Brad Klinge’s odyssey toward a TV show scientifically investigating the paranormal began 20 years ago on a family trip to Gettysburg. The then 17-year-old Klinge saw — and caught on video — a squad of phantom Civil War soldiers so vivid, he thought at first they were there for a reenactment, which in a sense they were!
Klinge’s new show, Ghost Lab, which airs Tuesday nights at 10pm on Discovery, is the logical conclusion of the journey begun at Gettysburg, as he, his brother Barry, and the rest of the San Antonio-based Everyday Paranormal team, seek to bridge the subjective and the objective by using the scientific method and high tech devices to prove the existence of entities not yet recognized by science.
Their “ghost lab” is a 24-foot car hauler capable of providing 200,000 watts of electricity to power audio, video and photo analysis stations; flat-screen televisions and an interactive touch-screen smartboard, devised by Klinge. Also in their arsenal are video cameras capable of shooting 300 feet away in total darkness with 180-degree peripheral view; temperature, humidity and dew point data loggers; various digital cameras, including thermal imaging cameras; audio recorders; and more than 8,000 feet of cable.
On tonight’s episode, the team investigates two locations thought to be associated with the ghost of John Wilkes Booth: a historic opera house in Texas and a furniture store in Oklahoma. Whose disembodied voice IS that they captured on the digital recorder?
I talked with Brad Klinge last week about the show, Everyday Pararnormal, his goals, and using the scientific method to cross the great divide between the living and the dead.