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The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco

Annette Martin — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 07:11:05 +0000

“A delightful must-have handbook to the best haunts in San Francisco. Don’t go there without reading this first!”—Chris Fleming, co-host of Dead Famous and Psychic Kids

Everyone knows San Francisco … or so they think. Everyone has seen the countless picture postcard views of the Golden Gate Bridge, the cable cars, Fisherman’s Wharf and the world’s most crooked street. But there’s another San Francisco that most tourists never see—a hidden city of ghosts, apparitions and paranormal phenomena.

This is the San Francisco revealed by paranormal research scientist Loyd Auerbach and world-renowned psychic Annette Martin in their new book, The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco (Craven Street Books, April 2011).

The fruit of Auerbach and Martin’s 15-year partnership as Bay Area ghost hunters, The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco is a one-of-a-kind guidebook that shows the reader how to find publicly accessible haunted places that lie unsuspected in San Francisco’s most famous tourist destinations, including Alcatraz, Chinatown, the Presidio and more.

This unique travel book invites readers to personally explore the Bay Area’s most haunted places … and maybe even have a ghostly encounter of their own. Guided by Martin’s astonishing psychic perceptions, Auerbach’s field expertise in paranormal investigation, and a handy map and directions to haunted attractions, readers can follow in the Ghost Detectives’ footsteps and strike out on their own ghost-hunting adventure.

The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco gives an extraordinarily detailed view of the real work of paranormal research, as experienced by a gifted and sensitive psychic and a skeptical but open-minded paranormal researcher. Written in a direct, immediate, you-are-there style, The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco presents actual transcripts of perceptions, observations and discussion between the two authors and through experiential narrative gives readers an authentic feel of what it’s like to have the spine-tingling experience of encountering a genuine ghost.

Behind every ghost, there is a human story, and Auerbach and Martin never let the reader forget that ghosts are the sentient spirits of once flesh-and-blood men and women who even now feel as keenly as they did when alive. In The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco, you’ll meet fascinating characters such as:

* The teacher who refused the afterlife in order to stay close to the spirits of her students in the hotel that was her school.

* The doña who haunts the remnants of San Francisco’s Spanish past, waiting for a lover who will never return.

* The soul of a killer who remains the last prisoner of Alcatraz, trapped by his fear of judgment in the afterlife.

* The fun-loving and fashionable lady in blue who has lingered at a bar since the 1930s, mingling with the living and occasionally flirting with respectable paranormal research scientists.

* And many more eerie encounters with spirits who live in an unseen world … and yet remain proud residents of San Francisco.

Filled with stories that are sometimes melancholy, sometimes joyous, but always filled with human feeling that transcends death, The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco is a thrilling tourist guide to the history, culture and supernatural mysteries of America’s most beautiful city.

To purchase: The Ghost Detectives’ Guide to Haunted San Francisco

The first psychic to ever testify as an expert witness in a murder trial, Annette Martin first experienced what she calls the “Gift of the White Light” at age 7. She had a premonition about being hurt by a group of playmates. This premonition came true and was followed several weeks later by a stunningly accurate diagnosis of a family friend’s infected toe. Immediately she realized that it was a gift from God and that it was her mission in this life to learn how to use its awesome power to help people.

Martin was living in Hong Kong (1969–1975) when she began providing professional medical readings, and it was then that Edgar Cayce first appeared to her. Cayce politely asked that she remain calm and told her he had been helping her since she was a child. Over the ensuing years Cayce has been mystically, lovingly and helpfully by her side during thousands of sessions.

During a difficult time in his life, song writer John Denver learned of Martin and requested a reading. Denver, an aviation buff, told her he had a desire to go into outer space, perhaps on one of NASA’s space shuttles. Annette said she didn’t see that, but she did see him flying a small craft that would tumble down and crash into the ocean. Fifteen years later Denver died when he lost control of a small experimental plane he was flying and crashed into the ocean off of Pacific Grove, California.

