HGB Ep. 608 - Haunted Cemeteries 31

Moment in Oddity - Yeti Crab (Suggested by: Michael Rogers)

Diane, do you know what the definition of hirsute (HER-suit) is? Hairy, and it's usually used to describe men's chests or sometimes circus performers when they grow an excessive amount of hair on their body. But did you know that there is a crab by that name? Let me introduce you to the Kiwa hirsuta. This crustacean was discovered in 2005 in the South Pacific Ocean along the Pacific-Antarctic Ridge. It is approximately 6 inches in length and is also known by its common name, Yeti Crab or Yeti Lobster. The reason for the Yeti name is due to the quantity of silky blond to white colored setae (SEE-thai) that covers the decapod's body, making it look like a furry yeti. The crabs live along hydrothermal vents, deep in the ocean. Their hairy arms and bodies collect toxins released by the hydrotherms in their environment. This process is known as chemosynthesis. They are thought to be blind and their diets consist of epibiotic bacteria. Our vast and deep oceans contain many strange and unusual creatures, with many of them, likely not having been discovered yet. But a furry white crab that clearly resembles a Yeti, certainly is odd. 

Haunted Cemeteries 31 

Cemeteries just lend themselves to ghost stories.There is hardly a town that doesn't have that one cemetery that has a legend or myth connected to it. These legends are hard to prove, but even without evidence they have staying power. And most people like to believe that their loved ones hang around even after they've died, so why not hang out at the cemetery where they're buried. In this 31st episode of haunted cemeteries, we share cemeteries in Arkansas, Texas, Canada, Oklahoma, Illinois and Indiana. 

Kellers Chapel and Cemetery - Jonesboro, Arkansas

The chapel and cemetery are located at 2401 Kellers Chapel Road in Jonesboro, Arkansas. The Keller family came to Jonesboro in the 1850s and it is believed that this cemetery started as their family cemetery. The earliest burial was for J.W. Keller in 1859. . Many settlers to the area are buried here as well as veterans of the Civil War, Spanish-American War, World Wars I & II, Korean War and Vietnam War. The oldest person in the cemetery is a man named William Murphy Loudermilk who lived to be 105 years old and was the last living veteran of the Confederate Army. This cemetery has a legend connected to the chapel within its borders. It is said that if a guest knocks on the door of the chapel, they will hear a knocking in return. Apparitions are seen walking in the cemetery and the sound of babies crying is also heard. 

Concordia Cemetery - El Paso, Texas

Concordia Cemetery in El Paso, Texas is known as El Paso's Boot Hill. It was established in 1856 and has around 60,000 burials. The site started as a family cemetery for Hugh and Juana Stephenson, who had moved to El Paso from Chihuahua, Mexico. Juana passed in 1856 and Hugh buried her in what would become Concordia Cemetery. People from El Paso would travel the three miles to Concordia to bury their dead. In the 1890s, various areas were bought and set aside for the Jews, the Catholics, the Masons, the Chinese, the Military and Blacks. There are Buffalo Soldiers here, Texas Rangers, gunslinger John Wesley Hardin, Lawmen John Selman. 

That Old West gunslinger Hardin is said to be one of the sirits in the cemetery. There is also a Lady in White people call Lady Flo. The hoofbeats of horses are heard and some people claim to catch children's laughter. Three sisters on a ghost tour in El Paso in 2012 asked the tour guide to take a picture of them in Concordia Cemetery. When they looked at the picture later, they could see what seemed to be a dark figure walking to the side of them. Their brother brightened the picture and there is a clear dark figure of a man in a hat walking. If there wasn't a real person walking there, it certainly is interesting. But what makes it even more interesting, is that this figure has popped up in several pictures through the years. 

Ghost Adventures visited Concordia Cemetery during their 13th season. This was part of their Route 666 Halloween special. The crew was investigating the nearby De Soto Hotel where Richard Ramirez may have conducted Satanic rituals and it is believed these rituals spilled over into the cemetery. The X camera picked up three shadowy figures walking in the distance after Billy does a reading. Billy is so convinced that these are real people, he calls the police to come, but they find no one in the cemetery. 

Burkholder United Cemetery - Hamilton, Ontario 

Some of the first people to arrive on Hamilton Mountain were Jacob Burkholder and his wife Sophia and they came in October 1794. Some of their land was used as a cemetery starting in 1800. The cemetery was officially founded in 1839 as a public burying ground and a small log school was built just inside the entrance. A small church was added in 1850 and everyone called it the "The Little White Church." That church stood for 100 years, until it was demolished in 1955 and replaced with the bigger Burkholder United Church. Stories of weird activity in the cemetery date back to the small church, which would have a strange light run along the roof of the church every time a prominent person died. Occasionally, this orb of light would float over to the house of the person who passed and rest above it. People claimed that this was an angel of some sort. Some claim that the new church has the same mysterious light run along its roof. The churchgoers were very superstitious. They believed that if the cemetery claimed a victim, two more deaths would follow. Kinda like our "deaths in threes" today when it comes to celebrities. A woman in black is seen walking in the cemetery. There is supposedly a double headstone for a wife and husband and when people bend down to get a better look at the husband's name, his wife appears and scares them away. Some pioneer doctor is reputed to have done some grave robbing in the cemetery, once getting away with a body that he boiled pieces of in a huge wash-boiler in his house. A servant girl reported him and he was busted. 

Arapahoe Cemetery in Arapahoe, Oklahoma  

The Arapahoe Cemetery is located in Arapahoe, Oklahoma and was established in 1893. The town of Arapahoe was established after the 1889 Oklahoma Land Run. This had been the land of the Cheyenne and the first American settlers arrived in 1892. The most notable person buried here is Jesse J.W. Lawton. He was the newspaper editor of the Arapahoe Bee for 32 years. As a matter of fact, he passed away at the newspaper office. 

A man named Walter S. Mills wrote of his passing, "LAWTON is dead. The word flew from lip to lip last Monday and it was true. An old timer has passed on. One who for more than thirty years sat at his old table at the Bee office, is gone. And with the passing of Jesse W. LAWTON, Arapaho loses its strongest character. He had his faults. He had his enemies. He knew it, and like a man did not try to deny either. Lawton's pen cut like a knife at times, and his blows were often sledge hammer blows that raised welts and sometimes left scars. But no lick he ever struck was without a purpose. When timid men scudded for cover, Lawton took up his pen and hit the bull's eye. He ridiculed the foibles and lambasted the idocies of the community. In a larger town or a more sophisticated community, they would have laughed-- because the thing did not sound so personal. But in a community that has only one or two fat men, and one or two extra lean ones, and only a handful of all kinds, generalities took the form of personalities and often one with an imaginary injury went gunning for the editor. Lawton had a keen sense of humor and a dauntless courage. He never advocated the side of wrong of lawlessness and he didn't know the meaning of the word policy. But long after lesser lights are forgotten, Lawton will be remembered. He was a man of brain and of character. In other environments, he would have been a great newspaper man. Arapaho has lost its staunchest friend, its truest advocate. Custer County has lost its one outstanding editor. The Bee will go on--but the personality that created it is gone."
       
The haunting here at the cemetery is connected to Robina Smith. She passed away in 1936 when the car she was riding in hit a creamery truck on U.S. Highway 183. When police arrived at the scene, they found several victims frozen to death. Robina had died when her head impaled on the floor-mounted gearshift. She doesn't haunt her plot, but apparently her father does. The haunting started when her father passed in 1972. He had worried that his daughter wasn't a Christian and so wasn't saved and his spirit is heard wailing. EVPs have been captured of him saying "Oh no, oh my God, Robina has not been saved." Others claim to hear it audibly. 

Auxiliary Sable Cemetery

People claim that Auxiliary Sable Cemetery is the scariest cemetery in Illinois. The cemetery is located along Brown Road in Minooka, Illinois. This is one of the oldest rural burial grounds in the area and was founded in 1834, with many burials going back to the 1800s. There are a few hundred burials. What makes this cemetery creepy is that one must drive through a forest on a narrow gravel road to reach the iron gates at the entrance. A windowless shed at the back of the cemetery has been rumored to be a portal. This was more than likely a receiving structure for storing bodies to wait for temperatures to warm up. It's made of stone with metal doors. The main ghost here is a little girl named Adeline Stevenson and much of the activity happens to people's cars. Their electrical may go crazy with lots of bells and whistles and lights going off. Cars may even stall or not restart. Electric windows go down, even without a key in the ignition. Mysterious mists and fires have been seen. Many people have shares their experiences online.

Not Right posted: "As soon as went through those gates the whole energy changed, this was at around 11 at night. You just knew we were not supposed to be there. I was doing a spirit box, and I’ll never forget what it said, Thomas crash die. At the time didn’t take it seriously, but two years later a buddy of mine name Thomas crashed and passed away, and it makes me think."

My Knowledge And Experience wrote: "I’ve had friends go out there and were demonically attacked. A blue glowing dog jumped on the hood, car engines die, the windows going up and down, and the gate closes behind you after you cross the bridge and come into the cemetery. These were some bad-ass guys, and they still to this day will not go back into that cemetery. I have more info, I don’t want to post it, but I think much worse happened out there. My advice would be, all those spirits need to be left alone, and I truly hope they cross over or find some kind of rest, salvation, or find their way home to heaven."
Many of the headstones inside Aux Sable Cemetery date back to the early 1800s. John Ferak/Patch

Awesome remarked: "Went during the middle of the night with a group of like 5. We absolutely 10000 percent saw a ghost car come down the narrow wooded road."

There's Something Off About This Cemetery commented: "I go to a lot of cemeteries because I find them peaceful, and I like to take photos of the cemeteries I've been to. I have never felt that any of them were haunted or had a weird feeling, even at Bachelor's Grove, until I went to this one. I went twice in the same day because a friend wanted to come along later, and I caught a glowing white orb and a transparent dark orange glow with my professional camera. One in the day, and one at night ... I am officially spooked out. When I was here alone in the day, I had a really weird feeling. I heard crying twice from the forest and lots of shuffling and footsteps behind me. When I walked up to the rusty door, there was a loud bang once coming from inside, and it scared the shit out of me because it was completely quiet until I walked up to it. I'm not blowing smoke. I have NEVER encountered anything unusual in cemeteries before this one! Really weird!" 

Handprints And A Welcoming Feeling Wrote: "Handprints in the dust on my buddies previously clean car. We go all the time. Using a box, the spirits like to speak to us, as we’re younger, both 17. They seem to remember us. I wore pink the first time I went and every time I go they seem to say 'he’s back, pink' over and over. It’s surreal, but I don’t feel weird being there. I feel like I’m welcome, it’s odd." 

Stepp Cemetery

And then there is what is said to be the most haunted cemetery in Indiana. This is the Stepp Cemetery located near Bloomington, Indiana. It was named for Reuben Steep who owned the land. Apparently, the cemetery was already on the land when Stepp bought it in 1856. We're not sure when the cemetery was established, but the oldest burial is for Isaac Headstocks in 1850. He was a veteran of the War of 1812. It's unclear how many people are buried here, but only around 50 tombstones remain. This is a rural cemetery, so doesn't get much care. The state of Indiana bought it in 1929. But before that, a group of people who had some weird religious beliefs, would meet in the cemetery. They were known as Crabbites - which sounds like a tasty appetizer - but definitely was not. A man named Reverend William Crabc founded a cultish religion named Church of the First Born. He had quite a following in the early 1900s because he was a great orator even though he had little education. He detested worshiping inside a meeting house, wanting to be out in nature. So he would bring his flock of 300 out into the woods near the cemetery and he would clamber up on a tree stump and start preaching. And then he would bring out the snakes. Oh yes, these were snake handlers. This is really how Reverend Crabb got his start with people following him. He was like a sideshow who charmed people into listening to him. Crabb asked for no money and he fathered thirteen children, twelve of them girls. He got his followers comfortable with handling rattlesnakes and they would speak in tongues ans sometimes even dance naked among the tombstones. The group eventually moved on, but they left in their wake the negative energy they may have conjured in the cemetery with their bizarre rituals.

