77: The Pfister Hotel

Gina (01:03)

to I Scream, You Scream, your weekly scoop of the most chilling histories, mysteries, and paranormal perplexities. My name's Gina.

Kathryn (01:11)

and I'm Kathryn

Gina (01:12)

And we are in a whole new month, y'all. So this month, in the month of May, the beautiful, merry month of May, we're gonna be talking about haunted hotels.

Kathryn (01:15)

Yes, we are.

Gina (01:21)

and we are having chocolate surprise ice cream. I think we forgot to say this when we announced what the topic was this month, but the reason we're doing chocolate surprise is because of the like chocolates they leave on your pillow that you get at hotels sometimes.

Kathryn (01:25)

Yes.

Mm.

Okay, was,

yeah, I was gonna bring that up when we were talking about how we chose our flavor, because I do think we forgot to talk about that, but I was like, am I just forgetting that we talked about it? Yeah, okay, so we did have a reason for doing chocolate. Yeah. Yes. Just gotta figure it out.

Gina (01:43)

Yeah, we did.

We did. It's thematically related, yes, as always. Everything means something on this podcast.

Yes, real quick, this episode is sponsored by Clo-Bear Money Coach. If you are so very ready to start investing but you're unsure how to get started, visit GetLazyNow.com and Chloe will help you out. Until then, grab a spoon and let's dig in.

Kathryn (02:16)

and it's very hot and humid this week so my ice cream is melting.

Gina (02:20)

I would love to hear what you're having. I want to know what your chocolate surprise is.

Kathryn (02:23)

I would love to tell

you. So there's like multiple surprises here for me even. So is a whole thing. Bear with me. I can't not ramble about this. Remember when I was really excited about Bourbon month, the coffee and Bourbon month, and then proceeded to mess that up royally. ⁓ I was very upset about that. And I was like complaining about it nonstop all month and Phil felt really bad.

So he went out and found me whiskey ice cream. Because I knew it existed. I knew it existed. He got it from Purple Door Ice Cream, but I just didn't have time to go searching for it. And he did one day. So he found it for me. So it's whiskey ice cream. And this is also thematically related. I've been saving it for this month because...

One of my favorite things to do when I'm staying at a hotel is hang out. I know you know this, but I love a hotel bar so much. So was like, okay, that would pair perfectly. Like you wake up to like your little chocolate, pillow chocolate, do whatever you're doing for the day. Stop in at the hotel bar before you go and get ready for what you're doing at night. The surprise is I thought it was just whiskey flavoring. No dog, this thing's 43%.

Gina (03:22)

Mm-hmm.

Kathryn (03:43)

ABV. So I'm about to have a real good time today. I thought it was just like a flavor. Yeah. Yes. Sure is. I told Phil, I was like, I feel like there should be a warning. I had to like read the fine print ingredient list. It's literally just whiskey, cream, and vanilla flavoring. Those are the three ingredients in this ice cream.

Gina (03:44)

What?

had that ice cream before from Purple Door and I didn't know it was actually alcoholic. Damn.

Yeah!

Kathryn (04:08)

like there should be like a 21 plus tag on it. Not to like call out purple door, but it was just like in the freezer. Any old buddy could purchase it. I'm like, I don't know. Maybe they just like know to card people to like, like young ones. But like, I don't know. I feel like there should be some type of indicator on here. I don't know. I could just be elderly and like reading too much into this, was like...

Gina (04:23)

That's a good point.

Kathryn (04:36)

I thought it was just the flavor. did not realize it was like actual whiskey ice cream. So, yeah, a good, good, good surprise over here.

Gina (04:40)

No, I had no idea. That's fun.

Kathryn (04:44)

And then the chocolate is just my purse chocolate. My emergency purse chocolate. It is that same ⁓ lemon chocolate thing that I had previously. I just broke up a little bit on it. It's great. It's fine. Yeah, it's the ice cream is definitely the star of the show. Yeah. Okay, what are you having?

Gina (04:58)

yum.

Nice. Okay, so

mine is, it's very different than yours, but I actually, it's, I think we took a more similar approach than I was anticipating. So I have honeycomb ice cream.

Kathryn (05:13)

Okay.

Yum! ⁓

Gina (05:18)

Exactly, and I have topped it with little chocolate covered honeycomb pieces, which you might be able to see. Yes. Yeah, and the reason I think this is funny is that the theme is chocolate surprise and neither of us are actually having chocolate ice cream. It's ice cream with chocolate.

Kathryn (05:24)

Yum. Okay.

Yeah, I was wondering if that would happen. Yeah, I was wondering

if that would happen, because I was like, I know what I'm doing. And I know you don't love chocolate ice cream. So I was curious if this was going to happen. Or the flip side is you were just going to do it for the theme and suck it up and figure out. Yeah, I didn't know which way. Yeah.

Gina (05:43)

Hmm.

I dig it.

That was, yes,

I really thought about it. Because I was like, you know what, Gina, when was the last time you really tried chocolate ice cream? And then the other Gina in my head was like, I'm 30, I don't need to try something I don't want to try.

Kathryn (06:01)

Yeah.

with new things.

Yeah, ooh, I love that. This ice cream's very good. And now it's melting, so I feel like I'm drinking like a boozy shake.

Gina (06:12)

Yay, exciting.

Ooh, that would make a ⁓ boozy salted caramel whiskey milkshake. That would be good.

Kathryn (06:20)

You know what I mean? Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

You know what would also be good? Using it for a float, like a boozy float. Yeah. Oh, I'm going to have a good time with this. Have we not done floats? I feel like we've talked about floats so many times, like variously, like in this context, we'll mention it or something and be like, oh, we should do that. And then we never have. We need to stop panic choosing our flavor.

Gina (06:31)

yeah, yeah, that does sound good. We should do floats one month.

Never, do.

You're right, we do.

I have something I want to say. I an announcement I want to make. It's not an announcement. It's something you already know about. I just keep forgetting to mention it on the podcast. I have an extremely loud neighbor and you've been able to hear him in quite a few of the recent episodes and I keep meaning to apologize for it to you listening and then I keep forgetting. So I'm sorry for me and I'm mostly sorry for him.

Kathryn (06:57)

Tell me.

You

Yeah.

Gina (07:19)

because he's so freaking loud.

Kathryn (07:21)

He is very sorry. We are sure of it. So we are relaying that information here. There is no ghost. Well, there's probably ghosts, but just not... You can't hear them over the neighbor. So... Yeah. If you hear any bumps, don't be alarmed.

Gina (07:26)

Yes.

No. No.

I actually, okay, so my neighbor, is loud, like he yells and is loud verbally, but he's also loud musically, like he plays music very loudly. And the other day, I had such a moment with it, I was so sad. So he was like blasting music. I think he had some friends over and I can hear like every word of every song that he plays when he has it at that volume. And I heard the opening notes of the song.

Kathryn (08:01)

Yeah

Gina (08:06)

And it was a song I used to be obsessed with when I was a teenager. It was ⁓ a postal service song. Yeah, like one of Ben Gibbard's projects. And it was like the first few notes of Such Great Heights, which I feel like everyone was obsessed with that when they were a teenager. And then, so it was like the first couple of bars were those notes. And I was like, my gosh, like his music taste is changing. He's only been listening to rap for months and now he's getting into like indie stuff. This is so great. And then someone came in and started rapping over.

