Amerighost Tours Blog

The Mystery of the Palace Theater Phantom

Wed, 12 Jul 2023 02:01:17 GMT

Louisville's Most Haunted Theater

For decades, the ghost of the Palace Theater was a complete mystery, but we now believe the true identity of this spirit may have been solved.

A century ago, the strip on 4th Avenue was known as “Movie Row.” Grand movie theaters like the Rialto, the Casino, and others used to line this street. The Palace Theater was considered one of the finest. It cost over a million dollars when it opened in 1928 originally named the Loews Theater. John Eberson was the architect and was inspired by Spanish Revival in its design. The ceilings on the interior were painted to look like open night skies with white fluffy clouds, birds and glittering stars. The building changed hands a number of times, and by the mid eighties the theatre was empty with its future uncertain.

In 1991 it was purchased by The Sunshine Theatre Company from Indianapolis and they restored the theater to its current state.

It is now owned by LiveNation and is a venue for live acts. In recent years the 2800 seat theater has seen musicians like Jackson Browne and Tori Amos as well as comedians Jim Gaffigan, Chelsea Handler and more.

The restoration of the building in 1991 was a massive task. Construction workers labored busily on the site. During this time several of the workers reported seeing a strange man around the theatre. He was always described as wearing worker’s coveralls, old‐fashioned thick framed glasses and a 1950’s style flattop haircut. From the stage, some of the witnesses saw him in the balcony, leaning over the rail as if he were admiring the repairs going on. One worker said that he was on a scaffolding, had fallen asleep by accident. He was awakened by a soft whisper in his ear, “wake up.” The man woke up to see that he was lying on the edge of the scaffolding. He believed that the ghost had saved his life.

Others have told of seeing a door open, hearing footsteps cross the room accompanied by an almost cheerful whistle, as if an invisible man were making his late night rounds through the building. There are constantly maintenance problems which employees have attributed to the ghost. Workers would often return from work to find their heavy equipment and tools moved to various areas in the building.

There was a particular area of the theatre where the sawhorses were located, and piles of sawdust lined the floors. On several occasions, workers claimed that they would be sawing away, and would glance down to see an amazing sight. The sawdust beneath them would begin to move, and soon it would become clear that letters were being formed. It was as if some unseen finger were drawing in the sawdust. The name “Ferdinand” would appear. Since 1991 others have had similar experiences finding the name written in the dust in the basement. Speculation about the ghost’s identity has run rampant.

Some believe that he is the ghost of a former projectionist from the 1930s named Barney. Barney had become ill, and was being carried out of the theatre on a stretcher. Coming down the steep stairs from the balcony, the stretcher was dropped breaking his back and killing him. Employees suspect he is the source of the haunting because a dark shadowy figure often appears in the projection booth where Barney would have worked. He is viewed as a prankster by current employees, pulling ponytails, breaking projectors and slamming doors.

There is another possibility though. In 1965, there was a man named Fred Frisch that had worked here as the chief engineer since the theatre opened in 1928. In 1965, he was found dead in the basement from a heart attack. Even today his picture hangs in his old office in the basement. The picture is of a man with a flattop and thick, black glasses. And as it turns out, Fred’s name was not short for Frederick or Alfred. It was short for Ferdinand, the same name that had been seen in the sawdust years earlier.

What do you think? Is this the ghost of Ferdinand or Barney?

Happy Haunting,

Frank

The 4 Types of Ghosts to Look for when Ghost Hunting with Photography (For Beginners)

Wed, 05 Jul 2023 22:24:04 GMT

4 Types Of Ghost To Look For In Your Pictures

If you are interested in ghost hunting with photography, there are 4 major types of ghostly manifestations to look for. Whether you are taking a ghost tour or visiting a site you suspect may have spirits all around (and you’d like to see if you can capture some of evidence of these specters yourself) you don’t need a lot of expensive equipment. You can simply use your camera or even the camera on your phone to investigate a location. But what exactly are you looking for? Read on as we break down the 4 different types of paranormal phenomena you will be looking for in your pictures

1). ORBS

The most common type of image you are likely to capture are what most paranormal investigators refer to as “orbs”. Orbs are perfect circles and are typically white in color (although red and blue tints can sometimes be seen as well). They can vary in brightness and size. You might capture one, or even dozens of these in a single photograph. It is also possible to follow an orb from one spot to the next as it travels through the area.

The dominant theory with most ghost hunters is that the orbs are not the actual ghosts themselves but a type of energy trail or psychic matter indicating that the site is haunted. This is why orbs are most often found in areas with high concentrations of souls (Battle fields, prisons, cemeteries, etc). In fact when you are taking the pictures, you probably won’t even see anything with your naked eye. It’s after the fact that people usually find these orbs as they are scrolling through their photos, and will then notice an orb, zoom in, and realize they have caught one on their camera.

