HGB Ep. 639 - Haunted Nottingham

This Month in History - Dance Like a Chicken Day

In the month of May, on the 14th, Dance Like a Chicken Day is celebrated annually. The beak snapping, wing flapping, tail feather shaking song is a staple at weddings, Oktoberfests and other types of parties and events. Composed by Swiss accordion player Werner Thomas in the 1950's, after being inspired while watching ducks at a Swiss ski resort. He named the song 'Der Ententanz'(ENT-en-tahnz) or 'The Duck Dance'. This fun and silly dance is all about letting go of inhibitions, relieving stress and bringing people together. The Oom-pah Polka-style song became internationally popular in the early 1980's following its introduction at the Tulsa, Oklahoma, Oktoberfest in 1981. According to the Guinness World Records, the largest participant chicken dance occurred on September 1st, 1996. It took place at the Canfield Fair in Canfield, Ohio and hosted a whopping 72,000 participants to set the official record. Other large Chicken Dance gatherings have taken place in Zinzinnati in Cincinnati, Ohio with 48,000 dancers. Though some events have claimed larger numbers than the Canfield Fair Chicken Dance, the 1996 gathering still remains the recognized record.

Haunted Nottingham

Nottingham is located in Nottinghamshire in the East Midlands of England. The city is known for its Robin Hood legend, its lace heritage and the extensive man-made cave network that runs beneath it. There are centuries of history here and this has led to numerous legends and ghost stories connected to several locations. Join us for the history and hauntings of Nottingham. 

Nottingham was once a bustling inland port because the River Trent was able to accommodate large ships. And while the port side of its history is no longer important, this is a significant British city with the seventh largest economy in the United Kingdom and a population of several hundred thousand. The history here includes Norman conquest, Anglo-Saxon settlement, the Black Death killing 60% of the population, the Industrial Revolution bringing a successful textile industry and the world's oldest professional football club. The name Nottingham has a very interesting origin. The Anglo Saxons established a borough named Snotengaham because their group was known as Snotingas. The borough's name meant "the homestead of Snot's people." When the Normans came along, they thankfully dropped the S from the name. (Anybody need a tissue?) The founder of the Salvation Army, William Booth, was born in Nottingham. The city has a system of caves, canals and railways and many country homes and abbeys on its outskirts. There are also many haunted locations here. But let's start with a legend first.

St. Anne's Well 

Nottingham had several springs in the city that were all said to have medicinal qualities. One of these was St. Anne's Well. A chapel built for St. Anne was near the spring, hence the name. People would come seeking help for arthritis and other pains, although this spring doesn't seem very pleasant as a book from 1797 said that "the water is very cold, it will kill a toad." But maybe people came here for a very different reason as Pat Mayfield's 1976  book "Legends of Nottinghamshire" says, "The water of St. Anne's Well was well known all over England for its ability to restore the sexual powers of the people who drank it." One can't find this well anymore because it was demolished and the spring disappeared under a new railway. 

Prezzo Italian Restaurant

Prezzo Italian Restaurant is located on Forman Street within the Cornerhouse entertainment complex. This had been the site of the Nottingham Evening Post headquarters from the 1870s until 1998. But before that time, Forman Street was the red-light district during the Victorian era. Sir Charles James Watkin Williams was a Liberal MP and legal expert during that time and he liked to frequent the brothels. It was at one that stood on this site that he came to his end that has left many calling him the "happy ghost." Apparently, Sir Williams died mid coitus of a heart attack in the embrace of one Miss Nelly Blankey. A rhyme about this moment in history goes, "In eight feet deep of solid earth, Sir Watkin Williams lies. He lost his breath, which caused his death, 'twixt Nellie Blankey's thighs'." It is the ghost of Sir Williams that is said to be here. Patrons and employees have reported frantic banging and knocking sounds from the floor above when there is nobody up there.

Mapperley Hospital 

Mapperly Hospital is a really cool looking building that started off as the Nottingham Borough Lunatic Asylum. The building was designed by George Thomas Hine using a linear corridor layout that was added on to in 1889. The asylum opened in August of 1880. This would become Mapperley Hospital in 1948 and did well for a few decades, but went into decline starting in the early 1980s, eventually closing in December 1994. 

There were multiple buildings that were part of the complex and most still remain, having been repurposed with apartments on the south end called Nightingale House, and the Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust taking over the north end, which is called Duncan Macmillan House. People who had worked there claimed that they would hear their names being called by an unknown, disembodied voice. A female ghost was seen gliding down the corridors. And this is very interesting, the former ITV drama series ‘Staying Alive’ was filmed in the building and there were several times that production had to be stopped because of ghostly shrieking. Graham Dawson said on Facebook, "I worked at the hospital in the works dept as a floor layer. One of my jobs was to replace the floor in the South corridor working at night. Night work meant you had to have someone working with you for safety . I sent my mate off to the mess room to make tea and I carried on working after a while I heard him coming down the corridor and started a conversation with him when I looked round there was nobody there. Think what you will but we always made tea together after that." Maxine Joesphine Palmer said on Facebook, "I worked there in 1995, as receptionist, brilliant place to work. Very spooky stuff happened especially on the night shift. Always heard a child singing 'silent night' on the south side corridor even though only housed adults."

National Justice Museum/Galleries of Justice

The National Justice Museum had been the Galleries of Justice. This is located on High Pavement in the Lace Market. The site was first used by the Normans and they called it Sheriff's Hall and this housed the sheriffs who were to keep the peace and collect taxes. 

This would become a law court in 1375 and a prison was here starting in 1449 and some of those prison cells are still accessible today. So this was a place where one could be held, tried and punished all under one roof. The last hanging here took place in 1864. The building was also used as a police station from 1905 to 1985. The courts closed in 1986. Employees and overnight cleaning staff have all reported having strange encounters in the museum. There are at least three spirits here including a soldier, an old lady, and a Victorian man. Cleaners will not go into any areas alone. The former courtroom has had disembodied groaning and screams, the sound of knocking, strange lights and shadows have been seen. Those sentenced to death are believed to haunt the courtroom. Claire Finn led ghost tours through the building and the museum's website interviewed her in 2020 and she said, "After snaking our way through the courtroom, my group and I arrived at the dark cells. This is when things became interesting. A few members of the group felt as though they were being watched. One women suddenly felt her arm had been pulled and was so terrified she insisted on staying outside in the exercise yard. I thought it best not to tell her about the bodies buried underneath. A man suddenly said he felt a huge pressure around him, so I decided to lead the group outside to the exercise yard, as the atmosphere was getting tense. When I asked if everyone was ok, the same man showed me his arm to reveal several scratches. He was convinced something had attacked him in the cell. As the tour came to an end I could tell the group was unnerved, so I reassured them they were all safe and far away from the dark cells. I returned to the reception area to collect my next tour and standing there was our medium, staring intensely at me. She walked over to me and said 'you really need to practice your spiritual grounding.'"

Lauren Williams was the Hospitality and Events Sales Manager at National Justice Museum when she spoke to the Left Lion website in October of 2025. She said, "Within my first week of working there, I had a paranormal experience. I was in the corporate kitchen, which is an area back of house and had my hair in a ponytail, and someone pulled my hair. I was in the middle of the room on my own. It was quite a yank and very odd. I understand why, as people have been executed on the front steps. There were terrible conditions in parts of the jail, and a lot of history with it being a court for 650 years. It’s a bit of a dark place to work." 

Ernie Wilkinson was a caretaker in 1995 when the goal became a museum. He told Left Lion, "My favorite ghost is Sam, that's what we call him. He's around all day. He's a little grey-haired old man. He’s been seen by wardens from Lincoln Prison, and when we had a builder in he saw Sam walk across the yard and straight through his car. Then there's the one seen in the exercise yard, he's a youth of about 19 or twenty wearing a sackcloth who appears to be writing on the wall. He gets more friendly each time I see him." Lauren said, "A fundraiser for Marie Curie Cancer Care, in 1995, reported ghostly apparitions in the early hours. Those attending the ‘spookathon’ reported seeing a mysterious lady attempt, and fail, to open a door in the grand jury room at 4am. Another saw a woman, a small boy and a man at the same time. A law student from Nottingham University said he had put his ear to the floor of a room and was able to hear a muffled conversation taking place below. However, he couldn’t hear what was being said." Lauren did outline another experience that genuinely frightened her. “It was when I was pregnant and I was coming through the museum towards the women’s laundry. I could hear the faint sound of a baby crying, so I went to have a look. There wasn’t anyone down there as it was towards the end of the day. We are on a cliff face, but the street is so far away, and this was a really loud crying noise by the time I got there. I freaked myself out and needed to leave immediately. I did ask our head historic interpreter if [babies] would have been there. Babies were in the jail, either by inmates who were pregnant before they came, but also, above the laundry is the Governor's house, where the governor, the jailer who looked after the men and the matron who looked after the women lived with their families and children. A colleague also felt someone walk through them, which was quite a visceral experience, but they didn’t feel it was too threatening."

Nottingham City of Caves 

Nottingham is a city with caves beneath it. The city sits upon a soft sandstone ridge that made it easy for early dwellers to hand dig cave dwellings. For this reason, it was known as Tigguo Cobauc ( Tig woe Caw bah) meaning "Place of Caves." These caves were around for hundreds of years and some still exist today. 

These were places where mainly the poor lived, but there was also a tannery. The St. Mary's Inclosure Act of 1845 eventually banned the renting of caves to the poor. Some of these caves are under the Broadmarsh Shopping Centre, which was built in the early 1970s. A Franciscan Friary known as Greyfriars, Nottingham, stood here until 1539. While the site was being prepared for the shopping center, the caves were rediscovered. The developer planned to bulldoze them, but locals protested and they were saved and protected as a Scheduled Monument. The caves were excavated by archaeologists who found pottery dating back to 1270 and then they were opened to the public as a museum. They are part of the National Justice Museum. Occasional ghost hunts are held here as well. Lauren said of the caves to Left Lion, "What’s reported the most are physical things like stones being thrown, like small gravel stones. It's the cave area and a lot of people feel a presence that is like a feeling of despair, anger, frustration and quite negative feelings." 

Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem Pub (The Trip)

Nottingham Castle was built upon Castle Rock and the building that houses Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem rests against that rock. There are several caves attached to it as well. It is thought that these caves and the building may have been a brewhouse for the castle going back to the medieval period. While the pub claims to have been established in 1189, the first mention of this name is in 1799. 

