HRPI Interview Mike Hallowell:
Mike Hallowell was born in
Mike is a regular contributor to/columnist with many journals, newspapers and magazines, and has written for Contemporary Review, UFO DATA, Magonia, Paranormal Magazine and VISION. He frequently appears on radio and TV, and has starred in several documentaries.
Mike's first book on ghostly phenomena was Ales & Spirits, which detailed the history of over twenty haunted public houses. He is currently writing a book about monsters of the north east of
His book Invizikids, about the phenomenon of “imaginary” childhood friends, was published by Heart of Albion Press in August 2007.
Mike has interviewed many of the leading lights in the world of paranormal research and spirituality, including Uri Geller, Jon Downes, Stephen Holbrook, Richard Freeman, Cliff Crook, Colin Fry, Derek Acorah, Tony Stockwell and Nick Redfern. Mike also writes the
How did you first become interested in the Paranormal?
When I was 11 my parents took me to
We went inside and while my Dad and my uncle were browsing I happened to see an old cardboard box by the door filled with bargain basement paperbacks. I thumbed through them and saw a copy of The Flying Saucers are Real, by Donald E. Keyhoe [Fawcett Publications, 1950].
I’d never read anything about the paranormal before, but there was something about that book cover that mesmerised me. I bought it, read it and realised that you simply can’t neatly cubby-hole everything in the universe. We live in a crazy cosmos, and Donald Keyhoe kick-started my interest in it. I’d love to have met him, but sadly he passed away in 1988. I was talking to Timothy Good recently, and he told me that his interest in UFOs was also started by reading the very same book. It’s a funny old world…
Can you remember your very first Investigation?
I suppose it depends on what you mean by investigation. Some colleagues and I spent a night in a haunted pub to raise money for charity back in 1992, I think it was. It wasn’t a serious investigation, although a few spooky things happened. Someone (or something) kept unscrewing the toilet seat in the gents’ loo, and the weird thing was that the manager warned us that this would happen.
If you’re talking about serious, well-organised investigations then my first one was back in 1998 when I started writing my WraithScape column for the Shields Gazette.
The editor who was subbing my column told me that he’d received a call from a reader who had some pretty spooky stuff happening in her home. On arrival I saw this thing lift a cut-glass ashtray from a coffee table and gently lower it to the floor. I was fascinated, but it was the first time I’d seen anything like this with my own eyes. It scared the shit out of me, but I had to maintain an air of professionalism and composure for the householder. The bottom line was that she had been subject to a poltergeist infestation.
The case took a couple of weeks to resolve, and eventually the polt went away.
What investigation really got you excited?
Well, there are a few, but the most exciting would have to be the South Shields Poltergeist. Watching someone get cut to ribbons by a poltergeist is pretty exciting, although not particularly pleasant – particularly for the experient.
There was another occasion when I was making a documentary with Jon Downes and Richie Freeman from the Centre for Fortean Zoology. The documentary – Anatomy of a Haunting – was being directed by Gary Wilkinson the filmmaker and was set in a well-and-truly haunted pub.
There was one particular location in the building where we were all frozen to the spot, overcome with a sensation of absolute dread. Even Jon felt frightened, and there isn’t much that scares the Big Fellah, as I affectionately call him. We later discovered that a body had been uncovered at that very spot during renovation work.
Can you tell our readers about the
Basically, the story involves a young family who, from December 2005 onwards, were subjected to the most horrendous poltergeist infestation we’d ever come across.
It started off by moving objects and making the odd banging noise – all pretty low-level stuff – but then it graduated to throwing knives, moving the child in the house around and doing some really scary shit. We even recorded its voice on tape. This was a nasty, cunning, devious, manipulative entity that could present itself to investigators in any way it wanted. It was the hardest investigation I’ve ever taken part in, and, as you know, we eventually wrote a book about the case which is to be published by Sutton Publishing on March 30th.
Eventually we managed to get the entity to go back to wherever it had came from – hopefully into a state of non-existence. If anyone ever tells you that there’s no such thing as a poltergeist, then quite simply they haven’t got a clue what they’re talking about.
How did you feel when your wife was attacked by the poltergeist, throwing six-inch nails at her and knowing you was helpless to protect her?
It’s a funny thing, but to this day I’m not sure that it was actually attacking her. That probably sounds crazy considering that it was throwing nails at her down the stairwell of the infested house, but we can’t be certain.
I used to believe that poltergeists never hurt people, only scared them. I now know that this is totally untrue. Poltergeists can hurt anyone, any time – period. They simply choose not to because it suits them. However, press the right metaphorical buttons and a polt can hurt you as easily as taking candy from a baby. When the polt threw those nails at my wife it could have hurt her had it wanted to, but they simply whistled past her shoulder. The polt simply wanted to scare her the way it had the rest of us.
How did I feel? Yes, it bothered me that by taking my wife along I’d exposed her to something spiritually and psychically malign, but the polt never did anything to indicate it wanted to hurt her. It just wanted to freak her out and drive her away, the same as it did with anyone who went with the intention of helping the family.
