Haunted hotel guide · Milwaukee, Wisconsin

The Haunted Brumder Mansion, Milwaukee: Ghosts, a Speakeasy Legend and a B&B Stay

A 1910 brick mansion west of downtown Milwaukee, built for a newspaper family, rumored to have hidden a Prohibition speakeasy and now a four-suite bed and breakfast with a basement theater. The owners themselves say they share it with ghosts.

By The Haunted Rooms Team · Updated November 2026 · How we rate hotels

2.5/5Haunted Rooms Score

1910Built for the Brumder family

4Guest suites

Visit hotel websiteMeet the ghosts

The Brumder Mansion stands at 3046 West Wisconsin Avenue on Milwaukee’s near west side, a short drive from downtown. From the street it is a handsome brick house with steep gables, stained glass and dark woodwork, the kind of family home Milwaukee’s German American elite built at the start of the twentieth century. Inside it is a bed and breakfast with four suites, each with a fireplace and private bath, and a 55-seat theater in the basement that hosts murder mysteries, comedy and magic shows.

It is also one of the best-known haunted places in the city. Owners Tom and Julie Carr have told local TV about a lady in a Victorian dress on the stairs and a tall man in a fedora in the basement, and guests have their own stories from the suites upstairs. This guide sets out what people report, the real history behind the speakeasy legend and how to plan a stay at one of the most personal haunted hotels in Milwaukee.

The ghosts of Brumder Mansion Bed & Breakfast

The lady on the stairs

The owners’ own story is the one to start with. Speaking to CBS 58 in 2018, Tom Carr said, “There’s a lady in a Victorian dress that walks up and down the stairs.” He also said guests hear organ music in the house, which is a strange detail in a building with no organ in it today. During the mansion’s church years, described in the history below, there was a chapel upstairs, and it is tempting to connect the two, but nobody has shown that they are linked.

The man in the fedora

Julie Carr told the same reporters that the first full apparition she saw was in the basement: a figure about six feet tall wearing a fedora. The basement is the part of the house tied to the Prohibition rumors, and it is now the mansion’s theater. Julie also said that guests have told them about shadows moving along the hallway.

Suzanne, the housekeeper who stayed

Older accounts of the house, including the earlier version of our own Milwaukee guide, describe the ghost of a former housekeeper usually called Suzanne, who seems unwilling to leave the home she worked in. Pictures that were firmly fixed to the walls are said to have dropped without breaking, doors open and slam in the night, and the doorbell has played tunes it was never set to play. We have not found a record of a housekeeper by that name, so treat Suzanne as the house’s legend rather than a documented person.

The Gold Suite story

The most dramatic story comes from the years after 1997, when Carol and Robert Hirschi restored the house. As retold by WROK in 2021, drawing on the Paranormal Milwaukee website, a voice told the owner to “get the dog out of the bed” while she stayed in what was then called the Gold Suite, a bathroom mirror lifted off its hook and shattered in the tub with nobody nearby, and drops of what looked like fresh blood appeared in the tub of an empty room. The same retelling says investigators believe there are at least three distinct spirits in the house, including a child seen in the halls.

These are second-hand accounts, and the suite names have changed since then, but they explain why paranormal groups have kept coming back.

What investigators found

For its 2018 Halloween story, CBS 58 sent two of its own staff to sleep in the mansion alongside the Paranormal Investigators of Milwaukee. Meteorologist Chris Nelson, who slept in Marion’s Suite, said he felt uneasy “the second I stepped into” the room and later felt something brush the side of his head. His colleague in George’s Suite reviewed the night’s video and found several orbs, especially in that suite. In the basement Nelson asked if anyone else could feel static, and the investigators offered a sensible explanation: old electrical wiring running overhead. It is a good reminder that the best investigations look for ordinary causes first.

