I Found The Exorcism Kit that Inspired The Exorcist

Yes, you read the title correctly..we used a REAL exorcism kit in a music video..now it's time to share the story of how I found it and the story behind the kit itself.

A friend of mine, who I'm not sure wants his identity to be known (may update this if he approves), used to cut grass for a hospital janitor, who worked at Alexian Brothers Hospital in St. Louis back in the mid-late 40s.

In 1949 a 14-year old boy, known at the time only as "Roland Doe," underwent an exorcism, the second of which he'd been through, with the previous one taking place in Cottage City, Maryland.

Alexian Brothers Hospital in St. Louis

The priests that performed his exorcism in St. Louis were Father William S. Bowdern and Father Raymond Bishop. Father Raymond Bishop kept a 29-page diary of the exorcism they performed.

After Roland's exorcism the priests left and also left behind their exorcism kit..

The story of Roland's exorcism went on to inspire The Exorcist, and therefore, every filmmaker that went on to follow in the footsteps of The Exorcist.

Back to my friend and the janitor. When the priests left, the janitor discovered the exorcism kit. My friend who cut his grass was gifted this kit from the janitor and took it home and forgot about it for several years, until Thanksgiving 2023, when he found it again while tidying up his family's home and brought it back to Nashville. He shared it with me last year and I asked him if he'd allow me to very carefully use the kit for this project.

The exorcism kit that went on to inspire The Exorcist

With his permission and generosity we were able to use this historic artifact for this music video for my song "A Cemetery of Secrets," for my hip-hop project I Am Khaos, off of the album "A Haunting in the South." This album was created with the intent of paying homage to several of my favorite horror films, including Talk to Me, the Exorcist, Videodrome, The Rite, Poltergeist, and more.

In 2020 the boy from this story, Roland, passed away just before his 86th birthday, and his identity was revealed as Roland Edwin Hunkeler. I found out that Roland went on to live a full life and had a 40 year long career at NASA as an engineer during the Apollo era, where he patented technology for the heat shield tiles on the Space Shuttle that allowed the shuttle to tolerate excessive heat. Now, if you know anything about me you will understand how absolutely insane this connection is.. For those that don't know, I film rocket launches and am absolutely obsessed with spaceflight and humanity's longing to touch the stars.

I'm convinced that there's no such thing as a coincidence.

Roland's story went on to inspire just about every possession film that followed in The Exorcist's footsteps.

Roland Edwin Hunkeler

Now, I understand that there will be people that hear this story and assume I'm trying to "provoke" something evil, but that is simply not the case at all. I bear the full weight of the responsibility of using something like this in my art and took the necessary precautions in doing so.

This was an opportunity to use something extremely authentic to not only cinema, but also to the history of the church. I have always been fascinated with exorcisms and at one time thought I may become an exorcist, but after moving overseas and learning more about how the church operates, I knew that I couldn't support the corruption within that community.

That being said, I hope you all enjoy the music video for "A Cemetery of Secrets," starring myself and Shane Harvey, who played the priest. This video was filmed by Dustin Luttrell at Warren Paint in Nashville.

Behind the scenes photos and content were captured by Josh Alves.

The behind the scenes video