Ghost, demons, heaven, hell, exorcisms, voodoo. They frighten and fascinate us — whether we believe in them or not.
Peter Cannon, a Green Acres Middle School English teacher, is hoping the public’s appetite for the supernatural will translate into success on the small screen. Since Jan. 3, a Fresno television station has broadcast “Stories of the Supernatural,” a half-hour television show Cannon created and executive produces from his Visalia home.
The show deals with “anything paranormal,” said Cannon, 54, who also directs, edits and performs some of the show’s music with his wife.
He’s also bankrolling the project, using the money he’s made running his own, local film company and editing local television shows on top of his teaching job. Cannon declined to say how much he’s spent, but money has gone toward:
- Production staff and actors, many of them students and entertainment industry beginners.
- Travel expenses.
- Station KAIL, which has agreed to run seven original episodes and repeat six of them over 13 consecutive Saturdays. Two have aired since Jan. 3.
The show
Each episode is hosted by Vincent Sola of Tulare, a dairy consultant and part-time actor.
“Between life and death. Between heaven and hell, there’s another world. A fourth dimension,” Sola — standing in a cemetery — says in the first episode.
How real is this world? That depends on whether you believe, Sola tells the audience.
Those interviewed for the series definitely believe, he said in an interview. And it’s apparently contagious.
“You almost have to believe they’ve seen something,” Sola said.
In the first episode Sola introduced three individuals:
- Curtis Kelly, a Connecticut man who describes how, in 1971, he died of a drug overdose, was dragged down to hell and managed to return through his mother’s prayers.
- Mary K. Baxter of Chattanooga, Tenn., who claims that angels took her to see what happens to stillborn babies.
- Dallas Pattee, a Tulare County resident who has spent years compiling ghost stories from the Central Valley — including some of her own.
In that first episode, Pattee — the only Tulare County resident profiled so far — describes growing up in a haunted house. In her late grandparents’ farmhouse in Monson, southwest of Dinuba, she regularly heard floors creak and saw doorknobs turn and doors open and close on their own.
“As a child, I didn’t want to tell my classmates this happened in my house,” Pattee said in a recent interview. “They wouldn’t believe it. And kids can be mean.”
Now she has no concerns about sharing her stories — even with skeptics.
“They don’t have to believe in it,” she said.
Pattee’s family home is not the only place she claims to have had supernatural experiences.
Her mother promised that after she died, she would find a way to communicate with her daughter. Not long after her mother’s death in 1982, Pattee walked into her dining room to find all the cabinets unlatched.
“I took it as a sign,” she said. “Mom was telling me she was OK.”
Pattee also claims to have captured ghost-like apparitions on film. One looked like a human-shaped beam of light, while others, photographed during the conversion of Visalia’s Hadley Funeral Home into a bank — took the form ghostly orbs.
Some of those photos are featured in the television show.
But so is James Randi, a famed professional skeptic. Randi has appeared several times on "The Tonight Show."
The orbs and other images seen in photos are caused by light reflecting off bits of dust, rain, snow or even small insects, he said.
"I see a lot of evidence [of the paranormal], but it's not convincing," he says on "Stories of the Supernatural."
Pattee doesn't mind being challenged on the show.
"I like [the show's] diversity," she said. "[Cannon] covers all angles. I think it's very educational to people — especially people who have had these experiences."
Among the other tales Cannon has filmed for "Stories of the Supernatural" are those of a professional exorcist and a man who claims to have turned down an offer from the devil to buy his soul.
For each episode, person-on-the-street interviews are filmed in downtown Visalia. Participants discuss their own paranormal beliefs and experiences.
Off the set
For a man currently embedded in the paranormal, Cannon seems pretty darn normal.
His home isn't covered with pentagrams, shrunken heads or zombie-movie posters. Nor does he dress in black or shy away from sunlight.
There are a few props from the show scattered about, including a handmade demon mask and plastic cubes used to recreate one person's description of hell.
Cannon's interest in the supernatural is a recent occurrence. He got into videography and editing mostly by teaching it in school, and few years ago he was hired to edit some English- and Spanish-language shows.
For a show called "Quieres Ser Sano" ("Do You Want To Be Healthy") for the Spanish-language Telemundo television network, Cannon, a former Spanish teacher, did person-on-the-street interviews with those who claimed supernatural forces had cured them of various ailments.
Later, he formed his own, home-based production company, Genesis Productions, to film and produce online videos.
The one thing that's surprised Cannon since taking on "Stories of the Supernatural" is that most people seem to have a story to tell. The stories often feature ghosts, angels or miraculous healings, he said.
"It seemed that everybody we talked to, just about, has had something happen," Cannon said.
And that gives Cannon hope that people will watch his show — and that he'll have a ghost of a chance to make it a nationally broadcast television series.