After the state took over the cemetery, stories began to circulate about haunting activity. There was a tree stump in a far corner that had the appearance of a chair and so people started calling it the Warlock Chair. This was next to an infant's grave and visitors would claim to see a woman in black visiting the grave. She often sat in the stump chair and appeared to be rocking. People would swear she was holding a baby as she rocked. On some nights, she would have no baby and would be heard weeping. She disappears when approached and that isn't a good idea - to approach her - because sometimes visitors have had trouble starting their cars or their headlights won't work. 

A woman named Annie Hacker lost three of her children and she was so broken by that that people believe she may be the crying woman in black who has returned to the cemetery. There is a curse connected to the Warlock Chair too. Anyone who sits in it will have misfortune come upon them and there are some whom claim that the person who sits on the stump will die within the year. A story claims that a German Shepherd who jumped onto it was found dead the next morning. Ashley Hood who wrote Haunted Cemeteries of Indiana in 2020 shares that one evening when she was in the cemetery with a group, they heard the weeping of a woman and it was very chilling. Ashley Hood writes in her book about other legends connected to the Lady in Black , "In another version of this story, Anna was a wife and mother. Her husband, Jacob, was killed in a quarry accident and buried in Stepp Cemetery. Anna reportedly turned all of her attention to their sixteen-year-old daughter, Emily, and became protective of the girl. When Emily was invited to a dance, Anna had her reservations but allowed her daughter to attend. The weather turned rainy that night. Returning home from the dance, the car with Emily and her date slid off the road, hitting a tree. Emily was killed instantly. Anna had her daughter buried in Stepp Cemetery next to Jacob. Anna visited Emily’s grave every day and was often seen by locals, draped in black, sitting on the large stump and speaking to her daughter as if she were still alive. Much as with the previous tale, the sorrowful spirit of Anna is said to remain in the cemetery, mourning the loss of her daughter. There is potentially some truth to this tale, as there is a Jacob and Anna Adkins buried in Stepp Cemetery. The couple had eleven children, one of whom, Ida Mae, passed away at the age of seventeen. She was buried in Frye Cemetery, also known as Taylor or McGowan Cemetery, located on North Low Gap Road in the Morgan-Monroe State Forest, not far from Stepp Cemetery."

There is a grave for a baby named Lester buried near the Adkins family that always has gifts piled up around it - particularly toys. It is always so tragic to see these graves for infants. Poor little Lester didn't even have a chance to live. He was born Paul Lester and stillborn. His parents were O'leathia and Harley Lester and they were 16 and 21 respectively. Certainly not equipped to deal with losing a child at birth. Trying to find a real history behind Baby Lester is, as the Orange Bean Indiana blog describes it as finding, "a few flakes and nuggets, but mostly [just] sludge." And the legend goes on to claim that Lester died in a car wreck, or was it a fire or... His mother, the lady in black, comes to visit his grave often. People hear her weeping and sometimes she screams. Ashley Hood shares, "In truth, Baby Lester passed away after taking only a few breaths in 1937. His mother, Olethia Pryor Lester, and father, Harley Lester, eventually divorced. Olethia later married James Walls and moved to Indianapolis. It is unlikely that Olethia is the woman in black, as she lived to be eighty-five years old, passing away in 2007, long after the reports of the woman in black began. She is buried in Oaklawn Memorial Gardens in Fishers, Indiana."

Many of the legends connected to the cemetery started in the 1950s and increased in the 1970s as young people visited the cemetery for late night parties and shared the stories. They embellished real things as well. For example, the German Shepherd did die, but it was at the hands of a group of cruel boys who found themselves in court for their actions. Another story is told about a son of Reuben Stepp dying over a property dispute and being buried here at the cemetery and he supposedly rises to confront people trespassing in the cemetery. But the only Stepps buried here are Reuben and one of his grandsons who died as an infant. A similar story predates the Stepp family and claims that the property dispute was between two sons of the previous owner. They decided to have a duel because their father had passed without telling them, which of them was to inherit the land. And they managed to kill each other. No graves seem to back up this story, but there are those that claim there is at least one angry spirit in the cemetery. This entity could be connected to the Crabbites. There is also the spirit of a woman wearing a long white dress that is thought to be connected to the Crabbites. Another ghost here is said to belong to a young woman who was murdered in the nearby Morgan-Monroe State Forest. Because her killer was never found, she wanders the cemetery near where her body ended up. There was a murder of an Indiana University student named Ann Harmeier in 1977. Her car was found on Indiana 37, abandoned because it had overheated. Her body was found two miles from Martinsville, which is 12 miles away from Stepp Cemetery. So more than likely not her. So who is this young woman seen in the cemetery? 

And then there is a legend about a Hookwoman. She lost her hand in an accident she had, that killed her young son. She replaced that with a hook and she would visit her son's grave in the Stepp Cemetery. After she died, she continued to visit with her hook hand. She chases off trespassers in the cemetery. And this cemetery even has stories about Bigfoot being seen in the nearby woods and a group of strange men wearing white cloaks. 

It really does make sense that there would be spirits in cemeteries since this is where bodies are buried. But we do always wonder who would want to hang around their dead and decaying body. Are these cemeteries haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 607 - Mizpah Hotel

This Month in History - National Hagfish Day

In the month of October, on the 21st, in 2009, National Hagfish Day was established by the non-profit marine conservation organization WhaleTimes. Hagfish are a strange looking, jawless, slime-producing fish that live deep on the oceans floors. Found around the globe, the peculiar fish play an important role as scavengers, cleaning the ocean floor and recycling nutrients. They prefer silty, muddy bottoms that they can burrow into. Similar to the shape of an eel, the hagfish has also been likened to that of a giant, pink worm. The extreme slime threads produced by these unique creatures can be used as ultra strong fibers for clothing. The slime can be spun into threads, similar to spider silk or Kevlar. The purpose of creating National Hagfish Day is to appreciate the less charismatic creatures of the ocean, the important role they play in the marine ecosystem, and the threats they face such as overfishing and pollution. National Hagfish Day is celebrated annually on the third Wednesday of every October.

***So, the take-away is that slimy hagfish haute couture, may be coming to a store near you!?  

Mizpah Hotel

The Mizpah Hotel has been voted the number one haunted hotel by a couple of publications. Not surprising for a hotel that has stood for 120 years. And it's been able to stand this long because this is one strong hotel. This building was formed from concrete, stone and brick in the Nevada town of Tonopah near the height of its mining boom. The lighted sign that sits on the roof can be seen from miles away. We wonder if that sign not only attracts travelers to come and stay the night, but does it get the attention of spirits as well? There are several spirits here, including a Lady in Red. Oh, and did you know that the Clown Motel is in Tonopah too. We'll talk about that as well. Join us for the history and hauntings of the Mizpah Hotel. 

Tonopah was the Queen of the Silver Camps. The town is located between Las Vegas and Reno in Nevada and began with the second richest silver strike in the state. How this silver was discovered is a matter of which story one wants to believe. A prospector named Jim Butler had married a Paiute woman and he more than likely learned from her tribe that there was some pretty silver minerals in the area. But the legendary story is much more interesting. Apparently, Butler had a burro that got away from him one night and he was quite frustrated looking for it the next day. When he found the creature, he picked up a rock to throw at it and he noticed the rock was really heavy and then he realized it was silver and BOOM! So 1900 would see the birth of another Nevada mining town. The town was named for Butler until 1905 when it was changed to Tonopah. Men flooded the town looking for their fortunes and this included many Chinese men as well. One of these men was a 24-year-old George Wingfeild. He was a gambler and found great success at the poker tables and soon had a gaming license. He had a friend come to town and start a bank, which he invested in and the men partnered in buying mines and supplying miners. They headed off for Goldfield later, having made around $30 million in Tonopah and knowing that the town would soon go bust. The mining in town peaked in 1913 and then slid until 1921 when the town's population was half what it had been. But before that bust, the Mizpah Saloon was the place to be in town. 

The Mizpah Saloon was a one-story building and shared a name with one of the mines. Mizpah comes from a Hebrew word meaning lookout. The word was connected to a story in the Bible featuring Jacob and his father-in-law Laban and a promise they made between each other. The erected a pile of stones as this mizpah watchtower and this served as a witness between the two men and God. This then became a word that represented an emotional bond between people and there is special mizpah jewelry inspired by this. Jim Butler's wife Belle is the one who gave one of the mines the name Mizpah. It was the richest and most successful in the town. 

The Mizpah Hotel was built by George Wingfield, George S. Nixon, Cal Brougher and Bob Govan in 1907 from reinforced concrete with stones on the front and bricks on the sides and rear. Architect George E. Holesworth designed the hotel, which stood five stories, matching the height of the Belvada Building that was built the previous year. The buildings shared the title of tallest building in the town. The Mizpah also had a three-story building next door that had rooms on the upper floors and businesses on the ground floor. The buildings were connected with a wood stairway crowned with a skylight. It cost $200,000 to build and was one of the first luxury hotels in the state of Nevada, featuring leaded glass windows, solid granite walls, Victorian-era appointments, solid oak furniture, and an electric elevator, which was unheard of at the time. There was also hot and cold running water and steam heating. 

There are many legends connected to the hotel, most of them not having any truth to them. One legend about the bar at the hotel claims that Wyatt Earp kept the bar at the Mizpah. That wasn't true. Earp did move to Tonopah in 1902 and he did co-found a saloon, but that was called The Northern. He served as a private police force for the town as well, mostly going after claim jumpers. Apparently, Earp left town before the Mizpah Hotel was ever built. Another legend claims that Jack Dempsey was a bouncer, but he always maintained that he had never been a bouncer. He did, however, box in Tonopah in bare knuckle fights and some of them lasted up to 25 rounds. And then there is the legend that Howard Hughes married Jean Peters at the Mizpah. Hughes did get married in town, but it wasn't at this hotel. 

And then there is the legend connected to Key Pittman. Pittman had been a powerful Democrat senator in the U.S. Senate. He advocated for and supported the silver industry in his home state of Nevada, so everyone called him the Silver Senator. He was  running for a sixth term in the U.S. Senate in 1940 when he died. Apparently, the Senator liked his drink and he was drinking heavily as he campaigned through Nevada. On November 4, Pittman had a heart attack and was hospitalized where two separate doctors said he would die shortly. Newspapers were told that he was just exhausted and resting at the hospital. The next day was election day and people went to the polls and re-elected Pittman. Pittman did die on November 10th. Now, some stories claimed that Pittman had the heart attack in Reno, but the more interesting tale claims that he was in Tonopah and that he actually died before the election and was put on ice in the hotel. The truth was hidden, so that people would vote for him. The book "The Green Felt Jungle" shared this legend and it became fact. So while Nevadans like to share a story that their state once elected a dead man, that wasn't true. But the story of Pittman on ice in a bathtub at the Mizpah continues to be told by some in the town today. 

