Though asking spirits to rap on walls has been mostly out of vogue since the decline of Spiritualism (that’s so 19^th century), Syfy’s bringing it back with a bang in Ghost Hunters, Ghost Hunters International, and the most recent spin-off series, Ghost Hunters Academy.

Well, not exactly.

To a skeptic’s great delight, Steve Gonsalves and Dave Tango—paranormal investigators turned teachers in the newest series—spend more time debunking shoddy sightings than anything else, probably much to the chagrin of Syfy producers pushing haunting music tracks and sensational editing.

“We’re not big fans of mediums,” is one of the first comments of Tango in the pilot episode, and throughout the series that definitely comes through—Heathyr, a self-described “sensitive” with mediumship abilities, is the first of the class to flunk out.

The students, raised on ghost stories and quick to turn any shiver up the spine into the spectral communication of a residual spirit, make easy targets for the more critically-thinking Steve and Tango, whose (usually successful) attempts to fool the ghost cadets through the power of suggestion provide some amusing television.  Edifying too—as counterintuitive as it might seem, Syfy’s new ghost hunter school might just provide lessons in skepticism for audiences expecting goosebumps.

Personally, I’m impressed.  Steve and Tango make a point of emphasizing their focus on either verifying the personal experiences of “sensitives” and others or debunking them entirely:

“We’re looking for evidence, hard core evidence,” Steve drills into his students’ heads.  “We go by the method that, if there’s any way that anybody else can doubt what we’re going to present, we don’t even use it.”

Maybe it’s not the scientific method, but there’s a definite priority on protocol and technology.  (Do you know the difference between EVP and a disembodied voice?)

With cameras covering ever corner possible—at sites like a Civil War battleship, not getting everyinch of the brig might be acceptable—and thermal imaging tracking unusually cold or hot spots, the aspiring Ghost Hunters attempt to capture as much verifiable evidence as possible.  And though investigations can last from dusk to dawn—and Syfy fills an hour each week—that evidence is often shown to be disappointingly meager.

Steve and Tango are the first to admit it.

While it’s certainly entertaining to watch the personal reactions of sensitives, mediums, and empaths (apparently, there are betazoids among us) to potentially paranormal stimuli, accounts and personal experiences, however sincerely told, are ultimately just hearsay.  Steve and Dave understand that, and I fully believe that they’re there to turn the content of a Syfy series into science fact: in one early episode, they go so far as to throw out the tapes from an entire night’s work after learning that their cadets weren’t “tagging” the recordings (narrating their progress to ensure, for example, that a student’s sneeze isn’t taken as some sort of spiritual emission).

Even with the central role critical analysis of evidence plays, Ghost Hunters Academy still reads at times like a reality show (and that’s a good thing)—after a weekend Syfy marathon, I felt as strongly attached to certain members of the “class” as I ever have for a tribe on Survivor.  I even managed to put my own powers of suggestion into action by getting a friend I forced into joining my paranormal-TV spree to root for the cadet I personally wanted to “win” the opportunity to join an official TAPS (The Atlantic Paranormal Society) investigative team.  For the record—I chose right (and celebrated with excited shrieks as shrill as any banshee’s).

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised—while still thoroughly entertaining (and kind of addictive),Ghost Hunters Academy, whose season one finale aired Wednesday December 16, proved much less sensationalistic than I’d expected from a show which takes place predominantly in dark abandoned asylums with bobbing flashlights making creepy shadows everywhere.  In fact, with their focus on sifting the wheat from the chaff in terms of borderline “evidence,” I’d be just as comfortable calling Steve and Tang ghost busters as ghost hunters.

In this century, knocking on walls isn’t enough.

Human beings – especially the English – seem programmed to use the weather as a metaphor, and the recession has been no exception. You’re probably as tired of hearing about stormy weather and ill winds as you are of travelling in the real thing. Although there are no bonus points for collecting the set, the missing cliché is the one about battening down the hatches.

But it’s not one to dismiss. Last week’s news coverage included updates from the OECD on growth forecasts. The anticipated growth rate for the UK for 2010 has risen to 1.2% – recession is ending, at least by its dictionary definition. The OECD expects unemployment to continue to rise throughout 2010 and possibly into 2011, albeit at a slower rate. Here are the opening words of the OECD’s Economic Outlook No 86:

The economy is set for recovery, supported by improving financial conditions, an expansionary monetary policy and stronger international growth. However, the pick-up will be slow with GDP projected to grow by slightly more than 1% in 2010 reflecting strong headwinds from balance sheet adjustments, a still weakening labour market and fiscal tightening. In 2011 the recovery will gain momentum, but resource utilisation will remain low and the unemployment rate is projected to reach 9.5%.”

Canadian cult novelist William Gibson may not pack the same workplace kudos as the OECD, but a quote from him is worth citing here:

The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed.”

The OECD figures are general forecasts, not industry or region specific ones. A simple lack of demand won’t be the only reason that some companies continue to shed staff: shareholder pressure, cost-cutting, access to capital and servicing a legacy of debt will account for many lost positions. As an employer, there is another important message: some companies will be turning the corner, growing and recruiting. Possibly from you.

