Sarah Estep

Articles about AA-EVP Founder, Sarah Estep.

Join List

Sarah Estep and the Government

by

Summary Report
Regarding Brief Events at the National Security Agency
During the Mid-1980s Timeframe
Pertaining to Remote Viewing And UFO Phenomena

(Peripherally Involving Mrs. Sarah Virginia Estep – Former President of The American Association Of Electronic Voice Phenomena)

by Rebecca Anne Estep 30 May 2018

 

Per the mandate of the NSA/CSS Public Release Review Team/Information Security and Classification Division, the following statement is required:  “This memoir is a collection of personal recollections of a topic of personal interest.  The information and conversations contained herein are solely mine [Rebecca Anne Estep] and does not represent any official position, opinion or official record of NSA.  According to the Public Release Review Team (PRRT), this material is approved for public release in a private capacity [that is, Ms. Estep is not representing the NSA in any official capacity via this document] with no restriction on venue or medium per NSA/CSS Policy 1-30, dated 12 May 2017, paragraphs 2.a-e.  Nothing in this public release review approval should be interpreted as verification of the information included in the submission.  NSA is not responsible for fact-checking the document, nor does the PRRT “approve” (confirm) the data contained therein.  The PRRT solely verifies that the material is completely UNCLASSIFIED and contains no protected information.”

Any peculiarities regarding the names in this document (i.e., the use of the first letter of the first or last name) was solely at the direction of the PRRT.  Any exceptions to this rule which occur throughout the document has been approved by the PRRT.

CASE NUMBER PP-18-0085

I’ve been employed at the National Security Agency (NSA) in Ft. Meade, MD since May 1980 and currently work as an information management specialist.

This document describes several events that occurred at NSA during the mid-1980s which indicates the agency’s past interest – to the limited extent I was made aware of it – in the field of remote viewing and UFO phenomena.  It is common knowledge that during the 1970s-1990s, various DoD agencies were interested in exploring the field of parapsychology, particularly remote viewing, for the purpose of gathering intel against various targets.  I assume this is an idea whose time has come and gone and that the NSA no longer maintains an interest in remote viewing (or UFOs for that matter).

Because of the years that have passed, I do not remember a fair amount of details.  Therefore, and regrettably, this document will be vague in some places; more specific in other areas.

 

NSA’s INTEREST IN REMOTE VIEWING

Sometime during the mid-1980s, Ms. D (an NSA employee who worked in my building – Ops 3 aka Frank B. Rowlett building) told me about a venture known as Project Center Lane.  I don’t remember much about what I was told except that the study was being conducted by the Army in Ft. Meade.  The Army wanted to investigate remove viewing for intelligence gathering purposes.  Several NSA employees were involved in it, but Ms. D was the only one I knew personally.  NSA sent Ms. D to the Monroe Institute in Virginia to learn how to do remote viewing.  Ms. D came back and told me that it could be physically and mentally damaging to some people who practiced the techniques.  She did not explain what she meant by that, except to say that it was “draining”.  She withdrew from Project Center Lane either because the project ended on its own or because of its negative psychological effects; I do not remember now what her reason was.  I also cannot recollect the reason why Ms. D chose to divulge Project Center Lane to me.  I don’t know if it would have been considered a security breach that she informed me of it; she never said it was classified.  Ms.  D knew that my mother was involved in the field of parapsychology and perhaps that explains her reason for telling me about the remote viewing project.

OTHER GOVERNMENT INTEREST IN REMOTE VIEWING

Somewhere in the mid-1980s, I was approached by an employee at NSA; his name was Mr. A.  I had seen him around in the hallways, and had spoken to him occasionally.  He told me about a group of people at NSA who were doing a project with someone at the National Standards Bureau (NSB) in Washington, D.C.  It was not an NSA-affiliated program.  The study dealt with remote viewing, and Mr. A wanted to know if I’d like to participate.  He explained that the man at NSB (who was never identified) was conducting the study as his own personal/private experiment.  I don’t know how Mr. A had heard of the remote viewing project and who approached him about it.  I think Ms. D was also a participant in this experiment.  I told Mr. A that I was willing to take part in it.

