Some workplaces have a bowling team or a book club. But one east Valley Motor Vehicle Department office had a paranormal investigation team.
What started as a group of coworkers staying in haunted hotels together on the weekends turned into one of the longest running active paranormal teams in the state, held together by a found family bond and a shared love of history, travel and all things spooky.
"We're not aggressive. We're just friendly ghosthunters," said Debe Branning, the leader of the MVD Ghostchasers for over 30 years. "We don't egg them on or say, 'Demons, come out'. It's more like, 'We're here if you have any messages for us or you want to show us something.'"
The trip that changed everything
It started out with a trip to the Gadsden Hotel in Douglas in the early '90s.
The young group of coworkers enjoyed "Ghostbusters" and other paranormal shows and movies that were popular at the time. Branning had the idea to take some friends to stake out the historic hotel one weekend and see if they could find any ghosts of their own.
"There were no guidebooks, no TV shows to mimic. We simply went into a location, took film pictures, tape recorders, camcorders and wrote down a lot of notes," Branning said. "Now you can go on the internet and look up how to record a ghost, but we were just flying by the seat of our pants."
The first trip was about five people, Branning said. But when other coworkers heard them recounting their adventures in the office the following Monday, they wanted in. The next weekend, about eight people attended. Eventually the group comprised a caravan of three to four cars and multiple hotel rooms and adopted the name MVD Ghostchasers.
"Almost every other payday, a bunch of us would make that drive down to Douglas, or sometimes we'd go to Bisbee or Tombstone, places like that. But that's really how we got started," Branning said.
'History and mystery go hand in hand'
Not everyone in the group were "believers," at least not at the beginning. Branning suspected that some coworkers tagged along simply to avoid FOMO. But even the most skeptical member of the group came around one night after using a Ouija board to "contact" a spirit that the group believed may have been Pancho Villa. The "spirit" used Spanish to communicate, but the most significant answer, Branning said, was when it gave them the name of his horse and, after fact checking it a few days after the trip, appeared correct when it spelled a shortened version of "Siete."
Branning has believed in ghosts and the paranormal since she was a small child. Her first ghost memory was when she was 5 or 6 and saw apparitions of other children that no one else could see dressed in old-fashioned clothing playing in her Nebraska backyard.
She moved to Arizona in the '70s when she was in her early twenties. At her first Tempe apartment near University and McClintock Drives, she experienced banging doors, flickering lights and "shadow figures." She guessed that spirits might have been disturbed by nearby construction at the time. (Others have also reported "ghost sightings" near that intersection over the years, including at Four Peaks Brewery on Eighth Street.)
Branning has always had a love for all things mysterious. She's also a huge history buff.
If she suspects she's encountered a ghost, she wants to figure out exactly who it may be. With the MVD Ghostchasers, she's explored old train depots, schools, restaurants and other historic buildings. But simply hearing a bump in the night isn't enough to satisfy Branning. After an encounter, she dives into old newspapers and death certificates to try to figure out the stories behind the spirits.
"I always say history and mystery go hand in hand," she said.
MVD Ghostchasers aren't made for TV
In the MVD Ghostchasers' early days, Branning would do house calls for homeowners who believed they were living amongst spirits. But over time she found that, more than anything else, she loved the historical aspect of ghost hunting. Now, she's more interested in old-timey train depots, hotels, restaurants and other historic places.
Though she's made a few television appearances, she wants people to know that actual ghost hunting is not what it looks like on TV. She said she once asked a producer why they don't make a show about spirits that are helping people instead of just ones that are scaring people. She said he told her nobody would watch a show like that. "He said, 'people want to be scared when they watch these things on TV'."
That's why she decided to start writing books about her findings. Her first book, “Sleeping With Ghosts — A Ghost Hunter’s Guide to AZ’s Haunted Hotels and Inns” came out in 2004, about 10 years after the conception of MVD Ghostchasers.
