Arriving at the Thomas House Hotel
After coming back from Savannah, GA and having so many interesting experiences at the 17Hundred90 Inn, we decided to join in on a public ghost hunt at the Thomas House Hotel in Red Boiling Springs, TN later that year. We’ve attended 2 of these hunts in total as of today and have left with experiences both times. Our first stay was in Room 38 and our second stay was in Room 36. The most notably haunted room is Room 37, which is said to have been “Sarah’s Room" who is believed to be the spirit of a child that still roams the home today. We have been hoping to return at least one more time to book this room specifically and see if we have an increase in activity here someday.
When we first arrived at the Thomas House, we were welcomed in by the friendly staff and given the keys to our rooms. After an hour or so, we met up in the dining area to enjoy the home-cooked dinner buffet while the hosts gave a briefing of the history of the hotel and showcased videos of captured paranormal activity while we ate. After dinner, we began the guided hunt of the halls and seance room. This was a public event for all of the guests with around 20 or so people in total, so we were all split into smaller groups and sent in different directions. The group experience turned out to work really well, with the groups being split up enough to not hear each other while being sectioned out into different areas. Even during the quietest of times where I swear you could hear a pin drop, we never experienced any issues with cross-contamination of voices and noises from the other two groups in their locations. After the guided hunt, which lasted a couple of hours, guests were free to roam the hotel and investigate on their own until checkout after the provided breakfast in the morning.
The Seance Room
In the seance room, they had a table set up with an Ouija board and different ghost hunting equipment such as REM pods, which detect a break in the energy field when you get extremely close to them, and basic cat balls, which will light up and flash when fully physically touched. They also had EMF readers on each end of the “Yes” and “No” answers on the Ouija board and they had voice recording devices running during the session.
While a few volunteers began using the Ouija board, they began to get responses fairly quickly. To me, I don’t believe that Ouija boards can signify if a location is haunted, as in my experience, an Ouija board will work at any location you choose to use it in. However, it could have the potential to be helpful in speaking to any spirits who may reside nearby where it is being used, but it is always iffy if who you’re talking to is who they say they are. The power and manipulation of Ouija boards could potentially be an entire blog on its own, but I will leave it as that for now.
Using the Ouija board and getting responses wasn’t nearly as shocking as what happened around us during these sessions. At certain intervals while receiving responses, it seemed that something there was so powerful that it would spike multiple pieces of equipment to go off at the same time. On the table were 2-3 REM pods that will flash and emit flashing lights when the energy field around them is interrupted. If you run your hand near the antennae, it will flash a bit on a side that is nearest to where your hand is and let out some beeps. If you full on grab the antennae with your hand, the REM pod will light up all around, indicating that something is completely engulfing its surroundings, and emit a long, steady drawn out beep until you release it. During this Ouija board session, the multiple REM pods would instantaneously light up to their full extent, emitting full on steady beeps as if someone was grabbing the antennas. Below is a clip of these spiking during the session when someone asked the spirit to "calm down" (I, too, exasperatedly feel spikes in my energy field when someone asks me to calm down, so completely understandable there!) The cat balls, which only light up if physically tapped, would also go off unexpectedly and begin flashing, sometimes at the same time as the REM pods would. In my short video clips, I was only able to capture the REM pods, but I do recall the cat ball activity as well. Another guest in our group had his own REM pod set up on a smaller table nearby and his would also spike to its highest extent during this session. It takes an intense amount of energy to simultaneously set off these devices, especially when placed in separated locations, so whoever we were speaking with, assuming the evidence was completely legitimate, is definitely a powerful source of energy amongst us who is not shy in communicating their existence to the living.
The question always comes up, “could these equipment interactions have been manipulated by the hosts of these events?” When I first attended this event, I wasn’t too sure on how the REM pods truly work and if there was any way for these to be manipulated to go off using some kind of alternate button, etc. Now that I have my own REM pods and cat balls, I understand a bit better on how these work and can say that the only thing that sets these off is high levels of energy or physical touch breaking through the fields around the device. The other question would arise, “could they have some type of electrical device that emits high enough energy levels to manipulate all devices to react at once?” For the REM pods, I can’t say 100% that I know for sure whether something like that could have affected them, but, for the cat balls, from my current understanding, they do not react to anything outside of being physically touched. These cat balls were solely designed as toys for your pet, so they are pretty simple objects that were created to entertain your cat with flashing lights as they physically move them around your house while playing. With this knowledge, I truly have never seen them be set off by any electrical currents, however these are still electrical devices with electronic components inside of them, so it may be possible. To me, through my perception of the occurances happening around me, the consistency not being perfect, and the amount of energy radiating from the Ouija board responses themselves, I’ve concluded that there is a very high probability of these interactions with the equipment being a genuine force from the contacted spirit of the Ouija board as opposed to any staff playing it up for quick thrills for the group. You can also see the EMF reacting near the board at around a level 3/4 during these moments as well. This device does detect changes in the electromagnetic field so while it can be a compelling piece of evidence at times, using it as a basis to determine whether an electric current or paranormal phenomena was setting everything off in this circumstance is obsolete and can't really be used to debunk or verify legitimacy either way.
