For the last couple of years now my boyfriend and I have foregone giving each other gifts for our birthdays and instead we plan different experiences for each other, a cooking class, a camping trip etc. Well this year my boyfriend outdid himself and surprised me with a trip to Jerome, the largest ghost town in the country!
We began our trip with a drive north and ended our drive to Jerome with a 12 mile stretch of road that had 158 turns, boy was I glad we did this trip at night because I am terrified of heights!
We arrived at the the infamous Jerome Grand Hotel and just the look of it gave me the spooks! By the time we arrived I knew where we were going because the GPS announced our destination so I had some time to do some research on the area ahead of time.
I learned the general background of the hotel which started as a hospital, and was eventually turned into the beloved hotel it is today I read about all of the ghosts that supposedly still walked the halls of the hotel, like the nurses, miners, maintenance man and even a cat. Our room happened to be the room in which the cat lived before it was dropped down the elevator shaft but, the cat is still known to visit those who stay in his room, and sometimes he can be found wandering the halls.
The notorious room 32: the location of 2 suicides
On Halloween I woke up to the feeling of my hand being kneaded, I just assumed it was my boyfriend trying to wake me up nicely. When I opened my eyes I realized my boyfriend was still knocked out and facing the opposite direction. I later read in the hotels book of experiences that it was a common thing to be woken up by the feeling of a cat jumping on the bed or a cat kneading some part of your body. They even have a photos from the early 2000’s showing what appears to be the cat’s spirit sitting on the small table in our room. That was enough to get me excited for the rest of the trip!
On our first full day in Jerome we walked around the shopping strip, stopped in a cute coffee shop for some hot coco and grabbed some cute souvenirs. One of the shops we stopped in was the largest kaleidoscope store in the country which happened to be owned by the actress who voice Lucy in Charlie Brown.
After shopping we stopped for lunch at The Haunted Hamburger. It is allegedly haunted by spirits who like hammers as they are constantly stealing them. The burgers are okay, nothing to write home about but the adult beverages and the onion rings are great. I will say this is one of those places where you go here more for the experience than the food itself.
We spent the rest of our day learning all abut the history of Jerome from its mining days, the town burning down multiple times and it came to be a town for artists. In its golden years the town boasted a population of 15,000, was the location of the first Safeway and JCPennys, and was known as the wickedest town in the west.
Everywhere we went we read about shoots outs, ladies of the night, and the daily lives of the miners. The mines in Jerome produced a couple billion in metals which obviously created the booming economy of the town. Unfortunately, due to the use of so much dynamite in the mines, the ground isn’t exactly stable anymore. Hence, the Sliding Jail which is a small jail house that happened to slide 225 feet into the middle of one of the busiest streets in the town. Instead of moving the jail they decided to reroute the street around the jail until they finally realized how nonsensical that was and pushed it the rest of the way across the road where it rests now.
While we were out exploring we decided to drive to the Gold King Mine and explore the ruins of another ghost town. We got to walk around the area and see the town dentist’s office, shoe repair store and also happened upon some not-so-ghostly furry friends. This place was good for a quick visit, I especially loved the animals (goats, ducks, chickens, donkeys and even a pig who likes belly rubs). However, if you are into mechanics of any sort, cars or mining equipment, I am sure you could find yourself entertained for hours here.
Monkey, the dwarf donkey
We couldn’t go to Jerome, stay in the Jerome Grand Hotel and not spend Halloween night at the Asylum restaurant. Turns out Halloween is only their second busiest night of the year, I can only assume Dia De Los Muertos is their busiest day of the year.
We ordered a bottle of wine and started dinner off with a yummy cheeseboard that had some melted brie and lots of fresh fruit. For our entrees, I had the pork loin and my boyfriend had the special which was a super savory pasta dish with spinach pasta, pieces of filet mignon, a wine sauce topped with a drizzle of horseradish cream sauce. Definitely wouldn’t mind making a tradition of visiting the Asylum once a year.
After dinner we walked over to Ghost Town Tours where we signed in, loaded up in the shuttle and drove around Jerome. Some of the highlights were learning about the tunnels where the maimed and ugly people were forced to travel through so they didn’t disturb those on the street, learning the price of a hooker was either 10 cents (they were usually diseased) or 10 dollars for 10 minutes for the premium women and hearing all of the questionable death stories.
One of the stories that stuck with me was that of a young girl who attended the Jerome High School which didn’t;t close until the mid 1970’s. The girl was a lover of the drama department and during one of their performances she ran up the stairs to do a quick outfit change, but when she began heading back down the stairs, she tripped and fell onto the stage…breaking her neck. Her spirit is said to haunt the stage still. Our guide Levi even explained that he had one of the women on his tour make fun of the girl and suddenly her necklace came flying off of her body and flew onto the stage. I didn’t dare crack a joke about spirits after that.
The view of the stage upon entering the high school. 
The bathroom ceiling of the janitor’s apartment in the high school, notice the blood splatter from another sad death at the school. Unfortunately this was the murder scene of a 5 year old boy.
Levi definitely elevated our experience on the tour. He was funny and super knowledgable about all of the town secrets. If it wasn’t for Levi’s personality I don’t think the stories would have come to life as much as they did. If you are in town, I suggest stopping in a signing up for any of their tours. Also, if after your first tour you decide to come back to go for round 2, you get 50% off. Just tell the staff you had toured with them before and they will take care of you. The 50% off applies to any tour booked after your first one.
There are too many intricacies of this town to include them all in one post, otherwise you would be reading for hours. I just wanted to include a few of my favorites. We have already decided that we would be taking more trips to the wickedest town in the west. Maybe next time we will bring our own ghost hunting equipment so we can talk to some of the stars of the stories we were told!