The pub was named The Pilgrim going back to 1751. Both of these names were inspired by this being a stop over for pilgrims and crusaders traveling to Jerusalem. There is a map from 1610 that shows a structure here, so it really is up in the air how old this pub may be. There is a spirit that haunts this location. A portrait of a woman dressed in Victorian style attire hangs in the pub. This portrait was moved to a different wall during a renovation and patrons started pointing out that the once dower-looking woman now appeared to be smiling. Is this just faulty memory? But that's not the only object in the pub with a weird story. There is a wooden model gallion up on the second floor that is said to have been gifted to the establishment by a visiting sailor. Legend claims that this is cursed. This started when the model was cleaned and moved from its previous location downstairs. The person who cleaned the model, died right after completing that. A landlady named Marilyn said in 1994, "The last three people who have cleaned it are said to have died mysterious and unexpected deaths within 12 months of doing so." This model is in a very sorry and dirty state because nobody will touch the thing to clean it. A glass case was eventually put around the model. There is other paranormal activity. People claim to have their keys disappear and then reappear in odd places. Glasses and bottles have flown off shelves by themselves. There is also the sound of breaking glass and no broken glass is found. Two foot soldiers were seen walking through the wall in the cellar by a group of people. Marilyn also said, "Previous landlords have both seen and heard two ghosts, a man and woman. We hear people calling when there's no one there. The woman, wearing what appears to be crinoline skirts is seen walking down the stairs into the cellars." A manager named Claire also had experiences. She told the BBC that she was moving boxes to the attic and "I was aware that somebody was following some three stairs behind me. I dismissed it as fanciful, but a chill came over me that was hard to ignore. The first chill I could ignore, but the second time I climbed the stairs I saw a shimmering black shape that had no place in a badly lit corridor. In that light a natural substance could not have shimmered. I did not believe what I saw, I was tired, I imagined it. I picked up the third box in a determined mood, but the presence retaliated by seeming to grow stronger. I ran to my flat and locked the door." 

Ye Old Salutation Inn (The Sal)

The Ye Olde Salutation Inn is one of three pubs in Nottingham that claims to be the oldest. Parts of it date to 1240, but today it's been described as "an old fashioned rock and bike pub." There are unusually large man-made caves under this building. These are rock cut passageways, cells, chambers, and chimneys with stone-slab shelves, so probably used for food storage. Crusading knights more than likely stopped over here on the way to the Holy Land. 

Through the years this has been a tannery, alehouse, hostel  and private dwelling. The caves hid Jews escaping persecution and there was a leper colony here at one time too. A bit of tragedy occurred in 1820 when the landlord John Green and his family died from arsenic poisoning. Apparently, they were using arsenic to kill rats and it contaminated their oatmeal. There are those who claim this is the most haunted pub in Nottingham. One landlord claimed it had 89 spirits. One of the ghosts is thought to be of a young girl named Rosie. People leave marbles, dolls and other toys for her that are kept in a corner. She apprently likes to move things around. Back in 2016, manager Terry Webster said, "I'm a skeptic where ghosts are concerned, but I've seen things in this pub that really do make me wonder." He went on to share that he had been going downstairs when he heard footsteps and a cough. Terry was alarmed because it was early in the morning and no one should be in the building, but him. He worried that an employee had forgotten to lock the doors the night before and an intruder was in the pub. He found no one else inside and when he checked the security footage, there was no one, but himself. Could this be the highwayman that likes to draw his pistols and wander between the pub and the caves below? The poisoned landlord and his family are thought to be here and there may be the ghost of a lady of the night who was named Jezebel and had a disfigured face.

Church Rock Cemetery 

Church Rock Cemetery is built on the site of the old gallows hill where people were hanged for their crimes in the late 17th century. The cemetery was founded in 1851 by Edwin Patchett. Notable burials include the founder of Nottingham's renowned Raleigh Bicycle Company, Sir Frank Bowden, and famed architect Watson Fothergill. 

A local clergyman, named George Oliver, claimed to find Robin Hood's cave in the 1800s. He claimed this cave network had once housed an ancient Druid temple and that later, Robin Hood took up hiding in a cave here. More than likely, these caves were a byproduct of the sand mining that had occurred here centuries before. Robin Hood was probably never here, but the ghost of a Victorian lady dressed in white has been seen walking around the cemetery at night. The caves are said to have the spirit of a ghostly miner and some kind of negative entity that appears as a tall shadow. He whispers his name in people's ears and most people come out of the caves feeling sad and claiming to have heard disembodied footsteps and running. 

Wollaton Hall 

Francis Willoughby, who was an English industrialist, began construction on Wollaton Hall in 1580 and it took eight years to complete. This is an Elizabethan country house that stands in Wollaton Park that was designed by architect Robert Smythson. This is great architecture with these towers at each corner that are three storeys tall. The exterior is made from Ancaster stone and there are French and Dutch influences and much of the decorative carving is described as fantasy-Gothic. 

The interior has a fake hammerbeam wood ceiling and the gallery of the main hall contains Nottinghamshire's oldest pipe organ. There are cellars and passages beneath the main hall. The Willoughby family owned the hall until 1881. Then it was vacant for a while. The 11th Baron Middleton sold it to the Nottingham Corporation. The Nottingham Council opened it as a museum in 1926. The park has a herd of deer and today the hall is the Nottingham Natural History Museum, with Nottingham Industrial Museum in the outbuildings. If you look at a picture of the hall, you might recognize it as Wayne Manor. Scenes from the Batman movie "The Dark Knight Rises" were filmed here in 2011. And there is a city named Gotham in Nottinghamshire. Employees have felt something unseen tap them on the shoulders. A construction foreman was having a meeting with two of the museum's research staff in the early 1980s when the group heard the sound of labored breathing. This sound was definitely in the room with them and it seemed to be moving around the room. The sound eventually faded away and they all found it unnerving. The Minstrel's Gallery in the hall has a musical ghost who likes to whistle. Several employees have heard the ghostly whistling coming from this room when they are locking up at night. A ghost in military garb is seen sometimes walking around the courtyards and then it fades away. One witness described this ghost as wearing a German uniform. Andrew James Wright wrote Haunted Nottingham and he shares this story in there: 

(Keith Taylor Story)

Nottingham Castle

Nottingham Castle resides high on a cliff known as Castle Rock. Nottingham Castle doesn't really look like a classic castle. There is so much lore around it for many of us who grew up hearing about Robin Hood that we expect it to look like Cinderella's Castle or something. As was the case with so many castles, a Norman castle sat here first and this dated to 1068. This was a wooden motte-and-bailey castle built by William the Conqueror to defend a very strategic position near a crossing of the River Trent. 

A stone castle was built in its place by King Henry II in the late 1100s. When King Richard the Lionheart went away on the Third Crusade, the Sheriff of Nottingham and other supporters of Prince John, occupied the castle. Robin Hood is thought to mainly be a literary legend, but there are those who think he was based on a real person. Three people who have been suggested are Robert Hod, a man who owed the church money and fled to York; Robyn Hode who was a servant of Edward II at York in 1324 or Robin Hood who trespassed in a royal forest in Northhamptonshire. Zeroing in on a date is hard as well. But the strength of the legend seems to support that there must be some truth to this as it has made its way into no less than 39 ballads. There have also been four scripts for Elizabethan playlets. Here is an excerpt from Richard Grafton's Chronicle of 1569 (p. 584) This version of Robin certainly isn't the one we grew up hearing about who robbed the rich to give to the poor. Sounds like he robbed everybody and kept the loot for himself and his men. The story transformed through the years to be our lovable, heroic and generous Robin Hood. Nottingham Castle was the scene of the final showdown between Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham. 

One of the most important historic events to happen at the castle took place in 1330 when King Edward III staged a coup against his own mother, Queen Isabella of France, and her lover Roger Mortimer. The Queen - or she-wolf of France as some called her - and her lover had been serving as regents until Edward came of age in 1330. But they had no intention of giving up the throne. After all, the two had murdered King Edward II to get this throne. 

Here is the story behind the King's death, "He was held in a cell above the rotting corpses of animals, in an attempt to kill him indirectly. But Edward was extremely strong, fit and healthy, and survived the treatment, until on the night of 21 September 1327, he was held down and a red-hot poker pushed into his anus through a drenching-horn. His screams could be heard for miles around." Sir William Montagu led the coup and they used a secret tunnel under the castle to get them higher up into the castle where a door that was normally locked was left unlocked by Edward III. They killed Morimer's guards and bound and gagged him and took him to the Tower of London. He was hanged a month later. Isabella was sent away to Castle Rising Castle. King Edward III made Nottingham Castle his residence. It stopped being a royal residence in 1600. The castle was razed in 1649 and replaced with the Ducal Mansion. Riots in 1831 led to the burning down of the mansion. This left it a derelict shell until it was restored in 1875 and opened as the Nottingham Castle Museum in 1878. During World War II, the British Army took over the castle. The city got it back in 1946. There have been more renovations and the Nottingham Castle Trust now manages the museum.

Roger Mortimer is said to haunt "Mortimer's Hole," which was the secret passage that led into the castle. Although Mortimer didn't die here, his spirit is said to haunt this area and his disembodied footsteps are heard. A woman's voice is heard pleading, "Fair son, have mercy on the gentle Mortimer," usually in Norman French. 

There are ghosts here from another incident at the castle. In 1212, King John took 28 sons of Welsh noblemen as prisoners and kept them at the castle. After a border dispute, the King decided to hang all of the young men and he did this from the ramparts of the castle. The desperate disembodied cries of these young men are heard near the castle walls. There is also the ghost of a woman referred to as the "Lady in the Light." This is believed to be the spirit of Catherine Howard, Countess of Nottingham, was executed in 1542 for treason after being accused of committing adultery with her distant cousin, Thomas Culpeper, and concealing a scandalous pre-marital sexual past from the King. Her actions broke a newly passed law designed to control the Queen Consort's behavior.

These are some great locations in a city that has always held an air of mystique because of its Robin Hood legend. Was Robin Hood a real person? Are these places in Nottingham haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 638 - Railroad House Inn and Shank's Tavern

Moment in Oddity - Arrow Injury Saves Woman's Life (Suggested by: Chelsea Flowers)

A Texas school teacher by the name of Donna Barbour had an incredibly fortunate accident back in April of 2012. Mrs. Barbour was an avid gardener and after the stresses of spending her day teaching 20 young children, she liked to unwind in her garden. As dinner time neared, Donna stopped tending her garden to fire up the barbecue for herself and her husband. Suddenly, she felt like she had been hit by a baseball bat in her neck. She was startled and reached up to her neck, shockingly she discovered that she had been shot with an arrow. Panicking, Mrs. Barbour ran indoors to find her husband who had been speaking on the phone with their daughter. Mr. Barbour managed to stop Donna from frantically running around and convinced her to lie down while he called emergency services. The wayward arrow that Donna had been shot by came from a neighbors home where the son had been practicing with a compound bow. Donna was life-flighted to the nearest trauma hospital. The fact that she was still alive was a miracle. The arrow had narrowly missed both her carotid artery and jugular vein. She underwent a 2 hour emergency surgery to remove the arrow from her neck. The next morning she awoke with her family by her side, but that wasn't the end of her miraculous survival story. When her surgeon came to check on her, he delivered the news that her CT scan the day before revealed a brain tumor. Although thought to be benign, it needed to be removed because if it were left to continue growing, the tumor would cross the midline of Donna's brain, causing a massive stroke. A neurosurgeon performed the tumor removal surgery successfully. After the surgery, Donna Barbour underwent annual MRIs to ensure that the tumor had not grown back. In April of 2015, Mrs. Barbour received a call to schedule a doctors appointment to discuss her recent MRI results. The MRI revealed that there was no new tumor discovered, but that she had a brain aneurysm. Three months later Donna underwent surgery for the aneurysm and upon doing so, it was discovered that the aneurysm was on the brink of rupturing, which would have proven fatal. To survive being shot in the neck by an arrow is a miracle. But the injury leading to the discovery and treatment of a potentially deadly brain tumor and then a fatal brain aneurysm, certainly is odd. 