The 1940s also saw gaming come to the hotel. The first chips were issued in 1945. Guests could play at the craps table, roulette wheel, poker and blackjack tables and slot machines. The Mizpah closed in 2000 and sat abandoned. Today, the hotel is owned by Fred and Nancy Cline who purchased the property in 2010. They restored the hotel to its prior glory, keeping the lobby full of plush antiques that transports one back to a previous era. The doors reopened in 2011 and rooms offer elegance and luxury linens. There is the Lady in Red Suite or the Jim & Belle Butler Suite, and the latter suite has a bed frame made from a wagon. The Pittman Cafe is award-winning and offers great breakfast fare. The Jack Dempsey Room serves up dinner and the Longshot Bar has drinks.

The Mizpah Hotel embraces their haunted reputation by offering ghosts tours that incorporate a little bit of hunting. Several employees will say that they didn't believe in ghosts before working at the hotel, but after being at the hotel for awhile, they are true believers. There are several spirits at the hotel. Ghost children run and laugh through the upper floors. They like to play pranks on hotel guests. And strangely, there is a soldier that roams the grounds. Perhaps a carry over from the Civil War or maybe even the Paiute War of 1860. Some claim to see him wearing a World War II uniform. He is seen often on the 4th floor. A bellhop wanders the floors with people's luggage. We're not sure how he came to his end, but it must have been while he was working. And even though we don't know if Key Pittman was actually in this hotel...and on ice...there are those who claim his spirit is here and they say they have seen his apparition. Two bank robbers have their spirits hiding in the basement. It is here that they met their ends at the hands of their third partner in crime who betrayed them and murdered them both and made off with all the loot. There is anger here and people feel unsettled in the basement. 

The most famous spirit here is The Lady in Red. I feel like we should cue Chris De Burgh's song about his wife. The story about the Lady in Red has nothing to do with being a wife though. This woman was a prostitute. She often worked in the Mizpah Hotel and she had one of those clients who decided that he wanted her all to himself. So he put her up on the 5th floor of the Mizpah hotel in a suite. That suite today has been broken up into three rooms to give you an idea of how big this was. No one is sure if she was strangled, beaten or stabbed to death, but she died on the 5th floor after her lover went into a jealous rage.  

Much of the paranormal activity at the hotel is attributed to her . She messes with the elevator, especially when it is on the 5th floor. Her disembodied whispers are heard, often by men, and this usually happens in the elevator. This is how she would have escorted men to her room back in the day. But the really weird thing that happens is that guests will find a single pearl under their pillows in the morning. This is said to be from the pearl necklace she was wearing on the night she died. Cordero Gomez wrote on the blog Traveling Fiction, "While I didn’t witness any paranormal activity in the room, lobby, or roaming the halls, my daughters described hearing whispers at night. They also said their bed lifted up. That’s some weird and spooky stuff. However, I didn’t hear or see anything, despite a restless night’s sleep. Many instances of hearing strange noises can rightly be assigned to the building settling, guests roaming the halls, the elevator opening, or the wind. However, while my youngest daughter and I were exploring the upper floors, my wife, Amber, and my eldest daughter heard a knock on the door. When Amber answered it, no one was there. Cliché, yes. Classic, most definitely. I can come up with theories, such as the knock coming from the room across the hall, or naughty children ding-dong ditching. What I can’t account for, however, is why there were no creaking or thuds from the floorboards? Is it proof of life after death? I don’t think so, but it is certainly unexplained." Steven B. wrote, "My husband and I recently stayed on the second floor, Room 207. The floor itself felt very heavy when we stepped off the elevator and, in fact, uncomfortable. We didn't have anything happen while awake. However, we did not sleep well. I have never been one who has a lot of dreams or nightmares, but I had one after another while trying to sleep there, so did my husband. From talking in our sleep, to yelling out and in fact I woke with a bruise on my arm that had not been there when I had gone to bed that night. After checking out of the hotel, we compared notes on our dreams and nightmares and found that we both had similar dreams...and in fact one of them actually was the same dream. I can't find anything written about a bellman in this hotel, but he and a very angry woman in period clothes seemed to frequent both our dreams the whole night. My husband also had a woman whisper "hey you" in his ear while in the lobby bathroom."

Yvette wrote, "I stayed in Room 205 with my 9lbs dog. She woke up around 3am startled and was looking back as if someone was trying to pet her. She jumped off the bed and proceeded to "avoid" this person for 5 minutes. I also felt a light touch on my ankle around midnight but dismissed it as nothing. The next morning, I noticed a thumb sized bruise on my left arm as well as a smaller one as if someone had pinched me." Hebert wrote, "The breakfast coffee station on the fifth floor is the corner of the floor where the lady in red is said to be. We were at the opposite end of the floor and my partner heard children playing in the hall way in the night, but there were no children on the floor." 

Letsctheworld wrote, "We are in the wagon wheel room right now. My husband was sitting in the chair while I'd gone down to get ice and he was tapped on the shoulder three times." Jill Delaney wrote in 2024, "My daughter and I stayed in the Lady in Red room in July of 2024. We went on the evening ghost tour, which was really cool. I felt something heavy pounce on the foot of the bed. It didn’t feel light like a cat, though. I woke up and gasped in fright, expecting the sheets to next get pulled off the bed. That didn’t happen, but for a split second I saw a large black dog curled up on the foot of the bed who was gazing at me with kind eyes. And then the image was gone. My daughter didn’t wake up at all. I asked the clerk in the morning if others have mentioned a ghost dog. She said that she sometimes sees a large black dog out of the corner of her eye, but when she turns nothing is there. Pretty cool." 

Ghost Adventures investigated the hotel in 2011. A static night vision camera was placed in the basement and captured a shadow figure. Zak also saw a shadow and this blocked out a light coming from under the door. They caught EVPs saying "Dammit, What The Heck", "We Got Work To Do", some moaning, an unexplained voice, an unexplained scream, "Hey You" and "I'm Evil." Nick said he felt as though something went through his body. The crew also heard knocking and banging. An elevator that no longer works suddenly opened and closed its doors. 

Sam and Colby visited in 2022 and the woman at the front desk said that she was standing next to a guest who was taking pictures in the lobby and in one of the pictures, they captured the Lady in Red. The woman described her as being in a red period dress and it looked as though she were captured in mid-waltz across the room. They were excited to see a rocking chair in their room because Connor Randall, one of the inventors of the ESTES Method, told them that rocking chairs enhance the session because of the rocking leading to a trance-like experience quickly. There were two women with the guys and the group was down in the basement where a vault had been and one of the girls was touched on the back of her neck. She had long hair so it had to go through the hair. The guide who was taking them through the basement had felt something touch the back of her head a little before this. This guide told them the following story, "I guess I'll start with the first time that I did an investigation. It was just me, Celia and Jonathan. I'm standing here, Celia is here, Jonathan is there. Celia all of a sudden starts like moving backward. She's like, I just got groped. Then all of a sudden I jump and I was like what the *F*, something just grabbed my leg full on and squeezed it. Then Jonathan's standing here and he goes, "Something is grabbing me." His whole sleeve was like [and she pulls the sleeve out away from her arm]. So all three of us got touched or grabbed." They used a spirit box and the Lady in Red identified herself as Evelyn. They think her name was Evelyn May Johnson. Most people refer to her as Rose, which could've been a pseudonym. They returned to the hotel again in 2023. 

There are other haunted locations in Tonopah. The town has seen some tragedy. There was the Tonopah Plague, which swept through the town in 1905. What started as chest pains lead to death within a number of hours. People's livers turned black and hard as stone. It was believed that poor sanitation led to the illness. Hundreds died. In the early hours of February 23, 1911, a fire broke out in the Belmont Mine, at least 1100 feet deep.   

A man named William 'Big Bill' Murphy set out to rescue the trapped miners in the mine and he went down in the cage and returned with it full. He went a second time and then a third. When the cage got to the surface, Big Bill was not on board and one of the injured miners said that someone had fallen out of the cage. It was Bill, of course. His last words before he went down that third time were, "Well boys, I've made two trips and I'm nearly all in, but I'll try again." Bill was only 28-years-old and he had saved many men. His tombstone in the Tonopah Cemetery reads, "Died while saving others." Seventeen miners lost their lives that day, along with Big Bill. There was another fire in 1942. The Tonopah Historic Mining Park is located where several f the original mines were located. The park covers 100 acres and offers history exhibits, self-guided tours and ATV tours. The park is open seven days a week and hosts a few spirits. The name of one of the ghosts is Bina Verrault and she is said to be elegant and smart. Hard to believe she was a criminal. She apparently was on the run from the law, having made it to Nevada from New York City. Bina died of alcoholism and was buried in the Old Tonopah Cemetery. She is seen looking out of the windows of buildings. The disembodied voices of dead miners is heard and people have captures anomalies on their cameras.

The Tonopah Liquor Company is a historic saloon that was established in 1906. They have over 100 whiskeys on site. There are a couple of ghosts here. One is Hattie who is believed to be a former barmaid. She seems to love children and is a benevolent spirit. The other is George Davis who went by the nickname Devil. He loves to play pranks because he was a trickster in real life. Apparently, he was a black man whose wife shot him in the back. He had abused her so she was only given a year in prison for it.

The Vanwood Variety Store had been the Nye County Bank. The building was constructed in 1902 and was Tonopah’s first permanent stone building. Visitors and staff in the store say that there are cold spots, unusual lights, strange sounds and disembodied voices. The spirit here may belong to a former bank employee who died inside the old basement safe. The Old Tonopah Cemetery was founded in 1901. There are 300 graves in this dusty cemetery. Burials stopped in 1911. People claim to see mysterious lights in the cemetery and they hear strange noises. Full-bodied apparitions are seen walking among the tombstones. They have self-guided maps, so a cool place to visit. And wouldn't you know that this cemetery sits right next door to the infamous Clown Motel. 

The Clown Motel was built in 1985 by the children of Clarence David, Leona & Leroy. Clarence had been buried in the Tonopah Cemetery and so they decided to open a motel next to it. Their father had collected clowns, so they used the motel to display all 150 pieces of that collection. There are clown statues, dolls, paintings and toys. In 1995, Bob and Deborah Perchetti bought The Clown Motel because they lived in Tonopah.  Bob ran the hotel for twenty years and it was popular with motorcyclists, but traffic was slow. That was until Ghost Adventures visited in 2015. 

Zak's crew put the motel on the map. People not only visited, but sent clowns from all over the world. There are now around 6,000 clown items. During their investigation they caught a shadow figure and they had "Hello, it turned on" come across the Spirit Box. And they caught the hand of a large clown moving off it's leg entirely of it's own accord on camera. In 2017, Bob decided to retire and put the motel up for $ 900,000 with the strict condition that the new owners had to keep the clown collection at the motel. The motel sold in 2019 to the Mehar family and they have embraced the Clown Motel's haunted reputation. Vijay Mehar worked as a Master Chef in hotels around the world and he has worked hard to renovate the motel. He gave it a 360-degree facelift by revamping its exterior adding clown colors and polka dots to give it a real circus look. Jolly the Clown has become the brand of the motel and so there are two Jolly Clown cutouts that stand 19ft. tall on the outside. There are themed rooms featuring the Exorcist, Friday the 13th, IT, Fear Unlimited and a Chucky Room. They offer ghost hunting at the motel. If you do want to record videos, there are rules and money and such, which seems to be a growing trend in some of these haunted locations. And reviews indicate that it is scary for all the wrong reasons. People do claim to have experienced objects being moved, hearing disembodied voices, seeing full-bodied apparitions and experiencing unexplained cold spots and hearing strange sounds. EVPS include "we mined" and "we died that day." One guest had a terrifying dream of a headless lady in a rocking chair.