Martin has used her psychic talents to crack murder cases, locate missing persons, solve medical mysteries that puzzled expert doctors, make verified predictions for individuals, and help put criminals in jail. Annette has appeared on the Biography Channel’s Psychic Investigators, Coast to Coast with George Noory, Good Morning America, Court TV’s Psychic Detective, Entertainment Tonight, The Nancy Grace Show, The Catherine Cryer Show, 48 Hours, The Montel Williams Show and numerous other national and international television and radio appearances.

Martin’s amazing life story and psychic abilities were documented in The Gift of the White Light, a biography by James N. Frey (Quill Driver Books, 2008). Martin is the director of Closure4U Investigations (www.closure4u.com), a detective agency using traditional and psychic investigation techniques to investigate cases involving homicide, missing persons, grand theft, arson and industrial espionage.

Loyd Auerbach is well-known to the public as a leading expert on ghosts and psychic experiences. The holder of a master’s degree in parapsychology, Auerbach is director of the Office of Paranormal Investigations, a professor at JFK University, a professor of parapsychology at Atlantic Univeristy and creator and instructor of the Certificate Program in Parapsychological Studies at HCH Institute, available both in California and for distance learning.

He is a member of the advisory boards of both the Rhine Research Center and the Windbridge Institute, and the Scientific Advisory Board of the Forever Family Foundation. He was a consulting editor and columnist for FATE magazine from 1991-2004.

Auerbach is the author of seven books on the paranormal, including A Paranormal Casebook: Ghost Hunting in the New Millennium (Atriad Press, 2005), Hauntings & Poltergeists: A Ghost Hunter’s Guide (Ronin Publishing, 2004) and Ghost Hunting: How to Investigate the Paranormal (Ronin, 2004).

He is a professional mentalist and psychic entertainer, performing as Professor Paranormal—a title that follows him into his more serious work. He is a past president of the Psychic Entertainers Association (and currently on the Board of Directors).

He has appeared in hundreds of radio and print interviews, and well over 100 national and local TV shows including The View, Larry King Live, The Oprah Winfrey Show, Criss Angel: Mindfreak, Sightings, In Search Of, The Today Show, Unsolved Mysteries, Late Night with David Letterman, and frequently on A&E, the History Channel, the Travel Channel, the Syfy Channel, the Discovery Channel and The Learning Channel (and many of his cable appearances are in eternal reruns).

Visit his Paranormal Network website at www.mindreader.com.

History of Christmas In America

Annette Martin — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 07:03:56 +0000

For over 4,000 years people around the world have been observing Christmas with traditions in secular and religious practices in nature. Many of Americas Christmas traditions were celebrated centuries before the Christ child was born. The giving of gifts, holiday feasts, the Yule log, carnivals, singers going from house to house and church processions can all be traced back to the early Mesopotamians.

The pilgrims, who came to America in 1620, did not celebrate Christmas. Actually from 1659-1681 the celebrations of Christmas was outlawed in Boston. And anyone found celebrating the Christmas spirit was fined five shillings. But in the Jamestown settlement, Captain John Smith reported that Christmas was enjoyed by all and passed without incident.

During the 19th century there was a period of class conflict and turmoil. Gang rioting became prevalent and unemployment was high during the Christmas season. In 1828, the New York city council created the city’s first police force in response to the Christmas riot. This moved members of the upper class to look at the way Christmas was being celebrated in America.

Around this time, the English author Charles Dickens had created the classic story, A Christmas Carol. The message in this story is about good will towards all mankind, which struck a powerful chord in America and in England, showing the members of Victorian society the wonderful benefits of celebrating the holiday.

Americans began to embrace Christmas as a family holiday. They looked at the recent immigrants and Episcopalian and Catholic churches to have an idea of how the day should be celebrated. Christians celebrate Christmas Day as the anniversary of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, whose teachings are the basis of their religion. December 25 – has been a federal holiday in the United States since June 26, 1870.

