The Hidden, Haunted Histories of 7 American Landmarks

The stories of presidential ghosts in the White House are well known, but numerous other American landmarks—in Washington, D.C. and beyond—have their own spectral stories and haunted histories.

The Smithsonian Institution

With more than 155 million artifacts in its collections, the Smithsonian is called “America’s attic.” And it turns out that attic may be haunted.

Many a night watchman in the early part of the 20th century claimed to have seen unidentifiable figures and heard ghostly footsteps echoing in the halls—but some of the Smithsonian’s permanent residents are also recognizable former members of its staff. One is the spirit of Dr. Emil Bessels, an Arctic explorer who accompanied Charles Francis Hall’s unsuccessful expedition to the North Pole in 1871 and who was accused of (but not tried for) poisoning Hall with arsenic. Other recognizable phantoms have included Fielding Meek, a paleontologist who lived and worked at the institute; Joseph Henry, the institute’s first secretary; Spencer Fullerton Baird, its first curator; and even British founder James Smithson, who left his entire fortune to establish the Smithsonian in Washington but never actually visited America.

If ghosts really exist at the Smithsonian, Smithson would be the most likely candidate. His remains have been kept at the museum since 1904. In fact, his body was disinterred in 1973 because of what James Goode, former curator of Castle collections, called ghost sightings. Officially, though, the institute just did a complete study of the contents of Smithson’s casket, including his skeleton, which was still inside, not out wandering the halls scaring people.

The Hollywood Sign

Peg Entwhistle was an up-and-coming actress on Broadway in the mid-1920s. When she tried to make the transition to Hollywood in 1932, however, she found that she was just another pretty face. After a single film role, her prospects dried up and she was out of work.

Around September 16, 1932, Entwhistle told her family she was going for a walk; it would be the last time anyone saw her alive. She traveled up the scrubby ridge to the Hollywoodland sign in the Hollywood Hills, where she took off her purse, coat, and shoes. She climbed a maintenance ladder to the top of the H (other reports say it was the last letter, D). There, she plummeted some 50 feet to the ground below. Her body and belongings—including a suicide note—were discovered two days later.

Since then, LAND has been removed from the sign, but the spirit of Peg Entwhistle still lingers. Park ranger John Arbogast claimed to have seen her ghost many times, usually in the middle of very foggy nights. He also claimed to smell gardenias, Entwhistle’s favorite scent, in the area when there are no flowers in bloom.

In 1990, a man and his girlfriend were hiking near the sign when their dog suddenly began whining and backing away from the trail ahead. The couple soon saw a blond woman in a white 1930s-style dress walking toward them. She looked confused and disoriented, so the couple tried to steer clear of her, but then she suddenly vanished before their eyes. They claim to have been unaware of Entwhistle’s suicide at the time of the sighting.

Liberty Island

Since 1886, Liberty Island has been the home of the Statue of Liberty. But earlier in its history it was known as Bedloe’s Island, and was reportedly a favorite spot for notorious pirate Captain Kidd to bury his ill-gotten treasure.

As reported by The New York Times in 1892, two soldiers named Gibbs and Carpenter were stationed at Fort Wood, the military installation on Bedloe’s Island that would later form the pedestal for Lady Liberty. Hoping to get rich quick, the duo snuck out of their bunks to dig for the treasure at a location that had been foretold to them by a psychic. Then, sometime after midnight, the entire fort was woken up by a blood-curdling scream. As guards headed in the direction of the noise, they encountered a hysterical Carpenter, who led them to the dig site, where Gibbs was found unconscious.

The men said they had only dug a few feet down when they found a wooden box. But just as they were about to claim their fortune, an otherworldly creature appeared. Gibbs described it as a typical depiction of a demon—blackened skin, horns on its head, giant wings, and a barbed tail. Carpenter, though, said it had red skin, didn’t have wings, and moved about without any visible form of locomotion. Carpenter had run away, but Gibbs had remained frozen in terror. He claimed that it was the spirit of Captain Kidd, who breathed sulfur in his face before throwing him into the bay. The guards saw no wooden box or demon pirate, so apparently Kidd took his treasure with him when he disappeared into the ether.