Unlike some European countries, the UK has not intervened to subside short-time working to avoid redundancies. This is a lesson that could have been learned – certainly Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman believes it could help the US – but ‘what might have been’ is a parlour-game, not an employment practice. Nonetheless, two contrasting stories (fictional or fictionalised case studies) – one from Germany and one from the US – are interesting reading. Taking government responses to economic crisis out of the equation, there is a sharp difference in attitudes to talent retention and in company practice. If talent retention is key to your company – and to its future competitiveness as recovery takes hold – the stories should provide a wake-up call. But as recovery does begin to take hold – or is more clearly on its way – there are issues both for talent retention and for recruitment.

Twist or stick?
Staff who are actively looking to move on don’t, by and large, announce their intention. Some who have keep their individual hatch well battened through the storm may now be tunnelling vigorously beneath it, making a decision as to whether ‘holding on’ will pay personal dividends or whether moving on may produce a greater return. Their work experience during the downturn will be a major factor in their private calculations.

If your employer brand honestly reflects their actual experience, their calculation might be weighted in your favour (provided both brand and experience are of a reasonable quality). Brands that have previously oversold their company and built idealistic views, by comparison, may struggle.

Unlike your product or service brand, employees experience your employer brand – your Employee Value Proposition (EVP) – unmediated, firsthand and for a large proportion of their week. It’s not an occasional purchase – it’s a big part of their life. (Why probably explains why no-one talks about a product/life or a service/life balance.) If the gap between the brand’s proclaimed view of itself and their experience of it is too wide, you might start seeing other gaps. In your workforce and your capacity – your human capital.

Staff who have suffered in silence may now decide to move on – and may even decide suffering slightly less somewhere else is preferable. If you’re not sure how realistic your employer brand has been, now is the time to act before the recovery gains strength – for your competitors.

Following best practice in building your EVP – involving staff and gathering their honest experiences, building on your values and mission, reviewing policies, processes and practices – will come at a cost, but so will replacing your existing talent, bedding in new staff (and losing others who carry the weight during the interim). But if staff are making their calculations, shouldn’t you be making yours? How much human capital can you afford to lose before you make a decision?

Here comes the flood …
As the economy moves out of recession, the labour market will initially lag – recession may have different causes, but this aspect is relatively constant. As you increase (or re-start) recruitment, a larger pool of applicants will be available.

As Jared Woods points out in his Professional Heretic blog, you don’t actually want to become everybody’s Employer of Choice:

Your brand needs to be relevant, targeted and honest. Otherwise, you end up having to manage a lot of expectations, and you create promises so meaningless and vague that it’s impossible to meet them to the satisfaction of your staff. You brand can’t be open to interpretation. It must be specific about the kind of people it is geared to attract, and the kind of people it wants to repel.”

Faced with an abundance, you don’t actually want to appeal to all of it. You will want to bag the best of what’s on offer, but using your EVP to encourage candidates to self-select will ease the toll on your HR department. As HR Zone recently reported:

In normal times people look for a career move when they are ready. In other words, they are in control and have a choice. Today, that choice element has disappeared for many and we are seeing an increase in the ‘serial’ job hunters as people apply for roles that under normal circumstances they would not consider. In fact, new research from Changeworknow, Online Recruitment – its all about the candidate, reveals 70% of applicants would consider taking a job even if it wasn’t the ideal job for them.”

If your EVP is clear, strong and direct enough, you may filter out a good share of that 70%. We assume that your aim in recruiting is to find the right people, rather than just as many possible people as you can? If you already know you have round holes, why attempt to appeal to square pegs?

But is your recruitment advertising defining the hole, or digging one? As Ross Clennett so wittily skewers them, there are innumerable Clichés, tautologies, vagueness and other rubbish found in recruitment advertising – and none of them help. (You might want to look at the London School of Economics’ recruitment guidelines for potential employers too.) It’s an advert: you’re selling your organisation and the experience of working for it. Most of us can assume we need to be ‘dynamic, flexible, self-motivating individuals’ (and so – interminably and unhelpfully – on). We want to know what the job entails (can I/do I want to do it?), what the culture is like (do I want to do it with them?) and the opportunity it can offer us (I know having the post filled successfully helps you – what’s in it for me?). Get your EVP and your recruitment processes wrong, and you either lose great applicants, drown in mediocre or inappropriate ones – or both.

Après le deluge
Once you have recruited, you will – of course- need to keep your new staff retained. A third aspect of a strong, effective EVP is employee engagement. The labour market will undergo significant change as recovery begins to be felt, and your EVP needs to move with these changes. Where budgets have been withheld or tightened during the downturn, there are grounds for optimism in 2010/11 that there will scope to invest in process changes and improvements.

Involving both your new recruits and existing staff in these changes could not only help your keep your EVP strong for the ‘better years’ to follow, but also increase their motivation and sense of being valued. Not only does this increase their sense – and experience – of engagement, it increases the probability that process improvements will be successfully implemented, as there will be a sense of ownership rather than imposition.