The experiment didn’t involve going to another office or building on site; rather, it simply entailed sitting at home in the evening and trying to guess at some numbers that were sealed inside an envelope which was in the possession of the NSB man.  I did the experiment and handed the results to Mr. A several weeks later.  He took my answers to the unidentified man at the NSB.  Mr. A later told me that I had a 50% hit rate; that the NSB man said it was statistically significant for a first try, and that he wanted me to continue with the project.  I told Mr. A that I didn’t feel I qualified to continue with the experiment with a 50% hit rate, and informed him I no longer wished to participate.  It seemed somewhat irrelevant for me to do so.  Mr. A was disappointed but understood and accepted my withdrawal from the remote viewing experiment.  He said he hadn’t done well in the NSB project and subsequently ended his participation in it.

NSA’s POSSIBLE INTEREST IN UFO PHENOMENA

In 1985, I worked as a secretary for the International Relations Office in what was then known as the DDI organization.  At the time this event occurred, I did not ask if it was considered classified in nature, and I was never informed as to whether or not it was.

Somewhere between November-December 1985, I received a call at work from an individual within the agency.  I don’t remember his name but he referred to himself as Chief Scientist of NSA [CH/SCI].  At that point in time and to the best of my knowledge, Mr. K was the CH/SCI.  He held that position from 1983-1990.  In 1990, he took the post of Chief of Research and Technology at NSA and held that position until he retired in 1994.  He passed away in March 2001.  Although the name of Mr. K does not ring any particular bell with me, I will use his name for convenience’s sake throughout the rest of this document.  However, due to my lack of recall, I cannot vouch that it was, indeed, Mr. K that I talked to.  It is only an educated guess on my part.

During our initial telephone conversation, Mr. K said he wanted to talk to me about my mother’s (Sarah Virginia Estep) organization – the American Association of Electronic Voice Phenomena [AA EVP].

BACKGROUND ON EVP

EVP is a field which combines both parapsychology and technology.  In EVP, the experimenter attempts to communicate with those who have died and passed on to “the other side” via electronic means.  EVP does not employ the usual methods of spirit communication, such as mediums, séances, self-induced trance states, automatic writing, Ouija boards, etc.  Back in the 1980s, EVP was conducted primarily with reel to reel tape recorders and cassette recorders.  The field now utilizes digital tape recorders, computers, and other electronic “gadgets” – the mechanics of which I do not have the technical smarts to understand.

EVP is based primarily on the premise that an individual survives death and can, in a resultant metamorphosed conscious energy state, communicate its thoughts onto physical recording devices.

My mother founded the AA EVP in 1982 and ran the organization until May 2000, at which time she turned it over to Tom and Lisa Butler in Reno, Nevada (now designated the ATransC organization).  It was, and still remains a small, international organization.  I don’t know what the current membership is but in May 2000, the AA EVP consisted of approximately 300 members from 30 states and 13 foreign countries.

The voices my mother and others recorded on tape ran from the very faint and barely discernible to clear, “Class A” types.  It’s my personal opinion that the vast majority of the voices are very poor in quality. Usually, these messages are brief and run no more than six to seven words in length.  They generally are not audible during the actual recording process; they usually can only be heard in the playback mode.

These voices, at times, are able to answer direct questions and also occasionally make comments which indicate they are aware of what is happening in the life of the experimenter.  They have also been known to exhibit precognitive abilities.  Sometimes, the voices do not come through and there is nothing but silence on playback.  In other instances, voices appear on the digital recorders/computers which cannot be readily explained.  At times, the voices speak in unusual rhythm, sometimes speaking more quickly than a human voice, and at times will run their words together.  Now and then, they appear to have a metallic or mechanical quality.

There were certain members of the AA EVP who felt that, in addition to hearing from those who have died and passed on, they were also receiving messages from “other life forms” (OLFs).  These particular voices are the ones which tend to sound metallic or mechanical in quality.  The spirit voices never exhibit this type of tonal characteristic.  Furthermore, the content of the OLF messages tends to be somewhat different than messages of those claiming to have once lived and are now deceased.  Occasionally, the OLFs use words which don’t seem to belong to any known language.

It has been theorized that these OLFs may come from other dimensions of existence (alternate realities/parallel worlds – a quantum model of the Universe allows for both).  The possibility has also been considered that some of these OLFs exist on physical worlds within the Universe; i.e. “alien entities”.  Both the spirit voice of those physically deceased and those of the OLF type, were sometimes recorded on the reverse or “wrong side/dull side” of a reel to reel tape, which technically should not be possible.

