Haunted Places in Madison, WI: 7 to Visit and 1 to Leave Alone
A projectionist in a State Street movie palace, a tuberculosis hill on the north side, a human foot in a campus attic and two pioneers still buried under Bascom Hill. These are Madison’s ghost stories, with the facts behind them.
Madison’s haunted places sit close together: the Orpheum, the Majestic and the Great Dane around Capitol Square, Science Hall and Bascom Hill on the UW campus, and the old Lake View Sanatorium on the north side. Some stories rest on real history: the embalmed foot found in Science Hall’s attic in 1974, the graves found on Bascom Hill, the decades of tuberculosis patients on Sanatorium Hill. Others, like Frank the steelworker in the Capitol, have no record we could find, and we say so.
Where to look The projection booth by the stage door, the seats under the balcony, the furnace room and downstairs restrooms
Reported ghosts Pete the Projectionist, a head usher who fell from the balcony, figures in 1920s clothes
Visiting A working concert venue; go to a show
Ghost hunting No public ghost hunts
The Orpheum opened on State Street on March 31, 1927, designed by the Chicago theater architects C.W. and George L. Rapp, with an Art Deco front and French Renaissance interior. It has hosted vaudeville, movies, weddings and concerts from Bob Dylan to Bob Marley, and it was added to the National Register in 2008 as Madison’s best surviving movie palace.
Its best-known ghost is Pete the Projectionist, who the story says hanged himself in the booth near the stage door and still moves things there. Staff also tell of a head usher who fell from the balcony, a man who sits under the balcony and vanishes, muffled talk and jingling keys after closing, and figures in 1920s and 1930s clothes. A 1927 photo in the hallway is said to show a man who was not there.
Haunted Rooms tip: Look at the 1927 photograph in the hallway to the left as you walk in, then find a seat under the balcony.
Where to look The woods of Lake View Hill Park and the small graveyard to the west
Reported ghosts Hot and cold spots, lights and mists in the woods, phantom touches
Visiting County park open to walkers; the main building is county offices
Ghost hunting Park rules apply; no access to the building
Dane County’s Lake View Sanatorium treated tuberculosis patients on the highest hill on Madison’s north side from 1930 until 1966, when antibiotics made sanatoria obsolete. Its main building, designed by Law, Law and Potter, was listed on the National Register in 1993 and now houses the Dane County Department of Human Services. The wooded grounds behind it are a 41-acre county conservancy park with trails and an interpretive site on the old staff veranda.
Locals call it Sanatorium Hill. People walking the woods and the small graveyard describe hot and cold spots, apparitions, strange lights and mists, and being touched. Darker tales of smokestacks and a tunnel for the dead are lore, not record, and a visiting paranormal team in 2023 got no response at the cemetery.
Haunted Rooms tip: Walk the park trails in daylight, read the interpretive signs at the veranda, and stay out of the working county building.
Where to look The attic and the fourth floor, where dissections were done
Reported ghosts Smells of formaldehyde, sounds in the attic, a mad professor legend
Visiting University building; see it from Park Street and Bascom Hill
Ghost hunting No ghost hunting
The first Science Hall burned in 1884, and its red brick Gothic replacement went up from 1887, billed on its plaque as the first all steel and ceramic building in the country and the first fireproof building on campus. A worker died during construction. For decades it housed the anatomy department, with a basement morgue and a lift carrying cadavers up to fourth-floor dissection rooms, until the last dissection in 1956. The geography department is there now.
In 1974 graduate students found an embalmed human foot in the attic, left behind by the anatomy lab, and leg bones have turned up too. Students describe odors of formaldehyde where the labs were, unexplained sounds and a legend of a mad professor’s secret attic lab. It inspired the comic The Phantom of Bascom Hill.
Haunted Rooms tip: See it from Park Street on an evening walk up Bascom Hill; the building is for university use.
Reported ghosts Frank, a steelworker said to have fallen in the rotunda; workers killed in a collapse
Visiting Open to the public daily
Tours Free 45 to 50 minute guided tours daily from the rotunda
Hours and season Building open weekdays 8 am to 6 pm, weekends 8 am to 4 pm
Ghost hunting No ghost hunting
The present Capitol rose between 1906 and 1917 to designs by George B. Post and Sons, after a fire on February 26, 1904, gutted its predecessor. Free guided tours run every day from the ground floor rotunda, and the observation deck is open from mid-April through December.
Madison’s ghost guides tell of Frank Smith, a steelworker said to have fallen to his death in the rotunda while building the dome, a friendly ghost some claim to see from the balcony. Others say workers killed in a construction collapse still walk the building. The collapse on record was in 1883, when part of the old Capitol’s south wing fell and killed five workers; we found no record of Frank.
Haunted Rooms tip: Join a free tour and ask about the dome, then go up to the observation deck in season.
Reported ghosts A misshapen shadow man, the 'putty man', a voice that pulls hair
Visiting A working music venue
Ghost hunting No public ghost hunts
The Majestic opened on King Street, just off Capitol Square, on December 15, 1906, as Madison’s second vaudeville house, and Harry Houdini played its stage. It began showing films in 1908, became an art house in the 1970s and was made a city landmark in 1995. After closing as a cinema it had a spell as a nightclub, and since 2007 it has been a live music venue.