Skeptics about orbs will most often claim that what is being captured isn’t supernatural at all, but simple dust or moisture in the air. There are a few problems with this type of attempt to explain orbs away however.

Although dust can be caught by a camera, dust is everywhere at all times. If Orbs were simply dust particles, you would always get orbs in your pictures (wedding photos, parties, vacation, selfies, etc), but this doesn’t occur with any regularity. Also, orbs are consistently captured in the same haunted sites over and over. And as for moisture, rain can also be captured on camera, but they do not produce the perfect circles that appear as orbs.

2). VORTEX/FUNNEL GHOSTS

Unlike the orbs, which are the psychic energy trail of a ghost, a vortex (or Funnel Ghost) is believed to be the actual, physical manifestation of the ghost at that location. They can appear as a type of cloud like streak or shape, sometimes with branches extending from the main form. These are typically stationary and are found in the heart of the haunted site, like where most of the reported haunted activity has occurred, or where extreme cold spots at the location have been discovered.

The main thing to look for when trying to determine if your vortex is authentic or not is the possibility of foreign objects dangling in front of the lens. Camera straps, hair, bracelets, etc can often be misinterpreted for evidence of ghosts.

3). MIST/FOG/WILL O WISP/VAPOR

This type of phenomenon is harder to catch than that of the orbs, and less predictable. These Vapor type of image look like some form of cloud made of light. Sometimes you can even see the facial features of the ghost within those images.

The most common mistake made with these are cigarette smoke, steam from vents or even breathing out on a a very cold day can create some interesting pictures, but can also be misinterpreted for genuine paranormal evidence.

4). APPARITIONS

Perhaps the most exciting image to catch is that of an actual apparition. These are the most rare to find, but are well worth the effort should you be fortunate enough to catch one. The better ones often get circulated widely with everyone in the field excited to vet the authenticity of the evidence. As the name implies, the apparition is the physical appearance of the ghost. It can be a full form or a partial image (face, silhouette, hand, leg, etc).

The best way to be certain that the apparition is real, is to be aware of your environment. Is there glass in the background that might reflect? Are there insects flying about? Was it drizzling when the picture was taken?

Do you have any unexplained phenomena that you’d like to share? We’d love to see your pictures, so please share below!

Happy Haunting!

Amerighost Tours

What Should I Expect and Look for in a Ghost Tour?

Tue, 18 Apr 2023 14:00:52 GMT

Not ALL Ghost Tours are created equal. Here are the key elements of a great ghost tour and what to look for when selecting a Ghost Tour to learn the haunted history of a city.

Walking ghost tours really began as an English Tradition, which is likely not difficult to imagine. From castles to wars, from Jack the Ripper to the Plague, the United Kingdom has a plethora of great ghost stories to explore.

I remember when my future wife were on vacation, and she was interested in taking the local ghost tour at the town we were visiting, which happened to be Savanna, Georgia. I had no idea what we were in for.

Were the stories made up or were they authentic? Would we be guaranteed to see a ghost? Was it indoors or outside? Was it a scientific endeavor or more historic? Were there “jump scares” or things rigged throughout the tour to frighten the groups?

After taking that tour, we were hooked and would from then on always take the ghost tour of any city we were visiting, if they had one. But I’ll never forget my apprehension and questions that first time, so I thought it might be helpful to share my thoughts on an industry that has become my family’s work and passion.

One thing to realize about a ghost tour is that every ghost tour is different in how they approach the topic. With the content, the vast majority of the ghost tours base their content on the authentic haunted history of the city. Most people in this industry began leading ghost tours as a labor of love, and do their best to provide a quality tour. Of course, as with anything there are some companies that don’t do adequate research when putting a tour together.

How do you know if a ghost tour is right for you? Online reviews can be manipulated, so they are not always the best indicator of the quality of a tour. There are two things I do when considering a ghost tour that have proved helpful

1). Ask the locals. The concierge or front desk clerk at your hotel is often a great resource. They get a lot of feedback about which tours in town are professional and well received, and it’s in their best interest to give you an honest opinion on what to do while in town. If you take a cab or Uber anywhere, ask them as well. Taxi drivers are often a wealth of information and will have likely heard about the local ghost tour (good and bad)

2). Visit the website. What kind of feel does it have? The messaging in a company’s advertising is often a sign of the kind of service they will provide. If you take the time to read a company’s website, you will often either get a good feeling or may see some red flags.

But what should I expect?

The majority of the ghost tours out there are story telling tours. Think of the vibe you get at a campfire ghost story or when you watch “Haunted History Week.” Tour guides all have their own styles. Some are funny and engaging, while some entertain in a more dramatic or suspenseful way. Some are very interactive to the point where your entire group will often know each others ghost stories, while other ghost tour guides treat a tour more as a performance.

