In the first half, guest host Lisa Garr (email) spoke with paranormal historian and author Courtney McInvale about her investigations of America's most haunted locations. McInvale attributed her fascination with the paranormal to her upbringing in New England, where she experienced unexplained activity in her childhood home. The renowned paranormal experts Ed and Lorraine Warren visited her house to investigate the disturbances when she was just 15 years old. Before operating paranormal tours in Connecticut and Georgia, McInvale initially worked for the FBI's counterterrorism unit and the Department of Homeland Security. She developed a rigorous, fact-based approach to investigating the unknown during this time in law enforcement.
Much of the interview focused on Civil War battlefields, especially Gettysburg and Chickamauga. McInvale argued that the Civil War left such a strong imprint because it was "American versus American," and also because so many soldiers feared being forgotten. She said the dead were often buried far from home, with letters and final words left unsent. That, she claimed, helps explain why battlefield hauntings feel so active. At Gettysburg, she revealed both she and a friend heard drumming and music at the exact times a skirmish had begun and ended in 1863. At another point, she said she saw what appeared to be a Civil War soldier near her car and later experienced more strange activity that night.
McInvale maintains a strict code of ethics when engaging with the afterlife. "I don't believe in conjuring a spirit," she explained. "I always just try to be open to what is, and to be receiving of the energy in that moment. I never want to make a living person do anything they don't want to do, and so I feel that way with the dead as well."
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In the second half, Dr. Jonathan Kendall discussed the intersection of his medical background, paranormal phenomena, and UFOs. Despite a career rooted in hard science, he has dedicated his recent work to documenting the "metaphysics of UFOs," exploring the potential link between extraterrestrial encounters, apparitions, and near-death experiences. Dr. Kendall noted that he has not personally experienced an abduction, though he emphasized that his lack of first-hand experience does not diminish the reality of the reports he studies. He recalled a striking account involving his sister-in-law, who allegedly witnessed a strange craft hovering over his property. "It was a cylindrical device... emitting a bluish-white glow, making no sound whatsoever, and just going very methodically slowly from east to west," he claimed.
Central to the discussion was the "Men in Black" phenomenon. Dr. Kendall suggested that while some of these figures may be intimidating government officials, others reportedly possess a more spectral, paranormal quality. He described these entities as figures who "look normal... but they have all these other strange features, like really long fingers on their hands, or they just don't act quite right, like they're not from around here."
The conversation also shifted to the psychological and physiological aftermath of such encounters. Dr. Kendall observed that many people who report abductions share characteristics with NDE experiencers, noting that both groups often report a profound, positive shift in their worldview. "Whatever is happening... these folks that experience them are breaching some kind of spiritual realm," he stated. Regarding government possession of UFO materials, Kendall asserted, "I do think that the government has some kind of exotic materials. In fact, I tend to lean towards the belief that they probably have a full blown spacecraft."