Post by Graveyardbride on Oct 18, 2014 1:32:14 GMT -5
Hunting Ghosts
Ghosts would be hard enough to hunt just because they have no bodies. but they are not merely discarnate, they’re famously indirect in their approaches to the living. Now and then, you will hear of one that haunts in full human form, an amiable ghost, perhaps, that eats and dances and talks with the living as if there is nothing unusual about popping up in the wrong dimension. More often, however, they appear to humans by hints and signs rather than in the photoplasmic flesh. They produce strange and inexplicable noises, smells and visions: the sound of weeping, or phantom conversations, or footsteps in an empty hall; sweet floral scents or noxious odors; shadowy forms or eerie blobs of light. Sometimes they are even more oblique in their manifestation. You perceive them as a sudden coldness in the air, or a general sense of restlessness, irrational and pervasive, or as an atmosphere densely humid with melancholy or fear.
Indeed, hunting ghosts is like hunting H. G. Well’s Invisible Man, looking not for the unseeable whole but for the visible footprint in the snow. Ghosts are like elusive birds and ghost hunters are like determined birders, hurrying to sites where this or that species has been reported, hoping to claim even the merest intimation of these spectral rara avis.
Like birders, ghost-hunters look first for favorable locations. Ghosts may settle around silver, which they favor, but disperse where blocked by running water, which they are said to abhor and fear to cross. They are believed to congregate around such oases of death as battlefields and cemeteries, hospitals and sits of violent crime. But they may turn up at the scene of some long-ago act of violence, attracted, experts believe, by the dense psychic imprints etched on the surroundings. Crossroads were once popular gathering places for specters because witches, criminals and traitors were executed at such junctions. Ghosts also like hotels and schools because of their thick strata of psychic residues. And spirits, attracted by the intense emotions expressed on the stage, seem to like theaters. Among actors, it is axiomatic that any theater worth the name must be haunted. The curse that seems to haunt almost every production of Macbeth (among other plays) has done nothing to dispel this notion.
Homebodies. Sometimes ghosts do not flock to a place, but simply “live” there because they always have. Haunted houses are usually inhabited by former residents, although now and then, a spectral newcomer may do the haunting. Some spirits appear to be pinned eternally in place by some violent event – often grief of unrequited love, while others may return simply to recapture a sweet happiness they once experienced there. In once English manor, an aristocratic ghost reportedly drops in to use the current lord’s fine library. More recently, investigators of the paranormal have theorized that ghosts are not drawn so much by a particular location as by something at that location. Many believe this something is a so-called portal, or doorway, from our three-dimensional world into worlds of another dimension. These ghost gateways are like the hypothetical worm holes that are believed by some cosmologists to link different universes. So what appears to be a haunted house may be just a kind of spectral turnstile to and from the Other Side.
Beginning the Hunt. Like all expeditions, ghost hunting is largely preparation. Every report of paranormal activity must be examined with an eye to finding a natural explanation. An underground stream or fault like might produce the strange noises attributed to restless spirits, for example, and houses may tremble not from a terrible entity within, but because they sit atop abandoned mine shafts. Only when all other explanations have failed should a hunt begin.
The aspiring hunter’s most important items of equipment are a sensitivity to the paranormal and skeptical, but open, mind. No amount of gear can compensate for what the hunter brings in the way of natural ability and no amount of yearning will produce a sighting to a hunter whose mind is closed to all but a few possibilities. Ghosts are generally inclined to shun overly skeptical or unimaginative company. Nor do they favor hunters who arrive reeking of alcohol. Tobacco should also be put aside. Smoke skews the sense of smell and may look like a ghost on film.
Ghost-Hunting Gear. As for a physical kit, the modern investigator’s prime imperative should be: Keep it simple. Going out to explore reported paranormal phenomena isn’t much different from going out as a reporter to cover a fire and it requires the same basic equipment. Like any good reporter, the hunter has to take notes and make diagrams, so a notebook and writing implement are primary. And because the hunt is generally nocturnal, a flashlight is essential. Beyond the basics, the hunter’s outfit really depends on the expected type prey. A camera isn’t needed for a spirit that manifests itself only with noise and there’s no point recording the silence of a floating white veil. Again, spares are important: film or memory cards for the camera, cassettes for the recorder and batteries for everything electronic. As on the veldt and in the jungle, the hunter is bound by certain rules of engagement. Where the quarry may ignore boundaries, the investigator must not. Care should be taken not to trespass on private property and those who violate this rule – especially in the company of a disgruntled spirit – probably deserve what they get. A good hunter obtains permission to enter the premises before, not after, being challenged at gunpoint by a jittery owner. Hunts should never be undertaken on terra incognita, but in an environment whose present and past have been closely studied beforehand. A trip to the library is probably a good idea before a trip to the site. Moreover, haunts should not be conducted by just one hunter; any sightings will need the corroboration of a witness.
