My history with pendulums

As a kid, I used a pendulum now and then.  Like many teen girls, my friends and I briefly used a pendulum to find out the name of our future husbands.  I have no idea of the success rate, and suspect that subtle (and some not-so-subtle) physical movements aided the responses.  Perhaps that’s one reason why I didn’t use pendulums for the first 10+ years of my paranormal research; I didn’t take most divination tools seriously.

However, in the 1990s, a few ghost hunters were using pendulums and they seemed to be successful.

So, about a dozen years ago, I conducted pendulum experiments at Gilson Road Cemetery.  I assembled a group of paranormal researchers and equipped them with clipboards, survey questions, and pendulums.

They surveyed each marked grave at the haunted cemetery, using yes/no questions and homemade pendulums.  These were generally very primitive devices – hardware-style washers on strings, etc. – just to see if the results were consistent.  They weren’t.  At each grave, about half the people received “no” answers, while the others all received “yes” answers.

After that, I resumed my disinterest in pendulums as a serious research tool.  Fun? Yes.  Reliable?  No.

Then, Lesley Marden‘s research raised questions.  Her results with a pendulum have been — and continue to be — remarkably consistent and helpful.

In addition, I’ve tried a wide range of Sean Paradis’ hand-crafted pendulums, and they are responsive beyond anything I’ve seen with other pendulums I’ve bought, made, or tried.

So, I’ve had to revise my opinion of pendulums.

The cemetery that’s not a cemetery

On our way to the Mal’s Pals event, we stopped at a site that can only be described as a cemetery that’s not a cemetery.  Something there is not right, and my camera — which had been working fine that morning — actually broke.  The lens only opened a tiny amount.  (I took photos, anyway.)  When we returned to the car, I tried it again, and it abruptly worked fine.  Then, at the event, the lens opened partially.  I’m letting the camera sit, untouched, to see if it’s an energy issue that will resolve on its own.

This is one of the most dramatic and unique equipment failures I’ve seen in my many years in paranormal research.  I’ve had the camera for about a year and a half, it’s always been reliable, and there was no reason for it to fail so abruptly… except, perhaps, the location.

Lava rock pendulum. Photo courtesy of Sean Paradis.

Since the camera wasn’t reliable, I took out about half a dozen different pendulums that Sean had given me.  My favorite is the lava rock pendulum, shown at right.  However, I also tried the pyrite cube pendulum and the ruby pendulum, and a few others.  Each had its own behavior characteristics.  Each seemed very powerful and the answers were clear — and consistent — no matter which pendulum I tried.

How I use pendulums

With each pendulum, I do the same thing: I hold the weighted part in my hand for just a second, in case that imprints it with a connection to me.  Then, I hold the pendulum from the small, handle-style bead, pin, or whatever’s at the end of the chain or cord.

I say, “Show me a ‘yes’.” I wait to see what the pendulum does.

Then I say, “Show me a ‘no’.” Once again, I wait to see what happens.  I have never seen a pendulum give the same response for both answers.  For me, a “yes” is usually a vertical swing, and “no” is a horizontal swing.  Now and then, it’ll be a circular motion, with clockwise being one answer and anti-clockwise being the other.

I check this every time I use a pendulum in a new location.  I’m not sure how much the answer relies on my psychic energy, the pendulum itself, or the energy at the location.  I’d never want to mistake a response.  So, I make a fresh start with each pendulum and each site where I test them.

The responses of a spirit named Fanny

At this cemetery (that’s not a cemetery), and thanks to Sean’s pendulums, I was able to confirm — repeatedly — the identity of the energy (or spirit).  I had several names to work with, from the few headstones nearby.  The entity was named Fanny.  That was abundantly clear from the pendulum response to that name, and only that name.

However, that’s when the information stopped.  No matter what question I asked — and we tried a lot of questions — the entity wasn’t responsive.  I’d shrug that off as a quirk, or maybe I was influencing the pendulum with micro movements, but the responses were such a sharp contrast.

Pyrite cube pendulum. Photo courtesy of Sean Paradis.

I think I tried about five or six different pendulums.  Each time, the response was nearly identical, though the pyrite pendulum seemed most sensitive at that one location.