The most haunted rooms and places to look

• Marion's Suite: A queen suite with a gas fireplace, an 1880s birch mantel and a double whirlpool under a stained-glass window. The suite where a CBS 58 meteorologist felt something brush his head.
• George's Suite: The largest suite, three rooms named for George Brumder, mostly furnished with antiques, with an oak fireplace and an original marble shower. Orbs were filmed here.
• The main stairs and upstairs hallway: Where Tom Carr says the lady in Victorian dress walks, and where guests report shadows moving along the hall.
• The basement theater: The old recreation room tied to the speakeasy story, now a 55-seat theater. Julie Carr’s tall man in a fedora was seen down here.

History of Brumder Mansion Bed & Breakfast

The Brumders were one of Milwaukee’s leading German American families. George Brumder Sr. built a publishing business around German-language newspapers and he built homes for his children. CBS 58 reports that this was one of seven mansions he built for them and is the only one still standing. It was designed by architect Herman P. Schnetzky for George Brumder Jr., his wife Thekla and their three children, at a cost of about $25,000. George Sr. died in May 1910 before it was finished.

The house is a mix of English Arts and Crafts, Victorian and Gothic touches, with stained and leaded glass, dark woodwork and a floral mosaic with Tiffany tile by George Mann Niedecken around the dining room fireplace. The younger Brumders lived here until 1926.

The speakeasy story begins with the next owners. From around 1927 the house belonged to Sam Pick and his wife Laura. Pick later ran the Club Madrid, a nightclub on Bluemound Road that was a well-known gambling spot, and he was rumored to have ties to Al Capone. The theory is that the basement recreation room served as a speakeasy and an outlet for bootleg liquor. OnMilwaukee’s history of the house points out that nobody can confirm the Capone link, and that the Picks had left before Prohibition ended in 1933, but the record of four single women, aged 19 to 41, living with the Picks as roomers in 1930 in the house has kept the rumors alive. Some retellings, such as WROK’s, say Sam and Ed Pick bought the house together.

After the Picks, the house was listed as vacant in 1932 and 1933, then housed three lawyers’ offices and, by 1937, furnished rooms to rent. Pastors from Our Savior’s Lutheran Church moved in during 1947 and 1948, and the church later used the house for its activities, including a second-floor youth chapel. In 1997 the church sold it to Carol and Robert Hirschi, who restored it, opened it as a bed and breakfast and built the basement theater. Tom and Julie Carr bought the mansion in January 2008, after staying as guests the year before, and were running it when CBS 58 visited in 2018.

Tips for a haunted stay

• Book directly through the mansion’s website or by phone; it is not on the big booking sites, so that is the only way to choose your suite.
• Ask for George’s Suite or Marion’s Suite if you want the rooms named in recent ghost stories.
• Check the events calendar before you book: a murder mystery or magic show in the basement theater is the most fun way to spend an evening in the old speakeasy room.
• Ask your hosts about the house over breakfast. The owners have long been happy to talk about its history and its ghosts.
• Park in the mansion’s own lot, which is included with your stay.
• Pair your stay with a night at the Pfister Hotel downtown, Milwaukee’s most famous haunted hotel.

More haunted hotels nearby

• The Pfister Hotel, Milwaukee: The 1893 hotel big league ballplayers talk about
• The Ambassador Hotel, Milwaukee: 1928 Art Deco hotel with a dark Dahmer connection
• Hotel Retlaw, Fond du Lac: Room 717 and Walter Schroeder’s 1923 hotel
• Haunted hotels in Chicago: About 90 minutes south of Milwaukee
• Haunted hotels in Wisconsin
• Haunted hotels in Milwaukee

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.

• Brumder Mansion Bed and Breakfast
• Brumder Mansion: Suites
• CBS 58: The Haunted Mansion, Investigating Brumder
• OnMilwaukee: Urban spelunking at the Brumder Mansion (2016)
• WROK 1440: This Milwaukee B&B is home to one of Wisconsin's scariest ghost stories
• Travel Wisconsin: Haunted historic hotels

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