10 NoVA/DC Spooky Haunts To Visit This October
NORTHERN VIRGINIA/DC — Spooky season is still very much alive, despite the COVID-19 pandemic putting a damper on some festivities. Costume parties and trick-or-treating in mass groups might not be such a great idea this year, but taking a socially distanced walk around these haunts in Northern Virginia and D.C. is relatively safe, from coronavirus anyway — the ghosts however, we can't speak for.
Check out these 10 haunted places around the NoVA/DC area:
1. The Bunny Man
In 1970, a couple saw a frightening man with bunny ears near a train overpass on Colchester Road in Clifton. In another sighting in the area, a construction worker saw a man standing on the porch of an unfinished house wearing a bunny costume. In the weeks following the incidents, more than 50 people contacted the police claiming to have seen the Bunny Man. Within a few years, children across Fairfax County were exchanging stories about a man in a bunny suit chasing kids through the woods with a hatchet, Ally Schweitzer writes in an article for WAMU. The legend of the Bunny Man, especially around Halloween, began to grow and kids across Northern Virginia still are on the lookout for the bunny-eared man.
2. Exorcist Steps
The ominous stairway in Georgetown is best known for its role in the horror classic "The Exorcist," the 1973 movie based on the bestselling novel by William Peter Blatty, a Georgetown University graduate. The novel was inspired by a reported exorcism of a young boy. Be careful as you wander over to the stairs this October.
3. Omni Shoreham Hotel
The Omni Shoreham Hotel, at 2500 Calvert Street NW in D.C., was named by Historic Hotels of America as one of the "Most Haunted Historic Hotels" in the country. During the Shoreham's early years, three people died unexpectedly in suite 870, according to the Historic Hotels of America report.
4. Gadsby's Tavern
Visitors to Gadsby's Tavern Museum in Old Town Alexandria have heard tales of mysterious events, such as the sightings of a young woman who died on the premises in 1816. A tavern guest once followed the apparition upstairs to a deserted bedroom where a hurricane lamp glowed. The museum has re-opened and can be visited Friday and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sundays from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.
5. Weems-Botts House
The Weems-Botts Museum in Dumfries is the home of a ghost who throws books and likes to turn lights on and off. Staffers at the museum say that after a new bookshelf was built in the house during remodeling in the 1970s to create the museum, books would fly from the shelf halfway across the room. The museum designers decided to remove the bookshelf and no other ghostly occurrences have occurred in that spot of the house. However, staff members have also heard sounds coming from a bedroom on the second floor and visitors have felt a sense of claustrophobia upon entering the home. The museum is open for appointment-only tours at 10 a.m., noon and 2 p.m., Tuesday-Saturday.
6. Olde Towne Inn
The Olde Towne Inn in Manassas is known for the ghosts who reside in the hotel, Andrew L. Mills writes in his new book "Haunted Prince William County." According to most people, the three most haunted rooms in the hotel are rooms 50, 52 and 54. One couple reported hearing the sound of crashing items as they slept in room 54, he writes.
7. Paxton Manor
Some say that Paxton Manor, a mansion in Leesburg in 1872, is one of the most haunted mansions in Virginia because it has a natural subterranean body of water flowing underneath the house. The manor now functions partly as an education center for disabled young people and partly as a haunted house attraction. This October, the house is open only for virtual tours.
8. Febrey-Kincheloe House
During a remodeling job in 2012, construction workers at the Overlee Community Center pool site just off Lee Highway in Arlington reported that they were not alone. They would often see a little girl in Victorian clothing climbing through the debris and walking the site. The construction site was on the grounds of a former historic mansion, known most recently as the Febrey-Kincheloe House, which stood for more than a century. Ernest Febrey built the home in the 1890s, where he raised his daughter, Margaret.
9. Ford's Theater
On April 14, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by gun-wielding Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth. Ever since, Ford Theater has a creepy reputation. Gunshots and screams have been heard coming from the balcony box where Lincoln was shot. And apparitions of assassin John Wilkes Booth have been spotted on stage.
10. Dominion Hills Shopping Center
In 1967, a sniper shot and killed American Nazi leader George Lincoln Rockwell in a shopping center on Wilson Boulevard in Arlington. Arlington police arrested a fellow Nazi named John Patler, a Greek American and former Marine from New York City, for the American Nazi leader's killing. The small shopping area, now called Dominion Hill Centre, stands as an eerie reminder of how Arlington County was for many years the home to the headquarters of the American Nazi Party.
This article originally appeared on the Fairfax City Patch
