As technology evolved, recording equipment became accessible, and with this innovation came attempts to capture spirit voices in recordings - the true origins of the modern-day EVP movement. It was an American psychic of Hungarian descent named Attila von Szalay who was at the forefront of this new approach.

At the time, Szalay was working as a photographer in California, where he specialized in spirit photography, the art of photographing ghosts or spirits. In 1941, to expand his work, he decided to attempt to capture the voices of spirits. He did this using one of the first commercially available home recording devices, the Packard Bell Phonocord.

The phonocord recorder cutter used an external microphone to record sounds to a 5-inch blank record spinning at 78 revolutions per minute. The device was also capable of playing back the recordings. From 1950 on, Szalay teamed up with psychologist Raymond Bayless, and together they continued...