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Episode Description
He arrived with felt shoes, a bowl of mercury, and a hunger for fame. When ghost hunter Harry Price drove up to Borley Rectory in 1929, he was stepping into the role he'd spent his whole life rehearsing, and into one of the most controversial paranormal investigations in history.
In this episode of Talking Strange, we dig into the strange, murky world of Harry Price: self-made skeptic, showman, and the man who declared a crumbling Essex rectory "the most haunted house in England." We trace his rise from a staged adolescent ghost hunt to the heights of British paranormal celebrity, his decades-long obsession with Borley's phantom nun, mysterious wall writings, and objects that moved on their own — and the damning posthumous expose that called it all into question.
Was Price a dedicated investigator who genuinely believed? A fraud who manufactured evidence for book deals? Or something more complicated, such as a man whose craving for legend became indistinguishable from the legend itself?
Whether you're a seasoned ghost story enthusiast or new to the world of paranormal history, this episode explores the blurry line between investigation and performance, belief and deception.
Topics covered:
- Harry Price's origins and rise to fame as England's premier ghost hunter
- The dark history of Borley Rectory and its phantom nun legend
- The 1937 experiment: 48 volunteer observers and a year of documented strange occurrences
- The fire, the bones in the cellar, and the investigation that never truly ended
- The 1956 debunking — and why Borley's ghosts refuse to stay buried
Sources include: Alice Vernon's Ghosted, Brian Righi's Ghosts Apparitions and Poltergeists, Lisa Morton's Ghosts: A Haunted History, and David Jaher's The Witch of Lime Street.
If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to Talking Strange and leave a review — it helps more strange history find its audience.
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The Talking Strange Show with Aaron Sagers is a weekly paranormal pop culture show featuring celebrity and author interviews, as well as experts in all things strange and unexplained. Talking Strange is a creation of Aaron Sagers with production help from Michael Ahr.
Host Aaron Sagers is a paranormal TV host and journalist who appears as host of 28 Days Haunted on Netflix, and on Paranormal Caught On Camera on Travel Channel, Discovery+, and MAX streaming service.
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