Your browser may not support display of this image. Where did Santa Clause come from? Santa Claus is known by British children as Father Christmas. Father Christmas, is very similar to the American Santa, but his direct ancestor is a certain pagan spirit who regularly appeared in medieval mummer’s plays. The old-fashioned Father Christmas would wear long robes with sprigs of holly in his long flowing white hair. Children write letters to Father Christmas telling him what gifts they want, but instead of dropping them in the mailbox, the letters are tossed into the fireplace. The draft carries the letters up the chimney, and theoretically, Father Christmas reads the smoke. Gifts are opened Christmas afternoon.

The custom of hanging stockings from the mantel piece, also comes from the English. It seems that Father Christmas once dropped some gold coins while coming down the chimney. The coins just happened to land in a stocking that had been hung out to dry. Since that time children have continued to hang out stockings in hopes of finding them filled with toys and gifts.

The custom of singing carols at Christmas is also of English origin. During the middle ages, groups of serenaders called waits would travel around from house to house singing ancient carols and spreading the holiday spirit. The word carol means “song of you.” Most of the popular old carols we sing today were written in the nineteenth century.

The custom of kissing under the mistletoe is descended from ancient Druid rites. The decorating of Christmas trees, though primarily a German custom, has been widely popular in England since 1841 when Prince Albert had a Christmas tree set up in Windsor Castle for his wife Queen Victoria, and their children.

The Nativity scene, one of the most beloved and enduring symbols of the holiday season, originated in Italy. St. Francis of Assisi asked a man named Giovanni Vellita to create a manger scene. St. Francis performed mass in front of this early Nativity scene, which inspired awe and devotion in all who saw it. The creation of the figures has become an entire genre of folk art.

During the next 100 years, America built a Christmas tradition all their own with a collection of pieces of many other customs, which included sending holiday cards, gift giving, decorating trees, attending church, meals with family and friends, caroling and, of course, children anxiously waiting for Santa Claus to arrive. Americans had really re-invented a holiday to fill the cultural needs of a new growing nation.

A little bit of trivia. Did you know?

Since the 1890’s, The Salvation Army has been sending Santa Claus – clad donation collectors into the streets.

Rudolph, “the most famous reindeer of all,” was the creation of Robert L. May’s imagination in 1939. The copywriter wrote a poem a reindeer to help bring more customers into the Montgomery Ward department store.

Construction workers started the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree tradition in 1931.

Merry Christmas and A Healthy, Safe Happy New Year!

Annette Martin has been a consulting Psychic with law enforcement agencies across the world for more than 40 years. Her cases have involved local, state and federal departments, including the FBI. Annette’s insight, which includes her gift as a Medical Intuitive while working on homicide and missing persons cases has been an outstanding tool for numerous police detectives. Her successes have been many on an endless variety of cases that have also been filmed on TV shows such as Court TV’s, “Psychic Detective, Biography Channel’s, “Psychic Investigators,” Nancy Grace, BBC, Catherin Crier, Coast to Coast Radio and many more.

Annette is also a ghost detective who can see and talk to the ghosts. With this capability she has been on numerous TV and radio shows, such as Good Morning America, Discovery Channel, History Channel, CBS News, ABC, Travel Channel and many others. Clients have included movie stars, doctors, lawyers, journalists, TV and radio personalities, famous singers, writers, artists, teachers, genius engineers, CEO’s, TV producers, international diplomats and many more. http://www.annette-martin.com

Photo Credit © Candybox Photography | Dreamstime.com

HISTORY OF THANKSGIVING

Annette Martin — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 07:18:44 +0000

Thanksgiving is a holiday we celebrate to express gratitude, thankfulness, and appreciation to God, family and friends. Traditionally, it has been a time to give thanks for a bountiful harvest. Thanksgiving Day is a harvest festival celebrated primarily in the United States and in Canada.

