Paranormal News Insider celebrates TEN YEARS!

The Show History

   I received an email from Daniel Bautz back on April 22, 2008 regarding appearing on his radio program titled the Grand Dark Conspiracy. I would be the first guest on this new podcast and I was kind of excited about that. We went back and forth with emails for a few days and finally recorded the show on the evening of April 29th. The episode went up with very little fanfare in early May and I began to help Dan add some content to his message board and we continued to talk about the paranormal and I passed on some suggestions for future guests.

 

2008 concept logo (top) and first working logo (bottom). Red
and green represented opposite ends of belief. In late 2017 blue
replaced the upper right swirl which expanded. Light blue stands
for the sky and dark blue for the oceans while green (land)
ties it all together (yes, thought went into the logo!).

His podcast was prerecorded and was only to be a monthly show to start off with. He had parapsychologist Loyd Auerbach on for June and his ratings began to slowly accumulate. He had another ghost-based guest, author John Kachuba, as his July guest and had emailed me about coming back on for August to help shift the show into a different direction with talking about UFOs and cryptozoology. During that interview we talked about the Georgia Bigfoot Hoax that was underway at the time as well as some other news. He wondered if I was interested in doing a monthly news segment and I jumped at the idea.

   The two-hour September podcast of the Grand Dark Conspiracy featured an interview with Stanton Friedman, campfire tales, and the debut of the Paranormal News Insider. Back then the Paranormal News Insider were a short five to ten-minute segment that I prerecorded and sent to Dan. Since the segment was on a monthly show I utilized the new Paranewsinsider.com website to essentially become a blog style format writing about some of the top stories broken down in the various segments which at the time included cryptozoology, UFO, ghost, and strange Earth. I changed strange Earth to other news some time in the second year of the show.

   The Grand Dark Conspiracy ran as a monthly show until August of 2010 when it went weekly beginning on August 30th. Shortly after I realized I did not have the time to keep up the website for Paranewsinsider.com and it transitioned into a static website, but this is when I began to track the conferences and conventions and added other things to continue to attract people to that aspect of the show. The Paranormal News Insider powered on finishing 2010 with 25 episodes and then rallied through 2011 with 52 episodes completing the entire year without missing a week. The show went on with 49 episodes in 2012 and then 43 in 2013. However, after the December 30, 2013 show the Grand Dark Conspiracy took a hiatus until August 5, 2014. The host show had bounced around a number of podcast hosts over the years including the Shark Radio Network and Fate Radio, but in 2014 a new opportunity arose that would take the show into a new direction.

2014 promo for the show going to AM radio

   Starting on August 5th, 2014, the show was broadcast through WQTT AM 1270 AM based in Marysville, Ohio. The station is just outside the state capitol of Ohio covering the Columbus metro area at night. Over the next ten months the Grand Dark Conspiracy was broadcast from 2-4 AM and worked its way into going five nights a week. The Thursday night show was subtitled “The Darkest Hours” for a couple of months until Dan decided that the name Grand Dark Conspiracy might need to be adjusted if the show were to grow into syndication. The Friday night show was co-hosted with demonologist Dave Considine and myself when I was able to join. Eventually Dan cut back the show to just one night a week, the Thursday night show (Friday), and rebranded the entire show The Darkest Hours Late Night.

   After the June 5, 2015 show there were some changes at the WQTT radio station and Dan opted to move on before the show was removed. This left the Paranormal News Insider without a home once again. I had toyed with the idea of taking the show out on its own a few times when I thought that Dan was going to stop broadcasting or at least between downtimes when the host show was silent and then return to his show as my flagship broadcast. I peddled the idea to a few existing podcasts and live radio shows but was turned down by them for a variety of reasons. Interestingly, a few that “decided to pass on the idea” suddenly came up with their own paranormal news segments that imitated my effort. It was then that I decided if I couldn’t join them I would then beat them. There was a chance that the GDC would come back as I had heard that it was to join another network in early July, but the show never appeared, and I never heard back from Dan on the idea.

   On September 8, 2015, the Paranormal News Insider made its debut on the CJ Mars Radio Network on Tuesday nights at 7 PM for a one-hour time slot.  During the next few months the network changed to WCJV Digital Broadcasting and had several great shows and hosts associated with it. However, just days after the April 17, 2018 show WCJV decided to cease operations immediately and after a year and a half and over 125 standalone shows it was once again without a home.

   I had toyed around with several ideas although I knew I wanted to continue to do a radio show. Of my several options one was to just produce it myself, another was to join another network, and other ideas included doing a completely different show with a focus on guests on another network and potentially doing the PNI on the side. I did a show in late May to address the issue that the show was homeless as well as cover some news. In July I decided that I should come to a conclusion and while I had many offers as well as other ideas I opted to join the Paranormal King Radio Network. The show launched with episode number 360 on July 17, 2018 live at 8 PM eastern.

