Bannack, Montana: Ghost Town History, Dorothy Dunn and Visiting

Bannack sits in a dry valley on Grasshopper Creek in Beaverhead County, southwest of Dillon. About 60 log, brick and frame buildings still stand along its main street, kept as they were left rather than restored, and the whole town has been a Montana state park since 1954 and a National Historic Landmark since 1961.

Its ghost stories grew out of a hard history: a gold rush, a sheriff hanged by vigilantes, mine accidents and a drowning that the town never forgot. The best known centers on the Hotel Meade, the brick courthouse turned hotel at the heart of town, where a girl in a long blue dress has been reported at an upstairs window for more than a century. Below we set out what the records say, what is legend, and how to see it all for yourself, including the park’s October Ghost Walk.

History of Bannack

John White and his party found gold on Grasshopper Creek on July 28, 1862, at a spot that became known as White’s Bar. Within months a rough camp of miners and merchants had sprung up, and Bannack became the first major gold town in what would soon be Montana Territory. In 1864 it briefly served as the territorial capital, until the seat of government moved to Virginia City after the even richer strike at Alder Gulch.

Gold brought crime with it. Henry Plummer, elected sheriff, was accused of secretly leading a gang of road agents who robbed and killed travelers between Bannack and Virginia City. Miners formed a vigilance committee, and on January 10, 1864, Plummer and two of his deputies were hanged at Bannack without a trial; the vigilantes went on to hang about two dozen men in all. Historians still argue over how guilty Plummer really was, and some see the outlaw story as partly a cover for the vigilantes’ own violence.

The town’s most important building went up in 1875: a two-story brick courthouse for Beaverhead County. During rumors of a Nez Perce attack in 1877 settlers sheltered inside for a week. When the county seat moved to Dillon in 1881 the building stood empty, until Dr. John S. Meade remodeled it as the Hotel Meade around 1890; sources give dates from 1888 to 1891. Bertie Mathews’s parents, Rufe and Montana Mathews, later managed it.

Bannack shrank once the railroad bypassed it in 1880, though dredges kept working the creek into the 20th century. By the 1940s the hotel had closed and the last residents were leaving. The Beaverhead County Museum acquired the land in 1953, the state took it over as a park the next year, and the National Register added it in 1966. Today the park keeps the buildings in arrested decay and hosts Bannack Days each July.

The ghosts of Bannack

Dorothy Dunn at the Hotel Meade

In August 1916, 16-year-old Dorothy Dunn went swimming in a dredge pond near town with her cousin Fern and a friend. None of them could swim, and when they stepped off a ledge into deep water a passerby managed to save the other two girls, but not Dorothy. The spot is still called Dorothy’s Hole.

Her best friend, Bertie Mathews, spent much of her childhood in the Hotel Meade, which her parents ran. According to Bertie’s godson, Lee Graves, quoted in the Montana Standard in 2004, Bertie later saw Dorothy upstairs in the hotel and knew her by her long blue dress. That account is the root of the story, and it is a family one, passed down rather than recorded at the time.

The girl at the window

Visitors since have reported a young girl in a long blue dress on the Hotel Meade’s second floor or looking down from an upstairs window. Legends of America collects reports of cold spots, the sound of children crying, a front door that swung open on a still day, and a seven-year-old who said a girl’s mouth moved as if she were trying to speak. Others describe trouble breathing upstairs, as if underwater. None of it can be checked, but the stories are remarkably consistent.

Henry Plummer and the hanged men

Some say Sheriff Plummer still walks the town he died in, perhaps to clear his name. We found no specific sighting behind this; it is the kind of story that attaches itself to any famous death. The same goes for reports of women in fine dresses seen around town.

What the park says

Montana State Parks leans into the stories once a year with the Ghost Walk, when costumed actors portray people from Bannack’s past on evening tours. Outside October the park presents Bannack as history, and even a Bureau of Land Management planner at Garnet sends ghost hunters here, calling it the place to go.

Where to look

• The Hotel Meade: the 1875 courthouse turned hotel; Dorothy is said to appear on the second floor and at the upstairs windows.
• Dorothy's Hole: the old dredge pond along Grasshopper Creek where she drowned in 1916.
• Main Street: for the empty storefronts, the Masonic Lodge and schoolhouse, and the 1877 Methodist church.
• The cemetery and gallows: on the hill above town, where Bannack’s dead and its vigilante history meet.

Visiting Bannack State Park

Bannack State Park is southwest of Dillon in Beaverhead County. In 2026 it is open year-round from 8 AM to sunset, closed only on December 24 and 25. The visitor center is open 9 AM to 6 PM from Memorial Day to Labor Day and 9 AM to 5 PM the rest of the year, though hours depend on staffing, and guided tours start there.

Montana residents get in free through the state parks fee on their vehicle registration. Nonresidents pay $8 per vehicle or $4 on foot or by bicycle. The campground has 28 sites, including a wall tent, open year-round with water only in summer; reserve through the Montana State Parks system.

The Ghost Walk runs on two October evenings, October 23 and 24 in 2026, with tours at 7 PM and 9 PM. Reservations are required and go on sale in September. Bannack Days, a living history weekend with an old-fashioned breakfast at the Hotel Meade, takes place the third weekend of July. There are no public ghost hunts, and the town closes at sunset.

• Visiting State park ghost town; campground on site
• Tours Ghost Walk with costumed actors each October, 7 PM and 9 PM, reservations required
• Hours and season Open year-round, 8 AM to sunset; closed December 24 and 25
• Tickets Nonresidents $8 per vehicle; Montana residents free
• Ghost hunting No public ghost hunts; join the October Ghost Walk

Tips for your visit

• Book the October Ghost Walk the day tickets go on sale.
• Walk straight to the Hotel Meade first and climb to the second floor before the crowds.
• Bring water and layers; the valley is dry, windy and cold at night.
• Camp overnight to see the town at dusk from the campground.
• Combine it with Virginia City and the Bonanza Inn.
• Respect the buildings: they are kept in arrested decay, so do not move or take anything.

More haunted places nearby

• Bonanza Inn, Virginia City: a former hospital where a nun is said to sit by guests’ beds
• Fairweather Inn ghost hunt and sleepover: our own ghost hunts in Virginia City
• Haunted hotels in Montana: haunted places to stay across the state
• Haunted places in Montana

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.

• Montana State Parks: Bannack State Park
• Wikipedia: Bannack, Montana
• Southwest Montana: Dorothy Dunn
• Montana Standard: Bannack ghost story (2004)
• Legends of America: Ghost town ghosts in Bannack
• E&E News: Spooky BLM town lives in state of arrested decay (2019)