In September 1981, after five years of research, my mother recorded what she believed to be her first OLF message.  Approximately 5% of the voices received on tape were considered to be from other life forms.

INITIAL CONTACT WITH MR. K

During my initial phone call with Mr. K, I asked how he had heard about my mother’s organization.  He seemed vague and evasive in his response.  I don’t recall him ever answering the question.  However, it’s possible he might have learned about my mother’s work through a local talk show or newspaper article.  Information regarding my mother’s work had been in the media more than once over the years.

One remark I do recall which Mr. K made, was:  “The Director of NSA (at the time, General O.) has given me a long leash to explore whatever topics arouse my curiosity.”

I could have asked Mr. K to explain the purpose of his inquiry, but I felt I didn’t have the right because his position at the agency was so much higher than mine.  I don’t know how Mr. K heard of me, and how he knew that I worked at NSA.  I don’t know how he knew I was the daughter of the president of the AA EVP.  At one point during our initial phone conversation – prior to our face to face meeting – I asked the CH/SCI how he had located me, but I don’t recall him answering the question.

I told the Chief Scientist on the phone that he was free to contact my mother; he didn’t need to go through me for information about EVP.  My mother would have been more than happy to discuss the subject with him.  If Mr. K didn’t want my mother to know he was from the NSA, he simply could have told her he worked as a clerk at the local grocery store.  My mother would have been none the wiser.

All that notwithstanding, the CH/SCI seemed unwilling to go to my mother directly.  He wanted to meet with me instead and requested I not tell my mother he had sought information about her work.  He did not explain his desire for secrecy and once again, I refrained from asking because I believe I didn’t have the right to question him.  I agreed to Mr. K’s request for silence, and told my mother nothing about his inquiry.  Mr. K also requested that I not tell anyone at work about his investigation (he did not explain his rationale for this, either) and I promised him I wouldn’t.

I met with the CH/SCI in my office the following week.  For some reason, he didn’t want to see me at his office.  The meeting lasted about an hour.  I was instructed not to tell my boss or anyone else in the office ahead of time that Mr. K would be visiting.  If, after the meeting was held, I was asked why the CH/SCI had visited me, I was advised to say that I wasn’t at liberty to divulge that information.  Afterwards, people did ask (including my boss) why he showed up in our office, and I responded that I was asked to keep it in confidence.  This raised some eyebrows but no one questioned me further.

During my conversation with Mr. K, which occurred behind closed doors in a small conference room, the CH/SCI asked some basic questions about EVP:  its history, development, methods of research and results.  In due course, it became apparent that Mr. K was not primarily interested in contact with “the dead”.  His main focus of interest was whether or not my mother felt she was in contact with UFOs and extraterrestrials via her EVP recordings.

In 1985, the primary emphasis in EVP was the exploration of the afterlife through electronic communication with “the dead”.  It still remains the primary focus of research.  However, in1985, as I sat in the conference room with Mr. K, the possibility that alien entities were coming through the tape recorder was just beginning to be acknowledged by various members of the AA EVP.

It wasn’t common knowledge that people working within the field of EVP were studying this relatively new and unexpected development.  Barely a handful of people knew about it.  I didn’t understand why the Chief Scientist was interested in what my mother was receiving in the way of possible alien contacts.  Nor do I comprehend how he had even come to suspect that UFOs were part of the electronic voice phenomena.  I rarely spoke to anyone at work about my mother’s research in the field of EVP.  On the few occasions when I did mention it, it was always in reference to its “spirit” aspects, never in the context of “other life forms”.

I tried to emphasize the parapsychological nature of EVP, wanting to steer clear of its “alien” implications.  Frankly, I felt awkward discussing the fact that various EVP experimenters believed they were in contact with alien beings/UFOs/OLFs.  I was extremely skeptical that this was occurring.  Since I gave the idea limited credibility, I assumed that the Chief Scientist would give it even less.

I felt the need to defend my mother’s character against what I thought would be the conventional, straight-and-narrow-path logic of the National Security Agency’s highest ranking scientist.  I was afraid that Mr. K would think my mom was a nut.  Yet, he assured me repeatedly that he didn’t think my mom was crazy, and continued to press for information concerning electronically received UFO contacts.  He was very persistent and the meeting seemed to take on the air of an interrogation.  I had the uncomfortable sensation of being drilled.

