For my first visit to the Arizona History Museum, I didn’t get to see much of it. At least, not with the lights on.
My fellow Arizona Daily Star reporter Analeise Mayor and I joined Tucson Ghost Company & Society for a one-hour "Night at the Museum" ghost hunt Saturday evening, Oct. 17. Exploring a museum in the dark sounded like enough of an adventure, with or without a paranormal encounter.
Halloween decorations added to the atmosphere as we navigated the darkened museum. Ghosts or not, the setting had the creepy part covered.
Our first stop was upstairs, where exhibits included recreations of bedrooms from another era. I probably should have paid more attention to the displays, but I was a little preoccupied trying to communicate with the dead.
Natasha Olson, left, and her daughter Adrianna are caught by surprise when a flashlight on a shelf suddenly turns on by itself during the Tucson Ghost Society's "A Night at the Museum" at the Arizona History Museum, 949 E. Second St., on Oct. 17. The light was one of several left around the museum to tempt "ghosts" into turning them on and off.
Much of the session was spent exploring independently, with ghost-hunting tools laid out for visitors to use. Options included an electromagnetic field reader, twist flashlights and cat toys that light up when touched, all offered as ways to try to make contact with spirits.
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We wandered around to get a feel for the area before settling at a table for our own mini ghost hunt. Armed with a light-up cat toy and a flashlight, we started asking questions.
The flashlight flickered on and off, sometimes growing dimmer or brighter as we spoke. I couldn’t tell you what was behind it, but it gave us something to work with.
Before we could get much further, we were called back to join the group. We sat in a circle in the dark, with an EMF reader and a cat toy in the middle, taking turns asking questions and waiting for a response.
The spirits, if they were taking questions, seemed a little shy in front of an audience. Though the EMF reader did flash once or twice.
For the second half of the hunt, we headed downstairs, where the recreated mine exhibit caught my attention.
An eerie mariachi band greets the group filing into the exhibit halls for the Tucson Ghost Society's dark tour of the Arizona History Museum.
Spiders hung from the ceiling, skeletons lurked around corners and a single light offered little relief from the darkness.
According to Becky McKiddy-Gydesen, the owner of the ghost tour company, the mine is an area where her team often reports paranormal activity.
“In the mine area, you’re always seeing like shadows and hearing footsteps,” she said.
As we had upstairs, we spent some time exploring on our own before meeting McKiddy-Gydesen inside the mine for another group session.
A rather demonic leprechaun stands outside the mine shaft exhibit, cloaked in darkness for Tucson Ghost Society's "Night at the Museum" at the Arizona History Museum.
She invited any spirits present to make a noise or interact with the equipment and lights. A strobe light spontaneously activated while we were asking questions, but otherwise, the session was quiet.
Spiders dangle all over the mine shaft exhibit during the Tucson Ghost Society "Night at the Museum" held at the Arizona History Museum on Oct. 17.
For me, the most fun came from simply wandering through the museum in the dark. Seeing old artifacts in the shadows, with Halloween decorations adding to the scene, was eerie enough on its own, and a wonderfully spooky way to spend an evening.
Running the ghost tours
By Analeise Mayor, Arizona Daily Star
Becky McKiddy-Gydesen spends most of her nights introducing guests to the haunted history of Tucson’s most iconic locations and the ghostly inhabitants who, according to local legends, never left.
Adrianna Olson gets caught in the beam of a flashlight suddenly turning on by itself in the mine shaft exhibit at the Tucson Ghost Society's ghost hunt at the Arizona History Museum.
She has owned Tucson Ghost Company & Society since 2013, offering walking tours and ghost-hunting experiences that bridge history and the occult.
Everything she does, McKiddy-Gydesen said, revolves around the paranormal.
Charlie Smith listens for signs with a tour group in the mine exhibit at the Arizona History Museum as a member of the Tucson Ghost Society tries to tempt a spirit to react. The halls were decorated with scary props, especially the spiders, webs and their victims adorning the mine exhibit.
“I've always been interested in the paranormal. I've always had paranormal experiences my entire life. I grew up in a haunted house and lived in a haunted apartment as I was older, so I've always experienced it, and the curiosity grew and grew,” McKiddy-Gydesen said. “I never expected to be doing this for a living. It was just something that happened, and for the past 13 years, I have been running it, and I have a huge passion for it.”
She said she hadn’t known how many other people shared her interests in ghosts and hauntings until she came across one of the popular ghost-hunting series on TV.
“I just happened to discover the show ‘Ghost Hunters,’ and that's what made me realize that people actually talked about this stuff and did this stuff,” she said. “Then I did a ghost hunt in Bisbee, and that sparked my interest like 100 times more.”
That ghost hunt was life-changing for McKiddy-Gydesen in more ways than one, as she eventually purchased the rights to the Tucson Ghost Company from the owner of the Bisbee tour. Now, she proudly says hers is the only locally owned Tucson ghost tour.
“Once everyone found out I was local, they started talking to me and they started giving me their stories,” she said.
On her Haunted History Tour, which she runs almost nightly, McKiddy-Gydesen shares those local experiences with the paranormal, as well as some of Tucson’s Old West history.
Becky McKiddy-Gydesen, owner of Tucson Ghost Company & Society.
The tour starts at JoJo's near the Presidio and explores the reportedly haunted downtown area.
“We actually had to shorten the tour because there's so many haunted places,” McKiddy-Gydesen said. “So we do roughly six or seven locations, and it's 90 minutes long.”
Once or twice a month, she also hosts “Monday Boos,” an immersive investigation at JoJo’s restaurant, 76 W. Washington St., where attendees can attempt to communicate directly with the spirits that are said to haunt the property.
“We go lights out in the building and outside of the building, we set up paranormal equipment, and we just try to communicate,” McKiddy-Gydesen said. “We go in there and we get locked down, in the dark.”
Two of the ghost groups have had interactions with the building’s resident cowboys, she said.
“One is a prankster, so he likes to play pranks on girls, and he likes to pinch the girls,” she said. “One is very protective; like he's a very protective cowboy.”
People also report the smell of cigars, seeing shadowy figures and feeling like they are being touched, McKiddy-Gydesen said.
“The other popular one is a little girl. And I've had plenty of interactions with that little girl,” McKiddy-Gydesen said. “This little girl would literally play with my daughters. My daughters would do ring-around-the-rosie, and things would move.”
She claims to have even seen the girl with her own eyes.
“I literally thought it was my daughter trying to do a little jump scare because she was hiding behind something,” she said. “So I was yelling at my daughter not to do that, and my daughter was in a completely different area.”
Tickets to the Haunted History Tour and Monday Boos are each $20 per person.
Her most unusual offering, however, is the Night at the Museum ghost hunt in partnership with the Arizona History Museum, which usually happens once a year around Halloween. Tickets are $20 or $40 for a VIP experience.
Visitors looking for an evening of paranormal adventure can explore the Arizona History Museum after dark, when the exhibits fall silent and one can imagine spirits coming out to play.
