Silver City, Idaho: The Ghost Town, the Idaho Hotel and Its Ghosts

Silver City sits at about 6,200 feet in a narrow valley of Jordan Creek in the Owyhee Mountains of southwest Idaho, some 25 miles of mostly gravel road from the county seat at Murphy. In the 1860s and 1870s it was one of the richest mining towns in the Northwest. Today around 70 buildings survive, nearly all of them privately owned by families who come up for the summer, and the whole valley is a National Register historic district.

At the center of town stands the Idaho Hotel, a rambling wooden building that began life in another mining camp, was dragged here by oxen in 1866 and still rents rooms. Its owners have spoken openly about the ghosts they share it with. This guide covers Silver City’s history, the stories told about the hotel and the town’s cemeteries, and the practical things you need to know before you make the drive.

History of Silver City

The first mining camp on Jordan Creek was Ruby City, where the Idaho Hotel opened in 1863. When rich silver ore was found on nearby War Eagle Mountain, Silver City was settled in 1864, closer to the mines. It quickly outgrew Ruby City and took the Owyhee County seat in 1866, and it kept it until 1934. Silver City had the territory’s first daily newspaper, The Idaho Avalanche, an early telegraph line, telephone service by 1880 and electric power in the 1890s.

Population figures for the boom years vary widely. Some accounts say the town reached about 2,500 people and 75 businesses in the 1880s, though the 1880 census counted only 593. The richest placer and quartz mines were largely worked out by around the time of statehood in 1890, and mining limped on in a small way until World War II. By the 1940s only one permanent resident, Willie Hawes, remained, and the town’s power lines were taken down and reused at Mountain Home Air Force Base.

What saved Silver City was its isolation and its families. Descendants of miners kept their houses as summer homes, and in 1972 the Silver City Historic District was listed on the National Register, covering more than 10,000 acres. The land is federally owned and managed by the Bureau of Land Management, but the roughly 70 buildings are private. Exteriors can be repaired but not altered. About 60 families keep part-time homes here, and the winter population is often a single watchman.

The Idaho Hotel’s story is the town’s in miniature. It was established in Ruby City in 1863; when Silver City took the county seat in 1866, a wing was dismantled, hauled up Jordan Creek on sleds pulled by oxen and reassembled here. It grew over the following decades, with a bar, a billiards and gambling room in 1889, two stories of bedrooms above the dining room in 1898 and a storage tunnel in 1901. In 1868 a man was shot dead in front of it. The hotel closed in 1942, was restored and reopened by Edward Jagel in 1972, and since 2000 has belonged to Roger and Jerri Nelson, who are still restoring sections that remain closed.

The ghosts of Silver City and the Idaho Hotel

Screaming Alice

The hotel’s best-known ghost is a woman in a white dress the owners call Screaming Alice. In a 2022 interview with KIVI, owner Jerri Nelson said the story is that she fell down the third-floor staircase decades ago, and that she is still seen there. We found no record of who Alice was or when she died.

The man in the tuxedo and the children

Nelson also described a large man dressed in a tuxedo and tails, and children, as presences she has encountered in the building, along with cold spots in the hallways and small iridescent orbs that seem to drift down the corridor. Other ghost writers mention an old man in a duster coat and lights that flicker in the upstairs rooms.

The ghost that was a duffle bag

Nelson is refreshingly honest about some reports. She told KIVI about a couple who stayed the night: the wife was sure someone was sitting at the foot of the bed, the husband put a hand over her mouth to keep her quiet, and she bit him. Nothing supernatural had happened, Nelson said; he had left a duffle bag on the end of the bed. It is a good reminder of how a dark old building plays on the mind.

The cemeteries

Silver City has three cemeteries. On the east side of the valley is the old pioneer and Chinese cemetery, where the Chinese graves show only as hollows because the remains were sent home to China. Downstream on the west side of Jordan Creek are the Protestant and Masonic cemeteries. Idaho ghost round-ups describe the miners’ graves here as restless, but no specific story is attached to them; they are best visited by day for their history.

Where to look

• The Idaho Hotel's third-floor stairs: where Screaming Alice is said to have fallen.
• The hotel hallways: for cold spots and the small orbs the owners describe.
• The saloon and dining room: with its noticeably sloping floor and 19th century bar.
• The pioneer and Chinese cemetery: on the east side of the valley.
• The Protestant and Masonic cemeteries: downstream on the west bank of Jordan Creek.

Visiting Silver City

The usual route is from Murphy, south of Nampa: about seven and a half miles of pavement and then twelve and a half miles of gravel that is rough in places. A second route climbs in from Jordan Valley, Oregon, on a narrower, rougher road. Ordinary cars make it in dry weather, but the roads get slippery in rain and are buried by four to six feet of snow in winter. There is no gas, no grocery store and no phone service, so fill up and bring water, food and a first aid kit.

The Idaho Hotel opens on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend and closes in mid-October before the snow. It has 13 rooms with antique furniture and no televisions or in-room bathrooms, solar-powered 12-volt lighting and a saloon and dining room serving meals; book ahead by phone or text on 208-941-1119. Every building in town is private, so stay on the streets unless you are invited in. The best chance to see inside is the annual open house on the second weekend after Labor Day, when ten or more private buildings open for a small fee.

• Visiting Remote ghost town reached by gravel road from Murphy; no gas, groceries or phone service; private buildings, so stay on the streets
• Tours Annual open house in September lets visitors inside private buildings
• Hours and season The hotel opens from Memorial Day weekend and closes in mid-October before the snow

Tips for your visit

• Book a night at the Idaho Hotel rather than driving in and out in a day; the town is at its best after the day visitors leave.
• Do not attempt the road in rain or before Memorial Day weekend.
• Go to the September open house to see inside the private buildings.
• Walk the cemeteries by day and leave everything as you find it.
• Ask the owners for their stories over dinner in the saloon.

More haunted places nearby

• The Old Idaho Penitentiary, Boise: Idaho’s most haunted place, two hours north
• Canyon Hill Cemetery, Caldwell: the Phantom Jogger legend, on the way back to Boise
• Haunted hotels in Idaho: more haunted places to stay
• Haunted places in Idaho
• Haunted places in Boise

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the official website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as staff, visitors and investigators tell them, and we say where records contradict a story.

• KIVI: Is Silver City's Idaho Hotel haunted? (2022)
• Wikipedia: Silver City, Idaho
• Historic Silver City: The Idaho Hotel
• DesertUSA: Exploring Silver City
• Expedition Portal: A ghost town reborn, Silver City
• Only In Your State: The oldest hotel in Idaho is also one of the most haunted