Spooky Coincidence

A busy and mixed week which has been spent between the hard slog at the desk and out and about.

On Saturday last week I was pleased to be invited to the annual Cheslyn Hay Local History Exhibition. I was made most welcome by an efficient and friendly group of people who clearly love there chosen subject. The support from the locals was quite exceptional, visitors able to purchase copies of old photographs, find out how to trace the history of their house, or tips on genealogy, or purchase some memory or book pertinent to the region - even a cup of tea or coffee with a piece of cake for just 50 pence (yes PENCE). I managed to sell a few of my own books and extend my heartfelt gratitude to those who made me so welcome.

Wednesday and I was off to Worcester and the local BBC Radio station. In the morning I was in a studio linked to Joel Hammer at BBC Radio Oxford pre-recording a number of pieces from my Paranormal Cotswolds which will be running on air between 5am and 7am every day in the week leading up to Hallowe'en.

In the afternoon I joined Lucie Plant as we travelled to the Malverns and back to Worcester with an outside broadcast. Again we were taking advantage of the topical Hallowe'en to look at stories from another book Haunted Worcestershire, these will again be serialised in the week leading up to Hallowe'en, this time in the afternoon on Andrew Easton's show.

As we returned to the studios, I was chatting to Lucie about the one story which came from these very premises. A few years ago a ghostly image appeared on a photograph when taking a publicity shot of one of the presenters in one of the studios. A little research found there had been a suicide some years earlier when the site was used by a tannery. It was decided to perform an exorcism live on the air during the Dave Bradley show. During this broadcast strange sounds were heard on air, although nothing was heard or seen in the studio. The interviewer, Lucie Plant, had not heard this story as she had joined here after these events and asked around and found most people knew about the exorcism and we recorded a piece in the studio from where Dave Bradley had broadcast. Here we discovered the exorcism took place in the same studio as I had started the day that very morning where I had recorded the items with Joel.

The following links will take you to the BBC iplayer for those two presenters if of interest:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p004rp4z/Joel_Hammer_23_10_2009/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p004rnvh/Andrew_Easton_23_10_2009/