Six Washington places with a haunted reputation and a public door

Oxford Saloon, Snohomish

The Oxford is a downtown bar and restaurant, open for lunch, and the homepage cannot decide when the building became that. One line says "Established 1910." The same page spells the town "Shohomish" in a heading. A Herald story published October 11, 2022, "3 (possibly?) haunted Snohomish County sites," says the building was constructed in 1900 as Blackman's Dry Goods, and that a decade later it was converted into a bar with boarding rooms upstairs. The saloon's own haunted-history page reprints a paragraph it credits to HistoryLink. In that paragraph, J. S. White designed and built Arthur M. Blackman's store, at a cost of $5,000 "according to newspaper accounts." The same paragraph says the building was the Oxford Pool Room during Prohibition, and that it was not a drinking establishment until World War II. A July 1, 2024 post on the same site says the Blackman family built it in 1890 as a general store. A Weird US account reprinted above that post says 1900 and a saloon after a decade. I searched HistoryLink for the Oxford and did not find the essay the saloon credits, so that paragraph is used here as text on the saloon's page, not as a HistoryLink file I opened. The dates are not a small typo. They are three different origin stories.

The ghost is labeled as rumor on the news side and as something firmer on the saloon's reprint. The Herald calls the Oxford the most notorious haunt on its list, then says "supposedly" many untimely deaths occurred there. It calls the story of an off-duty police officer named Henry, fatally stabbed at the saloon, an urban legend, and says rumor puts his spirit in the basement. The Weird US text the saloon hosts calls that killing "well-documented," puts Henry on the basement stairs and in the ladies' restroom, and says women report being pinched. The 2024 post on the same site says a moonlighting officer "met his end on the cellar stairs," and then calls those stories "whether fact or folklore." This article will not upgrade a rumor the Herald flagged. The saloon page also reprints Weird US names the Herald does not use: a businesswoman called Kathleen or Katherine, said to have rented the upstairs rooms, and Amelia, said to have been found dead in a closet in Room 6, with the account itself unsure whether that was suicide or murder. The same reprint says the Washington State Ghost Society investigated beginning in 2005, and it describes voices the investigators said they heard on a tape playback, including "I am the one" and "You'll die." That is the reprinted account. It is not a finding that those voices were there.

Visit: The homepage posts 913 First St., Snohomish, WA, and does not print a ZIP code. (360) 243-3060. oxfordsaloonsnohomish.com. Posted hours: Monday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., Tuesday and Wednesday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Thursday 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday 11 a.m. to midnight, Sunday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. The Cellar is Friday and Saturday, 7 p.m. to midnight, and another line says 7 p.m. to close. Happy hour is Monday through Friday, 3 to 6 p.m. The music lines on that homepage do not match. One says live music every night. Another says live music every night except Monday and Wednesday. A third says live music every night of the week. Call if the band, not the burger, is why you are going.

Manresa Castle, Port Townsend

Manresa is a hilltop hotel with a lounge, and the building history on its about page is plainer than the ghost lore. The castle was completed in 1892 as the home of Charles and Kate Eisenbeis. The page says he was Port Townsend's first mayor, elected in 1878, and that the house had 30 rooms, 12-inch brick walls from his own brick works, and a slate roof. Locals called it the Eisenbeis Castle. Charles died in 1902. The page says the castle then sat empty for almost 20 years except for a caretaker. In 1925 a Seattle attorney bought it as a vacation place for nuns who taught in Seattle schools. The page says that plan did not work out. In 1927 the Jesuits bought it as a training college, named it Manresa Hall, and in 1928 added a wing with a chapel, sleeping rooms, and an Otis elevator they priced at $3,400. They stuccoed the original brick. They left in 1968, and the building was converted into a hotel. The about page says three owners since 1968 have renovated it, and that the Jesuits left three bathrooms where the hotel now has 43. A Port Townsend Leader story by Luciano Marano, November 6, 2020, says four different owners. The hotel's count and the newspaper's count are not the same number.