Kathryn (08:09)

my god, really? that's funny.

Gina (08:33)

This is such great Heights music. Yeah, it was like a remix and I was like, okay, nevermind. No. Yeah, no, we're still enemies. We're still enemies. Yeah.

Kathryn (08:35)

It was like a remix. That's funny. Or like sample. Yeah, that's fantastic. I love that.

I also

real quick want to address the fact that you mentioned his screaming. We do suspect he is a gamer. He's not just spontaneously yelling or bursting into screams. I just wanted to clarify that so no one was worried for your safety. Just a lot of violence going on next door. Ignore it, okay?

Gina (08:55)

No.

Yeah, sorry. He just, you know, he screams in pain all the time.

But he's also one of

those kids that ⁓ because I've seen him before and I think he looks like he's around maybe 12 like tween years and he Does the thing that he like screams for his grandma? Like she'll be downstairs. He'll be upstairs cuz that's where his room is and he'll scream down to her and obviously I can hear that too

Kathryn (09:29)

yeah.

Oh my God,

dude, that used to drive my mom nuts. I forgot about that. And now as an adult, yeah, like, ma, ma, instead of just getting off my lazy ass and going to tell her what I needed, because I'm also a mumbler, so I'd be like, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma. Oh my God, she used to get so raging. I'd be like, I'm here, but ma, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma,

Gina (09:38)

marketing like yelled for him. Yeah.

You know what I was thinking

about the other day? Just like paretic stuff. I wasn't allowed to say the word butt when I was a kid.

Kathryn (10:07)

Okay,

the things that parents or grown adults choose to not let their children say because they're bad is so funny to me. We were not allowed to say lie. We weren't allowed to call people a liar or like say like it was a lie. We had to say storytelling. He's telling stories. call it what it is. That bitch lied. Like what? I don't know.

Gina (10:16)

Right?

Kathryn (10:30)

But it's like, yeah, that's so funny to me. Cause I feel like everyone has their own little thing.

Gina (10:35)

Yeah.

If your parents wouldn't let you say something weird, tell us. iscreamyouscreampod@gmail.com. What would they not let you say? I wanna know. Yeah. Yeah.

Kathryn (10:38)

And what do you say extra now because of it? I

do think it's funny that you weren't allowed to say but but you were like so obsessed with Captain Underpants. I think that there's something there psychologically.

Gina (10:54)

Well, you know what? think it... Did I ever tell you about my collection of words for butt? Like butt synonyms?

Kathryn (11:01)

No, but that's so

Gina-coded. Tell me, hit me with it.

Gina (11:04)

So I'm just not realizing, I think one fed into the other. So when I was really little I wasn't allowed to say the word but, I had to say bottom. And then at some point when I got a little bit older, still like probably around 10 or just under, I started compiling a list of all the synonyms I could find for the word but. And I think it's probably because I was not allowed to say but. And so to this day, like for example, if...

Kathryn (11:23)

For sure, 100 % it was. Yeah.

Gina (11:29)

The word fanny is in a crossword that my mom is doing. She'll send me a picture of it and be like, add it to your list. Yeah, it's funny.

Kathryn (11:31)

You

That's so sweet. I love that. This is, that's totally

different, but it reminds me of... Do you remember my Odetschinary? Did I ever mention that? Okay, let me see if I still have it. Okay, it is like my pride and joy. I used to work as a nanny and one of the children...

Gina (11:44)

Yes, yes you did! my god, I forgot about this!

Kathryn (11:54)

her name is Odette and I was with her when she was probably like three to like six or seven. And she did this thing where... Sorry, it makes me laugh so hard. She did this thing where if she didn't know the word for something, she wouldn't ask. She would just say a sound. And like we were all supposed to just understand what it meant.

⁓ And so I have this a dictionary in my notes app with a very long list of words that she created and their definitions. And I'm gonna read just a couple of them. The first one is CropGlop, which means hangnail.

⁓ Basajin, which is a stethoscope. She, her dad was a, is a doctor. ⁓ so they had a whole bunch of like toy doctor stuff. Not that your parent needs to be a doctor for you to have that, but anyway, ⁓ that went, and these are all set. Like I remember the day she said that we were playing and she literally just goes, can you hand me that Basajin? And I was like, what the fuck is that? What are you talking about? And she like goes and gets it. was like, the stethoscope? Are you crazy?

Gina (12:53)

Yeah, I get it,

Hahaha!

Kathryn (13:09)

Yes, she was. It was great. I loved her so much. Number three was, I didn't know how to spell this, but it's pronounced like, Mraaav. So you have to like, it's Mrav, but with a haa in the middle of it, that means hair clip. And ninch is my favorite. It's an expletive used to express frustration. Yes. She'd just be like, ninch. Yeah.

Gina (13:09)

Hehehehehe

Right.

Ooh, that's a good one. That has a power to it. Like I could see... Yeah, yeah,

Kathryn (13:37)

Like it sounds like a bad word, doesn't it? Yeah.

Gina (13:37)

yeah, that's satisfying. It does, yeah.

Kathryn (13:41)

Anyway, won't go, there's so many more. I won't go into all of them. But yeah, I shared that with her mother one day and she was like, you have got to link that to me because I would like, she would text me every now and then be like, we got another one added to the list. Same with your mom. That's what reminded me of her. Yeah, it's so cute. I love that.

Gina (13:55)

So cute! I love that so

much. And how creative of a kid to be able to do that, because she was tiny when she was doing it.

Kathryn (14:02)

She was tiny, she was the most creative kid though. Yeah, that was so great.

Anyway.

Would you be interested in hearing a story?

Gina (14:12)

I would love nothing more.

Kathryn (14:14)

Excellent.

right. Today we are talking about the regionally infamous haunted hotel, the Pfister. And it all started with a man named Guido. Yep, not the kind you're thinking of. He was not a faux Italian man on the shores of New Jersey. He was a German immigrant named Guido.

Gina (14:34)

Never

Kathryn (14:37)

He was born in Germany in 1818 and he made his way over to New York where he settled in Buffalo and he worked as a tanner. after several years of success there in New York, he and his family, including wife Elizabeth and a few children,

Varying accounts on how many kids they had. I know they had at least a few. I think they had a couple of daughters and then they had an adopted son named Charles who you will be hearing about at length. But it is contested exactly how many children they had. They aren't really talked about. There's not a ton of like records on them or anything. But anyway, so they made their way out west where the land was riddled with opportunity and they ended up settling in Milwaukee.

when Wisconsin was still considered the West. And that is where he opened Buffalo Leather Company or corporation. I don't know what co stands for. I realized in this moment, is it company? I thought it was company, I'm well, it wouldn't be a corporation. Yeah, it wouldn't have been a corporation. Yeah. Inc. Inc. incorporated. Inc. is for corporation, I think. Anyway, he opened Buffalo Leather Co.

