A paranormal researcher will create a road map to some of the most haunted places in Illinois on Monday.

Chad Lewis will be presenting some of his discoveries and adventures at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the Grand Ballroom of the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union.

Lewis is a paranormal researcher who has written many books about the most haunted places in different states including Wisconsin, Illinois and Iowa.

Lewis said his presentation will be dominantly visual with pictures of the places and things they have captured during their investigation.

“I’m going to give people the background story, the folklore, the eye witness accounts, the equipment we use on our investigations and really just share the scariest hauntings from the state,” Lewis said.

Lewis said he got his start in paranormal research because he grew up in an Unidentified Flying Object capital.

“I was really interested in why people believe in UFOs, and then I started studying psychology at the university, and I really got interested in ghost and crop circles, Big Foot and mysterious creatures,” Lewis said. “It really went from there.”

Lewis said his favorite spot in Illinois was Death Curve in Cambridge, Ill.

“It is a place for years where people were seeing this woman carrying an axe, walking the lonely road,” Lewis said. “No one really know why she was out there, but the legend is that if you drive out to see her, you’ll drive off the road and die.”

He said when he started researching this place, he found out about a woman who killed her six children with an axe.

“It happens quite a bit where I get stories about the legend or these places, and sometimes the real history is not quite the same as the legend, but many times you get the cases, like the case at Death Curve, where it is based on a real case,” Lewis said.

Lewis said he likes the adventure of doing paranormal research.

“When you go to these places, hopefully something happens—maybe it will, maybe it will not—but I’m certainly going to have an adventure,” Lewis said. “You take the back roads, you run into weird people, weird places. I think a lot of people like that as much as the stories of the haunting.”

Lewis said he is looking forward to hearing stories of paranormal activities from the audience.

“One of my favorite things about doing these lectures is not only do I get to tell a lot of great cases and share some places for people to visit, but I also get to hear cases from people,” Lewis said. “I’ve already been receiving stories from people on campus that I’ll talk about that night.”

Lewis said he is always surprised by how many people have experienced some type of paranormal activity.

He said he likes telling people about all the local places people can visit to decide for themselves if it is haunted or not.

“I hope people will not take my word, one way or the other on these cases, but that they’ll actually go and investigate for themselves, visit these places and explore their own backyard,” Lewis said.

Samantha McDaniel can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].