Tour de fright

Spirited guides scare up visions of Colorado's creepy side

Erika Gonzalez, Rocky Mountain News

Friday, October 27, 2006

If you like that fake horror stuff, pay a visit to one of the many haunted houses scattered across the metro area. But if you crave a more authentic experience, consider taking a tour of places that don't have to hire teenagers with fake blood on their faces to scare you. And Colorado has plenty of spooky properties from which to choose.

Stephen King penned The Shining after a lonely and creepy stay at the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park. The 1980 horror flick The Changeling may have been set in Oregon, but the story was based on events that occurred in a Capitol Hill mansion.

Of course, not every place that claims to have a story lives up to the folklore. We tackled a few tours to find out which ones delivered in the thrill department. Our findings:

Ghost tours at the Brown Palace Hotel

• Stops include: Ship's Landing (the lobby area outside the Ship Tavern, where a shooting once took place); the glass bridge connecting the hotel to the Comfort Inn, from which guests can view The Navarre Building (once a brothel, which some say was linked to the Brown through underground tunnels); the second-floor balcony overlooking the lobby; a room full of suspicious events; and a suite on the eighth floor, which once served as permanent housing for some of Denver's wealthiest families.

• Duration: 45 minutes

• The rundown: Don't expect a peek at the boilers in the basement or other off-limits areas in this free tour. Hotel historian Julia Kanellos sticks to mostly well-traveled paths, but points out interesting architectural details along the way, offers reports of unusual sightings (many people have reported seeing a man dressed as a conductor disappear into the spa, which once housed a railroad ticket office) and shares offbeat trivia (the hotel's furnaces are so large, they once offered cremation services).

• Guide style: Move over Katie Couric: Kanellos may be the new queen of perk. Knowledgeable and accessible, Kanellos is a hotel veteran who tries hard to engage tour-takers. Her ghost stories also stem from personal experience, which improves her credibility as a ghost guide.

• Scariest site: Though it underwent a $6.5 million renovation in 2000, the rooms on the eighth and ninth floors were once home to Denver's most prominent residents, including Mrs. Crawford Hill. Once a glamorous society maven, Hill lived the last years of her life lonely and heartbroken. When Kanellos began telling her story six years ago, the hotel switchboard starting receiving calls from Hill's old suite. When the operators answered, they heard static on the other end. At that time, Hill's room was under renovation, empty of furniture, lights, wires and telephones. When Kanellos dropped Hill's story from the lineup, the calls stopped.

• Most gruesome tale: The Brown is short on the blood-and-guts department. "There were two shootings in the hotel, but they didn't result in death inside our walls," says Kanellos.

• Rating: Three ghosts

Banjo Billy's bus tour: ghosts, crime and history

• Stops include: Hotel Boulderado, the site of three suicides; The Arnett-Fullen House, the haunted former home of Historic Boulder; Mount Saint Gertrude Academy, supposedly haunted by the ghost of Sister Mary Theodore O'Connor; The Boulder Theater; Pi Beta Phi Sorority house; The University of Colorado's Macky Auditorium and the Boulder History Museum, which reported strange occurrences after inheriting memorabilia belonging to an obsessive Boy Scout, who was forced out of the organization at the age of 46.

• Duration: 90 minutes

• The rundown: Warmer and easier on your feet than a walking tour, Banjo Billy's offers a view of Boulder's spookiest spots from the comforts of a kooky wood-covered school bus featuring a couch, five La-Z-Boy recliners and five saddles. Banjo Billy (aka John Georgis) draws his stories primarily from the books, Haunted Boulder: Ghostly Tales from the Foot of the Flatirons and Haunted Boulder 2: Ghostly Tales from Boulder and Beyond, but also provides plenty of fun history about the city. (Did you know that Boulder has had more than 80 couch fires and a dozen riots since 1997?)

• Guide style: Like the town he guides visitors around, Banjo Billy takes an easygoing, lighthearted approach to his job. He knows the right details, but also adds a dash of humor ("On the right-hand side of the street, you'll see Tom's Tavern," he says. "Before it was Tom's, it was the morgue. So, they've been serving dead slabs of meat for over 50 years.") Though he'll cater his tour to the audience (offering a racier version for college students), he says he'll never include JonBenet Ramsey's story. And yes, he does play banjo music on the bus.

• Scariest site: It isn't difficult to imagine ghosts occupying the foreboding red brick Castle House. Located in Boulder's University Hill neighborhood, the house has been the subject of ghost stories for decades. Former resident, artist Ruth Savig, says her daughter once awoke in the middle of the night to report a large man shaking her heavy bed. When she checked on her daughter's story, she found the nearly-impossible-to-move bed a foot away from the wall. She later discovered that a large man had died in the room. On another occasion, while sketching alone in the house, she heard a woman telling her to "get out." Not easily intimidated, Savig explained that it was now her house and she had no plans to leave. When she looked down at her sketch, she found that she had drawn the portrait of a previous owner.

