HGB Ep. 467 - Old Town Albuquerque

Moment in Oddity - Fairy Chimneys

We have many adventurous listeners. Their ears may perk up at any reference to fairies or the supernatural. Some of these adventurers would love to spend some nights in a location such as this. It's like an Air B&B of a different sort. Located in Turkey, the Fairy Chimneys began their creation millions of years ago. This was when volcanic eruptions rained down ash in the area, which formed into rock covered by a layer of basalt. Once eroded by time the pillars revealed themselves, some as tall as 130 feet. The chimneys are located in a region once known as Cappadocia, which ran through the historic Silk Road trading route. This area was raided by the Hittites, the Persians, Alexander the Great, the Romans, the Byzantines, and the Ottomans. They all wanted to claim the land. But it was during the Roman period that the persecuted Christians learned that they could easily excavate these 'chimneys' to created homes and churches. This area is now described by UNESCO as "one of the world's most striking and largest cave-dwelling complexes." Today, tourists can even sleep in certain caves and chimneys, which have been remodeled into uncommon hotels. The contemplation of sleeping in such an amazing, historical location is intriguing, but it certainly is odd.

This Month in History - Clara Barton

In December, on the 25th, in 1821 the founder of the American Red Cross was born. Clarissa “Clara” Harlowe Barton helped distribute supplies to the Union Army during the Civil War. She was born the youngest of five children. As a teenager, Clara helped care for her seriously ill brother which was her first experience as a nurse. While still a young adult, she spent time inspiring pupils working as a teacher and even opened a free public school in Bordentown, New Jersey. When the Civil War began in 1861, Barton quit her current job and decided it was her calling to bring supplies to Union soldiers in need. This began her life-long career in aiding people during times of conflict and disaster. In 1862 she was granted permission to bring supplies to the battlefields and aided in every major battle in Maryland, Virginia and South Carolina. In 1869, Barton traveled through Europe and while in Switzerland, she learned about the International Red Cross, established in Geneva in 1864. Upon returning to the United States, Clara began building support to establish an American Red Cross by writing pamphlets, lecturing and meeting with President Rutherford B Hayes. On May 21st, 1881, the American Association of the Red Cross was formed and Clara was elected president that June. In 1882, the United States joined the International Red Cross and Barton remained with them until 1904.

Old Town Albuquerque

Old Town Albuquerque is home to more than 150 shops, restaurants, galleries and museums. This community center was built centuries ago and features several blocks of historic adobe buildings. A handful of these locations are reputedly haunted. Join us as we explore the history and hauntings of Old Town Albuquerque.

Governor Francisco Cuervo y Valdes was born into a noble family in Spain in 1651. He got involved with politics and traveled over to New Spain in 1678 and served as an infantry captain. He was eventually appointed as a lieutenant governor and then he served as governor of Spanish Texas. He helped to found numerous missions before he became governor of New Mexico. He founded La Villa Real de San Francisco de Albuquerque in 1706, naming it for the Viceroy of New Spain who was the Duke of Albuquerque. The Spanish were far from being the first people in the area. Humans had been here for at least 10,000 years and when the Spanish arrived in 1540, the Tiwa people were living in pueblos along the Rio Grande. Governor Cuervo y Valdes had a hard time establishing Albuquerque because Spanish law required that 30 Spanish families be living in a new settlement before it could gain status as a village. The settlement only had 18, so the Governor ordered a Spanish garrison to be set-up nearby so that families would be attracted to the safety of the town. A mission church was also here, San Felipe de Neri. Irrigation canals were built and soon the few adobe houses grew to several hundred structures. 

New Mexico was under Mexican rule when Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1821. At the end of the Mexican-American War, America made New Mexico an official U.S. territory. A fort was then established in Albuquerque. This would be attacked and taken over by Confederates during the Civil War. After the war, a livestock industry grew up in the town and this brought in a railroad. And that's when the original part of Albuquerque became Old Town and the city center and government moved closer to the railroad depot. Albuquerque was incorporated in 1885 and although Old Town was no longer the center of business, it truly became the heart of the town. The Pueblo-Spanish style architecture is anchored by the white towers of the San Felipe de Neri Church, which was built in 1793 and has walls that are five feet thick. They wanted to make sure that this one did not collapse like the original mission church. Several locations in Old Town are reputed to be haunted!

Church Street Cafe

Church Street Café is also known as Casa de Ruiz, which means House of Ruiz and is the oldest residence in Albuquerque and one of the oldest structures in the state of New Mexico. This was originally built a little after the founding of the town in 1706 by the Ruiz family. That ancestor is unfortunately unknown today, but the house remained in the possession of the Ruiz family until 1991, when the final Ruiz owner, Rufina G. Ruiz, passed away at the the age of 91. The home was an 18-room hacienda with the classic Spanish U-shape. The walls are very thick, more than two feet thick, which was normal for the time that it was built. This protected against both cold and heat. Since it was located near the Rio Grande River, adobe bricks called Terrones were used in construction. The floors were tile and the ceilings were 15 feet high with wooden beams and there was a traditional ceramic fireplace/oven. In 1920, a major flood washed away half of the house, but it was rebuilt. Marie Coleman bought the house when Rufina died and she had a different vision for the dwelling. Marie was a college student taking a break to explore Albuquerque when she spotted the house and fell in love. She offered half the asking price and it was accepted. She renovated it into an upscale restaurant that offers indoor and outdoor dining with the ambiance of strolling guitar music, but it still retains much of the original interior.

Marie was the first person to report strange happenings in the house. It's quite possible the spirit she experienced was Sara Ruiz, the mother of Rufina, because it wasn't happy about the changes. Sara had been known around Albuquerque as a curandera or witch healer. At first Marie didn't believe in ghosts. Then Marie heard a disembodied voice scream at her to get rid of the contractor. The voice literally screamed, "Get him out!" When workers would come in to do work, they would find their supplies and tools in a disarray. Buckets would be kicked over. The main contractor was Charlie Trujillo, who was a healer and a bit of a psychic. He told Marie that she needed to sit down in the great room and have a conversation with Sarah, telling her about her plans and that she was going to keep much of the house the way it was. This seemed to quiet Sarah for a time, After the restaurant opened, employees and patrons started having unexplained experiences as well. They would sometimes glimpse the image of a woman in a long black dress who would disappear after being seen. This mostly happened after hours.Sarah loves to engage in light battles. Employees will turn on the lights and Sarah will flick them off. She drops water glasses, throws silverware and turns over coffee cups, once this was done in front of an entire table of patrons. Sarah also likes to feed her none existent chickens outside and sometimes helps with making up tables.

