Author, researcher, storyteller, and “supernatural historian” Mason Winfield is upstate New York’s premier paranormalist. Mason studied English and Classics at Denison University, earned a master’s degree in British literature at Boston College, and studied poetry and fiction at SUNY Buffalo with professor emeritus and MacArthur grant recipient Irving Feldman. In his thirteen years at The Gow School (South Wales, NY) he chaired the English department, won a 50K cross-country ski marathon, and was ranked among the Buffalo, NY, area’s top ten tennis players. 

As a journalist, Mason writes on a range of subjects, including the War of 1812 and Celtic and First Nations folklore. He is the author or editor of eighteen books, including the upstate sensation Shadows of the Western Door (1997) and, with Michael Bastine, Iroquois Supernatural (2011), a much-praised study of the traditions of the Six Longhouse Nations. Mason’s award-winning short story “The Hunters” (2000) gained honorable mention in the year’s Best Fantasy & Horror. He’s written a pair of occult adventures, The Prince of the Air (2021) and its sequel The Elven Smith (2024). In between them, A Ghosthunter’s Journal (2022) details the adventures of a pair of Buffalo-based paranormal detectives. Buffalo’s Haunted Architecture, Volume 2, will be published in 2025.

Mason is a popular lecturer who’s addressed audiences at the New England Antiquities Research Association, Lily Dale Assembly, the Roycroft Campus Corporation, and Larkin Square Author Series in Buffalo, NY. His talks have been sponsored by Poets & Writers, “The Big Read,” New York Council for the Humanities, National Endowment for the Arts, and First Night Saratoga. As a storyteller, Mason has appeared at a variety of prestigious festivals, including City of Night (Buffalo), Rochester (NY) Fringe Festival, and Piccolo Spoletto (Charleston, SC). 

Mason has been a guest on countless podcasts and TV and radio programs. He designed and hosted The Phantom Tour (2003), a two-hour TV program/DVD on upstate New York’s haunted history. He’s appeared on a number of major network programs and stars in a 2006 episode of the Travel Channel program Legend Hunters. More recently he appears in two Travel Channel programs, Mysteries at the Museum (2018) and Hometown Horrors (2019).

Mason is the founder of Haunted History Ghost Walks, Inc., a company that designs tours and events with supernatural themes. Cultural, historic, and architectural preservation are vital issues to Mason, and his company has supported those causes through fund-raising events with organizations such as Lewiston Council on the Arts, the Allentown Association, The Landmark Society of Western New York, Saratoga Arts Council, Ontario County Historical Society, Wayne County History Museum, and Friends of Knox Farm State Park.

Mason is the co-founder (with Michael Bastine) of the research association The Spirit Way Project, devoted to the preservation of upstate New York’s supernatural and paranormal legacy. In association with Spirit Way Project, Mason is the host of a podcast series of interviews and discussions with experts in niche fields of the paranormal.
 
If you would like to contact Mason about a media appearance or a speaking engagement, please contact him directly at: 
 
masonwinfield360@gmail.com
or by mail:
Suite 240 
21 S. Grove St.
East Aurora, NY 14052