Gina (15:26)

You

assumed it was company. Yeah, would be corp, wouldn't it?

Thought it was for incubus.

Sorry.

Kathryn (15:56)

We're doing so good. ⁓ I literally have in parentheses named after the town, not the animal, in case there is any confusion.

Gina (15:57)

You

That's actually part of the legal name. Town, not the buff, not the animal LLC incorporated.

Kathryn (16:09)

Yes. Yeah, it is. Buffalo,

parentheses, of, and parentheses, leather cow, in case anyone wants to look up their LLC. Just kidding, it doesn't exist anywhere. Anyway, so his cousin, his cousin Frederick Vogel would join him out in Milwaukee eventually from Buffalo.

and together the company would transform to the Pfister and Vogel tannery, which at one point was one of the largest leather producers in the country. But despite the fact that their tannery was very successful, leather production in Milwaukee would only be a leading industry for a few years because soon other industries would kind of take over as more and more people moved into the city. So it would transition to a like flour milling town. Did you know there?

flour milling was big in Milwaukee, I had no idea. yeah. Followed by meat packing, which makes sense. Lot of cows, yep. Yeah, my God, yes. ⁓ Then eventually beer brewing, no surprise there. What is surprising, beer brewing has not been the number one industry in Milwaukee for many years. And outside of that singular couple of years, ⁓

Gina (17:05)

What?

No.

⁓ mm-hmm. The Packers.

Kathryn (17:31)

It's been manufacturing. None of this matters, I just thought it was interesting. I just really was expecting it to be like, then it was, you know, brewing and it's been brewing ever since. No, it's manufacturing. Anyway, so the point that I think I'm trying to make.

Gina (17:34)

Hahahaha

Kathryn (17:53)

The reason I'm yammering on about this is what this says to me is Milwaukee was a growing town and pretty much everything I just mentioned. There were a lot of changes happening. People were kind of figuring out what opportunities were here, what they could build, what they could kind of get their hands on because at the time there really wasn't much going on here.

Guido was one of those guys. He was very much a work smarter, not harder. So instead of trying to just like start all of these businesses from the ground up and like join all of these different industries, what he would do is he would like spot quote unquote gaps, if you will, if you wanna be all corporate about it, gaps in the company and like figure out how to make a business out of that. So for example,

when When the leather industry started to dwindle a little bit, instead of worrying about decline in selling and trading the leathers they produced, he said, okay, fine, leather to couple shoes and sell the shoes instead of trying to sell the leather. So that's when they opened the shoe shop. So little things like that. He wouldn't start whole new...

ventures he would just kind of like tack on to the ones that he already had started. Go ahead. Yeah.

Gina (19:15)

so, because you said this is 1800s right?

That is so 1800s coded to just be like oh oh yes well I I can just hop from industry to industry and make a living.

Kathryn (19:21)

100%.

Well, and that's the thing. I also like we're kind of just what I'm doing right now is just kind of describing how capitalism got going. You know what I mean? Like nothing was here and it's easy to build businesses when there is a literally no competition and you already have a little bit of money from the business you had that was successful where there was commerce. You know what I mean? So like not to like discredit him or whatever, but like

Gina (19:37)

Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Imagine.

Kathryn (19:57)

It's kind of like that thing. Have you ever seen that? It's like a tweet that's like digging philosophers and stuff. They're like, yeah, I could be a world famous philosopher too if I was the first one to ever communicate my thoughts on anything. It's like, yeah, like if you're just the first one, it's like, okay, well, yeah, you better open the shoe shop. There was no shoe shop. Like, of course it's gonna be successful.

Gina (20:12)

Yeah

Kathryn (21:24)

Anyway, whatever, they did it. He was very successful. We're all very proud of the Pfisters. Anyway, so eventually when Charles came of age, he started working in the family business as it goes. And he started down at the shoe shop and he was working in sales and he kind of like obviously grew and learned the tricks of the trade from his father. And he eventually became his own kind of entrepreneur and continued expanding the family business and

investing in various other businesses and properties, et cetera, until eventually he started to kind of make his own name for himself in and around Milwaukee. And I thought that this was really interesting because in the city of Milwaukee, people know the name Charles Pfister for obvious reasons, but we'll continue talking about it.

And I was really surprised to learn about Guido at all because I had never heard of him before at all. It very much feels like Charles was the one that started everything. But the more research I did, the more I realized that that's kind of purposeful because back in the day when Charles was like coming of age and becoming his own kind of businessman and a lot of people were

let's just say his entrepreneurship was widely contested by fellow German immigrants and like how much of a like self-made man he actually was. There was a lot of like, you know, are you putting in the work or did like Guido do it for you kind of thing, ⁓ which I personally have no opinion on, but like that is the story that is was like being circulated.

Gina (22:52)

Hmm.

Kathryn (23:02)

So it makes sense that now, you know, once he was running everything, he was kind of able to scrub the whole Guido side of it and like reset the narrative. So now, like if you go into the hotel, it's his portrait you see on the wall and just things like that. that's neither here nor there. do, I will say I did want to kind of like give Guido a little moment because like he did.

start the Pfister and Vogel business. But that is not to say that Charles did nothing. I he did do a lot of stuff on his own and where Guido started the family business, you cannot contest the fact that Charles absolutely expanded it. And they together, but led by Charles, the older and older he got, they kind of transitioned into property investment, which is

the same way any of these guys make any of their money. Like it's a tale as old as time. Exactly, I mean, like once you have the money from your businesses, it's immediately property development and investment and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I feel like I tell this story a million times. I don't know why I always have to include this. Anyway, long story short,

Gina (23:51)

It's always the end game. Always.

Kathryn (24:12)

regardless of this kind of complicated experience that Charles had with life as his own entrepreneur, one venture that they did definitely embark on together for which Charles's name is most prominently associated is the Pfister Hotel. And that was a big deal. The Pfister is and was a luxury hotel,

Guido and Charles had it built in 1893 and to do so they hired the highly sought-after architect, fellow German immigrant Henry C. Cook, who did a lot of work in and around Milwaukee and one of his most famous designs is a location you might recognize, one Turner Hall. And if you don't recognize it, check out episode 38 when we discussed Hotel Emma. We'll talk about it then. Bye.

Gina (25:01)

wow.

Very beautiful.

Kathryn (25:06)

But yes, so that, like he did many buildings in and around Milwaukee, but that was his kind of signature style. It was the Romanesque revival style. And yes, very fancy, quite, quite. And in total, cost $1 million to build, which is just shy of 36 million today or roughly 26 million pounds.

Gina (25:19)

No, yes. Squad.

Kathryn (25:32)

It was really ahead of its time, especially for the area. At the time it was built, Milwaukee had only become a city around 50 years prior. And there was still a lot of farmland and stuff. It wasn't like an urban area yet. So not a lot of places were fully equipped the way the Pfister was. The lights were 100 % fully electric.

which made me very excited. I love ⁓ an electric building, you know?

Gina (26:00)

you should.

Kathryn (26:00)

Thinking of like literally ever since episode three, I've been so obsessed with like these old buildings and whether or not they had electricity and like when they got electricity. This bad boys had electricity since the beginning. So not to brag, but yeah. So no gas lamps anywhere. And it was one of the first hotels, at least here in the United States that had.

