subtle to the profound and the comforting to the disturbing. Many people not seeking supernatural experiences have felt the presence or touch of recently departed loved ones, for example, or have even seen them, often just once, as if in final farewell. Others have at various points, and perhaps in places reputed to be haunted, experienced things like disembodied footsteps, inexplicable cold spots, or sounds with no discernible source, such as someone calling their name.
Those who are psychically sensitive, are exposed to extremely haunted sites, or actively engage in paranormal investigations of various sorts—including what have been widely referred to for some years now as ghosthunts—might experience any number of other things as well. These can include anomalies not audible to the unaided ear or visible to the naked eye that are captured in recordings or photographs, such as electronic voice phenomena (EVP) in the former and orbs, mists, or even coveted “full-frontal apparitions” in the latter.
Our intent with the America’s Haunted Road Trip series is to provide readers with resources they can use to personally discover and explore publicly accessible places that might be occupied by ghosts or the sites of other paranormal activity. We are not in the business of trying to prove that any particular place is or is not haunted; every single one of the places that appears in Ghosthunting Colorado certainly could be, and we believe that a number of them definitely are. The purpose of this volume and the others in the series is, rather, to tell everyone from the casual historical traveler to the hard-core ghosthunter about places of potential interest and to provide actionable, concrete information about how to visit those places.
As noted, all of the places covered in this book and the other volumes of the America’s Haunted Road Trip series are, to a lesser or greater extent, publicly accessible; there is simply no point in creating a travel guide to places people cannot easily visit. Places we cover in our guidebooks therefore include appropriate bridges; churches and other places of worship; cemeteries and graveyards; colleges and universities; government buildings; historic sites; hotels; museums; neighborhoods/districts of towns or cities; parks; restaurants and bars; roads and highways; railroads; shopping areas and malls; sports stadiums; and theaters.
Places we do not cover in our guidebooks or encourage people to visit generally include elementary, middle, or high schools; hospitals; assisted-living facilities; private homes and residential apartment buildings; private property; or prohibited areas like abandoned mental institutions or condemned buildings. It also bears mentioning that all potentially haunted places, their intersection with the otherworld notwithstanding, are still subject to all the hazards of the real world. So, show due respect to other good people and watch out for bad ones, do not violate local laws, be prepared for environmental hazards, and, in keeping with the mantra of urban exploration, “take nothing but photographs; leave nothing but footprints.”
Beyond that, we hope this book and the others in the series will be useful to you and that you have an enjoyable, informative, and fulfilling journey on your own haunted road trip.
Michael O. Varhola
Editor, America’s Haunted Road Trip
Introduction
“Jack stood in the dining room just outside the batwing doors leading into the Colorado Lounge, his head cocked, listening. He was smiling faintly. Around him, he could hear the Overlook Hotel coming to life.”
— Stephen King, The Shining
FOR 20 YEARS OF MY LIFE I have lived in Denver or in the metropolitan area surrounding it. Denver is an ideal city. It has all of the excitement that city life brings but is also a short and easy drive away from the beauty of the mountains. It is the Rocky Mountain State, forged on the blood and sweat of miners, and in some places unfortunately scarred by the angry battles between the American Indian tribes who called these lands home and the settlers who were trying to make it theirs.
Probably the most surprising thing I found as I dove headfirst into the supposed haunted areas of Colorado is how much their stories were rooted in history. Some places were actually able to trace their ghostly stories to real events that happened there. This feeling was mirrored by Bryan Bonner, co-founder of the Rocky Mountain Paranormal Research Society. Bonner and the rest of the RMPRS make it their mission to search for ghosts using science and logic and, for them, the first step is almost always research.
Research means being able to separate urban legends from what actually happened. Knowing the background of a location can help a researcher understand why any sort of paranormal activity might be happening there. Bonner used an old inn in Evergreen, Colorado, as an example. The ghost story was that the original owner’s son had died in the building as a child of a lung condition and has been running up and down the halls bouncing a ball as a spirit since then. After doing research at the Evergreen Library for a couple of years, they found an obituary from 1922 saying that the son died of pneumonia at the house.
“It doesn’t prove that it’s a ghost, but it’s a huge piece of a puzzle to at least say, well, some of these stories we’re hearing are true. The original owner’s son did die of a lung condition,” Bonner said. The inn, which is now privately owned and will not let RMPRS come in for any more investigations, provides a good example of the importance of visiting sites multiple times if possible. While not every location will allow someone to investigate as many times as they might like, the more you visit, the more information you can collect.
Before I ever knew about ghosthunting, I lived in Denver and interacted with many of these locations on a regular basis. Tivoli on the Auraria college campus was where I spent a large amount of time while working on Metropolitan State University of Denver’s student newspaper. Spending late nights in a dark brewery turned student union is enough to raise the hair on anyone’s neck. One of the strangest coincidences, however, was that I lived in an apartment directly across the street from the Croke-Patterson Mansion. For the first year I lived there, I was completely ignorant that the building across the street from me had a reputation for being one of the most haunted buildings in Denver. Despite not knowing, I definitely felt that the building had a presence, and I would often wonder what the inside of the massive red sandstone structure looked like. Once I began writing, I was quickly hooked on the mansion’s story, and it became hard to let it go.
Croke-Patterson Mansion is far from being the only haunted hotel in Colorado; in fact, as many know, it is not even considered to be the most haunted one. That honor goes to the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park. I doubt that I have to tell many paranormal enthusiasts, but the Stanley is the location that inspired Stephen King’s The Shining. That book, which was King’s third novel, is only one of his works that is located in Colorado. While King typically writes about his home state of Maine, he occasionally branches out to the Centennial State. The Stanley is one of the few locations I know of that fully embraces its haunted reputation, and even profits from it.
While all of the locations in this book are worth the visit, I have to say I have a personal favorite—yet another location I interacted with before knowing it was haunted. It is an unwritten rule that all true Coloradans must see a concert at Red Rocks Amphitheatre. But I try to get out there whenever I have the time, and not just for concerts. I never felt any malicious spirits, but the area certainly has magic of a different kind, and I never feel more at peace than when I am at Red Rocks surrounded by the mountains. The same can be said of many of the mountainous locations in this book, and the Rockies are simply beautiful to behold. Their giant presence in Colorado Springs inspired Katharine Lee Bates to write the poem “Pikes Peak,” more commonly known today as “America the Beautiful,” and the “purple mountain majesties” that she writes about stretch across the entire state.
As a local Coloradan, I had no idea just how surrounded by ghost stories I was and, despite having written a book on the subject, I still consider myself to be a novice ghosthunter. There are
