Ghost Hunters of Asheville Tours has begun using the ghost-talking Ovilus on their Haunted
Montford Strolls! We recently spoke to Chattanooga Ghost Tours who has used the Ovilus for two years with excellent and satisfying results. We decided to bring the Ovilus on board for the Montford tour to extend guests' experience with different types of paranormal equipment. We're still using the digital thermometers, EMF meters and dowsing rods on the Downtown Spirits Tour.

The Ovilus is going to be a LOT of fun. It was developed by Bill Chappell, a retired electronics engineer, to facilitate communication with ghosts. The Ovilus measures and interprets environmental energy fields and translates these into audible speech using a synthesizer chip, 512-word dictionary, and 71 phonetic syllables-- the latter to report words not in the dictionary. Mr. Chappell specifically states his devices do not employ any type of random generation, sweep functioning or programmed algorithms for results.

The Ovilus has seven modes: (1) Dictionary, (2) Q&A, (3) Phonetic, (4) Reverse Phonetic, (5) Touch, (6) White Noise, (7) Energy Scope, (8) Draw, (9) Utility, and (10) Sync. These various settings allow users to measure energy, ask questions, "hear" ghosts, and even sync the Ovilus to other ghost-hunting equipment. A speech synthesizer utters the words while also spelling them across a screen.

As with everything paranormal, there are cheerleaders and naysayers and mixed reviews. The fun, though, will be in the journey and the experience. Come join us!!

The Haunted Montford Stroll operates on Friday and Saturday evenings from April through November, weather permitting. Call 828.779.4868(HUNT) for further information, times, and reservations or visit us at www.ghosthuntersofasheville.com.

Paranormal Goes Way Beyond Boo

Paranormal: The word conjures up visions of mist, ghosts, disembodied voices, and transparent apparitions. Yet the current theory of the supernatural is far more involved; it is even suggested our brains are incapable of imagining the big picture.

It's all about "The String Theory" which, simply put, states there are dimensions beyond the three we inhabit. Although invisible to us, these other parallel dimensions exist very close to our own. Scientists posit there may well be inhabitants in these other dimensions and, when the planes of two dimensions collide, there appears a brief window into the other world in which those inhabitants can be seen. This could be then a partial explanation of shadow people or apparitions. Perhaps even residual energy.

In other words, think of a particular piece of ground as a hotel. It's the same plot of ground, but there are different people and different activities going on in each dimension (or floor) of that spot. When planes collide, we sometimes see and capture pictures of those people and activities.

This picture illustrates one facet of this idea. Taken in the backyard of 1900 Inn on Montford, the spectres are hovering above the ground because, according to a psychic who investigated the property, these forms are the ghosts of 2 men and a woman (middle figure) who were alive in 1896 before the house was built. They are standing on what they knew to be the ground before it was graded and altered for the house to be constructed. Navigating in the pre-house world of 1896, they do not know the house is there.

In another curious episode, Matt Canfield of the Mississippi Paranormal Society told Ghost Hunters of Asheville a story relayed by a T.A.P.S. TV show member. According to this cast member, T.A.P.S. established communication with a ghost via an EMF meter: One blink = yes, two blinks = no. When asked if they saw us as shadow people, the ghost replied affirmatively: Yes!

Lastly, in a belief long held by psychics, scientists are now beginning to look at small particles as vibrations that are beginning to mesh with those of other dimensions, thereby increasing the recent number of experiences we're now having with ghosts and shadow people.

To see these theories in action, watch the movie "The Caller" which is currently streaming on Netflix. It illustrated these principles beautifully and understandably -- while giving the viewer a chill or two.

The Ghosts of Ford's Theater

Ford's Theater in Washington DC was built in 1833 as a Baptist Church. It transitioned into a live performance theater in 1861 and launched into the American consciousness when President Abraham Lincoln was assassination by John Wilkes Booth during the play Our American Cousin.

The federal government took possession of the building after threats of arson were made against the theater's owner should it reopen after the assassination. The theater was converted into a 3-story office building that housed the Army Medical Museum, the War Department, and the Office of the Surgeon General.

On June 8, 1893, the front of the building collapsed, plunging workers, desks and filing cabinets into its cellar. Sixty-five people were injured; 22 were killed. The building was largely left vacant for 60 years until Congress approved funds for restoration. The theater was reopened on January 30, 1868 as a National Historic Site and working theater. Ford's Theater today still presents live theater productions and is an organized museum of Lincoln's Presidency, assassination and legacy.

The theater plays host to many paranormal spectacles as part of the many traumatic deaths which have occurred there. Residual energy is witnessed as the events of Lincoln's assassination occasionally repeats itself by the sounds of running footsteps headed towards Lincoln's box, a gunshot, screams and shouts of murder. A witness has seen an apparition of Mrs. Lincoln at the railing of their former theater box and pointing to the stage shouting, "He has killed the President!" as she did at the time of the murder. Actors have reported experiencing an intense cold spot on stage left that has caused them to become nauseous or have uncontrollable tremors. Booth's spirit has also been seen scurrying across the stage, re-enacting his getaway.

Ghost Hunters of Asheville discovered strong indications of paranormal activity on their equipment during a recent visit.

The Orb Defined

An orb is loosely defined as "the soul of a once living person or animal that appears in photographs as a spherical[ly] shaped light." Both ghosts and spirits can manifest as an orb (The Orb Controversy, Miller's Paranormal Research, 2001). Many paranormal investigators pooh-pooh most orbs in photographs as dust, small flying insects, light refractions, et.al. Whatever. All I know is that we, at Ghost Hunters of Asheville Tours, get a lot of them. 