Gina (26:10)

God about that. man, throwback.

Yeah, sing it.

Kathryn (26:25)

heating and I believe cooling. don't think air conditioning had been invented at the time that this was built, but like it was installed very shortly after air conditioning was invented and it was one of the first hotels to have individual like thermostats in every single room. Yeah, like genuinely it

Gina (26:36)

wow.

talk about luxury in a time when that doesn't really happen or isn't really

a thing.

Kathryn (26:51)

Absolutely, it's one of those things that like now we take it for granted. Like why wouldn't a hotel have like a luxury hotel specifically? Like of course they're gonna have a thermostat in every room. But in 18, whatever the hell, that was like unheard of. That was a big deal. And I don't think it was every room. I think it was like the suites and like the more expensive. Like that was like a ⁓ perk that you could get.

Gina (27:10)

Hmm.

Only the truly rich, rich people. The poor rich people had to sweat.

Kathryn (27:16)

Yes, not the poor rich. Yes, we're talking,

yeah. Yeah, if you're only moderately wealthy, you like bring a sweat, sweat rag because there's no thermostat for you.

also considered entirely fireproof, which was a big sell for people because before the Pfister was built on that property, the lot was home to the Newell House and the... Sorry. I don't... Listen, I've started singing when I do the... It's because... It's because when I do it, I'm like, no, Kathryn, don't do it. And it's like, I'm sorry.

Gina (27:47)

anything but I like it. You've added an operatic element to it.

The singing is you apologizing for-

Kathryn (28:02)

It's like one of those like, whoopsie. Oh no. Didn't mean to do that.

Gina (28:17)

You sounded like a Scooby-Doo character when you said that.

Kathryn (28:18)

I can't. my God. Wait, I was thinking of

Scooby-Doo the other day. Can I tell you this real quick? It's because I don't remember what, I was craving a sandwich and someone said the word like double decker or something. I think it was double decker. And I like, you know, you know what I'm talking about. And I just like, I was just sitting there and I imagined myself as a cartoon version of me. And you know how they would draw Shaggy and Scooby like,

Gina (28:24)

Yeah

you

Mm-hmm. I know what you're talking about.

Kathryn (28:47)

post eating all the sandwiches and they were just like balloon people. I just like had this image of me illustrated in that type of animation having having like eaten a bunch of sandwiches. And this was all just me daydreaming like around around my lunchtime. Like I was ready to like go take my break at work. ⁓ Yeah.

Gina (28:50)

Yeah.

That's an adorable image. I want to see...

There has to be someone on Etsy we can pay to turn you into a cartoon character. You would make a really cute cartoon character.

Kathryn (29:13)

We, there must be. Yeah,

yeah. my God, wait, I love that. I want to see us in like various styles of cartoon animation, but I don't want to use AI to do it. We should like call on artists to like do that for us.

Gina (29:25)

⁓

No.

Help. You know what I wanna see?

You remember the style that I wanna see? Do you remember when you used to watch SpongeBob and every now and then they would have a frame of a different animation style that would be really freaky? Like way too detailed, like almost too realistic where it was like deeply unsettling. I want that.

Kathryn (29:45)

Yeah, I forgot about that.

I don't know what I want.

Boy, ain't that a loaded statement. All right, I'm gonna get back to it.

Gina (29:56)

Hahaha!

Okay, yep, yep.

Kathryn (30:01)

the Pfister was built there, the property was home to the Newell House. And the story of the Newell House is a little bit tragic, I will admit. It was also a hotel or like a boarding house type situation that was made essentially entirely out of wood.

So naturally it caught fire in 1857 and burnt completely to the ground. People referred to it as essentially a tinderbox. Like there was no way that this thing wasn't going to catch fire at some point, just the way it was built and the materials with which it was built. And unfortunately the fire was so horrendous that an estimated somewhere between 70 and 90 people ended up dying. And...

That's a pretty big range of people. you know, that could be a result of just like inaccurate record keeping or, bodies not being found or people like potentially getting away and just not having like friends or family to really account for them or anything. So regardless, either one of those numbers, any number in that range is huge, especially considering at the time Milwaukee only had a population of like 12,000 people.

was an even bigger self for a new hotel like the Pfister the fireproof element to it added to the luxury. Like part of the cell was, you know, don't worry, that will not happen again. It cannot happen again. People felt safe there.

It was dubbed the quote, grand hotel of the West, again, back when Wisconsin was the West. And if you were basically a well-to-do businessman monitoring your trade routes or a politician on the campaign trail, or even just a well-to-do family trying to get away from Chicago for a weekend, this was the place you wanted to be. Like they were not a, they weren't a like, know, troubadours would.

Gina (31:35)

You

Kathryn (31:56)

wander in and move on the very next day. Like they were, they catered to the elite. They were a one percenter type of hotel.

Essentially, it was opulence incarnate and it is still considered a luxury hotel. Bit of a modern day description. ⁓ They have a really nice steakhouse on the premises and a lovely quote unquote rooftop bar that isn't actually a rooftop, it's just a bar on a really high floor.

with really scenic views out the window. I don't know why they call it a rooftop bar. I think it's just because Milwaukee doesn't have a lot of those. So they like claim that whenever they can, even when it's not, but kind of like a rooftop bar. It would be if it was on a shorter building.

Gina (32:22)

You

Yeah.

We just go ahead and trim the top off right there.

Kathryn (32:42)

We just chopped off

Gina (32:47)

Yes, architect

Kathryn to the rescue. This is the type of vision that we fucking need.

Kathryn (32:50)

Just chop it up just a little off the top.

Whatever you want to call it, rooftop penthouse high floor. The bar is called Blue. They have great cocktails and live jazz on the weekends. Hashtag not sponsored, but how cool would that be? Yeah. So the hotel is part of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. So they do a very good job of keeping it true to what it once was. And of course,

Gina (33:09)

It be so cool.

Kathryn (33:20)

My favorite part of the hotel is the fact that it is said to be one of the most haunted locations here in Milwaukee. The most common recurring sighting is that people will say that they've seen Charles himself wandering the halls because it was kind of his biggest claim to fame and he was really, really proud of running this hotel.

It just makes sense that his energy would still be there. It is said that he's still wandering and like just checking in to see how things are going, making sure business is good, people are okay. ⁓ I will say this, I'm not a skeptic, we all know this. I don't mean to like try to debunk this, like Charles just kind of looked like every stereotypical old German guy and there's a lot of those wandering around the city of Milwaukee. So like.

Gina (34:09)

I'm

Kathryn (34:10)

I do wonder

Gina (34:10)

like, okay.

Kathryn (34:11)

if some of the sightings were just like guests who are like elderly gentlemen, like German guys in suits, you know, because he was very, and I will say like, to be fair, he was a nondescript guy and he didn't love the spotlight. Like he wasn't, you know, like he loved doing business. He loved, you know.

Gina (34:17)

Happy!