We generally think of Thanksgiving as an American holiday, due to the Pilgrims at the site of Plymouth Plantation, in Massachusetts. This celebration occurred early in the history of what would become one of the original thirteen colonies that later were to become the United States. Thanksgiving was modeled after harvest festivals that were commonplace in Europe at the time. The corn crop was gathered by the Pilgrims in the fall of 1621. Governor Bradford invited the Indian Chief Massasoit and ninety of his braves to celebrate their first harvest in the New World and ordered a day of feasting and thanksgiving.

But actually a thanksgiving for the annual harvest is one of the oldest holidays known to mankind, honoring the agricultural gods which goes back thousands of years, in one form or another, though celebrated on different dates.

The Romans honored Ceres, the Hindus and the Chinese observe the gathered harvest with a holiday. In ancient Egypt and in Greece, the harvest festival was celebrated with great rejoicing. The Anglo-Saxons rejoiced with a feast to celebrate the reaping of the harvest; the Old Testament includes references to harvest festivals where Moses gave instruction to the Hebrews to give thanks for the harvest with an 8 day Feast of Tabernacles.

It is hard for us to realize that the beginnings of Thanksgiving go back not only to the Old World but to the early world.

Long before the dwellers by the Nile dreamed of building pyramids, all people who grew grain gave thanks at harvest time to the beings who had given them their daily food for the hard winter months. Moreover, these ancient farmers sensed the changing seasons and in the cycle of seed, to plant, to seed again, the miracle of death and resurrection and turned their wonder at it into legends.

In Canada Thanksgiving is celebrated on the second Monday in October.

The USA used to celebrate thanksgiving on October 3rd, or just over a week after the Fall equinox but President Abraham Lincoln declared in 1863, after Thanksgiving had become a national holiday, that all in the United States should ‘set apart’ and observe the last Thursday of November as a day of Thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heaven.

Happy Thanksgiving to one and all ~

Photo credit © Monkey Business Images | Dreamstime.com

The History of Halloween

Annette Martin — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 07:57:16 +0000

By Annette Martin

Halloween’s birth began around 500B.C. in the area that is now Great Britain, Scotland, Ireland and France. Samhain,(Sow – en) fell at the end of October, and for the Celts it was a pretty unnerving time. On Sow-en it was believed that the veil between the real and spiritual worlds was thinnest. Therefore, it would not be unusual to see banshees or sundry spirits of the dead wandering about.

It also marked the Celtic New Year, the day of the end of the summer season, the end of the harvest, and the beginning of winter. It may seem strange to start a new year at this “dead” time, but the growing season really begins with the winter sowing of crops, thereby implanting new life in the dormant fields. It was a time of communing with the ancestors, a feature which Celtic Christians incorporated into the festival of All Souls, a direct legacy of the ancient festival.

Storytelling began in earnest during the long, dark, winter nights; many of these tales would have been ghost-stories about the Otherworld, whose gates stood wide open at this time, allowing the dead to walk among the living, but also to meddle in our affairs.

Only those in disguise would venture out on this night to confuse the sidhe, the Faerie kind and the feared, though revered ancestors; a custom which has been passed down to us as Mischief Night, Halloween and trick or treat.

Sow-en is a good time for recycling, transforming or throwing away whatever is stale or outworn.

Sow-en became the Eve of All Hallows – the day before the Catholic festival of All Hallows or All Saints. Many Catholics today observe All Saints Day with services remembering loved ones who have died. And Festive Day of the Dead celebrations are popular in Latino cultures.

However, as with the other grafted religious holiday, many of Sow – en’s pagan aspects remained with Halloween. Among them, bonfires, trick – or – treating, and the darker, spookier vestiges.

Today, some people with a cultural interest will observe Celtic New Year with music, food and dancing. Some people who seriously practice witchcraft will observe Sow – en with pagan religious rites. And some people looking for a good time will dress up and act silly just for the fun of it.

Whatever you participate in, sacred or pagan, Halloween holds fear, suspense, goblins and ghosts….and candy for all of us. I hope you have a good time.

Your Secret Weapon: The Sixth Sense – Volume 3

Annette Martin — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 07:14:55 +0000

Last month we left off with taking an inventory of yourself and finding out where you are in your Sixth Sense development. How did you do? Write back so that I can answer some questions you might have.