Railroad House Inn and Shank's Tavern (Suggested by: Kay Eberhart)

The Railroad House Inn celebrated its bicentennial in 2023. Through those 200 years, the inn has witnessed a lot of history in Marietta, Pennsylvania. The oldest continuously operated bar in all of Lancaster County, Shank's Tavern, is also in Marietta. Both of these historic locations are reputedly haunted. Join us for the history and hauntings of the Railroad House Inn and Shank's Tavern.

Robert Wilkins was an Indian trader and he bought 300 acres along the Susquehanna (suss-kwuh-HANN-uh) River in 1719. He sold this property to Rev. James Anderson whose son set up a ferry across the river and the river trade industry was strong here. Eventually James Anderson IV and James Cook established the towns of New Haven and Waterford. In 1812, these two became one and it was named Marietta after the two men's wives, Mary and Henrietta. The residents raised two companies to fight in the War of 1812. The early years were tough with slow growth and an economic crisis. The 1870s would see the end of the river trade. Timber and iron became the main economic engines of Marietta after that. The town has a dense concentration of historic Federal and Victorian homes and buildings. One of these buildings sits at the corner of Front and Perry, the Railroad House. The Railroad House Inn got its start as a boarding house when it was built in 1823. The building was made from red brick and stands three stories tall with a balcony on the second floor and a veranda on the first floor. There is a touch of gingerbreading to the porch. The inn sat across from the train station that was built in 1820. This provided accommodations for canal traffic before the railroad came to town. The Marietta Railroad Company was formed in 1832 to help construct a railway from Marietta to a spot near Columbia. The railroad would become a boon as Columbia, Marietta, and Wrightsville would start producing pig iron, which hadn't been successfully manufactured in this country before 1840. The Reading and Columbia Railroad purchased the Hanover Junction and Susquehanna Railroad after they declared bankruptcy in 1880 and this became the Reading, Marietta, and Hanover Railroad. The first Reading locomotive came to the area on April 19, 1883. There were great hopes that this railway would have routes to New York City and Washington, D.C., but the Columbia Bridge burned and those dreams were dashed. The line was eventually abandoned in 1930. Today, the station is a visitors center and trailhead station along the Northwest Lancaster County River Trail. 

There have been several owners and name changes through the years. This was a boarding house and a tavern referred to as Depot House and then it was the Railroad Hotel. Thomas Scott was owner of the inn in the late 19th century. 

Scott was an American industrialist and railroad executive, so it was fitting he would become owner of the Railroad House Inn. Scott had been born in 1823 to a father who was a tavern keeper. He quit school at the age of ten and worked as a handyman and his work at a general supply store taught him about running a business and he pursued a couple of small business ventures in his early 20s. At 27, he got involved in the railroad and worked his way up from station agent to general superintendent to Vice President of the Philadelphia Railroad. Scott was described as being daring and operated in ethically gray areas sometimes to turn a profit. During the Civil War, he accepted a special commission in which he was placed in charge of railroad and telegraph lines for the Union and he worked to build a railroad through Washington, D.C. as an assistant to the Secretary of War. After the war, he continued to work in transportation and his employment practices that included cutting the pay of railroad workers in Pittsburgh heavily, led to the Great Railroad Strike of 1877. Scott said that the strikers should be given "a rifle diet for a few days and see how they like that kind of bread." This led to him being referred to as one of the first robber barons of the Gilded Age. His business never recovered from the strike and he had a stroke in 1878, ultimately dying in 1881. 

Mrs. Bell ran it as a boarding house again in the 1940s. There was a time it served as a private residence. Architect John DeVitry purchased the building with a man named John Westenhoefer and they hand dug the cellar to create space for what would become a 60s-era coffee house. This later became a disco in the 1970s. 

In 1989, Richard and Donna Chambers bought the Railroad House and hey had a dream that they could turn the old hotel into a beautiful Victorian restaurant and bed and breakfast. And they did just that, running it into the early 2000s. Eric Farr and Tracy Beam bought it in 2008 and they operated it until 2015. Freddy States and Joey Bowden became co-owners of the restaurant portion in 2015 and they acquired the rest of the building in 2020. Bowden had been the former manager of the Bull’s Head Pub in Lititz and States had been co-owner of McCleary’s Pub. The men took advantage of the shutdown during the pandemic to make repairs and restore the building. The only thing not made-over was the main-floor bar and dining rooms and the inn and restaurant was reopened in the fall of 2020. That bar has Victorian charm with a beautiful fireplace and hardwood floors and the adjacent dining room has a steampunk theme. Another dining room, the Brodbeck Room, has a traditional Colonial feel with exposed beams, a cooking hearth, lighting fixtures and furnishings that contribute to the atmosphere. The original summer kitchen became a private dining room that can accommodate 15 to 20 guests. The Perry Street Cellar features craft beer, pub fare and musical entertainment. There is an outdoor patio as well. The inn specializes in what they call Micro-weddings. Joey said, "We’re unique. We were doing micro-weddings before the concept even existed.” The carriage house became the wedding venue. There are nine rooms in the inn with full bathrooms and luxury linens.

The building has managed to stand through two major floods, one in 1932 and the other in 1976. Tropical Storm Lee hit in 2011 and waters from this, inundated the cellar and first floor. The cellar sustained the worst damage, as the muddy river water impacted everything. The inn also survived a visit from Jane Fonda when she came through in 1972 protesting the Vietnam War. The coffee house had a psychedelic vibe at the time and welcomed her. 

And speaking of psychedelic, there seems to be some former guests and a former owner who are still here at the inn in the afterlife. So, if you book a room, you may get a ghostly visitor. One of the spirits here may be former owner Thomas Scott. Interestingly, everything we saw in our research reported that Scott died in 1881, but when owners Richard and Donna Chambers were renovating, they found an invoice for a keg of beer and a case of wine dated May 17, 1900 and signed by Thomas Scott. One has to wonder how this could be if he were dead in 1881. Did his ghost sign off on the order? A waitress had gone down into the basement to retrieve something and she saw a man sitting at the bar and as she passed by, he spoke to her saying “Hello.” She turned to reply and the man was no longer there. Could this have been Scott? Perhaps, but there are other ghosts here. 

Room 6 is said to be one of the most haunted at the inn. Guests have reported hearing the sounds of banging coming from within its walls. It is believed that someone shot themselves in this room. Cold spots have been felt and a presence is sometimes felt. That presence sometimes sits down on the bed. In Room 8, people have reported a figure at the end of the bed. 

There is a spirit here named Anne Marie and a couple back stories are told about her. The first is that she lived next door and she tended the garden, ensuring there was a bounty to serve in the restaurant. Many eligible young men would come through and she fancied eventually marrying one of these men, but that never came to fruition. So its said that is why she appears only to single men and she likes to flirt with men. Anne Marie has been seen walking around the gardens in a Victorian dress and men have seen her on the outskirts of the Biergarten - she knows where to find the men. But she also is thought to haunt Room 6. Another story claims that she was left broken-hearted and may have been the one to take her own life in the room. She has been seen looking out the window and softly crying as though she is seeking her lost love. Some people refer to her as the white lady or lady in white. Only one woman has ever reported seeing or interacting with Anne Marie. 

One of the stranger claims people have made is that they hear the sound of a typewriter in a room that has no typewriter. Disembodied footsteps are heard throughout the building and cold spots and winds are felt. 

An employee named Jean Adams spent a night alone in one of the rooms. She was in the bed and felt a presence get in the bed with her. It didn't feel threatening, but it did make her uneasy. Jean thought she heard a voice in her head say "Move over, you’re taking up all the room." She decided to move over and the uneasy feeling left her. Another employee decided to take a nap in the TV room upstairs and she heard the door open and felt an unseen presence as if watching her. A former chef at the restaurant got the scare of his life when he came out of the kitchen and noticed that his reflection in the mirror which hangs over the bar wasn't alone. There was a little girl in a Victorian dress staring back out of the mirror at him. He quickly turned around to see if there was a child behind him and there wasn't and when he looked back at the mirror, she was gone there too. This chef saw that little girl again one day as he walked past the stairway which leads to the second floor. He saw her out of the corner of his eye. A second look revealed an empty staircase.

Spirits don't just stick to the main building. The summer kitchen has a weird experience that was reported. A couple was staying in the one-bedroom loft and the wife awakened in the middle of the night and saw an elderly woman sitting in a rocking chair, knitting. She turned to wake up her husband and when they both looked back in that direction and the scene had disappeared. We word it that way because the rocking chair was gone now too. And there was no rocking chair in that room. So the spirit brought its own chair, which makes us think this was residual. Another couple was staying several months later and reported the same thing to management. 

Dark Whimsical Ghosts did an investigation in 2024 and here is one of the exchanges she had. (Innocent Spirit Box) So interesting to get both Innocent and Trapped. So does this spirit feel trapped in the room or at the inn? Then it was like to spirits were talking to each other. A female voice said "Patience" and a loud male voice said "Disagree." At this same time, an orb floated through the screen. Then there was these two "pleases" that came through the box, and they were unusual because the one was loud and firm, while the second sounded like it was whispered, but the voice was the same. (Please Spirit Box) Did another ghost tell them to speak softer? They had a cat shaped REM Pod that plays music when it goes off and it did go off on command. So they had a couple of interesting little things happen, but nothing that would have me convinced that this place is really haunted. 

Just a couple blocks down Front Street is Waterford Avenue. Shank's Tavern is located here. Retired riverboat captain James Stackhouse opened a tavern on the corner of South Waterford and West Front streets in 1814, so this location predates the Railroad House Inn. This is one of the oldest continuously running taverns in the commonwealth. Stackhouse called his establishment The Compass and the Square, most think as a nod to navigation on the waterways. It later became Hauer House and then Maulick's, named for local brewer Ernest Maulick. A speakeasy ran here in the 1920s and when the bar was warned that the police were coming, liquor was moved next door until the coast was clear. Right before Prohibition came to its end, John and Kathryn Shank bought the property and named it Shank’s Tavern. The tavern has remained family owned with Bob Shank as the current owner. He is the grandson of John and Kathryn. Shank's got in on craft brewing right when it started in the 1990s. They have a constantly rotating selection of beers on tap as well as a selection of hard liquor. The restaurant serves up salads and sandwiches and market-fresh produce as well as theme nights like Seafood Night on Fridays and Beef on Weck Thursdays. Beef on Weck is an iconic Western New York sandwich, particularly famous in Buffalo, featuring thinly sliced, rare roast beef piled high on a "kummelweck" roll. Kummelweck is a crunchy roll topped with kosher salt and caraway seeds. The sandwich is usually served with horseradish and a side of au jus. The tavern has stayed much the same as it has survived a couple of centuries of floods, the Great Depression, Prohibition, wars and much more. The original tile floors, fireplace, and wainscoting still remain. Bob Shank freely admits that the place has ghosts. 

