Welcome To Massillon Ghosts
Sprinkled within some of Massillon’s more newsworthy events are local tragedies and sorrowful tales responsible for the haunts that terrorize the locals. From a YMCA that’s seen more death than one could imagine to a hotel with an eternal employee, the ghosts of Massillon have plenty of stories to tell.
Haunted Hospitals
Museums not only carry a city’s history. They hold its deepest, darkest secrets. A pair of hospitals once served the community, each with their own stains of the past. While the Doctors Hospital was merely a victim of its service to the community, time attempted to repress a memory that continues to corrupt the Massillon Community Hospital’s legacy.
Stand with Massillon Ghosts just outside the Massillon Museum and hear the tale of what could have been the worst night in the city’s history. Multiple young lives violently snuffed out, long before they even had a chance to venture into the world. The horrific slaying left a permanent scar on the community, one that still has influence over Massillon’s energy.
Elsewhere, the Doctors Hospital did its best to stay above the usual trials and tribulations of a medical facility. As if the basement morgue wasn’t enough to manifest darker specters, there’s an alleged curse on the grounds, a gift from a former elderly patient.
What Will I See?
Visit Massillon’s Most Haunted Locations, Including:
- Massillon Public Library – The former home of Massillon’s founder, the building the public library occupies has been a piece of the city since the beginning. It’s not his phantom that haunts the stacks, though, but rather the tethered souls of two former owners.
- Massillon Woman’s Club – A family home-turned-Woman’s Club, the building has no recorded tragedies that account for the spectral activity observed by investigators and visitors.
- YMCA – This community center isn’t just a space for fitness and childcare services. Its second story once housed a homeless shelter, and its ghosts are thought to be those found dead under mysterious circumstances or at their own hands.
Stay Away from the Upper Floor
Opened in the early 20th century, Massillon’s YMCA has always served the community, though how it did so has changed over the years. One particular period may be widely responsible for the spirit activity that workers and guests have reported witnessing throughout.
Get to know the history of Massillon’s historic community center and listen as Massillon Ghosts uncovers the tragic truth of the YMCA’s upper floors. A former haven for the city’s growing homeless population, not everyone found safety within the YMCA’s walls. It’s those souls that remain bound to the center, their screams often heard echoing in the emptiness.
Workers complain of moving objects and keys that somehow wind up in a completely different room than where they started. There’s a dark malevolence embedded in the highest floor, which some attribute to the stories of unconfirmed murders amongst the homeless population. Flickering lights and the cold breath of a presence from beyond have even unsettled the most skeptical visitors.
Why is Massillon so Haunted?
The Darkest Stain on Massillon’s History
It doesn’t take one major event to manifest haunts throughout a city. However, Massillon has a history surprisingly gripped by violence. During the early 20th century, steel workers across several states sought improved conditions and higher wages. Though typically peaceful, the Little Steel strike of 1937 took an unexpected turn when police engaged with the union members.
Feel the negative energy that permeates Massillon’s air as Massillon Ghosts recounts the bloody confrontation that unfolded on July 11, 1937. Listen closely and you may still hear the explosions of gunfire that had suddenly cut through the crowd. More than a dozen died in the fray, and parts of Massillon wore the weight of the heated conflict.
Lost souls wander near the site of the strike, forever seeking justice for their untimely and preventable death. On quiet nights, the shadows of the fallen can be seen standing in the streets, an eerie vision sure to get anyone’s heart racing.
Massillon’s Most Haunted
A heavy air circulates throughout Massillon, a manifestation of the city’s dark energy and most tragic events. Spirits have found a home in many very haunted locations, like Massillon State Hospital’s McKinley Hall. As the building that began the facility’s legacy, the abandoned hall has several specters. It’s Eleanor, a woman whose mysterious death has never been resolved, that remains the most active, her apparition seen peering through windows on full moon nights.
Massillon’s Public Library is another historic building in the old city. The former site of the Massillon Museum, the past has permeated throughout the building, leaving behind haunts with ties to an earlier age. Investigators, workers, and even guests have seen or heard the remnants of these spirits as they navigate through the library’s vast collection.
* This is a walking tour and we do not enter privately-owned buildings or private property *
