Indiana Statehouse

The Indiana State Capitol building, completed in 1888 in the Renaissance Revival style. Designed by architect Edwin May, the limestone structure features a 234-foot dome and houses all three branches of state government.

The Indiana Statehouse was completed in 1888 at a cost of $2 million, a Renaissance Revival masterpiece designed by Indianapolis architect Edwin May with a cruciform plan and central domed rotunda. May's design, titled Lucidus Ordo -- Latin for "a clear arrangement" -- was selected from 27 submissions in 1878 for its balanced neoclassical composition and Indiana limestone construction. Tragically, May did not live to see his most prestigious project finished; having been ill for several years, he died in February 1880 while on a trip to Florida, shortly after construction began. His chief draftsman, Swiss-born architect Adolf Scherrer, completed the building over the next eight years. The four-story structure houses the Indiana House of Representatives, Senate, Supreme Court, and Court of Appeals, and underwent an $11 million restoration from 1986 to 1988 that removed decades of piecemeal alterations and restored the original 1888 interior.

The Statehouse is believed to be home to several distinct entities. The most frequently reported ghost is a late 19th-century mailroom employee who either fell or jumped from the fourth-floor balcony while pushing his mail cart. Staff members working late on the upper floors describe hearing the unmistakable sound of squeaky wheels rolling behind them -- the phantom mail cart following its eternal route -- though when they turn around, no one is there. The creepy spiral staircase leading to the fourth floor generates particular unease among staff who avoid it after hours.

In the basement corridors, a different haunting traces back to an incident during the building's early operational years when a blacksmith's horse became uncontrolled and fatally struck a worker. Staff who work late into the night report hearing the distinct sound of horses whinnying echoing through the basement, a jarring anachronism in a building that has had no horses in its lower levels for well over a century.

The third entity is a woman in period dress -- long hair, flowing 19th-century gown -- who has been spotted by both visitors and employees on the upper floors of the Statehouse. She appears without warning and vanishes just as quickly, leaving witnesses unsure of what they have just seen. Staff members call her the Ghost Lady, though her identity has never been determined. A mysterious gray or black orb has also been reported appearing randomly inside the building by multiple visitors over the years, drifting through the rotunda and corridors before disappearing. Staff describe a general unease throughout the building after hours, reporting strange noises and glimpsing things out of the corner of their eyes with no logical explanation. Ghost tour companies including US Ghost Adventures feature the Statehouse as a stop on their downtown Indianapolis walking tours.