She now has published over a dozen books documenting her ghostly experiences in Arizona and the American Southwest. She also cohosts ghost tours in Phoenix every fall alongside "Hip Historian" Marshall Shore. Branning's books and ghost tours are more focused on sharing the history of places than on trying to scare people.
Arizona's haunted history
Branning said she could talk for hours about her favorite adventures — and has, in her books, at paranormal conventions, on television and podcasts and plenty more places in between. Some of the most haunted towns she's visited in Arizona are old mining towns like Globe, Jerome and Bisbee, where she has a second home. She teased that her latest book project is about Arizona's Harvey Houses, the railroad-side restaurants and hotels in northern Arizona, including the El Tovar Hotel at the Grand Canyon.
In three decades of ghost hunting, Branning and the MVD Ghostchasers have seen more of Arizona than almost anyone. But one of the most significant experiences in Branning's ghost hunting career was a visit to the Old Congress Cemetery, about half an hour north of Wickenburg. While she's heard or "felt" dozens of ghosts over the years, only a few times in her life has she seen what appeared to be a fully formed human apparition. One of those times was at that cemetery.
She and a couple of other crew members were stopped there during what she called a "cemetery crawl," which she likened to her own version of "The Amazing Race." It involved visiting multiple cemeteries across Arizona to look for specific "clues" or landmarks. Her carpool was the first of the team to arrive, so they stood chatting near some of the older graves while they waited for the rest of the MVD Ghostchasers to catch up.
It was starting to storm, Branning recalled, so at first glance, she thought nothing of the sight of some gray-ish figures wearing long coats just over the hill. She said she thought they might have been members of her group, so she told the two other members with her to go fetch them while she waited in her spot in case others arrived.
However, as her friends approached the spot where they had seen the people in coats, they lost sight of said strangers and were met instead with nothing but empty space. They should have left muddy footprints due to the rain, Branning said, but when she and the crew looked, they saw only their own.
MVD Ghostchasers went from coworkers to found family
When Branning started leading ghost exhibitions over 30 years ago, her daughter, Nikki, was just a child. Today, as an adult, Nikki Wheeler still hunts for ghosts alongside her mother.
"I was like the little mascot, at the time," Wheeler joked.
She assumed that her classmates at the time probably thought the ghost hunting adventures she went on with her mom were silly, but her favorite part as a kid were the fun things that they'd do along the way on their road trips.
Three decades later, the remaining members of the OG ghost gang are even closer than some families. When they meet up, they reminisce over shared memories not only of their ghostly adventures, but also of all of the things in between, from weddings to birthdays to watching Wheeler grow up before the entire group's eyes.
Over the years, some members of the original ghost hunting team have left — some moving away and some passing away. But around half a dozen friends still regularly go on trips together.
Tips for ghost hunting from the OG
"To be considered one of the pioneers of ghost hunting in Arizona, it makes me proud that other people have, through the years, gone on and made their own teams to learn more," Branning said.
She has some advice for anyone who wants to start ghost hunting.
It's easier to hunt for ghosts at night, Branning said. "Our minds are busier in the daytime. If your mind is busy, you can't think about or see ghosts because you're thinking about your day. Where at night, it's dark and you're more relaxed, so your mind is able to allow more things in."
She urges ghost hunters to respect the places that they're visiting and not vandalize historic property or enter spaces without permission. And, if serious about the mission, she suggests doing research about the history of the place being investigated.
Most important, she said it's vital to be patient and make sure to enjoy the entire ride, even if you don't find anything on your first try.
"It's kind of like going fishing," Branning said. "Sometimes you're sitting there all night and you don't catch any fish. Sometimes we'd go out there and we'd see absolutely nothing. But we still had fun. It was about the lifelong friendships that were made along the way."
Reach the reporter at eddie.fontanez@azcentral.com. Follow @ERFontanez on Instagram.
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: For AZ ghost hunters, 'history and mystery go hand in hand' | Exclusive