To quote Jared Woods again:

A good employer brand lives on the continual transfer of emotion, the ongoing renewal of that psychological contract. If your communications with employees feel more like impersonal manuals and less like messages from one person to another, you’re alienating employees from the brand they identify with. And there’s no faster way to make people fall out of love with an idea than assuming that you only have to fall in love with it once.”

Good times may come and go, but work remains a relationship. As you continue to review and rebuild your EVP, remember to keep that gap between rhetoric and reality manageable: it may not be only the rhetoric you need to modify – if feedback is telling the experience is flagging, sagging or floundering, take positive steps rather than punitive ones to improve the reality too. As anyone in a long and successful relationship will tell you, relationships depend on work just as much as work depends on relationships.

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We arrived at Willow Creek Farm Friday night. I admit I was a bit apprehensive. I had heard of this place before from friends and associates who spoke of it with a certain sense of hushed excitement, so I didn’t know what to expect. Forest City Paranormal had investigated the site back in July alongside Paranormal Research of Illinois, however, and their confidence helped to allay some of my misgivings. I had also met Al Kelchner, the owner of the farm, at my presentation at the Rockford Public Library. He spoke with us for about thirty minutes before leaving to run some errands.

Despite having only four members of the team present for duty, FCPS immediately set to work casing the house.

Whitney and I went from room to room, recording the base temperature. Al has been working to refurbish the farmhouse by hand, so my first impression of the residence was that we could have been walking through a place that had been uninhabited for many years. In an upstairs bedroom I later learned was home to a ghost called “the creep,” a window sat open and there was a constant chill in the air. We crept from room to room, which were otherwise barren aside from a few basic pieces of furniture, or perhaps a child’s toy sitting in a rocking chair.

Later that evening, when Al returned, I accompanied him to the Yellow Creek Inn, a local bar and restaurant in Pearl City, where he filled me in on the history of his farm. Al has done a great job of researching his property and he keeps a log of all his paranormal experiences. I was fascinated by his story. The next day, FCPS laid out voice recorders on every floor of the farmhouse and then left to check out the barns.

When FCPS returned, they reviewed the tapes and discovered several strange auditory phenomenon, such as rapping and creaking, on the first and second floor. One EVP sounded like a loud knock on the table next to the recorder, but no one was in the farmhouse at the time. In the middle of the day, FCPS was joined by several more of its members. They set up remote cameras and took EMF readings. That night, I accompanied them from one room to another as they split up into groups of three and tried to goad the 9-10 different entities into revealing themselves.

When Sunday morning dawned, we still hadn’t seen any ghosts, but the adventure was not fruitless. FCPS came away with hours of audio and video recordings, some of which contained clear anomalies. The full report of their investigation, along with their EVPs, will be posted on the FCPS website soon: www.forest-city-paranormal-society.com. As for me, I enjoyed learning the fascinating history of this place, and I look forward to devoting a future issue of the Legends and Lore of Illinois to it.

]]> http://trueillinoishaunts.com/2009/11/17/fcps-investigates-willow-creek-farm-part-2/ Tue, 17 Nov 2009 00:29:38 +0000 makleen http://trueillinoishaunts.com/2009/11/17/fcps-investigates-willow-creek-farm-part-2/

Willow Creek Farm has been called one of the most active haunted sites in Illinois. Last weekend, Forest City Paranormal scoured the farm for 48 hours and recorded some interesting audio anomalies, which will be available on their website soon. Until then, we will be posting exclusive video and pictures from the investigation.

Willow Creek Farm has exsisted in one form or another for the past 171 years.

FCPS scoured the property, looking for unusual temperature and EMF fluctuations.

The farmhouse bedroom is allegedly haunted by an overbearing ghost named Sarah.

Some mediums claim this farm has hosted up to 38 different entities at one time, several of them malevolent.

The Forest City Paranormal Society (http://tinyurl.com/FCPS1) was gracious enough to invite the Legends and Lore of Illinois on their recent weekend investigation to Willow Creek Farm outside of Shannon, Illinois. Willow Creek Farm has existed for 171 years, beginning in 1838 when William Boardman built a log cabin on the property. The farmhouse dates back to at least 1878, with evidence suggesting it is even older. Its current owner believes his home is haunted by a wide range of ghosts, and has invited mediums and paranormal investigators to his farm in the hopes of corroborating his experiences. Willow Creek Farm has been called one of the most active haunted sites in Illinois.

Forest City Paranormal scoured the farm for 48 hours and recorded some interesting audio anomalies, which will be available on their website soon. Until then, we will be posting exclusive video and pictures from the investigation.

EVPs or electronic voice phenomena make up the bulk of our digital evidence. I don’t know if this is because of where we live or the tactics we as a group have developed to coax and cajole the local residents past and present into chatting with us. Put it this way:  Deer Creek Research has never left a hunt without at least one ghostie voice on the recorder.

Here’s a few tips regarding EVP sessions. See also “EVP Sessions: Typical questions and explanations.”

