May 2020 - These Curious Times

Giving A Voice to the Dead
Hensley and Kessler on an investigation in Loraine, Ohio.
Tammye McDuff
“We give a voice to the dead,” says
paranormal investigator David Hensley,
founder of EVP Mediums “I want to
be clear, we help spirits find their way
home, and we educate the public on
this very real phenomenon.” These
Curious Times had the opportunity to
speak with Hensley last month. Hensley
and partner in the paranormal Randy
Kessler investigate claims of paranormal
activity in the Ohio North coast area.
Hensley and Kessler also co-host a
podcast called Paranormal Road.
“We started EVP Mediums back
in 2012,” Hensley told TCTN, “I started
doing EVP’s and quickly realized it was
real – it was mind blowing!” Hensley
said it became an obsession and he
was recording EVP’s every day. “When
I began receiving messages from my
grandmother and my father, it changed
everything for me.”
Hensley was a corporate executive
and did not believe in or have time for
anything paranormal. “People react
differently; some can hear an EVP and
some can’t. Ghosts could come and bite
them in the back side and they would
deny it.” Hensley was the director of
food and beverage operations for an
amusement park in Ohio, he said it was
a multimillion dollar business and he
was charge of over 1500 employees,
“We approached 80 million in revenue
annually, it was huge. I opened a
Investigations
restaurant which turned out to be a
nightmare, and then I decided I was
just going to take a normal nine to five
job so I would have the time to pursue
investigations and devote more time to
EVP Mediums.” He says it’s the happiest
he has ever been.
Hensley’s brush with the paranormal
began at the age of ten when he lost his
father. “When you’re young, you miss
your parent, but the affects of actually
losing them didn’t hit me anyway until
I was much older. In 2000 I lost both my
grandparents and it left a big hole in
my life.” That’s when he began to record
EVP’s daily, he began receiving messages
from his grandparents, “This gave
me hope that I would be united with
them someday. The ironic thing is that
I actually never attempted to contact
them,” Hensley agrees he was very naïve.
Shortly after their passing, Hensley
recalls one of his most clarifying
moments. “I stepped outside the
restaurant for a break. I lit up a cigarette,
[I was a smoker back them] and turned
on my phone. Immediately I heard a
lyrical humming. It was something I had
not heard before.” He went back to his
office and transferred the recording to
his computer so it could be heard better,
Hensley choked up a bit and said as soon
as he listened to the music he began
to cry like a baby. “The humming was
actual singing. My grandmother was
always making up silly songs and singing
them. The words sung were ‘Be proud of
Photo by Hensley/Kessler
yourself, my David’. The only person to
call me ‘My David’ was my grandmother,
we adored each other.”
As the story goes, Hensley left the
restaurant straight away and headed
to the cemetery, recording the entire
time, “You can hear my footsteps as I
am walking to her grave,” said Hensley,
“Playing my recordings back later I
hear ‘I told you he would come Daddy’.
My grandmother always called my
grandfather ‘Daddy’.” Hensley says that
he can be heard sobbing at the gravesite
and then he hears “David Hensley! Your
grandma is not in the grave!”
This event turned into the creation
of EVP Mediums in order to help others
understand that hauntings are real, it
doesn’t mean it is always evil, it doesn’t
mean it is demonic – although Hensley
says they have had those cases.
Hensley and Kessler are so successful
in their endeavors that A&E [the Arts and
Entertainment network] filmed a pilot
called “The American Murder House”. “It
was horrific, “said Hensley, “Reality TV is
anything but reality, we were told to act
as if demons were afoot – they weren’t
– and we decided to be such awful
actors, that we were released from our
contract.” They have subsequently had
numerous television offers that are
continually declined. “We want to bring
the real issues, and make sure that we
have the final say over how our work
and investigations are perceived. I don’t
want to part of the lie.” He goes on to
admit television has become a double
edged sword, it has opened the way for
the general population to be introduced
to the paranormal, but at the same
time some shows have veered off into
unrealistic personifications.
“We have met some of the most
wonderful people. We know ghosts are
real and we also know that demons
are real. We have had six cases that we
classify as demonic.”
Hensley and Kessler are well known
for their experiments into the unknown
“They show that those who crossover
become part of the conscience universe
– they become part of everything. My
father died when I was barely a teenager,
and I remember crying that he would
never know my children. Before the birth
of my son, I had a dream. I was mowing
my lawn and my dad drove up in this
beautiful red convertible. I was furious
with him because I thought he was alive.
I remember really letting him have it. In
my peripheral vision I saw a little boy in
the back seat. My dad grabs my hand
sternly and he squeezed it and said today
– I bring you the greatest gift.” Hensley
said that day his wife informed him that
she was pregnant. “I knew it would be a
son. My father was able to meet my son
before he was ever born.”
In his lecturers he tells people “Yes,
you have lost your loved one. They will
not be at that graduation or wedding
or birth, but they are around you all the
time. These are the things that drive me.
If we can help one person, give them a
glimmer of hope about their loved one,
then all the ribbing we take is worth it.”
Hensley added “It just blows my mind’ to
actually know that there is something
greater out in the universe. I love being
part of something that most can’t wrap
their heads around.”
Visit EVP Mediums on Facebook and
on YouTube.
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David Hensley, founder of Paranormal Road Podcast.
Photo by Paranormal Road