• Most gruesome tale: It doesn't get much more horrifying than the murder of Elaura Jaquette. In 1966, a janitor killed the zoology major in the west tower at Macky Auditorium, smearing her blood against the walls of a small rehearsal room for the music school. Legend has it that the young woman's screams sometimes fill the building at night.

• Rating: Three and a half ghosts

Ghost walk with Phil Goodstein

• Stops include: The state Capitol, (an elderly prospector allegedly haunts the dome, hoping one of the gold flakes will fall down); The Warwick Hotel (whose penthouse is allegedly haunted by the ghost of a Playboy bunny); The Hotel Newhouse; the University Club, (where a Denver banker died after playing a game of squash); The William Garrett Fisher mansion; The Molly Brown House (which supposedly still smells of the cheap cigars Brown's husband used to smoke); and The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, which has been struck by lightning twice.

• Duration: Two hours

• Rundown: Wear your good walking shoes because Goodstein covers a lot of ground and moves relatively quickly, dishing on downtown and Capitol Hill landmarks, skyscrapers, hotels, ancient apartment buildings and private residences on his in-depth outing. If you miss anything, most of his stories can be found in his 472-page tome, The Ghosts of Denver: Capitol Hill, which he sells on the tour.

• Guide style: Armed with a doctorate in Modern European History, Goodstein takes an almost academic approach to his subject. His stories are long and painstakingly detailed and delivered with a bit of dramatic flair. If you're looking for quick and dirty, search elsewhere.

• Scariest site: The Croke-Patterson Mansion has to be one of Denver's spookiest dwellings. Whether used as a private residence, apartments or as office space, the structure has been plagued by mysterious incidents. Former Rocky Mountain News owner Thomas Patterson died in the house, and Goodstein is fond of saying that when the newspaper fails to expose a scandal, Patterson's spirit acts up, causing typewriters and office equipment to shut off and on spontaneously. When one owner renovated the property, he had difficulty finding a night watchman to stand guard, so he got a Doberman to protect the house. The following day, said Goodstein, he found the dog dead on the lawn. Two other dogs supposedly jumped to their deaths out of a third-story window. A psychic conducting a séance in the house for a local television station claimed there was the ghost of a little girl living in the basement. One of the current owners reported waking up one night and seeing a petite woman dressed in old-fashioned clothes, who introduced herself as Maggie. One of the children who lived in the house in the past was named Margaret.

• Scariest tale: The scorned mistress of a politician cut her wrists and slowly bled to death in one of the units in the Acacia Apartments. Residents of the unit still claim to hear water gurgling in the tub late at night and keys spinning in the locks.

• Rating: Three ghosts

Specter-filled sightseeing

BANJO BILLY GHOST TOURS

• When and where: 6 and 8 p.m. today and Saturday; meets at The Hotel Boulderado

• Cost: $16

• Information: 720-771-0087 or www.banjobilly.com

GHOST TOURS AT THE BROWN PALACE HOTEL

• When and where: 1 p.m. today, Saturday and Tuesday. Brown Palace Hotel, 321 17th St.

• Cost: free

• Information: 303-297-3111 or www.brownpalace.com

HAUNTED HALLOWEEN

• When and where: 9 to 11 p.m. Saturday, Castle Marne, 1572 Race St.

• Cost: $29

• Information: 303-399-0093

A HAUNTED EVENING AT THE OXFORD

• When and where: 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday and Tuesday, The Oxford Hotel, 1600 17th St.

• Cost: $25

• Information: 720-234-7929

HISTORIC BOULDER'S GHOST WALK GHOST TALK

• When and where: 6 to 9 p.m. today and Saturday; tour starts at Whittier Elementary School, 2008 Pine St., Boulder.

• Cost: $15 for adults ($12 for Historic Boulder members)

• Information: 303-444-5192

TOMBSTONE TOUR OF MOUNT OLIVET CEMETERY

• When and where: 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday, Mount Olivet Cemetery, 12801 W. 44th Ave.

• Cost: $25 for members of the Colorado Historical Society; $30 for nonmembers.

• Information: 303-866-4686

STANLEY HOTEL GHOST AND HISTORY TOURS

• When and where: 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. Saturday; 11 a.m. Monday; 11 a.m. Tuesday, Stanley Hotel, 333 E. Wonder View Avenue, Estes Park.

• Cost: $10

• Information: 1-970-577-4110

Where the ghosts are

Denver's ghost expert Phil Goodstein offers insight into haunted habitats.

• Most haunted part of the city: Capitol Hill, followed by downtown and northwest Denver. "Can you really say that one of these suburban tracts has anything to recommend it to a ghost?"

• Most legitimate ghost story: Croke-Patterson Mansion. "Some of the Cheesman Park stories have some credence to them. I've felt icy-cold pockets in there."

• Scariest place to spend the night: The basement of the Capitol, the Peabody Mansion and the Croke-Patterson are the three most notorious haunted places around.