Mr. K was primarily interested in whether or not these “space” entities had identified themselves, where they claimed to have come from, and what they said.  He asked if they had ever said anything of a threatening nature.  I told him I didn’t think so.  He asked if they had ever described their “propulsion system”.  I asked him what that meant.  He said “it’s like what makes a car run.”  I said I didn’t know.  I wasn’t able to answer most of Mr. K’s questions regarding “alien contact”, since I knew very little about it.  My mother didn’t discuss it very often and when she did, I did not take it seriously.  All things considered, I don’t believe I was very helpful to the CH/SCI.

Near the end of our conversation, I told Mr. K that my mother would be giving a lecture about her work in the near future.  I also informed him that I planned to attend this lecture.  I suggested he attend the lecture in order to hear first-hand what EVP was all about.  The CH/SCI seemed interested in the opportunity to hear my mom talk about EVP.  Yet, he also appeared to have some reluctance in attending the lecture.  I don’t understand what his hesitation stemmed from but after several moments, he said that he himself would not attend the presentation but two of his “advisors” would.

He made it clear that he didn’t want me to know who these two individuals were or what they looked like, so that I would not be able to spot who they were when they arrived at the lecture.  The CH/SCI then requested that I not tell my mother that two people from NSA would be attending her lecture, and repeated his request for my mother not to be informed of our meeting that day.  I was reluctant to keep my mother in the dark but promised I would say nothing.  At one point, I asked Mr. K if he was going to tell the Director about our meeting.  His response was:  “I might.”  I don’t know if he ever did or not.

At the time our conversation took place, I didn’t know the specific date for when my mother’s lecture would be given.  I told the CH/SCI that I would obtain this information and forward it to him.  He said that when I called his office with the date and place of the lecture, I should ask for him directly and not to leave the message with his secretary.  I passed the information to him directly, by phone, several days later.  That was my last contact with the CH/SCI.

The lecture was given in January 1985 at the Towson United Methodist Church.  It was sponsored by the Spiritual Frontiers Fellowship, a metaphysical organization.  During the lecture, my mother focused entirely on spirit communication.  She did not mention that she felt she was also, upon occasion, having contact with alien entities/OLFs.  To reiterate, it was a relatively new phenomenon at the time.  It was (and still is) a rare occurrence and I think my mom was somewhat reluctant to openly talk about it in public.  I remember seeing two men at the lecture who appeared a little out of place, but only because they wore business suits.  Everyone else was dressed casually.  I have no way of knowing if these two individuals were the “advisors” the CH/SCI referred to in our meeting.  I vaguely recall that these two individuals left the lecture early, before it ended.

FOOTNOTE 1:  OTHER GOVERNMENT INTEREST IN EVP (NOT RELATED TO NSA)

In September 1981, my mother was contacted by a man named Mr. P.  My mother didn’t remember how Mr.  P heard about her work; the AA EVP had not been established yet.  Mr. P claimed he was from Air Force Intelligence and stationed in San Antonio, TX.  He said his interest in EVP was personal, not professional.  He made this statement more than once, as if he felt compelled to drive home the point.  Mr. P visited my mother several times and on one occasion, made a recording with her.  He asked “the other side” to describe “target number 1 through 5.”  This is not a typical question an EVP researcher would ask when attempting to contact someone who has died and passed on.  Mr. P never explained the meaning or purpose behind his question and I don’t think my mother asked.  It’s possible it had something to do with a remote viewing experiment which he was not at liberty to discuss, but that is just a guess on my part.  The responses to Mr. P’s question were:  “53”, “I look in”, and “what’s this?”

  • Years ago, when I was going through some notes my mother had made regarding Mr. P’s visit, I came across a piece of paper which indicated that at some point, he had been transferred to Japan.
  • There is also a note saying that he had visited Gilbert Bonner, who lived in England at the time, to observe him doing EVP research. The visit occurred during the same year Mr. P visited by mom.  Bonner was a well-known researcher in the field and has since passed on.  I don’t know how Mr. P explained his interest in EVP to Mr. Bonner and if he identified himself as being from Air Force Intelligence.