Kathryn (34:33)

growing his businesses, but he didn't spend a lot of time. He wasn't like flashy. Like he was very nondescript and he kind of just looked like any old business guys. So grain of salt, but I will say enough people have seen him as an apparition and there are tons of stories that at least a percentage of them I am sure are true. I just think it's kind of funny. I'm just imagining someone being like, ⁓ ghost. And the guy is like, where, no.

Gina (35:02)

It's just like

someone's grandpa.

Kathryn (35:04)

Yeah, it's literally

like, he's like the father of the bride that's happening later tonight.

Gina (35:07)

my god, where?

Kathryn (35:13)

But that's not the only ghost that people are seeing

like I said, the fister prides itself on catering to the elite. numerous celebrities have stayed there.

It has hosted every US president since William McKinley. Elvis reportedly stayed there mere months before his death. Yeah. So I do wonder, there's no story specifically about Elvis, but I do wonder if he saw anything. And it has hosted numerous other celebrities who have claimed to have paranormal experiences while staying at the Pfister.

Gina (35:33)

Wow

Kathryn (35:50)

one example is actor Joey Lawrence, who stayed there when he was in town back in 2006. He apparently woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of his daughter's motion-censored toys going off repeatedly, like on and off throughout the night. Yeah.

Gina (36:05)

Hmmmm

Kathryn (36:08)

And no one was awake, no one was up moving around. The shades were drawn, so it wasn't like a reflection of anything. There was like no explanation as to why this was going off.

A more recent example is

Megan the Stallion, who was in town for Summerfest just a few years ago, and she apparently had no idea that the Pfister was reportedly haunted. So she like got on social. I don't know if she was on TikTok. I'm assuming she was on TikTok. She was like live streaming or posting a video like, no one warned me this place was haunted, blah, blah, blah, blah. She was like freaking out. So she and her team.

decided to do like a little mini paranormal investigation like in her suite and They streamed it. There's like video footage of it. You can find it. I I Couldn't find it by put like very little effort into finding it. I didn't have a lot of time, but it is out there I Was gonna promise to link it but in this moment I'm deciding not to because I will probably forget I'm sure it's very easy to find the footage does exist But of course the most modern

Gina (36:50)

damn.

Kathryn (37:15)

claim to fame the Pfister has is that they are hosts of visiting major league baseball teams when they are in town to play the Brewers. So if anyone has heard of Pfister hauntings, this is most likely what they have heard of before because so many players have come forward to say that they've had encounters at this hotel and many of them adamantly refused to stay at the hotel.

not just out of fear for the ghosts, but also for fear of playing poorly, because a lot of guys believe that the ghosts like to mess with visiting players so that they perform poorly. And the theory is it's because the ghosts are Milwaukeean, so they're Brewers fans. So they want to mess with the players so that the Brewers will win. So it's not so much a curse. It's not like a fister curse, but it kind of feels like it, because it's like...

Gina (38:04)

⁓ man.

Ahem.

Kathryn (38:10)

If you stay there, you could be off your game the next day for lack of sleep because of the haunting you might experience. So a lot of guys just straight up refuse to stay there.

a lot of guys will use their own money to get their own room at a different hotel. And one of my cousins works for a baseball team and he like travels around with players like after he goes to like the games and stuff with them. And I brought this up to him before and he is

confirmed that this is completely real. He has personally needed to comfort players before, especially since he's from Milwaukee. So like they will ask him like, are the rumors true? Is this place really haunted? And he will need to be like, no, like you're going to be fine. Like just stay at Yeah. Like it's like an actual real thing that a lot of the players don't come forward with their fears. Like a lot of coaches and you know.

Gina (38:55)

my God.

Mmm.

Kathryn (39:07)

team-related people have confirmed, yeah, we do have guys that are nervous or I've needed to come for it, but they don't want to be public because they don't want to sound crazy or whatever for believing in it. But it is a thing that is woven throughout the MLB. But because this is such a well-known legend within baseball, I am going to share a few of the most famous stories.

One of the most famous stories came from a player, also preface. I do not watch baseball or care about baseball whatsoever. So like, sorry if I like don't know any of the names or teams that they played for. They're all very basic names, but in case I'm just kind of like, I don't know who any of these guys are. So anyway, this one guy, his name was Michael Young, who played for

Gina (39:41)

Hmm?

Kathryn (39:48)

the Rangers at the time, I think. I don't know what team that is. Anyway, yeah, I think it's from like, you know, I'm not gonna pretend to guess. I was gonna say New York, but that's probably like super wrong. I don't know about baseball. Okay. You actually, I wanna look that up now. Hold on. didn't, I looked,

Gina (39:53)

Sounds fun!

No idea.

Where are the Rangers from?

Kathryn (40:07)

Super not New York. Texas.

Gina (40:10)

Where are they from? Where are they from?

Okay, so opposite of New York.

Kathryn (40:16)

It's like the New York of... No, that's not gonna work. Yeah, but Texas is just Texas. I don't think they claim... Well, I feel like New York's the same way. New York City is like, we're New York. And Texas is like, yeah.

Gina (40:19)

The South?

Yeah. We're not like anywhere else. I'm walkin'

Kathryn (40:36)

anyway, baseball ghosts. Some guy named Michael Young wherever he was at the time, allegedly Texas, he said in an interview, listen, sorry, that's literally how it starts. Listen, I'm not someone who spreads ghost stories. So if I'm telling you this, it happened. A couple of years ago, I was lying in bed after a night game and I was out. My room was locked.

Gina (40:37)

Mm-hmm.

Kathryn (41:02)

But suddenly I heard these footsteps inside my room, stomping around. I'd heard all these stories about the hotel, so I was wide awake at that point. And then I heard it again, these footsteps on the floor. So I yelled out, hey, make yourself at home, hang out, have a seat, but do not wake me up, okay? After that, I didn't hear a thing for the rest of the night. I just let him know that he was welcome, that we could be pals.

that he could marinate in there for as long as he needed to, just as long as he didn't wake me up. Isn't that great? I love that. Like, I'm imagining this, like, I do too. That was the part that I had to read that a couple of times to make sure I was like getting the quote right. Yeah, I love that. I love that. I'm just the image of this.

Gina (41:40)

Love, marinate.

Kathryn (41:52)

baseball guy who does not believe in ghosts who's just like, listen, man, I gotta get some sleep. Like I gotta, you know, be up and doing shit tomorrow for the love of God. Like just do whatever, just let me sleep. I love that. So that was one of the most famous ones. Another story came from a player named Bryce Harper who was playing his rookie year on the Washington Nationals in 2012. That one.

I did document just because they said it right in the source I got it from, whereas the previous one did not, and I did not look into it. Anyway, so as the story goes, he had laid his uniform out on the table that was near the end of the bed. I don't know if it was a coffee table or that desk thing that the TV is on. Either way, he had his outfit, like uniform thingy, laid out and ready to go the night before the game.

Gina (42:20)

You

Kathryn (42:44)

And when he woke up in the morning, he swore up and down that the table had been moved all the way across the room and that his clothes were on the floor. He went on to say, quote, was so flustered, I honestly thought there might be someone in my room. I had no idea what the hell had just happened. So I looked around like looking for someone. And then I checked to see if the door was still latched and it was. Yeah, I know, right?