Ghost Tours typically do not rig anything on the tour or do jump scares, because most ghost tours are hoping to get lucky on any given night that an authentic paranormal event might occur. Imagine if a ghost tour company used some cheesy smoke and mirror effect at some point in the tour, and then later that evening a REAL paranormal event occurred. What would your reaction be? Most likely you would think that it had been faked as well.

Most ghost tours are walking tours and can vary in duration from 1 to 3 hours. Some are all outdoors, and some will go inside certain locations. With ghostly sightings, no one can really guarantee a paranormal experience will occur on any given night. After leading ghost tours in Nashville for 20 years, I have learned that the spirits work only on their schedule. So I would always be wary of any company offering “guarantees” about seeing ghosts.

One thing I have learned over the years is that there are two things that really make a ghost tour great.

1). A tour with a great balance of authentic, local history AND ghost stories. If a ghost tour leans too far one way or the other, I often don’t find this as enjoyable. One of the things I like about ghost tours is that they are sort of sneaky history tours. It’s just that it’s the dark history. The scandals, tragedies, murders, intrigue and such are often at the heart of most great haunted tales.

2). The skill of the tour guide is a huge factor as well. If selecting a ghost tour, it might be a good idea to find out how long the company has been around. Or you could even reach out to the company and ask who their best guides are and which night they are working.

If you haven’t ever taken one or are skeptical of ghost tours, I highly recommend trying at least just one. They are often reasonably priced, take place in the evenings when it’s cooler and will give you a good sense of the local culture and history.

Did I miss any elements that make a Ghost Tour great? Do you agree with my recommendations? Comment below.

Happy Haunting,

Frank

#ghosttours #hauntedtours #hauntedwalkingtours #amerighost #ghostwalk

A Tale that Haunts Me

Tue, 18 Apr 2023 13:56:03 GMT

The Bell Witch Encounter

As a ghost tour guide, most often I am the story teller. My goal is to present the factual accounts of haunted, historic sites in an entertaining way, hopefully with the guests feeling a wide range of emotions throughout the evening.

But ghost tours are a very personal experience for most people. Often guests are there for a reason. Many times they have lived in a family home that was haunted by an ancestor, or they worked at a place that had paranormal activity. This experience has sparked their curiosity in the supernatural, and for this reason they have taken an interest in ghost tours, books about haunted locations, ghost hunting programming, etc.

Quite often, guests will want to share these experiences and talk about them. Sometimes they are stories that are very personal. Sometimes they have great pictures with phenomena they can’t explain. In essence, I’ve collected thousands of ghost stories from people from all over the world.

As fascinating as all of these stories are, there is one in particular that still haunts me to this day.

If you grew up in the state of Tennessee, there is a very good chance you were often frightened by ghost stories of the Bell Witch. Whether you were at a sleepover or listening to an adult tell these frightening stories around a campfire, there is arguably no ghost story more ingrained in the subconscious of the minds of Tennesseans than those of the truly evil spirit from Adams, Tennessee.

Although the Bell Witch is not “officially” part of the Nashville Ghost Tour, I often will tell her story when guests ask about her. There are countless books written about how the Bell Witch (Kate Batts) haunted and cursed the John Bell family in a violent and horrific manner. The torment of this ghost started in the early 1800s and lasted for many decades.

One night, I was leading the Haunted Tavern Tour with a small group of about 6 guests. I began talking about the Bell Witch. As soon as I mentioned her, a gentleman in my group was struck with a look of horror as he turned a pale, white color. I continued with the stories, but mentally I took note of the man. My assumption was that he must be a local. Many locals had grown up being terrified of the Bell Witch. I went on telling the many stories of the Bell Witch, and when I got to the end, I said to the guest, “I noticed your reaction when I started talking about the Bell Witch. I’m guessing you’ve heard some of these stories before?”

He reluctantly started to speak. By the time he finished his tale, we were all mystified and amazed.

This is the man’s story, as best I can recall:

“I grew up in Adams, Tennessee. So of course, we all knew about the Bell Witch. When we were teenagers, the Bell Farm was one of the places the kids would go camping. So one night, it’s me and eight friends from my high school. We’re all getting drunk and goofing around. It’s getting real late and everybody is pretty well trashed, so somebody gets the idea to go find the Bell Witch grave. Being stupid and drunk, we get in a couple of cars and go tearing through town looking for the Bell Witch grave. We finally pull up to a cemetery somewhere and someone says it’s the Bell Witch’s tombstone. But to be honest, we were so wasted, I don’t know where we were or whose grave it actually was. I kind of doubt it was even her gravesite, but anyway one of the guys starts peeing on her tombstone, showing off like he’s brave. So of course, eventually all of us did it. All nine of us did it.”