There could be other spirits here as well. A china closet at the entrance has dolls inside that get moved around. One time a server was in the ladies room when she felt a negative presence enter the restroom. The door in the next stall slammed hard twice, scaring the employee. A window that wouldn't budge near the front of the house was found opened. When the guests sitting at the table near it were asked if they opened the window, they said "no." The waitress closed the window and when she returned to the table later, the window was opened once again. The patrons again said that they hadn't opened the window. A phone at the restaurant was hidden and never found. An employee got grabbed from behind by someone he couldn't see. Sarah seems to be no nonsense, so nobody thinks this was her spirit. On occasion, when the opener gets to the restaurant, they find the state of the interior as if someone threw a party over night.

Chapel of Our Lady of Guadalupe

The chapel was built by nuns who made the adobe bricks themselves. They were led by Dominican nun Sister Giotto. It was built to give the students of Sagrada Art Studios a suitable place to pray as a group. Sister Giotto made four colored glass windows for the chapel and calls them her most significant body of work. Three are in storage, but the fourth can be seen today to the left of the entryway and features a representation of the sun and moon phases. Six wooden benches line the adobe walls in the sanctuary with hand carved Scripture verses on the chair backs. Our Lady of Guadalupe is considered the Patroness of the Americas and because the Spanish and Native Americans love her, the chapel was dedicated to her. The chapel is often used for weddings. You can find it in the Patio Escondido Mall. 

The chapel is home to what people claim is the scariest ghost in Old Town. This is the Lady in Black. She is often seen as a full-bodied apparition dressed in black, sitting on a bench. She is seen praying, meditating and sobbing. Not sure why that makes her scary, other than she just appears and disappears out of nowhere. Jeff Steam wrote in a comment on YouTube, "I've seen her. I swear. I walked in and was woman in a black veil praying. I stepped out because I wanted to give her privacy and I had an odd feeling. She never came out. I went back in and no one was in there. I found it odd but figured I somehow missed her. It was very strange and spooky. A few years later I learned the story of the woman and was shocked. I told no one because they wouldn't believe me. Also this is a special place. But I swear that I saw her."

Old Town Cafe

The La Placita Dining Rooms was a restaurant that had once been the home of the Armijo family and even a trading post. Juan Nepomuceno Armijo built the family house in 1706. The Armijo family was powerful and prominent. Manuel Armijo, who had lived in the house, was the last Mexican governor of New Mexico. The house went into ruin for awhile and became a restaurant in the 1930s and the open-air patio was enclosed, although a large cottonwood tree does grow through the roof. An old staircase was imported from Spain, so it could be used during a wedding. The La Placita permanently closed and was bought by Michelle La Meres who opened the Old Town Cafe in the location in 2022. Employees claim to see the spirit of a little girl who is believed to have died in a bedroom in the late 1880s. Cold spots are felt and employees clear to hear their names called out by a disembodied voice. Customers have claimed to see a weird mist take shape over their tables and then dissipate. Patrons claim to see the face of a young woman in the ladies restroom when there is no young lady standing there.

Bottger Mansion

The Bottger Mansion was built by the man for whom it was named, Charles Bottger. He was born in New York City and eventually made his way to Albuquerque around 1893. He found work at the Sunnyside Tavern, which was owned by Tom Post. Bottger married Post's stepdaughter, Miguela, and thus he became the owner of the tavern when Post passed away. In 1909, the couple demolished the tavern and built the Bottger Mansion, which was completed in 1912. The mansion was designed by Edward Buxton Cristy in the American Foursquare style and had all the modern amenities of the time. That meant that the mansion was the first residence in Old Town Albuquerque to have gas lighting. The house had a dumbwaiter, pressed-tin ceilings, a coal-fired cnetral heater and a speaker system using tubes. And it had a basement, which is almost unheard of in Albuquerque. The mansion was called the “Pride of Old Town.” Bottger also owned one of the first cars in Albuquerque. Bottger died in 1914 and Miguela found herself having to turn the mansion into a boarding house to make ends meet.

One of the renters was Machine Gun Kelly who stayed here with his girlfriend and members of his gang. They used assumed names and had disguised themselves by dying their hair and wearing different clothing. The group would pay a local boy to go out and bring them food. This made Miguela suspicious and she called the police, but a member of the gang heard her making the call and everybody left before the authorities got there. Elvis Presley stayed at the Bottger with his bandmates, Bill Black and Scotty Moore in 1956 when they did two performances in Albuquerque. Frank Sinatra attended a wedding at the Bottger and performed in the courtyard. The property remained in the Bottger family until 1970 when family disputes over ownership led to it being sold. The mansion passed through several hands and served as a restaurant, art gallery, beauty parlor and then in 1989 it became a bed and breakfast and remains that today. It has been restored to its original form and its location on Historic Route 66 makes it a prime place to stay. This is the only lodging to be found in the Old Town Historic District.  Steve and Kathy Hiatt are the current owners and have been for fourteen years.

Charles Bottger loved his home and is said to remain in the afterlife. But he isn't the only one here. There is a spirit nicknamed "The Lover" who likes to sit on the bed of sleeping women and a sighing female ghost. And people have also described an older female ghost that people called "Grandmother." Amazingly, with so many spirits here, there is not much to be found of personal experiences.

Painted Lady Bed and Brew

If we are ever in New Mexico, we know where we are staying! First, the website is breakfastisoverrated.com. Second, there is a little cartoon female ghost holding a beer mug at the top of the website. And finally, this is a Bed and Brew - such a unique and novel concept! There are only a few of these unique establishments in America. The name Painted Lady was inspired by the working gals of the former establishment here. The original building was constructed in 1881 and ran as a saloon and brothel, playing witness to many shootouts and knife fights. It came under the ownership of Cesario ‘Sario’ Gonzales in 1899 and he operated it as the Swastika Saloon. Now hearing that immediately makes one think Nazis, but this was way before they came on the scene. This was a Navajo symbol that meant life and prosperity and good fortune. The saloon quickly became a place of ill repute. People knew it as a dance hall with a Wine Room. At the time, Wine Room was code for brothel. The brothel thrived with the town having five men to every woman. Unfortunately, this was a crib style brothel, which we have covered on other episodes. Basically a room big enough to fit a mattress was where the women worked. Many of them serviced 50 men a day.