In May 1982, my mother was contacted by a man named Mr. N.  Mr. N stated he worked for the government but did not elaborate beyond that.  My mother said he was very closed-mouth about his job, but she had the impression that he travelled a lot.  My mother did not recall how Mr. N heard about her work.  Initially, he was skeptical that my mother’s taped voices were of paranormal origin.  But he was apparently open-minded enough to borrow one of my mother’s tapes.  He returned for several more meetings and during one particular visit, told my mother that he had the tape “tested” and was convinced that the voices were not coming from stray radio broadcasts and signals.  He also provided several pieces of equipment (something called a tone generator and a magnetic microphone) for my mother and said he thought they would help her in taping.  My mother used them for a short time, but since they didn’t appear to improve her results, she discontinued their use.  On the last visit, Mr. N said he had to go away, didn’t know if he’d ever cross her path again, and wished her success in her work.  She did not hear from him again.

FOOTNOTE 2:  (UFO/NSA RELATED):  Sometime during the mid-1980s, I had a brief conversation with an NSA employee (Mr. G).  He worked in the printing organization, known as the Y Group.  He related the following to me:  A partially filled, open bag was discovered behind one of the duplicating machines in the print shop.  Since it was uncertain as to whether or not the bag was left by mistake or was left behind simply in order to be disposed of, Mr. G briefly examined the contents of the bag in order to determine who it belonged to.  He came upon a cover sheet titled Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence.  I don’t remember if Mr. G said whether or not a report was attached to the cover sheet; I don’t think there was.  In any event, Mr. G decided the bag had been left in the print shop by accident and was meant for destruction.  A disposal unit for the bag was nearby; Mr. G secured the bag and had it destroyed.  To the best of my knowledge, he did not discuss the cover sheet with anyone else.

THIS CONCLUDES THE SUMMARY OF EVENTS REPORT

Join List

Sarah Estep EVP

by
c2006aaevp-estep-i_found_you_there

The following examples have been recorded by Sara Estep, the founder of AA-EVP (now the ATransC).  She usually used an audio tape recorder and external sound source; however, she also has had great success recording in the field with little more than a simple hand-held cassette recorder.

c2006aaevp-estep-i_found_you_there

  • Sarah had been setting in her office reading the night before this recording was made.  She noticed a black and silver object spinning about a foot off the floor, several feet from her.  It was in view for about two seconds.  The following morning, she asked what the object was.  On the reverse side of the tape, a voice replied, “We’re down beside ya.”  You can hear Sarah’s voice in reverse followed by a male voice.

Please read before emailing us about this EVP: It is interesting that we have had several messages from visitors to this site that have wanted us to know that they hear the EVP we call, “I was seeing the war,” in other ways. For instance, “I was seeing the water” or “I will see you no more.” We can understand how these alternative interpretations are possible. Sarah was in a lighthouse that was used as a Civil War hospital, and it is natural for her to have been looking for a Civil War related interpretation. Someone listening to the EVP in a different setting could very easily hear the utterance in a different way. Sarah has given her permission for Universal to use this example with the interpretation that better supports the story in White Noise. We do not know who the person is to which Universal attributes the voice.

The Butler’s were on-site for a television program and standing in front of the video camera for an interview. On cue, the “I was seeing the war” example was played over a pair of very large studio speakers that were on the floor directly behind them. There was no doubt that there was a “ter” sound at the end of the utterance. This might be a good example of how EVP are not made like normal voice, and how they are listened to has a lot to do with how they are understood. See the online listening trials report for a discussion about this.

Please see the FAQ: Beethoven did not speak English, so why would his ghost be able to?

Did Sarah Estep invent the Class A. B and C classification system?

We originally understood Sarah to say that she “invented” the system when we read her book, Voices of Eternity where she wrote:

It is astounding to receive any communication from another dimension. Even hearing raps, which many people who sit in séance circles have reported, boggles the mind. How much more startling if the unseen can come through with even one word on recording tape! Most messages, I discovered, are faint, whispery voices I call Class C. Headphones must be worn to hear them, and rarely can all the words be interpreted.

Class B messages are louder and clearer and can often be heard without headphones.

Class A voices are the most gratifying. Loud and clear, they can be duplicated onto other tapes. No headphones are required.

It has been recently pointed out to us by a friend in the UK that Konstantin Raudive wrote about the Class system in his book, Breakthrough, which we attribute as the book that brought EVP to the English-speaking world. Raudive wrote:

The microphone voices fall into three classes of audibility:  Class “A” voices can be heard and identified by anyone with normal hearing and knowledge of the language spoken; no special training of the ear is needed to detect them.  There are several hundred microphone-voices amongst my recordings that fall into this group. It is easy to make tape copies of “A” voices, and they can be repeated as often as desired. Thus, I have analysed roughly 25,000 voices according to speech content, language and rhythm. By this method of repetition, the acoustic reality of the voices can be established beyond doubt, and hallucinations of the ear are excluded. 

