Hans Holzer (26 January 1920 – 26 April 2009)
[1] was an
Austrian-born, American pioneering
paranormal researcher and author. He wrote well over 100 books on supernatural and occult subjects for the popular market as well as several plays, musicals, films, and documentaries, and hosted a television show, "Ghost Hunter" (not to be confused with
Ghost Hunters, a separate show).
[edit] Career
Holzer was born in Vienna, Austria. His interest in the supernatural was sparked at a young age by stories told to him by his uncle Henry. He went on to study archaeology and ancient history at the
University of Vienna but sensing that war was imminent, his family decided it was unsafe to stay in Austria and left the country for
New York City in 1938. He studied Japanese at
Columbia University and, after studying comparative religion and parapsychology, claimed to have obtained a
Ph.D. at a school called the London College of Applied Science. He went on to teach parapsychology at the
New York Institute of Technology.
His extensive involvement in researching the supernatural included investigating
The Amityville Horror and some of the most prominent haunted locations around the world. He also worked with well-known trance
mediums such as
Ethel Johnson-Meyers,
Sybil Leek, and
Marisa Anderson. Holzer has been credited with creating the term "The Other Side" (already in use, however, in nineteenth century spiritualism) or in full "The Other Side of Life". He is also sometimes credited with having coined the term
ghost hunter, which was the title of his first book on the paranormal published in 1963. However, an earlier book by
Harry Price published in 1936 was titled
Confessions of a Ghost Hunter.
Holzer believed in
life after death and the existence of
ghosts, spirits, and "stay behinds". Ghosts were, according to him, imprints left in the environment which could be "picked up" by sensitive people. Spirits were intelligent beings who could interact with the living; while "stay behinds" were those who found themselves earth-bound after death. He also believed in
reincarnation and the existence of "
levels of consciousness"
[edit] The Amityville Horror
Holzer's most famous investigation was into
The Amityville Horror case. In January 1977, Holzer and spiritual
medium Ethel Meyers entered
112 Ocean Avenue in
Amityville, New York. Meyers claimed that the house had been built over an ancient Native American burial ground and the angry spirit of a
Shinnecock Indian Chief - "Rolling Thunder" - had
possessed the previous occupant,
Ronald Defeo Jr., driving him to murder his family. Photographs taken at the scene revealed curious anomalies such as the halos which appeared in the supposed images of bullet marks made in the original 1974 murders. Holzer's claim that the house was built on Indian sacred land was, however, denied by the local Amityville Historical Society and it was pointed out that it was the
Montaukett Indians, and not the Shinnecocks, who had been the original settlers in the area. However, Indian burial sites have been found all over Long Island, including Amityville, so no one has been able to confirm or deny the burial of an Indian chief on or near the 112 Ocean Avenue property. Holzer went on to write several books about the subject, both fiction and non-fiction.
[edit] References
[edit] External links
[show]
The Amityville Horror
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