of the ghosts who frequent the Music Hall and the Matron’s House.
CHAPTER 16 Van Cortlandt House
Trapped in an endless cycle, the ghost of a Hessian soldier repeats his death at Van Cortlandt House. Ghostly sounds of jingling keys are heard, along with disembodied footsteps.
MUSEUMS
CHAPTER 17 Alice Austen House
This historic home, known as Clear Comfort, overlooks the river. It’s a beautiful spot to enjoy a picnic—but be mindful of the ghosts of Alice Austen and her great-grandmother.
CHAPTER 18 Garibaldi-Meucci Museum
Garibaldi converted this home into a postmortem shrine to his friend Antonio Meucci, whom many say was the true inventor of the telephone. Today, Meucci is still trying to make one last long-distance call from beyond the grave.
CHAPTER 19 Merchant’s House Museum
Gertrude Tredwell lived and died in her father’s house, and apparently she still hasn’t left. Her father, Seabury, makes his presence known as well.
CHAPTER 20 Morris-Jumel Mansion
Years after her death, Eliza Jumel admonished noisy children visiting Morris-Jumel Mansion.
PARKS
CHAPTER 21 Fort Wadsworth
No battle ever took place at Fort Wadsworth, but suicides and accidental deaths add up to one haunted fort on Staten Island.
CHAPTER 22 Washington Square Park
What was once a Potter’s field or paupers’ cemetery is today a scenic park at the heart of the New York University campus.
CEMETERIES
CHAPTER 23 Woodlawn Cemetery
This sprawling cemetery in the Bronx has the graves of famous people such as Herman Melville and Henry LaGuardia. Beyond the history of gravestone reading, there is the accent on the paranormal with the capturing of EVP at this cemetery.
Off the Coast of City Island in the Bronx is the largest Potter’s field for the City of New York. The 800,000 bodies buried on this lonely one-mile island do not rest peacefully.
Spotlight: How to Investigate a Cemetery
A practical model for setting up and conducting your own cemetery hunt.
THEATERS
CHAPTER 24 Belasco Theater
The ghost of David Belasco, “The Bishop of Broadway,” activates elevators and manifests solidly enough to congratulate performers.
Spotlight: Theater Myths and Traditions
Superstitions and traditions abound in the theater. Learn the basics before investigating a haunted venue.
CHAPTER 25 Cherry Lane Theater
The ghosts of poet and playwright Edna St. Vincent Millay and actress Kim Hunter keep current actors on their toes.
CHAPTER 26 New Amsterdam Theater
The beautiful actress Olive Thomas Pickford appears regularly at the New Amsterdam Theater. That’s impressive, considering she died in 1920.
CHAPTER 27 Palace Theater
The ghosts of children and performing pooches appear to Palace Theater crew and patrons.
Times Square, at the heart of the theater district, is home to one of the best examples of a crisis apparition.
CHAPTER 28 Paradise Theater
The ghost of a suicide victim haunts this gorgeous theater in the Bronx.
CHAPTER 29 Public Theater
The Public Theater has a full cast of spectral actors and actresses, not to mention the ghost of author Washington Irving.
Spotlight: Radio City Music Hall
Famous for its Christmas show and the Rockettes, Radio City Music Hall has a ghost lurking in its art-deco halls and lobbies.
HOTELS AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS
CHAPTER 30 Chelsea and Algonquin Hotels
From the punk-rocking ghost of Sid Vicious at the Chelsea to the “Vicious Circle” at the Algonquin, these hotels are proof positive that some guests check in but don’t check out.
CHAPTER 31 The Dakota
This luxury apartment building on the Upper West Side is home to many of the rich and famous, both alive and dead.
CHAPTER 32 Fordham University
Several buildings on the Rose Hill campus in the Bronx have more than just students and professors inside. Ghostly sounds and sights are part of the curriculum.
Spotlight: Various New York City ghosts
Some ghosts have a need to possess; others just want to be heard. You may encounter both types around New York City.
Visiting Haunted Sites
Bibliography
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Welcome to America’s Haunted Road Trip
DO YOU BELIEVE IN GHOSTS?
If you are like 52 percent of Americans (according to a recent Harris Poll), you do believe that ghosts walk among us. Perhaps you have heard your name called in a dark and empty house. It could be that you have awoken to the sound of footsteps outside your bedroom door, only to find no one there. It is possible that you saw your grandmother sitting in her favorite rocker chair, the same grandmother who had passed away several years earlier. Maybe you took a photo of a crumbling, deserted farmhouse and later discovered strange mists and orbs in the photo, anomalies that were not visible to your naked eye.
If you have experienced similar paranormal events, then you know that ghosts exist. Even if you have not yet experienced these things, you are curious about the paranormal world, the spirit realm—if you weren’t, you would not now be reading this Preface to the latest book in the America’s Haunted Road Trip series from Clerisy Press.
Over the last several years, I have investigated haunted locations across
