The overhead fluorescent lights flicker inside the University of Maryland, Baltimore County archives. It’s probably because the lightbulbs need to be replaced.

Or it could be ghosts.

The room’s shelves are stacked with books, articles and shoeboxes of artifacts that make up the Eileen J. Garrett Parapsychology Foundation collection, one of the world’s largest archives devoted to the study of hauntings, poltergeists, out-of-body experiences and seances.

You can’t major in paranormal studies at UMBC, but there’s one building with plenty of school spirit(s).

The collection includes more than 12,000 volumes and over 100 periodicals, including rare books and early journals about phenomena outside the scope of natural physical laws.

“It’s a really amazing resource,” said Beth Saunders, associate director and curator of special collections at the university. “The students are really into it because it’s full of fascinating, funky, cool material.”

The university received the collection three years ago, and it’s so extensive that archivists are still in the process of cataloging it.

The materials come from the Parapsychology Foundation, founded by trance medium and research advocate Eileen J. Garrett. It includes information from Garrett’s personal archives, including Polaroids of her in a trance, connecting with those on the other side through a spirit she called Uvani.

UMBC snagged archives because it already had a collection on Ted Serios, an unemployed bellhop from the mid-1900s who claimed to have the ability to transfer images from his mind to film.

Parapsychology arose out of spiritualism, but in the 20th century, the field of study became more methodologically scientific. Scientists would study Garrett and other mediums when they were in a trance, conducting blood work and monitoring their vitals.

The collection has curiosities like spoons with curled handles (purportedly bent by minds) and a game from the 1990s that claimed participants could use their mind, instead of a controller, to play. Called “Mind Skier,” two players would wear a finger monitor and use their thoughts to go left and right. The archive has the game and manual, though Saunders said the librarians haven’t yet played it.

There are also plenty of unsettling pieces — things that truly lack explanation.

That includes the largest collection on the famous ghost of Dr. Bindelof, including a selfie he took.

The spooky tale of Bindelof starts as all horror stories do, with a group of teen boys looking for something to do.

The boys conducted seances between 1929 and 1933. They asked the famed spirit to write notes and show photographs of himself. Legend has it that they put unopened film in a lockbox and when they opened the box at the end of the seance, a photo of the Bindelof stared back at them.

The boys also put a pencil and paper outside their seance circle and asked the spirit to communicate with them. The UMBC archive has the notes that Bindelof and his unnamed spirit friend supposedly scrawled to them.

“It’s kind of amazing to have the writings, the plates, the photographs and the accounts from the boys who were involved,” Saunders said.

Perhaps the most popular part of the collection is a taxidermic mongoose.

In 1931, at the remote farmhouse of Doarlish Cashen on the Isle of Man, located in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland, the Irving family supposedly discovered a mongoose who could speak. They called him Gef, pronounced like Jeff.

“I am [a] freak,” Gef is reported to have said. “I have hands, and I have feet.”

While UMBC doesn’t have the real Gef, the team cataloging the archives uses their taxidermic mongoose — whom they also named Gef — as their unofficial mascot.

Guests are welcome to request a viewing of the animal. The collection is open to visitors from noon-4 p.m., Monday through Wednesday, and noon-7 p.m. on Thursdays. Appointments can be made through the collection’s website.

“Gef makes appearances on social media and for classes,” Saunders said.

It’s clear that the team responsible for spending their days among the haunted paraphernalia also have fun. Gef is often posed in the office, sitting on a chair or reading a book.

But is Saunders, who says she is rational and skeptical by nature, a believer?

“The more I learn about this world and meet people who have psychic abilities, the more I believe,” she said. “I’m open to it.”

Banner reporter Cayla Harris contributed to some of the ghost-related puns in this story.

About the Education Hub

This reporting is part of The Banner’s Education Hub, community-funded journalism that provides parents with resources they need to make decisions about how their children learn. Read more.