Gadgets and Gizmos. Because all living things are surrounded and animated by a spectrum of energy, many paranormal investigators believe the denizens of the Other Side may likewise crackle with some form of electromagnetism. A glowing specter, for example, might be composed of pure light, while others might emit radiation at other wavelengths. Another, invisible ghost might cut a rippling wake through the geomagnetic field or visually distort its background. Still others might produce sudden cold spots.
With these presumed ghostly properties in mind, ghost hunters have adopted a broad array of remote sensors. Some are quite ordinary. Compasses, for example, are said to skew toward concentrations of paranormal energy and their needles will spin if placed directly over the source. More elaborate devices, such as electromagnetic field meters and Geiger counters, detect energy emissions that are thought to be generated by spirits. Where the ghost signal is a sudden chill, some hunters recommend a digital thermal scanner, which provides instantaneous readouts of air temperature. Anomalous pools of low temperature may mark the spot where spirits have drawn energy from the air in order to manifest themselves. Infrared vision devices are also popular. These permit the investigator to see relatively warm objects in almost total darkness – in effect, to see the Unseen. Such high-tech gadgets can be cumbersome and costly and sometimes produce false readings. In the end, there is no substitute for a keen observer with a skeptical but open mind.
Examining Witnesses. An investigator’s most important partner is the person who reported the phenomenon in the first place. Reports should be checked against external facts; a stormy night remembered by a witness can be verified by weather records, for example. Every possible natural cause should be eliminated before a ghost hunt is considered.
While taking these data, however, the good hunter also keeps in mind that no two people remember events in precisely the same way and he or she must be careful not to influence what is reported. A chance remark, the wrong body language, an inadvertent intrusion can trigger all sorts of bogus memories and responses. Investigators must also be delicate in explaining away reported phenomena (the ghostly rattle that turns out to be a tree branch rubbing an attic window), so as not to seem to be calling the witness a liar. Not that no one lies. Ghost hunters have learned, often the hard way, that liars and lunatics are to be avoided – albeit courteously – at all costs. Nothing destroys a ghost hunter’s reputation faster than the hot pursuit of a ghost spun by a storyteller. Certainly any self-respecting spirit would thing twice about manifesting itself to someone who was so easily deceived. Finally, no matter what comes out of the expeditions, a ghost or some natural phenomenon, the veteran hunter writes a report, which becomes part of the body of knowledge for all explorers of the paranormal. For all you know, a hunt that seems to yield nothing may turn out to be a key step in the continuing exploration by the living of the unquiet dead.
Ghost Image. The camera doesn’t lie? Fact is, cameras were telling visual fibs long before computers made altering photos an easy possibility. Still, because photography was supposed to be beyond reproach, it has long been a key tool of the ghost hunter. The first spirit photograph was taken by William Mumier in 1861. Mumier was a jeweler’s engraver in Boston who stumbled on a potential of the camera to capture spirit images on the large glass plates of the day. As he developed a photograph he had made of himself, he saw materializing next to his image what appeared to be a portrait of someone dead. Coming as it did when Spiritualism was in full throttle, Mumier’s discovery quickly found applications among mediums and serious probers of the paranormal. But the ability of spirit photographers to cook up multiple exposures and manipulate images in the developing baths was too rich a vein of charlatans to ignore. The photograph fad, like mediumship itself, soon dissolved into fraud.
Serious investigators still use cameras, but their equipment is much improved. Modern cameras have turned that venerable art into something closer to a science. A modern camera captures far more than the human eye perceives at a given moment and many ghost images were not seen until the film was developed. Digital cameras are famous (or infamous) for capturing orbs or vortices of light or patches of opaque white fog. While serious investigators usually dismiss these anomalies as mere dust particles, light refractions or magnified hairs, other investigators believe them to be manifestations of the paranormal. To avoid the oft-heard challenge that ghostly images are merely products of flawed equipment, light sources or environmental conditions, serious photographs of the paranormal generally use more than one camera. Some investigators prefer infrared film, which they believe allows them to photograph entities at wavelengths longer than visible light. But the more scientific ghost hunters urge caution: Almost everything emits some infrared energy, guaranteeing that every frame may be full of spooks – but not necessarily spirits.
Source: Carl A. Posey, Discovery Travel.
Photos: The photos above by William H. Mumier shows (left to right) Master Herrod, a young medium, in a trance with his spiritual body appearing behind him (circa 1868); Mrs. French of Boston with the spirit of her son (1868), and Moses A. Dow, editor of Waverley Magazine, and the Spirit of Mabel Warren (1871).