The A & E cable network will soon debut a brand new paranormal reality series.

Truth be told, despite my affinity for the paranormal, the majority of these types of shows don’t interest me and I don’t watch most of them. Yet, the television in my home will be tuned in to the A & E cable network to watch Paranormal Cops on Tuesday night.

I’ll tell you why.

There’s a shtick for this new show, of course, but it is a shtick that intrigues me. This team is comprised of Chicago police officers who “moonlight” as paranormal detectives. This new series allows us to “ride along” with the Chicago Paranormal Detectives (CPD).

I trust the “cop intuition” or “blue sense” that many good cops possess. A good cop can sense danger in their environment. A phrase used by cops is generally some variant of: “I just had a feeling in my gut that something wasn’t right.” This feeling allows them to observe evidence or quickly pinpoint suspicious activity to support that feeling. 

Don’t get me wrong, a person does not have to choose law enforcement as their day job to possess these skills in order to investigate the departed.  A good cop also possesses a specific skill set that helps to evaluate the living. A good cop can function as a human lie detector. They can infer the demeanor, facial expressions, emotions of people to detect lying, or guilt. This skill is crucial when evaluating a potential client before taking on a case. This team (hopefully like every other team out there) will not take a case based solely on a homeowner’s feeling that something “is just not right” about their environment. The homeowner must offer observed evidence and pinpointed examples of paranormal activity to support that feeling.

What makes this team stand out for me is the knowledge that members of this team were heavily screened, trained and certified to perform their day jobs. They successfully passed a battery of tests that predicted that they would be good cops. Predictions aren’t always right. “Bad cops” have been recruited into law enforcement.

Yet, there are no established and uniform screening guidelines for paranormal investigators. Anyone can form or join a paranormal team, and that worries me. Some groups do employ strict guidelines to screen and select team members. These groups are also strict in their screening process of potential clients. Not all groups are as strict. Additionally, there are generally accepted principles and methods utilized during paranormal investigatons, but they aren’t always adhered to. Paranormal teams have been known to split over the disagreement of paranormal investigation methodologies. The research methods, tools and techniques must be uniform across the board or how will we prove anything?

That is what appeals to me about CPD’s paranormal investigative methods. The methods, according to their website, are aligned with the same methods used to investigate crime scenes.

A visit to the Chicago Paranormal Detectives website reveals that pets must be removed from a home prior to an investigation. This is absolutely necessary in order to create a controlled and safe environment.

Yet, with the day job in law enforcement, it would make sense to me to employ a dog on investigations. In law enforcement, K9 units are trained to support officers in a way that’s more reliable than what man and technology can do without their aid.  The acute senses of a dog could aid in paranormal investigations. Use the K9 unit in tandem with the K2 meter. If any team could select and train a dog for paranormal investigations, this team would be it. This team doesn’t use a K9, as far as I know, so that’s neither here nor there for this show at the moment.

End of rant.

I can’t predict whether this will be a good show or a bad show. I have this feeling in my gut that the show might be good. I studied the Paranormal Cops website, the Chicago Paranormal Detectives website, as well as the team’s blog. I will examine the last piece of evidence on Tuesday night to decide whether it’s good or bad.

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Paranormal Cops Series Premiere January 19, 10:30/9:30C  on A & E.

Check local listings

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During my two-year stint as a resident of the Old Fort Lowell Historic District on Tucson’s northeast side, my paranormal curiosity was continually fed by intriguing tales of ghosts and hauntings.

These accounts of hauntings aren’t limited to Fort Lowell park, where remnants of the United States mililtary camp are preserved.  Reported paranormal activity circulates well outside of the boundaries of the park, and even into some of the old homes in the general vicinity. The accounts of ghosts and hauntings are known to have been circulating since the year 1900, nine years after the last living soldiers left Fort Lowell.

According to many accounts, the spirits of soldiers who died at Fort Lowell have never left.

It was first reported around 1900 that the ghost of a solder haunted the ruins of the old Fort Lowell. Residents of the area allegedly spent much time participating in a crude early form of ghost hunting. The residents were said to have spent countless hours, along with countless rounds of ammunition, firing at the ghostly soldier. The soldier would simply disappear upon attack.

It is said that the soldier turned the tables on one attacker and fired back in defense with a blast of rocks.

The newspapers of the time started covering the story. On December 14, 1900, the Arizona Daily Citizen (predecessor of the Tucson Citizen newspaper) reported that  “reputable citizens” continued to see the ghost. The story stated that these reputable citizens were preparing for a gun battle with the said spectre soldier, scheduled to take place that very evening.

The ghost was victorious, as the paper reported on December 28th that the ghost had returned to steal resident’s turkey on Christmas Eve. The Republic in Phoenix also ran the stories, as interest in all things paranormal grew at the time.  

