Spooked in Seattle (spookedinseattle.com) is a tour company in Pioneer Square that hosts an array of paranormal-themed events every day, from ghost tours to ghost hunts to movie nights. Author, historian and ghost hunter Ross Allison founded the company in 2004.
Four years prior, Allison started Spooked in Seattle’s parent company, AGHOST (www.aghost.us), a professional investigation company that seeks legitimate paranormal encounters.
In late October, I attended one of the regular ghost tours, which take place every day. Although Halloween season, the company’s busiest time, has come and gone, reservations are still selling out.
To believe or not to believe
The main lobby was filled with creepy knick-knacks: Ouija boards, fake dead bodies, pictures of real dead bodies and even an old embalming license.
Meanwhile, the receptionist was on the phone with customers, talking about sold-out events. Luna Eclypse also works here as the tarot reader.
The rest of the crowd for the tour began to filter in, and we all took our seats in the theater area, where the company hosts its scary-movie nights. We waited patiently, slightly unsettled by the ambiance.
Finally, Aten Pharaoh strolled in. He was sporting an authentic Victorian aristocrat outfit, with cane, top hat, pocket watch and a killer pair of mutton chops. Part of his role as a tour guide for Spooked in Seattle? Nope, he says he wears the attire regularly out of a fondness for the Victorian era.
Pharaoh started having paranormal encounters when he was very young. Soon after, in the 1990s, he began to study witchcraft and psychology in an attempt to fully understand these experiences, and eventually, he became involved with the occult and, later, paranormal sciences.
“Our goal here is not to prove that something is a ghost,” he said. “It’s to prove that it’s not a ghost. We are looking for the scientific explanation…. It’s only when we run out of these scientific possibilities that we have to consider that there is something else going on.”
Pharaoh began the tour with a 20-minute discourse on the history of Pioneer Square and some general discussion about Spooked in Seattle. He made a point to mention that a lot of ghost-hunting shows and programs are unreliable because of the sheer quantity of material they produce.
Pharaoh asked the group if anyone was a “believer.” One man said, “The evidence is intriguing, but currently, I’m not convinced.”
The tour group exited the company’s headquarters and ventured out into Pioneer Square, where Pharaoh walked us around a radius of a couple blocks and gave brief history lessons on significant, haunted places in the area.
Many of the spooky stories he told were anecdotes from his own tours.
More collaborative work needed
The tour came to a close back at the Spooked in Seattle building in a room called The Death Museum, which was even more dank and mildewy than the main area.
In a room filled with clothed skeletons and dusty vanities, Pharaoh played a couple of EVPs (Electronic Voice Phenomenons) on his iPad that had been recorded in that same area. EVPs are strange voices or sounds that appear on a recording that do not belong to anyone who was in the room at the time.
The EVPs were the most paranormal part of the tour. Ghost hunters like Pharaoh have conducted scientific research in a field in which the world has very little understanding. At Spooked in Seattle, skepticism is encouraged, and only thoroughly investigated occurrences are considered legitimate.
“Paranormal investigation is today where black holes were 20 years ago,” Pharaoh said. “We had enough evidence to suggest the existence of black holes, but it wasn’t actually proven yet.”
According to Pharaoh, to move this field of study forward, paranormal investigation institutions need to work together more and share more data. Currently, there is a lot of independent work being done.
For the hardcore skeptics, Spooked in Seattle also holds public ghost hunts. These involve hands-on training and a venture into the dark in a hunt for real paranormal activity.
Other ghost tours in the area include the Market Ghost Tour, which takes visitors on an expedition around the haunted areas in Pike Place Market (www.seattleghost.com).
Private Eye Tours hosts a Queen Anne True Crime Tour (www.privateeyetours.com/queen-anne-tour). This tour features famous crime scenes in Queen Anne, Pioneer Square and Chinatown/International District, solved and unsolved.
Although it does not explore specifically ghostly or haunted areas, it is still sure to be spooky.
To comment on this story, write to QAMagNews@nwlink.com.