Group tries to scare up spirits

Hobby for the believers, not the fainthearted

• From left, Lee County Ghost Hunters members Honey Archey, Julie Gleason, Melissa Condenzio and India Cheslick set up their equipment recently in an old building on Hendry Street in downtown Fort Myers. CLINT KRAUSE/The News-Press

GHOST HUNTING EQUIPMENT 1) Indoor/Outdoor Thermometer — used to get a baseline temperature in an area. Also, weather conditions, including temperature, humidity and wind speed, can all affect photographs and instrument readings during a ghost hunt. 2) Tape Recorder — a traditional tape recorder, one that automatically records when sound is detected, is left behind in a room for several hours to see if any EVPs are picked up. 3) Digital Camera — many modern ghost hunters prefer to use newer digital cameras because images can be checked instantly and there is less chance of false images, like kind that appear can appear during film processing. 4) Nightvision Camcorder — the ghost hunters record video as they walk through a building or property. The camcorder has a special feature that elevates the amount of light making more things visible in the dark. 5) Pyrometer (digital thermometer) — This hand-held device beams a red laser beam at a surface and reads the temperature there. Ghost hunters use it to check for ominous cold spots in a room. 6) Geiger Counter — this device measures ambient radiation in the area. Spirits are believed to emit radiation when the manifest themselves. 7) Electromagnetic Field Detector — an EMF is used to measure the presence of a magnetic field as well as its strength, direction, and fluctuation. Paranormal researchers use the device in an attempt to detect a ghost's magnetic or energy aura. 8) Digital Recorder — used as a complement to the cassette recorder, this device also records sounds and voices in a room during a ghost hunt. Can also be used for team member's to note their observations. 9) 35 mm Film Camera — used as a compliment to the digital camera, the old-fashioned film camera provides back-up images to support or disprove an apparition captured on the other camera.

L.C.G.H. LEE COUNTY GHOST HUNTERS • Headquarters: North Fort Myers • Contact: Melissa Condenzio • Web site: www.leecountyghosthunters.com • E-mail: leecountyghosthunters@yahoo.com FLORIDA GHOST CHAPTER • Headquarters: Marco Island • Contact: Ronnie DeAngelis • Web site: www.floridaghostchapter.com • E-mail: floridachapter@aol.com • Phone: (941) 232-1617 FLORIDA PARANORMAL RESEARCH FOUNDATION • Headquarters: Merritt Island • Contact: Tim Tedana • Web site: www.floridaparanormal.com • E-mail: floridaparanormal@yahoo.com • Phone: (321) 504-1140

RELATED ARTICLES GHOST HUNTING GLOSSARY

MULTIMEDIA Ghost video: Ghost hunters believe this is an orb (.avi) Ghost sound 1 (.mp3) Ghost sound 2 (.mp3) Ghost sound 3 (.mp3) Ghost sound 4 (.mp3) Ghost sound 5 (.mp3) Ghost sound 6 (.mp3) Ghost sound 7 (.mp3) Ghost sound 8 (.mp3) Ghost video: A bright light crosses the camera view (.avi)

Holding flashlights in front of them like swords, laden down with backpacks and satchels jammed with equipment, the four young women climb the creaky, dark stairs to the second floor of this humid, old building in downtown Fort Myers. Like doctors preparing for an operation, they assemble a menagerie of electronics — testing batteries, checking digital thermometers, recording everything on the clipboards they carry.

These women are after an elusive prey this warm October night. They're hunting ghosts.

"(Spirits) are just like a normal person," said Honey Archey, a local paranormal investigator. "You can still communicate with them."

Archey and her colleagues are all members of a group called the Lee County Ghost Hunters, which was founded five years ago. The seven current members spend the occasional weekend night prowling through old homes and snapping photographs in overgrown corners of area cemeteries.

The group has had their best luck at the old Buckingham Cemetery. Ghostly balls of light, unusual voices coming from nowhere and, once, the hazy image of a young child resting on a crypt.

"A lot of times, they're just trying to get your attention," said India Cheslick, another member of the group. "It wants you to know they're there too."

ON THE HUNT

Spirits can apparently pop up anywhere. Old homes are the most popular, but there are schools, hospitals, railroads and airplanes the are rumored to be haunted. Even guests at the White House have reported seeing ghosts there.

On this particular night in late October, the Lee County Ghost Hunters have come to an old building on Hendry Street in downtown Fort Myers. Built in 1917, it's shuttered, unused. It sits right next to building that local historians say used to house the city morgue, making this whole block prime property for hunting ghosts.

Tonight's mission is what's known as a "ghost hunt" meaning there's no known reports of hauntings here driving the search — just curiosity.

"We were interested in it because it's an older building," Archey said. "We just wanted to see if anything was going on. You never know what you can get."