This business wasn't illegal. As a matter of fact, prostitution was legal in New Mexico until 1914. So, of course, the brothel closed down after that *wink, wink.* It actually ran illegally until Prohibition. The saloon had its own song and made headlines in local papers all the time. There was “Four Wounded in Cutting Affray, One May Die”; “Saloon Keeper is bound over to grand jury”; “Hold Knife man for stabbing at Swastika Saloon”; and “Co. Commission hears roadhouse complaints.”Sario shut down the Swatstika Saloon when Prohibition started and he died before Prohibition was repealed. His son Charlie opened up Charlie's Grocery here in 1930. And uh, the brothel was still there. Charlie ran this combo business until the late 1970s. The property then became a triplex with three apartments. Jesse Herron bought the building in 2014 and did a complete renovation. The Painted Lady Bed and Brew opened on August 3, 2018.

There were thought to be four spirits in the Bed and Brew. Some may have been exorcised. The most haunted room here was said to be the owner’s suite and Herron has had several experiences. Herron said he made a deal with one of the spirits in his suite saying, "Leave me alone, and I’ll leave you alone." But Herron says the ghost didn't keep with the deal and started to torment Herron's dog making it "yelp in pain" and Herron noticed "bloody marks on his body, from being bitten or poked by something." We think this is what Herron describes as a Succubus on the website writing, "I blame my friend for dropping this lady demon off at my home. It was September 11th, 2017. We were headed out on a bike ride in the bosque. The house had been cleansed of “Bill” just a few months earlier and armed with a grid of black tourmaline in each corner of the apartment. Yet, something was back in the house. Murray would yelp in pain from his bed in my bedroom. After running in to check on him, he was staring with his ears up at a spot just over my bed. Then one night I remember sleeping and waking up to this very uncomfortable, disgusting feeling that consumed me. In my dream (I think) I saw a tall black shadow figure enter the bedroom and climb the walls, getting closer to me. I woke up in hysterics. I called the mediums the next day. After another demon trap session, they were unsuccessful in driving the entity into the trap. Rather, it left out the window (to likely end up in someone else's home). This time, they informed me that unlike Bill, this thing was never human--it was a succubus."

Herron shares his first experience, "This was the first eye-opening ghost experience for me at the brothel. It was the summer of 2014. In the middle of the night, while sleeping on my stomach, something was on top of me forcing me down into the bed. I remember being angry at first that it was trying to force me down. But, once it was over, I remember being so excited to tell everybody about the ghost that made actual physical contact."

Another experience in 2015 for Herron was, "My mom was helping me put the final touches on a room (mere hours prior to the first guests arriving back in October 2015). It was a real rush and I was dealing with a tremendous amount of stress and pressure. I remember attaching handles on the kitchen cabinets in the Lizzie Suite. My mom had the job of removing packing tape from the refrigerator shelves. I will never forget her looking over at me and saying “what did you just say?” I, of course, had said nothing. She told me that a man’s voice said to her “can you grab me a beer?”

And then there is Bill, which Herron says, "Bill, as this spirit was known, was present when I bought the home in 2014. A person related to the original family informed me that the owner’s suite was haunted. He told me that when the property was a hotel, a jealous husband (Bill) took an ax to his lover and his lover's lover when he caught them in the act in this room. Unbeknownst to me, Bill was fairly upset that I bought the home and spent a year or so making his distaste for me clear. A Buddhist priestess cleared the home of two spirits in 2014 after the home became almost uninhabitable. Bill was the lone spirit that stuck around. I remember thinking that we had an understanding: I would stay out of his way and he would stay out of mine. This was not the case. When the paranormal activity reached a peak during the summer of 2017, I called two new mediums to force the spirit out. Bill was successfully exorcised via a demon trap on June 14, 2017." They offer a Brews and Boos package, so this place embraces their ghosts!

High Noon Restaurant and Saloon

The High Noon Restaurant & Saloon is a veteran owned restaurant serving up wild game, steak and margaritas. It officially opened in July of 1974 by the Villa family and has stayed in the family from its inception. The original part of the building was constructed in the 1750s and was a home for several years. Then it served as a saloon and brothel. Carlos and Felicitas Vigil were married in 1910 and moved into the house in 1920. At the time, Felicitas was pregnant with the couples third child. Their youngest, Willie, died five months after moving in from gastritis. The baby was born and was another son named Ernesto and he passed away after his first birthday. Felicitas was soon pregnant again and gave birth to a girl who also passed away at just two months from pneumonia. Another baby was stillborn. That's four kids in a row. Carlos then came down with Syphilis and let's just say that Felicitas didn't give it to him. She had him committed to the New Mexico Hospital for the Insane where he passed away in 1927. Felicitas passed away in 1959 and the property passed to her surviving children who held onto it until it was bought by the Villas and turned into the restaurant. For a time in the 1960s, this was a furniture store and then an apartment. A sixteen-year-old, Freddy Moya, was fatally stabbed at a New Year's Eve party happening down the street in 1951. The Moya family had lived across the street from the High Noon restaurant.

Patrons and employees have experienced unexplained activity. Bartenders have seen glasses move or go crashing to the floor. The activity is so intense here that Dead Files visited in July of 2015. Steve was told that employees and patrons had been experiencing electrical problems, weird noises, objects moving, apparitions have been seen and people had been touched. Employees have had to have their schedules changed because they don't want to close at night. The current owner, Carla, is the daughter of the man who opened the restaurant and she took Steve behind the bar and told him that she often feels something breathing on the back of her neck. What made this even more unusual is that she has long hair and she told Steve that she feels it through her hair. Carla's fifteen-year-old daughter is pretty scared of the spirits. She was once sitting in the dining room by herself playing a video game when she heard a woman crying out in agony. The scariest thing that has happened to her is that she got trapped in the women's restroom. She tried opening the door and she felt like something was pushing back against it. She kicked the door to get out.

