The Stone Tape Theory: Residual Haunting or Negligent Categorization?

Anyone who has done their research knows the premise of the Stone Tape Theory is that certain rock or stone has retained or captured an energy or memory of some event from the past that will replay like a tape recording. These experiences have also been labeled as residual hauntings as if the energy of the event has been left or absorbed into certain objects or places. These spirits or ghosts have been seen or experienced by multiple witnesses to be doing the same actions completely unaware of people or objects in their vicinity. They have also noted some of these spirits or ghosts do not follow the layout of the current structure but follow a different route that some speculate could have been a former layout or structure in the past.

Recently I came across a note from a Facebook follower asking how my team or myself viewed the Stone Tape Theory and whether we had any experiences or data that demonstrated the validity of the theory. While I cannot refute those who have hypothesized this theory, I also cannot claim that I hold any validity for it myself. I will start by saying that any theory is there for a valid reason. These reasons in most cases are of years of painstaking research into paranormal phenomena that resulted in creating a categorization that certain types of experiences or data that could not be explained otherwise. The only issue with creating categories for paranormal phenomena is that, in my experience, it is always changing and asking more questions of those studying.

Residual hauntings, intelligent hauntings, poltergeists, demonic hauntings, tulpas, and more all have key components that cross over into other categories. Each of these potential explanations for paranormal phenomena can be viewed in varying perceptions based on religion, cultural belief, and personal experiences. I will not be delving into each of them at this time, I will focus solely on residual hauntings. Residual hauntings in my opinion fall under the umbrella category of human spirits. When I consider these types of hauntings I think of someone doing a repeated action over and over every day of their life. The energy and emotion that goes into these repeated actions, etches itself on the environment and objects that were used. I also consider traumatic experiences that a living person experienced leaving part of their soul in a location or object that has meaning to be part of this haunting. But my question is are these types of energy residue unable to change? Is it possible that the spirits these residues belong to, be something they can find and in turn they inhabit these areas as an intelligent haunting? Are they really a residual energy left behind or are we experiencing something that is happening in another dimension or plane alongside ours?

In 2014 my team was called in to investigate a location in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. This location was inhabited initially by armorers as a residence for the Armory and Arsenal of Harpers Ferry. During the Civil War the location was used as barracks, dormitories, and as a Provost Marshal's Jail. Post war the location was purchased by a local Odd Fellows organization when it was determined their former location was destroyed during the war. Upon arriving at this location we were excited by the vast history and the experiences of seeing soldiers in various locations about the property. In any paranormal researchers mind an initial opinion would be that much of this activity could be residual and none of the spirits would communicate with us. After a 6 hour investigation with no experiences and no data to support the phenomena the Odd Fellows reported we thought maybe that term could explained the case. The Odd Fellows graciously allowed our team to do repeat investigations to further the research and study. What we were able to determine over the course of 9 years challenged the label residual haunting to the extreme.

We have continued to investigate the Odd Fellows Lodge in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia to this day. Our team has compiled a vast amount of data cataloging weather, investigators, moon phases, temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, with equipment, without equipment, with investigators, without investigators and more; that allows us to step back and really look at components that could give us insight on the paranormal phenomena in the location. Each investigation has yielded different spirits willing to talk to us for a time, it has yielded spirits who confirmed they only inhabit the building between March and October which can be confirmed based on our data, and each investigation tells us that if we had taken the conclusion we made from the first investigation; we would have been making a negligent and wrongful claim. (Note: While it can be argued that there are some residual and some intelligent spirits within the Odd Fellows Lodge, the reason for this blog is to point out that extensive research and investigation may alter the diagnosis of the "haunting".)

While I am a firm believer that spirits are everywhere, I also do not believe that we can make hard and fast theories that limit our ability to continue to research hauntings.  Any good theory should hold the test of repeated research that attempts to validate the claims. All paranormal researchers should do exhaustive investigations into any paranormal phenomena or location that challenges any theory or hypothesis, this includes residual hauntings. After all how can we realistically label any case residual when we don't really have irrefutable data that backs this up?

Rebecca Boyer
Co-Founder/ Case Manager
Antietam Paranormal Society