Shadowy figure at the top of the stairs

With Halloween right around the corner the radio station I listen to was in the Halloween sprit and asking listeners to call in if they're ever seen a ghost or lived in a haunted house.  I didn't have time to call in, so I'll share my story here.

I grew up in an old house, that had been in my dad's family for 4 generations.  I always thought there was something there but never saw anything strange until one night.  My sister and I were home with a friend.  I needed something from my bedroom, but the upstairs hall light was burnt out and I was to scared to go up there alone.   The top of the stairs turns 90 degrees, so when you get to the top there's a little nook off the hallway that leads into one of the bedrooms and a window opposite the bedroom door.

My sister, our friend and I all went upstairs together, using a flash light to see.  When we got to that turn in the stairway we shined the flash light on the wall between the bedroom door and the window and very clearly saw the shadow of a man in a wide brimmed hat.  It scared the crap out of us and we ran down the stairs without killing each other in the process.

There's no explanation as to how that shadow could've been cast in that spot because the bedroom door was closed and there was nothing outside the 2nd floor window that would make such a shape.  I never saw it again after that, but it was something that stuck with me for years.

A few years ago, while doing some genealogy research, I ran across a shadowy photo of my Great Grandmother's second husband standing in the doorway of our grainery shed.  I immediately recognized the figure in the photo as the shadow figure I had seen at the top of the stairs years earlier.