Rocky Smith was born and raised in Oregon City, Oregon. Today, he teaches art at Oregon City High School, where he has been for the last 20 years. Rocky worked for three years in the historic Ermatinger House, the oldest house in Oregon City and the third oldest house in the state of Oregon. He has had many paranormal experiences over the past 20 years in the Ermatinger House including his first experience, which was featured in Susan Smitten's book, Ghost Stories of Oregon. Smith has also worked to preserve the historic home which has undergone a complete restoration and is now open to the public!

Smith started researching the paranormal activity in Oregon City in 1995 and has documented close to 100 haunted places within the city. In 2006, he combined his love for history and knowledge of the paranormal, founded Northwest Ghost Tours and is the owner of Haunted Oregon City, Books, Tours and Gifts. Smith has been featured on local radio and TV and has been asked to speak at several paranormal conferences on the west coast and is a frequent guest speaker for McMenamin’s Paranormal Pub series at Kennedy School. Due to his popularity with that event, he was asked to start his own Paranormal Pub and Tour series at the haunted McMenamins White Eagle Saloon in Portland called “Spirits of Stumptown” that ran for a year but was put on hold due to the pandemic. Rocky was part of the Cast and an Associate Producer for the All Around Us Documentary, Inside the Life of Psychic Medium Seth Michael.

Rocky was recently featured in Loren W. Christensen’s book Seekers of the Paranormal and is the Director of the popular Oregon Ghost Conference.

Chapter 4 of Loren W. Christensen's book Seekers of the Paranormal is Rocky Smith, Historian and Paranormal Investigator.