1. Never have more than two people asking questions at a time. Ideally, choose one person to lead sessions. This will help focus the questions (as they will end up being repetitious but consistent) and provide a bank of data to compare as well as make things easier on the ghosts. Sometimes people want to jump in as they have an urge (they usually can’t explain) to ask a particular question.  That’s fine but don’t overwhelm the dead and return to the session leader as soon as possible.

2. Take the time to introduce yourself and everyone with you as well as the equipment you are using. Ghosts are people too and deserve that much respect. They may also prefer to speak to or address a particular individual in your group and your introductions will help them identify people. Digital voice recorders, cameras and k2 meters are all foreign and scary to ghosts. Take the time to explain what they are, what they do and that they will not harm them.

3. Ask the ghosts to shout and come as close as possible.  Anytime we have neglected to do this, the EVPs we capture are very faint and distant. The ghosts don’t know how to use the equipment or how close to stand. Tell them. It helps everyone out. I think sometimes they are in a wind tunnel because when we ask them to shout loudly, they come across as a very definite whisper.

4. Don’t ask stupid questions that express your boredom, impatience or plain old fashioned disrespect. I have heard of investigators asking things like “Do you chew gum?” “What’s you favorite music?” “Do you like ice cream?”  These people have passed on and the concerns of this world are unlikely to be the concerns of the next. Ask information seeking questions that either give you facts you can research or that help you understand the current emotional state of the individual.

5. Try to leave ten second pauses between questions to give ghosts time to answer. I don’t know how things work in the spirit realm but they do seem to always pause before giving a direct response. Ask too much too fast and you could lose important evidence.

6. Limit your time and choose consistent blocks of time for areas or rooms within the same location during initial EVP sessions. Spending two hours in the alleged “creepy room” and throwing a passing glance at other areas is a sign of a hasty and over eager investigation group. Pick a time limit, say ten to twenty minutes, and spend this much time in every room within the location. If the evidence shows more activity in one area in the same time a sit shows little in other areas, you know where to spend time on the second investigation.

7. Engage the spirit and respond to external signs of company. If you ask for knocks and get them, pursue a line of questioning using the knock system. If you ask for the K2 to flicker and it does, ask again.  Often times investigators get over excited and turn a conversation between the living and the dead into a “hey I bet you can’t do this” session. Ghosts are people not performing monkeys. Be consistent and focus on the purpose of an EVP session; that is to converse with the dead, no more no less.

8. Close each session with a thank you not an insult. Often, ghost hunters like to ridicule a ghost and taunt them into a final response as they leave the room. Rather than make enemies with invisible folk, thank them for their time as you would with any person you had just interview or questioned. Manners cost nothing and can get you repeat performances.

The more EVP sessions you do, the easier they become and the rules and tricks to a successful conversation become automatic.

We just finished an investigation in Historic New harmony Indiana. It is always a fun and interesting trip when I visit this small town on the banks of the Wabash. I love this town. It is small and beautiful. Our client asked us to investigate her antique store on one of the major streets in town. If you ever have a chance to get away, take the family and children for a nice walk through this beautiful town. It has wonderful parks, beautiful scenery, and plenty of local shops to keep your wife happy. You might just stumble upon some cool stuff yourself.

My first thoughts were of some creepy haunted dolls dressed up in Victorian garb and turning their head in a circle. Don’t know why I automatically went there but every time I do an investigation in this town, I come back with some eerie and truly interesting experiences.

Now we are going over the evidence. All I have to say is that I am very excited and hope we can find some video or audio proof of the experiences we were having while on location.  The shop was beautiful and our client was a gracious host. I was blown away by their historic civil war memorabilia. It was a truly impressive collection. No dolls with their heads spinning… yet!

Jeff Barnes

EVPs are electronic voice phenomena. These are the spooky sounds that might be somebody trying to communicate by either speaking into the microphone of an audio recorder, speaking to an investigator, or directly impacting the audio recording process. In either case, the ‘voice’ is not heard by the humans near the equipment.

The downside of EVPs is that there is no control for this process.  Most of North America is covered with electronic signals – cell phone communications, emergency response service radio calls, garage door openers, microwave transmissions, TV, radio, short wave radio, and whatever else is floating around in the electronic spectrum.

How do we know that the alleged EVP is not one of those other sources that just happened to interfere with the equipment?  We don’t.  Even two identical devices placed near each other may not give the same result, and that’s just with normal reception.  Two audio recorders may be used in an investigation, but let’s say that the entity only speaks to one of them. Is that a proof of paranormal? Not really.  Broadcast waves are fickle enough in general that any one of a number of random effects might eventually be observed even in controlled settings.

In order to try to screen out radio station broadcasts, microwave communications, television signals (and whatever else is floating around in the air electronically) one current idea is to put the audio recording devices in a Faraday cage.  This is a metal cage that is hopefully big enough to let a ghost in, but the metal structure will keep the radio waves bouncing off – away from the audio recording equipment. Some investigators are using microwave ovens for this, but I’m a little dubious of this since I would think the ovens would be tuned only to keep the microwave range of signals inside, not necessarily to screen out other broadcast frequencies (AM, FM, TV, and so on).

