Free Chasing Spirits: The Building of the "Ghost Adventures" Crew by Nick Groff, Jeff Belanger Page A

climbed up to the attic—a place filled with creepy old dolls. Zak was unnerved by the dolls. He hates old dolls. I think we all do to some degree.
    In the attic I suddenly felt dizzy. Then I felt goose bumps and tingles run down my arm. Behind me, I heard a loud breath right by the dolls. As quickly as the activity started, it ended. The room was quiet again and that tense energy was gone.
    When we reviewed our audio, we heard what sounded like a faint conversation. One voice says, “Help”; then the other answers, “I know who you are.” Joni was shocked to hear the voices too.
    I loved being back in Tonopah and having the opportunity to jump back into the Castle House. Unlike the first time we went there, on this visit we captured evidence we could use.
    Our
Ghost Adventures
roles weren’t planned—they just fell into place. Zak naturally fell into the front-man role—he would deliver the history and story—while Aaron was always the funny one with great reactions. I was there to be the voice of reason—the one in the middle who isn’t scared of much, but needs to be convinced.
    Another scene we didn’t include in the documentary involved Aaron and his antics. He’d walked into a candy store in Virginia City to buy a big caramel apple. I was outside filming down the wooden sidewalk and a biker couple was walking by.Just as Aaron walks out of the store taking a bite of this huge caramel apple, the biker dude slaps his girl’s ass. Aaron didn’t even see the ass slap—he was concentrating on his apple. But the whole scene looked so goofy, we just cracked up. I’d put the scene in the first cut of the documentary, but in the end we dropped it. My point is, Aaron has always been Aaron—a big teddy bear of a guy with this childlike wonder and innocence about him. Whether he’s trying it or not, funny stuff just happens around him.
    I made a blooper reel of some of the funny things that happened to us during filming. When you’re on the road, overtired, hungry, or punch-drunk, weird things happen. Today if you watch some of our video blogs for
Ghost Adventures
, you can see some of what I’m talking about.
    Our style of investigating was coming together in those early documentary shoots, and we were just falling into it naturally.
    One difference between what we were doing and what everyone else was doing was that we were the camera crew and producers. If you’re a camera operator working on a show, your job is to film whatever the on-screen talent is doing. Your function is to focus on them and capture their actions and reactions. If the on-screen talent sees a ghost, points, and says, “Holy shit, right there!” the camera has to try to capture the reaction of the on-screen talent, and then try to film a ghost. Because we’re also operating the cameras, we can point the camera at whatever we see. We stand a better chance of capturing something that way.
    Our formula was starting to gel as we headed into the Washoe Club in Virginia City, a place I had never been able to get out of my head ever since the spring of 2001.
    When we walked into the club, we had no idea what we were in for.
    In Virginia City’s heyday, millionaires were being made almost daily. The newly rich needed a place to hobnob with other wealthy men. Local establishments like the Washoe Club and the Millionaire’s Club were built so the rich could drink, gamble, carouse with prostitutes, and plot ways to expand their respective empires.
    The Millionaire’s Club had a respectable main entrance up a winding staircase and two secret rear exits, where prostitutes could enter, and drunk and disorderly patrons could make a discreet getaway.
    Inside the once decadent club were suites, gambling tables, and a billiard room. We also learned that in the winter, bodies were sometimes stored in a crypt in the building while the grave diggers waited for the ground to thaw. From raucous good times to debauchery, the Washoe Club is Virginia City’s