Imagine yourself walking down a street in NYC. It’s 12:30 at night. A woman’s voice whispers into your ear, asking, “Who’s there? Who’s there?”
You look around. The street is deserted, except for a bum sprawled out on the curb. You think your imagination has gotten the better of you, and you start walking again. Then the voice whispers, “It’s not your imagination.”
Would you freak out?
Fast forward to approximately 7:30 a.m. You find yourself walking down that same street to go to work or meet a friend for coffee. That same voice whispers the same message. This time, you happen to see a billboard with a rooftop speaker. The disembodied voice you heard last night is coming from that speaker.
Is this ingenious advertising or invasion of privacy? Joe Pompei, president and founder of Holosonics, said the creepy approach is key to drawing attention to A&E’s “Paranormal State” without adding to the noise pollution that is so prevalent today.
Alex Weprin of BC Beat did not find the concept all that innovative, but felt that it defeated the show’s concept. While he has a less than favorable opinion of the ad and the show, I can neither agree nor disagree because I haven’t had the chance to watch it yet.
Paranormal State is the newest ghost hunting show in a growing stable of supernatural shows. Whether it will become as popular as Ghost Hunter or Supernatural remains to be seen.
This was one of the sites I wanted to visit on our family vacation this summer, but we never made it. I’d read stories about how visitors would hear maniacal laughter as they walked past Death Row. Much to my disappointment (although not a surprise), Tiffany Stine explains the source of these sounds in her article, ESP, a Real-Life Haunted House.
I was searching for a picture of the penitentiary when I found the complete episode of the Ghost Hunters investigation of this place. After enjoying two unrelated Ghost Hunters episodes, I decided to watch this to see what happened. The highlight of the episode came in Part 2, when the team caught something forming on film in front of cell block 12. It looked like a person running down the walkway with a blanket over his head. I saw what looked like a white pant leg toward the bottom of the anomaly. Jason confirmed what I saw when they watched the film footage.
Was it an apparition or a hoax? In the end, the TAPS team wasn’t quite sure. Neither am I. If this was a hoax, it was a very good one. Watch it for yourself, if you haven’t already.
As for my disappointment in not visiting the penitentiary, I’m glad in some ways we didn’t go, due to the playacting. I wouldn’t want to pay $30 to get a cheap thrill, but rather learn about the history and explore the place on my own.
Based on the popular Ghost Hunters reality TV show, Ghost Hunters International will debut on the SCI FI Channel in January 2008. The new team is comprised of veteran TAPS investigators Robb Demarest, Andy Andrews, Brian Harnois, and Donna La Croix, Barry Fitzgerald and newcomer Shannon Sylvia. Each week, they will travel across Europe to debunk its most legendary haunt spots.
I’d love to watch them tour the Edinburgh Castle, which is said to be the most haunted place in Scotland.
Eastern State Penitentiary, considered by many to be America’s most historic prison, will host an unprecedented seven hour live and interactive broadcast on the Travel Channel, Most Haunted Live USA on Friday, June 1st, 2007.
Most Haunted Live, is a spinoff of the popular paranormal investigation show Most Haunted which airs on the Travel Channel in the US and on LivingTV in the United Kingdom. The June 1 program is the first broadcast from the United States and is expected to generate a wide national audience.
The Most Haunted panel of paranormal investigation experts - including presenter Yvette Fielding and spiritual medium David Wells - will be armed with night vision cameras, thermal-imaging devices and other paranormal investigation tools to detect supernatural findings from within the prison walls.
The Most Haunted Live USA experience will be extended to the web, with multiple webcams streaming live images from select areas within Eastern State Penitentiary. Viewers will be able to log onto http://www.travelchannel.com/mosthaunted to watch all of the action from the webcams, supplementing the live broadcast. Viewers can also participate in the broadcast by e-mailing the studio with paranormal sightings, sending well wishes for the team, offering suggestions on rooms to investigate, and premonitions.
Eastern State Penitentiary opened in 1829 as part of a controversial movement to change the behavior of inmates through “confinement in solitude with labor.” Some of America’s most notorious criminals were held in the Penitentiary’s vaulted, sky-lit cells, including bank robber Willie Sutton and Al Capone. After 142 years of consecutive use, Eastern State Penitentiary was completely abandoned in 1971, and now stands, a lost world of crumbling cell blocks and empty guard towers. The prison hosts one of America’s largest and most acclaimed Halloween events each fall, Terror Behind the Walls.
I’m not sure if my satellite dish offers the Travel Channel, so this was a great idea on the part of the producers. The interactive element should add some interest, should the ghosts decide to be shy.
