Ocean City Life-Saving Station Museum

The Life-Saving Station building dates to 1891 and was originally a boardinghouse for young men before becoming the museum it is today. The building's seaside location and history of rescue operations has attracted spirits.

The Ocean City Life-Saving Station Museum occupies a striking white wooden building designed by architect J. L. Parkinson in the Carpenter Gothic style, constructed in 1891 at the northern edge of Ocean City on Caroline Street. For decades, a keeper and crew of six to eight surfmen lived in the station, monitoring the treacherous Atlantic coast for ships in distress. These brave men earned just $1.33 per day with no pension, charging through ten-foot waves using oars and courage to rescue drowning sailors. The Life-Saving Service motto captured their grim reality: "You have to go out, but you do not have to come back."

Death was a constant companion at the station. During its 36 years of operation, the 19 Life-Saving Service stations on Maryland Eastern Shore rescued 7,502 people from over 300 shipwrecks—but not all could be saved. Sailors frequently died from hypothermia or drowning before rescuers could reach them, their frozen bodies pulled ashore and laid in the station equipment room.

The most haunting tragedy occurred in 1955, when the U.S. Coast Guard was still manning the station. A family of six from Baltimore was boating out to a hunting lodge on Assateague Island when their boat capsized. The entire family perished. Their bodies were brought to the Life-Saving Station large equipment room so relatives could identify them. Today, visitors entering that room report sudden chills and an overwhelming sense of grief. Some say they feel the presence of a little girl among the victims.

The station most famous spirit is a small blonde-haired boy, approximately three to four years old, who has been spotted running through the exhibits. One evening, as museum staff was closing, the child dashed through the front door into the building. Workers searched frantically, convinced a child had been left behind by his parents. They searched high and low but found no one. Days later, after the stairway to the attic was repainted, staff discovered a single small footprint in the fresh paint at the top of the stairs—a lone shoe print with no explanation. Psychic mediums who visit the museum consistently mention sensing a child presence. Museum Aide Robin Beauchamp reported that visitors have seen the boy running toward the locked gift shop and later spotted him coloring in the children room.

The life-cart, a rescue vessel that could hold two to five people during water emergencies, is another paranormal hotspot. Several visitors have reported seeing a transparent figure sitting in the cart, shivering as if just pulled from frigid waters after a rescue. One woman told author Mindie Burgoyne that while standing near the life-cart, she felt extremely cold and saw a man in a slicker who appeared dead—just for an instant, like an apparition, before he vanished.

Perhaps the most unusual spirit in the building works through an unlikely vessel: Laughing Sal, a six-foot-tall animatronic rag doll with a grotesque gap-toothed grin. For decades, Sal was the star attraction at Jester Fun House, one of Ocean City most memorable twentieth-century amusements. She would shake her head, wave her arms, and continuously laugh while patrons watched in wonder. Now retired to the museum in a display case, Sal no longer moves—but she still laughs. According to Burgoyne, "Sometimes she laughs when you do not push the button." Staff and visitors have heard her distinctive cackle echo through the empty museum when no one is near the activation button, leading some to believe a mischievous spirit—perhaps the blonde boy—enjoys triggering her unsettling laughter.

The Dead of Night Paranormal Investigation team has conducted multiple investigations at the museum, using EVP recorders and EMF meters to communicate with the spirits. During one pre-investigation, their eco-vox picked up the sounds of two adult women and a child. Near the life-cart, they recorded murmurings of "I am cold..." Assistant Curator Christine Okerblom, after participating in an investigation, admitted she became "a little less skeptical of the spirit world." Something significant occurred in what investigators call the "children recovery room"—a detail staff speak of only in hushed tones.

The building was nearly lost to demolition in 1977, but concerned citizens formed the Ocean City Museum Society and saved the structure, relocating it to the southern end of the Boardwalk. Today, ghost tours led by Chesapeake Ghosts begin at this very spot, where the spirits of drowned sailors, lost children, and unknown souls still linger among the rescue equipment that could not save them all.