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By DONNAMY STEELE / Special to the Reporter

Mysteries of paranormal activity were unraveled over the weekend when the Southern Ghost Girls Tour came to town. Founder and owner Lesley Hyde said she was overwhelmed with the success of the event after receiving many requests to bring the tour to Helena.

“We had always gotten the request to do Helena. This was our first time ever doing an investigation and ghost tour there, and it was extremely popular,” Hyde said about the event. “We have a few things we want to change and need to tweak to make our next tour even more of a success.”

Each tour location is decided based on the history behind them. For the first Helena tour, the two locations were Oversoul Brewing and Goodfellas, places Hyde said are known for having history and potential paranormal activity associated with them.

“We will tell the history of each location, they will get to use real paranormal investigation equipment that they would see on TV if people watch the shows, and so we will do a real, live, true paranormal investigation of each location,” she said.

The Southern Ghost Girls do events all over the southwest, Hyde said, with Alabama being their most popular location. Introducing both lovers of the paranormal and skeptics alike to their top quality investigation equipment is one of the many aspects of the tour.

“We got a lot of evidence using our equipment. The equipment can detect a spirit in the room, an electromagnetic field, a change in temperature, and it alerts us to something we can’t see,” Hyde said. “There are some skeptics that show up and come on our tours and you can definitely see that they have been converted. Not everyone, but a lot of them. You can see in their faces that they are shocked and stunned. They can’t believe what they’re seeing, and when they get to use the equipment themselves and have hands-on experience they are just amazed really. That happens on all of our tours.”

Dowsing rods are also used by the guides and participants to channel spirits during the tours, Hyde said. Although it is a more old-fashioned option compared to other equipment, Hyde said they are “really effective” and help them receive relevant answers to simple yes and no questions as they move.

“We did reach out to a lot of native American spirits, and we did feel that we had some spirits come over that may have been people who lived in the late 1800s,” Hyde said about the Helena tour. “We actually had a Civil War soldier that we felt come through using the equipment that we got answers from. We also did some recordings where we ask questions and you can hear the disembodied voice come over. I think there was a question asked at Oversoul of if there was a native American woman here and it said, ‘I am here.’ You could hear it. It was crazy and there was a lot of evidence.”

Hyde is hoping to bring the ghost tour back to the area during the Fall months, just in time for Halloween. The Helena tour tickets sold out within two weeks with over 50 people on the waiting list, Hyde said. Tour dates are updated regularly on the Southern Ghost Girls Website and Facebook page.

“It was the first time ever in Helena and due to it just being overwhelmingly popular, I am trying to negotiate with the city’s historical society to do another one,” Hyde said. “I think they are on board with it, we just need to plan it. I am trying to do something in the fall and we will add some different locations.”

To stay updated on The Southern Ghost Girls Tour schedule, visit their website Southernghostgirls.com or their Facebook page @southernghostgirls.