There is the Lady in Black who is often seen standing in the upstairs window, looking down at the street. She likes to hang out near the ladies' room and hovers at the top of the stairs. Barb Hauer ran the tavern from 1865 to 1885 and people think this may be her. The black in her name comes from the black dress she is seen wearing.

Bob grew up in the old hotel portion that had been turned into apartments. he said that he and his brother had strange experiences on Sundays when the bar was closed and everything was quiet. They called these "Sunday Night Terrors." Bob and his brother would hear people talking that weren't there. The cigarette machine would work all on its own. They even heard dimes being dropped into the payphone as though someone were making a call even though no one was standing at the phone. Bob told Uncharted Lancaster, "One night, the silence was shattered by three heavy knocks on their bedroom door. When the boys looked beneath it, no feet or shadows were visible. Their mother checked—doors locked, no one there. But the moment she returned to her room, something slammed against the boys’ door so violently it split the wood and sent coat hangers flying across the room." Bob also said of a neighbor, "One neighbor, Jack Fry, had a ghostly encounter so terrifying it kept him from entering the bar for 35 years. He described seeing two headless, floating apparitions enter through the door. As they passed through, the katydids outside went silent. The world held its breath. Then the spirits retreated, and the night sounds returned all at once. Fry never forgot it."

Patrons have felt something unseen touch them and grasp their hands. Phantom laughter is heard in the stairwell. A bartender saw a half-bodied figure in the kitchen. Booming noises are heard that have no origin and doors slam all on their own. 

Marietta, Pennsylvania is a charming river town that owes a lot to its former days when the railroad was the core of the town. Like many historic downtown areas, bars and restaurants continue to be the anchors and it would seem that these two locations have some unseen patrons. Are the Railroad House Inn and Shank's Tavern haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 637 - Haunted Fort Smith, Arkansas

This Month in History - The Haymarket Affair

In the month of May, on the 4th, in 1886, a bombing took place at a labor demonstration in Chicago, Illinois. The event became known as the Haymarket affair. This was a rally that began peacefully on May 3rd, but then erupted into violence when police fired at the crowd of strikers. It was organized to support striking workers who were demanding to reduce their work shifts to eight hours per day. The initially peaceful gathering was held at the McCormick Harvesting Machine Company plant on the West Side of Chicago. On the 4th, an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb at the police as they were working to disperse the crowd. The resulting gunfire from the police resulted in the deaths of seven officers and four civilians, with many others injured. Eight suspected anarchists were identified and charged with the bombing. The legal proceedings made international news. During the trial, one person was identified as possibly having built the bomb, but evidence at the hearing indicated that none of the defendants on trial had thrown it, with only two of the eight defendants on trial having been present at the Haymarket at the time of the bombing. Seven people were sentenced to death and one person received 15 years in prison. Governor Richard H. Oglesby commuted two of the death sentences to life in prison. One person died by suicide while awaiting his execution and the remaining four were hanged on November 11, 1887. In 1893, Illinois Governor John Altgeld criticized the trial and pardoned the remaining four deceased defendants. 

Haunted Fort Smith, Arkansas

Fort Smith in Arkansas was the gateway to the West. The city is over 200 years old and got its start as a military outpost. There are several haunted locations here that are connected to that military heritage. And some are connected to the law, like the US Marshals. And then there are places of ill-repute. Fort Smith was a place where outlaws, bootleggers, gamblers and ladies-of-the-evening flourished on the traffic that came up the Arkansas River. Join us as we share the history and hauntings of Fort Smith! 

US Army troops established Fort Smith in 1817 in Arkansas to help keep the peace between the Osage and Cherokee. They named it for General Thomas Adams Smith, commander of the United States Army Rifle Regiment. People started to settle around the fort and it was expanded in the 1830s. The town of Fort Smith was founded by John Rogers and was incorporated in 1842. It was a military and supply center during the Mexican-American War and the California Gold Rush. During the Civil War, the Battle of Devil's Backbone took place nearby and the Confederate post was occupied by Union troops. Formerly enslaved people took refuge in Fort Smith after the war. The fort was abandoned in 1871, but parts of the original fort are still visible at the Fort Smith National Historic Site. Before the historic site was established, the site was a federal court under hanging Judge Isaac Parker who sentenced 160 people to death and hanged 79 of them. The courthouse is part of the historic site. Fort Smith had an interesting history through the 1900s with legalized prostitution for awhile, Jim Crow laws, lynchings and strikes. The city continues to hold a strong military presence with Fort Chaffee and it also has quite a few haunted locations.  

Fort Chaffee (Chay fee)

Fort Chaffee was built in 1941 and started as Camp Chaffee, named for a World War I Cavalry officer named Adna Chaffee Jr. This eventually stretched over 72,000-acres. This military base was the training site for thousands of troops heading overseas during World War II. German prisoners-of-war were housed here. It later served as an annual reserve training center. Vietnamese and Cuban refugees were housed here during the 1970s. 

The Arkansas National Guard still uses 66,000 acres of the property and the other 6,000 has been redeveloped. 700 buildings were demolishedTwo interesting facts: Elvis Presley was processed into the army at Fort Chaffee in 1958 and Mark David Chapman, the man who murdered John Lennon, worked at Fort Chaffee in the 1970s helping Vietnamese refugees at the camp. People hear disembodied footsteps and whispers, some people feel cold spots and there is a story about a disembodied arm floating in mid-air. Ghost Adventures visited the fort during Season 4. Their evidence included strange noises like music, work sounds and banging. A ball of light was captured flying into Zak's chest. And they captured the following EVPs: "It's Getting Hot In Here", "Its Not The Cops", "Watch Your Back", "Come And Get Me", "If You Believe That ****", "Get On The Bed", "Coffee, Cafe", "Get Out", "It's Hot In This Building and I'm Here To **** You." 

Fort Smith National Historic Site 

When it comes to the former Fort Smith, all that is left of that are the stone foundations. The Old Commissary Building still stands and is the oldest standing building at the historic site. This was built between 1838 and 1846 and initially was used for food and supply storage. Within a few years, it was the largest and busiest supply posts in the southwest. 

Both sides ended up using the building during the Civil War. From 1875 to 1890, Hanging Judge Isaac C. Parker’s office was on the second floor of the building. The first floor became home for the Hammersly family from 1890 to 1896 since two members of the family were court officials; Jacob Hammersly was the Court Crier and his daughter, Florence Hammersly, was a Deputy Court Clerk for Judge Parker. A group of local women saved the building when plans were made to demolish it. They opened it in 1910 as the Old Commissary Museum, which was the city’s first history museum. When the NPS made the building part of the historic site, the museum moved to the Atkinson-Williams Warehouse and changed its name to Fort Smith Museum of History. The Old Enlisted Men's Barracks was built in 1846 and was a two-story structure with porches on both sides at the first and second floor levels. Stone was quarried from Belle Point. A fire ripped through the building in 1849 because of a defective flue and it had to be rebuilt. It continued to house single enlisted men until the fort closed in 1871. But that wasn't it for the barracks. The next iteration for it would be as the courthouse for Judge Isaac Parker. While Judge Parker sounds like he would be a harsh man with the nickname of "Hanging Judge," he was actually a man who believed in redemption and he would weep as he sentenced a man to death. He would preach at the gallows before hangings. Parker had arrived in Fort Smith in 1875 at the age of 40 and at the time, outlaws had operated in the area with impunity for years and the justice system was in shambles. Parker fixed that and the gallows helped. The jail and US Marshal's Office was also located in the barrack's building. The jail was in the basement and had been the former mess hall and most people referred to it as hell on the border. Now it had two large cells that could hold up to 50 men each. There was limited ventilation and a bucket for the toilet. Today, the Barracks is the visitor center. The courtroom had been recreated on one end of the second floor with period desks and chairs. 

Eighty-six men would die on the gallows here, but it is the Judge who is thought to be the predominant spirit because he suffered psychologically and had nightmares constantly after becoming the judge. Visitors feel a heaviness near the recreated gallows structure. Anomalies appear in photos. 

A cleaning lady had been there late one night to do some dusting and when she entered the courtroom, she saw a man dressed in a dark period suit, sitting before the judge's bench. She excused herself, not wanting to disturb the man. She thought maybe he was a re-enactor or somebody left over from an event held earlier that day. But then she thought, wait a minute, nobody should be here at 10 o'clock at night. When she went back into the courtroom, the man was gone. Visitors have claimed to see this same figure and they describe him as being a large, heavyset man with a dark beard, and that is how Parker looked in his later years. People have also heard disembodied footsteps, smelled cigar and pipe smoke and heard whispered conversations and the rapping of a gavel. 

AM Nightshade wrote "Arkansas: True Hauntings, Urban Legends, and Paranormal Encounters from the Natural State" and in there he shares, "A ranger named Tom Yates, who worked the site for fourteen years before his retirement in 2018, described his first experience with the jail's sounds in an interview with the Fort Smith Times Record. He had been closing up the building on a winter evening when he heard what he was certain was a man crying in the lower cell block. He went down the stairs expecting to find a visitor who had stayed past closing. The cell block was empty. The sound stopped when he reached the bottom of the stairs and did not resume. Yates had several subsequent experiences in the jail over his fourteen years, all of them in the auditory range: sounds that had no visible source and that stopped when he approached them." 

Author Bud Steed had been taking pictures of the Barracks one day and he saw a man looking out the window from the upper floor. He didn't think much of it until the group he was with went inside and he realized that the upper level was padlocked and no one was in there. There were no other entrances or ways to get to the window. The shadowy form of a man has been seen hanging out around many of the museum's displays. (Jail experiences from Steed book)  

Fort Smith Museum of History

As we mentioned, The Fort Smith Museum of History is now located in the Atkinson-Williams Warehouse Building, which is located at 320 Rogers Avenue. This four-story brick building was built in 1907 and designed by architect Tllman Reddick. This was a commercial warehouse owned by Colonel Benjamin Atkinson and W. Buckner Williams who specialized in hardware. They ran the Atkinson-Williams Hardware Company into the first decades of the 20th century. 

A warehouse district grew up around it as this became a wholesale distribution center. The company became an exclusive distributor for John Deere and Studebaker. In 1979, that building became the home to the Old Fort Museum, now the Fort Smith Museum of History. The museum has more than 35,000 artifacts in its collection. The third floor is said to be the most haunted. Leisa Gramlich was the museum's executive director and shares that one of her most frightening experiences happened one day as she arrived to the third floor. She said, "We got off the elevator and heard a child's voice plain as day, like a child running and yelling. Playing is what it sounded like, and I even walked from the elevator back to the back here and said, 'Who's up there?', and I hear the voice jump from that corner to this corner so I came over here and there was nothing here." Investigators have reported getting a sudden cold chill in the museum's basement.  A slamming gavel is heard on the second floor that has some of Judge Parker's furniture. A child ghost has been seen on the second floor too.