Tonopah has a deep mining history and the tragedies in the town lend themselves to hauntings. Is the Mizpah Hotel and these other locations haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 606 - Cassadaga Spiritualist Camp

Moment in Oddity - Lung Tree (Chelsea Flowers)

In April of 2009, a 28 year old man named Artyom Sidorkin had been experiencing chest pain and was coughing up blood. He subsequently went to a hospital in Izhevsk, Russia. The hospital performed x-rays of the man and determined that there was a tumor in his chest area. A biopsy was ordered and while being performed, it is said that the surgeon discovered not a tumor, but a small fir tree sapling. It was believed that the plant's needles had been pricking the man's lungs, causing the blood and pain. According to a newspaper article, the doctor stated that the branch was too large to have been inhaled or swallowed, but must have grown from an inhaled seed. A plant ecology researcher from Toronto shared his thoughts on the discovery stating, "It looks like a hoax to me, it's dark inside a lung, and most seeds need light to stimulate germination and to grow. I don't see how it could get anywhere near that size without photosynthesis". Also noted in the x-ray was a shoulder growth plate that was not yet fused which indicates a pediatric case and not a 28 year old man. We have been told as children not to swallow watermelon seeds because then a watermelon plant would grow inside our tummies, but the thought of having a tree sapling growing in a person's lungs, certainly is odd. 

Cassadaga Spiritualist Camp

There are two main Spiritualist Camps in America dating back to the Victorian Era: Lilydale in New York and Cassadaga in Florida. We've visited Cassadaga several times, which is known as the Psychic Capital of the World. Almost as often as St. Augustine, and like St. Augustine, Cassadaga oozes spiritual energy. While some people might think that Spiritualism was just a craze during the Victorian Era, it is a real religion that still exists today and is recognized by the military as a standard religion. There are around 13 million practicing Spiritualists in the world today. Many of them still live in Cassadaga and there seems to be many spirits in this small town, not only of the Spiritualists who have already transitioned, but perhaps of the many spirits called to the town. Join us for the history and hauntings of the Cassadaga Spiritualist Camp. 

The practice and beliefs around modern spiritualism have their beginnings in the Victorian era in the 1840s, but even before that there were The Shakers. The Shakers were a communal Protestant sect that was founded in England in the mid-1700s. This was a breakaway group from the Quakers and a woman named Ann Lee joined the Shakers with her parents in 1758. Very early on, the Shakers recognized Ann as a prophetic voice who shared visions. She married and had four children, all of whom died in infancy. Her marriage faltered and she decided to emigrate to America, which she did in 1774 and she brought her Shaker religion with her. Ann settled in New York and built her commune there with everyone referring to her as Mother Ann Lee. The Shakers invented things like the clothespin, the broom, Shaker furniture and the circular saw, which we shared in a Moment in Oddity. Communicating with spirits started creeping into the practice in the early 1800s and they would entertain trance speakers. The Shaker community eventually lost members and today there are just a handful of communities. Many of the Shakers moved over to this new religion that embraced spirit communication and that was Spiritualism.

Andrew Jackson Davis was born on August 11, 1826 in Blooming Grove, New York. Davis claimed that he grew up fairly poor with an alcoholic father and a very religious mother. And she apparently was clairvoyant. The family relocated to the Poughkeepsie area. Shortly after turning fourteen, Davis realized he had a gift where he could diagnose illnesses and he started to teach himself hypnotism. He took on the nickname "The Poughkeepsie Seer" and he wrote "I have a body, a tangible body – I reside in the form – but is it my natural or spiritual body? Is it adapted to the outer world, or to the post-mortem life? Where am I? Oh, I am so lonely! Alas, if this be death!" 

Davis decided to use his gifts through a medical clinic and he opened one with a partner named William Levingston. This magnetic healing, as he called it, progressed to giving lectures and spreading the principles of Spiritualism. He felt that this wasn't just a religious movement, but that it was scientific and that it would make man "happier, and wiser, and better." Davis would enter a trance and write down what he learned in books. His writings became the foundation for American Spiritualism. One of the spirits he claimed to in contact with was the spirit of Swedenborg and there was a Greek physician named Galen. One of the lectures Davis gave was on mesmerism and Edgar Allen Poe was in the audience. It inspired him to write the short story "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar." Davis really helped the growth of the Spiritualist movement, despite criticism that referred to him as a crazy "coot" and pointed out that his books were filled with scientific errors. But Spiritualism was going to get a real boost from another area of New York. Three years after Davis had his first trance experience, the Hydesville Rappings occurred. This phenomenon is named for the city where it happened, Hydesville, New York. The Fox family had moved into a two-room cottage in the city in March of 1848. The family had two daughters, Margaretta and Catherine who were known as Maggie and Kate, and shortly after they moved into the cottage the two girls claimed to hear knocking on the walls. The two sisters quickly figured out that a spirit was trying to communicate with them. Neighbors and other family members witnessed the rappings, both hearing and feeling them. They investigated to see if they could figure out what was causing the noise, but nothing was found. The girls decided to name the entity Mr. Splitfoot. 

At first, Mr. Splitfoot communicated in very simple ways, like one rap for yes, two raps for no. The Fox sisters' older brother David, developed an alphabet to make the communication more in depth. You can imagine how long this took going A, B, C, D, knock, okay. The sisters also incorporated table tipping. So, they're communicating with whatever had been knocking on this wall and this entity tells them that he was a peddler, that he had come here to sell his wares and the people who lived in this house had murdered him and buried him under the house. As news traveled about the Fox Sisters, they became hugely popular and they began touring the country. 

Those tours inspired people into hosting seances in their parlors. The sisters admitted sometime later that they were frauds and the that the knocking noises people heard were actually created by them. Apparently, they would crack the knuckles of their toes. We don't know how they were doing that and making it loud enough to sound like knocking on a wall. They eventually reneged on that confessions and claimed they really were talking to spirits. So who know, but when they excavated under that cottage later, they did find the bones of a male. Maybe a peddler had been murdered and really buried there. Another key figure in the movement was Emma Hardinge Britten. She was born in London in 1823. She got involved in the theater and traveled with a company to New York in 1856. When there, she met a medium named Ada Hoyt who converted her to Spiritualism. Britten mastered automatic writing, psychometry (which is reading objects by feeling them), prophecy and healing. Robert Dale Owen was an American statesman who communicated with Britten after he died and he gave her the first four of the seven original principles of Spiritualism. British spiritualists still adhere to these principles, while the American Association has drafted its own set of principles. Britten was one of the most zealous spiritualists in history and she took her message around the world. Another pioneer to Spiritualism in America was a very unlikely person, a Chief Justice of the New York State Supreme Court. Judge John W. Edmonds wrote the book "Spiritualism" in 1853 detailing his investigations of mediums. He had witnessed hundreds of manifestations. His book outraged the churches and politicians and they, along with the press, forced the Judge to resign the bench and return to private practice. Despite the negative response of much of the public, many high profile people were embracing this new spiritual science. The Lincolns used mediums and participated in seances, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a true believer as were Elizabeth Barrett Browning, William Cullen Bryant, Thomas Carlyle, Emily Dickinson, Sir William Crookes, Edgar Allen Poe, Alfred Russell Wallace, Mark Twain, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Queen Victoria, and W. B. Yeats. 

Another adherent was George Prescott Colby who was born in New York in 1848. He became a teacher as an adult. His relationship with Spiritualism started early with him demonstrating mediumship abilities starting at the age of twelve. Through the years, he seemed to gather spirit guides around him. There was a Native American spirit named Seneca, then a German guide named The Philosopher, a healing guide named Wandah and another named Professor Hoffman. He became ill with tuberculosis. Legends connected to Colby claim that during a seance he was told to establish a Spiritualist Camp down south and a group traveled to Jacksonville, Florida and Seneca told them to travel to Blue Springs to establish a town. This is an interesting legend, but almost certainly an embellishment. The truth was that a doctor told Colby that Florida would be good for his tuberculosis. 

Colby homesteaded in 1875 and named the town Cassadaga after the city in New York. There was a lake here that he named Lake Colby, for himself, and he built a large house on the west side of the lake. The house burned down in 1911, but he rebuilt. Colby started a chicken and dairy farm, planted an orange grove and opened a lumber business. And what started as 35 acres, grew to 57 acres. He granted access to parts of his property and sold plats and a group of 13 Spiritualists from De Leon Spring Camp started the Cassadaga Spiritualist Camp in 1894. Campers came from the north in the winter and lived in tents. Eventually, they built cottages and a post office, grocery store and pavilion were added. And a three-story hotel named Cassadaga Hotel was also built. The main thoroughfare in town is Stevens Street and the neighborhood along it started with a woman named Anna Stevens. She platted the subdivision after buying one large plat. Anna built a beautiful Victorian home that still stands. She left before paying out the balance of her mortgage and the new camp assumed that. In 1926, a fire ripped through and burned down everything. Buildings were rebuilt and today there is the rebuilt Hotel Cassadaga and a temple/auditorium that is known as The Colby Memorial Temple, a large educational building built named Andrew Jackson Davis Educational Building, Harmony Hall and Brigham Hall.

We had never done the Encountering Spirits Night Tour, so we decided to give it a whirl. Diane had done the historical tour before and it explained more about Spiritualism and how their main goal had been to prove the afterlife with science and that they don't believe in death, rather that we transition. Spiritualists adopted the sunflower as their symbol because the sunflower turns to the sun as spiritualism turns to the truth. There is a certification to work as a medium in Cassadaga and there are dozens available for readings. Back in the day, you could visit the camp from October to March it was 10 cents a day to enter. If you stayed for the whole season it was two dollars and 50 cents. 

The tour met in the Andrew Jackson Davis Building, which is also the bookstore there. There is a lot of activity going on in this building. The building was completed in 1904 and initially served as the new Pavilion with a dance floor. The dances hosted here attracted people from other towns, particularly during World War II. The floorboards had pretty big gaps between them and when people were dancing, the change that was in their pockets would fly out and down through the cracks and the children in town would crawl under the building to collect the change. The Pavilion was renovated in 1974 and the roof was lowered and the walls were paneled. The Andrew Jackson Davis name was given to it two years later in 1976. Another renovation in 1985 transformed the front part of the building into the bookstore. We checked in and gathered in the back room for a Power Point presentation on Spiritualism and orbs. Here is a video of that back room. The focus of the tour was going to be catching orbs in pictures. We had only been sitting for about five minutes when a flashlight across the room turned itself on. (Flashlight On 1) At the end there you hear us mention that our K2 has gone off and gone up to red. This happened multiple times. The second time, a couple behind us shared something that verified the activity. (Pedulum) So very interesting that their pendulum started swinging crazy and then our K2 went crazy. Here are a couple of videos featuring the K2. The flashlights turned on and off several times. There were cat balls in a couple spots also and there were two at the front that were about 6 inches apart from each other and they both went off at the same time. Our two guide shared this story that happened to her to illustrate how spirits might help us. (Drive Story 1)

Some of the activity described happening here include people hearing change dropping on the floor. They'll hear band music playing and there are no instruments in this room at all and they will hear children that are running around laughing and specifically there is a little boy and a little girl that haunt this place and they like to get into a lot of mischief so they do a lot of poltergeist type activity. People also feel cold spots. On one area of the wall there used to be a door that people would come in that was the main door. This former door has been paneled over and the reason why they paneled it over was because spirits used that door like a portal. They felt this was the only way to stop all the spirits from coming in. 