Alcatraz Island

Thousands of inmates passed through Alcatraz in its 100-year history as a Civil War-era military stockade and federal prison that housed some of America’s most dangerous criminals. Thanks to the isolation of the island, as well as the guards’ sometimes brutal treatment of prisoners, many men took their own lives while others were killed by inmates. With so much blood staining the Rock, it should come as no surprise that ghosts are said to roam the halls today.

One allegedly haunted area is Cell 14D, one of the solitary confinement cells known as a “hole.” There, prisoners were stripped naked, thrown into a small, dark room, and were kept completely isolated for up to 19 days. By the time they came out, many suffered permanent psychological damage. In the 1940s, an inmate in Cell 14D screamed throughout the night that something with glowing red eyes was in there with him. The next morning, the cell was finally quiet, so the guards unlocked 14D to check on the prisoner. Inside, they found his body, strangled to death. An autopsy later revealed that his wounds could not have been self-inflicted.

It’s been said that one of the Rock’s most infamous guests, Al Capone, never really left. As late-stage syphilis ate at his brain, Capone feared that other inmates might kill him during the prisoners’ weekly recreation period in the prison yard. So Capone asked for and received special permission to practice playing his banjo in the prison’s shower room instead. Since the island became part of Golden Gate National Recreation Area in 1972, many park rangers have reported hearing the distinct sound of a banjo coming from the room, often near the end of the workday after all the tourists have gone.

The Empire State Building

Sadly, the Empire State Building has seen its fair share of deaths in its 80-year history. There are many stories of people who have seen ghostly figures recreating their fateful plunges from the skyscraper’s 86th floor observation deck, but one stands above the rest.

In 1985, a tourist went to the observation deck to get a bird's-eye view of the Big Apple. While there she met a woman dressed in 1940s-style clothes, crying into her handkerchief. When asked what was wrong, the woman said that her husband died in the war in Germany. Obviously distraught, she said she couldn’t live without her beau, so she walked through the fence that surrounds the deck, and disappeared over the edge.

Shaken by what she'd seen, the tourist went into the bathroom to splash water on her face. Suddenly, the same woman appeared next to her at the sink, touching up her makeup in the mirror, before heading to the observation deck to replay her final moments again … and again … and again.

Wrigley Field

According to Mickey Bradley and Dan Gordon, authors of Haunted Baseball and Field of Screams, the most haunted ballpark in the country is Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs.

One of the best-known ghost stories is retold by security guards who have heard the telephone in the bullpen ring in the middle of the night. But it’s not a wrong number, because the phone is a direct line to the dugout, which they say is haunted by the spirit of Charlie Grimm, a Cubs manager in the 1930s and ’40s. Some guards have even claimed they’ve seen Grimm in the hallways, but as soon as they speak to him he disappears. But why would Grimm still be haunting Wrigley after all these years? Perhaps it’s because his ashes are said to be buried in left field.

Fans say they’ve spotted famed WGN broadcaster Harry Caray in the press box and in the outfield bleachers ever since his death in 1998. Others have even seen Steve Goodman, writer of the Cubs’ anthem, “Go, Cubs, Go!,” sitting behind the batter’s box, despite his death in 1984. Goodman’s ghostly box seat would be appropriate since it’s rumored his ashes are buried under home plate.

The Golden Gate Bridge

San Francisco Bay’s ghostly past goes back to well before its world-famous bridge was constructed in 1937. In 1853, the steamship Tennessee ran aground at a spot that has since been named Tennessee Cove in its honor. Fortunately, 550 passengers and 14 chests of gold all made it safely ashore before the waters of the Pacific tore the ship apart.

Since then, there have been many reports of a ghostly, antique ship passing under the Golden Gate Bridge before disappearing into the fog. Perhaps the most famous sighting occurred in November 1942, when the crew of the USS Kennison claimed to have floated right past the phantom Tennessee; so close the Kennison crew could tell that the steamer ship’s decks were unmanned. The Tennessee was said to leave no wake as it passed, nor did it show up on the Kennison’s radar.

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A version of this story was published in 2015; it has been updated for 2024.