Hotel Macomber

Cape May's Hotel Macomber has at least eight ghosts, including trunk-dragging Irene in Room 10 and a waitress who shoves people into the walk-in.

Irene Wright checked into Room 10 every June and checked out every November, dragging the same enormous steamer trunk behind her. She wore too much perfume, talked to everyone, and was a recurring summer regular every hotel builds its identity around. She died sometime in the 1970s and kept coming back. Guests in Room 10 still report her trunk scraping across the floor at night. They report loud knocking on the door when the hallway is empty, furniture moved between when they leave and when they return, and the very specific sensation of being watched by a talkative stranger who can't find her audience anymore. Psychic medium Craig McManus captured an EVP in Room 10 of a woman's voice saying "I'm still here." During another session, a voice answered a question with "We love this bedroom."

The Hotel Macomber opened in 1916 as the New Stockton Villa, which at the time was the largest frame structure east of the Mississippi. Five stories, thirty-six rooms, wraparound verandas. Sarah Davis founded the hotel and lost her daughter Cannell to encephalitis from a mosquito bite in the 1920s. She never came back from it. In 1934, shortly after announcing that the inn was open for business, she killed herself in the building she had built. During World War II, the Army and Navy leased the hotel as soldiers' quarters, and the space beneath the front steps served as a drunk tank for servicemen who came back from leave too rowdy to sleep in their racks.

Sarah didn't leave either. Guests see her coming down the main staircase and standing at the front desk. Try to talk to her and the lights flicker. Cannell comes back in the summers with a small group of other child spirits. Ghost tour founder Al Rauber captured an EVP in the hotel of marbles dropping on a hardwood floor followed by a child's voice saying "These are mine!"

The Union Park Restaurant downstairs is haunted by a Depression-era waitress who choked to death on a chicken bone and has been moving silverware around ever since. She flickers the dining room chandelier. She floats through the kitchen in a ragged dress. Occasionally she pushes staff into the walk-in refrigerator when she's in a particular mood. The chef's knives rearrange themselves when he works alone late.

The basement is where the Growler lives. He's a male spirit who groans, knocks things over, and makes sounds like a man trying to finish a construction project that was never going to end. Rooms 41 and 45 have seen the worst guest activity in recent years, with beds rocking at night and unhappy presences apparently annoyed at the company. A friendly farmer ghost greets people in the foyer. A couple nobody can see occasionally argues in the hallways. Two uniformed military figures, probably left over from the WWII lease, have been sensed on the upper floors.

The Davis family still runs the place. Guests can request the most active rooms. It's one of the last of the original automobile-era Cape May hotels, and apparently some of its best customers never checked out.