In your book Ales & Spirits - The Haunted Pubs and Inns of South Tyneside is there one place you enjoyed investigating more then any other, and why?
There are a few pubs that I particularly enjoyed investigating, but the most interesting was probably the Red Hackle. It’s not a particularly old pub, but some of the staff and patrons had really scary experiences in there. I get a bit bored with polite ghosts that smile sweetly before disappearing into the ether.
Give me your scarey-darey entity any time! The Red Hackle had a few of those, but it’s still a cracking pub to drink in.
Can you tell our readers about the book you are currently writing called Mystery Animals of Northumberland & Tyneside?
Sure. In 2007 I was commissioned by the Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) to write a book about cryptozoological encounters in the north east. The CFZ has plans to publish an entire series covering every county in the country. As I know more about the cryptids in Northumberland and Tyneside than anywhere else, I suggested that I work on it and they agreed.
I’ve also written a second volume entitled Mystery Animals of Durham & Wearside, although the CFZ hasn’t officially said they’ll publish it yet. I’m hopeful they will, though. Mystery Animals of Northumberland & Tyneside is a pot-pourri of weird tales concerning strange animals that have been sighted in the north east region throughout history.
They include The Giant Rabbit of Felton, the Monster Lobster of South Shields, the Ghost Birds of Jesmond Dene, the Beast of Bolam Lake and our own legendary sea monster, the Shony. I’m not kidding when I tell you that some of the weirdest cryptids in the land are featured in this book. And, if you think that they’re weird, wait till you see the
Can you tell us about the book you have co-written with Jonathan Downes and Richard Freeman called Order of the Dragon?
Back in 1999 I started work on a book about the Marsden Grotto pub in
The book ended up being way too long – over 700 pages – and I eventually split it into three separate volumes. The first is a history of the pub itself and how it came into existence, It presents a revolutionary view of why the inn was built and will shock many people, including historians.
Essentially, the pub was simply a cover for excavations to find a hoard of Roman treasure that was stashed there by the legionaries from
the local Roman fort at Arbeia. When the book is published people are going to be stunned. Its currently being reviewed by my publisher.
The second volume, Order of the Dragon, concerns a dragon cult that operated in the north of
The third volume concerns the ghost stories centred around the inn, and I’m currently co-authoring that book with Darren W. Ritson. Darren has also carried out a number of investigations at the Grotto and is knowledgeable about the pub and the paranormal phenomena that occur there.
In your time you have interviewed many famous psychics, mediums and paranormal investigators. Can you tell us the one you most enjoyed interviewing and why?
I’ve enjoyed interviewing them all, but perhaps the most fascinating was Uri Geller. Some people are sceptical of Uri’s abilities, but I can tell you that I’ve seen that man do things that have absolutely no rational explanation – up close and with my own eyes
I’ve been in this game long enough to spot frauds, and he isn’t one. He bent my door key without it even being taken out of my pocket. Uri Geller is the real deal. He’s genuine, incredibly gifted and one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Anyone who says he’s a fraud is talking rubbish, and I know whereof I speak.
You write a column called WraithScape for the Shields Gazette every Thursday. Can you tell our readers about this?
I’d freelanced for the Gazette for years, and in 1998 I had an idea for a paranormally-related column that would write up local ghost stories and other weird tales. I sent in three samples to the then editor, Rob Lawson, and he decided to run with it. Initially it was planned to run the column for eight weeks, but its still going now and is more popular than ever!
Last year the name of the column was changed from Bizarre to WraithScape, but it’s essentially the same. Every week I write up a spooky story, most of which are sent in by readers. The column has become something of
a phenomenon, and can be accessed on the Gazette’s website. It now attracts readers from all across the globe, including, the
I think the secret of the column’s success is that it doesn’t tax the reader too much. I simply write the stories up in an unashamedly populist style and resist the temptation to get too philosophical.
WraithScape is pure escapism; it allows the reader to step out of the workaday world for twenty minutes and explore uncharted realms where nothing is as it seems to be. I love writing the column.
Is there one case you are working on at the moment you can tell our readers about?
When Darren and I finished investigating the South Shields Poltergeist I was physically and psychologically exhausted. I swore I’d never take on another case like that, but now I’ve changed my mind.
We’ve been told about another polt case and we’ll probably begin to investigate it within the next two weeks. I’ll keep your readers up-to-date with things as they transpire. If anyone reading this has a really nasty polt infestation – or knows someone else who does – we’d be interested.
What are your plans for the future?
Darren and I have several book projects underway at the moment. I can’t say too much about them, but one involves a recurring ghost sighting in
The more we look at the case the stranger it gets. We hope to formally begin our research in the spring, and it will probably involve a trip to
We’ve also got some TV appearances in the offing, and some radio appearances. I’ve got a book called Happy Hunting Ground coming out within a month or two, and it details a near-death experience I had in 2005.
We’ve recently done some charity appearances with David Wells, Richard Felix and Ralph Keating, and have some others up-coming. If anything scary happens during them I’ll let you know