“Somehow, we all made it back to the campsite. But, here’s the tough part, from that day until the day we should have all graduated high school, five of the nine of us were dead. Three of my friends died together in a car accident, one died from a rare blood disease, and the other died in his sleep from an unknown cause. So ever since that day, I have believed that our lives are all cursed because of what we did, and that someday, somewhere, the Bell Witch will get her revenge on me too.”

He quit speaking and you could hear a pin drop. My jaw was probably hanging open at this remarkable and horrifying story. I heard this story over ten years ago, and I think about it often, especially the lost, hopeless look on the face of the man who told it. I’ll probably never know, but I’ve often wondered is he doing ok, or was his fear of being the Bell Witch’s next victim actualized?”

What do you think? Do you think the man in the story survived? Comment below.

Happy Hauntings,

Frank

#bellwitch #nashvilleghosttours #hauntedtaverntours #amerighost #adams #thebellwitch

When Are Ghosts Most Active?

Tue, 18 Apr 2023 13:44:23 GMT

Leading ghost tours for the last 20 years in Nashville, some questions come up from guests over and over.

“Are ghosts more active during a full Moon?”

“Do you have a better chance of seeing ghosts at night?”

“Are ghosts more likely to be seen on the anniversary of their deaths?

After studying paranormal history, exploring local ghosts stories and leading groups through countless reportedly haunted locations in Nashville for many years, I have developed a few theories about ghosts through my own observations.

One core belief I have about ghosts is that how we perceive them and how they interact with us or show themselves varies from one ghost story to the next. It makes sense that just as each individual person on this earth is unique, so too are the ghostly manifestations of those that have remained in the afterlife.

Some are aware of our presence and interact with us, sometimes even speaking or touching directly. Others seem unaware of our world at all, completely ignoring us as their phantoms walk right by. Some can be comforting and gentle, and some unfortunately can be dark and menacing, even violent in some rare cases I’ll write about in the future.

But one thing I have come to firmly believe about ghosts over the years through personal experience is that ghosts do work in patterns. Because of the nature of my work as a ghost tour guide, I will visit the exact same haunted sites for years on end. I have learned that when I have a sighting or paranormal experience at a location, I am very likely to have several at that same location over the next couple of months. Conversely, one spot can go “cold” for a long time, where I may have no or very few sightings for a long period of time, before that location goes “hot” again sometime in the future.

For example, starting in January of 2023 through March of the same year, I have had 3 families on my tour (seven guests in total) all see the same ghost on separate tours at the Tennessee State Capitol building.

If you have been on our Haunted Downtown Nashville Tour, you know our second location is the grounds and tombs of the Tennessee State Capitol. It’s my favorite stop on the tour with several fascinating ghost stories.

One of those is that of Rachel Jackson. Rachel is a famously tragic, historic figure in Tennessee state history. She was married to future U.S. President, Andrew Jackson. Their marriage was not one of political convenience (as was often the case in those days), but Andrew and Rachel were very much in love. His heartbreak over her death many decades after her passing is well documented.

Rachel had been married once before, and had been divorced, but the paperwork was not filed properly. Because of this, unbeknownst to Rachel, when she married Andrew Jackson, she was still technically married to her first husband. It is of course illegal to be married to two people at the same time. When Andrew began running for the Presidency, this scandal made its way into the newspapers badly damaging Rachel’s reputation in the community. She lost her friends, and polite society turned its back on her. The last several months of her life were sad and lonely. She spent months at her home with crippling depression. She ended up dying of heart failure the night before Andrew left Nashville to be inaugurated in Washington, DC, so she never got to become first lady, or see her husband become President.

This brings me to my second theory on ghost stories. I have come to believe that the vast majority of ghost are here because of unfinished business. A life cut short, regret, revenge, war, murder, redemption, and such are all common traits with ghost stories. Rarely do ghost stories center around people that have lived full, robust lives passing on at an advanced age.

With the tragedy of Rachel, her ghost manifests itself in a few ways. One, is that she haunts her former estate The Hermitage by playing the piano there. Second, she haunts the State Capitol tower.

ThIs is by far and away the most reported ghost in all of Nashville. There have been thousands of sightings of her over the years.

Will the ghost of Rachel stay active? Will we continue to see her on our tours, walking silently by the tower windows, looking down on our crowds below? Or is she soon to go dormant for a period? It’s hard to guess, but only time will tell how long this current streak will last.

When do you think ghosts are most active? Have you noticed any patterns with ghosts in your life? Comment down below. We would love to hear your stories and theories.

Until next time, my friends!

Happy Haunting,

Frank

#nashvilleghosttours #amerighost #amerighosttours #ghosts #paranormalactivity #hauntings