Hey, but if ghosts are energy, wouldn’t they be kept out of the Faraday cage too?  Maybe. Maybe not? We don’t know.  But we know for sure that the radio spectrum is full of contamination that can get into your audio recordings and make you think you’re having a conversation – when you’re not.

The other trick some investigators are using is to modify a scanning radio so that it continually scans its frequency range (AM and FM signals).  The theory is that the entity can select bits of signals as the radio scans by them, and let those bits of audio through to communicate.  If you insist, you can look up ‘ghost box’ on youtube.com.

What you end up with is what I call an audio version of the fabled Rorschach test.  You see, those visual ink blot tests let the viewer project onto them whatever comes to mind since the inkblots are designed to be neutral.  With these radio samples, the listener can project onto them whatever ghostly communication they feel a need for – without any further proof being required of course.

The next step in this evolving idea is what you see in those videos of guys putting their ghost box in the microwave and having a ‘discussion’ with somebody by listening to the words clipped through when the scanner pauses.  Well, that rules out the Faraday cage idea for microwaves then, doesn’t it?  If radio contamination is getting in, it isn’t a Faraday cage.  And finally, how are we supposed to know which words are really important in whatever might be coming through?  Ah, it’s what we think might be important.

Let’s say that an entity really does choose to communicate through a scanning radio.  The entity would have to have simultaneous knowledge of multiple frequencies, predictive abilities about when the words it wants to use will be available, and the ability to stop the scanner on the frequency long enough (and at precisely the correct time) for the word to come forward.  These are deceased humans trying to communicate? I certainly couldn’t do this even if I were given a script and a timeline to memorize in advance.  Why should some random dead guy be able to do this when we cannot?

Ah, but what about those genuine-sounding EVPs where the breathless voices from beyond seem to answer our questions? I don’t know. Hey, I’m not ruling out the possibility of paranormal events legitimately happening! But it is far too easy to manipulate an audio recording to insert stuff in there. Unless I’m hearing it from the original device in a pre-downloaded state (or other controlled method) I’m going to be skeptical. Especially if it is on one of those TV shows.  Those are SHOWS after all, right?  It looks bad if they don’t find something, don’t you think?

Actually, I’d like to run a voice analysis on the EVPs on those shows and compare them to the staff members, sound guys, camera guys, and investigators who were present. You know? Just to be sure.

Following the Dublin Paranormal Convention there was a special paranormal investigation arranged at Wicklow Gaol, where the PIGS, BumpzInTheNite, Barry FitzGerald of Ghost Hunters International, Ciaran O’Keeffe of Most Haunted, Richard Jones and Steve Parsons were in attendance.

The investigation started off with a short talk about the equipment used and a historical talk regarding the gaol. The group then broke off into smaller teams. I was in the team with most of BumpzInTheNite, two PIGs and with Barry FitzGerald leading it. We began in the main body of the gaol, near the ground floor cells. We were split into two groups and one group continued to the basement area where the solitary confinement cell was situated and my group remained at the ground floor cells. Here we were given one cell each to sit in alone. I had never been alone in a ‘haunted’ room before and I have to say I was rather frightened. I seem to be able to cope if there is at least one other person with me, but alone I feel unsafe. This may be because I have experienced being touched by possible entities on investigations and therefore feel a bit afraid of this happening while totally alone as it is quite disconcerting. I could not go deep inside the cell or close the door and had to instead stand in the entrance looking out. While here I felt a coldness to the side and back of me and felt like I was being watched from inside the cell. However, as I was so afraid this may have been my mind playing tricks.

One of the others who was sent to stand on the first floor walkway experienced a tug on his trouser leg. I found this interesting as I had experienced a tug on my trouser leg the first time I had visited Wicklow Gaol while in a cell on the first floor. This same person also often experiences being touched by possible spirits, so perhaps he and I have a sensitivity to this kind of paranormal encounter.

After we had spent some time in the cells we regrouped and came together in a circle near the cell I had been standing in. We held hands and Barry called out for whatever was in the room with us to come closer and communicate. Many of us felt an icy breeze cutting through the circle from the cell I had been in. The atmosphere also became heavy and it appeared to darken. After a few moments this atmosphere then dissipated and the breeze retreated.

Following this experience it was decided for us to go down to see the other group near the solitary confinement cell. Here we were played an EVP which had just been taken. An almost amused voice was heard to say ‘Yes’ in response to the question ‘Do you like us being here?’ We then proceeded to take some more EVPs while holding hands to increase the energy in the room. Nothing further was heard here, but there was a loud bang from above. This was investigated to find that nobody was up in the cell area. But it had sounded like a cell door slamming.

We returned to the ground floor cell area and took a cell each again. One individual would not go into the original cell he had been in as it had an ominous atmosphere inside. I also did not return to my original cell. I took another cell and was able to stay inside it for a time, until I heard a scraping noise and leapt out hurriedly. This was in fact the people in the cell next door moving around, but I was pretty jumpy being alone and could not handle the situation.

