 TOM SLEMEN, Liverpool's renowned ghost-hunter, was drawn into the art of story-telling by his grandmother, Rose. As a child, he would often visit and, in those pre-electronic gadget days that now engage youngsters from dawn to dusk, listen spellbound instead to her stories. Tom says: "She told me magical tales of Liverpool's past. She brought alive characters such as the Galosher Man, the Teacher Clock and Spring-Heeled Jack. My imagination was fired by her tales. "While I was researching Haunted Liverpool I found a lot of facts that would not fit into my paranormal story books. Thinking of my gran's stories, I thought, how about a 'Strange Liverpool', to follow up the Haunted and Mysterious series and I just went from there? "There is a seam of very unusual local history, that is not really categorised. Some local history books are grey and erudite, whereas this is just strange. "I was so over-loaded with information that it could be a series. Just after we went to press I learned of a series of explosions on Edge Lane, where man-hole covers were blown 30ft into air." Tom relies on what he calls "the human internet". His fame throughout Merseyside, Cheshire and North Wales is such that people send him a continuous flow of stories. He says: "I spend a lot of time in the Liverpool Record Office tracking these stories. Researchers like Kevin Roach are a big help. He's a maverick who has a knack of tracking a story down to the month and day. In the meantime, I sit endlessly at microfiche machines trawling for information." There are stories that elude Tom and his team (so far). One that got away was a circa 1910 Daily Post story about "the lion boy", who was covered in a mane of hair and a dark nose, looking like a werewolf. This poor unfortunate was exhibited across the land, but died a few years later. "One of my favourite stories is the mysterious mass grave at St Oswald Street, Old Swan," says Tom, "there were 3,561 bodies buried according to age group in a huge square, in coffins of an unknown type of wood that would not burn. | 