Was the entity someone named Fanny?  Yes.  That was a dramatic swing from a full stop.

Did she have something to say?  Yes, maybe… that evoked a sudden halt to the pendulum movement, followed by an indecisive waver I could almost (not fully) attribute to the breeze.  It was sort of a yes, but not entirely clear.

There was no response when I asked whether she was frightened, if she was alive and well in her own time, whether her body was actually nearby, if she had unfinished business, and so on.

Every time I went back to the initial question about her name, the “yes” was clear.  Nothing else evoked a clear response.

It was a mystery, and remains one.

Nevertheless, I’ll continue to experiment with the pendulums Sean makes.  They’re ridiculously inexpensive — about 1/10 the price of similar-looking pendulums I’ve seen elsewhere — and the energy on Sean’s pendulums is clean.  That’s unusual.  In the past, I’ve always had to immerse new pendulums in sea salt for a few days, to remove others’ energy.

I’m always enthusiastic about mixing low-tech research methods with sensitive, scientific tools.  I’m hoping they’ll lead us to results we can document with the scientific method.  Alternatively, they may lead us to better “what if?” questions.

I’m very selective about the research tools and businesses I recommend.  However, Sean’s pendulums at Sleeping Meadows are an exception, and I can recommend them without hesitation.

In addition, I may conduct more research at the “cemetery that’s not a cemetery” and the area around a nearby ball field, but — for now — if you know the location, I hope you won’t broadly publicize it.  If the site attracts too much attention, it may limit our ability to visit the site for undisturbed research.

While we were there, I noted several figures moving steathily in the woods. Most of them were about 20 or 25 feet behind the back cemetery wall. I also saw a momentary flash (residual energy?) of a Native gentleman who’d appeared to us at that back left corner (where there’s a break in the wall) during a 2003 visit to Gilson.

The Lawrence headstones remain among the most active in the cemetery. Many of our photos produced orbs, but the most vivid were around the Lawrence stones. Here are two photos taken within seconds of each other:

This is a good reminder of the importance of always taking two photos, as close together as you can. (Learn more about this in our article, Ghost photography 101.)

(If that orb looks familiar, it’s because we’ve photographed it before. From a slightly different angle, it’s in the photo in our article, Gilson Road Cemetery – ghost orbs return 6/02.)

Rufus Lawrence — like many people interred in this isolated cemetery — has been difficult to find in any records of the era. Despite numerous records for other members of the Lawrence (or Laurence) family, and generally good census records (at least for adult males), Rufus and others in Gilson remain elusive.

He was probably related to Samuel Laurence who married Betsy Thyng (or Tyng) and named a son Rufus in 1815. (The Rufus Lawrence in the Gilson grave would have been born much earlier. We suspect that he was from Epping, NH, and the son of — or closely related to — David & Anna Lawrence.)

We’re not sure why the people in Gilson Cemetery were buried there rather than in the old burial ground in the middle of town. (Today, that’s by the shopping center at Daniel Webster Hwy near Spit Brook Road. The cemetery is nicknamed “Schoolhouse Cemetery.”)

Another note about Gilson: One of our group noticed that the back wall of the cemetery appears to include pieces of broken headstone. Look at the shapes of the stones, and — amid the usual round-ish rocks and boulders — you’ll see several slabs of stone.

If those really are pieces of headstone, we’re not surprised that the back wall of this cemetery is one of the most haunted areas in a profoundly eerie graveyard.

Also, outside the wall just south of the gate, we noticed several pieces of headstones, as well. We’re not sure why these suddenly became obvious, but they indicate another area for research.

As a guideline, any time you see graves, monuments, or pieces of headstones near (but outside) a cemetery, check it for anomalies. Those are often the graves of “sinners” who couldn’t be buried in hallowed ground. Whether or not they were unjustly accused of crimes and mortal sins, these spirits often return to haunt their remains. Perhaps to them, being shunned after death isn’t the final word, after all.

Using a digital camera, she took just two “regular” photos after dusk. One has a clear anomaly:

no orbs

same location, less than a second later, one orb

And no, that’s not a “smiley face” in the second photo. Enlarged, here’s how it looks: