anyone or to upset the community. Keep your adventures legal, keep them respectful, and above all keep them safe.
HAPPY GHOSTING!
Gravestone carving at Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum, profile.
SECTION I
cemeteries
Cemeteries are often haunted, as if the dead have a hard time leaving their physical bodies behind. Much of their world seems to consist of wandering aimlessly through cemeteries or repeating trivial gestures that they often did in life. While many of these actions may seem meaningless, we need to make sure that when the dead do have something important to say…
we’re listening.
Adath Israel Cemetery
Beth Israel Cemetery
Congress Green Cemetery
Darby Lee Historic Cemetery
Hopewell Cemetery
Kings Island Cemetery
Miamitown Cemetery
Millville Cemetery
Price Hill Potter’s Field
Reily Cemeteries
Rose Hill Cemetery
Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum
Wesleyan Cemetery
Woodside Cemetery
ADATH ISRAEL CEMETERY
1661 Sunset Avenue, Cincinnati, OH 45238
directions
Take I-75 to the Harrison Avenue exit. Follow the signs that direct you to Queen City Avenue. Follow Queen City Avenue a little more than a mile up the hill and turn left onto Sunset Avenue. Follow Sunset for less than a mile. Adath Israel will be on your left just after you pass the intersection with Guerley Road.
history
When the cholera epidemic hit Cincinnati in the 1840s, the only Jewish cemetery in the city filled up quickly. As a result, many Jewish communities throughout the area created more cemeteries. Adath Israel Cemetery in Price Hill was one of them.
This cemetery eventually was filled to capacity, and the congregation of the temple started another one elsewhere in the city and discontinued burials at the Price Hill location, but this is the one that is reputed to be haunted.
In 2008, a group vandalized several headstones, and the cemetery now is watched more closely by law enforcement and by concerned neighbors at night.
ghost story
Most of the ghost stories from this cemetery take place in the caretaker’s building. This red-brick building sits within the cemetery itself. The paranormal events tend to occur in the basement. A chair will move around all by itself. Lights in the basement will come on by themselves. Other times voices and figures will be seen and heard throughout the basement despite the fact that the building is empty. When curious onlookers gaze through the windows into the basement, sometimes they will see strange reflections of figures standing behind them. When these terrified witnesses turn around, no one is there.
The caretaker’s building, however, isn’t the only haunted location in this cemetery. People will often see figures walking among the headstones, especially at night. When people approach the area where they saw these figures, no one is found.
visiting
It’s probably best to visit this cemetery during the day, when it is easier to look through the basement windows in the caretaker’s house and see how the basement is set up. Most of the stories involve things that happen during the day because that is when people are usually around. I have caught interesting EVPs at the cemetery during the day.
Recently, the caretakers and owners of the cemetery have posted warnings that the cemetery closes at nine p.m., meaning that it is illegal to enter the cemetery at night. Unfortunately, this limitation probably resulted from the vandals who uprooted several headstones—an example of how one group of insensitive people can end up ruining a place for the rest of us.
BETH ISRAEL CEMETERY
Pleasant Avenue and Hill Avenue, Fairfield, OH 45014
directions
Take I-75 North to I-275 West. From I-275 take the Hamilton Ave/SR-127 exit (exit 36) and turn right on Hamilton Ave/SR-127. Hamilton Avenue changes its name to Pleasant Avenue. Follow this road for about five miles until you cross Hill Avenue. Just past Hill Avenue on Pleasant, Beth Israel Cemetery will be on your left. There is a Catholic cemetery across the street on your right.
history
This cemetery was built in response to the need for more Jewish cemeteries throughout the Cincinnati area. In 1849 when the cholera epidemic hit Cincinnati, there was just one Jewish cemetery in the city. Cholera quickly filled this cemetery so the Jewish community built several others in the Greater Cincinnati area to fulfill the need for consecrated Jewish burial grounds. Today it is still in operation, and it is well kept.
ghost story
This cemetery is supposedly a hotbed for EVP activity. I have not run across any stories of figures or even ghostly, disembodied sounds coming at any time of the day or night, but I have heard about people recording a strange voice they didn’t hear at the time they were there. Many times the recordings feature human whispers, but some include a barking dog or a ringing church bell that wasn’t heard when the recording was made.
visiting
As far as I can tell, this cemetery is open throughout the night. There are no signs on the gates advertising any hours of operation, and the gates are always open. I have come to this cemetery many times during the late hours of the night and have never been approached or questioned as to my intentions there.
At the same time, I can’t stress enough how important it is that you stay respectful within the cemetery, especially if you are there late at night. If people are running around, yelling, and screaming, someone is sure to call the police, and although it doesn’t close at night, I would be on the side of any police officer who arrests someone being disrespectful in a cemetery. If you go there late at night, quietly make a recording and ask respectful questions to
