People like to be scared. Add some history and an afternoon or evening outdoors to a mixture of gentle shudders and goose bumps, and it's a plan for ghost-hunting Nevada style.
This year, Carson City and neighboring Gardnerville and Genoa have combined their popular ghost walks and cemetery tours into a weekend package designed to attract tourists and locals Oct. 20-22. And Truckee Meadows Community College offers up another session of its Nevada Ghost and Paranormal Conference this weekend.
"I think people just really enjoy hearing ghost stories," said Candy Duncan of the Carson City Convention and Visitors Bureau, which has boosted the Carson City Ghost Walk to more than 1,000 participants in the past 13 years. "We have a lot of history in our area. I think people like combining history, ghost stories and being outside."
This year's Ghost Walk, named "Grave Concerns," involves a one-mile, 90-minute walk among Carson City buildings purported to be haunted. The walkers meet costumed actors portraying ghostly characters from the city's history. Other sightings include gunfights, careening stagecoaches and various strange encounters.
"We've always done the Ghost Walk on our own," Duncan said. "This year we decided to combine with Carson Valley for a haunted weekend. With the Ghost Walk, it was just one day. We talked about two days, but it's such an undertaking, we couldn't ask our volunteers or homeowners to do two days."
The idea of combining the Carson City and Gardnerville-Genoa events was attractive.
"We talked about how visitors from out of the area would have a reason to spend the night," Duncan said.
Last year Laurie Hickey of the Douglas County Historical Society, put the Gardnerville Ghost Walk together in a couple days and drew 60 participants with little advertising.
"It's an opportunity for adults to feel like children again," Hickey said. "It's fun for kids too, not too scary. A family thing."
"I think adults like walking around, like it's Trick or Treat, to feel what it's like with the wind kind of blowing. It makes them take a step back in time.
"It's an easy fun way to learn history and also a little spooky element," Hickey said. "It kind of lets people relive the Halloween feeling."
In Gardnerville, walkers will encounter John and Mary Gardner, for whom the town is named, early settlers Leander and Carolyn Ezell and others. In the Genoa cemetery, they'll find David Walley of Walley's Hot Springs fame, seamstress Mrs. Allen Bach and more, mainly from the 19th century and the first years of the 20th century.
Many people who show up for the tours believe in ghosts. Some don't. Some are more into the history and stories while others like the idea of being a little scared.
"People like to do it because it's fun," Hickey said. "We are getting people booking out of Sacramento and Reno," she said. They'll "spend the whole weekend, which means food, lodging. Maybe we'll be the tourist capital of haunted stuff for Nevada."
For those who want to know more about things ghostly and paranormal, Truckee Meadows Community College has for several years attracted experts on those subjects to the Nevada Ghost and Paranormal Conference. This year, the one-day seminar features:
Vickie Gay, a medium who will talk about spirit guides.
The Rev. J. Thomas Dvorak III, a ghost counselor.
S. Rune Emerson, founder of the Rising Tradition of American Witchcraft.
Janice Oberding, a local ghost researcher and historian.
In addition to sessions on contacting spirits and ghost counseling, participants can take in a ghost walk in downtown Reno, including such sites as the Washoe County Court House and the Lake Mansion.
The conference, now in its fourth year, draws about 70 participants, said TMCC spokeswoman Kathy Berry.
"I think a couple types of people attend," she said. "The curious. People want to hear ghost stories and things they don't normally hear about. And people who have strange things happen to them and are looking for explanations to those things."
Some participants have lost loved ones and are looking for comfort from the stories they hear at the conference. Stories people tell about paranormal experiences usually aren't the campfire ghost stories of their youth, but are more upbeat and comforting, Berry said.
Participants don't earn college degrees in ghost hunting through this conference, Berry said. It's just a way to explore alternative theories about what happens after death, she said.
"Society does not create an open forum to discuss this," she said. "We're not saying, 'This is it.' But, 'Let's have a discussion and see what's out there besides traditional theories.'"
The ghost conference is one of the more diverse offerings for TMCC's Workforce Development and Continuing Education Division, Berry said.
"All ages, all races. You'll have a Goth sitting next to someone who's 75 and they just talk and talk," she said. "It's amazing."
http://news.rgj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/artic ... /610120303
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