William Roll, Quintessential Poltergeist Expert
Eminent Parapsychologist Has Excellent Credentials and Achievements
Aug 20, 2009
William Roll’s name is one of the first mentioned when students of parapsychology are asked for names of poltergeist experts. This parapsychologist had a distinguished career and made significant contributions in this part of the paranormal realm.
Roll’s Educational Credentials
William Roll earned a BA with psychology and philosophy majors from the University of California, Berkeley. After a year of graduate work in sociology, Roll went to Oxford University to do research in parapsychology under Professor H.H. Rice and earned a Master of Letters Degree for his thesis, Theory and Experiment in Psychical Research.
Roll was president of the Oxford University Society for Psychical Research. Roll’s PhD Psychology is from Sweden’s Lund University. His thesis was This World or That: An Examination of Parapsychological Findings Suggestive of the Survival of Human Personality After Death.
Roll’s Career Highlights and Accomplishments
William Roll has written several books, including The Poltergeist and more than two hundred scientific articles. He has appeared on numerous segments of Unsolved Mysteries, the Discovery Channel and other televised documentaries. He retired in 1990, but continues to write, speak at conferences and conduct occasional investigations. He’s been teaching parapsychology at the State University of West Georgia as an adjunct professor.
- 1957 – Roll joined the staff of the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke University, working under Dr. J.B. Rhine until 1964. During this time he was appointed Project Director of the Psychical Research Foundation, PRF, and elected president of the Parapsychological Association.
- 1961 – Roll became Project Director of the Psychical Research Foundation, an extension of Rhine’s Laboratory.
- 1986 – Roll was appointed Professor of Psychical Research and Psychology at West Georgia College, now the State University of West Georgia, with funding from the PRF.
- 1996 – Roll earned the Parapsychological Award for a Distinguished Career in Parapsychology.
- 2002 – Roll received the Dinsdale Memorial Award for his RSPK studies. The award was established by The Society for Scientific Exploration’s founding member, councilor, and editor of its journal, Professor Henry Bauer, so that the SSE could recognize noteworthy contributions to the expansion of human understanding through the study of inexplicable phenomena.
Roll’s Most Famous Poltergeist Cases
His first case was in 1958 about objects moving on their own volition in a home on Long Island, NY. The activity was centered on twelve-year-old Jimmy Hermann. Roll and co-investigator J. Gaither Pratt concluded the boy was a human agent poltergeist. This led Roll to coin the term, Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis, RSPK. The case is known as that of the Seaford Poltergeist.
In late 1966 or early 1967, Roll and Pratt invested a case of objects mysteriously moving in the Tropican Arts warehouse. This was the first poltergeist case where scientific experiments were utilized and the case is now known as the Miami Poltergeist, as referecin literature written about it.
Roll's most recognized case was when he was the lead investigator in the 1984 Columbus Poltergeist investigation in which fourteen-year-old Tina Resch was the poltergeist agent. She was examined by a neurologist, screened for psychological problems and tested for PK in Roll’s laboratory. She fit the psychological profile for the human agent poltergeist. Her foster parents, the Resches, abandoned her. Her life was filled with more tragedies, the final and ultimate was when her daughter, Amber, was killed. Roll and co-author Valerie Storey wrote about the tragic case in Unleashed: Of Poltergeists and Murder: The Curious Story of Tina Resch.
Articles Related to William G. Roll
Readers who enjoyed this article might find these to be of interest: Bizarre Poltergeist in Jail for Murder, Miami_Florida_Poltergeist and Poltergeist_Unbound_in_Seaford_NY
Sources:
- The Encyclopedia of Ghosts and Spirits, Rosemary Ellen Guiley, (FactsOnFile, 1992).
- Poltergeists, Michael Clarkson, (A Firefly Book, 2006).
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