Charley is Carla's sixteen-year-old son. He feels very uncomfortable in the restaurant at night. He once saw a cowboy sitting on the last seat at the bar wearing a brown trench coat and a cowboy hat. This was at 8 o'clock in the morning and the restaurant wasn't opened yet. Charley thought it was strange, but maybe someone had let him in early. Charley went through the bar to the gallery and when he looked back, the cowboy was gone. On another occasion, Charley was passing through a hallway and looked through these double doors and saw a woman floating with no arms and no legs! He was so startled, he had an anxiety attack.

Shirley is Carla's mother and for the first 32 years of ownership, she said that she had no personal experiences. Then one night she opened a door and stepped into one of the dining rooms and she immediately saw an apparition on the other side of the room that came at her very quickly and passed right through her. She felt this icy feeling like nothing she had ever experienced before. Shirley described her as being small. She also told Steve that they had two different electric companies come out to work on light issues they were having with lights flickering and neither company found anything wrong.

Amy picked up on a lot of residual energy she described as "lots of men and pandemonium, people drinking and partying and getting crazy." Amy said the effect of all this energy would be claustrophobic and make people feel dizzy. Amy felt as though somebody had gotten stabbed to death when she was behind the bar and this spirit has a lot of pain and sticks to the bar. This pain seems to transfer to other people. Amy picked up on the name Frankie and said this victim had been stabbed twice, once in the front and once in the back. That is how Freddy died. In one of the storerooms, Amy felt the spirit of a murderer. Amy picked up on a short, heavier woman who presented as a busy body who was in her forties and new to the being dead thing. This little woman gets very angry because people ignore her. She tends to mess with the electrical stuff. It would seem that she is Felicitas.

A town marshal, Milton Yarberry, was hanged down the street from the restaurant. He had been a murderer and was a bad dude. People lined the streets to cheer his execution. They even sold tickets for people to get rooftop views. More than likely, the restaurant had people standing up on their roof watching this as well. Amy picked up on this energy outside the restaurant and could hear a lot of men yelling and see a man being walked through the streets. This could leave some bad energy in the whole of Old Town. 

Old Town also has many spirits that just wander the streets. People claim to see the spirits of Civil War soldiers and other apparitions. Hundreds of years of non-indigenous history is captured along the streets of Old Town. Imagine how much indigenous history that we don't even know has taken place here too. Is Old Town Albuquerque haunted? That is for you to decide!

Show Notes:

Ghost tour of Old Town: https://www.abqtours.fun/ghosttours

HGB Ep. 304 - Of Jail Riots, Ghosts and the Penitentiary of New Mexico

Moment in Oddity - The Earling Possession

The Earling Possession took place in 1928 and is said to be one of the most well-documented possession cases of the 20th century. Most of you have either watched "The Exorcist" or seen some other movie or documentary about exorcism. This case would be about Anna Ecklund who would suffer demonic possession over and over in her life starting at the age of 14. According to reports, Anna's aunt had been a witch who cursed her food with spells and then later her father would heap curses on her and wish for her possession. Father Theophilus Riesinger, a native Bavarian and a Capuchin monk, would be the man to finally free her when she was 46. If this account is true, Anna displayed some of the most horrific and bizarre behavior. Father Theophilus took Anna to Earling, Iowa to the convent of the Franciscan Sisters on August 17, 1928. Upon arrival, Anna purred like a cat, demanded unblessed food, spoke in languages she didn't know, had to be held down by six strong nuns, vomited tobacco leaves and other spice-like debris and she vomited, urinated and defecated inhuman amounts of waste. The really unbelievable stuff included her lips growing to the size of her hands, she levitated many times, from a prone position she leapt from her bed onto the wall above the door, where she maintained a position of crouching, defying gravity and her body would bloat to twice its size. The claim was that Anna was possessed by many demons, described as "a swarm of mosquitoes." On December 23, 1928, Anna stood erect on her bed and then crumpled back down as the demons left her, each one calling out its name as it left. The exorcism was done in three rounds and took 23 days in total. I'm skeptical of these demon possession stories, but if the Earling Possession is real, it certainly was odd!

This Month in History - St. Columba account of Loch Ness Monster

In the month of August, on the 22nd, in 565, the Loch Ness Monster is spotted for the first time. Now I know many of you are thinking, what is Diane talking about? The story of the Loch Ness Monster didn't come to worldwide attention until 1933. That is true, but the first sighting supposedly was much earlier. The Loch Ness Monster or Nessie as it came to be known was named for the place she was said to inhabit in the Scottish Highlands. It was a dinosaur-like creature with a long neck that had one or more humps protruding from the water with these front flippers to help it get around. When scholars began investigating the tales about Nessie they discovered that the first account of a sighting dated back to 565 in the semi-legendary tale of St. Columba. He was an Irish monk who had sailed to Scotland to spread the gospel of Christ. As he traveled to the land of the Picts, he reached the river Ness and found some people burying a friend. They told the monk that the man had been attacked by “some water monster" that had "snatched at him as he was swimming, and bitten with a most savage bite.” After that, St. Columba ordered one of his acolytes to go fetch the boat, which meant swimming across the river. That was when the monster appeared. The story goes that the monster was “lying hidden in the bottom of the river and suddenly emerged, and, swimming to the man as he was crossing in the middle of the stream, rushed up with a great roar and open mouth”. Everyone was scared except St. Columba who raised his hands and made the sign of the cross and after invoking the Name of God, he commanded, "Think not to go further, nor touch thou the man. Quick! Go back!" And the monster did and a bunch of people were converted. Is the story reliable? We know that pictures of Nessie were hoaxes and many researchers think most sightings of Nessie are mis-identifications, but it sure is fun to think that the Loch Ness Monster that captured my imagination as a kid, just might be real.

Penitentiary of New Mexico
Suggested by listener: Aimee Sandoval

Jails and ghosts seem to go hand-in-hand. So much dark and negative energy in one place. Inside these walls have resided some evil or bad people and even some innocent people. Those accused or guilty of some evil doings. The Penitentiary of New Mexico has the dubious distinction of being the site of the worst prison riot in American history. Prisons are already notorious for being havens for paranormal experiences, but what ensued during that riot, left behind a residue just begging to feed negative spiritual energy. There are those who claim the land here is cursed. Join me as I explore the history and hauntings of the Penitentiary of New Mexico!