So like it wasn't just locked, was like the chain thing was still, yeah.

Gina (43:18)

I wonder if he was in one of those, because you know how some rooms have an adjoining door with like another room?

Kathryn (43:19)

Right?

I don't think so,

because I don't think the suites do. And I also think...

Gina (43:29)

That makes sense, because they wouldn't put... someone important.

Kathryn (43:31)

Yeah, I don't think that

that's exactly my thought too. Yeah, yeah. And I don't know. mean, maybe, but even still, it's not easy to break into those. You know what I mean? Because it would have to be his fellow player doing a prank on him and like...

Gina (43:37)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Kathryn (43:51)

if they busted through a lock, they would not be able to like repair it. Do you know what I mean? Like, I don't know. That would just be that. I thought that too, and I don't think that's an outrageous guess, but I do think that that would be very unlikely, you know.

Gina (43:57)

Yeah, yep, yeah. Would not be a good prank.

so funny because it's such like a not, it's not a threatening haunting that one. And so you kind of just have to get your little outfit and go on with your day. Like, what do you do? Like, okay.

Kathryn (44:17)

Yeah, because it's that feels

almost like poultry. I mean, I even almost like that's like kind of poultry I see like a table was dragged across the room.

Gina (44:25)

Like moving stuff around. Yeah.

Kathryn (44:28)

And then a third story came from Carlos Gomez, and he played for the Rays, don't know where they are. And he said that he heard voices while staying in his room. And he apparently had multiple encounters that really freaked him out. And one of the most notable was one time he got out of the shower to the sound of his iPod making this weird like staticky noise.

⁓ Which is kind of weird because I feel like iPods, did they get radio reception? I don't know what the staticky noise would be. Unless it was a weird, maybe if you illegally downloaded a song onto your iPod, which I doubt a professional baseball would need to do, professional baseball player would need to do. Anyway, so super weird right off the bat. Just want to clarify for anyone who...

Gina (45:10)

No.

⁓

Yeah.

Kathryn (45:26)

was too young to know about iPods. That was like a weird thing, you know, that was not a normal occurrence with those. It should not have been doing that. So he grabbed the iPod and like really quick switched through his songs until one started playing normally. And on top of that, as he was doing that, he kept hearing whispers. I don't know if it was like around the room or if it was like coming through the iPod. That wasn't clarified. But he was so scared.

Gina (45:28)

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Kathryn (45:55)

at like what he heard and saw or whatever that he ⁓ basically ran screaming from his room and he ran out the door so fast that he didn't even have time to put pants on. I'm assuming he was in his undies. Otherwise there'd be a mugshot. But yes. ⁓ Yeah, he was absolutely horrified. He would go on to say later in an interview about the incident, quote, I'm scared to go there. Everything's scary.

Gina (46:06)

Nice.

Kathryn (46:22)

Everything in the hotel, the paintings, the pictures, it's a lot of old crazy stuff. No good, man. No good. So he was real freaked out. Yeah. Exactly. He's just like, hell no. So there are a lot of other stories from other players, but I want to land on this one in particular because I have thoughts on some of the things that he had to say. I want to talk about the scary paintings and pictures because one thing that

Gina (46:30)

You know what? I respect that. Set your boundaries, dude. Hell yeah.

Kathryn (46:51)

I think not enough people talk about in regards to the hauntings of the Pfister is the fact that, fun fact, the Pfister holds the largest hotel collection of Victoria-era original art in the entire world.

Gina (47:08)

What?

Why?

Kathryn (47:11)

Because that was a decision that Charles made. He was like, hey, we're gonna be like a little mini art museum as well. Yes. Yep. So at any given time, the Pfister houses somewhere between 60 and 90 pieces of original art from era in which it was born. And it's not just like the bedroom decor. You know how there's always like a,

Gina (47:11)

I mean, great, cool, but.

Okay, yeah, get, yeah, that makes sense, okay.

Kathryn (47:37)

cheesy little painting in every bedroom. In addition to that, there's also like weird sculptures. There's these two lobby sculptures of these little kids that like greet people upon arrival. There's various busts and carvings and just all kinds of shit just all over the place as well as, you know, your standard oil paintings, et cetera, that are all original. They're all like...

Gina (47:37)

Yeah.

Kathryn (48:04)

old as shit. None of them are replicas or anything like that. So they also do an artist in residence program and one of their more recent artists named Margaret Muzza, I think it is, took tin type photographs using all this fancy like old time kind of camera equipment and like

That just kind of fits the vibe. I bring that up because that's kind of the type of energy that the Pfister likes to have and maintain. anything that can be original in that hotel is original, which means there's a lot of objects in that building that are holding a lot of very old energy in them.

on top of that, we have all these years and years and years and decades of people coming in and out of the hotel. Like these objects are holding a lot of energy.

another theory that I want to posit, that I want to say I do not ascribe to, and I will explain why in a second, but I do want to mention this one just because it is a rumor that has circulated as an explanation as to why the hotel could be so haunted.

And the only source that I found for this rumor was was with a guy who was being interviewed about something that Charles allegedly said one time. So this is like not Charles being interviewed. It's like a very much a telephone that's why I want to specify it's just a rumor.

Gina (49:24)

Okay.

Kathryn (49:30)

Apparently, according to Charles, according to this guy, before any hotel was on the property, so before the Newell House and Pfister and all of that, there was a little log cabin where Charles apparently lived. And this guy claimed that Charles said there was a little family grave site on the property. As they were breaking ground on the Pfister, they searched for the bones from this family grave site.

so that they could move them like respectfully, but they couldn't find it. So the hotel is allegedly built above this family grave site. I will say based on things that we do know for sure, this cannot possibly be true as it is stated because Charles simply could never have lived in a cabin on that property because the Newell House was built between 1856 and 57 and Charles

wasn't born until 1859, he also was born in Buffalo. So like that simply could not have happened. What could have happened is there was a different family living in a cabin before the new old house was built. But I don't know that that was not the story that was being told. So it's one of those things where like that.

Gina (50:23)

Hmm. Hmm. Well.

Kathryn (50:47)

I would believe that certainly much more than this like provably incorrect version of the story. But I don't have any evidence of it. I don't, I'm not saying there isn't any, but I personally could not find any. So if anyone does know what was going on on the property before it was that original hotel, please let us know because I am curious to see like what was actually there before it was the Newell House. All of this is to say, even though the story about

the family bones being there proving to be false, that doesn't mean that there couldn't have been spirits left over because of the fact that we know what happened at the Newell House, right? Like this big tragic event that happened before the Pfister even existed. To me, it's kind of a one-to-one, since...

this hotel that got burnt down in such a tragic way and had so much tragic loss was replaced with another hotel, it is possible that there are spirits in this hotel that genuinely think they're just still in the Newell House. Like, they just moved from one hotel to the other. There just has to be a lot of energy left over from that. Luckily, one thing I will say is there have been no reports of hauntings related to fire in the hotel.