Miss Laura's Social Club

The Row had been the former red-light district in Fort Smith. One of the brothels still stands today as a museum, Miss Laura's Social Club. This Victorian was built in 1896 and started as the Riverfront Commercial Hotel and was converted to a brothel in 1903 by Laura Ziegler, hence the name Miss Laura's. 

The house was quite grand and soon earned the nickname as the "Queen of the Row." The brothel was high class and only accepted the best clientele and working girls who made three times what was charged in other bordellos. The girls couldn't come downstairs unless they were fully dressed. Miss Laura made sure they got regular medical exams. Miss Laura sold the house in 1911 to "Big Bertha" Dean who ran it until it closed in 1948. The building served a variety of uses as it fell into disrepair and then in 1963 a man bought it and did a full remodel to open it as a restaurant. In 1992, it became a visitor's center and today is a museum. There are several ghosts here. People feel cold spots and catch the scent of cigars and brandy as though men still sit in the parlor waiting to converse with the girls and pick their "date" for the evening. The sounds of laughter have been heard audibly. A woman in a white gown has been seen, especially walking the upper floor. A ghostly piano is frequently heard playing in the mansion. 

The Clayton House

The Clayton House started as the Sutton House in 1852. William Henry Harrison Clayton bought it in 1876 and doubled the size of the house before moving in his family in 1882. He changed the look of it to Victorian Gothic/Italianate style as well. Clayton was the federal prosecuting attorney for the hanging judge. He had married a woman named Florence and they had six daughters and one son. Florence was part of a literary group that helped to establish the first public library in Fort Smith and Clayton was active with the Freemasons and Knight Templars in town. 

The house was six thousand square feet and had a formal parlor, a study, sitting room, dining room, ornate coal-burning fireplaces, a semi-detached servants’ quarters, a kitchen, four bedrooms and a common living area near the bedrooms. The Claytons lived here until 1897 and they left behind a few pieces of furniture that are still with the house, including a writing desk, a tea table and the family Bible. The house was a boarding house owned by Emma High for many years after the Claytons. Before the Claytons bought the house, it served as a Civil War hospital for the Union and many of the spirits here are thought to go back to this time. 

People claim to smell weird scents and some have been touched and had their hair pulled and there have been full-bodied apparitions seen. There is the Lady in Brown who seems to be residual as she usually sits just looking out a window and doesn't respond to anyone. She wears a long brown skirt and white linen high-necked blouse buttoned all the way up with her grey hair in a bun. People think she might be Emma High. She is seen for a moment and then disappears. 

Bud Steed wrote "Haunted Fort Smith & Van Buren" and in it he shares a story a tour guide named Amy shared with him, "Amy had been working in the office, which is located at the back of the home when she thought she smelled something burning - an odd type of smell that was unfamiliar to her. She searched all throughout the house, checking to make sure that nothing was on fire. Finding nothing that would account for the smell, she went back to the office to continue her work, but while passing through the study, she once again smelled the odd smoky odor. While standing there trying to figure out where it was coming from, she realized that it seemed to be all around her but concentrated just in the study, not in the adjoining rooms. At about that time, a maintenance worker who was doing some restoration work outside came in for a moment, and she asked him if he smelled the smoke as well. He said that he did and it smelled like high-end pipe tobacco. A bit nervous now, she half-jokingly asked whoever it was that was smoking if they could refrain from doing it in the house and while she was working. Within moments, the smell of pipe tobacco completely disappeared, and she has never experienced it since." Perhaps this had been Clayton visiting the house in the afterlife since the scent seem concentrated to the study. Or something residual frozen in time, although it went away when asked to do so. 

Lanky-Concentrate wrote on Reddit, "So, I currently work here! There is a servant's door with a large buffet on the other side. This door has a history of opening on its own! It's happened at 2 in the morning when no one was in the house! On the other side of the door is a table with a silver tea set that rattles all on its own. I've had so many experiences that it's easy to block it out which sounds insane. In the same area I've seen a woman several times. Unsure if it's the nurse or a servant. There are also footsteps in the study that you get used to."  

OceanStorm1914 had worked at the Clayton House and they wrote on Reddit, "All that being said, there are 4 or 5 active spirits and residual energy/hauntings from when it was a Union hospital during the Civil War. There's the gentleman in black (men wore dark colored clothes, he's always been perfectly polite to me), 1 or 2 women (not sure on that count. I've seen one lady almost clear as day except no color and others have said they've seen someone else), a young girl, and a grey cat. Based on hair style, I'd say it is a photo of the girl. She's most likely around 10, maybe younger, and during a spirit box session conducted during an investigation the team let me shadow and help with, her name is Grace. To me, she was a sweet heart and a shy little thing. I never physically saw her like the 3 others, but once we were introduced she made her self known. Edit: took another look at the photo. Someone mentioned the spirit having a shawl or similar and that's a definite possibility. If it is, it's the woman in brown that I never saw."  

Martha Siler had been the former director of the Clayton House and she had some experiences. She said that one bedroom on the second floor had doors that would slam hard and people would hear music playing and hear boots stomping. Martha saw the apparition of a woman dressed in a linen shirt and brown skirt in Mr. Clayton’s study one day. A carpenter took some pictures and he captured what appeared to be a woman in one of them and he was the only one in the house. Paranormal Investigation and Research of Western Arkansas has been to the house numerous times and recorded EVPs, including a meowing cat, a man shouting obscenities and someone calling Anna. 

There is a spirit that hangs out on the upstairs landing area and the bedrooms near the stairs and people call him "The Angry Man." People think he was a soldier and he is often seen dressed in black and he paces the floor impatiently. He was possibly seen at a wedding at the house. (Printed story) A volunteer once heard the piano in the house playing. She freaked out because this piano is a Mathushek orchestral square piano from 1884 that is worth $40,000. She thought a visitor was pounding on it. She ran to the room where it was and the music stopped right before she got there. She looked into the sitting room and no one was in there. She searched the whole downstairs and no one was there. It then occurred to her that maybe a spirit was playing it so she asked aloud if the person would stop playing the piano because it was an expensive antique and if anything happened to it, she would lose her ability to work there. She never heard the piano play again.  

Fort Smith has all the charms of a southern city, including the ghosts. Maybe. Are these places in Fort Smith haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 636 - Hotel Metlen

Moment in Oddity - The White Baneberry

Many varieties of flora can take unusual forms, they can be beautiful or strange in appearance, and some can even be deadly. We've previously featured the naked man orchid, the white egret orchid and also the corpse flower whose bloom smells like rotting flesh. Another strange plant with a creepiness all its own, is the White Baneberry. This is an upright plant featuring fern-like leaves with white flowers and distinctive white berries. These white berries have a black dot resembling a pupil, giving this perennial plant the nickname of "dolls eyes". Not only are the multiple eyes watching you creepy, but the entire plant is quite toxic, especially the berries. The compounds of the eyeball berries can cause cardiac arrest. This perennial herb dies back to the ground each winter and can be found in wooded areas from Eastern Canada down to southern locations like Georgia and west to Louisiana, Missouri and Minnesota. It thrives in rich, moist deciduous forests, especially under northern hardwoods in humus rich, acidic soils. To many people, dolls in general are creepy and they sometimes can be haunted, but a toxic plant whose berries look like creepy doll eyeballs watching you, certainly is odd. 

Hotel Metlen 

Dillon, Montana has served some important purposes in its time. This was the terminus for the Utah and Northern Railway and was the supply and shipping hub for the Beaverhead Valley, meaning it supplied most of the mining in the area. Eventually this would be the wool capital of America. The Hotel Metlen was built here and it still stands today in the town's historic district. There are several ghosts that reside within the hotel and not all of them are friendly. Join us for the history and hauntings of Hotel Metlen!

Like many states in the west, precious metals would bring settlers to Montana to establish towns. In the mid 1800s, silver and then gold were discovered in what would become the Beaverhead Valley. Not only was this ore rich, but this was also agriculturally rich. Immigrants flocked here and the railroad took notice with the Utah and Northern Railway founding Dillon as a railroad town in 1880. They first named it Terminus since that is what it was for the railway, but they eventually changed the name to Dillon in honor of the Union Pacific Railroad President at the time, Sidney Dillon. Dillon had been the key architect for getting the railroad through Butte, Montana. The town was situated perfectly to be a support hub for all of the nearby boomtowns like Virginia City, Bannack and Argenta. We've done an episode on the ghost town of Bannack. The introduction of the gold dredge at the same time as Dillon was being established, really helped the town flourish as well. Dillon was incorporated in 1884 and really started growing at this time. And then the gold mining was done and most boomtowns faltered, but Dillon held on because of agriculture. The area was perfect for cattle ranching and especially, sheep ranching. Dillon would become the largest exporter of sheep wool in the country. In 1897, the Montana State Normal School opened to train teachers for the state and it is today University of Montana Western.

Before there was a Metlen Hotel, there was the Corrine Hotel. This was a unique hotel made from canvas that could be moved. It was named for the town where it started, Corrine, Utah, and it traveled with the railroad to Dillon. It's hard to believe a flimsy hotel of canvas could thrive, but it did.

Joseph C. Metlen had been born in Pennsylvania in 1834 and he traveled to Montana with his brother where they settled on Horse Prairie in 1867 and started in a business to bring supplies from Corrine, Utah to Bannock. By 1871, Metlen was involved in politics, representing Beaverhead County in the territorial legislature. In 1883, when he was elected county treasurer, Metlen moved to Dillon. He ran for sheriff in 1884, but lost. The Corrine Hotel had been improved from a canvas hotel to a wood hotel by 1884 and so Metlen decided since he wasn't going to be sheriff, he should get into the hotel business and he bought the Corrine. Unfortunately, the hotel burned to the ground in 1892. Unthwarted, Metlen decided to rebuild and he chose the Second Empire architectural style with the distinctive mansard roof that was really popular at the time. The building was three-stories and made from white sandstone brick and there was also a central tower. The third story has dormer windows all along and around the mansard roof. Ashlar was quarried from the nearby Daly's Spur Quarry to serve as the foundation. The front entrance was recessed with a semi-circular arch over the top that was filled with a three-lite fan window and was beneath the tower. A second entrance was to the right when facing the building and this led into the saloon. There had been a balcony on the front originally, but that no longer exists. The building took up the entire city block. Inside there was Oregon pine and on the first floor was the lobby, bar and billiard room, dining room, double parlors, kitchen and the proprietor’s room. The second floor had a women's parlor and the twenty-seven guest rooms. While the hotel appeared to be just two-stories from the outside, it did have a third floor under the mansard roof that had twenty-nine rooms. The tower was accessible and had seats so guests could get a good view of the countryside and town. The hotel remains much the same today, although a large neon sign with the hotel's name stretches across the roof. During World War II, there was an aircraft warning facility added to the roof, which was like a penthouse apartment.