During the second trip there, which also coincides more with my belief that the interactions experienced the time prior were likely legitimate, we didn’t experience the same levels of high spiking energy that we had the first time we were at the Thomas House. This time, the spirit we seemed to have contacted on the board appeared more calm so this second session went without nearly as much chaotic energy as the first.
The Green Hallway
During our first investigation of the green hallway, Amy wandered into an open room nearby and believes she felt two separate taps on her shoulder before deciding it was time to step out of there. At one point, Amy and another member who was with us felt an intense temperature drop in the doorway. For awhile, they pondered this cold spot until eventually they looked up and had a good laugh at the rather large air vent emitting the A/C above their heads. Nothing paranormal there, but the taps on the shoulder are still unexplained, as they were the only two (living) people in the room at the time. We attempted many EVP (electronic voice phenomena) sessions, which detect responses that we may not be able to hear with the human ear, but we didn’t have much luck. I do recall some people claiming to have heard infamous whistling in the hall but did not ever experience this myself.
When we arrived in the green hallway during our second visit, it was quite silent for us. There are many reports of the man whistling a tune or reoccurring images and movements in the mirrors in the hall, but we unfortunately didn’t seem to experience anything too crazy and unexplainable during our second investigation here.
The White Hallway
During the first night here, this hall presented an incredible display of activity. On the ground were a few balloons scattered across the floors. After a few attempts to make contact without luck, I remember my focus falling onto a balloon near my foot. I’m generally a fairly quiet person and was pretty new to the world of investigating, so I was not normally the first person to volunteer my own questions during the group sessions. For some reason this time, I had the urge to ask any spirit to move the balloon. Within a mere few seconds, the balloon began to slowly rotate on the floor beside me. Everyone was in awe, including our main host, who excitedly expressed his amazement and checked with one of his staff to make sure he was recording, as they had never witnessed this before. As we asked more questions, the balloon would roll slowly towards certain people who requested it or it would just begin to spin on the floor consistently. You could physically see when the balloon was touched as it moved in a motion that was not coherent with a simple gust of wind, almost as if someone tapped it or gave it a little push in the direction they wanted it to go in. This went on for at least 15 minutes while the other balloons around it were completely unaffected. If this had been a draft or airflow, the other balloons would have certainly been affected as well, but only this one balloon had consistent movement for 15+ minutes straight. Sadly, since I was close to the balloon, I was using my built in flashlight on my phone for everyone to be able to see it and did not record the event. I am not sure what happened to the footage that was recorded by the team member, unfortunately, as we had never seen it get posted to our knowledge. But this was a remarkable event to have witnessed and I believe it very well could have likely been the child spirit "Sarah" who resides in the nearby rooms just making her presence known through a fun game of rolling a balloon back and forth with her house guests.
Our second visit, we did not receive much interaction. We did have a cat ball go off a few times but it was pretty inconsistent with any answers so it may have just been manipulated by an air vent in the room nearby.
The Locket Pendulum
At one point, I found myself alone in the room, which was room 38 during our first stay. I had a small locket in my purse and curiously decided to try something a little different and see if it could be manipulated like the balloon we had just experienced in the hallway right outside our room. I rested my elbow on my leg and held my hand as steady as I could while I asked around me if anyone was here and if so, they could feel free to play with the locket. With the story of the ghost girl named "Sarah" residing in this area of the hotel, I thought she might appreciate such a trinket. As I sat there with this locket dangling, I felt it begin to sway slowly and then pick up speed until eventually, it was in a full swinging motion with me still being as still as humanly possible while talking and thanking “Sarah” for making herself known. At this time, I also had an EVP device running in case any responses could be heard as I spoke to her. I then asked if I could listen back on the device now and if yes, if she could stop the locket from swinging now. Sure enough, I could feel the locket slow down before coming to a complete stop. Unfortunately, I didn't hear anything out of the ordinary in the EVP playback.
This, to me, is a piece of personal evidence that I truly love, but at the same time, it is very hard to use as a convincing piece to present to other people. I understand that it is nearly impossible to believe that I am not moving this on my own, as in the video, since I move the camera around, which makes it appear as if I am moving more than I actually am, it is impossible to prove that I was sitting as still as I was. The best thing that I can point out to watch for is the fact that whether or not my hand appears to move a lot during the video, you can pay attention towards the end when I ask it to stop. During this time, one can notice that I don’t move any more or less than I had been during the entire recording, yet it comes to a stop when asked. With the momentum of the swinging, this would have required a bit more effort and hand movement for me to stop the swinging in such a short time frame.
This session was very similar to a pendulum session which has been used in divination to communicate with spirits throughout history. With the tugging I felt on the chain and the force used to move this suspended locket, I do believe that I very well may have made contact with "Sarah" that night.