Like nothing has ever spontaneously caught on to my knowledge, I will say. Like maybe they keep things hush hush, but I'll knock Yeah, nothing's like caught on fire. No one ever smells like smoke when there is no or like anything like that. It's not ever been that kind of haunting, which I think is really positive because I wonder if that just means the energy from the fire is not what got left over. Like maybe there are people who just still think they're like.

Gina (52:06)

it.

Knock on wood.

Kathryn (52:31)

traveling through Milwaukee and having a lovely time at the Newell House. I kinda like that and I'm really, really hoping that that, I think it's a combination of all of these things. I think it's the paintings, I think it's Charles, and I think it's the people from the Newell House. But that is the one that makes most sense to me, especially for the hauntings in the rooms. That checks out as far as I'm concerned.

Gina (52:51)

Yeah.

I think that is, if there are ghosts from the newel in the fister, that is the best possible scenario, I think.

Kathryn (52:59)

Yeah, I

think so too, for sure. I will say, unfortunately, this is one of those places that they do not lean into the haunting story at all. Yeah, like they're very, they're just a luxury hotel. Nothing is wrong. Please come stay with us very rich MLB players. Like they do not want to ascribe to the haunting thing ever. They never comment on it outside of the very, very, very rare comment, one of which

Gina (53:09)

Boo.

Hmm

Kathryn (53:27)

was a few years ago, I don't remember when it was exactly or what it was in response to, but they posted a tweet that I don't remember exactly what it said. I'll find it and we can share it in the video. But it was basically just like. We're not haunted. Stop talking about it. It was a very like marketing, like like only thing that's haunting us is great hospitality. It was like some cheesy shit like that. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Gina (53:43)

Hahahaha

Perfect, beautiful, beautiful.

Kathryn (53:53)

But locally, everyone knows that that is known for being haunted and those who do believe it's haunted lean into it quite a bit. And it almost, the fact that they don't want to talk about it or they don't address it at all, actually makes it more of a desirable location because it has prevented it from becoming a cheesy, kitschy type of tourist grab or whatever tourist trap. It really does feel like a very authentic haunted location.

Gina (54:13)

Yeah.

It is stunning. I remember the first time I ever saw the Pfister. It was before I lived in Milwaukee and I think me and my friends drove up there for a weekend or something and we were just walking around downtown and then we saw it and I was just like, ⁓ my God, because it's beautiful. Like it's really, really gorgeous. Yeah. It's a very, it's a striking hotel. So I think if I come back as a ghost and got stuck in the afterlife somewhere, that might not be a bad place to do it.

Kathryn (54:29)

Mm-hmm.

It's very pretty. Yep, it's really pretty.

Yes.

absolutely, yes. ⁓ I would love to haunt the fister. ⁓ can you imagine? I'm at the hotel bar. ⁓ my goodness, hello. That was me talking to the bartender, sorry. I stopped because I was like, Yeah, French 75, please.

Gina (54:51)

my goodness.

I'll have your fanciest haunted drink. You're a spirit, if

you will.

Kathryn (55:06)

Yeah, so that's the Pfister. For those I've been hinting at doing an episode on the Pfister since literally I think our first week. So here it is finally. You're welcome.

Gina (55:07)

Very good, very good.

Mm.

was fun. I didn't know all that about the Pfister. I really wanna go there now. I'm in like a Milwaukee mood.

Kathryn (55:24)

Wait, so one thing, I'm so sorry about this, one thing I just realized and remembered, I'm gonna be staying at the Pfister at the end of May. Holy shit, I'm So, sorry, Chloe is gonna be in town

Gina (55:31)

What?

Why are you- what? Why? Why are you staying at the Pister?

Kathryn (55:40)

and she's getting a room at the Pfister. So I'm just gonna like pop over and see her. So, so yeah, I forgot that I literally until this moment, I'm so sorry. I did not like make this in at all. I literally was about to be like, when you said that I was about to be like, yeah, me too. completely forgot. We literally just planned this like this week.

Gina (55:45)

Nice, fun.

that's so funny.

Kathryn (56:02)

Yeah, I forgot that that was what we decided. So I will keep an eye out for you when I see her there.

Gina (56:09)

Yes,

please do. Make note of your experiences there, as if you wouldn't. I don't why I'm telling you this, because you definitely will, but I wanna hear about it.

Kathryn (56:13)

Yes, I will. Yes, I will, absolutely,

yeah.

So anyway, enough about the Pfister

Gina (56:22)

I do have a scary on top for you, if you'd like to hear it. Oh, okay. Have you ever been on what?

Kathryn (56:25)

Tell me. Hit me with it.

O-K. That was the longest two-syllable word I've ever heard.

Gina (56:39)

You gotta let the syllables breathe. Let them sit. Have you ever been on the subreddit Tales from the Front Desk?

Kathryn (56:44)

You

No, that sounds interesting though.

Gina (56:53)

It

is one of my favorite subreddits because it's exactly what it sounds like. It's like tales from people who work at the front desk of somewhere. So it's normally a hotel. I think it is pretty much just hotels and motels, that kind of thing. Because they see crazy shit all the time. And so this is a place for them to talk about the crazy shit that they have seen. And there is a story on there about a haunted hotel. So I thought it would be perfect, the perfect story to tell you today.

Kathryn (56:56)

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

That sounds very hotel-y, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

So.

Yeah.

Gina (57:23)

Let me get my dual screen set up one second.

Kathryn (57:27)

Man, I'm just remembering I used to work at a hotel and I don't know if I ever had any experiences. I did too. Yes, I was a housekeeper and then I got promoted to front desk and then I quit because it was so fucking terrible. I would take house cleaning over front desk any day. Dude, the entitlement people have. ⁓ my God.

Gina (57:32)

forgot that you were a cleaner, weren't you?

I believe it.

I believe it. my God.

Kathryn (57:51)

It was this like middle of nowhere Hampton Inn and the number of people who would come in and be like, well, I'm a blue member. Can't you do anything like, nah, dog. Blue just means that you like logged in. Like it takes nothing to become a, you know what I mean? It's like, I am making $7 an hour. Do I look like I can do anything for you? Like leave me alone. Awful. my God. And the best part about being in housekeeping is...

Gina (58:05)

Yeah.

Yep. Yeah.

Kathryn (58:18)

Even though these people were staying at a fucking Hampton Inn in the middle of nowhere, they all thought they were better than me and like wouldn't talk to me or even make eye contact with me. It was so nice. But people would like leave me things as a tip. I remember someone left an entire bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken in the fridge with a note for me that was like, we're not going to get to this. It's fresh. Promise. Like, please enjoy. I'm like, sweet. I'm a broke college kid. That's dinner for like three nights. That was great. It sucked. But like.

Gina (58:32)

Yeah!

Nice

Kathryn (58:48)

It was great.

Gina (58:49)

At least you don't have to deal with the front desk people though. I never worked at like a hotel but I've worked in enough service environments to know that yeah you don't want to especially when like all of the service environments I worked in were like people come in they get something they leave. I've never worked somewhere where people stay fucking overnight and they might come back. That sounds like a nightmare. Tales from the front desk I respect you so much.