Following a break we returned to the ground floor cell area to watch a ’spirit box’ experiment. A spirit box, also known as a Frank’s box or ghost box,  is an AM/FM radio that has been modified to continually scan up and down the dial nonstop, producing fragments of clearly distinguishable voices as it scans the stations. These voices do not appear to be linked to any broadcast. The belief is that spirits lack a voice of their own and are able to manipulate radio signals in order to communicate.

Using the spirit box a medium present was able to communicate with a spirit calling himself  ‘John Long’ who claimed to have committed a murder. However, Ciaran O’Keeffe stated that the spirit box could mislead as the human mind needs to produce patterns in order for it to make sense of the world. Therefore we would hear words amongst the gibberish being produced by the spirit box as our brains would hear what it wanted to hear. For my part I did not pick up any of the words being ’spoken’, so I support this theory.

After regrouping again we then headed up to the old chapel which is designed to look like a ship’s deck, cabin and lower deck linked to the transportation of prisoners to Australia and elsewhere abroad. We started off in the cabin on the top deck. There was an oppressive and claustrophobic atmosphere in this room and the medium present sensed an energy with us. I was leaning against the heavy table in the room and several times I felt as if something was pushing me slightly from behind. I thought it was someone leaning on the table making it wobble, but upon inspection it was found that the table was too heavy to be pushed in such a manner. I was very tired at the time so it was also highly likely that I felt a bit shaky and this was the ‘wobble’ I was feeling, so I can not with certainty claim that this was a paranormal experience. However, the medium with us felt cold spots in the room near me, moving to the other side of the room and one other person claimed to have been pushed violently from the side.

Due to the unpleasant atmosphere of the cabin, we left this room and sat in a circle on the upper deck. Here I was requested to call out as apparently the spirit of a male had been picked up by a medium in the past, who had taken a dislike to the confrontational tone and accent of an English woman present. I, however, do not wish to anger or confront anyone (living or dead!) and so I continued to call out politely and calmly with no effect. However, we did all see a white spot of light in the corner of the room which appeared to be moving. Upon inspection it was agreed that it had a natural cause, being perhaps a crystal in the stone catching the light from the moon outside.

Next we investigated the lower deck. Here as soon as I sat down I felt uneasy about the doorway. I felt as if someone was watching us from the doorway. I did not speak up about this as I was not sure if I was imagining it as I had felt jumpy and spooked the whole night after being alone in the cell. However, after a few minutes the medium with us stated that she had seen a shadow moving past the door and it was ‘ as if someone was peering in’ from the stairs.  Also after a few minutes of being below deck we all heard light footsteps from the top deck. One of us went above to investigate and found nobody there.

Not long after we left the ’ship’ the investigation concluded. I enjoyed this investigation very much, especially hearing the EVP voice down near solitary confinement and the footsteps on the ship’s upper deck. I would very much like to investigate Wicklow Gaol further, but there never seems to be enough time to cover each section desired.

This was an excellent conclusion to the Dublin Paranormal Convention and I very much look forward to similar next year.

Ribeyre Ghosts by Jeff Barnes

Ribeyre Ghosts FREE DOWNLOAD <- Click Here

Ribeyre Ghosts by Jeff Barnes

In 1925, the small little town of Griffin, Indiana found itself on the collision path of the world’s worst tornado in history. The Ribeyre gymnasium in nearby New Harmony was called into duty to serve as a makeshift morgue and hospital amidst this tragedy. Now the gymnasium is the crime scene of a strange and unexplained death. The police have no answers and now the influential of the town turn to a small paranormal investigation team for answers. History shows that the once quiet town of New Harmony is being plagued by a ruthless spirit bent on revenge.

This is the first draft of my book and while I am going to have to go through rewrites, I figured it was an opportunity to share with others my love of writing. This book was my first attempt at a novel and it has been a fun and interesting journey. For those of you who are really interested in ghost hunting, this would be both a fun and informational read. In it I share my ideas on ghost hunting while playing my part to spin a horror tale.

So, please take this opportunity to read this book. It is an absolutely free download and my gift to you. While, I know that are errors (grammar, etc), this is your opportunity to get it absolutely free. My next step is to make an audiobook and share it with the world.

Thanks,

Jeff Barnes

After a very informative discussion, John Zaffis led us to the most haunted dorm on campus for a little ghost hunt. Though I believe in ghosts, I try to be skeptical on a case by case basis. Even if the location is a place that I have had personal experiences with the paranormal, I try to keep a skeptical eye on “ghost hunting” scenarios. Now, I would never accuse John Zaffis of faking evidence during an investigation, but being skeptical means questioning the reliability of the evidence gathered and the method in which it was gathered. Last year when Mr. Zaffis came to campus, we did a K-II session in this same dorm. At that point, the resident ghost “Henry” answered several yes and no questions (one swipe at the K-II for yes, two swipes for no.) Henry indicated that there were more than 2 spirits in the attic but less than 5. Last year, in an attempt to remain skeptical, I considered the fact that K-II’s are very sensitive and it could have all been coincidence or worse, fraud. Still, I believed that there was some activity that night because of the intense cold spot that formed next to me. This attic is very well insulated and VERY hot. Add to that the 40+ students that were crammed into this small room and there is no logical explanation for a cold spot. So, I decided to stay on the fence about that experience. It was interesting, but I wasn’t ready to call it evidence of a true conversation with Henry.