The following video was taken during my second stay in Room 36, where I attempted the locket interaction again. As you can see, I didn't have quite the same luck here.
The ...Fire?
During the second investigation of the Thomas House Hotel, I had one of my most vivid and realistic paranormal experiences to date. This was the kind of experience that isn’t able to be measured on any fancy devices or showcased visually for everyone else to speculate on, but this is in the category of those wild and unexplainable events that millions of people have reported experiencing on a personal level.
After the night of investigating had ended, and I had been asleep for a little while, I was very abruptly awaken with all senses in full force at once. In the hallway, I could hear the sounds of running footsteps and muffled, panic voices. As I shot open my eyes, the entire room was engulfed in a thick black hazy smoke and I began to immediately cough and gasp for air as I tried to sit up in bed. I instantly realized that the building was on fire and that we had to get out, but almost as soon as I was sitting upright, within another blink of an eye, the room was back to normal and there was Amy, sound asleep in the other bed. The muffled chaos from the hallway was gone and all was still and quiet again. I remember sitting there on the edge of the bed in shock for a moment while I tried to figure out what had happened. I have had my share of bad dreams and vivid nightmares, but nothing like this, where I was in full awareness and awake for those few seconds while experiencing a moment of pure chaos and panic. I had smelt the smoke, tasted the smoke, and even felt the smoky air in my lungs as I coughed out loud trying to clear them. I felt the sting in my eyes as I squinted through the haze while coughing and throwing the covers off of me to sit up. I had felt the floors thumping beneath my bed and even felt the bed shake as people were running down the hallways to get out and I heard the muffled shouting panic as clear as day right on the other side of the wall behind my headboard. It was a bizarre experience and I wondered where in the world this could have came from.
The next morning, as we were preparing to leave, I casually asked one of the staff there, who was a relative to the owner, about any fires in the past. He told me that a part of the original Thomas House had actually burnt down many decades ago and was rebuilt, and showed us where it was that the fire had occurred at. Of course, it was right where our room was located within the White Hallway. If I recall correctly, I don’t believe he mentioned any fatalities during the fire, but I could be wrong.
Regardless, I believe that this was truly one of the most mind-blowing potentially paranormal experiences that I have ever had. I can still recall how all of my physical senses were manipulated into realism and then how quickly it all seemed to be back to normal in a flash. The reactions I felt seemed way too strong to have just been a vivid nightmare, especially as I don’t remember dreaming of anything in particular at all prior to waking up in such a smoke-filled, chaotic situation. I remembered where I was the millisecond I woke up and was fully aware of my surroundings, whereas most of the time, when you wake up in a different place and especially out of a vivid dream, it takes you a split moment to remember where you are. For some reason, I guess the house just wanted to show me this glimpse of its prior misfortune and though it was startling, I am grateful for that chance to step back into a previous timeline, albeit for mere seconds, to be able to have this experience to remember for a lifetime.
Extra: The Doll
While on my first visit there, exploring the rooms of antiques they had on display, I caught sight of a gorgeously dressed Madame Alexander doll. I am not personally a doll collector but I was really drawn to her and debated on buying her. On my way out the next day, due to the hefty price tag, I decided against it and headed home. The next time we came back, she was still there where I had left her, behind the main desk. I knew I had to get her this time and so I negotiated out a good deal with the owners and took her home. She’s now comfortably a part of my home and don’t worry, no negative happenings have taken place since she’s been here. She is just a lovely doll that serves as a reminder of the amazing times and encounters we’ve experienced at the infamous Thomas House Hotel.
Extra: The Cat!
The Thomas House also has a sweet little mascot cat who hangs out on the large front porch. I had to get a picture of him of course.
Conclusion: Is The Thomas House Truly Haunted?
The Thomas House Hotel is a remarkable place filled with stories and history and brimming with spirits, seemingly eager to continue telling their stories. Through all of my personal encounters at this location, I do believe that it is, in fact, truly haunted by the people who have taken residence there in the past. The staff there are great people and they serve lovely home-cooked dinners and breakfasts for their guests. The location itself is just beautiful, tucked away in the mountainous wooded hills of Tennessee. There used to be a small chapel on the property that people could investigate, but we weren't able to do so, as it is in too much disrepair to allow people to enter it safely. It is pictured in the extra photos below.
They still do regular hunts at the Thomas House during some weekends most months, so if you are interested in experiencing it yourself, feel free to Google their location to find their affiliated ghost hunting crew and sign yourself up for a weekend of fun!
If you have your own experiences you would like to share or have any questions on ours, please feel free to leave a comment below! Thanks so much for reading! 👻
~Kylynn
Quick Disclaimer: This blog is not sponsored in any way by the Thomas House or its affiliates, I am simply just putting my own experiences out into the world for anyone interested in reading.
Just a few extra photos taken during our stays:
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