Class “B” voices speak more rapidly and more softly, but are still quite plainly audible to a trained and attentive ear. The ability to differentiate increases with practice, but this is a slow and wearisome process. For this reason it is difficult to use non-regular participants for experimental purposes with class “B” voices.

Class “C” consists of the most interesting voices; voices that give us a great deal of information and much paranormal data. Unfortunately, these can be heard only in fragments, even by a trained ear, but with improved technical aids, it may eventually become possible to hear and demonstrate these voices, which lie beyond our range of hearing, without trouble.

This grading and my comments are but a rough guide in the present stage of our approach to the psycho-acoustic aspect of the investigation.  We do not know if that was the first use of the A, B and C classification system but we know that Sarah was at least the second person to use it and it has become a very popular system.

Join List

In Memory of Sarah Estep, an ITC Pioneer

by

See also the Becky Estep’s eulogy

Sarah Estep sitting in her experiment room

American paranormal researcher Sarah Wilson Estep made her transition to the other side due to kidney failure on January 3, 2008. She was the premier pioneer researcher in Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP) in the United States and was considered one of the world’s leading experts in the field.

Sarah became a believer that death was the end of life at the tender age of seven. After the death of her grandmother, her grandfather married a woman who was the director of a funeral home. A couple times a year, Sarah’s family visited her grandparents in the funeral home where they lived. She was deeply distressed by the grieving families that came to view their loved ones, and when no one was around, she frequently sneaked into the viewing areas to look at the bodies. This traumatic experience was to shape Sarah’s life and create a thirst for knowledge that death was not the end of life. She dove into every nonfiction book that she could get her hands on, especially those dealing with paranormal topics. She found hope in the Seth books by Jane Roberts, as their words conveyed the premise that we were more than our physical bodies and that our lives continue after the death of the physical body.

During a visit to the library in 1976, Sarah came across The Handbook of Psi Discoveries by Sheila Ostrander and Lynn Schroeder. The book included two chapters on EVP and talked about the work of pioneer researchers Konstantin Raudive and Friedrich Jürgenson. It also mentioned the Americans Harold Sherman and Walter and Mary Jo Uphoff, who would later become Sarah’s good friends.

The Handbook of Psi Discoveries changed Sarah’s life and also the lives of the thousands of people she would later touch with her work. She felt that EVP could be the most tangible evidence of survival yet and decided to conduct experiments to see if this was true. She used her husband Charlie’s old reel-to-reel tape recorder and committed to trying to record for at least a week. At every session, she asked the same question, “Is anybody there?” but after five days, she had not recorded an answer. Out of boredom, on the sixth day she tried a different question, “What is your world like?” she asked. On playback of the tape, she heard a clear voice answer her question with the word, “Beauty.” Contact had been made.

Sarah founded the American Association of Electronic Voice Phenomena in 1982 and began publishing a quarterly newsletter. Membership in the Association grew from twenty to several hundred people in twenty-seven states and twelve countries. There was no Internet and Sarah was the glue that allowed researchers to gain knowledge about the work that others were doing. She held three national conferences and helped countless people learn about the voices and how to record them. For eighteen years, Sarah led the AA-EVP and then in the year 2000, she decided to retire and asked us (Tom and Lisa Butler) to take the Association over.

(c)becky_estep2006-earland_mary_sarah_becky_web
Mary Babcock (left), Sarah with Becky sitting, Erland Babcock (right) at the 2004 AA-EVP conference

In 1981, Harold Sherman asked Sarah to write about EVP for his book The Dead Are Alive and her work became Chapter 4. When Harold had to discontinue his ESP Research Associates Foundation due to health concerns, he showed his faith in Sarah by giving Foundation members a membership in the AA-EVP.

Sarah has written two books on her own. Voices of Eternity was published in 1988 and is now out of print but is a free PDF download at the AA-EVP website at aaevp.com (Books tab). Her most recent book, Roads To Eternity, is available through Galde Press via the same web page.

