Posted: Oct. 12, 2009

Muskego — A photograph of himself standing beside the grave of his great-great grandparents and enveloped in a bluish-white mist that seemed to have emerged from the grave propelled Terry Fisk into a career as a ghost hunter.

He was only a college student at the time, but he said the amazing photograph had a profound effect on him.

"It made me wonder if it is possible to find physical proof of the afterlife," Fisk said. He returned to that cemetery night after night, took dozens of photographs. But the mist never returned to any of them.

Even so, Fisk and paranormal co-researcher Chad Lewis have hunted ghosts in nine states.

Just in time for Halloween, Fisk, who lives in Eau Claire, will recount some of the results of those researches. He will give an illustrated talk at 7 p.m. Oct. 22 at the Muskego Library, W16663 Janesville Road. Admission will be free, but a donation of a nonperishable food item for the Muskego Food Pantry will be accepted.

Five books and counting

Fisk and Lewis have co-authored five books so far. The first is "The Wisconsin Road Guide to Haunted Locations," published in 2004. Since then, they also wrote ghostly guide books for Minnesota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois. They hope that their Florida edition will be out by the end of the year. After that, they will finish a Michigan guidebook and work on a second volume for Wisconsin.

For their research, they look for places with long histories of hauntings with multiple eye-witnesses they could interview, Fisk said.

"In a lot of cases, people didn't know each other and thought they were the only ones who had these experiences," he said. Yet they saw almost the same things, he said.

While nearly all the approximately 75 ghostly locations in their Wisconsin book came from interviews with witnesses, and visiting and photographing the places, the two researchers got uncomfortably close to a haunting themselves.

It was close to dark when they stepped off the ferry onto isolated and deserted Rock Island off the tip of Door County. There were no phones, no cars, no people.

A walk through the darkened woods brought them to the foot of one of the oldest lighthouse in the state. It was empty and padlocked, and it was said to be haunted. The researchers were there to see for themselves. Suddenly, they were startled by the sound of a door slamming violently against a wall inside the structure. But they were skeptical.

"We thought maybe the wind blew a door (closed)," Fisk said.

"But within two minutes, we heard 'bam,' " he said. "We knew there was no wind, it was perfectly calm. And there was no way somebody was in there because it was padlocked."

"I tell you, it scared us," he said. "If something came charging out of there, we could only run and wait for the ferry the next day."

But some of the "hauntings" that Fisk has found have been pretty benign, even helpful.

The owner of a bar/restaurant in Balsam Lake in northwestern Wisconsin credits a trio of ghosts that he believes inhabit the place with foiling an attempted burglary, Fisk said.

About half a dozen years ago, the door was jimmied and the bar/restaurant entered. But nothing was taken - not liquor, not cash. For some reason, the burglar had rushed out the back door. The owner believes the burglar saw the apparitions that he, his employees and customers all know.

Bringing his work home

With all his ghost hunting, Fisk wonders if one of those "ghosts" may have followed him home. How else could he explain the strange things that started happening in the home he and his wife had occupied for eight years?

It was 2008 when he and his wife both saw the orange mist in their living room. They glimpsed it just in the corners of their eyes, but when they turned, it was gone.

But then they saw the doorknob turn and the living room door open wide all by itself, Fisk said. For months, doors would mysteriously open. Then the happenings just stopped.

Library Director Jane Genzel predicted the library audience will enjoy Fisk's presentation as audiences have liked visits near Halloween of other ghost hunters.

"People are on the edge of their chairs listening to every word, they ask questions and are inspired to relay their own experiences," Genzel said.

Every year around Halloween, the library invites those who delve into the paranormal to give talks.

"The cool part about all these people is they're not crackpots," she said.