HALTON PARANORMAL GROUP INVESTIGATE MILTON TOWN HALL

Is Town Hall haunted? Halton Paranormal believes so. Halton Paranormal members (from left) Andrea Fowler, Donna Brinkman, Kimberley Valstar and Kim Hadfield visit Evergreen Cemetery. Graham Paine / Canadian Champion

A flickering light could be the result of bad wiring, or a creaking door simply a victim of a bad hinge. The strange shadow in a photo could be dust on a lens. Or could these be the work of spirits?

That’s where Halton Paranormal comes into play.

The group of five Miltonians has spent the summer roaming graveyards, taking trips down abandoned paths and hiding out in vacant buildings in hopes of connecting with ghostly spirits. Their findings have garnered local and international attention.

“People experience these things, but they don’t talk about it because it’s taboo,” said group member Donna Brinkman.

Brinkman said she has experienced strange whispers and flickering lights in her Milton condo.

Added Kim Hadfield, “They want to know what’s going on, but at the same time people don’t want to know what’s in their house.”

The group has snapped thousands of photos and recorded hours of video and voice recordings in areas believed to be haunted by spirits.

While not visible to the naked eye, photos from abandoned buildings throughout Halton show dozens of orbs floating in vacant rooms. Also, the group has captured electronic voice phenomena (EVPs) on digital voice recorders.

Videos, pictures and voice recordings of Halton Paranormal’s investigations are available on their Facebook group and YouTube channel.

During one of their visits to Halton Hill’s abandoned Barber Mill — which is currently being looked at to house a 65-room hotel and retail shop — Hadfield said she recorded a clear “help me.”

She believes it was the spirit of the paper mill’s owner Robert Barber asking for help saving the old mill.

Hadfield also captured a picture that shows a man resembling Barber staring out the mill’s window.

If fact, the man shows up in three of 40 photos taken within seconds of each other, she said.

“He likes people being there. He doesn’t scare anybody,” she said.

But not all of their visits have been so friendly.

During a trip to an abandoned house in Puslinch, EVP recordings picked up “get out” and “leave.”

“The house was wide open. It looked like someone had started to renovate it and one day, just left. The doors and windows were open and there was scaffolding outside.”

Hadfield contacted the home’s owner to enquire why they abandoned it, but she never heard back.

Halton Paranormal say they’d love to spend a night ghost hunting in Milton’s Town Hall — which used to be the Town’s jail.

“Town Hall is apparently haunted,” said Hadfield. “It has to be quiet for a ghost to come out. If it’s busy or if you’re closed minded or not a believer you won’t see it.”

Surprisingly, the group members aren’t the biggest fans of ghost movies. In fact, they say scary movies “ruin things for us.”

“Ghost hunters are the real deal. They try to debunk things like strange sounds or doors slamming before saying it’s a ghost.”

Halton Paranormal received some international exposure when renowned U.K. ghost hunter Chris Halton featured one of the group’s photos on his website Haunted Earth.

The anomaly captured by Kim Hadfield

The photo, taken at a Mississauga cemetery, shows a glowing anomaly floating above the ground. Hadfield sent the photo to scientists at the University of Toronto and Guelph University who confirmed the glowing object wasn’t a bird or a bug.

The local ghost hunters said typically they don’t try to rid a house of a spirit, rather, they try and find a way for the spirit and home owner to live together.

Asked if the ghost hunters are ever scared of their finds, Brinkman replied, “No, no, no. It’s the most amazing thing. You feel for these people who have died and didn’t pass over. I get emotional over it.”

Hadfield said in a perfect world, ghost hunting would be her full-time job. But in the meantime, Halton Paranormal’s investigations are reserved for evenings and weekends.

The group has planned a Halloween night at Jamiesons Bumper’s Roadhouse on Main Street. They’re also looking to take small groups out on investigations.

She continued, “We obsess about this. Like the mill, we’re obsessed with it. If we can get paid for this work, it would be perfect.”

The group doesn’t charge for its services, but it does take donations to buy equipment. For more information, search ‘Halton Paranormal Group’ on Facebook or email halton_paranormal@hotmail.com.

Source: Inside Halton