One of the important steps to begin our new adventure in discovering our Sixth Sense is to look at how we process our brain, tune into our body and understand who we really are!

Left Brain Connection to the Right Brain

LEFT RIGHT

Language	Intuition
Mathematics	Art
Reasoning	Creativity
Physical World	Imagination
Science	Insight
Logic

By a process of relaxation and exercises, you will be learning how to connect this network of fibers linking your left brain to your right brain. When we are receiving insight or a flash through our sixth sense, we are creating an arc of energy that reaches over from the right brain to the left brain. It is then processed into either a feeling, picture, odors, taste, or just a “knowing.” The sides of our brain control the opposite sides of the body.

We all have the capacity to learn how to develop this skill. I do not feel that being aware of our sixth sense is supernatural, beyond our comprehension, or devil worship, as some may believe.

Can I Tune into My Body and Mind?

If you want to know what is wrong with your body, you can tune into the body through your right brain and ask it, the answer will come to you. It may come in a dream or a flash of thought or just a knowingness that you should go and visit your doctor. Let your mind talk to you and whisper the answers that your conscious, Left Brain is covering up.

Don’t try to get the answer, let it come to you. One of hardest things for my students to do is to just let go and let the answer appear. It might take a few days, hours or minutes to get an answer but you will begin to understand how your body operates after awhile.

Throughout my career of teaching others to develop their Sixth Sense, I have felt very adamant that we need to understand who we are first, how we process information, how we feel, what our personal experiences have been.

It is most important that you know yourself before beginning to read another person. You do not want to get your emotions and thoughts mixed up with the client, friend, patient, loved one, etc.

Understanding Who You Are Can Help You

How you think - basically determines not only what you are but how you are, how others react to you, how you react to them, and what constitutes the real values in life and living. Don’t you think it is time to devote a few minutes a day to the business of getting in touch with your own mind so that you can learn to operate it more efficiently?

We think in mental pictures and not in words! Everything that happens to us takes the form of a mental picture in your memory. Recorded with it is the feeling or emotional reaction you had at the time. Perhaps you had an aroused feeling of hate or fear, these impressions have now become a part of your subconscious mind.

We all have had the experience of discovering and saying, “What is the name of that mutual friend of ours? I can’t quite remember it.” Then the next morning I’ll remember it. You’ve had that same experience. So we all have the experience of asking ourselves a question that gets answered by ourselves later on. In other words, this tells us we have a reliable subconscious functioning operative in our brains even while we sleep.

Even if an event happened in the past, it is still having an effect upon you. All of your experiences, up to the present moment are still alive in another form in your memory stream. If this were not true, then you could not recall them at will or be mentally or emotionally disturbed upon remembering an unhappy situation, or fear the recurrence of some tragic or regretted circumstance.

You are influenced not only by how you react, mentally and emotionally, to past experiences, but by the nature of your desires and aspirations as well as your fears and hates. Your subconscious mind is designed to reproduce for you, in your outer life, whatever you picture.

Remember that the subconscious mind has no capacity for reasoning. It merely follows along what the conscious mind has dictated, accepting all feelings and associated mental pictures, as though they were blueprints to be reproduced in your outer world. Your conscious mind, with the exercise of your reason and your will, represents the only force that can change or eliminate these pictures that the subconscious mind is holding.

If you keep telling your subconscious mind that it is impossible for it to transcend space and time, then you will never be able to experience ESP or your Sixth Sense. You must remember that your subconscious mind cannot reason! I must repeat, it only can follow your direction issued by your conscious mind.

To be continued…

May the White Light Be With You,

Clients have included movie stars, doctors, lawyers, journalists, TV and radio personalities, famous singers, writers, artists, teachers, genius engineers, CEO’s, TV producers, international diplomats and many more.

Excerpts from, “Discovering Your Psychic World,” by Annette Martin http://www.annette-martin.com

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