The Haunted Franklin Hotel, Strawberry Point: Lily in Lavender and Leo's Bell

The Franklin Hotel stands at 102 Elkader Street in Strawberry Point, a town of about 1,200 in northeast Iowa best known for its giant fiberglass strawberry. Built in 1902 and opened in February 1903, the two-story brick hotel wraps around the corner of Elkader and Mission Streets, with a long front porch, a restored staircase and a vintage lobby. It is on the National Register of Historic Places and was run as a hotel for more than a century.

It also has one of the most charming ghost stories in Iowa. Lily, or Lillie, is a woman in a lavender gown who is heard singing or moaning and is said to drift between her old room and the lobby. A former owner says he saw her walk toward the empty dining room and vanish. And Leo, a long-time resident who died in 2004, is said to ring the old bell system he once used to call the front desk. Sadly, the Franklin closed in 2025, but we have kept it on our list of haunted hotels in Iowa for its stories.

The ghosts of The Franklin Hotel

Lily in the lavender gown

Lily is the Franklin’s best-known ghost. She is described as a woman in a lavender gown, heard singing, moaning or occasionally screaming in the halls with no source anyone can find. She is said to move furniture in what was once her room and to float between that room and the lobby.

The most quoted sighting came from former owner Doug Schmidt, who ran the hotel from 1989. He has said he saw a woman in a lavender gown in the bar area after closing and went to tell her they were closed, only for her to vanish as he reached her. Schmidt himself told KCRG in 2017 that he was skeptical, and that at least six ghost-hunting groups had visited over the years, some reporting things they could not explain.

Who was Lily?

Popular lore says Lily was a prostitute who worked at the hotel in the 1920s. Local writer John Brassard Jr., who looked into the story in 2024, notes there is no factual evidence for this. A visiting psychic once told an owner that Lily was upset because a mirror had been moved from her room, but the owners found nothing to back that up either. Interestingly, the name itself is said to have come from Leo Gallagher, who claimed to know her.

Leo and the bell

Leo Gallagher was a legally blind man who ran a laundromat nearby and lived at the Franklin for more than forty years. He said he had met Lily more than once and counted her as a friend. Leo died of lung cancer in 2004, and some believe he never left.

Leo had a bell system installed between his room and the lobby so he could call the desk. Guests and staff have reported hearing that bell ring when nobody was there to ring it. Travel Iowa describes him as a former merchant who ran the hotel laundry for 30 years, and the details vary from telling to telling.

The most haunted rooms and places to look

• Lily's room: An upstairs room where furniture is said to move. Owners have not published which room it was.
• The lobby and staircase: Lily is said to drift between her room and the lobby; the restored staircase is one of the building’s best features.
• The bar and dining room: Where Doug Schmidt says he saw the woman in lavender after closing.
• Leo's bell: The old call system between Leo’s room and the front desk.

History of The Franklin Hotel

Strawberry Point’s first hotel was the Blake Hotel, built in 1854 by Alexander Blake Jr. on a stagecoach route. In 1902 local businessmen formed the Franklin Hotel and Land Company to give the town a modern hotel. E.M. Loop of Hopkinton built it to a design by Netcott and Donnan of Independence, Iowa, in a mix of Neoclassical and Romanesque Revival styles, with a rounded corner that follows the curve of the intersection. It opened on February 12, 1903.

Railroad tracks ran just north of the hotel, and it served rail passengers and, later, highway travelers. Over the years the building also housed a laundry, a newspaper, a barbershop, a bar and event rooms. In 1989 Lu and Charlie Eck sold it to their daughter Kris and her husband Doug Schmidt, who restored it, cut the number of guest rooms and added modern comforts while keeping the call box and front desk. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000.

The Franklin went up for sale in 2023, and owner Hernando Espinosa, who had bought it shortly before the pandemic, kept the restaurant running through COVID with a drive-up window. In July 2025 the city declined to renew the liquor license after a state inspection found fire-safety violations. The bar had already closed, the restaurant closed in September 2025, and Espinosa said the hotel would close on October 30, 2025. When we checked in November 2026 we found no news of a sale or reopening.

Tips for a haunted stay

• The Franklin is closed, so do not try to book it through old listings. If it reopens, we will update this guide.
• You can still see the building from Elkader Street. The curved brick corner and long porch are worth a photo, and the giant strawberry is nearby.
• For a haunted stay in northeast Iowa, Hotel Julien in Dubuque is about an hour east.
• Haunted Rooms runs ghost hunt sleepovers at Ringling House in Baraboo, Wisconsin.

More haunted hotels nearby

• Hotel Julien, Dubuque: about an hour east, with an Al Capone legend
• Redstone Inn and Suites, Dubuque: an 1894 mansion inn
• DeSoto House Hotel, Galena: just across the Mississippi from Dubuque
• Independence State Mental Hospital: about 40 minutes west
• Haunted hotels in Iowa

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the hotel’s own website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as guests, staff and local historians tell them. Read how we rate haunted hotels.

• Wikipedia: Franklin Hotel (Strawberry Point, Iowa)
• KCRG: Franklin restaurant closes, hotel to close in October (Sept 2025)
• KCRG: Inside Strawberry Point's historic (and haunted?) hotel (2017)
• John Brassard Jr.: Strange, the Franklin Hotel (2024)
• Travel Iowa: 13 of Iowa's most haunted
• Only In Your State: The Franklin Hotel