In 1996, the Dr. A. Hedri Foundation for Exopsychology (the study of the behavior of alien beings) and Epipsychology (study of post-death mental states) awarded Sarah the first prize for epipsychology in recognition of her accomplishments. She shared the prize that year with another famous researcher, George Meek of Spiricom fame.

To provide a tool with which people could specify the quality of their EVP samples, Sarah popularized a classification system originated by Konstantin Raudive using “Class A” as the highest quality example, “Class B” as a good quality example and “Class C” as the poorest and most typical recorded samples. Although more has been learned about how we hear EVP and why it can be difficult for the untrained ear to hear them, this grading system is in use to this day.

All of us working with EVP owe Sarah so much for her bravery in being amongst the first in our field. She recorded thousands of voices, published seventy-two newsletters and authored one of the foremost books on the voice phenomenon. In 2006, the Association that she founded presented her with a “Lifetime Achievement Award” at the Atlanta, Georgia AA-EVP conference.

cmartha_copeland2006-george_martha_sarah_tom_lisa_web
George Wynne (left) Martha Copeland, Sarah Estep, Tom and Lisa Butler

People have been writing to the Association with their condolences and memories of this great woman. Here are just a few of the comments:

“Her enthusiasm and passion for voice phenomena inspired me to continue seeking ways to communicate with those departed. She was clearly one of my main motivators as she has been for many.” J.S.

“I did not know Sarah personally, but I feel like I did through her work and through the legacy that she left behind. She definitely made the EVP field what it is today and I am so grateful for her loving efforts.” W.R.

“She never failed to acknowledge a letter or bit of info I would send her. At a time when EVP was still relatively unheard of, it was comfort to receive Sarah’s handwritten notes and have her publish my and others’ communications with the other side in her newsletter.” L.M

“My abiding memory of Sarah was the broad smile on her face when she opened her door to me on my first visit to her home in Maryland. It was 1983 and I had just read about her experiments in capturing the voices of dead people on recording tape…. For four hours, I sat entranced. Sarah not only gave me a purpose in life but changed it forever. I don’t ever remember seeing Sarah unless she was happy and smiling.” T.L.

“It is not the USA that owes to Sarah, but the world. Presently what we do, our research is not correctly evaluated, but in the future, it will be. When Survival has been scientifically proven and humanity jumps a new step forward in development, ITC pioneers will be remembered as heroes. And there will be our “Sweet Sarah,” as I used to call her. I am sure that she will go on working for the AA-EVP from wherever she is … not only for the benefit of this important association but for something bigger: Mankind.” S.R.

“I love this lady for the way she let us have our family back even for just a short time here on Earth until we meet them again on the other side.” L.N.

“Sarah’s book was my first foray into the world of communication with spirit, an event which would change my life. In a big way, Sarah is largely responsible for my current awareness of spirit.” K.M.

“I credit Sarah Estep with opening the door to this new world for me. I’ve thought of her every day since hearing of her illness and especially tonight since learning of her passing. I believe she will continue her work from the other side and guide those of us here who share her commitment to the study of EVP.” R.H.

cbecky_estep2008-estep-family_butlers_web
After Sarah Estep’s funeral: Tom Butler (left), Becky, Cindy and Robert Estep, Lisa Butler. Robert is holding Sarah’s dog, Lovy.about Sarah. Your comments have been forwarded to the family.]

[We thank all who have written to us about Sarah. Your comments have been forwarded to the family.]

Sarah’s daughter, Becky Estep, made a contribution to the AA-EVP in Sarah’s name, and asked that others donate to the AA-EVP instead of sending flowers. These donations have enabled us to establish the Sarah Estep Research Fund, which will be used to promote and support research toward an empirical understanding of these phenomena. Researchers need not be AA-EVP members, but they will be required to follow agreed-upon protocols and produce a final report for peer review. Details of this initiative are available via aaevp.com. You can honor Sarah and continue her legacy by donating to the research fund.

Our field is still very young, and there are people in many parts of the world who have braved the contempt of mainstream science to seek the truth about ITC. We honor their contributions, and especially Sarah for her bravery in giving people who had unexpected encounters with ITC a forum to be heard and where they could compare experiences free of the ridicule waiting for them in more public forums.