The building appears to be the quintessential setting for a ghost. According to the current owner, Raimond Aulen, it's an old hotel once known as the Greystone Hotel. Hallways disappear into the inky darkness, lined with broken wood doors, each with numbers on them. Cobweb-filled transoms sit above the doors where cool air once flowed in the days before air conditioning. In some of the rooms, old fixtures still can be found. Claw-footed bathtubs and sinks with old-fashioned ceramic handles and faucets. A black cat (no joke) flits in and out of the shadows.

"I just know that people don't like (the building). They don't like being in it," said Aulen, 40. "They get the sense of something going on in there."

The most frightening part of this night's visit — walking on the decrepit floorboards. They're so flimsy that light filters up between them from 20 feet below, and gaping holes create a heart-stopping obstacle course.

REGULAR FOLK

Despite their unusual pastime, the Lee County Ghost Hunters are a surprisingly normal bunch of people.

Archey, 28, is a local hairstylist while Cheslick, 29, is a customer service manager at a local Wal-Mart store and has two children. So does Julie Gleason, 34, who is an administrative assistant by day. Melissa Condenzio, 28, is a homemaker and mother of a 3-year-old and a 6-year-old.

Other members of the group include a construction worker and a couple who own a computer store.

Several members had ghostly encounters during their younger years. That became a grown-up desire to understand these unusual experiences.

Condenzio seems the most scientific of the group, avoiding small talk as she explores the Hendry Street building, snapping photos and taking copious notes. It's also her job to research the history of the buildings the group explores.

"I look up a lot of tax records for properties, to see the past owners, the basic dimensions of the house," Condenzio said. "I see how many owners have... owned a place. Sometimes, if there's a lot of switching, that can be an indication that something is going on."

The women say they are not embarrassed about what they do. They truly believe that spirits or ghosts could exist.

"Almost everyone (in the group) has had an experience," Condenzio said. "If you believe in angels and the Holy Spirit, how could you not believe in ghosts."

According to the group, there are several prevailing theories on what ghosts are and why they behave the way they do. Some ghosts are possibly spirits that have gone on to the afterworld, but come back to protect a loved one in danger. Other ghosts may be people who died so suddenly or so violently that their spirits are trapped in this world, rather than the next. Another possibility — for some reason the ghost doesn't know it has died and is wandering around confused and lost for all eternity.

The group doesn't pretend to have all the answers.

"You can't put a ghost in a bottle and study it," Archey said. "They're probably never going to prove ghosts exist."

NONBELIEVERS

That lack of proof is what sticks in the craw of skeptics everywhere.

"It's all balderdash," said Pat Linse, a co-founder of the Skeptics Society, based in Altadena, Calif. "If you could actually prove (that ghosts exist), you would have a Nobel Prize."

Linse says ghosts are more likely a construction of the human mind, stories created to explain the unexplainable or even empower people. She points to stories of Russian farm ghosts that protect buildings and Middle Eastern genie ghosts that promote giving gifts to women.

Other times, Linse says, ghost stories spring from hallucinations or mental illness. Her simple solution — just don't believe.

"Nobody is ever bothered by a ghost if they don't believe in them," she said.

The members of the Lee County Ghost Hunters are used to occasionally being laughed at for their hobby. They know trying to convince skeptics is a lost cause.

"What's the point?" Gleason asks. "If you don't believe it, I'm not going to tell you anything you're going to believe."

Despite the rare ridicule, she says just as often her ghost-hunting is met with keen interest.

"People are like 'Oh wow, that's so cool,' " said Gleason, whose Florida Paranormal Research Foundation sign on her car often stirs interest among passer-bys. "They all have their own story."

Indeed, there is at least a small demand for the group's services.

Since they created a Web site in 2001, the Lee County Ghost Hunters have been asked to look into eerie incidents at nearly half a dozen Southwest Florida homes. Contrary to the crapshoot that is a ghost "hunt," these cases are called "investigations" because the location is already purportedly haunted. Positive results are more likely.

NO GHOSTS

Conducting a ghost hunt or investigation is hardly glamorous. In the case of the Hendry Street building, it's powerless so flashlights are de rigeur. With no air conditioning, shirts are soon sticking in the humid, breezeless rooms. Creeping around in the must and dust, the nose is assaulted by odd odors of hidden things long past their prime.

On this particular night, no ghostly apparitions appeared.

There's a brief ripple of excitement when one of the hand-held devices gets an unusual reading — indicating an odd energy or magnetic field in the area — but the glow of a low-battery light meant the reading was likely false.

The initial trepidation coated with a thick patina of the willies soon gave way to an uncomfortable tedium in the stifling heat.

"There are times we spend hours and get nothing," Cheslick said.

After the hunt or investigation is over, the group listens to static-filled tapes and obsesses over every glint and gleam that flashes on a videotape or appears in a photo.

Somewhere, sometime, they may just get the jackpot every ghost hunter seeks — solid evidence that ghosts exist and answers as to what they are.

The Lee County Ghost Hunters say once a person spots their first phantom or hears their first spectral voice — then that person will understand what ghost hunting is all about.

"Seeing is believing," Archey said. "There's a lot of people out there who have seen spirits and truly believe."

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