Ghosts of Georgia Investigation report

On March 12th, 2011 GOGPI investigated claims of paranormal activity at a business in the old Cotton Mill in Canton Georgia. Claims of activity in the business include: Voices, sightings of apparitions, shadow figures, equipment being turned on without explanation, missing or moved tools, an object being thrown at the owner, footsteps, loud unexplained bangs or noises, and a female being touched.

Investigators & people present at investigation: Investigators – Ed Laughlin, Christine Riley, Pat Riggins, Melissa Griffin, Kat Orr, Larry Conley, and Beth Peters.

Weather conditions:
Meridian Passing
Date Moonrise Moonset Time Altitude Distance Illuminated Phase

First Quarter at 6:45 PM
Mar 12, 2011
11:18 AM 1:12 AM
– 6:42 PM 80.0° 387,660 50.1%

Past Weather Conditions for K47A
Observations prior to selected time: March 12, 2011 – 09:00 EST
Weather Conditions at March 12, 2011 – 8:45 EST
8:45 24 Hour Max 24 Hour Min
Temperature 42.8° F 53.6 at 15:03 32.0 at 4:03
Dew Point 37.4° F 37.4 at 8:45 28.4 at 19:03
Relative Humidity 81% 93 at 4:03 40 at 17:03
Wind Speed 0 mph 12 at 14:03 0 at 18:03
Wind Gust – 22 at 13:23 16 at 9:05
Pressure 28.91 in 28.91 at 8:03 28.81 at 15:46
Sea Level Pressure 30.25 in 30.27 at 7:24 30.11 at 15:46
Altimeter 30.22 in 30.22 at 8:03 30.11 at 15:46
Weather conditions clear – –
Visibility 10.00 miles 10.00 at 9:05 10.00 at 9:05
Ceiling – 3400 at 9:05 3000 at 10:23

Condition of the Business:

The building was built shortly after the Civil War and was structurally sound. The were areas of drafts from the outside along with several broken window panes on the second floor. The main floor held several businesses, the second floor was vacant except for a few pigeons we found flying around. The main business in the building was the furniture plant, where our clients worked. All in all the building was in good shape for a building of it’s age.
Equipment used by Investigators:

Cameras: Two Canon Rebel digital cameras and Four IR Video Cameras connected to a J2000 DVR.
EMF Meters: Electro Sensor EMF Meter, Cell Sensor, Digital EMF Detectors, Mel-8704R-KII and K-II Meter.
Audio Recorders: Sony P210 digital voice recorder and an Olympus D-10 digital voice recorder and Olympus VN-4100PC.
Thermometers: Cen-Tech mini non-contact infrared digital thermometer and an Omega HH68K ambient thermometer.

Investigation
7:30 pm – Set up
• 6:00 pm – Walk through with business owners – some personal experiences were noted during this time and included on the attached personal experience report.
• 7:45 pm – Base readings were done by 2 team members while the rest of the team members set up equipment.

Team 1 – Beth, Pat & Melissa– 9:00 pm

1. 9:15 pm – While team 1 was walking outside to go upstairs – KII meter was going off – went up to 2 lights on side 1 of building, and up to 5 lights on side 2 of the building.
2. 9:18 pm – Second floor
a. 9:23 pm – 58 degrees when you walk in – EMF 0
b. 9:25 pm – 61 degrees – main room
c. 9:31 pm – Start EVP – 9:46 pm – End EVP (by the elevator shaft)
i. KII hits during the EVP session
d. 9:52 pm – Start EVP – 10:01 pm – End EVP
i. EVP session interrupted by the sound of voices upstairs with the team. The team thought there was a live person in the building. Experience is noted in personal experience report.
e. 10:08 pm – Resumed EVP session – 10:19 pm – End EVP
3. 10:30 pm – Second floor – side 2 of the building
a. 10:36 pm – Start EVP – 10:46 – End EVP
i. During EVP session, Melissa had a personal experience noted in the personal experience report.
4. 10:50 pm – Outside of building on side 2 – KII hits
5. 11:15 pm – Team 1 started investigation on the main floor. Team 1 did not have a radio for communication to base. Investigation will be summed up in personal experiences and evidence. EVPs were conducted during investigation along with meter readings.

Team 2 –Christine, Larry, Kat– 9:00 pm

1. 9:18 pm – Team 2 started investigations on the main floor. Team 2 did not have a radio for communication to base. Investigation will be summed up in personal experiences and evidence. EVPs were conducted during investigation along with meter readings.
2. 11:18 pm – Team 2 started investigations in the basement. Team 2 did not have a radio for communication to base. Investigation will be summed up in personal experiences and evidence. EVPs were conducted during investigation along with meter readings.
Findings:

The Cotton Mill was a wonderful place to investigate, it’s a piece of history that has been preserved. We would like to thank our clients for the tour, the history of the Mill, and for their wonderful hospitality!

We did not find any unusual temperature or EMF readings during the base readings or during the investigation, everything was in normal limits and were higher around the electrical equipment, electrical panels, etc. and that was expected. The exception to this is when Team 1 was walking around the outside of the building and had high reading on the K-II meter that could not be explained, no source of power could be found in the locations where the meter spiked. We did not find anything unusual on the video that was recorded . We did record several EVP’s and had an interesting picture of what appears as a mist on the outside of the building. The weather was not cold enough to see breath and no one was smoking.

During the investigation our investigators had several personal experiences that could not be explained, see below. The clients also experienced some of the same occurrences as the investigators.

With the stories told by our clients of their experiences along with the stories of other workers there, the personal experiences of the investigators along with the EVP’s and the picture of the unexplained mist we can say for sure that the building does have paranormal activity but we were not able to conclude that the building is haunted buy what evidence we collected.