Join List

Becky Estep’s Eulogy for her Mother Sarah Estep

by

by Becky Estep and read at Sarah’s funeral
See also the Memorial article

Sarah Estep
taken by Ludwig Schonheid in Tarrytown, NY in the 1980s

I want to thank each of you for being here today. At this moment, there are people scattered throughout the world, in this country and abroad, who wanted to be here and would have been, if circumstances had permitted it. I extend my heartfelt appreciation to those individuals as well, because I know their love and prayers are also being sent to my mother. In particular, I want to acknowledge a very special woman, Clara Laughlin. My mother and I are eternally thankful for her steadfast friendship and devotion, down through the years. Clara was an honor and a timeless gift to my mother.

My mom, as some of you know, was a researcher in the field of life after death. In particular, she was focused on the area of Electronic Voice Phenomena otherwise known as EVP. She was a pioneer in this field, and spent years educating the public about it. My mother traveled extensively: to New York, Florida, Nevada, Illinois, Indiana and Georgia; she journeyed to the pyramids, temples, and deserts of Egypt; to caves in England; to the coliseums of Rome; to Switzerland, Luxembourg, and to the mountains of Brazil. Everywhere she traveled, my mother shared her conviction with those she met: the conviction that we do, indeed, survive death and that we ascend into a magnificent eternity. Mom had a way of leaving a part of herself wherever she went and in doing so, she forever became more of who she truly is. My mother was, first and foremost, a seeker and a pilgrim. In her sojourn through life, she brought comfort and hope to countless people.

But this seeker and pilgrim was also “my mom,” and I’d like to share a little of who that person was.

In earlier years, my mother had been a social worker for a children’s aid society, a first grade teacher, a camp director and a writer. When I was a child, Mom showed me my first rainbow. She got me through scarlet fever, chicken pox, the mumps, strep throat and a broken foot. Even long after I had grown into adulthood, she still fussed at me when I wouldn’t wear a hat in cold weather or forgot to put on my seatbelt.

Mom shared her jelly beans with me when we went to the movies and I shared my popcorn (no extra salt). She walked with me through the forests of Camp Woodlands where we crossed Friendship Bridge together. She taught me how to play the slot machines at Dover Downs in Delaware, and we sometimes watched the Leonids meteor shower in November and looked for eclipses of the moon.

Mom always kept an eye out for my brother’s favorite candy bars and made sure he got the Ocean City, New Jersey newspaper that she was a long-time subscriber of. She gave rose petals, lilacs, fresh yellow tomatoes and wind chimes to my sister. When her grandchildren were younger, she took them clothes shopping at the beginning of the school year, and she relished each and every visit from them. She always made sure my father got the comics from the Sunday paper. My mom always treated us to lunch on Mother’s Day—it was one of her ways of saying “thank you for being in this world”.

Mom loved scary movies and James Bond movies. She could both love and hate the Baltimore Orioles baseball team, all within the space of a single inning. She volunteered at the local church garage sale, collected donations for the National Kidney Foundation, the American Cancer Society and charities that help blind people. She helped support the Christian Appalachian Project and various American Indian reservations. Mom would help a neighbor if she could.

Mom loved the ocean, licorice, books, all the dogs she’s ever owned, robins in spring, video games, wind chimes, lime popsicles, spareribs, spaghetti, a good bowl of chili, (with beans), pecan pie, kites and balloons. She could laugh until she had tears in her eyes, over the silliest and smallest of things. She helped point the way to the Temple of Abydos in Egypt; my arrival there turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to me.

Mom comprehended joy and anguish; she understood guilt and regret; she knew the healing power of solitude; she had her disappointments and triumphs. My mother possessed all the noble majesties and dark frailties of the human spirit, which are inherent in us all. And finally, my mother always had one foot in this world and one foot in the next, and sought to build a bridge between the two. This is my mother … all of this and so much more … the kind of person who weeps when dragons die.

One of Mother’s acquaintances, Anabela Cardoso, was once told by her friend and colleague in spirit, Carlos de Almeida, that: “Horizons far from you do not finish in the world but enter a sacred Universe.” I know my mother believed this and it was one of the lights that she lived by.

In closing, I’d like to say to my mom that it’s one of my eternal hopes and prayers that you are always and forever sanctified by the best that love has to offer. May you be everlastingly blessed with abundant laughter, redeemed by Truth, and consecrated by a joyful sense of wonder. At the threshold of the door of forever, there’s a welcome home sign for all souls. I know you’ll leave a candle burning for us in the window of Heaven.