Kathryn (58:52)

No.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

I've just, yes.

right, I'll ruminate on this later. Please tell me you're scary on top.

Gina (59:15)

Excellent. yes,

in the meantime, I ⁓ will spin you a tale. Okay, so this comes from user MrSnowflake2. If you don't believe in ghosts, I totally respect that. To be honest, before I worked at this hotel, I wasn't sure what I believed myself. When I was 19, I worked as a night auditor at a four-star hotel in my hometown. I'm not naming the hotel because they aren't

about being haunted which I love as a phrase. ⁓ They're not they haven't come out yet yeah yeah in the hotel haunted closet just like the Pfister.

Kathryn (59:45)

that. I love that. They're in the hotel closet. Yeah.

my god, yes!

Gina (59:55)

⁓ If I'd had known, I don't know if I would have applied to work there, especially at night. When I was hired, I had to sign a non-disclosure agreement stating that I couldn't talk to anyone, especially the media, about my experiences on the job.

Kathryn (1:00:13)

They knew they were haunted. 100%.

Gina (1:00:16)

But yeah,

yeah, I didn't think anything of it at the time. I assume all hotels have something like this question mark. On my first night, aka my training shift, I was taught that two to three times a night we were supposed to walk around the hotel. the hotel was so small that the night auditor doubled as night security. Which sounds like a whole lot of stress for one person. I wouldn't like that.

Kathryn (1:00:25)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I hate that.

Gina (1:00:43)

As some

context, each hallway had these beautiful floor-length mirrors at each end of the hall. The person training me advised me not to look into the mirrors while I was walking around, because if I saw something, I wasn't allowed to scream. This advice seemed harmless enough.

Kathryn (1:01:04)

That sounds harmless. I'm sorry not to victim blame, but what the F no it doesn't

Gina (1:01:09)

I I get it from the perspective of like, ⁓

if you see a guest walking around and you're not expecting to see them, like you're not allowed to like be like shocked by them because you might wake other guests up. But it's a stretch, but that's the only like logical thing I can tie it to. If it's not just a directly, hey, we're haunted and you're not allowed to scream about it, which I think is probably what it is.

Kathryn (1:01:21)

Guess.

Yeah.

was gonna say,

I guess it depends on the context with which it said. I just also am already afraid of mirrors. So anytime anyone warns me about anything even remotely related to mirrors, I'm like, great, what now?

Gina (1:01:49)

What nightmare is next?

Kathryn (1:01:50)

What dimension am I going to get sucked into?

Gina (1:01:54)

What fresh hell is this? Yeah, so that's how this person felt pretty much. No, it's not. They thought this was harmless. I'm putting words in their mouth. On my third night shift, I happened to be sitting at the front desk with my trainer and we had a good view out of the front door. The parking lot was well lit and sudden movement caught the corner of my eye. A child-sized red cloaked figure quickly came into view.

Kathryn (1:01:56)

You

Gina (1:02:22)

As they walked by, they turned to look into the glass front door. Words don't do the face justice. Let's just say it wasn't the face of a living, breathing child. I sat there stunned, unable to process what I had just seen. I was just about to open my mouth when I looked over to my trainer who was staring open-mouthed. She barely uttered, did you see that?

a long time passed of us just being quiet. Things were super awkward and uncomfortable for the rest of the shift. My trainer quit the moment the morning manager came in. She kept repeating that she had had enough and she'd seen enough. next night, the manager herself agreed to change her schedule to finish my training. We got along really well and we started chatting casually. When I finally worked up the courage to ask about my old trainer quitting,

Kathryn (1:03:00)

Wow.

Gina (1:03:17)

The manager admitted that they never kept night auditors long, and some of the more tenured day staff actually had a betting pool about how long people would last. She reluctantly went on to explain why. The backstory is the hotel started as a mill in the mid 1800s,

when the town was founded and remained so until after World War II. In the 1940s, there was a tragic accident where a little girl fell down the elevator shaft and her grandfather and her dog fell to their deaths trying to save her. Yeah. Yeah. This was actually part of the reason the mill was shut down. It was left empty until it was turned into a hotel in the 1970s.

Kathryn (1:03:53)

my god. Yikes.

Gina (1:04:05)

Since then, they have been quietly plagued by numerous ghostly encounters. The owners of the hotel didn't want this advertised because they were trying to project the image of a four-star hotel, not a haven for ghost hunters, her words. She said that apparently the old man ghost was at peace and hadn't been encountered since the mid-90s. I worked there in the mid-2000s.

Kathryn (1:04:17)

Mm.

Gina (1:04:30)

Aside from occasionally hearing unexplained barking noises coming from two specific rooms, which interestingly enough were on the top floor on either side of the original elevator shaft, the dog wasn't making any appearances either. The little girl was the only one who was active. Interestingly enough, that manager, who had been there for about five years, quit three months later when she was working late one evening and kept hearing a child's laughter.

Kathryn (1:04:41)

you

Gina (1:04:58)

when the hotel was mostly empty and there were no children staying in the hotel. And then they end the story by saying, I made it six months.

Kathryn (1:05:09)

⁓ That's a decent amount of time. Yeah. Yeah.

Gina (1:05:10)

That's a long time. I would have been so out of there.

So a spooky hotel story to end a spooky hotel story.

Kathryn (1:05:15)

Damn.

Yeah,

that was spooky. I'm, that's my thing. I, you know, I love a ghost, but I don't know if I would want to stay there. Being alone in a hotel at night, like the lights get dimmed and like no one's really around. I don't know. That might, that would be too much for me, I think.

Gina (1:05:39)

Hotels are already, like I love a hotel, don't get me wrong, but they are already a little bit unsettling because it's new surroundings. Like you're away from a place where you feel safe. And I feel like all of that gets heightened when you see the face of not a living, breathing child staring at you through a window under a red cloak. I can see how that would be terrifying and cause you to quit your job.

Kathryn (1:05:42)

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Especially a small hotel. Like the hotel I worked at was a small hotel in the middle of the country. And it was spooky at night. I didn't work the night shift

Gina (1:06:02)

Mm-hmm.

Kathryn (1:06:10)

would be too much for me, especially when it was haunted.

Gina (1:06:10)

Because at least if it was like,

yeah, if it's in a city, at least you have somewhere to run, I guess.

Kathryn (1:06:13)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, and also like, I'm imagining like my head's back at the Pfister now, a big hotel and there's a restaurant on the premises and there's a bar that stays open late. they don't dim the lights. It's not like a quiet, thing. So it's a little bit easier to digest. You're never alone, you know, there's never just one person working at a hotel like that.

Gina (1:06:35)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm, yeah. Well, if you have a story about a haunted hotel or anything, literally almost anything, as long as it's not, know, let's be reasonable here. But ⁓ if you do have a story that you would like to see right at the end of an episode, you can send it to iscreamyouscreampod@gmail.com. We also have a Patreon page where you can check out tons of behind the scenes content or

Kathryn (1:06:50)

I'm

Gina (1:07:06)

Maybe we should go behind the screams. Yes, yes, yes. So link is in the show notes and

until next time, little spoons, keep it cool.

Kathryn (1:07:21)

and keep it creepy.