evidence I was telling you about.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Can you imagine the first time I met Billy and I come to his house and I said, what are you doing with the headstone?
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
This is Timothy O'Riordan, died May the 30th, 1893, aged 63 years. And Lida, she checked it out, and he was a patient there, and he was buried in the cemetery. I mean, it's in fairly good shape. It is. It's been sitting there since in the 70s. I mean, it's been out there since 1893, I reckon.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
Yeah, and I'm going to do a little demonstration with the divining rods.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
And I like this to be able to move freely. That way, you know, if you spin all the way around, I'm not touching the metal at all. And so I don't want anybody thinking, yeah, he's making that turn. You know, I can't make it turn.
Under Yazoo Clay
Like They’re Reaching Out to Me
You can take a coat hanger, you can be done with a loom, you can be done with copper. This is just... metal that came from, like, Home Depot or Lowe's.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
About a month ago, I received a message from Dr. Jennifer Mack, the archaeologist. And she said that they were getting ready to do the excavating where my grandfather died. where I had placed a cross about five years ago, where I felt like he was located. And I had told them that when they got to that point to call me, I would like to be there.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
And so I went, and I was very impressed with their professionalism. There were about 10 archaeologists working in the mud, laying on their bellies, on their knees, I mean, they really go through everything with like a fine-tooth comb, brush. I was very impressed with them and very respectful to me. Well, it had been raining a lot, and so everything was muddy. You could barely walk.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
You could barely stand up. Everything, the ground was uneven. I'll say this, the dousing that day, I did some dousing that day, but it just didn't seem right. It was very hard to even stand up. And when we got to the location, nothing seemed to be quite right. I can't explain why that is, but when... after they spent all the time, and the bodies are so decomposed.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
I mean, all you see mostly is a shadow of a body, almost. It's like you can see where a bone was, and if you reached in to try to pick it up, it would just kind of crumble, just like dirt. And they found some things, but the sad part was, that they said that there was no DNA to be found. And so they couldn't guarantee that that was him. The one thing that didn't really match very well was
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
In the location, the archaeologist said she really didn't think that he was in the right location, that he would have been buried there. They've kind of found certain things that kind of clued them in as to what year it might have been or what decade. So nothing seemed to be quite right. Like I said, I can't really explain that other than it just didn't seem quite right.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
Afterwards, I asked the archaeologist if she thought that was my grandfather. What's your gut feeling? She said, I don't think it is. And my gut feeling was that too. And I do appreciate Dr. Mack's opinion and her gut feeling. In talking to her, she said, you know, the sad thing about her job, she said, I don't work with exacts.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
She said, a lot of times I don't have closure because I can always look back and say, well, it could have been this or it could have been that. But the other thing was that team was so dedicated. I was really impressed with, you know, they spent hours out there in the mud and, you know, just to find almost nothing. And so it was just kind of the end of that.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
I'm okay with it because I feel like I've done everything that I could do to show respect for my grandfather and all the others that were buried there. I wish that there had been better records kept. But, you know, I think they are doing everything they can right now to be professional and to handle things correctly. I've been asked, will you go back?
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
Yes, I'm going to go back because I think it's going to take another six, seven, maybe ten years to complete the project. And I just want to make sure that it's completed. One other thing that has happened in just the last few days, you know, my cousin Billy had saved one of the headstones from back in the 70s.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
And after talking to Billy and talking to Lyda and talking to Dr. Mack, he returned the headstone just a couple days ago. And so Billy won't have that at his home anymore. It'll be back at the hospital.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
Yeah, I talked to him. I had to persuade him to give up the headstone. You know, he's carried it around since the 70s, and he wanted to be sure that it was not going to be just dumped again, you know. So it took a little persuading, but he gave it up and he felt good about it.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
Well, I feel like I'm almost family with Lyda and Dr. Mack. They're really good people. I'm really impressed with them.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
Yeah, it really has. And not just that, but the dowsing in general. I'd heard about it, but didn't really know anything about it. It was all new to me. It was just so odd how it all came together. That right before, while I was trying to find my grandfather, that's when I received the gift and started using it.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
But, you know, after they removed the cross, and after they said they had to remove it, I mean, it was there for about three or four years, but when they removed it, they were cutting trees down, and they had heavy equipment coming in and moving dirt and stuff, so they transformed that whole hill. And after that, it just never seemed the same.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
When I would go back and do some dowsing, it just never seemed the same. And so, I mean, they guaranteed me that they pinpointed exactly where I'd had the cross. And I believe that, but it never seemed quite the same. And that was just because it had changed so much. They took out all the trees. the equipment would take off the top two to three feet of soil.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
And so they would have mounds, large mounds of soil, and they would have a a stretch of land there that the top two to three feet had been removed, and most of the people were buried, I say, four to five feet. And so that way, they only had to go down another foot or so before they got to the remains. But the landscape had changed so much, you really couldn't make heads or tails of it. Dowsing
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
It, and I've told you guys this before, I wholeheartedly believe in it. 100% it works. I've done it over and over and over again where I have found people in cemeteries that I didn't know where they were. And so it's proven to me. But If I'm not concentrating, if for whatever reason God doesn't want me to be able to, if he doesn't want it to work that day, then it doesn't work.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
And when I do dowsing for people, I tell them that. I said, if God wants it to work, then it'll work. If he doesn't or if I'm not paying attention, if I'm not focused, then it doesn't. And that day, it just didn't seem right. But I'm okay. I'm okay with it because probably no matter where he's buried in that field, if that was him or not him, there's no DNA.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
because he's been buried for so long and because of the Yazoo clay. There was very little of anything left.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
Well, I feel like I've done everything I could do, but I do want to see them complete the project. And I'm glad that I did what I did with placing the cross there, because I think that drew attention to the project. And maybe there was one more thing that might have nudged them a little bit to keep going forward with this mission.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
That was my sole purpose for doing it, was to find him, but also to keep them moving forward. You know, I really wanted to find my grandfather. I really wanted to, if I had some remains, take them back to Kentucky and have the remains placed with his wife and his children. But, you know, I believe in God, and I believe in heaven, and I believe that's where he is.
Under Yazoo Clay
Bonus: Family by Mud
So he's already with them anyway, and he's with my brother. And so I guess what I was wanting to do with the remains, it's not that important to me now. I did everything I could do. And I don't feel like there's anything else I can do. And so I'm just satisfied with myself and we'll just go on.
Under Yazoo Clay
A Southern Ethos
My name is Wayne Lee. I'm a hairstylist. Grew up in Kentucky, live in Durham, North Carolina. See, I grew up with a little bit of the stigma of they thought your grandfather was crazy. They put him in an insane asylum. You know, was he? Was he not? Our mom said he wasn't crazy, he was just starving.