The Strange World of Ghost Hunting (and its history)

People have always believed in ghosts in one way or another, but when did we start HUNTING for them, and why? Come learn with me about the world of paranormal investigation media and its complicated history!

I'm on TikTok @ kazrowe

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Sources:

Confessions Of A Ghost-hunter by Harry Price

"Give us a Sign of Your Presence": Paranormal Investigation as a Spiritual Practice by Marc A. Eaton

QUEER SPECTRALITIES AND UNTIMELY SUBJECTS by KEVIN CHABOT

Ghost Hunting in the 19th Century– Distillations Podcast Episode 277, Science History Institute

The Broken Technology of Ghost Hunting By Colin Dickey

“Ghost Hunting in the Twenty-First Century” by John Potts in “From Shaman to Scientist: Essays on Humanity's Search for Spirits”

‘Make Me Believe!’: Ghost-hunting technology and the postmodern fantastic by Sarah Juliet Lauro and Catherine Paul

Phantasmic Science: Medieval Theology, Victorian Spiritualism, and the Specific Rationality of Twenty-First Century Ghost Hunting by Brenda Gardenour Walter

Ghost-Hunters and Psychical Research in Interwar England by Joanna Timms

Wandering the Web -- Subcultures: Ghost Hunting: A Passion for the Paranormal by Jack and Lesley Montgomery

Paranormal Technology: Understanding the Science of Ghost Hunting By David M. Rountree

Haunting rhetoric: Ghost Adventures and the evolution of the ghost hunting genre by Shannon Dale

A Haunted Genre: A Study of Ghost Hunting Reality Television by Abigail L. Carlin

Re-imagining the National Past: Negotiating the Roles of Science, Religion, and History in Contemporary British Ghost Tourism by Michele M. Hanks

Ghosts: A Natural History: 500 Years of Searching for Proof By Roger Clarke

“14 Spectral Men: Femininity, Race, and Traumatic Manhood in the RTV Ghost-Hunter Genre” by David Greven, from the book “Reality Gendervision”

Ghostland: AN AMERICAN HISTORY IN HAUNTED PLACES By Colin Dickey

Ghost Hunters: WILLIAM JAMES AND THE SEARCH FOR SCIENTIFIC PROOF OF LIFE AFTER DEATH By Deborah Blum

Speaking into the Air: A History of the Idea of Communication by John Durham Peters

Video:

Ghost Adventures

Buzzfeed Unsolved Supernatural

Bleach

Ghost Whisperer

Legend of a Ghost (1908)

[trevorevans]

Shane from Buzzfeed will always be my favorite accidental ghost hunter.

[queenmimic]

My town has an extreme grudge against the tv show Ghost Hunters.
We’re a small town that has been struggling to bring up our tourism so when we heard that Ghost Hunters wanted to come here we were very hopeful it would help. The town rolled out the red carpet for them, helped gather stories, gave them tours, and they were allowed to stay above our apothecary for FREE for two weeks despite the fact that the owner’s only source of income.
When the episode came out they painted not a picture of a charming small town with a tumultuous history but a town in the middle of nowhere so crime ridden that no one wants to go there.
The two weeks after the episode aired two years ago was TENSE

[bichiAllen]

Ryan and Shane are lit the only ghost hunting team I'd actually believe if they said they saw a real ghost

[theohedgpeth]

One of my favorite paranormal shows was one where they had electricians, building inspectors and plumbers come into so-called haunted houses and investigate the cause of certain thinks, ie cold spots, slamming windows and doors, etc. And they'd just tell the home owner how to fix them lol

[TheKapitan]

"P.T. Barnum, the circus villain, " is the best description of him I think

[stevem.o.]

I once found a gravestone with my own name on it from the 1800's (I don't have a super rare name lol) in a graveyard that the internet said was a "portal to hell" (the town was a shithole, so I don't doubt it).

Being a bored teenager, I decided to go out there with a tape recorder and ask questions like "are we related" and "is this really a portal to hell?".

And I caught a VERY clear EVP saying, "Shut the FUCK up."

Wish I still had the tape, but this was over a decade ago, and it's not like anyone would believe me anyway lol. It was almost TOO clear, in spite of the fact that I was the only one out there and heard nothing until I played the tape back.