I went into the attic last night expecting something similar. When John pulled out an am/fm radio and two speakers instead of a K-II meter, my interest peaked. Instead of 40 minutes of flashing red lights indicating yes/no answers that may or may not have been given by the spirit of a suicidal medical student, we had an hour long conversation– that’s right, a back and forth conversation– with a ghost. And Henry wasn’t the only one to speak up, either.

At first, John asked the questions, opening with “Are there any spirits in the room with us?” Through the static and rapidly changing radio stations broke a distinct voice, “Yeah.” John then asked “How many of you are there?” “Four.” said the same voice. “Could you say that number again?” “Four.”

The paranormal enthusiast in me was ecstatic with this exchange; the skeptic in me was doubtful. After all, the voice could be pre-programmed. But then, Mr. Zaffis opened the floor for random questions. He encouraged us to shoot out whatever came to mind. Henry was by far the most talkative. He had a very distinctive voice that did not change throughout the course of the night. He answered open-ended questions thrown at him, and more, he answered in classic, smart-ass fashion. I was reminded strongly that Henry was once alive, and he seems to have carried his prankster personality over to the other side. He answered several questions with dry humor. When we asked him for the names of the other spirits, he replied “John.” John Zaffis rolled his eyes and said, “I’m not dead.” to which Henry responded, “Get a therapist.”

Though Henry was by far the dominant presence last night, we also got to speak to Michael. Apparently Michael used to live in Waterford, VT. He had an older sister and he liked to play tennis. All of this information was gleaned over this radio set up. No student stories ever mention a Michael. The same voice responded every time, and it was clearly different from Henry’s and clearly not that of DJ spinning late night tunes. Michael was particularly receptive to Marie Robinson, a very good friend of mine who also co-founded 40:51 Paranormal. Any disbelief that I held toward the legitimacy of this conversation dissipated when Michael answered her four open-ended questions as soon as she asked them. Like I said, I would never accuse someone as world renowned as John Zaffis of faking a back and forth with a ghost… but there are plenty of people out there who would accuse him of that. As paranormal investigators, we need to adopt the view points of the most hardened skeptics in order to counter them. I know Marie. She is very new to this field and certainly didn’t know that she was walking into a two way conversation with a ghost last night. Even if John Zaffis did somehow pre-program the different voices, how could he possibly know what questions the students would ask. And even if he did guess the questions, he would have no way of knowing the order that these questions would be asked in.

And the conversation was not all that transpired last night. There were your standard cold spots. Several of them, in fact. One girl fainted after seeing something black above her and feeling a weight in her chest.

The most interesting report of the night for me, though, was a girl toward the back of the room who reported seeing a black hand on the wall waving at her. This is interesting because it brings me to my own story.

Freshman year, Marie, another friend, and I were hanging out late one night looking for things to up our adrenaline. Basically, we were thrill seeking. We climbed to the bell tower of the on campus chapel and hung out in a sketchy looking basement in front of security cameras for a while. When that got boring, Marie suggested that we check out this attic. She lived in the dorm at the time and told us the story of Henry, the disgruntled medical student who had hanged himself from a rafter in the attic in the 20s. Henry was the stuff of campus legend… though, where there are creepy looking dorms and partying college kids, there are always ghost stories. Still, the six floor Gothic castle-like building was certainly intriguing, and since we had nothing better to do, we decided to check it out.

We climbed the ridiculous amount of stairs and ended up, finally, in the attic. We went to the South wing of it (largely regarded as the creepy side) and entered a small little study room. My friend picked up a piece of chalk and wrote on the beam of one of the rafters, “Hi, I’m *James, and we are listening.” About a minute later, he jumped away from the wall and exclaimed “Did you guys see that!?!” Marie and I had not seen anything, so we asked what he thought he had seen. He responded, “Three black hand prints, like shadows, only darker. The moved across the wall.” Marie and I knew that *James was severely ADD and his medication from the day was wearing off. Still, I was curious, so, though *James left the room because he was too freaked out, I stayed, and I asked Marie to close the door a little to make the room darker. I didn’t say anything, I just looked at the spot where *James claimed to have seen the hands. Suddenly, I saw the shadow of a hand on the pale white paint of the wall. I jumped and left the room (this was before my calm, collected, ghost hunting days.) Though for the next several days I was convinced that what I had seen was real, I gradually began to second guess myself. After all, it was late, and I was hyped up on caffeine and jittery from lack of sleep. When *James recanted his story and blamed his behavior on lack of meds, I decided that I must have just gotten caught up in the moment. Until last night. When a girl two rows behind me spoke up and said “Mr. Zaffis, there was a black hand on the wall waving at me” the hair on the back of my neck stood up. Now, it could just be a coincidence and I admit that I am not a reliable witness to the “hands” from freshman year. It could have been a product of my imagination. But the fact that someone else reported something similar… someone who had never heard my account of the hands (which are not part of any local campus legend) does seem to lend some credibility to the experience.

