Haunted Cain's Ballroom, Tulsa: Bob Wills and the Lady in Red

Cain’s Ballroom sits on North Main Street in the Tulsa Arts District, a low brick building with a plain front that gives little away. Inside is one of the most famous dance halls in America: a sprung maple floor, a wooden ceiling, a neon star, and walls lined with portraits of the musicians who played here, from Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys to the Sex Pistols. A banner over the stage still reads “Home of Bob Wills.”

It is also Tulsa’s best-known haunted venue. TravelOK, the state’s tourism site, says the hall is rumored to be haunted by Wills himself, and staff and fans describe a “lady in red.” Bartenders, managers and a tile installer have told local reporters their own stories. Below we set out what is history, what is told as a ghost story, and how you can stand on that floor yourself.

History of Cain's Ballroom

Tulsa businessman W. Tate Brady built the building in 1924 as a garage. In 1930 Madison W. “Daddy” Cain bought it and opened the Cain’s Dance Academy, and through the 1930s it ran as a dime-a-dance hall, where ten cents bought a lesson or a turn around the floor.

On New Year’s Night 1935 a young fiddler named Bob Wills brought his band, the Texas Playboys, to Cain’s. They played there through the late 1930s and early 1940s, broadcasting on the Tulsa radio station KVOO, and their mix of fiddle music, jazz and big band swing became known as Western swing. When Wills left in 1943 his brother Johnnie Lee Wills took over the regular shows. Wills went on to the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and “Take Me Back to Tulsa” is still a local anthem.

Cain’s was unusual in segregated Tulsa for regularly booking Black artists, among them Count Basie and Ernie Fields. In the 1940s and 1950s it had a rougher side too; KJRH describes it as a rowdy roadhouse with fights outside, and by the 1960s it was reported to be almost empty. Marie Meyers bought it in 1972 and tried to bring the dances back without much luck.

In 1976 promoter Larry Shaeffer bought the hall for $60,000 and turned it into a rock club. Eric Clapton dropped in unannounced in 1975, and on January 11, 1978 the Sex Pistols played here on their only American tour; Sid Vicious punched a hole in the green room wall, and that piece of wall is now on display. Promoters began booking Halloween shows in 1974, a tradition that changed the hall’s image.

Neurosurgeon James Rodgers and his wife Alice bought Cain’s in 2002 and their family restored it, opening the old attic as an upstairs bar around 2006. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003, celebrated its hundredth year in 2024, and today is one of the busiest club venues in the country and a rite of passage for red dirt and Oklahoma musicians.

The ghosts of Cain's Ballroom

Bob Wills

The most famous ghost story at Cain’s is the simplest: that Bob Wills, who made the hall his home for eight years, never quite left. TravelOK says the venue is rumored to be haunted by him. Author Jeff Provine told News 9 that people say Wills still shows up, recognizable by his hat and outfit. It is a story about a man and a place that belong together, not a record of anything seen.

The lady in red

Employees and fans describe a woman in red. Teri French, founder of the Paranormal Investigation Team of Tulsa, told TulsaPeople that a bartender saw a “Lady in Red” during the first concert after the renovation. In a later interview with KJRH, French said a bartender had seen a see-through woman in a ballgown and suggested she might be an elderly woman who once lived on the property, though she was not sure. Other accounts give the hall more than one female ghost and different names.

The cowboy who wants popcorn

One of the better stories is about a man in old cowboy clothes who came to the bar and asked for popcorn at ten cents, a price Cain’s has not charged since the early days. Longtime bartender David Standingwater told Oklahoma Magazine he once saw a jacketed silhouette in a hat leaning on the bar around 2006 or 2007, a figure that vanished when he looked straight at it, and wondered if it was Hank Williams, whose portrait hangs on the wall. A tile installer working on the upstairs renovation is said to have told management about a phantom cowboy and refused to come back.

The child's voice and the crying woman

Bar manager David Ward told Oklahoma Magazine that a paranormal team’s recording picked up a child’s voice saying “I wanna help,” which seemed to come from the northwest corner of the room. A speaker later told staff that in the Bob Wills years parents would leave children asleep on cots there while they danced, and Ward connected the two. Teri French also told KJRH that while alone in the restroom behind the stage she heard a woman crying and moaning, and found no one there.

Where to look

• The maple dance floor: the heart of the hall, where Wills’s band played for dancers from 1935.
• The bar: where the popcorn cowboy and the silhouette in a hat are said to appear.
• The northwest corner: where staff say the child’s voice on the recording seemed to come from.
• The restroom behind the stage: where Teri French says she heard a woman crying.
• The upstairs bar: the old attic, opened around 2006, where the tile installer’s phantom cowboy story is set.

Visiting Cain's Ballroom

Cain’s is a working concert venue, so the way in is to buy a ticket for a show; it books rock, country, red dirt, punk and touring acts most weeks of the year. The box office is open on weekdays, and the venue also runs a gift shop. There are no public ghost tours or ghost hunts inside, and paranormal teams that have investigated did so by arrangement with the owners.

Tulsa Spirit Tours, founded by Teri French, includes Cain’s on its downtown ghost tours, and the Tulsa Theater, Tulsa’s other famous haunted music hall, is a few blocks away in the same arts district. The Greenwood district, with the Greenwood Rising history center on the 1921 Race Massacre, is a short walk east.

• Visiting A working concert venue; you get in with a show ticket
• Tours No regular public tours; it is open for concerts
• Hours and season Box office Monday to Friday, 10 AM to 4 PM (closed noon to 1 PM)
• Ghost hunting No public ghost hunts; paranormal teams have investigated by arrangement

Tips for your visit

• Arrive early and walk the edges of the room: the portrait walls are a history of American music.
• Look up at the neon star and the wooden ceiling; much of the room looks as it did in the Wills years.
• Ask the bar staff about the hall’s history on a quiet night; several of the ghost stories come from them.
• Pair a show with the Tulsa Theater and a Tulsa Spirit Tours walk downtown.
• Check the age policy for each show before you buy tickets.

More haunted places nearby

• Tulsa Theater: the 1914 hall where Caruso’s ghost is said to linger
• The Belvidere Mansion: a towered 1907 mansion in Claremore, half an hour away
• Haunted hotels in Oklahoma: where to stay the night
• Haunted places in Oklahoma
• Haunted places in Tulsa

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.

• Wikipedia: Cain's Ballroom
• TravelOK: Cain's Ballroom
• KJRH: Tulsa's famous haunts, Cain's Ballroom
• TulsaPeople: Ghost town (October 2010)
• Oklahoma Magazine: Hosting a ghost or two
• KJRH: Green Country ghosts, the most haunted places across Tulsa
• News 9: Countdown of the 6 most haunted places in Oklahoma
• TravelOK: Most haunted places in Oklahoma