An orb is the lowest-energy manifestation of a ghost or spirit. Ghosts need energy to manifest and move, but cannot create energy -- only steal it. Common sources of such paranormal theft on our tour include lightning, electrical wiring, cell phone batteries, even us! Once ghosts' reservoirs are full, they tend to be conservative with their supply so most often choose to manifest as orbs since these take the least amount of their energy.

If you get an orb in a photograph, you might want to zoom in on it as faces and words can sometimes be embedded in them.

A last, sobering thought regarding orbs: Guests reveal that the most orbs they've ever gotten in photographs are at Ground Zero.

The Pizza-Loving Ghost

In 1999 and 2000, customers and staff of the Godfather's Pizza restaurant in Ogden, Utah experiencd numerous episodes of ghost and poltergeist activity. They called Utah Paranormal Exploration and Research (UPER) to investigate. Their research uncovered:

* The sighting of several apparitions including a man, woman and two boys.
* A jukebox that played when unplugged.
* Mysterious whistling
* A tile floor that arbitrarily bulged ten inches and then flattened out
* Forty fluorescent light tubes flying from their boxes and smashing on the floor

UPER discovered that the restaurant had been built upon an old pauper's field, accounting for the extreme paranormal activity. UPER's general manager, Merry Barrentine, took a photo of this misty apparition in the restaurant in 2000. Several witnesses also saw it with the naked eye.

The Tragedy of Lizzie Borden

It's a jump rope ditty surviving over 110 years: “Lizzy Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks. And when the job was nicely done, she gave her father forty-one."
Lizzy Borden entered the world of infamy on August 4, 1892 when her father, Andrew Borden, and stepmother Abby were killed in savage axe attacks. Lizzy, then 32, lived in the back of the upstairs part of her father's house with Emma, her older spinster sister. The house was also occupied by the family's maid, Bridget "Maggie" Sullivan.

The Fall River, Massachusetts, murder case became an immediate "whodunit" national obsession. Emma had been out-of-town, Maggie in her bed from a migraine headache, and Lizzy in the barn looking for fishing sinkers when the crime occurred. Because Lizzy was the only person readily available to commit the murders, she was the target of investigations.

Some little-known facts of the case:

• The District Attorney begged several times to not pursue the case against Lizzie, citing a tremendous lack of evidence.
•  Police officers were caught in several lies during court testimony, specifically concerning the presentation of the would-be weapon (which was proven to be the wrong size hatchet blade with no trace of blood) and the absence of footprints in the barn (when several others had already been there).
•  The assailant was left-handed, the opposite of Lizzie.
• The jury took only 10 minutes to acquit Lizzie.
• There was no blood evidence incriminating Lizzie. None of her clothes were blood-spattered.
• Abby Borden was killed 60 - 90 minutes before Andrew. She was murdered in the upstairs guest bedroom; Andrew was murdered while taking a daytime nap on the sofa.
• The house was only 20 feet wide with no hallways. How 200-lb. Abby Borden fell with no one hearing has always been part of the mystery.
• Andrew Borden had once been a coffin maker.
• Lizzie had a dream team for a defense including former Massachusetts Governor George D. Robinson.

Although acquitted, Lizzie Borden remained a virtual prisoner the rest of her life in Fall River. She purchased a large, 3-story Queen Anne home christened "Maplecroft," and became a social pariah to the end of her life 34 years later:  never married, shunned by her church, and reclusive to avoid the perpetual staring and pointing when she was in public. She changed her name from Lizzie to Lizbeth, dying of pneumonia in 1927 at 67 years. Her sister, Emma, died 10 days later.

The Lincoln Ghost Train

The following undated newspaper article was found pasted in a late 1860s scrapbook:

 

A PHANTOM TRAIN

THE DEAD LINCOLN'S YEARLY TRIP OVER THE NEW YORK CENTRAL RAILROAD



A correspondent in the Albany (N.Y.) Evening Times relates a conversation with a superstitious night watchman on the New York Central Railroad. Said the watchman: "I believe in spirits and ghosts. I know such things exist. If you will come up in April I will convince you." He then told of the phantom train that every year comes up the road with the body of Abraham Lincoln. Regularly in the month of April, about midnight, the air on the track becomes very keen and cutting. On either side it is warm and still. Every watchman when he feels this air steps off the track and sits down to watch. Soon after the pilot engine, with long black streamers, and a band of black instruments, playing dirges, grinning skeletons sitting all about, will pass up noiselessly, and the very air grows black. If it is moonlight clouds always come over the moon, and the music seems to linger, as if frozen with horror. A few moments after and the phantom train glides by. Flags and streamers hang about. The track ahead seems covered with black carpet, and the wheels are draped with the same. The coffin of the murdered Lincoln is seen lying on the centre of the car, and all about it in the air and the train behind are vast numbers of blue-coated men, some with coffins on their backs, others leaning on them.

It seems then that all the vast armies that died during the war are escorting the phantom train of the President. The wind, if blowing, dies away at once, and all over the earth a solemn hush, almost stifling, prevails. If a train were passing, its noise would be drowned in silence and the phantom train would ride over it. Clocks and watches would always stop, and when looked at are found to be from five to eight minutes behind. Everywhere on the road, about the 27th of April, the time of watches and trains is found suddenly behind. This, said the leading watchman, was from the passage of the phantom train.

The route taken by Lincoln's funeral train, in large part, still exists -- marked by ancient railroad beds and towns. New Yorkers who commute daily from bedroom communities along the Hudson River, north of Manhattan, don't realize that they are traveling the same route as the 16th President's funeral train. So it is for thousands of unknowing railroad passengers.

[Taken from Bloody Crimes by James L. Swanson]