With the return of “Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition” to the St. Petersburg area, and its widely regarded rumors of haunting, a group of paranormalists went to view the exhibit on November 17, 2012. As this was not an official investigation we primarily relied on research, sensitives, one EMF meter, and employee accounts of activity. We had 3 invited guests with us as well.
The cost for the exhibit via the Mahaffey Theater is $20.12. There is an additional $5 parking fee. Upon arrival, guests are photographed (see above). Everyone receives a boarding pass with the name and general information about an actual passenger on the cruise. Visitors can check to see if they survived at a listing of those who survived and those who didn’t. Of our group of 8, 2 perished and 6 survived.
Ghostly activity has certainly been reported with this exhibit. Excerpts and information from the internet shows the following:
From http://www.rmstitanic.net/community/blog/223-rms-titanic-stories.html (Luxor Hotel, Las Vegas exhibition):
*Feeling as if someone is following
*Photo of Bruce Ismay, which was witnessed on security camera shaking, then slowly sliding to the floor on its own.
*A woman with her hair in a bun, wearing a black period dress with a white collar. “On one occasion a photo crewmember was setting up in preparation for the Exhibition to open. During set up he noticed a lady walking down the Grand Staircase, which puzzled him because he never saw anyone walk up and the doors weren’t open yet. He proceeded and asked the lady if she would like her photo taken, there was no reply. As the crewmember went back to work he suddenly felt someone behind him and when he turned it was the same lady. Again he asked if she would like her photo taken and he got no response. The lady slowly disappeared and didn’t show herself again for a few days.”
From: http://pitchengine.com/kirvindoakcommunications/titanic-the-artifact-exhibition-presents-haunted-tours-this-halloween
*Guests and employees have felt strange feelings
*Heard funny noises
*Witnessed ghostly apparitions
* “Lady in Black”on the Grand Staircase (not in the St. Petersburg exhibit) crying for her famous friend, Molly Brown.
*Presence of Frederick Fleet, “Titanic’s look-out, who watches over the Promenade Deck as he attempts to make up for his unfortunate late sighting of the iceberg.”
And lastly, from http://www.ghosteyes.com/ghosts-titanic#ixzz2C8fwF8UC:
*Feeling of being watched.
*Feelings of sadness at or around specific objects in the exhibit.
*”… while viewing the 1st class quarters, she and her daughter thought little of the young boy’s repeated questioning “Who is that lady?”, and “What is she doing?” They assured him that there was only a dress laid out over the love seat, as if waiting to be adorned. It wasn’t until they heard later that TAPS was investigating paranormal activity in the Titanic Exhibit that they believed the boy had experienced his first ghostly encounter.”
*This site also references the Ghost Hunter’s show in which they got an EVP at the exhibit:
“...an eerie EVP recording. They were seated in a room trying to communicate with the ghost, and asked the spirit if it wanted them to leave. The voice clearly replied, ‘Now [SIC] – please, wait’.”
INTERVIEW with exhibit employee:
Q: Does anyone report anything strange with this exhibit?
A: The manager sees a woman wearing white associated with a leather compact with powder shown in the exhibit. There is one suit in the display that exudes a feeling of sadness.
One day while we were really busy with no one near the gift show register, we had a technical person working with the computer. He reported that the computer started to show streams of type, as if someone on the other end of the connection were slamming their hands onto the keyboard. He asked them to cut it out and learned that no one on the other end was typing (as per the manager who was at the other terminal).
Brandy: On the morning of the day we went to the exhibit, I had a very unusual dream:
The dream featured the exhibit where I started to ask the roundabout questions about the exhibit until one employee, a larger, dark haired woman, came up to me and said "You're not asking directly enough." Finally, I blurted out, "Is the exhibit haunted?" to which she promptly replied "No." Her reasoning was that the St. Pete Ghost Tours had come through with "800 people" and they got nothing. The woman started to say, "But they don't know about the most recent story" --something about the lights on the Titanic and a little girl's ghost associated with one of the lights. In the dream a replica light, presumably of the one the girl haunts, fell. I found a second replica that contained an etched newspaper article in the class. Before I could read it the alarm went off. I realized who the Museum employee was -- she was the owner of the Sunset Grille, a client that we investigated for about 3 years ago. The strange thing is that she died unexpectedly before I could meet with her to go over the results of the investigation.
Most of this I can explain. The tour comes from the fact that at one point the exhibit offered a paranormal tour. The little girl and light have not matched with anything I've researched about the Titanic so I don't know what those are. But, what I can't explain is Linda (I think was her name) as the employee who was telling us about an undocumented ghost story....I haven't thought about her in years.
Post tour: I do realize that the woman also struck a similarity to an actress playing Molly Brown who toured the exhibit. Nothing held up to this dream , other than the exhibit was mostly empty, but it was an odd one.
The EMF meter wasn’t much help. The EM showed .0 on the 0 – 3 scale for much of the exhibit except when we went into the hallway of portraits. There the EMF was 2.0 on the same scale. We did get spikes with the meter but realized that the artifact cases have wireless alarms on them, which likely explains the spikes.
The only area where I felt anything was looking into the First Class Cabin display. The first time I looked in, I got dizzy. I stepped back, then peered in again and the same dizziness returned. I mentioned it to Mary. Only later did I re-read the research that said there was one report of a child seeing a woman in the First Class Cabin display. As I did the research it is possible there was suggestion. However, I did it a while back and have little direct memory of activity. I did NOT remember the info on the First Class Cabin display and only vaguely recalled a couple of reported details. I have been a contact person for the SPIRITS many times and rarely do I actually experience any phenomena. As I had no other reaction elsewhere, and no one else had a similar reaction, I personally do believe it was genuine rather than suggestion.
So, is the tour haunted? You’ll simply have to go and see for yourselves!
