While they were growing up, Patrice Alexander and her brother, Iolaus, suspected that something strange was happening inside their apartment.
Objects disappeared and reappeared, and Patrice sometimes felt a tug at her shirt. “I would be working at my desk and I’d feel like the room would get really cold,” said Patrice, 32, who works at the Brighton branch of the Anythink public library system near Denver. Iolaus, 28, who works at the Wright Farms branch, remembers finding a lost MP3 player inside a medicine cabinet.
The siblings believed then that a “small ghost child” residing in their bathroom was responsible. “We would hear laughter sometimes,” Patrice said, “like a little girl giggling.”
Now, they have the technology to test for paranormal activity by checking out one of the public library’s ghost hunting kits. They are packed inside hard-shell cases with five paranormal investigation tools: a UV flashlight, an EMF reader that measures electromagnetic fields, a digital voice recorder, an infrared thermometer and a “spirit box” that scans radio frequencies.
The idea originated in 2021, as the library system was reopening after the coronavirus pandemic and brainstorming ways to draw people back. “At that time we wanted to create moments of surprise and delight when you walk into the library,” said Keely Smith, who buys many of the objects — air quality testers, Wi-Fi hot spots, EnChroma glasses for color blindness — that are circulated through the system’s Library of Things collection.
A few librarians suggested paranormal equipment, so Ms. Smith assembled five kits, trying to keep them portable and easy to use for beginners. “They just started checking out like crazy,” she said.
Today the system owns 30 kits. Patrice and Iolaus recently brought one home to their new apartment and spread the equipment across the bedroom and kitchen.
“We’re not doing this alone,” Patrice said, thinking back to the ghost-hunting television shows they watched growing up, including MTV’s “Fear.” “We can’t even get through a Halloween haunted house alone.”
After little luck with the EMF reader, they set up the spirit box. The device scanned through radio frequencies as the siblings asked questions into the apartment.
“Is anybody here?” Patrice asked. “Would you like to talk to us?”
The spirit box produced a word:
“Here.”
After several more questions, the box produced another word:
“Go.”
“So then we left,” Patrice said. “We’re rule followers.”
Eventually, the siblings nicknamed the supposed ghost Bob.
“He’s a one-word guy,” Iolaus said.