Imagine for a moment the energy connected to a jail complex. You have the fear, the anger and the sorrow from the criminal and I would imagine, even the victim. After years of sharing the history and hauntings of a variety of historic jails from around the world, I've learned that many of them had similarities that made them not only places of inhumanity, but keen spots for hauntings. Nearly all of them housed men, women and children in the same areas and overcrowding was the norm. There was no plumbing, so buckets or honey pots were used. Some crimes considered worthy of punishment would be ridiculous by today's standards, like stealing bread. And every one of these jails had "The Hole" - solitary confinement, a place of utter hell that could leave someone insane. Sickness, abuse and murder were rampant behind the bars. While we would all like to believe that the purpose of jail is to reform, at its core its meant to punish. And I'm fine with that, but within reason. Because when things happen outside of reason, hauntings are not far behind.

As I look back over the list of episodes I've done featuring jails, I count 16 of them. Most of them are considered the most haunted jails in the world. There's episode 34 on Kilmanhaim Gaol in Dublin, Ireland with the spirits of former prisoners and wardens with the warden spirits being the most terrifying. Alcatraz in San Francisco was the subject of episode 53 and is thought to be one of the most haunted jails in America with the spirit of The Butcher and something evil with glowing eyes in The Hole. The Old Charleston Jail has made two appearances, in episodes 55 and 262, and is the only jail on the list that I've visited so far, but I had no experiences myself although people claim the spirit of Lavinia Fisher is there. Episode 66 featured the infamous Ohio State Reformatory haunted by the warden's wife Helen, wayward boys and shadowy figures. Episode 68 featured the Maitland Gaol, a jail that housed Australia's worst criminals and is home to the spirit of Sawas who hanged himself inside the door of cell 4 and possibly a former guard. Episode 84 features the Carleton County Gaol in Ottawa, Canada and there are so many spirits here that it has been declared the ninth most haunted building on the planet. Episode 86 had us in Australia again for Pentridge Prison with a female spirit and the ghost of Mark Chopper Read. Episode 104 took us to a Civil War era prison known as Andersonville with the spirit of Father Whelan and the sounds of gunfire and foggy apparitions. Episode 112 on Fremantle in Australia featured the gaol there that has the spirit of the only woman executed there, Martha Rendell and the sounds of a scuffle at the gallows. Episode 113 featured Eastern State Penitentiary that is probably the most haunted jail in America located in Philly with hauntings in Cell Block 12 and Cell Block 6. Episode 116 features Moundsville State Prison or more famously known as  the West Virginia Penitentiary with its castle-like structure and ghost of a maintenance man, shadow figures and a prisoner named Robert. Episode 215 that includes the Derby Gaol in Derby, England has the spirit of a murderer, a female ghost, a human-like gray mist and child ghosts. Episode 220 with the Kentucky State Penitentiary and spirits of some of the 162 men executed at the jail. Episode 223 featuring the Old Idaho State Penitentiary and its haunted Cell House 5 and Solitary Confinement. Episode 284 has the Squirrel Cage Jail in Council Bluffs, Iowa with spirits of a little girl and cats and lots of sounds of jingling keys and loud sighing and the hauntings seem friendly which is good news for us since we'll be investigating it in September.

So there are definitely a variety of ghosts in these places, but there are many similarities including cold spots, disembodied voices and the slamming of cell doors on their own. Added to this list of haunted prisons is the penitentiary in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Parts of it are still open today as a maximum security prison, but the jail dates back to the late 1800s. Congress had authorized for New Mexico to build a prison here in 1853, but it would not be open until 1885. This would be the original Old Main and the design was based on the same plans used for Sing Sing and Joliet. This prison would put the prisoners to work making bricks and this would be its first industry. The next industry would be building highways and New Mexico would be the first western state to use prisoners to do this work starting in 1903.

It would seem this prison and riots would have a long and tense relationship. The first would take place on July 19, 1922. Prisoners were angry over the overcrowding, excessive force used by guards and the bad food. The inmates were all out of their cells and refused to go back to them when the guards ordered them to do so. The tower guards apparently weren't fooling around and they just opened fire, killing one prisoner and injuring five others. They were reprimanded for their obvious heavy-handed approach and a report claimed that guards had a failure to understand how to control a prison population and were inexperienced. Despite decades passing before the next riot, nothing would be learned. The second riot took place on June 15, 1953 and was fueled by inmates protesting excessive force used on them. They grabbed Deputy Warden Ralph Tahash and twelve guards and held them hostage. By the end of this riot, two inmates were dead and several others were injured.

It was decided after this riot that it was time to build a new facility and that was done in 1956 at a spot about 11 miles south of the original and they would dub it "the main unit." This was a bad place to build. The land is said to be cursed here, more than likely from something that happened in 1680. Spanish settlers had moved into the land that was already occupied by a Native American tribe. These settlers had made the tribe members into slaves and they revolted. The Native Americans stripped the settlers naked and beat them. During that revolt, 400 settlers were killed. So this prison was already haunted by something before it was even built.

Things were good here for awhile with reform being the focus. Under President Lyndon Johnson, Project Newgate was started, which developed programs for job training, community service and education. The population was kept below capacity as well. Things were good, until they weren't good and then, they got really bad. The programs were stopped in 1975 and lock downs were done for long periods. One really disturbing incident was the "Night of the Ax Handles," which sounds like a bad horror movie, but was actually punishment dealt out by guards. The inmates formed a work strike in 1976 and the Deputy Warden stopped it by using tear gas. The prisoners were run out of the dormitory, stripped naked and forced to make their way down a gauntlet of ax handle wielding guards who beat them.  

What fueled the flames of the worst prison riot in America I would say are based on two things. One, prisoners had some legitimate beefs about the quality of their conditions. They were not allowed recreational time, the sanitation was horrible and the food was nearly inedible. There was overcrowding with 1,156 inmates in a prison that had beds for less than 963. A visiting warden reported that this was the most disgusting prison he had ever visited. Inmates made several complaints, but everything fell on deaf ears. The second catalyst was a snitch system that was in place turning prisoner on prisoner. This was an angry volcano ready to erupt and when it did hundreds were injured and dozens were killed.