The about page I opened does not mention a ghost. Marano wrote that the hotel website did not either, and that a paragraph in the Guest Services Directory did, "in a somewhat bemused tone." He quotes that directory: "Although not substantiated with any paperwork, it is said that a young woman jumped to her death from Room 306 after learning that her fiancé had died at sea." And: "It is also claimed that a monk hanged himself in the peak of the turret above Room 302." He adds that some people say a bartender invented the tales to draw customers. Rob Owen, in The Seattle Times on August 31, 2015, was writing about a Ghost Adventures episode filmed at the castle. He reports what the show said it found, a door, a chair, footsteps, and he also writes that several online histories suggest a bartender invented legends, and that the Olympic Peninsula Paranormal Society's website could not find historical evidence for a priest's suicide or for a woman who killed herself when a lover did not return. Hold the Room 302 monk and the Room 306 woman at the level the hotel's own directory used, as quoted by the Leader: said, claimed, not substantiated with paperwork. Marano stayed the night of October 30, 2020, ate in the lounge, and wrote that he did not see a ghost. He did write that a front-desk clerk, who said she is not a believer, described doors locking and unlocking when nobody was nearby. That is her account, through him.

Visit: 651 Cleveland St., Port Townsend, WA 98368. (360) 385-5750. The contact page also prints (800) 732-1281. manresacastle.com. The lounge page posts open daily, noon to 10 p.m., closed Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day. That is the public room. The about page does not post a separate tour.

North Head Lighthouse, Cape Disappointment

This is the one where the state park will sell you a view and a climb, and will not sell you the ghost. Washington State Parks puts North Head on the northwestern spur of Cape Disappointment, still an active aid to navigation. The park calls itself 2,023 acres on the Long Beach Peninsula, at the mouth of the Columbia. The lighthouse page says you can stroll the grounds or climb. It also says the tours are volunteer-run, and to call ahead.

The ghost is a newspaper story, and the two papers do not tell Mary's death the same way. Elleda Wilson's "In One Ear" column in The Astorian, published September 17, 2026, and labeled an isolated rerun of a June 2, 2017 column, says the North Head light first shone on May 16, 1898, because a bluff hid Cape Disappointment's light from mariners coming from the north. She writes that the first keeper was Alexander K. Pesonen, and that his wife, Mary, was diagnosed with "melancholia" after years of isolation, wind, and the work of the station. One morning, six months before his retirement, Mary told him to sleep in and walked with the dog, Jerry. Wilson writes that only the dog came back, that searchers found her coat at the cliff's edge and an indentation in the grass, and that the body was retrieved from the base of the cliff. She is buried in Ilwaco. The last line of that column is "Some say she still haunts the lighthouse." Patrick Webb, in the Chinook Observer on October 23, 2018, was writing about a Ghost Adventures episode filmed on the peninsula. He states that Mary Pesonen jumped to her death from the lighthouse in 1923, quotes the old newspaper phrase "rash act," and ties it to isolation and "the incessant howling of the winds." He also writes that over the years the Chinook Observer has reported visitors feeling a ghostly presence, and volunteers reporting electrical surges and objects that appear to move. Actress Jenna Austin, hired to play Mary, told him she "possibly had a ghost experience" on an earlier stay and did not know it at the time. The park pages checked for this article do not mention Mary, a jump, or a ghost. Wilson's column does not use the word jumped. Webb's does. Both are reports. Neither is a ruling on how she died, and neither is proof of a haunting.

Visit: The lighthouse page posts N Head Lighthouse Road, North Head, WA 98624. (360) 642-3029. North Head Lighthouse. The park page posts 244 Robert Gray Drive, Ilwaco, WA 98624. (360) 642-3078. Cape Disappointment State Park. Those are two phones and two addresses, and both are official. The lighthouse header says summer hours are 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., and winter hours are closed October 1 through April 30. A lower section names the open season as May 1 through September 30, daily, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. The climb fee is $3 for ages 18 and older. Ages 7 to 17 are free. Children under 7 are not permitted to climb. No flip-flops, and no shoes without a heel strap. The park itself posts 6:30 a.m. to dusk year-round. Parking uses a Discover Pass, listed at $10 for one day or $45 for a year, separate from the climb fee. RV parking is not accommodated at the North Head lot. In October 2026 the tower is inside that posted winter closure, so the climb is not the door this month. The park page also posted a construction notice, dated September 17, 2026, and running through October 31, 2026: the boat launch closed October 1 through 31 for paving, and the campground entrance down to one lane October 1 through 17. That notice does not say the lighthouse road is closed. The Cape D Store is posted as closed in 2026 and into 2027 for a new contact station. The lighthouse page says you can stay in a campground, a yurt, or one of the North Head keepers' residences. It does not print the reservation number on the page reviewed here.

