State file · MT
Haunted places in Montana
What are the most haunted places in Montana? The best-known are Old Montana Prison, Bannack and the Hotel Meade and Virginia City and Nevada City, Montana.
Montana’s ghost lore was mined out of the same ground as its gold. The rushes of the 1860s threw up Bannack, Virginia City and Nevada City almost overnight, along with road agents, vigilantes and hangings without trial – and when the gold ran out, many of those camps were simply left standing. Today they are some of the best-preserved mining towns in the West, and the stories told in their empty hotels and saloons are woven tightly into real, documented lives and deaths.
- 3 hauntings
- 12 recorded sightings
Haunted places in Montana
Old Montana Prison
Montana’s first prison held inmates from 1871 to 1979; its cellhouse, “Hole” and riot-scarred tower now host nightly ghost tours. Regional legend
Bannack and the Hotel Meade
Montana’s first territorial capital is a preserved ghost town where a girl in a blue dress, said to be drowned teen Dorothy Dunn, haunts the Hotel Meade. Regional legend
Virginia City and Nevada City, Montana
Gold-rush Virginia City and its neighbour Nevada City keep their 1860s saloons, hotels and vigilante graves – and a nightly summer ghost walk. Regional legendThe ghost lore of Montana
The state’s ghost tradition owes a great deal to Ellen Baumler, the Montana Historical Society historian whose books, including Spirit Tailings and Dark Spaces, collected tales from Butte, Helena and Virginia City and tied each one to the archival record. Her work set the tone that most Montana ghost tours still follow: history first, the haunting second.
Ghost hunters head first for the Old Montana Prison in Deer Lodge, where seasonal night tours walk the cellhouse and the tower where the 1959 riot ended, and for Bannack’s Hotel Meade and its girl in the blue dress. Beyond those, Butte’s red-light district and copper-baron mansions, Billings’ Moss Mansion and a string of old railroad and hot-springs hotels all have resident spirits of their own.
Ghost-hunting hotspots
- Uptown Butte
The copper city’s brick blocks, mine headframes and the former Dumas Brothel, where staff tell of a long-dead madam, give Butte more ghost stories than any other Montana town.
- Helena
The capital’s Last Chance Gulch, mansions and old institutions supply many of the tales in Ellen Baumler’s Spirit Tailings.
- Moss Mansion, Billings
The 1903 home of the Moss family is now a museum whose staff and visitors talk of playful spirits, including a little girl.
- Sacajawea Hotel, Three Forks
A 1910 railroad hotel where a maid is said to pass through a third-floor wall where a linen closet once stood.
- Boulder Hot Springs
The historic spa inn near Boulder has a well-known story of a young woman named Simone said to linger in its upper rooms.
Timeline
- May 26, 1863Gold found in Alder Gulch Virginia City and Nevada City, Montana
Bill Fairweather and Henry Edgar’s strike set off one of the richest placer rushes in the West and created Virginia City and Nevada City almost overnight.
- January 1864Vigilante hangings in Virginia City Virginia City and Nevada City, Montana
Vigilantes hanged five accused road agents, among them Boone Helm and “Clubfoot” George Lane, without trial. They were buried on Boot Hill, now one of the town’s most visited spots.
- January 10, 1864Sheriff Henry Plummer hanged Bannack and the Hotel Meade
Vigilantes hanged Plummer and two of his deputies without trial at Bannack. The killings feed the town’s darker legends and remain a subject of historical debate.
- April 19, 1875The capital moves to Helena Virginia City and Nevada City, Montana
Losing the territorial capital sealed Virginia City’s decline, leaving the 1860s and ’70s buildings that later restorers saved.
- 1908Escape attempt and the prison’s only hangings Old Montana Prison
Inmates George Rock and William Hayes attacked staff during an escape bid, killing Deputy Warden John Robinson and wounding Warden Frank Conley. Both men were later hanged at the prison, its only executions.
- August 1916Dorothy Dunn drowns Bannack and the Hotel Meade
Sixteen-year-old Dorothy drowned in a dredge pond while wading with two other girls, who were rescued. The spot became known locally as “Dorothy’s Hole.”
- August 15, 1954Bannack becomes a state park Bannack and the Hotel Meade
Montana took over the abandoned town as a state park, opening the Hotel Meade to the visitors whose accounts built up the modern ghost story.
- April 16–18, 1959The 1959 riot Old Montana Prison
Jerry Myles and Lee Smart led a takeover that killed Deputy Warden Ted Rothe and held the warden hostage. The National Guard retook the prison on April 18, and both ringleaders died in the northwest tower.
- July 4, 1961National Historic Landmark Bannack and the Hotel Meade
Bannack was designated a National Historic Landmark as one of the best-preserved mining camps of the American West.
- 1967Death of “Turkey Pete” Old Montana Prison
Paul Eitner, imprisoned since 1918 and known for tending the prison flock, died at 89. His funeral was held inside the walls and his Cell 1 was retired; later ghost stories often name him.
- September 5, 1979Last inmates leave Old Montana Prison
The remaining prisoners were moved to the new Montana State Prison west of town. The old campus reopened as a museum the following year, and its ghost tours followed.
- October 2025Ghost-walk guide’s accounts published Virginia City and Nevada City, Montana
The Madisonian profiled guide Lois Stephens and the staff stories from the Bale of Hay and the Wells Fargo Steakhouse, including two new employees who described a lady in blue.
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