So here is our scene. This is Cell Block 4 and the date is February 2, 1980. This cell block is at the far northern end from the Control Center. This contains the E-2 dormitory, which was specifically designed for minor offenders. Due to construction, some of the most hardened and violent prisoners were moved to E-2. That's right, murderers and rapists are housed in a dormitory. Add to this, many new and fairly untrained guards. Prisoners in E-2 had made themselves some Prison Hooch and several were fairly intoxicated when the 1:30am count was conducted by two guards. At approximately 1:40am, two inmates overpowered a guard before he had closed the door in the southside Dormitory E-2. Another four officers were taken hostage. As long as the grill to the south wing was closed, this little blip on the radar would be over as the other guards would easily be able to handle the situation. But the grill was not closed. One of the inmates took one of the guard's uniforms and positioned himself by the grill. Officers Larry Mendoza and Antonio Vigil heard several men's voices as they ate breakfast in the officers' mess hall. They got up and saw the hallway beyond the grill filled with prisoners. These inmates would have access to the control center if that grill wasn't closed. They knew the situation was urgent. They ran to the control center and warned the officer inside about the growing situation and then they took refuge in the north wing of the prison. The inmates stormed the control center at 2:05am, smashing the bulletproof plate glass window with a brass fire extinguisher, and this gave them complete control of the prison.

Around 2:30am, several inmates broke into the infirmary and they started dealing the drugs that were there. So they are not only drunk on hooch, but now they are high too. And they all start talking among themselves about what they should do with the guards and how they were going to punish the snitches. The most brutal and dark place in man was opened this night. Whether it was supernaturally influenced or not, it would be pure evil. Execution squads formed and groups started carrying around  acetylene torches that had been left by construction workers. They used the torches to cut into Cell Block 4 where many snitches were kept in protective custody. This happened around 7am. The Attorney General's report about the riot stated, "Some impatient killers threw flammable liquids into locked cells and ignited them,." And when the groups got a hold of their victims they "stabbed, tortured, bludgeoned, burned, hanged, and hacked [them] apart." No amount of begging spared anyone the execution groups were set on punishing.

And no amount of begging from the inmates now trapped in Cell Block 4 got officers outside to attempt to save them, even though there was a back door to route them through. The reasoning was that as long as the guards weren't being killed, negotiations would continue. The guards weren't being killed, but they were being hurt. Twelve of them would be beat and raped. The snitches were beat, raped, dismembered, burned and one was decapitated with an axe. The axe marks can still be seen today. The official report stated that "the violence had spent itself" by 1:30pm on Sunday, February 3rd and the National Guard finally went in and retook the prison. They found 33 dead inmates and more than 100 others injured, including the 12 guards. Unbelievably, Old Main would remain open until 1998. Systemic reforms did follow although there are claims that abuse continued until it was closed. Hollywood has used the Old Main as a setting for film making. The Longest Yard and Zero Dark Thirty were both filmed here.

Shortly after the riot came reports of weird phenomena. Inmates claimed to hear disembodied screaming and guards started having problems with cell doors opening and closing on their own. The most consistent story about this prison are experiences with shadow beings. Former guards and tour guides claim to have seen multiple 3-dimensional dark figures. Negative emotions are often felt near the Gas Chamber and the main areas that experience haunting activity are the tool room and laundry room. Ghost Files featured this location in its second season and we'll discuss what they found in a little bit.

A radio show was hosting a Halloween special at Old Main and they invited a Paranormal investigation group to join them. There was no electricity hooked up as they entered the dark building. After they got inside, they heard the cell doors closing, one after the other. They caught it on their recorders as well. Thing is, the door system is controlled by electricity, so there was no power to close those cell doors. It can be controlled manually, but that is very difficult as the metal wheels are hard to turn and most are rusted. The group checked to see if the doors had actually shut or if they were just hearing residual sounds and the cell doors were indeed shut.

A producer on a film being shot at Old Main, picked up one of the actors from the airport and he said he wanted to take him by the old prison before shooting the next day so he could get a feel for the place. By the time they arrived, it was already dark, so they grabbed a couple of flashlights. Their first stop was Cell Block 4 and the producer pointed out the axe marks on the floor where an inmate had been decapitated. Then he showed the actor the outline of a human figure that had been burned into the floor when an inmate was tortured by a welding torch. Then he challenged the actor to sit in the old Gas Chamber and he actually agreed. As they made their way to the basement, they saw a light at the end of the corridor and they found out it was a lit candle. The candle was sitting on a chair in the room used for viewing executions. The actor chuckled and patted the producer on the back telling him that he had done a good job with this prank. Only the producer hadn't done this. The actor stepped into the Gas Chamber and sat down. When he looked up, he could see that the producer was peering into the chamber and he looked scared and was clearly staring at something behind the actor. He spun around and saw dark figures there. The producer waved for him to get out and then took off down the corridor. The actor was right behind him and both men ran until they got to the ground level.

An actress named Sandy had been at the prison working on a film in which she played a prisoner. On Ghost Files, she informed Steve that she had a truly chilling experience. The crew had already been feeling and seeing strange things like shadowy figures that would run by. The crew was filming a scene up in the cells when Sandy got locked into one of the cells. They got her out and as she was exiting, she heard a male voice behind her say, "Hey, how you doin'?" She said, "Fine, how are you?" The voice said, "Fine now." She thought it was a member of the crew, but when she turned around, nobody was there. She almost peed her pants. To make matters worse, something followed Sandy home and was tormenting her at home. She couldn't sleep and was getting an ulcer from the stress she was feeling.  This seemed to be connected to a hat she found in Cell Block E-2 and took home with her. After scary stuff started happening in her house, she burned the hat, but the activity continued. Amy helped her to resolve the issue.

Steve talked to a former corrections officer who worked here in the early 1990s named Anthony. The activity here was so well known that during training at the academy, it was addressed. Anthony had three inmates that he brought down to get linens from the laundry room. As they walked back, they heard a rattling noise and when Anthony looked he saw a shadow and he shined his flashlight at it the beam was invisible. He gets chills just thinking about the jail. There was also Leon, a former corrections officer who really was scared of the jail. He saw shadows like regular shadows, but there was nothing to cast them. Windows opened on their own as well.

Amy picked up on all the chaos and horror of the riot. I sometimes feel like Amy can see residual pictures like watching a movie rather than seeing actual spirits. But here, she was also encountering entities. She said that the whole prison felt haunted and that the land was cursed. The most disturbing thing that Amy saw was a shadow figure that was completely three dimensional. She said that it was not a human spirit, but something ancient. She used the term "devil" to describe it. The entity was thriving in the jail. She managed to trace its origins to a hole in the lowest area. It looked like a sewage pipe or something to me. She saw many spirits that seemed to be mentally ill down near the laundry area and Steve confirmed that many inmates were unmedicated for their mental illness.