We headed out onto Stevens Street and worked our way down to the Colby Temple. There are two buildings across from each other that are called Harmony Hall and Brigham Hall and both have paranormal activity. Harmony Hall is a long, two-story building that was constructed in 1895 and served as a boarding house to accommodate winter guests. There were suites of three rooms that could be rented separately or together and there was a shared kitchen in the center. In just one season, they had 33,000 people come through Harmony Hall. Since it only had 16 rooms, that's a lot of turnover of people coming in and out. Our guide shared that a picture was taken on a tour that featured three faces in a window. She showed it to an 89-year-old medium in town one day and she said, "Oh, that's my husband, my mother and my daughter." Then she asked if the guide would print the photo off so that she could hang it in her home as a family photo. 

Brigham Hall was an apartment building constructed in 1898 by Dr. Hubbard and Sarah Brigham and Fred and Kate Brigham. There were 18 single rental rooms and they even accommodated extra people with quilts in the attic. Ownership changed in 1912 and then the Cassadaga Spiritualist Camp Meeting Association bought it in 1913 and they remodeled kit in 1928 into four private 3-room apartments with private bathrooms and that is how it is today. They conducted community seances on the third floor and so they have quite a bit of hauntings that are going on up there. A lot of the time they'll hear up on the third floor, tables dragging across the floor, chairs dragging across the floor and the floors will creak like there's people walking around. Our tour guide told us that a woman in period clothing is seen often in the downstairs hallway and has been captured in pictures taken from outside the door, shooting down the hallway. This woman is also seen going in and out of the front door every so often. 

The Norman House is next to Harmony Hall. Between the two is a camphor tree that has been cut back several times into a stump and it always grows back. A picture has been carved into the trunk and there is a story that goes with this. First, let's talk about the house. It was built in 1906 and this is one of those houses you could order out of the Sears Roebuck catalog when they sold kit houses. This particular house was an Aladdin home and that means that it had a big wraparound porch on it so it's really cool. Inside, there's a portrait of the family who had lived there at one time and they had an eight-year-old daughter named Evelyn Phelps, but they called her Neesh and she was very ill and she ended up dying in the house in 1927. She loved pennies and she would collect pennies and she would stack them and roll them. She was always playing with pennies. Well, now all of the owners that have been in that house ever since then find pennies all the time. Piles of pennies. They'll lift up the couch cushions and have a whole pile of pennies under there. You lose some coins out of your pockets with couches, but not that many. That carving on the tree features this little girl and there is an angel flying down from heaven, bringing her pennies.

The Bond House was owned by father and son Frank and Eber Bond. They owned a sawmill and they built the house out of heart of pine and heart of pine gives off this sap that makes the wood indestructible so when you're trying to build with it, you can't hammer a nail into it, so they had to drill into each board before they could put the nails in. So you can imagine how long that took. But it was worth it because wood doesn't do well in Florida and this house is still standing even though it is over a hundred years old. There's no hauntings going on here, but it was it was a really cool house to check out. 

The Snipes House was built by Joseph and Charlotte Snipes in the American Foursquare style. Joseph was the accountant for John D Rockefeller and he was very wealthy. Their house was the biggest house in Cassadaga and sits right across from the temple. The house was 4,000 square feet with a grand entryway and there was a gorgeous amethyst chandelier hanging in that entryway. The windows feature stained glass. Charlotte loved to wear a diamond tiara everywhere she went. When people would look back at old photos they would know who Charlotte was because she was wearing her diamond tiara. She got really ill and she would hang out by a window in the house. Charlotte passed away in the house and people started seeing her in the window. A neighbor across the street once complained because there was this woman in the window who would just stare at her. She said it was really unnerving and could they tell her to stop staring. The owners of the house said they had no idea who she was talking about because they didn't have anybody in the house that was older that matched that description. 

There is a memorial dedicated to George Colby right before the temple and this is where our group took orb pictures. I captured a strange one with Kelly. There seems to be some kind of mist. We'll upload to Instagram too.  

Then we also have the Colby Memorial Temple, which has both pews and chairs inside. This started as the Auditorium, which just had a shingled roof with cloth sides at first. This was replaced with a brick and cement building in 1923. It could hold 750 people. The floor was built to slope down and then there was a stage. The name was changed to honor Colby in 1975. Behind the platform is the Seance Room. This is lit with red light and table tipping is done in here. There is a large mirror on one of the walls and we all took turns taking pictures of ourselves in the mirror to see if we could catch anything strange. We got nothing. People often feel ill in there or light-headed. Just felt like a big closet to me. There is a lot of memorabilia in the temple. The first time I was in this building, they had these huge trumpets in there and if anybody knows anything about Spiritualism, one of the things that they do as a demonstration is they'll have voices that come out of trumpets. They would take these trumpets out of their cases sometimes when having a seance or a gathering and voices would come out of those trumpets and speak.

That ended our tour. Before we did the tour, we had dinner at Sinatra's Ristorante in Hotel Cassadaga. Great food! This is probably the most haunted building in the camp. It is across from the Andrew Jackson Davis Building. The small camp had lots of temporary visitors coming and it really needed a hotel. The original hotel was built in 1903. It was three stories and modeled after the Maplewood Hotel in the sister camp at Cassadaga Lake Free Assembly in New York. Visitors had to make reservations two years in advance, the hotel was so popular. The hotel burned down in the big fire in 1926 and the fire started on the second level of the hotel. 

Hotel Cassadaga was quickly rebuilt and this one was two-stories and was fashioned in the Mediterranean style and stuccoed. There were forty-two rooms and a long veranda. This was privately owned until the Great Depression nearly bankrupted the owners and they told the spiritualists if you want the hotel, you can have it. It was privately owned again in the 1970s and turned into a registered nursing facility. By the 1980s, it was a hotel again. Today, there are sixteen rooms as renovations opted to make bigger rooms. There are antiques in the lobby, as well as a historic bar and there is a gift shop. And, of course, Sinatra's Ristorante, which also hosts a haunted attraction in October. The main spirit who is here is named Arthur and he used to stay in the hotel back in the 1930s and he'd love to walk to the end of the second floor it has two two floors he would walk to the end of the second floor he'd put a chair there open up the window and he'd have himself a gin and smoke a cigar and he would just love to people watch all the people who were out there. Well he ended up dying in the hotel and so now to this day people if they go to that window they will sometimes hear smell his cigarette smoke or his cigar smoke they even might smell a little bit of gin or alcohol and they definitely will feel a cold spot he also likes to touch people so a lot of the time people will feel a little pinch on their shoulder a tug on their shirt with him letting them know that they're there but they never see him. 

And we should probably talk about the Devil's Chair at the Lake Helen Cemetery, which is right down the road. Most of the Cassadaga spiritualists are buried here. There's actually four brick chairs at the cemetery, but only one of them is considered the Devil's Chair. This has a brick border wall around it and the Devil's Chair is in the middle of this wall. You can sit in the chair. The story goes that a man's wife had died and he liked to come visit her so he had this built so that he could come and sit and visit her grave. Now, we don't know why there's three other burials that have them too, but perhaps they wanted to visit their loved ones too. The legend that goes with it obviously involved the Devil. They say if you sit in the chair at midnight, the Devil will communicate with you. And apparently he likes beer - who knew - so people will go in there with a beer and they'll leave it unopened on the chair. Then when they return the following morning, they find the beer is empty. 

Cassadaga can't help but be full of spirits. After all, the purpose of this town is to facilitate communication with spirits. But we still have to ask, is Cassadaga haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 605 - The Life and Afterlife of Liberace

This Month in History - Bobbies Hit the Streets

In the month of September, on the 29th, in 1829, uniformed officers of London's Metropolitan Police force began their first street patrols. The police were nicknamed 'Bobbies' or 'Peelers' for Sir Robert Peel. Peel was England's Home Secretary, and was responsible for internal affairs like overseeing law enforcement, shaping criminal and penal law, and managing prison reforms. Sir Peel became known as the 'Father of Modern Policing' as this was the first time that officers were trained to prevent crime, rather than just respond to it after it occurred. Peel wanted the officers' uniforms to be more distinctly differentiated from that of a soldiers' attire. This was achieved by having the bobbies dress in jackets with blue tailcoats and top hats to appear more like civilians. The look was designed to establish trust in the community. Their uniform also included a truncheon, which was a short wooden club as well as a rattle to signal for assistance, although the rattle was later replaced by a whistle. Along with an emphasis of crime prevention, the Bobbies also needed to adhere to a list of principled ethical guidelines. The creation of the Metropolitan Police Bobbies provided a new model for policing that influenced other forces in Britain and around the world. 

The Life and Afterlife of Liberace 

Pianist and singer Liberace was one-of-a-kind with big dimples, pompadour hair, huge rings on his fingers and expensive and flamboyant suits and capes. No one had his flair or style and he had a great dynamic with his audience, proclaiming often that he agreed with Mae West when she said, "Too much of a good thing, is wonderful." He was once the highest paid entertainer in the world. When one thinks of Liberace, the first thing that comes to mind are the costumes. Oh, those costumes! He grew up at a time when being openly gay was frowned upon and even dangerous and thus he denied his homosexuality all the way to his death from AIDS. So much talent and style couldn't possibly just go away with death. His spirit still watches over his collections. Join us for the life and afterlife of Liberace!

Liberace was the kind of performer who would fly onto the stage strapped onto a flying harness suspended 25 feet above the stage with a cape of ostrich feathers fluttering around him. His costumes were everything. He began with humble beginnings. Liberace was born in of all places, Wisconsin. He was born as Wladziu Valentino Liberace on May 16, 1919 to a Polish mother and an Italian father. Like Elvis, Liberace was born a twin, but his twin passed away at birth. Perhaps because Liberace was a big baby at 13 pounds and he was born with a caul around him, which in some cultures is believed to signify that a child will be greatly gifted. Liberace was called Wally as a child and later he would go by the name Lee, which is what we will call him. His father was a musician and wanted all of his children to become musicians, but his mother thought that music lessons were too expensive. She herself had been a concert pianist before getting married. The couple often fought, sometimes physically, over the amount of music in the children's lives. Dad won out and Lee began piano lessons at the age of four and at the age of seven, he won a scholarship at the Wisconsin College of Music, which lasted for seventeen years. That was the longest scholarship that had ever been awarded. Liberace was a prodigy and able to memorize difficult pieces even at the age of seven. 

At the age of eight, Lee would meet Polish pianist Ignacy Jan Paderewski and after watching the man play, Liberace knew that this is wanted he wanted to do with his life. Paderewski would become his mentor. Liberace said, "When I was a little boy, about 7 years old, I was greatly inspired by a visit from the famous Polish pianist Paderewski who was a friend of my mother’s. He came to our home and played for us and he asked me to play for him. He greatly encouraged my parents to let me follow music for my livelihood; and also he was the one who suggested that I adopt the use of my one name 'Liberace.' I shall never forget the number I played for him because it was his own composition, Paderewski’s Minuet."

Now, while Lee's fingers would float gracefully above the piano keys, his tongue did not do so inside his mouth. He developed a speech impediment that he would overcome with correction classes. As a child he gravitated to cooking and obviously liked music and he resisted playing sports, so the boys in the neighborhood teased him ruthlessly. Lee's older brother George suggested that he take some of his ragtime pieces to the theater and perform. Before long, he was playing on the local radio and for weddings, cabarets and even strip clubs. This is all before the age of 20. And a little fun fact, Diane had no idea where Bugs Bunny got his catch phrase, "I wish my brother George was here." It's something she says all the time. As she researched and listened to Liberace talking and read that his brother's name was George, the light bulb went off. Bugs Bunny was mimicking something Liberace used to say when his brother didn't appear on a show he will do later. The 1940s had early music videos that were called Soundies and Liberace started appearing in some of them. His big break came when he was 24 and played Las Vegas. At this point, Lee had pulled away from classical piano performances and started adding pop into the classical music. He said it was "classical music with the boring parts left out." A piece might run from Chopin into "Home on the Range." During this time, to separate his fun music from serious concert music he performed with the symphony, he went by the stage name Walter Busterkeys. The women loved him! He was handsome and charming and was a magnetic performer. It gave the ladies something to do while their husbands gambled. The casinos took notice that Liberace was drawing crowds and they started paying him a lot of money. Lee was a really funny and enchanting man and he quickly took to interacting with the audience. He would make jokes, ask for requests and even let audience members play the piano as he taught them.

