Looking for an evening filled with a bit of history and mystery? El Paso Ghost Tours offers a historical and paranormal experience you may never forget! The evening begins with a leisurely walk through the streets of El Paso, Texas with your host, Leon Baker.
Baker, the owner of El Paso Ghost Tours, is an avid paranormal investigator and tech specialist along with his team of knowledgeable investigators. Their goal is to bring guests a step closer towards the paranormal by providing an experience somewhat close to what it is like when participating on a real investigation. They encourage guests to use their personal photo, video and audio devices, and other paranormal equipment devices on the tours. The group enjoys taking guests into places where they have personally encountered the paranormal, giving you the chance to perhaps share the same phenomena.
Tour guests meet at 7:45 P.M. in front of the haunted De Soto Hotel which was featured on a recent episode of Travel Channel’s “Ghost Adventures.” Leon Baker greets his guests dressed as a Texas Ranger and gives a brief history of early El Paso history. Leon informed the group that he has been leading the tours almost every Friday night for the last ten years. The man really loves his job and the passion shows!
He casually led the group down Mills Avenue filling the tour with the history of the old 1917 Post Office and the Cortez Building (1925) where LBJ and JFK met to make plans for their upcoming trip to Dallas in 1963. Turning on Mesa Street we learned of the German spy missions of World War l, and buildings where traitors of the Mexican/US Border Wars hid away. Why, even Pancho Villa bought candies and ice cream in what was once a confectionary store. (now CVS)
It was fun to see the untouched “ghost signs” (painted ads on the old red bricks) that were once hidden behind a historic bank. Some guests say they have seen a ghost on the fifth floor of the Caples Building on Mesa and San Antonio. Snap a photo and see if he appears to you!
We stopped at the site where John Wesley Hardon was shot dead in the Acme Saloon in 1893 by Constable John Selman. It was said John Wesley Hardon—a most feared gunman, shot and killed more than 30 men. Does his spirit and those he murdered still linger in this spot?
The tour winds past the haunted Plaza Theater and towering Plaza Hotel where Conrad Hilton and Elizabeth Taylor kept a suite. The group passed by the San Jacinto Plaza once the home of frolicking alligators in the pond from 1889 to 1965. Only a fountain statue in their likeness remains…so they say.
Back at the De Soto Hotel, we were led inside and down the stairs into the dark basement mostly used for storage. Leon gather the group around and explained the De Soto hotel, built in 1905, is still the home to a few dozen living and breathing residents—and a few that aren’t!
He told the group that the team, El Paso Ghost Tours, know of at least three spirits that call the De Soto Hotel their home. One spirit is James, a gentleman who died on the premises and was not found for almost a week. Another is a playful little girl about eight or nine years old they call Sara who enjoys staying close to the female motherly visitors. It is believed (but not proven) that there was once a group of people who entered the menacing basement to do satanic rituals and every once in a while, a dark shadowy entity can be seen or felt in the doorway of the back room.
Paranormal equipment was loaned to those in need and the group of twelve guests and the paranormal team of six began a short EVP session to let the spirits know of out intentions. Once our eyes and hearts had adjusted to being in the darkened basement, everyone moved on to the back room where voices have been heard, lights have been known to go on and off, and objects have moved on their own. There was another EVP session, an assembly with a large ghost box, photos were snapped as we sat and monitored a Flir camera set up. All in all, the group spent over and hour experimenting with various pieces of paranormal equipment—one device at a time.
At the end of the night, Leon gathered the group in the adjoining room and thanked the spirits for letting us come to visit. He bid them farewell and asked that all spirits remain in their De Soto realm and they were not to follow any of the tour guests’ home.
You can book a tour with Old El Paso Tours at www.elpasoghostours.com or reach them by email at verifiedelpasoghosttours@gmail.com Proceeds goes toward usage rent of the De Soto Hotel basement, research, and new equipment for the tours.
Debe Branning has been the director of the MVD Ghostchasers–a Mesa/Bisbee, AZ based paranormal team since 1994. The team conducts investigations of haunted, historical locations throughout Arizona and has offered paranormal workshop/investigations since 2002. Debe has been a guest lecturer at Ottawa University, Central Arizona College, Arizona State University, Scottsdale Community College, and South Mountain Community College. She has been a speaker at science fiction conventions such as Phoenix ComiCon, CopperCon, FiestaCon, HauntedCon and AZParacon. Debe has been the guest speaker at many historical societies and libraries talking about historic/haunted Arizona.
She has appeared in an episode of “Streets of Fear” for FearNet.com which aired October 2009 and on an episode of TRAVEL CHANNEL’S “Ghost Stories” about haunted Jerome, Arizona in July 2010. She recently appeared as an extra in the 2017 horror movie “The Covenant”. She enjoys assisting in the research field for various Travel Channel TV shows such as ‘Ghost Stories’, ‘Haunted Highway’, and ‘Deadly Possessions’ and MTV’s ‘Fear’. She has traveled, toured and investigated at haunted locations across the United States, England, Scotland, Ireland and Mexico.
Debe is the author of “Sleeping With Ghosts-A Ghost Hunter’s Guide to AZ’s Haunted Hotels and Inns” (2004), “Grand Canyon Ghost Stories” (2012), “The Graveyard Shift–Arizona’s Historic and Haunted Cemeteries” (2012), “Dining With the Dead–Arizona’s Historic and Haunted Restaurants and Cafes” (2017) and a series of three children’s books, “The Adventures of Chickolet Pigolet: 1. “The Bribe of Frankenbeans” —-2. “Murmur on the Oink Express” —-3. “You Ought to be in Pig-tures”. For 7 years Debe penned 3 columns for Examiner.com titled: “Phoenix Travel Adventures,” “Arizona Haunted Sites” and “Haunted Places” so travelers could know where they might find a ghost or two when they visited Arizona and the United States. She was the Managing Editor of “Paranormal Investigator Magazine.” As a paranormal travel writer, Debe traveled to Europe to cover haunted castles, jails, ships, inns, cemeteries and ghost walking tours. She has been the guest of several US tourism departments such as Carlsbad, Historic Hotels of the Rockies, Salem, and Biloxi.
Debe is a preservation activist with a special interest in preserving historic cemeteries. She is on the board of directors of the Pioneers’ Cemetery Association and the Arizona Genealogical Advisory Board. She is also one of the co-hosts of the Association of Gravestones Studies in Arizona.
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