Tokeland Hotel, Tokeland

The Tokeland Hotel is a bayfront restaurant with rooms upstairs, and it is the rare place on this list whose own FAQ brings up the ghost. The homepage calls it "Washington's oldest hotel" and prints "EST. 1885." The FAQ asks what it is like to stay in the oldest hotel in the state, and answers that the building was a private residence more than 140 years ago, then a boarding house. It says the second floor has four shared bathrooms, two with standing showers and two with claw-foot tubs. The homepage says seventeen guest rooms up there, plus two cabins up the road. Check-in is 4 p.m. Checkout is 11 a.m. Bookings, unless noted otherwise, require two nights. If you need to arrive after 9 p.m., the FAQ says to call.

Then the FAQ asks the question directly. "Is the Tokeland Hotel haunted?" The answer: "Well, that's for you to decide but whatever kind of ghosts we have here are most definitely the playful and friendly type!" No name, no room number, no death story. This article will not supply one. The hotel is telling you the reputation is theirs to joke about, and that the decision is yours. A joke on an FAQ is not a documented haunting.

Visit: The homepage and the footer post 2964 Kindred Avenue, Tokeland, WA 98590. (360) 267-7006. tokelandhotel.com. Two event writeups on the events page, for dinners on April 19 and May 17, 2026, print 2694 Kindred Avenue instead. Use 2964 unless the front desk says the event cards were right. The events page posts breakfast and lunch 8 a.m. to 2 p.m., the kitchen closed 2 to 4 p.m., and supper 4 to 8 p.m. The FAQ says you can walk the downstairs during those business hours. Upstairs is for guests, though the front desk will show a room if you want to see one before you book. The closures are the part to read twice. From September 8, 2026, through November 23, 2026, and again from January 5, 2027, through June 17, 2027, the events page says the place is closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays. It also says the restaurant and hotel are closed November 23 through December 25, and reopen December 26 at 4 p.m. A calendar card titled Saturday, December 26, 2026, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., repeats the "we're closing" sentence and the 4 p.m. dinner. Read the prose line, not that card, and call. The FAQ still says the hotel is open nearly year-round and that room reservations are taken seven days a week. That sentence does not survive the Tuesday, Wednesday, and late-November closures printed on the events page.

Olympic Club, Centralia

The Olympic Club is a McMenamins hotel, pub, theater, and pool hall, and you can eat there without buying the October tour. The company's history page cannot pick one construction date. It says the hotel "has been a point of power, intrigue and contention since opening in 1908," that it is "virtually unchanged" since an opulent remodel in 1913, and that it was "built in 1913" and "long known as the Oxford Hotel." A later block says it "opened over the course of several years beginning in 1905." The same page puts a 1908 saloon, pool room, and cafe next door to the hotel, and then uses one street address for the whole property. Guest-room counts are easier to reconcile than the years. One line says 27 guest rooms. Another says 26 renovated rooms upstairs and a 27th on the ground floor. Check-in is 3 p.m. Checkout is 11 a.m. There is no elevator to the upstairs rooms. The page names Roy Gardner, captured at the hotel in 1921, proprietor Gertrude Howell, and original proprietor Jack Sciutto. Those are the company's historical claims. They are not the ghost.

The ghost language is on the tour listing, and it is thin on purpose. The October 15, 2026 event page says "some infamous events have occurred in these storied halls" and "we were bound to pick up a few ghosts." It invites you to hear the history, "including some tales of our more permanent residents." It does not name a resident. Hear that as the tour's pitch, the way the Edgefield copy in Oregon sells "more permanent residents" without a name. The property history page, checked in October 2026, listed those tours on Thursdays October 8, 15, 22, and 29, at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. The October 15 page prices them at $20, ages 3 and up, with a warning that some of it may be too much for younger kids, and it notes stairs and standing. A Thursday night in October is the ghost product. Breakfast is the place.

Visit: 112 N Tower Ave., Centralia, WA 98531. (360) 736-5164. mcmenamins.com/olympic-club. The pub page posts two clocks. A header says every day, 7 a.m. to 1 a.m., minors welcome until 7 p.m. A later block says Sunday through Thursday 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday 7 a.m. to midnight, breakfast 7 to 11 a.m. Happy hour is listed at 3 to 6 p.m. and 10 to 11 p.m. The game-hall hours on the history page match the 11 p.m. and midnight close, and say all ages until 7 p.m., 21 and over after. Both the 1 a.m. line and the 11 p.m. line cannot be the close. Call before you plan on the later one.