The New Mexico Corrections Department started the “Old Main Tours” in 2012 and so you can tour the facility and hear the stories about the riot, but don't expect to hear anything about ghosts. They don't entertain that stuff at all, which made it difficult to get information on the hauntings. But based on the people who have come forward with their stories and the reading by Amy, I imagine if ghost hunts were offered here, there would be plenty of activity. Is the Penitentiary of New Mexico haunted? That is for you to decide!

HGB Ep. 150 - St. James Hotel

 
Moment in Oddity - Daisy and Violet Hilton
Suggested by: Jill Phenix

Daisy and Violet Hilton were a couple of remarkable ladies and what makes them odd is that they were conjoined twins who managed to find a way to make a living from their difficult circumstances. The twins were not identical and they became fused to each other at the base of their spines in vitro. They were born in Brighton, England in 1908. Their mother was a barmaid and their father was a soldier. No one knows their names and it seemed that the mother died shortly after their birth and their father was killed in World War I. The midwife who delivered them was Mary Hilton and she would care for the twins and give them her name. Mary realized that displaying the girls could make her some good money, so she started touring them around to circuses and carnivals. She heard how well freak shows and vaudeville was doing in America, so she traveled to the US with the twins in 1916. Mary was a heartless woman and treated the girls horribly. They were malnourished and forced to participate in sideshows. The twins met Harry Houdini in the 1920s and he taught them how to do self-hypnosis, so that they could create their own solo spaces. It helped them to get rid of each other in their minds. The girls also decided to rid themselves of Mary and in 1929 they went to court and they were free. Once they could keep their earnings, the girls enjoyed the world of freakshows and vaudeville. They even appeared in the 1932 film "Freaks." They became headliners and their fame grew until the 1950s brought television and vaudeville went into the dustbin of history. They moved to Florida and worked in a grocery store. They were found dead at their home in 1969, having succumbed to influenza. Conjoined twins no longer are treated as bizarre oddities, but as an unique mutation and we can't help but think that the Hilton sisters had something to do with that.

This Day in History - The Beast of Gévaudan Killed by Antoine de Beauterne

On this day, September 21st, in 1765, the Beast of Gévaudan was killed by Antoine de Beauterne. The Beast of Gévaudan was a man-eating wolf that terrorized the former province of Gévaudan in France between the years 1764 and 1765. The wolf would kill its victims by ripping their throats out. The beast was reported to have an immense tail and massive teeth. Most reports have the wolf attaching 210 people and killing 113 of them. Over ninety of the victims were partially eaten. Antoine de Beauterne was employed by the King Louis XV as Gun-Bearer and Lieutenant of the Hunt and it was his job to hunt the animal. On September 21st, an announcement was made that the wolf pack had been spotted in Pommier Woods. Antoine gathered his hunting party and he positioned himself at a place where the hunting hounds would scare the beast towards. It worked and Antoine encountered the wolf. He fired his musket that was loaded with no less than five charges of powder, a ball, and thirty to forty pieces of shrapnel known as "wolf shot." The blast knocked him off his feet and hit the beast in the right eye and shoulder. The wolf struggled to its feet and lunged at Antoine. Antoine's cousin fired his musket and hit the wolf again, which struggled for twenty-five more yards before falling over dead. The Beast of Gévaudan was dead.


St. James Hotel (Suggested by listener Richard Cutshall)

When one thinks of the Old West in America, cowboys and Native Americans, along with all varieties of gunslingers from sheriffs to outlaws come to mind. It was a time when a man could die in the streets with his boots on or at the poker table holding the Dead Man's Hand: a pair of aces and a pair of eights, all black. Cimarron, New Mexico was in the middle of all this and the St. James Hotel built there in 1872, exudes the faded Wild West. This was a wild town that played host to a veritable who's who of old west gunmen, lawmen, gangs and famous performers like Buffalo Bill Cody. The hotel itself was witness to at least twenty-six deaths. And now the hotel seems to be playing host to spirits. The hotel is reputed to be quite haunted with at least seven identified spirits. Our listener Richard Cutshall has stayed there and hunted for some of those ghosts. Join us as we share the history and hauntings of the St. James Hotel!

There are many buildings and markers in Cimarron, New Mexico that reflect upon the town's heyday during the Old West days of the 1800s. Cimarron was originally home to the Native American tribes of the Ute, Jicarilla Apache and Anasazi. The town sits along the Cimarron River and before it was established, it was a place along the Mountain Route of the Santa Fe Trail, which was established to avoid confrontations with the tribes in the area. A fur trapper named Lucien B. Maxwell came to northern New Mexico and stayed at a ranch there where he fell in love with one of the owner's six daughters. He eventually married her and inherited the ranch and built a mansion on the land. He built the Aztec Mill nearby. This area that would later become Cimarron and several other towns was known as the Maxwell Land Grant. It incorporated a total of 1.7 million acres. In 1870, Maxwell sold the land grant to a group of English financiers. Such a large holding is hard to keep squatters off of and by 1873, a range war known as the Colfax County War had broken out between Maxwell and squatters. It would continue until 1888.

Henry Lambert is the man who built the St. James Hotel and pinning down details on him is difficult as there are differing opinions and accounts on his life. Most agree that he was born in October of 1838 in Nantes, France and moved to Bourdeux as a child. He came to the United States in 1858 and joined the Northern Navy during the Civil War. Some accounts have him working as a steward  and then he was employed by Ulysses S. Grant as a field cook. This employment lasted for one month according to some reports. President Lincoln heard about Lambert's cooking, either from General Grant or through the grapevine and he became the White House Chef for Abraham Lincoln. But there is no official record that Lambert was a White House Chef. There is a story that he owned a restaurant in the area. Perhaps he cooked for the President, but not in an official capacity? The family passed down the story and the hotel maintains it, so maybe it is true. There's just no official proof.

