Sightings – S1E08 – Ghosts – Moss Beach Distillery – 1992
“...a deluge of eyewitness accounts warranted more sophisticated diagnostic tools…”
“...we’re installing a infrared detector, a microwave detector, a ultrasonic detector…”
“The Blue Lady is quite comfortable with us, and we’re comfortable with her. We’ll protect her, as much as we can.”
“Despite their battery of detection devices and psychic input, the Blue Lady of Moss Beach did not appear…”
“Since most people have a sense of humor, I think most ghosts do too.”
A relatively routine haunting where nothing shows up. A distillery on the beach in California is haunted by the ghost of a woman killed over an affair, but the ghost is lighthearted and liked by the staff.
Moss Beach Distillery is also still open and also still a haven for ghost hunters. But not the ghost hunters of Ghost Hunters, who in 2009 investigated Moss Beach Distillery and found...an elaborate system of effects set up to stage ghostly activity. Loyd Auerbach claims the staged effects were set up in the late 1990s, with his knowledge, but that they don't detract from the "real" haunting since they're only set up in places where the Blue Lady is not reported to show up, and they keep a log so they can tell apart "real" and "fake" apparitions, and they don't have to mention it's fake because everyone knows already. Sounds believable!
Despite his claims that activity dates back to the 1930s, according to a 2021 story there's little evidence that the Blue Lady's story happened - and some evidence it was ripped off from a story by Dashiell Hammett - and no known references to the Blue Lady before new owners gave a interview in 1981.
...I thought this would be a mundane case, but this may be my longest post yet, and the first where the story in question is conclusively debunked since the Gainesville one. Imagine getting exposed by the incisive skepticism of the Ghost Hunters (TM).
Shout out to June Morrall, the descriptionless one, and Keith Buerke for the greatest job description yet:
The end-of-episode promo isn't Cops this time, but a special called Diana: Prisoner in the Palace, asking “is Princess Di the victim of a uncaring and unfaithful husband?” Which...yes, and also he's King of England now. Fun times.