The hotel officially opened in February 11, 1898 with an afternoon reception and an evening ball and gala. Everyone who was anyone in the state attended, including Governor RB Smith, Attorney General Nolan, State Auditor TW Poindexter, Chief Justice Pemberton and several other judges. 

The rooms were considered luxurious and there were call bells in each room. The hotel had electricity and steam heating throughout and there was hot and cold running water. The hotel was proud to advertise that their boiling was "absolutely free from hammering." Metlen ran the hotel until he died in 1906. The hotel was a social center for the town and still remains so today. It is said that it has the coolest back bar in the state made from solid oak with a mahogany bar top. There have been a series of owners with the hotel being put up for sale as recently as 2021 for $1.3 million. We believe the current owner is Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan who upgraded many things about the building, focusing on the bar by adding a new sound and lighting system to drum up business. They advertise, “Come dance with us at the only dance floor for miles around! Our state of the art sound and lighting system is perfect to get down to everything from country western to hip-hop hits.” The hotel still rents rooms and has a bar and cafe and there are ghost tours offered inside.

There are several ghosts in the hotel. Patrons and employees have smelled phantom cigar smoke, seen apparitions and shadow figures, watched as items floated through the air, had items go missing and have heard disembodied voices. An EVP once captured a male or female voice saying, "They don't know that we are dead."

Here are some of the ghosts that are thought to be here. A male spirit hangs out upstairs and he is very angry. This entity is so malevolent that the third floor has been padlocked at time for the protection of the living. Investigators have captured EVPs of a male voice cursing. He particularly likes to say, "Eff you, get out!" There is a Lady in White seen floating on the dance floor. She is usually smiling and seems pleasant. The room above the bar is Room 19 and this woman has also been seen in there and a woman claimed to see a woman in a white dress staring back at her from a mirror in the women's restroom. She was alone in the restroom when she turned around. A previous owner had a wife that liked to wear a black bonnet and there is a female ghost that hangs out in the back bar that wears a black bonnet, so everybody assumes that is who that is. There has been a cowboy ghost wandering around. The hotel's general manager in 2018, Bailey Murphy, spoke with NBC Montana and he said, "Everybody thinks it's haunted. I would say it probably is. I think a lot of them are the cowboy customers that still wander these halls. I think they're cowboys because of the noise their boots make on the hardwood floors. They're fun ghosts. The ghosts that are here had a good time. We like to say we are the caretakers of their place." Bailey went on to say that sometimes keys go missing, doors unlock on their own, furniture moves and staff hear footsteps. 

A group of people were hanging out in the little tower of the hotel and when they entered, all the windows were closed. When they left the tower, they noticed that the windows had been opened slightly and they hadn't noticed it or heard it. Some investigators decided to use a Ouija board and the first thing they got to come through was "I don't want you here." 

Ghost Adventures was here during Season 13. When the crew was setting up their equipment, Billy heard a voice whisper "Bill" into his ear. The group heard an audible disembodied scream. Something unseen grabbed Zak's arm. There were many unexplained noises like boards moving, stomping sounds, the ceiling cracking and footsteps. The spirit box said, "Taken", "Want some?", "Be gentle", "You're welcome" and "Yeah." The Ovilus got the words, "RAN", "LOOK", "FOUND", "NANA", "GREAT", "ROCKET", "CHEAT", "BEG", "MALEVOLENT", "FORTY" and "CLOSET." The thermal imaging camera captures a figure walking from left to right which carried a cold signature. Right after, Billy felt chills.    

Finney L. Bryant was a caretaker at the hotel and had numerous experiences. He wrote on Facebook, "My first experience took place in the Basement. There used to be a guy named Bill that was a gunsmith and lived in an apartment that was located in the front of the hotel in the basement. He was the night watchman and restocked the bar for about 35 years I was told. He had some health issues and his son had moved him out about a month before we took over the Metlen Hotel. It was a good month before I had entered his apartment. There are many rooms in the basement and in one of the rooms was a freezer that had maybe 20-30 packages of game meat well wrapped and dated less than a year previous. (Of course, we ate it all.) One night around 10:30, I went down to check something in the basement. I went down the stairs and unlocked the basement door and continued down the long hallway and as I passed the room with the freezer, I looked in the dark room and about 20 feet away was the freezer against the wall with a green light on. (Anyone that has a chest freezer that has malfunctioned knows why its good to always see the green light on) this means everything is still frozen. I continued down to the end of basement where my shop is and then returned back upstairs again passing the room where the freezer is located and saw the green light on again (just habit). I locked the basement door and returned to the bar. Of course, Sophie told me to check the soda bibs which I forgot so I returned to the basement door, unlocked it and continued down the Hallway. First thing I noticed was a wrapped package of elk meat right in the middle of the hallway, and then another, and in almost every room there were packages of game meat scattered around the floor maybe 10-12. Absolutely no way it could have happened in less than a couple of minutes - when you go down to the basement you always have to turn on the lights because its devil dark down there.
The packages of meat were still frozen. I collected them and returned them to the freezer. I checked and the door was padlocked from the inside of the basement, then I went to the very back of the basement where the exit door has a big slide bolt. It was locked from the inside. Hum that's weird. Only one way in and one way out. Never figured that one out. Strange."

He also shared, "My second strange event at the Hotel Metlen was my daughter bought me a Samsung smart watch to keep track of how many steps and stairs I take everyday. Jjust in the hotel, I average about 5-7 miles a day and at least 20-25 flights of stairs. In the very back of the basement I have a large workshop that I spend most of my time in. Whenever I am in the hotel, I lock the front door so I don't get disturbed by tourists wanting to check it out. One day I came in, locked the front door and continued down to the basement to my shop, which is about 150' from the front door walking. There have been a few times where I was in my shop and heard people walking around on the first floor because I forgot to lock the front door, so I would would go upstairs and meet with them and usually because I have the gift of the gab, I would talk with them for some time about the history and usually it turned to the paranormal stuff. After they would leave, I would go back to work in my shop. One day I was working in my shop, which is directly under the back bar area, and I heard someone walking in the bar upstairs, real hard footsteps like boots. I followed the footsteps all the way to the front and continued up the stairs, and like I had many times before, I yelled out "Hello!" There was no answer so I went to the back bar and there was no one there. The back bar exit was locked from the inside. I went to the kitchen exit and again, found another door locked from the inside. I returned to the front hotel door figuring they left already and that was locked from the inside. I think "hum weird." I walked the entire hotel twice, all the floors, and I found no other humans and all the doors were locked up tight. My wife Sophie was the only other person with a new key for the locks and she was in Bozeman. So, who was walking the entire run of hallways? Strange."

"My third strange event at the Hotel Metlen happened two months ago. The bar is only open on thursday, friday and saturday nights starting at 7pm. Normally, the front door is always locked and it was about 3 in the afternoon and I had just unlocked and opened the bar front door to empty the garbage can outside. At this moment, my Daughter Mana and my wife Sophie walked up and came inside the bar. We sat down at the end of the bar, facing the front of the bar and we were talking. I was on a bar stool with my boots up on the bar and my daughter and my wife were seated in such a way that we all could see the front entrance. All of a sudden, the front door opened as if somebody was walking in. The door swung like 45 to 50 degrees and there was no one there and then it just closed. We all watched it.They were freaked out because we were looking right at it when it opened (I was so happy this happened with them there because usually i don't tell them the things i see in the hotel.) My daughter Mana ran to the front door and went outside and looked up and down the streets and there was no one around at all. When she came back inside, we all kind of laughed at how weird that was. I never changed my posture, boots still on the bar and my hands clasped behind my head and just for kicks, because we still hadn't recovered from the event, I said out loud, "On the count of 3, show yourself!" We were all watching the front door and I counted "1-2-3" and nothing. I kept counting and when I got to five, it happened again while we were watching. No wind, no drafts, it was a sunny day and most important, the hydraulic door closer was cranked down so was really hard to open the door. The door is heavy and it keeps the drunk football players from ripping it open. It was really strange." 

There is another haunted location in town, the University of Montana Western. The university got its start as the Montana State Normal School in 1893. The purpose was to train teachers according to a model used by other states. The first term wouldn't start until September 6, 1897. To earn a degree in elementary education, it took two years. There was also a one-year professional course for all teachers with two years of prior experience. A four-year Latin course was also offered. Eventually this became a four-year college and was renamed Western Montana College. It became part of the Montana University System in 2000 and its name was changed to University of Montana Western at that time. 

The ghost that haunts Old Main is named Marie. There are a couple of stories about how Marie met her fate. In both versions, Marie was a Dillon resident who came to campus for musical lessons. The Western Centennial History Book has her as a cello player that came to campus to practice and play with the campus orchestra. In the other account, Marie was an elementary student who came to campus after school for piano lessons. She would go home after school, leave her books and then come to campus. One afternoon, she was running late and didn't bother to go home. She went directly to campus. Marie hurried home after her lesson and forgot to grab her school books. After dinner, she went to do her homework and realized she had left her books on campus. She rushed back and was struck by a car on her way to campus. Students and faculty have all experienced haunting experiences. They have heard piano music playing in the Main Hall when the room is dark and no one is in there.  

Mathews Hall is said to be haunted by the most famous ghost on the campus, Matilda. The story goes that she was a student in the early days of Montana State Normal College. During her second year at the college, she passed away suddenly. At least according to one telling. Another more dramatic story is the familiar, Matilda got pregnant out of wedlock and hanged herself. Matilda returned as a mischievous spirit who likes to pull pranks such as opening drawers and emptying the contents while the room occupants are asleep. When the dorms had radios in them, there was rule that radios had to be off when the resident was gone. One of Matilda’s favorite pranks was to turn the radio on after the resident left. That usually got the resident written up. The resident was left with no credible explanation other than “Matilda did it!” Students have heard disembodied footsteps and seen Matilda's full-bodied apparition.

Suzie O'Connell wrote in 2015, "Matilda primarily haunts the third, uppermost floor, but one night, she came all the way down to the basement floor where my roommate and I resided. We were up goofing around, cracking jokes in the wee hours of the morning in the dark, and my roommate suddenly asks why I went into the other room of our two-room suite. I was still in my bed, but she SWEARS she saw me get up and walk into the other room. We also heard stories of small appliances (microwaves, TVs, curling irons, etc.) turning on by themselves and people waking up with scratches." 

Daen wrote in 2017, "My daughter literally called me 30 minutes ago from Matthews Hall where she is a freshman. She said she was sitting in her bed reading and her door handle started shaking like someone was trying to get in. Thinking it was her roommate, she let it go for several seconds before she got up and went to the door. It stopped and when she opened the door, no one was there. Immediately the sink faucet started lightly running. She walked toward the sink and the handle turned by itself full blast! She is a little freaked out at the moment."