The Historic Davenport Hotel, Spokane

The Davenport is a working downtown hotel, and the public hook on its own site is a history walk, not a ghost tour. The amenities page says to ask at the front desk for a self-guided historic walking tour, and for a children's History Detective game. It lists the Palm Court Grill, the Peacock Room Lounge, Sunday brunch, and an espresso bar as services you can pay for. It does not print restaurant hours. It does not mention a ghost. The contact page puts the historic hotel at 10 South Post Street, separate from the Davenport Tower, the Grand, the Louie, and the Centennial, which are other buildings in the same collection.

The haunt stories are two newspaper pieces, and they do not match each other in every detail. Paul Seebeck's "Haunted Hotel" in the Inlander carries a January 4, 2005 byline and, at the bottom, "Publication date: 1/06/04." Both dates are on the page. Seebeck quotes spokesman Tom McArthur: "As an official spokesperson of the hotel, I can never say, 'We have ghosts or don't have ghosts.' But based on what enough people have told me, we might." McArthur describes a woman in a vintage 1920s dress walking the mezzanine, and says the hotel found a 1920s Spokesman-Review article about a woman who walked out onto the lobby skylight and fell to her death. I did not open that 1920s clipping. It is in this article as McArthur's account to the Inlander. The same piece quotes bellman Michael Peterson on a bell cart that felt pushed, on the way to room 1015; maintenance worker Harvey Hudson on a latched terrace door that opened on a calm night; flower-shop supervisor Kara Trail on a shuffling sound in an empty ballroom, which a coworker told her was "just people dancing"; and concierge Sharon Hunter, who came to think a presence "might've have been Mr. Davenport." The Inlander says Louis Davenport died in the hotel in 1951, that his wife Verus died in the same suite in 1967, and that the suite is 1105. It passes on guest stories about noisemakers moved to the floor in that suite, and a formally dressed man with a towel over his arm near the old barber shop in the basement. McArthur offers that figure as a butler from the years when servants roomed downstairs. That is his reading.

Peter Wagner's "Legend keepers," in The Spokesman-Review on September 16, 2007, is the later piece, and it is more skeptical in the room. He marks five years since the grand reopening after a $30 million restoration by Walt and Karen Worthy. He quotes caretaker Evelyn Conant, who lived in the closed hotel, on the legend of a woman who fell through the skylight and whose last words, "according to the tale," were "Where did I go?" Housekeepers, he writes, claim a lady in a black dress saying that line. Conant said, "I've seen shadows, and I felt the presence of something." Doorman John Reed, who told Wagner he had met Louis Davenport in life, said, "I never experienced something like that. At night, sound travels from everywhere." The Inlander has a 1920s dress and a fall McArthur ties to a clipping. The Spokesman-Review has a black dress and a last line that Wagner marks as a tale. Conant felt a presence. Reed did not. McArthur, in the earlier piece, would not say the hotel has ghosts.

Visit: 10 S Post St., Spokane, WA 99201. (509) 455-8888. The amenities page also prints (800) 899-1482. davenporthotelcollection.com, the historic hotel. The self-guided tour is the door the site actually describes. It does not say whether someone who is not staying the night can take the pamphlet. Ask. Restaurant hours were not on the amenities page when this was checked, so this article will not invent a seating. The 2007 Spokesman-Review story gave the same local phone for guided tours. Treat any current ghost event as something you confirm on that phone. The lobby walk is the public offer printed now.

How to use this

Start with the door that matches the trip you are actually taking. Snohomish will serve you on a posted weekly clock, and the Herald still calls Henry an urban legend while the saloon's own pages argue with each other. Port Townsend will pour a drink in a lounge that posts noon to 10, in a hotel whose about page skips the ghost and whose guest directory, as quoted in 2020, says the two famous deaths were not backed by paperwork. Ilwaco will let you onto a state park at 6:30 a.m. all year, and it will not let you up the North Head tower from October 1 through April 30. The Astorian says some people say Mary haunts it. The park does not. Tokeland will feed you between 8 and 2 and again between 4 and 8, except the Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and the late-November shutdown its events page posts, and its FAQ leaves the ghost question to you. Centralia will sell you breakfast most mornings and a $20 ghost tour on the October Thursdays it has listed, without naming a spirit. Spokane will hand you a history pamphlet at the Davenport's front desk, in a hotel whose spokesman told the Inlander he cannot say whether the ghosts are there.

If a guide adds a ghost this research did not find on the venue's site or in the news pieces cited below, enjoy it as a story and leave it there.

These six doors are not in one town. A 20L hiking daypack and a Washington road atlas are the practical extras if you are driving between them.