Henry named the hotel after himself and called it The Lambert Inn. It opened in 1872 and the saloon became a big draw. Fur traders, miners, cowboys and explorers visited the saloon on their travel down the Santa Fe Trail. Bar fights were a regular occurrence in this rough and tumble place and there are claims that as many as 26 people lost their lives in the saloon in shoot-outs. The reputation for violence sparked expressions around town like, "It appears Lambert had himself another man for breakfast." Henry added rooms in 1880 and fashioned them in such a way that The Lambert Inn came to be known as one of the most elegant hotels west of the Mississippi. Many famous names stayed at the hotel including, Bob Ford who killed Jesse James, Jesse James himself, Buffalo Bill Cody, Annie Oakley, Doc Holliday, Billy the Kid, Pat Garret, Black Jack Tom Ketchum, General Sheridan and Wyatt Earp and his brother Morgan.

Henry was married twice, first to a woman named Anna who died in 1881 and then to Mary in 1883. He had five sons with Mary: William, Frank, Johnnie, Fred and Eugene. Fred went on to become sheriff in Cimarron and he always told people that Buffalo Bill Cody taught him how to use a gun. Fred was also a member of the tribal police and a territorial marshal. Cody even gave Fred the nickname “Cyclone Dick” because he was born during a blizzard and he became his godfather. Cody loved Cimarron and he loved staying at the hotel. He met Annie Oakley at the hotel and invited her to join him in performing the Wild West Show. When the two took the show on the road, an entire village of Native Americans from the area joined them.

The roof was replaced in 1901 and more than 400 bullet holes were found in the ceiling above the saloon. Guests were prevented from being killed with an errant shot by a double layer of wood in the ceiling. There are still 22 bullet holes in the ceiling of the dining room to this day. The hotel did really well while the Santa Fe Trail was being used, but when the railroad came through, the trail died and soon the precious minerals that brought miners also dried up. The population moved out of Cimarron. Henry died in 1913 and his sons tried to maintain the hotel. Mary died in 1926 and the hotel fell into disrepair. The St. James passed through numerous owners and was occasionally closed.

In 1985, restoration was begun on the St. James and it was brought back to its former glory complete with antique chandeliers, brocade wallpaper, velvet drapes, mounted deer and buffalo and original furnishings. Old hotel ledgers are also available to peruse. As you will hear Richard share, the hotel is separated into two parts. There is the historic area where 14 rooms have been kept to their rustic, former nature with no televisions, phones or radios and then there is the Annex with 10 rooms that have all the modern amenities. The historic rooms are named for certain people who had stayed or owned the hotel at one time. For example, there is the Mary Lambert Room and the Annie Oakley Room. The old saloon is now the dining room and the original antique bar is still there.

The St. James Hotel staff are not shy about their ghosts as you will hear from Richard. The sightings and reports are numerous about the ghosts at this location and it is considered one of the most haunted places in New Mexico. There are at least seven identified ghosts here. The second floor is the most haunted area. Nearly all the senses are affected from the scent of roses and cigar smoke to the feeling of cold spots to the sound of disembodied voices and haunting music to seeing full-bodied apparitions. Ghost Adventures has been here and the hotel has been featured on A Current Affair and Unsolved Mysteries.

Mary Lambert gave birth to all her children at the hotel. Her son Johnnie was born in 1889 and tragically, he was killed in an accident in 1892, inside the hotel. His spirit has been seen in the hotel. Mary died at the hotel as well and she seems to have remained behind to watch over Johnnie. The two are seen together often. The epicenter for hauntings by Mary seem to be in her room, Room 17. Her rose scented perfume is smelled in the room. If a guests open the window in the room, they will hear a tapping on the window until the window is closed. Her apparition is seen in the room and in the hallway outside the room and she usually has a milky white appearance.

Sometimes Johnnie’s ghost is witnessed playing with two ghosts of little girls who are said to have died at the hotel as well. The girls were 8 and 10 when their family stopped at the St. James Hotel. They had been traveling along the Santa Fe Trail and the girls became ill. Unfortunately, both died from their illness. They are most often seen playing in the hallway by the Governor’s Room. The spirit of a prostitute has been identified as Melissa because EVPs have been recorded of a female voice saying her name was Melissa. She probably died at the hotel. Ladies of the Evening were not really allowed by Mary, but they would sneak in late at night through a side door and then slip out in the mornings before Mary made her rounds. Melissa is playful and enjoys tugging at men’s hair, sitting in their laps and tickling their necks.

There is a room at the hotel that is so haunted and by such a negative entity, that no one is allowed to rent the room. The room is actually padlocked. That is Room 18 and it was a room that was rented by a Thomas James Wright, who was known as T.J. on March 31, 1882. He liked poker and he was playing a game in the poker room with Henry Lambert and a couple of other men. The game got heated and a legend about the game claims that Henry ended up putting the hotel into the pot. T.J. won the pot and the hotel. Another story just claims that T.J. won everybody’s money. Whatever the case, somebody was not happy about losing and shot T.J. in the back as he walked down the hallway to his room. He threw himself into his room and locked the door. He succumbed to his injuries during the night. No one was ever convicted for the murder. And now his angry spirit has remained in Room 18. T.J.’s ghost has violently pushed and shoved people, including an owner who decided to put the padlock on the room. She claimed to see an angry orange ball of light in the upper corner of the room once, also. None of the staff is brave enough to enter the room to clean it and the room is staged as though a gambling, drinking cowboy is still in the room. When guests were allowed in the room, they would report seeing a cowboy popping up in the window and one couple told a security guard, "A cowboy ghost was rocking, watching and grinning at us!"
   
Another peculiar entity may not be a ghost at all. This thing is called The Imp or Little Imp. He is a dwarf-like man who is very mischievous. He moves objects around and likes to take things and then return them later. He laughs at the staff and plays tricks on them as well. Other unknown entities are here and some think that spirits come and go because of the nearby Santa Fe Trail. It seems to be some kind of energy highway. These spirits knock things off the check-in area, pictures fall of walls, lights flick on and off and cold spots are felt. Cameras malfunction often inside the hotel. A college student named Kody Mutz worked at the hotel during summer breaks. In 2002, he was working the front desk when he was startled by a loud shriek coming from a far corner. His eyes darted about, looking for whoever who had screamed. There was no one in that corner. And guests on the other side of the lobby seemed to not have heard the noise.

Do members of the Lambert Family still remain at the hotel after death? Are some of the cowboys of old still here, roaming the halls? Is the St. James Hotel haunted? That is for you to decide!