Home to Starbucks, the Seahawks, the Space Needle, scrumptious seafood…Seattle has it all; including some pretty sinister tales. Various buildings in Seattle have chilling histories and are known to be haunted by long-dead spirits. Continue reading to learn more about the city’s haunted past and where to go for a fright!
Warning! Some of the information in this article is graphic (describing murder, cremation, etc.). Read at your own discretion.
Kell’s Irish Pub – 1916 Post Alley, Seattle, WA 98101
Located in the old Butterworth building at Pike Place Market, Kell’s has a decidedly creepy history. It was originally home to Butterworth and Sons Mortuary: the first established mortuary in the United States. Clients’ bodies were brought in through what is now the restaurant’s front door, and legend says that some of their spirits still inhabit the building due to the mortuary’s unsavory practice of selling bodies for profit and burying empty coffins. Among these spirits are a little girl with long red hair who tries to play with customers’ children during the day and Charlie, a stylish older gentleman in a derby hat who appears in the bar’s Guinness mirror.
Martha Washington School for Girls – 6612 57th Ave S, Seattle, WA 98118
The Martha Washington School for (Insane) Girls was founded in 1900 by Major Cicero Newell and his wife, Emma, as a reform school for troubled female youth. It was originally located in Queen Anne, then moved in 1920 to the area that is now Martha Washington Beach on Lake Washington. There were various murders during the school’s history, including one of the janitors going on a killing spree of several students and staff members, later hanging the bodies from a madrona tree in the schoolyard.
In 1971 the school was shut down to be converted to the park it is today. In 1972, a group of Satanists began using the boarded-up building for various ceremonies, including animal sacrifices. Horrified Seattleites petitioned the city council, who eventually tore the building down. The school’s circular brick driveway remains standing today, as well as a stairway built up to the fated madrona tree. There have been reports of disembodied female sobbing and sightings of a transparent young girl in a nightgown by visitors to the park.
Georgetown Morgue – 5000 E Marginal Way S, Seattle, WA 98134
Now known as one of the best haunted houses in Seattle, the Georgetown Morgue also has quite a bit of haunted history. It was originally built as a mortuary, then transitioned to a funeral home (complete with crematoriums!), and finally to a real morgue. A few horrible events took place at the Georgetown Morgue: in 1947 the body of jazz trumpeter John “Figgy” Dorsey was stolen from the embalming table and later found dismembered on his widow’s front yard in Ballard; and in 1968 two armed individuals broke into the morgue during a staff meeting, bound the nine staff members present, and forced them one by one into the crematorium chambers. There were no surviving witnesses, and no suspects identified. No one has ever put together the motives of the perpetrators in committing such a grisly crime. Since there were no living employees left, the morgue was sold to the City of Seattle and later turned into the (truly) haunted house it is today.