If the reporting stemmed from an ”inside joke” of some sort, there seems to be a missing article somewhere and we don’t get the joke today. Perhaps the stories were inspired by a reporter’s vivid imagination?

We’ll never know.

Interestingly, the stories have sparked my imagination about those pre-Tucson Citizen / pre-Paranormal Old Pueblo weird news accounts by the Arizona Daily Citizen, written well over a century ago. The newspaper published their last story about the ghost April 13, 1901 - not long before the name of the newspaper changed. Later that same year, records indicate that the Arizona Daily Citizen changed their name to the Tucson Citizen.   

Isn’t it ironic that not long after the Tucson Citizen ceased distributing a printed publication in 2009 (transforming into the online TucsonCitizen.com) that the Paranormal Old Pueblo blog was born into it?

We seem to have come full circle here. The thought intrigues me.

However, I am also intrigued by ghostly tales around Fort Lowell.

There are still reputable citizens living in the Fort Lowell area more than a century later. The reports of ghosts and hauntings in the area have not ceased.  

For example, a woman I know shared with me that her father’s home, the home she grew up in, is haunted. The old house stands near Craycroft and Fort Lowell Roads, and it houses at least one ghostly resident. The woman’s father still lives in the home and claims to have witnessed strange events, in and around the house, over the span of more than four decades.

Most interestingly, he said that he began hearing the sounds of the wagon wheels turning, along with the clomping of the horses’ hooves upon the hard, dry desert ground. He stepped outside one day and witnessed  a ghostly horse-drawn wagon, steered by spectral soldiers. The eyes of the soldiers remained focused on their destination ahead, toward Fort Lowell Park. Then, the ghostly wagon simply vanished. According to the homeowner, he witnessed this event on more than one occasion and got used to it.

After a while, when he would hear the sounds approaching, he would simply go about his business and let the wagon drive by in peace. He says that the neighbors have learned to do the same.

Is the Fort Lowell area haunted? Or does the area simply spark our imaginations into a wild frenzy when we think about the soldiers who risked (and even lost) their lives at Fort Lowell?

We’ll never know.

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In 1970, Tucson’s Flowing Wells School District was the focus of some not-so-welcome national attention. It was reported that one of the district’s tenured teachers disregarded the established curriculum, in favor teaching a course in witchcraft. The teacher’s job and reputation were literally at stake.  The Flowing Wells “Witch Trial” concluded with a guilty verdict, and the teacher faced being burned at the stake. Well, she wasn’t literally burned at the stake, she was just fired. However, this is Tucson. The story can’t be that simple, and like many Tucson tales, it does contain an unusual twist.

The teacher’s name was Ann Stewart. Stewart taught English for 11 years in the Flowing Wells School District. When the allegations of teaching witchcraft arose against Mrs. Stewart, she stated that she only said that her physical characteristics were witch-like. Stewart’s students gave a differing account. One student, in particular, said that Mrs. Stewart did educate students about witchcraft, but she “did not try to influence or convince students of the reality of witchcraft.”

Charges were brought against Stewart. The first charge included the teaching of witchcraft,  including making statements about being a witch in such a way that affected students psychologically. The remaining charges included: insubordination; causing mental stress for many teachers; being a poor influence on students; and finally, discussing things outside the curriculum to the detriment of curriculum materials. The Flowing Wells Education Association voted unanimously that Mrs. Stewart not be rehired. The decision was backed by nearly every faculty member with a signed petition.

On November 27, 1970, Stewart was suspended from her job. Four months later, on March 23, 1971, a formal hearing determined that Stewart’s contract would not be renewed for the fall semester. She was fired.

A fortunate magical spell of luck was bestowed upon Mrs. Stewart in the months ahead – conjured up in the form of a good lawyer and a legal technicality in her favor. Arizona law requires that a tenured teacher must be given notice and a formal hearing before March 15th. Stewart received notice prior to that date, but the hearing did not take place until March 23rd.

Superior Court Judge John Collins ordered the reinstatement of Mrs. Stewart.

After that, it appears that Mrs. Stewart disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Due to a lack of after-the-fact documentation, coupled with a lack of witnesses to account for what happened to Mrs. Stewart, her story ends here.

All that’s left of the saga of Mrs. Stewart is burned into archived newspapers and magazines of the time, as well as The American School Board Journal of 1971.

“Those who stood against Mrs. Stewart may be relieved to know that if she does call down a plague, it will probably only be a financial one. Her attorney said that the court decision ‘definitely means that she will have to be paid from the first of the school year.’ “ – The American School Board Journal, Volume 159, 1971.

Flowing Wells students and faculty from 40 years ago are invited to share their memories of this strange event in Tucson’s history via the comments section.

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