Chad Lewis unveils the paranormal
The fall semester is already halfway into October and that means spooky season is afoot. Ghosts, monsters, vampires and haunted houses are all classics for Halloween terror.
But they’re just myths, right? Or so everyone thought.
In light of Halloween approaching at MSU, researcher Chad Lewis shared his own personal tales of exploring the world of the paranormal with students and public in the Ostrander Auditorium Tuesday and how sometimes, the real horror might be closer than you think.
Educational Entertainment Chair Sara Gustafson revealed the Student Events Team had hosted the event two years prior with Lewis as a guest and due to positive feedback, the event made its return this year..
“We had a really good turnout, with not only MNSU students, but also public turnout, so we decided to bring it back. Chad Lewis is not only locally accredited in Minnesota, but he’s also nationally accredited, so we wanted to offer a spooky speaking event free to the public to kind of go into the season of Halloween,” Gustafson said.
Like the Minnesota Zoo Mobile she organized in late September, Gustafson said the storytelling event serves a purpose of providing educational entertainment for students on campus.
“It’s learning about spooky things. It’s fun to get scared. It’s fun to have a little bit of a haunt. But educational wise, he takes historic monuments, historic locations, and he will explain the history of the location,” Gustafson said. “Then he explains, ‘Here’s where you’ll find ghosts or haunted auras.” It takes a spooky fun experience and brings education to the audience about how it became spooky.”
Having studied the strange and unusual for nearly 30 years, Lewis shared what his favorite aspect of investigating the paranormal is.
“For me, it’s the adventure of it, getting to these places. Try taking the backroads, exploring local history and mystery and the legend and more of it, more so than even if it turned out to be true or not true. I love the adventure of it and just exploring the legend and what it means to us,” Lewis said.
Lewis has traveled to numerous places to seek the paranormal which includes Puerto Rico and Costa Rica in search of Chupacabras; Canada to look for Bigfoot; famous Rosewell, New Mexico in search of UFOs; and Transylvania, Romania in search of vampires, a place he favors.
“I was in Transylvania, hunting for vampire legends, and that was one of my favorites, because people still in a lot of other countries, they take these legends seriously,” Lewis said. “I love when the locals really are fearful of the legends and so much of Transylvania was like that, that people still didn’t want to talk about vampires or the legends of them, because they felt like that would bring it closer to them.”
Among his ventures, Lewis has also investigated within the U.S., particularly Minnesota in search of Wendigos, mythological, cannibalistic creatures that are one of the oldest North American legends that first began with the First Nations people in Canada, and quickly spread throughout the Great Lakes region, claiming that these beasts now roam the forests of Minnesota.
“Most people think these are just legends and superstitions from 400 years ago, but there are numerous places in Minnesota where they still think a Wendigo is residing, from Grand Rapids to Warroad to Bemidji, where they name certain locations, a couple lakes and an island after the Wendigo throughout the state, and they believe that’s where the Wendigo still resides,” Lewis said.
Lewis said his goal is to integrate a sense of adventure within college students as whether or not they believe in folklore, it can help spark an adventure with friends and allow them to test their bravery in search of haunted locations.
“What I think students can learn from the program is that there are a lot of weird things. No matter where you live, where you are, there’s a lot of adventure, even though some of our restaurants may all look the same, our hotels, our stores,” Lewis said. “No matter where you are, those may look the same, but the legends are different. I think this program illustrates that there’s a lot of weirdness out there, if you’re willing to go and dig for it.”
With Paranormal Minnesota Tales pairing well with Halloween season at MSU with Lewis’s haunting experiences, the Student Events Team is now in motion with their main spooky event, CSU Haunted Takeover.
“This year, the CSU Haunted Takeover is ‘Haunted CSU,’ so it’s conspiracy theories and haunting stories about things about the CSU, where people have seen ghosts or heard voices,” Gustafson said.
Photo Caption: Researcher Chad Lewis shared his own personal tales of the paranormal with MSU students and the public in the Ostrander Auditorium Tuesday. (Troy Yang/The Reporter)
Write to Anahi Zuniga at anahi.zuniga@mnsu.edu