We recommend a follow up investigation in hopes of gathering more evidence of a haunting or perhaps to find out other causes to be able to explain why the client and co-workers are experiencing the things they do.

Ed Laughlin
Ghosts of Georgia Paranormal Investigations

Personal Experience summaries from investigators on the investigation:

Pat:
1. While doing our walkthrough and equipment set up, at the beginning of the night, I had a couple of experiences back in the loading dock area that Melissa dubbed the ‘creepy spot’. First I had a heavy feeling and a buzzing in my back teeth right there in the area where we had the camera set up. Secondly, I smelled cigar smoke outside on the dock.

2. While we are in the upper floor and doing EVP #3, I heard what sounded like footsteps and a couple of men talking. They passed by no more than a few feet away from us. I also heard female voices several times that sounded like they were in conversation although I’m not certain that we weren’t picking up on some of the sounds from downstairs.

Melissa:
During the walk thru when we walked to the “creepy spot”(paint room) I felt heaviness in my chest, it took my breathe away. Also during walk thru in the upstairs part of the mill I felt like I walked into a cobweb on my right side, I was brushing off my right arm and Christine asked me if I felt a cobweb and I said yes, but we looked around and there weren’t any.

During the investigation:
During 2nd EVP session upstairs, I heard footsteps and what sounded like 2 men talking.
During 4th EVP session upstairs in the first room you walk into, while doing the EVP and making the statement that I was a “boss” and how did they feel about that, I broke out into a sweat (room temp was 58 the entire time).
During EVP on the dock with Beth and Ed, I had an overwhelming sense of anger while certain questions were asked. I also saw movement behind the dock door.

Ed:
My personal experience consisted of what sounded like a shuffling noise in the area to the side of the loading dock while we were doing an EVP session.

Larry:
On the loading dock I did hear the cell sensor christine was carrying go off and when she pulled it out of her pocket it was definately turned off, and during our second visit to the paint room I did hear 2 knocks , Christine thought she heard shuffling at the same time to me they sounded like knocks.

Beth:
During the walk through there was a couple of places under the arches on the main floor I felt a level of energy. I had the tingle feeling on the top of my head that confirms there is more to the location than I know and to keep looking. It also confirms energy for me. By the loading dock I had the same feeling. When we went upstairs and into the basement I did not feel much of anything. During the investigation walking around the building outside to head upstairs I had several unexplained hits on my KII meter. I actually got a really nice mist picture in one of the areas I was having KII hits. While upstairs we had more unexplained KII hits during EVP sessions and while walking. I heard a heavy breathing in my right ear during an EVP session. While conducting another EVP session my entire team heard 2 mail voices upstairs walking toward us, and footsteps. It sounded so real, I thought real people had snuck upstairs and were coming toward us. I immediately stopped the EVP session and told everyone it needed to be checked out. We all agreed, we thought people were up there. It was confirmed nobody had gotten upstairs and indeed it must have been a paranormal experience. We resumed the EVP session in hopes to get the mail voices back, but we did not witness anything further. The investigation on the main floor was for the most part uneventful but we did have some random KII hits, and what seemed like could have been KII communication during EVP sessions.

Christine:
Walk through:
1) In the front room at the very far end of the mill upstairs, I felt the cobweb feeling on my right arm. I looked to see if there were any cobwebs that I may have brushed against, but I saw none. Then when I walked near Melissa, I noticed she was doing the same thing to her right arm I was doing, I asked her if she felt like she had cobwebs on her arm and she said that she did. It was strange because we were feeling it in the same place, but did not know either were feeling it until that moment when I noticed her rubbing her arm.

2) While in the basement, standing at the door by the cabinet with the old records in it, I was touched on the back of my neck. It was a very distinct touch, it was not the cobweb feel at all.

During the investigation
1) While in the dubbed “creepy area” (the paint room), Larry noticed the cell sensor going off, which I saw once he pointed it out. We were unable to get it to stop going of, so we decided to just turn it off. After turning it off, I put it in my pocket. We did about a 10 minute investigation with an EVP session included after putting the cell sensor in my pocket. When we were completed with the EVP session, we proceeded through the dock door and went out onto the dock. At the time of going through the dock door, I was on the phone with Ed reporting what we were doing when I heard a beeping/siren type noise, but at that particular moment did not pay much attention to it until I hung up the phone with Ed, and it did it again. I asked Kat and Larry if they heard what I was hearing and what was it. We realized it was coming from my pocket, forgetting that I had put the cell sensor it in it. I reached in my pocket pulled out the cell sensor, and indeed it was going off, BUT it was turned off.

2) During a second investigation in the paint room, Larry, Kat, & I tried to play music for a trigger. I heard interesting shuffling sounds from around the room that one moment sounded like it was coming from directly behind Larry, to the next time it sounded as if it came from the opposite side of the room from Larry. It almost seemed to do it on command, but was not consistent enough to say it was definitely responding to command. Larry and Kat acknowledged to me that they were hearing it as well.

3) While standing at the office door where base was set up, I heard what sounded like a woman scream. Kat said she had heard something also, but she thought it was a woman coughing.

4) While downstairs in the basement, the team was standing at the farthest point from the entrance before entering the wild looking crawl space area, we were conducting a conversational EVP session when to the left of me a child size figure came out from around the brick pillar beside me and looked at us.

5) Also during the basement investigation, from where I was standing, I could see a hole in the wall which light bleed through. Due to this, I was able to see shadows, that appeared to be children running and playing. There were at least three of them.