Jen Phillip wrote in 2025, "I was a student down in Dillon at Western and I lived in Mathew’s dorm on the 3rd floor. I never noticed Matilda until I had my own room on the third floor of Mathew’s. Every night it sounded like someone was up in the attic walking back and forth bouncing a ball. This always took place between early hours around 2:00am. Matilda never scared me or bothered me other than re-arranging my posters in my room and turning on my TV and radio. I would go home on the weekends and not all the time would it happen, but my posters would be upside down on the opposite wall I had them on. At first I thought it was my RA playing games on me, but when I asked him, he said it wasn’t him. He explained that if he were to ever go into a students dorm without it being an emergency he could get into a lot of trouble. Matilda never hurt me or scared me. She would always let me know she was around but she NEVER once harmed me. I heard she liked to mess with the girls, but it was never anything bad or scary, she just wanted me to know she was around. There were times when I could swear there was someone at my door, but when I answered the door there was no one around. I always used to tell her hello and whenever I would get the sensation she was around, I would always say hello and ask her how’s she doing. After I found out I wasn’t losing my mind, I would always tell her to behave and to leave my posters alone. I told her if she wanted the TV or radio on, that was fine, but to leave my posters alone. There were times when I would get back to my dorm after the weekend was over to find my radio and TV on, but she never did mess with my posters again. I thought it was pretty cool to have a ghost in the dorm." 

Dillon, Montana has decades of history behind it. Is it possible that these two locations, the hotel and the university, have spirits? Are they haunted? That is for you to decide!

HGB Ep. 635 - Haunted Whiskey Row

This Month in History - 1906 San Francisco Earthquake

In the month of April, on the 18th, in 1906, a massive magnitude 7.9 earthquake struck San Francisco, California, at 5:12am. What followed the 42-60 second earthquake was widespread devastation and destruction. The tremor emanated from a rupture of the San Andreas Fault line and traveled a spanse of roughly 275-296 miles. Broken gas lines and overturned stoves ignited fires that became known as, 'Ham and Egg Fires' which burned uncontrollably for three days. Broken water mains made fire fighting nearly impossible. Approximately 28,000 buildings were destroyed, affecting roughly 500 blocks in the city's center. Property damage  was said to be around $350 million in 1906 dollars. Over 80% of San Francisco was destroyed with nearby Santa Rosa and San Jose impacted as well. Although early reports cited lower numbers, it is now believed that over 3,000 people perished due to the earthquake and resulting fires and 250,000 people were left homeless. This natural disaster led to major developments in seismology and motivated the city to rebuild with better earthquake-resistant structures. 

Haunted Whiskey Row

Over the years, HGB has featured several Millionaire Rows from various historic city downtowns, and this is where the millionaires of old built their stone palaces. In Prescott, Arizona, there is a block that has been named Whiskey Row. Listeners won't be surprised to learn that this patch of rough and tumble was dotted with saloons and other forms of entertainment. Today, it is dotted with haunted locations. Join us for the history and hauntings of Whiskey Row.

The future Prescott was inhabited by the Yavapai (yah-vah-PIE) tribe living in their wickiups, which were small round or cone-shaped houses made of a willow frame covered with brush and dirt. Yavapai means "people of the sun" and they lived here for hundreds of years and still do on reservations. Their allies were the nearby Apache. When gold was found near the Prescott area, Ohio railroad magnates partnered to establish the Arizona Territory in 1863. Fort Whipple would be founded to be the territorial capital and settlers started moving to the new settlement. John NOble Goodwin was the Arizona Territorial Governor in 1864 and he initiated a tour of the territory. Fort Whipple was moved 20 miles away to a higher area and Goodwin decided to establish a new territorial capital on the east side of Granite Creek. A public meeting was held and it was decided to name it Prescott for historian William H. Prescott. Lots were sold and the new community began to flourish. Mining for silver and gold enriched it. This would remain the capital until November of 1867. Prescott would be the capital again from 1877 to 1889. Virgil Earp became the constable in 1878. Fires burned down the downtown in 1900, so it was rebuilt with brick. One of the places that was devastated with fire was Whiskey Row. 

The history of this area is a bit murky, but it is believed it started with a bar opened up by Isaac Goldberg. Other accounts say that this area was established closer to Granite Creek, but was moved because drunk people kept falling into the creek and drowning. Whatever the case, Goldberg got things started in 1864. 

Goldberg had been born in the late 1830s in Piotrkow, Poland. He followed his brother to the United States and started his new life in California. When gold was struck in Arizona, Isaac headed there and ended up in Prescott. People called him Lomo de Oro, which means "Gold Lion" because he spent all his free time prospecting. For work, he opened up that bar. And this bar wasn't much to look at. He set up a plank of wood and put a bunch of whisky bottles on it and then he added a little shanty over the top and he was ready for business. Isaac had this tin cup and for 50 cents, he would give a customer a dram of whiskey. Miners could pay in absolute gold. He needed help eventually and so he hires this Confederate deserter who was missing part of his nose to be a bartender. Goldberg made a $100 a month with his bar. Eventually, Goldberg opened a saloon on Montezuma Street. This street would be Whiskey Row. Whiskey Row would cover the block on Montezuma Street between Goodwin and Gurley Streets. Many other saloons would follow and attract the likes of the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday. In 1897, Whiskey Row became the first section of Prescott to have exterior public lighting installed. Whiskey Row is still home to many bars and restaurants today and many of the historic buildings that were built after the Great Fire of 1900 still stand. Several of them have ghost stories.

Woman in White

Whiskey Row is anchored by the Courthouse Plaza. The first or original courthouse was built in 1867 and housed the jail and Sheriff ’s Office on the ground floor and a community meeting hall and courtroom on the second floor. Executions took place in the fenced yard behind the courthouse. Our first two spirits are found here. There is a woman in white seen along Whiskey Row where it is believed she died in the Great Fire. She is seen most often near Courthouse Plaza and she is seen in a long white period dress. People claim she remains because she is looking for a lost love who died in the fire as well. 

Mike the Ghost Dog

Next we have a ghost dog. This four-legged spook is named Mike and nobody knows how he ended up in town, but the city adopted him and everybody loved him. Patrons on Whiskey Row would order two steaks, one for them and the other for Mike. He was frequently running around the courthouse plaza. Mike lived from 1946 to 1960 and when he died in 1960, a plaque was put up in the square's northwest corner to memorialize him that reads, "In memory of our community dog, Mike. Self-appointed guardian of the plaza, official welcomer of visitors and general ambassador of good will. Mike was known and loved by all. Regardless of race, color, creed or station in life, he was a silent, tolerant, loyal friend. Take heed if you will: a moral life herein." A paranormal investigator and author Darlene Wilson claims that she has recorded a dog barking in the square when no dogs were present and also the voice of a male calling out, "Here, Mike!" 

Whiskey River Tavern

Whiskey River Tavern is the current business at 214 South Montezuma Street. This building has seen a lot of different iterations. There has been Rickety Cricket Brewing Company, Far From Folsom, Coyote Joe's, Annie's Attic, Cantina, County Seat Restaurant, Brick and Bones and Arizona Hotel. 

That last one was the original. The Arizona Hotel was a two-story brothel. There is a supernatural story going back to the time when Coyote Joe's was here. The owner's cousin told him that she had a visit from a young female ghost that told her that there was going to be a fire in Joe’s and two weeks later, indeed, there was a fire in the dining room. So the owner opened a separate nightclub upstairs and named it in honor of the name the ghost went by, Annie. So this became Annie's Attic. Spirits in the building like to gather in the kitchen and they play with burners and ovens, making it hard to get food cooked completely. Parker Anderson reports in Haunted Prescott, "One of the new bartenders was closing early one morning when the pans and utensils started flying across the room. He took off running, called the manager and said, 'I’m out of here, and by the way, someone needs to go close the front door and lock up.'" Anderson was also told by the owner of Rickety Cricket, Terry Thomson, "that during the renovations of the new restaurant many strange things happened to him and his staff. One night he was in the kitchen working when one of the spice containers went flying across the room. On another night, he and another employee were the only ones there. There were three raps on the wall, and Terry thought it was the employee trying to scare him. Terry was telling his employee to stop when he saw him outside, waiting for Terry. Then Terry heard the three raps again, only louder. Another employee is very familiar with the building; as a child, he used to play with Annie, not knowing that she was a ghost. Terry and his staff all believed some of the ghostly activity came from Annie."

The Grumpy Sicilian 

The Grumpy Sicilian is located at 126 S. Montezuma Street. This is another location that has rotating restaurants in it for the last 100 years. This has also been the Devil's Pantry and Adirondack (A der ron dak) Cafe. 

A previous owner had some patrons ask him what was above the restaurant, an apartment? The owner answered no, that it was his office. They asked if he had a secretary who worked in the office with red hair. When he said no, they told him that they had seen a red-haired woman come down the stairs. The owner checked upstairs, but there was no one up there. He later found out who this mysterious woman might be. A customer told him a few weeks later that she used to come into the restaurant as a little girl all the time with her grandparents. One day, they stopped taking her there and when she asked why, they told her a woman had been murdered there. This was apparently an Irish woman who was shot. The owner was stunned. He didn't believe in ghosts, but now he wondered if that murder victim was haunting his restaurant.

The Grand Highland Hotel

The Grand Highland Hotel is located at 154 S. Montezuma Street. This boutique hotel offers 12 historically themed rooms and they offer a wedding setting. This started as the Grand Saloon & Hotel, which opened in 1903. This two-story hotel was more than likely a brothel. 

In 1949, a curio shop opened on the first floor of the hotel. This was the Holiday Shop and it was run by Howard Hinson Sr. who moved from the east. Hinson saved up his money and he was able to purchase the building. The hotel at that time had 16 guest rooms, 3 shared bathrooms and an apartment for the manager. Hinson added to the hotel in 1971 by purchasing the building next door. A fire destroyed parts of the buildings in May 2012 and the empty space created the inspiration for the Holiday Courtyard. In 2021, Nick & Sara Medina, purchased the hotel from the Hinsons making it part of the Medina Hospitality brand. Kelly Bartholomew wrote on Facebook, "My husband and I stayed in the Big Nose Kate room July 4th weekend of 2020 and experienced a presence. First, I had my drink on the counter in the bathroom. It had been sitting there for awhile but when my husband and I started arguing the glass flew off the sink and shattered! We thought maybe it was just a fluke (but immediately stopped arguing!). Then, around 3:30 am, I was awoken by a strong sense of a presence, my heart was racing and I was frightened. When we woke up that morning, I shared the experience with my husband and he revealed the same thing had happened to him at the same time! We were both a little shaken and told the front desk attendant who confirmed others had similar experiences in that room. When returning home and looking at pictures from our visit, we noticed the outline of a woman in the tub in this photo. Perhaps Kate was there all along?" Adrienne Dillmore wrote on Facebook, "My husband and I stayed in room 201, Jan 23 2021. On the first night I suddenly fell sick and fell asleep early. The second night, I was awaken by the sound of someone walking by my side of the bed. (Closest to the bathroom) it sounded like boards cricking. Then I felt something sit on the bed next to me. My heart was pounding and I couldn’t breathe. I slowly tapped my husband to wake up, and told him what happened. He said that prior to him falling asleep he heard the handles on the dresser moving. As well as sounds coming from the wall behind our headboard. But there is no building there. I did ask the front desk if anyone ever reported anything in that room and he said no. I know what happened and it still freaks me out to this day." 

