TV-Reviewed

I’ll admit, I’d never heard of Edith Wharton until this episode of Ghost Hunters aired. I’d heard of a few of her novels, though, once I looked her up on Wikipedia. That aside, it was already apparent she had been successful back in her day, if her house, the Mount, were any indication. Like Grant said, “Did this woman ever do anything small?” Her mansion and estate were definitely impressive. It was obvious that TAPS had their work cut out for them. With three buildings, the team would have to cover a lot of area.

So, Jason and Grant invited Britt from TAPS’s west coast team along. It was a good thing they did, too, because Britt brought with him two new experimental toys, one of which–the so-called geophone–ended up playing a profound role during this investigation, capturing some of the best evidence TAPS has, well, ever caught.

At first, the geophone just seemed more of a gimmick than anything else–not because it didn’t work, but maybe because it worked too well. The miniature seismograph, as Jason discovered, didn’t take much to be activated. It was extremely sensitive. The main problem with it was that it could too easily be deceived, meaning that the slightest movement–even made by the investigators themselves–could set it off. All Jason had to do was tap the floor and it’d go off. So, I’ll admit, at first, it really didn’t appear to be too useful a tool. It was only later during the investigation that it proved its true merit. But, I’ll get to that in a minute.

Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson of Ghost Hunters

The first bit of evidence was found by Jason and Grant as they headed to the mansion’s second floor after hearing scuffling from upstairs when they were in the dinning room. Jason states that footsteps are what they were hearing, but, honestly, I couldn’t hear anything, no matter how hard I listened. When they moved to the second floor there was a strange thump that happened from above. Jason says it sounded like a bowling ball being dropped. However, I think what they’re hearing is their own accidental contamination. Any movement they made seemed to cause other things to move and…make noise. It’s an old building after all, right? Moving on they came across something much more strange and unexplainable: a heat signature caught with the FLIR camera that was in the shape of a hand.

Jason had said the hand print was about 10 inches in size, though I think that might’ve been a bit over exaggeration. Disregarding that, the hand print was still an impressive sight. You could make out five distinct points that could match the pads of the fingers and two lower points that could be the palm’s heel. It was impressive to be sure. Yet, what if it had been left by one of the other team members during setup, barring, of course, the supposed unnatural size? The only catch here is that, according to Grant, it takes about ten minutes for a heat signature to begin dissipating. I guess this puts the nail in that theory, then.

The major bit of evidence, though, was caught in the stable. Jason and Grant had used the geophone earlier, but, to me, it was a half-baked effort. Here they were able to place the geophone in the perfect environment: alone, so that there could be no risk of cross-contamination. After having some hits on the K2 meter and hearing noises from above, Jason got Britt to put two of the geophones in the stable’s attic with a camera trained on them–to see if they might capture proof of the phantom sounds. This would later pay off big time when, during the analysis, it was learned that they had gotten exactly what they had hoped for: The camera had not only picked up the sounds of footsteps, but it had also caught the geophones reacting in response to those sounds. Of course, its impossible to prove the source of these sounds. But, this bit of evidence did have the hairs on my neck standing up.

The Mount was an awesome locale. And it yielded two really awesome bits of evidence. The rest of the investigation contained many personal experiences. What is it with all these footsteps lately? All in all, the Mount deserved its dedicated 45 minutes of airtime. Unfortunately, the claims in the cottage went unexplained. But, I think I can live with that.

Rating: 8.0