As a child, Vineta Shope awoke in the middle of the night to the sound of someone cooking in the kitchen—the unmistakable rattle of pans and silverware. The next morning, her grandmother asked why she had been up so late.
Confused, Shope insisted she had not been in the kitchen, although this behavior was reminiscent of her late grandfather. No one admitted to the late-night culinary adventure, leaving one explanation: her grandfather’s spirit had paid them a visit.
“We called (maternal grandparents) big mommy and big daddy. And I said, big mommy, that was you. You got up and went in there and got something to eat. And she said, when I walked past you, was I dragging my feet? And when she said that I automatically knew that it was big daddy, who had passed away,” Shope says.
Today, Shope uses her attunement to the spirit world to run PRISM, the Ohio Paranormal Research Investigation Society in Motion in Lawrence County. PRISM leads ghost hunts across Southeast Ohio. These hunts take place in some of the most notable haunted locations in the state.
The region has historic homes, empty buildings and abandoned mines—all attractive locations for a potential specter.
PRISM was founded by Shope and her husband in 2004. Since the organization’s inception, it has become larger and better-equipped, now working with a total of 12 members.
PRISM is dedicated to its mission of identifying and communing with all varieties of ghosts, spirits, apparitions and any other unexplained phenomena. If it’s paranormal, they’ll find it—though Shope wouldn’t describe these phenomena that way.
“There really isn’t a paranormal. There’s just the normal that people can see and the normal that people can’t,” Shope says.
By day, Shope works as a special education teacher in the Ironton City School District. She enjoys her work but finds a different sort of fulfillment from PRISM.
Shope’s mother and grandmother encouraged her interest in the spectral plane. Throughout her life, Shope has witnessed things she could not easily explain. Once, during an investigation in the Chesapeake Community Center, she describes being thrown against a wall by an unknown entity.
Shope believes that her background gives her a unique connection to the supernatural. In addition to public hunts, PRISM works with individuals to identify potentially dangerous spirits in their homes and cleanse the spaces.
Shope explains how some spirits can be violent demonic presences—which she refers to as “the worst-case scenario.” Most of the time, the spirits are benign with no intent to harm the living. But the process is always the same.
“We go in, we investigate, we compel our evidence and then sit down with the family to talk to them about it,” Shope says. “Almost all of the families ask for their house to be cleansed and blessed.”
Their equipment includes the standard gear employed by para-fessionals (paranormal professionals): EVP (electronic voice phenomenon) readers, EMF (electromagnetic frequency) readers and spirit boxes.
EVPs are intended to translate and record speech from spirits, and EMF readers are designed to detect abnormal electromagnetic frequencies in the immediate area—a sign of a ghost’s presence. Spirit boxes attempt to recreate a ghost’s voice by allowing them to manipulate nearby radio waves.
While the group has high-tech gadgets, Shope prefers the basics: a dowsing rod and a simple rubber ball.
Dowsing rods have been used for millennia to locate water, and Shope believes spirits can interact with the rods to make their presence known.
As for the ball, it’s one of the simplest objects and something every child is likely familiar with. When resting the ball on her palm, Shope asks a ghost to knock it off. If the ball moves or falls, the spirit has made its presence known.
Shope also searches for cryptids across Southern Ohio and West Virginia, such as the iconic furball known as Bigfoot or Ohio Grassman.
Though usually reported in the Northwest United States, in places like Oregon or Washington, Shope believes some may have migrated.
“One of our members had an experience near Moonville Tunnel. They saw something that appeared to be Bigfoot,” Shope says.
Julie Vance, a close friend of Shope and a member of PRISM, has a deep appreciation for the paranormal and seeing the group’s investigations grow.
“(PRISM) keeps me young, I just kind of follow along with these young kids … seeing what they get into,” Vance says. “They hear you tell them something that you’ve done or something you’ve seen in their eyes. It keeps me wanting to get involved more and more.”
When asked about skeptics, Shope slips a slight laugh and pauses.
“If they want to figure it out, they need to just go out and experience it,” Shope says.
Ghost Hunting Society PRISM Takes Over Southern Ohio’s Paranormal Scene
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