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Jack Nicholson sits at the Overlook Hotel’s Gold Room bar in ‘The Shining’ where a pale, quietly-smiling bartender appears to take his order — and we’re all wondering if he’s being served by a ghost. There’s something compelling about haunted public spaces.
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For sure, a haunted bedroom is the worst – whether it be in a haunted house, haunted hotel or haunted Airbnb – but there’s terror involved in taking food or drink into your body in a place where the spirits aren’t just in your glass! In honor of the upcoming Spooky Season, here is a listing of some great places to wine and dine (and maybe dash if you get scared?). Check out the spookiest haunted bars and restaurants in America. And maybe make mine a double?
1. Publick House Historic Inn | Sturbridge, MA
This 1771 historic inn with a restaurant, tavern and bakery is everything you’d hope for in terms of haunted ambiance—there’s even an ‘Old Burial Ground’ steps away. Its ballroom is haunted by founder Ebenezer Crafts who appears in his colonial garb, while upstairs in Room 40, the bridal suite, commotion is so severe that multiple people have changed rooms because of it. Ghosts pop up in mirrors, and best of all? There’s a reading ghost.
2. Old Absinthe House | New Orleans, LA
Here on Bourbon Street, pirate Jean Lafitte met with Andrew Jackson amid an absinthe-swirled meeting. Maybe? At any rate, this 1798 landmark boasts the spectral carousing of those two, plus voodoo practitioner Marie Laveau and a creepy woman in a long white dress. Sit at the bar for the ‘world’s best gin & tonic’ made with St. George terroir gin and try not to pay attention to the bottles and chairs reputed to move on their own.
3. Old Baraboo Inn | Baraboo, WI
Built in 1864 by German immigrants, this one-time brewery, boardinghouse and brothel offers barside conversation with disembodied voices, including that of one regular, Al Capone. Ghosts appear: an elderly man, elderly woman and a saloon dancer. Trading on its reputation, the inn offers a Ghost Bomb shooter. Open weekends and for ghost-hunt events. People report photos showing up on their phones that they never took; let’s train the spirits to upload to social media, too!
4. Big Nose Kate’s Saloon | Tombstone, AZ
Tombstone’s the ‘town too tough to die,’ which would seem to cut out any possibility of resident hauntings, but that’s the paradox we have learned to live with. Kate was a prostitutional cohort of Doc Holliday, but the bar’s ghost is actually a handyman who dug tunnels beneath this former hotel. Spectral hands encircling one’s throat? Cowboy ghosts on the staircase? A shooter named for Kate made with Dekuyper butterscotch schnapps and Irish cream? Check, check and check.
5. Silver Dollar Saloon | Marysville, CA
Stiff drinks and juicy steaks abound here where once ‘soiled doves’ plied their trade upstairs in this Gold Rush town named for a Donner Party survivor. With a brothel museum and a hidden speakeasy, the saloon’s ghosts almost seem like an afterthought although they’re terrifying, like the wraith in a white ballgown who likes to scare kids. The saloon under different ownership had connections to Juan Corona, a serial killer who murdered 25 migrant workers in 1971.
6. Hotel Blackhawk, Autograph Collection | Davenport, IA
This 1915 hotel, restored for $46 million, hosted illustrious guests like Barack Obama and Cary Grant, who suffered a stroke in his room and died soon after at the local hospital. It’s also hosted entities who should have checked out already, like a forlorn woman in evening dress who wafts down the halls—ghostly piano music has been heard to play, too. Dine at the hotel’s Bix Bistro or RISE Neighborhood Cafe. And for weddings, the hotel has a Gold Room, just like the Overlook!
7. Six Pence Pub | Savannah, GA
British comfort food and craft ales will calm you down after apparitions try to ruin your night. You’ll shiver when spirits lower the temperature and cringe when they throw pans in the kitchen. Your pint may actually fall off the bar (better than you off your stool?) when ghosts swipe at it. Perhaps this activity can be chalked up to the Revolutionary War mass grave located only 80 yards from the pub. Rumor says not everyone had died before being buried.
8. The Tides Beach Club | Kennebunkport, ME
This charming yellow landmark inn right on Goose Rocks Beach has been in operation since 1900 and hosted Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a proponent of Spiritualism (communicating with the dead) as well as the Sherlock Holmes author. Original owner Emma Foss haunts Room 25 and is said to mess with men she doesn’t like. She also causes trouble in Room 29 and the third floor in general. Luckily you can wine and dine to ignore this opinionated, deceased hotelier.
9. Grand Galvez Hotel | Galveston, TX
This sprawling hotel was built in 1911, and some say that thousands of drowned souls still mourn their deaths from the 1900 Galveston hurricane which whipped through the beachfront property. Child ghosts bounce balls and laugh, while candles blow out on their own. Audra haunts Room 501: she heard that her sailor fiancé went down with his ship and hanged herself; days later, he showed up healthy and alive. Enjoy casual seafood at Galvez Bar & Grill while mulling over these haunting narratives.
10. Cuzzy’s | Minneapolis, MN
Just a few steps from the Twins’ ballpark is a restaurant so concerned about its ghost that it mentions her on the menu. A notice invites you to ‘toast the ghost’ — her name is Betsy, and she likes to give hugs. Or move the ketchup on the table. Or turn off the lights. She sounds fun. She probably wishes she could order off the beer list or get a plate of ‘totchos,’ which are tater tots treated like nachos.