By the mid-1940s. Liberace had made the candelabrum a part of his trademark setup. These would factor heavily into the decor in his future homes as well. And he officially took on Liberace as his stage name at this time as well. He wore white suits with tails to be better seen on the stage. Liberace purchased a rare gold-leafed Bluthner Grand piano to make his stage presence even bigger and he called the piano "priceless." More pianos would follow with various decor from rhinestones to mirrors to paintings. After his run in Las Vegas, he moved to North Hollywood and played in local clubs there, particularly supper clubs.

But Liberace had bigger dreams. He wasn't satisfied playing in these smaller clubs. Lee wanted to be really famous. He wanted to be on television and wanted to be an actor. He returned to Vegas with a bigger act and extravagant costumes. This big act would become his hallmark and he became very wealthy and famous with it. In 1954, Liberace performed at Madison Square Garden and he made what would be over $1.6 million in today's dollars. He had a deal with the Riviera shortly after this and was making $586,000 a week in today's dollars. Lee's affinity for putting on a show, rather than a concert, earned him a lot of criticism. Music critics didn't like that he changed up the compositions of great composers making them easier to play or sometimes, more complex. They said he had sloppy technique. But the crowds loved what he did and he earned the nickname "Mr. Showmanship." A critic wrote, "Mr. Showmanship has another more potent, drawing power to his show: the warm and wonderful way he works his audience. Surprisingly enough, behind all the glitz glitter, the corny false modesty, and the shy smile, Liberace exudes a love that is returned to him a thousand-fold."

Lee would then get into television with The Liberace Show, which ran from 1950 to 1954 and 1969. The general manager of Los Angeles station KLAC-TV, Don Fedderson, saw Liberace perform at the Hotel del Coronado in 1950 and he got the idea that Liberace would be great for TV. The show started as a summer replacement for the Dinah Shore Show that was live, but went syndicated in 1953 as a filmed show. This was a smash hit and it hit the sweet spot of being both folksy and campy. The show had more viewers than I Love Lucy and won two Emmies. His brother George would join him often, playing his violin and doing orchestral arrangements. The show always signed off with Liberace singing "I'll Be Seeing You." There would also be sold out shows at Carnegie Hall, the Hollywood Bowl and other venues. 

His career begun to slump from overexposure on TV, so he returned to supper clubs and performing around the world. In 1955, he opened at the Riviera in Las Vegas for $50,000 per week, becoming the city's highest paid entertainer. He referred to himself as a one-man Disneyland. Lee was struck with acute kidney failure in 1963 and spent five days in the hospital. The doctors found that the cause was carbon tetrachloride, which was a compound used as a solvent and in fire extinguishers before being mostly banned. Liberace had been using it to clean his own costumes when hotel staff refused to send them out because a blizzard was raging outside in Pittsburgh. He took to the stage after cleaning the costumes and became dizzy and he rushed offstage. Lee was rushed to the hospital. Doctors told Liberace to get his affairs in place because he was probably going to die. A priest administered last rites. The doctors did try a new form of treatment at the time, hemodialysis - dialysis. This seemed to do the trick, but Lee actually thought that he had experienced a miracle and that it came in the form of a spectral nun. Liberace said, "A nun I’d never seen before came into my room and sat next to my bed and said softly, ‘St. Anthony has performed many miracles. Pray to him.’" And she informed him that everybody in the hospital was praying for him. Lee prayed earnestly himself and he began to recover. Later, he wanted to thank the nun and asked hospital staff about her and nobody recognized the description, particularly the fact that she was wearing a white habit. A staff member said, "But we have no sisters with white habits at St. Francis." Liberace believed that the spectral nun was a visiting angel and he later built a shrine to St. Anthony in his Palm Springs home. He wrote, "Maybe I was heavily sedated. Perhaps I was hallucinating in the fever of crisis. Whatever it was, that sister will always live in my heart. She was the herald of what I choose to believe was another miracle of St. Anthony." 

Later on, Lee returned to TV for lots of guest appearances on shows hosted by Red Skelton and Jack Benny, Batman and Saturday Night Live (on a tenth-season episode hosted by Hulk Hogan and Mr. T). He even managed to get on a WrestleMania in 1985 and served as a guest timekeeper. There were a few movies he made appearances in as well. His popularity brought about 200 fan clubs and he received 25,000 Valentines each year and even had 12 marriage proposals. Lee received six gold records in his lifetime. 

In Liberace's personal life, he surrounded himself with friends and his family. As we shared, he worked with his brother in television. His sister was also a big part of his life, serving as his personal secretary. Lee's mother and father had divorced in 1941 and he took on the care of his mother until her death in 1980. Apparently, he had spotted his father with another woman who would become his step-mother and he kept it a secret from his mother to spare her pain. The 2000 BBC documentary Reputations: Liberace: Too Much of a Good Thing is Wonderful shared that Liberace's mother would occasionally help herself to things in stores without paying. And Lee would get a phone call that the store didn't want to make a public deal of it and he would go get her and take care of making it up to the store. 

He owned six homes (one of which had a piano-shaped swimming pool), 100 pianos, 30 cars, and his one home had a wardrobe with sliding glass doors and contained 200 suits, 400 sport shirts and pants, and 100 pairs of shoes. All of his clothes he bought in three sizes because he liked to eat: thin, fat and impossible. He would say, "My clothes may look funny but they're making me the money." His costumes would run anywhere from $150,000 to the most expensive that was $300,000.  

The World of Liberace is free on Pluto and its so much fun because it's like Liberace is giving you a tour of his two mansions and his piano collection and talking a bit about his life and he cooks! Just getting to see the antiques that he collected is worth the watch - how we wish this was filmed in HD or 4K. At the Cloisters mansion in Palm Springs, Lee had his most expensive antique and that was a Louis the 15th desk, which was presented to Czar Nicolas II of Russia and upon which the Franco-Russian Alliance was signed. And we loved this one part where he opens a cabinet in the dining room and it has a bunch of glassware in it and he says that the glasses were made in Czechoslovakia, but that he actually bought them from Walt Disney World in Orlando. Liberace grew up during a time when being openly gay could utterly destroy a career. And women loved him so much, he surely worried that he would lose his biggest fan base. When he was publicly accused of being gay in tabloids, he would sue. One such lawsuit took place after Liberace went to London and performed for the Queen and this was against London Daily Mirror columnist "Cassandra" (William Neil Connor. Lee won. Another lawsuit was against the infamous scandal magazine Confidential. Despite claiming in court multiple times that he wasn't gay, it wasn't the truth. Liberace would never admit it and it wouldn't be until his death from AIDS at the age of 67 on February 4, 1987, that the truth was revealed. One of his partners was Scott Thorson and the two were together for five years, starting in 1977. When the couple broke up, Thorson sued Liberace for palimony in the first gay suit of its kind and wrote a tell-all book called Behind the Candelabra. That was eventually made into the movie of the same name starring Michael Douglas. According to Thorson, Liberace paid for plastic surgery that made him look more like Lee and that he helped to get him hooked on drugs and that Lee was very promiscuous during their relationship. Thorson had his chin implant removed in 2002. Liberace settled with Thorson for $95,000 and three cars and three dogs. Thorson had a rough life after spending time in jail for theft and eventually dying from cancer and heart disease in 2024 at the age of 65. *Fun Fact: Betty White claimed to serve as his beard to squelch rumors of him being gay*

The final stage performance for Liberace was on November 2, 1986 at New York's Radio City Music Hall. His final television appearance was on Christmas Day on The Oprah Winfrey Show in 1986. The official story claims that he never sought any treatment for his AIDS, almost as though he thought ignoring it would make it go away. (Diane talks about her friend Steve who did the same thing.) Lee dealt with pneumonia in January of 1987 and was hospitalized and went home where he fell into a coma shortly thereafter and was administered last rites. He died at the Cloisters on February 4, 1987.Liberace was buried at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Los Angeles.  

Such a spirited person would just have to haunt some place and it would seem that Lee haunts several locations. Liberace himself claimed that the spirit of Franz Liszt (List) haunted him and inspired him because he owned the classical composers piano. Whenever Liberace sat at the piano, he felt the presence of Liszt and as though the composer was moving his hands. Michael Jackson comes up twice with these hauntings. First, The Liberace Museum in Las Vegas is hosted in one of Jackson's former homes, Thriller Villa. The Liberace Museum at Thriller Villa has never been open to the public and can only be seen through private bookings. Tickets run $179.00 in 2025. The Liberace Garage and Hollywood Cars Museum is much affordable at $17.95. This is a Mexican Hacienda-style home built in 1993. Jackson lived there from 2007 until his death in 2009. The Liberace Foundation bought the property and moved the Liberace Museum Collection in there from its original location that Liberace opened himself in 1979, mainly to have somewhere to store all his stuff. This closed in 2010 because attendance had dropped from 450,000 a year to less than 50,000. The car part of the collection is now stored at the Liberace Garage, with the rest at the Thriller Villa where it was moved in 2015. Some other pieces, like the jewelry have been put on display around the world. The ghost of Liberace has been attached to his collection. Wherever the collection goes, the ghost follows. Pianos play by themselves. A shadow figure is seen moving between rooms.

The second paranormal thing connected to Jackson was a story he told about Liberace's ghost. He claimed that Liberace appeared to him at Neverland Ranch a few times. The two men had been close friends before Liberace died. Jackson would communicate with the spirit of Liberace in a closed off room that was filled with mirrors and he would listen for Lee's voice. Jackson said that during one of these conversations, he was given permission to record "I'll Be Seeing You." He didn't get the chance before he too died. 

The Liberace Mansion is located at 4982 Shirley Street in Las Vegas and started off as two homes that Liberace combined. He lived here from the 1970s until his death in 1987. Like all of his homes, this one had opulent fixtures and mirrors. Some of the columns were imported from Greece. The ceilings were painted to look like the Palace of Versailles. Today, it is owned by Martyn Ravenhill. He bought it in 2013 and restored it. Private events and tours are offered.Some of the unique architectural features include:
    Entry door that once greeted guests at the New York governor’s mansion
    Front living room surrounded by decoratively etched mirrors in the style of Aubrey Beardsley
    21 chandeliers
    Decorative mirrored bar with etchings of Liberace’s name and music notes
    Eight marble pillars imported from Greece
    Staircase imported from a can-can bar in Paris
    The “Eternal Hall of mirrors” lit by ornamental sconces
    Master bedroom featuring a ceiling mural depicting the Sistine Chapel and painted by a descendant of Michelangelo
    The Moroccan Room, the second-floor atrium named for its Tangier-inspired design and imported copper tiles directly from Morocco.
     Memorabilia, pictures and items once owned by Liberace placed throughout.

Lee's spirit is said to be here. In 2017, in the early morning hours of September 23rd, in the area that had been Liberace’s dining room, a french door opened all on its own when no one was there. No one was in the house at the time and all doors were locked and secured. In 2018, a security camera inside the foyer showed the front doors opening and no one was on the other side and according to the owner, the home was empty at the time of the incident. And the front door was double bolted and the gate outside was locked and bolted. The lights are said to flicker on their own. 

Liberace's Tivoli Gardens was designed and owned by Liberace. The Liberace Museum was right next door to it. The inspiration behind the restaurant was the Tivoli Gardens Amusement Park in Copenhagen, Denmark. Lee had visited it on his last international tour in 1983. This amusement park had also inspired Walt Disney. The restaurant served international gourmet cuisine and was a key meeting place for show business royalty. The interior had tiny little lights all over and there was an elaborate English pub-style bar along with a piano bar, a room completely surrounded with mirrored walls and he had the the music and lyrics to the song I’ll Be  Seeing You encircling the room at the crown.It was incredibly successful, but Liberace had to sell it in 1986 as he got progressively sicker. A series of owners have operated it and it has fallen into disrepair. By 2023, the place was vacant with roof damaged. Vegan restaurateur Sacbe Meling bought it a restored the interior and got permission to use the name Liberace's Tivoli Garden. It reopened on May 16, 2023, Liberace’s 104th anniversary serving vegan food. It changed again and is now called Hacienda El Conejo. The interior looked completely changed. Liberace haunts the place, maybe because it has changed so much. 

Lee's apparition has been seen peeking into the banquet room in the back of the restaurant from outside through the windows. Years ago, all the power in the building turned off suddenly. Electricity was still working in adjacent buildings, so one of the waitresses commented that it was Liberace's birthday and maybe they should sing to him. So the staff sang Happy Birthday and the power came back on. An electrician was called in the next day and he could fins nothing wrong with the system. On another night, someone said something offensive about Liberace and a tree in a pot near the bar fell over. It took five men to get the tree righted, so it took some power to knock it down. 

So apparently the singer Debbie Gibson - who was popular back in the 1980s - idolized Liberace. When she was seven-years-old, her grandparents gave her the gift of going to see Liberace in concert. She would later purchase one of his pianos that was all mirrors and glass. When she heard that Liberace passed away, she was really sad and decided that she wanted to try to contact him through a seance  when she hosted a slumber party. They used a Ouija board and she told Liberace she was a big fan and that she would love a sign from him. It was quiet for a minute and then all of a sudden a few keys on the piano in her bedroom made noise, as if something had dropped down on them. Debbie had been asked to make an appearance on the celebrity psychic John Edwards show. She shares what happened on Celebrity Ghost Stories. "I got this call to do a TV show with a psychic medium that would contact people from the afterlife. I was like I don't know who he's going to contact but sure okay. As I was walking out the door to go tape the show, I hear this [plink] on the floor and a mirror had broken off my Liberace piano and I was a little bit spooked and went over to the mirror and picked it up. I put it in my purse and I headed to the TV studio. I was a mystery guest and the psychic couldn't see me because our backs were to each other. So I'm getting my reading done and he asks if I'm from the East Coast and I say 'yes' and he asks if I'm from New York and I say 'yes' and he starts to ask something else and then stops abruptly and says 'Surely, you couldn't have brought a piano with you. I answered that I did kind of have a piano with me. That I brought a piece of a very sentimental piano. He says, 'I'm feeling a very strong artistic male presence. A musical presence' and then he proceeded to nail that it was Liberace and that he did want to come through and communicate with me that day. I could not believe that this random medium who I had never met, pulled this out of thin air. The medium then said 'He's here, he's around you, he's watching over you and that piano.' I definitely felt that he was around me." When she first brought the piano into her house, her cat seemed to have reactions to it. She also wrote this mysterious composition that was like nothing she had ever created before and she said that those close to her have said that it sounds very different from her other compositions and she jokingly referred to it as "more sophisticated than anything [she’d] ever written!" Furthermore, Debbie also alluded to not being familiar with those chords.

She continued that the most extraordinary experience she had came when she went to Salt Lake City to do a couple of concerts. Debbie asked a concierge if there was anything nearby she could do and the concierge suggested a used book store. She grabbed a pile of books and headed for the cash register. And I heard a thump. I knew that that thump was for me. She heard a thump behind her. She said, "And I looked over my shoulder and lo and behold, there was a book that had fallen off the shelf. I looked down and staring up at me is Mr. Showmanship himself, a picture of Liberace on the cover. It was an autobiography. And I was like, OK, this is weird. And I opened the book to start thumbing through it and out falls a piece of mail, an envelope. And I could not believe it. The return address said 'George Liberace Orchestrations.' Now, George was his brother. And I opened it up. It was an original Western Union Telegram. And it was dated April, 1957. And in my state of feeling anxious and wondering if I am doing the right things in my career, and all-- all my worry, I looked down and remember that I have a concert that night. And the telegram says, 'Good luck on your concert tonight.' And it's from Liberace himself. And I was like, oh my God. So spooked beyond belief. I put the letter back in the envelope. I could not believe that this original piece of mail found its way to me. I really just felt like that was his way of letting me know it was all gonna be OK. And you know what? It was. The concert went great that night and every other night. I think, overall, Liberace is like a guardian angel to me, because he has come to me at times when I've needed something beyond myself to get me through a certain time. And he's been there." 

Liberace was an extraordinary performer and an eccentric man. Those two things lend credence to the idea that his spirit would continue on and make itself known. He loved all of his clothes and pianos and other treasures. We're sure he would want to watch over his old stuff. Is Liberace's ghost haunting his collection? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 604 - The Elms Hotel

Moment in Oddity - The Tombstone House

Here at History Goes Bump, we often talk about how much we love cemeteries and old unique homes and architecture. In Petersburg, Virginia, there is a unique blending of all of the above. It is known as the Tombstone House. From the street, it looks like any ordinary block home. The two-story structure was built in 1934 at a cost of only $45 for the 2,200 marble blocks that were used for constructing the home. We are sure that by now, you have guessed where the marble blocks were sourced from. These were the bottom half of marble headstones. In the siege of Petersburg, during the last nine months of the Civil War, many of the Union soldiers who died in the battle, were buried at Poplar Lawn Cemetery. After the original wooden markers were beginning to rot away, the government replaced them with upright marble headstones. As we know, maintenance of old cemeteries can fall by the wayside, and it was during the Great Depression that the Poplar Lawn Cemetery decided to cut the existing tombstones in half, laying the inscripted parts flat on each individual grave vs having them stand erect. Of course this saved on mowing and maintenance fees for the cemetery. The construction of this modest home is quoted in articles as being, "A wonderful example of waste not, want not. Or is it waste not, haunt-not?". Local lore suggests that paranormal activity is experienced here. Haunted or not, a house constructed of repurposed headstones, certainly is odd.

The Elms Hotel (Suggested by: Jared Spangler)

Thirty minutes north of Kansas City is Excelsior Springs, Missouri. This town was formed around natural springs that attracted Native American populations for centuries. Europeans eventually discovered them, settled here and marketed the waters for what they believed were their curative effects. The Elms Hotel was one of several lodgings offered in the city. The location burned down twice before this third version that stands today was built. There have been deaths here and that has led to hauntings. Join us for the history and hauntings of The Elms Hotel!

Excelsior Springs was shaped by water and not just any water, but water rich in Iron and Manganese. These waters were unique as compared to other mineral waters in the area. These waters were found in shallow places that had iron-bearing rocks along them and underneath them and this caused the water to take on a reddish hue. There was also a distinctive metallic taste to the water. Excelsior Springs had seven wells that contained this type of water. The Native Americans knew of these wells for hundreds of years and considered them healing. The Nebo Hill People were an early indigenous group near here. Europeans would arrive in 1682. Rene-Robert de LaSalle claimed for France all the land drained by the Mississippi River at that time. The United States would buy the territory in 1803 and that is when settlers would flock there. Anthony W. Wyman bought land near the Fishing River and apparently had no idea he was sitting on a spring of healing waters. That was until a black farmer named Travis Mellion came through the area in the summer of 1880 with his family. Stories vary on whether he was sick with scrofula or one of his children was. The main story shared claims it was a daughter named Opal, but census records reveal she wasn't born until later. Anyway, this scrofula was awful and a form of tuberculosis that afflicted the lymph nodes of the neck. It rarely is seen today, except in HIV/AIDS patients. These painful masses would grow on the neck. The narrative goes that Travis was told about these springs nearby that might be able to help and then either he or his child got in the water and bathed in it for weeks and the scrofula was cured.

Word reached a man named Frederick Kigler who had rheumatism and an old Civil War injury and he tried the water too and was also healed. Before long, word of these healings began to spread and people flocked to the region. A merchant-preacher named Rev. John Van Buren Flack in nearby Missouri City heard the rumors about these healing springs and he traveled to the springs and collected samples for analysis. The chemists who tested it reported that the water "justified expectations of curative results." Rev. Flack was a fan of Henry Longfellow, so he named the spring Excelsior and told Anthony Wyman that he should plat the land because people were going to want to move here and they needed a proper town. Flack and Wyman had the land surveyed and then they platted the entire 40 acres. One hundred houses were built within a year and the town of Excelsior Springs was founded.

Now our listeners are probably asking the same thing. This Wyman guy owned the land, so what in the world does Flack think he is doing? He just kinda moved himself right into ownership here. The two men formed an agreement on August 7, 1880 that read, "...on a part of said land is located the spring known as Excelsior, and to promote said enterprise, the said Wyman agrees that any and all of his land as owned and as needed shall be used in said enterprise, except his residence, mill site, and one square acre of land. Said Flack agrees to carefully collect and collate all evidence as to the merits of said spring, and to write and publish a pamphlet setting forth the same in full detail, and to mail the same to his numerous friends and acquaintances." So basically it seems that Wyman didn't want to run a business, he just wanted to keep run his farm and mill. He gave Flack an acre of land to build a hotel, residence and business house and left the promotion of everything to Flack and if he kept up his end of the bargain, he would receive 25% of "seen and unseen developments" and a percentage of town lot sales. So the good doctor was now tasked with being a marketer. And he did just that, running circulars in nearby towns, boasting of the curative effects of the waters in Excelsior. These boasts included curing people of dyspepsia, gravel, fever sores, sore eyes, scrofula, throat diseases, liver complaints and many other ailments. Flack eventually moved on to other endeavors, but he still would run ads for the springs.

Excelsior Springs got very popular at the end of the 1800s because the Progressive Era was in full swing and one of the reforms at that time involved a Clean Living Movement. This incorporated proper hygiene, exercising and a healthy diet. Bathing in natural springs was a part of the craze. Before hotels were built, people had to bring tents since there was nowhere to stay and they had to bring their own tin cups to draw water from a barrel sunk into the mud that captured water from the spring. In 1881, this spring was named Siloam and a wooden Oriental-style pagoda was added, so that made things a little nicer. 

Other springs were discovered nearby and they were named the Regent Spring, Lithia No. 1, the Soterian, Excelsior Springs Lithia Spring, Salt Sulphur Spring, Superior Spring, the Seltzer Salt Soda Spring, the Sulphur Salt Soda Spring, the Relief Spring and the list goes on. Well into the 1920s, more springs were discovered until there were over 30 and there were different chemical contents in several of them. Most were the ferro-manganese (so the iron) but there was also sodium bicarbonate, saline, calcium bicarbonate and sulphur. Each new well was tested and different curative effects were linked to each one. So Excelsior Springs really lived up to its name. The town built the Hall of Waters and bought nine of the springs. This facilitated the bottling and distributing of the mineral water. The Excelsior Springs Bottling Company took the water to the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893 and both of their entries were awarded first prizes. 

Some of the successful businesses in Excelsior Springs incorporated modalities like massage into their services and there were a variety of bath types. And some of the most successful entrprenuers in the late 1800s and early 1900s were black. W.A. Doxey and his wife Alice had a popular bathhouse and they served a white clientele. 

The most successful black entrepreneur was Dt. Dee Amos Ellett. His parents had been slaves and he escaped captivity when he was 15-years-old. He fled from Virginia to Massachusetts where he became a body servant to Colonel Francis Washburn. When Washburn was killed in battle a man named Rev. Gray took him under his wing and made sure that he attended college. He became a teacher and then attended Howard University and earned his medical degree in 1885. Dr. Ellett arrived in Excelsior Springs in 1888 and set up a private practice, but was asked to head up the Elms Hotel’s bath facilities. He watched over that as he continued to run his own business and he eventually opened the first Star Bath House. An advertisement read, "The Star Bath House, D.A. Ellett, M.D., Prop. Gives all kinds of BATHS, Including mineral, plain, mud, vapor, Turkish, shower, douche, electric, magnetic. Chalybeate water (also known as ferrous or iron) used if desired. Magnetic treatment, oil rubs and massage. Everything first class."

The original Elms Hotel would be built here in 1888 by the Excelsior Springs Company. This was a three-story hotel with broad verandas that sat on a 50-acre site. Orchestras would entertain the guests on the verandas and they could sip their spring water as they gazed out at the lush forests around them. The hotel also had a large heated swimming pool, a four-lane bowling alley, a target range, and a billiards room. After only standing for ten years, the hotel caught fire and burned to the ground on May 8, 1898. The cause of the fire was thought to be a candle in the ballroom. Dancing by candlelight was probably not a good idea.

It was decided to rebuild, but it would take several years before construction would begin in 1908. The grand opening of this even bigger and better version of The Elms took place in July 1909. This hotel lasted even less time than the first. It burned down completely the following year in 1910 after a large party had been hosted in the Grand Ballroom. A boiler ignited and the roof was set ablaze. Thankfully, nobody was killed in either of these fires. So, they decided to try once again, but they got smart this time. They decided to make the place as fireproof as possible and so they built the hotel that stands today out of limestone and stucco. This is a really neat hotel because one wouldn't expect to see Tudor Revival architecture in Missouri. The architects were Jackson & McIlvain and they designed a five-story hotel with a full basement that resembles an H-shape with two, two-story semi-circular bays: one in the front and one in the back. Those bays have double-gable-on-hip roofs and the entire hotel has a gable-front roof. The entrance has a long porch with Tudor-arched spandrels between stone columns that are square and two oriel windows extend from the third to fourth story. The interior featured the same stone feel with tile floors and a brick front counter and a massive stone fireplace. There was a marble staircase leading to the grand ballroom with its own large stone fireplace. There are Tudor-inspired end spandrels in here. There was a dining room and restaurant and the really unique part of the hotel is found down in the basement - a large lap pool that is shaped in an oval with stone columns in the center creating a median, so it really is like a lap track. Construction was completed in 1912 and over 3,000 visited on opening day. 

The landscaping was amazing as well and was designed by landscape architect George E. Kessler. The 15-acre grounds feature curving graveled walkways with grass and large trees of all varieties dotting the landscape. A gazebo stands on the upper grounds. There is an outdoor swimming pool and hot tub added in 1956, a courtyard, tennis courts, picnic area and herb garden. Out buildings include a pump house and carriage house, which is today used for meeting space. The Fishing River runs nearby.

The 1920s were a successful time for the hotel, but the Great Depression would prove to be hard on the hotel and in 1931, it filed for bankruptcy. Prohibition had become law during this time as well and part of the reason for The Elms' success was that it became a speakeasy and gangsters frequented the hotel. "Big City" Tom Pendergast was the crime boss of Kansas City, so he hung out at the hotel and several times Al Capone came to the hotel. Pretty Boy Floyd and Bugsy Moran liked to host bathtub gin parties here. The police tried raiding the place many times and one time, the Missouri Governor was there at a party and he told the police to go bust people really breaking the law. President Harry Truman's early political career had connections to Tom Pendergast as he was military buddies and good friends with Perndergast's nephew. The Pendergast organization helped Truman with elections to county-wide positions and eventually Senator. Truman became President when FDR died in 1945. When he sought to retain the Presidency on November 2, 1948, President Truman checked into The Elms Hotel secretly. He was given Room 300 and he ordered a ham and cheese sandwich. He told the Secret Service he was going to retire early and that they should wake him if anything important happened. Truman clearly figured that the polls and political talking heads were all right and that Thomas Dewey was going to win the election. The Secret Service woke him up at 4am and turned on the radio where it was being reported that President Truman was in the lead and was projected to win. The President went to Kansas City for victory pictures and returned to The Elms for a party and really put the place on the map.

The 1950s and 60s would find the hotel a hotspot for weddings and honeymoons and corporations like the location for conventions. But then business slowed down and this became more of a motor inn and Sheraton bought the property, finally closing it in 1970. The hotel sat vacant for eight years. One of the reasons for this decline was due to the falling interest in the spring water.

Dr. Samuel Ball came to Excelsior Springs in 1918, and opened a private practice, that grew into the Ball Clinic that opened in 1919. This clinic specialized in the treatment of arthritis and rheumatism and would eventually have seven buildings. Dr. Ball drilled his own wells to begin with, but eventually used the water supplied by the Hall of Waters. Like all the other businesses in the area, Ball made big claims about the water. He retired in 1953 and died in 1956, shortly before the medical community started getting more vocal about being skeptical of clinics like this. The downfall for the Ball Clinic, and basically much of Excelsior Springs, came through a scathing expose written in the Saturday Evening Post by Ralph Lee Smith in the August 24, 1963 issue entitled The Hucksters of Pain. Smith revealed that $250 million a year had been made through peddling dubious remedies. He visited the clinic and lied about having issues with pain. Before this trip, he had visited one of the nation's most eminent specialists on arthritis and he found nothing wrong with Smith. However, Smith was told by the Ball Clinic that he had fibrositis also known as lumbago. They told him that this was a forerunner of arthritis, which it is not. The Arthritis and Rheumatism Foundation didn't think highly of the Ball Clinic and they told Smith that the Clinic's "theories about the causes of arthritis were 'disproven by medical science many years ago'." Weird machines were also used like the Sonus Film-o-Sonic machine, which the FDA tested and found to contain nothing therapeutic and they took legal action, seizing the machines. It was only a matter of months before the Ball Clinic closed its doors for good on December 31, 1963.

By 1981, there was a new owner and the hotel was refurbished and this brought an all-new spa renovation and this is when the lap pool went in that has a jogging track around it, there are cool and hot tubs, a waterfall tub and environmental rooms with cool mists and hot tubs. Part of the hotel was sold as time-share condos. Things were great for a decade, but 1991 brought another bankruptcy. The city stepped in and slowly bought interest in the hotel until it owned it in 1994. There was another huge renovation at that time and then another one in 2011 and today it is known as The Elms Hotel & Spa and has been proclaimed a Grand Dame of Hospitality with 152 guest rooms. 11,000 square feet of meeting space, including the 3,900-square-foot Elms Ballroom, a 42-seat amphitheater, a stone carriage house, and a 20-person boardroom. Amenities include two restaurants, two lounges, a 10,000-square-foot spa, an indoor European swim track, an indoor banked jogging track, a fitness room, an outdoor pool, a challenge course, a walking trail, and a professional volleyball court. 

The hospitality seems to run to the unseen as well. Several spirits find the hotel a comfortable place to remain in the afterlife. The Elms embraces their ghost stories. They offer a paranormal package that includes a one hour tour. The lap pool hosts someone from Prohibition days that is usually seen in a fedora hat. Gangsters stored their liquor down in the coolness of the basement and ran card games down here, out of sight. No one knows for sure, but it is believed that this man was killed during one of the illegal parties. Or maybe it was a hit that committed at the hotel. 

One of the spirits is a woman seen wearing a 1920s style maid uniform that usually appears on the third floor. She is said to be a nice spirit and ensures that the cleaning staff does their work correctly. Another female spirit is not so nice. She pulls people's hair and throws things. The story goes that she lost a child and is searching the hotel for that child and so she is angry. Room 422 was said to have a murder-suicide happen in there and this has led to a TV turning itself on and off. People have been scratched in Room 347.  

Everyday Outdoor Family on TikTok shared an experience she and her husband had at the hotel when they decided to book an overnight stay to get away from the kids for a night. They decided to go on the ghost tour and when they told the tour guide their room number, the guide asked if they wanted to know the stories connected to their room and she said that "of course they did." The room is known for things to move around. So as they were returning to their room after the tour, she and her husband were like, "Oh, is anything going to be moved around?" Everything was fine. So they went down to the pool and nothing happened. They returned to their room and again were kidding each other about whether stuff would be moved around - nothing. They get into bed and she asks her husband to close the curtains. These are really heavy curtains, not something that could easy be blown open. She wakes up at 2am and notices that the curtains are wide open. She goes back to sleep and asks her husband the next morning if he opened the curtains. He looks at them and goes, "Nooo." They couldn't figure out any reason why the curtains would be opened. The air conditioner was across the room. A person commented under the video, "I actually got married at the Elms, and when we were staying there that night, my husband was sleeping and I woke up, and I felt like someone was sitting on the side of the bed…..twice!!!!!" Another person commented, "My husband and I just stayed and had similar experiences. Doors opened when we woke up that we had shut before bed. LOTS of voices."

Investigator Janet Reed told 41 Action News that their team saw four wet footprints going away from the pool and disappearing like someone had just jumped out of the pool and walked off. She said of the girl ghost that roams the third floor, "I had a friend that stayed here and they thought I've got to get out there and tell that mother to take care of that child. they open the door and look down the hallways and there was no one there."  

These two guys named Jacob and Lucas stayed at the hotel in 2024 and they took the ghost tour at the hotel. They remarked that it seemed strange when they got to the Lap Pool and the tour guide told them that people see a male spirit standing at the far end of the room sometimes. They had both thought they saw something out of the corner of their eyes before when they were filming the pool area and doing a little swimming and they both had turned their heads at the same time, which made them think that something had to be there since they simultaneously thought they saw something., hearing the story on the tour convinced them that they probably did see an apparition. We just wanted to point out that there was this great moment in this video where they are partaking of a charcuterie board and they called it an adult lunchable. 

Ghost Moms stayed at the hotel in July 2025 and they set up a music box motion detector in the bathroom, which went off for quite a while. They wrote, "A motion detector being triggered by something unseen in the middle of the night is never going to not be terrifying. We were staying on the third floor of the Elms Hotel where guests have seen an apparition of a woman looking for her child and a maid roaming the halls. Maybe she was just trying to tidy up our room for us."

A woman was interviewed by the Excelsior Citizen and she was staying at the Elms with her husband. He went out for a bit and she decided to take a bath. In the middle of that the door handle jiggled and she wondered if he had left his key and so couldn't get in. She got out of the bath and went to the door and no one was there. Later, when he returned, she asked if he had tried to get in earlier an he said, "no." They checked the door handles and realized that moving the outside door knob doesn't move the inside doorknob, so how the handle was jiggling on the inside, they didn't know.

Ghost Hunters investigated in 2013. They brought a device with them that could detect when the water in the pool was disturbed. They also had something called a Shadow Detector that went off because the laser beam path was disturbed. At the end of the visit, they were comfortable claiming that the hotel indeed seemed to be haunted. But is The Elms Hotel haunted? That is for you to decide!