Hotel St. Michael

Hotel St. Michael is now a part of the Best Western family of hotels. Hotel St. Michael is directly across from the Courthouse Plaza. This started as Hotel Burke, which was opened in 1890 by businessman Dennis Burke and lawman Michael J. Hickey, who assisted in the hangings of two murderers, Dennis W. Dilda and Frank Wilson, in the late 1880s. Burke was also a military veteran and was a mayor of Prescott. He wanted to make his hotel more enticing than other hotels in town, so he advertised it as being fireproof. Only, it wasn't. So in the Great Fire of 1900, the Hotel Burke burned to the ground. 

Burke and Hickey rebuilt, constructing an even bigger hotel and adding a dining hall. They reopened in 1901. This new hotel had these new elements that were these types of grotesques but they were thought to represent local politicians, kinda like caricatures. In 1907, Hickey bought out Burke and renamed the hotel, Hotel St. Michael. He sold to Ed Shumate who sold to John Duke. Duke made several upgrades like telephones in the rooms and installing an elevator, the first in Prescott. Famous people who stayed here include Tex Ritter, Teddy Roosevelt and Barry Goldwater. Today, the hotel has added Fire & Sword, a new iteration of the hotel's original speakeasy on Whiskey Row. The speakeasy has a copper ceiling and original bricks and serves up craft cocktails. There is also the Bistro St. Michael that serves up comfort food and refreshing drinks. Guests claim to hear whispers and strange knocks, especially on the third floor. Lights also go on and off on their own. 

A guest staying in Room 325 was visited by a ghost named Mary. Mary was dressed in a period dress with a bustle skirt and corset. Other guests have seen her too and people have taken to calling her the "Lady of the Night." There have also been reports of the scent of cigars and perfume in rooms. At least 3 females have died here and 29 males. One of those males was John Opie who was shot and killed with a rifle. Another man unalived himself in 1935 by drinking cyanide.

Parker Anderson and Darlene Wilson write in their book Haunted Prescott, "Another story is about a couple who went for a weekend trip to Prescott, where they stayed at the Hotel St. Michael. They sat on the bed to watch TV. The man had his feet dangling off the end of the bed, and all of a sudden, he sat right up. He said that something cold had passed by his foot, and his foot was still tingling. Later that night, they were heading out, walking down the empty hallway, and they could smell the strong odor of a woman’s perfume. It was an old type of perfume, something the lady’s grandmother would have worn, like powdery lilac. In the middle of the night, the man woke up and said that, as clear as day, he heard a woman say, 'Show your face.' It sounded like it came from the end of his bed. He said that it wasn’t scary—almost playful, actually. Another couple reported that they stayed in room 228. They checked in at 6:00 p.m., and around 7:00 p.m., there was a knock on their door. He got up to open the door, but before he got there, a young lady opened it instead. She asked if there was a certain person in their room. They said that this person was not in their room. At that point, she closed the door. Jeff opened it immediately and looked down the hall, but she was gone. When they went downstairs shortly after that, they notified the lobby clerk that someone had tried to come in their room. The clerk in the lobby said that it was not possible since they had the only key. When they went back up to their room, the window was wide open, and the air conditioner was set at fifty-five degrees. It was the middle of January and freezing outside." 

Matt's Saloon

Matt's Longhorn Saloon is one of Prescott's last true Honky Tonks. The saloon is located at 112 South Montezuma and the building is officially known as the D. Levy Building. The name is in honor of the D. Levy & Company General Merchandise store that opened here in 1901 after the Great Fire destroyed a previous structure. 

This remained a mercantile until 1934. By this time, Prohibition had ended, so the building reopened as a saloon. Matt's Longhorn Saloon would open in the 1960s and has provided live music from country artists like Buck Owens and Waylon Jennings. There is dancing and the decor is mostly mounted game and skulls and there is a twenty-foot bar. Live bands play from the balcony to leave plenty of room for dancing. Steve McQueen hung out here when he was filming a movie in 1971. People claim to see shadow figures here and the apparitions of a Native American spirit and a duster wearing cowboy. An elderly male ghost likes to hang out in the basement and a little girl ghost has been seen in the women's restroom a few times asking for her mommy. Employees have thought she was a real little girl until she disappeared.

The Palace Saloon

The Palace Saloon is probably the most famous historic place in Prescott. This is located at 120 S. Montezuma Street. Historians claim it opened in 1883, but according to D.C. Thorne, his father, D.C. Thorne Sr. opened it in 1868. He wrote, "My father had the distinction of opening in l868, the famous Palace Bar, where the present Palace now stands on Whiskey Row (Montezuma Street)." Thorne did buy Lot 19, on Block 13 in 1867 and he owned it until 1883. 

The truth, however, is that it was opened by Nathan Ellis and Al Whitney. The original palace was burned down by a fire in 1883. The owner at the time, Robert Brow, built the new Palace, determined to make it fire proof by having a stone foundation and brick walls. The roof was made from iron. The interior featured a 20-foot bar with a beautiful back-bar. There were two club rooms and three gaming tables, crowned with three heavy chandeliers. Regular customers were Doc Holliday and the Earps and Prescott's own Buckey O'Neill. Buckey got his nickname because he liked to go up against the odds or buck the tiger in the game of faro. He was born in Missouri and came to Prescott in 1881 to work as a court reporter. He would later become a probate judge, sheriff and owner of the stockman's paper "Hoof and Hor." He was also mayor of Prescott in 1898 and helped sign up men to fight in Cuba during the Spanish American War. Buckey himself  was the captain of A Troop of the United States Volunteer Cavalry in Cuba. He lost his life there at the foot of Kettle Hill on July 1, 1898. O'Neill was the only regimental officer killed from among the Arizona volunteers.
 
The Palace Saloon was refurbished in 1897 and expensive fixtures were added. The owner, Bob Brow, wanted this to be a first-class restaurant and saloon. Just three years later, the Great Fire of 1900 destroyed it. Many of the interior fixtures and the alcohol were saved by residents. The oak bar was carried across the street to the Courthouse Plaza. The liquor made it over there too. The local barber saved his chair and implements and brought them to the plaza. The locals drank as the town burned down and the following day, the barber was doing haircuts in the plaza and gaming and drinking was happening there too. Soon, tin buildings and tents were erected to keep business going while the town was rebuilt. 

Bob Brow was committed to rebuilding, but it would be tough. Ben Belcher and Barney Smith had owned the saloon next door, Cabinet Saloon, and they were in the same predicament. The three men decided to pool their interests and they put up a new building that was second to none. This would be the new Palace Saloon. The Arizona State Inventory of Historic Places says of the saloon, "The Palace Hotel is a two story masonry structure 75 feet wide and 125 feet deep. Construction materials included native grey granite, iron, and pressed ornamental bricks.  An interesting feature of the front facade is the central pediment.  It carries the great seal of the Territory of Arizona and on either side figures of a mountain lion and a bear.  One of each animal had been given to each of the Arizona contingency in the Spanish American War by Robert Brow for use as their mascots." The entrance was made up of massive double doors of solid oak with beautiful frosted plate glass having the words "Palace" lettered in them. The interior was carved oak everywhere, much of it golden oak. The front bar was 24 feet long, made of solid oak with polished cherry top and has the finest French plate glass oval top mirrors. Electric fixtures were added to it. There were women who worked the bar singing and dancing and probably some other things. A glass of beer was five cents. A law passed by Arizona put the kabosh on hostesses and gambling. World War I made things tough and then there was Prohibition. But the Palace managed to survive. The food was great, as was the entertainment, but eventually the place fell into disrepair. Dave and Marilyn Michelson saved it in 1996 when they leased it and restored it. They matched it back to the 1901 look.  

This also happens to be the most haunted location on Whiskey Row. The reason why is that there were murders here. A working girl named Jennie Clark was beaten to death by Fred Glover, her lover, inside the saloon. After beating her, he stomped her as well and this was in front of a bar full of people who did nothing to stop him, including a candidate for sheriff. Glover was sentenced to death but the Governor commuted his sentence to life in prison and he was eventually released in 1890 and disappeared. Bar employees claim that they’ve had the stays pulled out of their corset uniforms and the female workers have been attacked in the bathroom. People believe that both Jennie and Glover haunt the Palace.

Parker Anderson and Darlene Wilson share in Haunted Prescott, "The owner had a beautiful porcelain mannequin dressed in period clothing at the top of the stairs. Located upstairs are the offices of the owner and partner now, but this used to be where two 'ladies of the night' had their rooms. One day, the owner came into work and found the porcelain mannequin shattered on the floor below the stairs, having fallen over the railing. So he went out and bought “Annie,” the mannequin seen now at the top of the stairs. Time passes, and the owner came to work to find that Annie had been turned completely around; he thought people were playing a joke on him, so he installed cameras. Time went by, and he came to work and noticed that Annie had been moved again, but this time her head was turned, as if watching the patrons below. The owner went through his surveillance video and saw Annie moving and her head turning, but no one is there moving her—at least no one he can see." 

Ghost Adventures investigated in 2016. The crew captured an EVP saying "Get back." They heard disembodied bootsteps, unexplained bangs and children screaming. Zak felt something touch his hand. The Ovilus gave the following words: "INCLUDE", "ALICE", "MASTER", "PREACH", "JACKIE." The SLS Camera picked up a figure standing next to the bar. Jay felt like something stabbed him in the leg and he also felt pulled back when he went into the crawl space in the basement. 

Closers have had glasses jump off shelves and land on the floor, not breaking. The owner was once nearly hit by a falling brass planter. The apparition of a former mortuary owner named Frank Nevin is seen and it is thought he sticks around here because he lost that mortuary in a poker game to the Sheriff at the time. Bottles and chairs have gone flying across rooms. A group of teachers was waiting on their lunch one day when they suddenly jumped up screaming and ran for the front entrance. Their waiter asked what was wrong and they said the condiments on the buffet had come flying out and were thrown at them. And like so many other places, the women's bathroom is haunted. Stall doors bang on their own and will get rattled when occupied and the person comes out to see they are alone in the bathroom. An employee who had a job that kept her in the basement most of the time, was moved to an upstairs position. She had to go down into the basement for merchandise a couple weeks later and as she climbed the stairs, she felt pain on her chest and stomach. Something had scratched her. This happened another time as well. Employees figured that a spirit in the basement had missed her not being down there and had possibly grabbed her to get her to stay downstairs. 

Whiskey Row has a very interesting history since this was definitely the seedy side of town. Is it possible that some of that previous history has carried over into the present era? Is Whiskey Row haunted? That is for you to decide!