5 Haunted Places in St. Louis
Fabulous Fox Theatre 527 N. Grand Blvd. St. Louis, MO
Opened January 31,1929, the Fabulous Fox Theatre was the highlight of builder William Fox’s motion picture empire. Costing nearly $5 million, an absurdly large sum for that time, the building attracted thousands of spectators over its nearly 80 years of operation.
Turns out, some were ghostly.
Over the years, the theatre has had its share of paranormal occurrences: toilets flushing randomly, the smell of cigar smoke appearing in certain locations around the building, a shadowy figure has even been caught on camera sitting in the empty audience seats. But it doesn’t end there; the marquee room, situated beneath the Fox club, is said to be a hotspot, where witnesses have reported the sounds of stomping footsteps and door knobs rattling maniacally. Upstairs, in the projector room, employees have claimed to hear voices. They also claim to have seen a red haired woman in a light blue suit watching them work, speculated to be Eve Fox, William Fox’s wife who never left.
Powell Symphony Hall 718 N. Grand Blvd. St. Louis, MO
Opened in November of 1925 as the St. Louis Theatre, the Powell Symphony Hall was acquired and renovated in 1966 by the St. Louis symphony Society, and has been their home for the last 60 years.
Joining them have been some interesting residents.
One of the most reported paranormal sightings is George, a spirit with a handlebar mustache, wearing an opulent white tuxedo and hat, who is said to wander the venue’s halls. A female spirit has been said to haunt the projector room, and another, named Richard, is said to wander upstairs. In October, 2010, a group of paranormal experts spent the night in the old theatre to investigate when an abundance of odd occurrences took place. The final straw was when the music director and his secretary were stuck in an auxiliary storage room after the door mysteriously slammed and locked. At 3 am, when a member of the team tried to communicate with an otherworldly spirit in the basement Whitaker room, the wall phone in the room rang, but only once. While most of the knocking and slamming noises reported are just the acoustics of the old hall, other experiences are harder to explain.
Zombie Road Lawler Ford Rd, Wildwood, MO
Known as Lawler Ford road, this unassuming 2.3 mile walking trail winds through the woods near the Meramec river. But urban legends and local history keep the road interesting.
Used first by Native Americans as a path to reach the Meramec river, then by Civil War soldiers, the area in 1868 was mined for its limestone deposits and a railroad built to transport the stone. It is said that you can hear the screams of men killed in industrial accidents from the railroads and mining. Other witnesses claim to see the ghosts of children, and Native Americans from a possible mass burial site underneath. In the 1950’s, as a hotspot for midnight hangouts and secret lovers, the road was given its name when stories of an escaped mental patient named zombie disappeared on the road, leaving only his bloody hospital gown. Some say he went on to live as a serial killer in nearby shack and kill couples that snuck out at night, while others believed he died in those woods, no one knows for sure if he was even real. Other reports of a translucent looking woman who stands on the old train tracks correlate with the real life death of Della Hamilton McCullough in 1876, when she was struck by a train in the area. Stories of an insane asylum and a sadist run orphanage have circulated, but no historical evidence backs up these claims.
Lemp Mansion 3322 DeMenil Place, St. Louis, MO
Built in 1868 by Jacob Feickert, William and Julia Lemp, the first members of the Lemp family to live in the house, moved into the ornate mansion in 1876. They lived and worked, owners of one of the most successful breweries of that time, using the Mississippi limestone caves underneath the house for freezing room and storage. The haunted claims derive from the multiple deaths and suicides by family members on the property.
In 1904, after the death of his son and closest friend, William J. Lemp Sr. dealt with his declining health, and on February 13, shot himself in his bedroom. Only a few months later, his wife, Julia, died of cancer in the room next door. His son, William ‘Billy’ Lemp jr. took over the brewery until prohibition in the 1920s, after that time, the Lemp brewery, once more successful than Budweiser, struggled financially and was later sold for a fraction of its former worth. Billy Lemp Jr. shot himself on December 29, 1922 in the front office of the mansion. Another daughter, Elsa Lemp Wright, also committed suicide in her own home in St Louis, after her marriage fell apart, and it is said her childhood bedroom is the most haunted room of the house. Charles Lemp, the last Lemp family member to live in the mansion, died May 10, 1949, when he shot his dog, then himself in the house. After Charles death, the mansion was turned into a boarding house for the remainder of the 1950’s, with residents fleeing constantly after reporting strange sensations and weird happenings. In the 1960’s the construction of I 55 destroyed much of the original grounds and a carriage house, but today, the Lemp mansion is a historical restaurant and inn, with dozens of reports of ghostly activity. The most common being the ghosts of the Lemp family that died there, but others are said to roam. ‘Billy’ Lemp is the most notorious known ghost, usually causing trouble and intentionally bothering guests. The ‘monkey faced boy’ thought to be the possible illegitimate son of Billy born with down syndrome who was said to have died after falling down the attic steps from where he lived, is known to play around at the base of the attic staircase. Another apparition of a little girl walking along the upstairs hallway confounds guests, as no known girl of that age died in the house. Workers at the restaurant/inn have reported the piano playing itself, glasses from the bar smashing, doors closing and locking on their own, and random cold spots appearing around the house. The Lemp mansion is considered to be one of the most haunted houses in America, and definitely lives up to its name.
Exorcist House 8435 Roanoke Dr. St. Louis, MO
Built around 1940, this quaint little home situated on a suburban cul-de-sac in Bel-Nor is the site of one of the most chilling horror tales told. The 1971 novel, written by William Blatty, stayed at the top of bestsellers lists for 54 weeks straight, and two years later audiences couldn’t get over the chilling movie. What few know, is that it is based on true events. The book, based on a diary kept by a priest during the process of exorcising a young boy, follows the tale. Around 1949, a young boy in Maryland was messing with an ouija board, and was supposedly possessed by a demon. His parents went to local priests after he began to act odd, and when that was unsuccessful, they followed a clue and moved in with family in this house in suburban St. Louis. While almost all of the exorcism took place in the Alexian Brothers hospital (in a wing demolished in 1978) and St. Francis Xavier College Church (3628 Lindell Blvd. St. Louis, MO), the house is still considered to be haunted. The whole ordeal was kept very confidential, those involved spoke very rarely of what happened, even until their deaths, but the boy, known by the pseudonym Roland Doe, identity was never released, but it is known that he survived and went on to live a quiet life. The boy was said to have been released of possession, supposedly by the devil himself, in the psych ward of Alexian Brothers. While the house has been lived in by many different owners since the event occurred, not all knew of its history. Some complained about the North-West bedroom, the victim’s bedroom, being cold or drafty, others didnt even know the place was haunted until years after moving out.