On the Show

 

While the format has always been paranormal news as well as conferences and conventions various changes have happened over the years. The first 230 shows were prerecorded and contained music and sound effects as part of the experience of the short segment. Many of the GDC segments I did had musical themes and I had tried a variety of other things including the Paranormal Poll, a book of the week, and conduct an annual “Top Paranormal News Stories” of each year. Of course, I did other zany things including using different voices as a tool to “go back in time” with aspects of the paranormal. I created a character named Rex Ritter for the 1930s and 40s from voices I did for a rap album back in 2006 and a mellow guy named Burt Williams to talk about stories in the 1970s. There were also the Halloween specials that would at least have some scary sound effects or other segments from old television shows. One year I created a fake UFO watch where the episode was prerecorded but Dan cut out to me in the field. I used the noises that had been recorded during sky noise encounters and pretended as though I was involved in an alien attack. Granted, while the show was on the Grand Dark Conspiracy there were many times I would join Dan live in studio where once we did a live Ouija Board session and another we did a séance with guest Dr. Kimberly Rackley.

   As the show moved to a live format I could no longer run music and have sound effects to support the segment. At the same time, I have been able to dig deeper into these stories as well as reflect to similar stories or to educate the listener on what is really going on behind the scenes. While many view the show as just a recap of the paranormal news and therefore has a shelf life I feel it serves an important service to capture what is happening at the time and using it to reflect on to keep the history straight as well as to show how we continuously fall for the same things over and over. In another attempt to document the history I began doing the "Top Ten Paranormal News Stories" of every year since 2010.

   The types of stories I discuss are cyprtozoology, UFOs, ghosts and other paranormal themes, as well as space, physics, modern mysteries, as well as viral news topics. Generally everything revolves around the paranormal or unknown to some certain extent. I take my reporting seriously and do my best to be as accurate and transparent as possible as to where my information comes from

   I do my best to dig for the truth to these stories no matter where that takes me. Some say I’m skeptical, but with many of the stories I cover being about hoaxes and misinterpretations I stress that I’m just covering this news and trying to stay objective. It’s easy to believe but it’s also easy to dismiss outright, the focus for me is digging for the reality behind the story and letting it put together the truth for me.

New Book Release- Handbook for the Amateur Paranormal Investigator II: The Art and Science of Paranormal Investigation Share

"The Art and Science of Paranormal Investigation" picks up where “How to Become a Successful Paranormal Group”, the first book in this series, left off. This book is geared toward those who know the basics beyond what is portrayed on television and the internet and this next chapter takes a step forward into the world of client centered paranormal investigations. Learn the art of the interview including basic body language that can help in interviews as well as everyday situations. Learn advanced interview techniques that are simple to use that will help your client remember the most detail and provide you with an accurate picture of your upcoming investigation of the location. Evidence review, and other topics that are rarely mentioned with investigations, are discussed tool by tool. Learn the reality behind the tools and methods used in the field of paranormal investigation that goes against the popular ways of doing things.

The above is from the back cover of the book and serves as the general description. It's actually my third book, but the second book ("Betty's Ghost: A Guide to Paranormal Investigation") was a companion written for the first book since I was unable to put that content into the first book. The problem for me is that I publish these books through a print on demand company. While this cuts out a lot of hands, time and expenses, it actually drives the cost of a single book up. My first book was a slender 135 pages, which I had to thin out to that size to keep the overall cost of the book to under $20 and still make a little money. The good news is since the costs of doing business for a print on demand company have gone down over the past two years I have been able to put a bit more content into a book for a much more affordable price. The first book is available at most online book stores, but this new release won't hit the virtual book shelves for a few weeks or months, but it is available (along with my other two titles) at Lulu. However, the best deal to get my book without the middle man is from me directly. I'll be at the Ohio Paranormal Convention in August and the Other Side Symposium in November (and hopefully another library tour in between).

My passion for writing these books comes from my frustration felt about the direction in this field years ago as well as my natural urge to want to pass on what I know by teaching others. I have been at my wits end in years past and was told by others in this field to either quit complaining or do something about it, I decided to do both!

My overall goal with these books is to help raise the bar when it comes to the average paranormal group and get groups to understand the difference between having fun, being scientific, as well as helping a client and releasing the urge to "be a part of" the investigation. Along with this, I hope to educate groups and individuals on what science really is, as well as other skills that they won't learn on television, and ultimately pass on some of the knowledge, skills, and resources I have gained in my time in this field. When it's all said and done, I can leave a lasting mark on the paranormal field and culture whether I actually accomplish anything of scientific, or other value, in the field or not.