[surfinsocal]

I have had three times where I’ve seen people/animals/masks in places they shouldn’t be and legit thought they were ghosts. Turns out it was just psychosis.

[aakanshyearsago]

I'm deeply honored how most of the comments are about Ryan and Shane. I think it'll be nearly impossible for anyone from the ghost-hunting industry to top them.

[astreaward]

When I went to New Orleans, I stayed at the Dauphine Orleans Hotel because I saw it on Unsolved and thought it was gorgeous. The bartender featured in the episode still worked there and spoke very kindly of Ryan and Shane and said they at least didn't fake any evidence while they were shooting. She didn't specify the people who did fake evidence, but apparently some do. For me, it's the history-related stuff I find fascinating. I don't believe in anything supernatural but there's usually something really cool to learn anyway. Probably why I really like your videos :)

[oviiembem]

I always love the part where ryan said "well, you are now ghost hunter" and shane brain got short circuit due to such revelation.

[KewlKat]

I use to be TERRIFIED of ghosts and I kind of blame it on ghost shows like Ghost Adventures and Ghost Hunters. They always framed ghosts as threatening entities that only wanted to bring you harm. Never trust child ghost, they could be demons, all ghosts are poltergeist, etc. It wasn't until I watched Buzzfeed Unsolved that I finally overcame that fear. Something about Shane's monotone nonchalance and his focus on the history of the places they visited helped me to see these "haunted" locations as places to be loved and appreciated instead of feared. These buildings housed people and lives and you can still find evidence of those lives lived there without living in fear of them. I visited New Orleans with my brother recently and if it had been just a couple years ago I would have been shaking in my boots the whole time but thanks to this new outlook I got to just enjoy a city full of history and culture. The idea that I was walking the same streets, sitting on the same bench, standing in the same building as people from decades before me, stood before headstones of people who died so long ago would have terrified me at a time but now it brings me joy and profound comfort knowing that there were people here before and there will be people here again. Also the fact that nothing bad ever happened to Shane during investigations despite everything he did helped lol

[bobbiemontgomery]

"Ask a Mortician" has a great video all about Mumbler, his life, the long trial and subsequent issues and moves. It's a thorough and enjoyable look into the spirit photographer who is recognized as the original.

[ashleynorton]

Screaming crying because I’ve had “the ghost hunting industrial complex” in my video idea list for months but the queen beat me to it.

[virgiltheghost]

Closest I’ve ever gotten to the paranormal was when my cat Ruby died. She was an absolute demon of a cat to everyone but my dad (who had her since she was a kitten) and me. She hated my mom, my little brother, and even my grandma who was probably the closest thing to a real life Snow White.
The night we had to have her put down, I couldn’t sleep since she usually slept on my bed and the missing weight was throwing me off. After a while my door opened, and something audibly jumped onto my bed and I COULD FEEL TINY FEET CRAWLING OVER ME. I, a scared shitless 6 year old, refused to move or open my eyes as a flour bag of weight plopped unceremoniously next to me. I kept my eyes closed thinking “if I can’t see it it can’t get me” (ya know, 6 year old logic), and eventually fell asleep.
I woke up the next morning to no ghost cat, but a bottle cap right where the weight had settled next to me the night before. (The only ‘game’ Ruby ever played was when we’d chuck a plastic bottle cap somewhere and she’d bring it back, no matter how obscurely we hid it.) I took it to my dad who promptly burst into tears and told me I was probably dreaming, which I may have been, but the fact that there were little teeth dents in the bottle cap made me doubt.
My mom also woke up with 2 small claw marks that were swollen and itchy (my mom is allergic to cats, but let Ruby stay for my dads sake). I like to think it was her ghost’s final little goodbye to me, and final ‘fuck you’ to my mom :).

[ninamason]

I have had. SO MANY. Paranormal encounters throughout the years, but I think the most astonishing one for me was when I was in a production of Antigone. My director wanted to mix film and live theatre as sort of a commentary on "if it bleeds it leads" media, so we decided to show Antigone's hanging via video. The idea was that it was a black box theatre with white curtains all around, and I'd be strongly backlit behind one and "hang" myself. Then my backlight would go dark and the video of my dangling body would play. This necessitated actually "hanging" me for video production, during which I stood en pointe on a clear stepstool to "hang." Yes, with a half-tightened noose around my neck. And as you may guess, at the precise moment everyone was distracted by something else, I slipped.

We pause here with me about to strangle so I can tell you about our theatre ghost, Dorothy. Dorothy was supposedly a theatrical professor in the 1920s who died in her office, as an old maid (some versions of the story say she was a lesbian, but either way, no husband and no kids). Ever since, before every performance you had to go up onto the old track (the building was originally built as a gym and the running track was still up above) and put a ticket stub and program on a specific chair belonging to Dorothy, and on opening night, roses. The chair was on no account to be moved unless it was necessary to do so for the stage to be properly visible, and if you did move it for that reason, you had to say "begging your pardon, ma'am, let me get you a better seat." If you did not do this, bad shit would happen--and it did. During one performance where my professor--a skeptic, up until the point of this story--had moved the chair, the lightboard caught on fire. During the Antigone run, our Eurydice chose to be a dick and kicked over Dorothy's chair on purpose, and in that same performance she accidentally stabbed herself with the dagger she was using for her suicide scene. (It wasn't serious, but still. Yikes.) The saying went that Dorothy would take care of you if you took care of Dorothy, and when I worked shows I was always the one taking up her ticket, program, and roses on opening night and telling her to enjoy the performance.

Okay, we're back to me in a noose on a 12" stepstool, about to definitely die with four people standing there because they were all having a conversation with the people hanging the lights. (Who needs to have a spotter for the person in the noose, right?) So I slip. In slipping, I kick the stool sideways. I felt the noose tighten.

....and then a pair of hands slipped underneath it and I dropped to the floor. Landed perfectly on my feet.

NOBODY ELSE HAD EVEN REALIZED I WAS IN TROUBLE. THEY WERE ALL STILL TALKING TO THE LIGHTING PEOPLE.

Dorothy got her roses on opening night, but my professor also made sure she had flowers of some kind every night of the run. And I never saw her move Dorothy's chair again.

[billykidman]

Imagine you're a long dead ghost named Apple Tater about to order dinner at the ghostly Fazolis when a discovery camera crew flings you into their realm just to roast you on national TV.

[EosFunk]

I am DYING for a youtuber to do a deep-dive on how post-911 anxieties encouraged this weird obsession with Christian horror and the paranormal. That whole era is so nostalgic for me - I consumed so much media about vampires, possessions, ghost hunting, etc etc. Still love all that stuff to this day. Those teenage years gothy obsessions later evolved into an obsession with Lovecraftian horror for a while - didn't we almost all collectively go through this in suburban middle class America?

[theloverlyladylo]

I have the most boring and pathetic supernatural encounter ever: I was at my grandmas and taking a bath, but left my shampoo on the counter, I got up and got halfway out of the tub (one foot in, one out) to retrieve it. When I turned to get back in, I slipped hard. I had nothing to catch myself on and my grandmas bathroom had a large tiled shelf behind the tub. I knew I was going to crack my head on it, and likely slip into the water. Yet, someone caught me and placed me sitting on the shelf. I personally think it was my grandfather who I was named after. So thanks, Papa, for saving me from drowning in he bathtub because I was too lazy to get all the way out of the tub.

[cattails]

I love Shane and Ryan soooo much!!! Ive been watching them since the year they started on buzzfeed all the way to Watcher! I don't remember if I first watched their true crime series or their supernatural series, but they're great

[julianaandersson]

I'm a professional photographer who joined a ghost hunting group in 2005/6.. for the specific reason of explaining how ghosts can't be captured on film... I even was a speaker at a ghost con with a 45 min power point explaining it. As you can imagine, I was very unpopular... People do not want to hear it. Which is fine.. lol.. but so refreshing to hear your well researched history... while you only briefly touched on ghosts and photography, suffice it to say that what were seen as ghosts in an image in the early 20th century and what we see as ghosts in images now is completely different and to me speaks loudly to photographic equipment used... cameras are freaky man... and looking at metadata the most haunted exposure is f/2.8 @ 2seconds with a flash discharge in very low light...