Its ghost is a shadow. Two college students in the balcony described a shadowy ‘putty man’ that grew larger as they watched, and others have reported a misshapen shadow figure moving through the building. Before the theater closed for a time in 2000, cast members preparing a Rocky Horror Picture Show night said they heard a ghostly voice and had their hair pulled.
Haunted Rooms tip: Catch a show and look up at the balcony between sets.
Address Bascom Hill, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI
Where to look Around the Lincoln statue and the steps of Bascom Hall
Reported ghosts An older and a younger man by the statue, a man in a bowler hat on the Bascom Hall steps
Visiting Open campus grounds
Ghost hunting No ghost hunting
Before the university, the top of this hill was Madison’s first cemetery, used from about 1837 to 1846. William Nelson, said to have died of typhoid in 1837, and Samuel Warren, an Englishman killed by lightning in 1838, were buried here. Most graves were moved as the campus grew, but the remains of these two men were found in 1918, when the Lincoln statue was moved to its present spot, and left in place under two small bronze plaques with their initials. Bascom Hall at the top dates from 1857 to 1859.
People crossing the hill at night have described an older and a younger man near the statue, and a figure in a bowler hat, ‘from a different time’, on the steps of Bascom Hall. Rumors that workers died building the hall have never been proven, and these are student and local stories with nothing to back them, but the graves are real.
Haunted Rooms tip: Look for the small initialed markers near the Lincoln statue, then watch the sun set over Lake Mendota.
Visiting a haunted place by day is one thing. Investigating one after dark is another. On a Haunted Rooms ghost hunt our team takes you through a historic building with professional ghost hunting equipment, runs EVP sessions and vigils, and gives you time to explore on your own. These are the nearest ones we run.
Mortuary Manor Ghost Hunt, Toledo: investigate a former north Toledo funeral home with its embalming rooms, basement morgue and viewing parlors still in place.
Where to look The basement storage room staff call the spooky room, the pool tables
Reported ghosts Phantom phone calls, pool cues falling one by one
Visiting A working brewpub
Ghost hunting No ghost hunts
The Great Dane opened its first brewpub in the mid-1990s on the corner of Doty Street downtown, in a building about 140 years old that was once the Fess Hotel. Traces of the hotel’s name can still be seen on the side of the building, and it spent years as office space before the brewery moved in.
The stories began in the office years, when calls reportedly came through from rooms that no longer existed. Staff still describe phantom calls that seem to come from the pub’s own in-house line, a cold, unsettling basement storeroom they call the spooky room, and one employee who watched pool cues drop from their rack one at a time.
Haunted Rooms tip: Order a house beer at the bar and ask whether anyone has been down to the spooky room lately.
These places appear in older lists of haunted spots. We keep them here so you know the facts before you go, but you cannot (or should not) visit them.
Wonder Bar, 222 E. Olin Avenue
Opened in 1929 as a front for Chicago bootlegger Roger Touhy and run by his brother Eddie, this roadhouse is wrapped in stories: a smuggling tunnel to Lake Monona, Eddie buried behind a second-floor fireplace, footsteps and a choking feeling in the basement. Paranormal researchers investigated in 2007. It has been closed since early 2021, boarded up and overgrown, and a developer wants to demolish it. Look from the street only.
Visited one of these places? Tell us what happened
We collect first-hand accounts from visitors and add the best ones to our guides, with your first name and the date of your visit. We read every story before it’s published.
Frequently asked questions
What is the most haunted place in Madison?
The Orpheum Theater on State Street, with its stories of Pete the Projectionist and a man who sits under the balcony, is the best known. Sanatorium Hill and Science Hall are close behind.
Is the Orpheum Theater in Madison haunted?
Staff tell of Pete the Projectionist in the booth by the stage door, a head usher who fell from the balcony, jingling keys after closing and figures in 1920s clothes. None of it is proven.
Was there a cemetery on Bascom Hill?
Yes. Madison’s first cemetery was on the hill from about 1837 to 1846. Most graves were moved, but William Nelson and Samuel Warren are still buried there under small markers.
Why is Science Hall said to be haunted?
It housed the anatomy department for decades, with a basement morgue and fourth-floor dissection rooms, and in 1974 students found an embalmed human foot in the attic.
Can you visit Lake View Sanatorium?
The wooded grounds are Lake View Hill Park, a county park with trails and an interpretive site. The main building is county offices and not open for exploring.
Are there ghost tours in Madison?
Yes. Madison Ghost Walks runs walking tours around Capitol Square, and the Capitol itself offers free daily tours.
Sources and how we research
Every place in this guide is checked against its official website, historic register listings and news coverage, and we confirm whether it is open, closed, private or gone before we list it. Ghost stories are reported as staff, visitors and local historians tell them; we say so where records contradict a story. Each place shows how many independent sources we checked it against; our own Haunted Rooms pages are not counted.
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About the authors
The Haunted Rooms Team runs public ghost hunts and overnight investigations at historic venues across the United States. We research every place in our guides using official sites, historic registers, local archives and news coverage, and we report ghost stories as the stories they are. We review each guide regularly so you are not sent to a place that has closed, changed hands or banned visitors. Spotted something out of date? Let us know.