I don’t doubt that this particular dorm is haunted. I have been up there four times now with the expressed goal of encountering Henry or anyone else that might want to be known, two times with John Zaffis and two times with 40:51. The first excursion with Mr. Zaffis was mildly interesting. There were cold spots and the the K-II did appear to be responding to someone’s manipulation. The second time was when we got the 6 second EVP and founded our group. The third time was a bust. And the fourth time was last night. Still, three out of four times I have had a personal experience… four out of five if you want to count the hands.

We are planning on returning to the attic sometime early next month with my new EMF meter. Hopefully Henry, Michael, and the other two spirits will want to give us all some more evidence of their existence… not that they have anything to prove to me.

Unhörbares wird hörbar

(The inaudible becomes audible)

Published as Breakthrough

by Konstantine Raudive in 1968

Part of a research conducted in Berlin, and for a forthcoming Herbst Radio program. Here is a PureData patch to allow the streams of the Many Voices Report:

When i sit with my back to the kitchen i can hear her in there clearly, rolling bones and rattling bottles, rubber soles squeaking across grouty and cracked tile. The only light in the house comes from the late, late movie and is quickly consumed by the shadows of the dining room. i catch the glowing tip of her cigarette floating through the darkness from the corner of my eye but it is gone when i turn directly toward it.

When i sit with my back to the porch i can hear her out there, the low and steady song of her West Virginia voice. A silhouette eclipses the street light but it’s only a stray cat walking the brick window ledge. Her ashtray waits empty and the swing no longer sways, not even in the strong October winds that blow the acrid Lilly fumes of the insulin factory through the streets now stripped of their once plentiful trees.

She possesses my daughters, twisting their faces into her own, inhabiting their walks and smiles. She is alway orbiting, moving just outside the periphery of my being. One night when i could feel her so exceptionally close and familiar, a phantom limb tossed around my shoulder, when she was so near i could smell her (smoke, beer, tavern steam table, and Charlie) i tried to confront her directly.

–You are haunting me. I get it.
–I always said i would.

Which she did. She said it often with laughter and green eye twinkles reserved for much younger women. I tried to explain to her that wasn’t what i meant, that it wasn’t particularly frightening nor necessarily enlightening but just the dull ache of her absence. It was never mists and dragging chains but the fuzzy specter of loss. There were no static slow EVP recordings to discover, only her voice in the lines of long forgotten songs passing randomly through my life. It was never flowing and ragged white linen and whispered omens, but dark shadows cast across my mood.

It wasn’t dramatic and terrifying like Hamlet, but melancholy and hopeless like Hamlet.

She was gone again, before i could finish telling her these things but i know she will return. She always does. She rides the whim of the westward wind and it is her bony-fingered Broomhilda witching season. In her restlessness she can’t resist these ashen and cloudy days and neither can i. We will pass them together bound by habit and memory and something more, a shade, a ghost, and some neutral grain spirits.

We’ve all seen television shows and specials on psychics helping to solve murders. This is an intriguing concept, and, until yesterday, I honestly thought that psychometry was the extent of paranormal forensics…

… Lately, I have been watching a series of youtube videos called “Ghost Hunting 101″ (it is put out by Midwest Haunts and is very informative– I recommend it), and on one of the webisodes Jason Sullivan, the host, suggests that there can be more to paranormal forensics than “psychic detectives.”

He suggests that if we (investigators) were to cooperate with local law enforcement and conduct an EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomenon) session at the scene of a recent murder asking questions like, “Do you know the man who is tying you up?” or “Who has the gun?” we could actually help to solve the crime.

For a long time, I was interested in becoming a detective or a crime scene investigator, so, naturally, this concept intrigues me; however, I think that, though this an interesting concept that I believe could work, it won’t for some time yet.

I have a very difficult time believing that an EVP would ever be admissible in court. Unfortunately a majority of the scientific community views paranormal investigation as a psuedo-science because the field has been riddled with superstition, hoaxes, and exaggeration. We are on the fringe of things and not accepted as a credible branch of science. Even if an incredibly open-minded judge were to allow the prosecution to present an EVP as evidence to convict a murderer, there are enough cases of EVPs being faked and unreliable that any defense attorney with half a brain could produce reasonable doubt.

If you were on a jury and the strongest evidence against the defendant was a scratchy EVP, would you feel comfortable convicting the guy to life in prison? I know that I wouldn’t– not even if I was the investigator that got the EVP!

Still, the concept is really very interesting, and the video series is great.

Check out Midwest Haunts’ video on paranormal forensics.

Or, just check out the Midwest Haunts Youtube Channel for the entire series.