Summary
Key West is a sunny island getaway that’s not just for people who are alive. There are also spiritual people who live in the two-by-four-mile paradise that is Key West.
Go on a scary trip in Key West, a place with a lot of haunted history, marine legends, and Victorian charm.
Key West’s haunted hotspots are full of ghosts and strange beings, from lighthouse spirits to phantom shoe organizers in bars.
Key West, Florida, is the most southern city in the United States. It’s also a popular place for vacations. There are many all-inclusive motels on the beach in Key West. Duval Street is a great place to party, and Key West is known as one of the most beautiful island paradises in the country.
People come to this warm island to enjoy the present moment, be grateful for their lives, and make memories. Some people who live on the island, on the other hand, are not living at all. In fact, they will always be in Key West and roam this two-mile-by-four-mile island.
While Key West is famous for being one of the Florida Keys that everyone should visit for a sunny beach vacation, it is also known as one of the most haunted towns in America, right up there with Salem, Massachusetts, and Savannah, Georgia. There are lots of scary things to do and places that people say are haunted.
There are haunted events and tours here all year long. They’re not limited to Halloween or fall stories, but rather to the island’s long naval past and Victorian-Gothic style. If you add a haunted doll, you have a real spooky paradise! If you’re brave enough, check out these haunted places in Key West. You never know what you might find!
9. The Old Lighthouse in Key West
There was one family, many sad deaths, and a terrible memory.
From the 1820s to the 1910s, the famous Key West Light House was always run by a member of the Mabrity family, either by blood or marriage. Barb Mabrity, the strict head of the family, took over running the lighthouse when her husband Michael suddenly died of yellow fever in 1832.
Over the next few years, Barbara lived through many terrible storms. But in 1846, the Great Havana Hurricane destroyed the lighthouse and killed most of Barbara’s children. Even so, she asked for the lighthouse to be fixed because she knew how important it was for trade and military operations to help ships get around Florida’s coral reef.
She kept working for years, and ten years after she retired, her granddaughter and grandson-in-law took over running the lighthouse as Barbara’s legacy, but both of them tragically died of typhoid. People say that Barbara and other ghosts still walk the Key West lighthouse, which offers tours to learn about its ghosts. Don’t worry, though; people who have been to the lighthouse say they have felt a caring embrace from a ghost, like when a grandma hugs her grandkids.
8 The restaurant Fogarty’s
Watch out for your feet, because this ghost is really interested in shoes.
People from all over come to Fogarty’s to have fun because they are famous for their signature frozen drinks. Along with the living people having fun, a local ghost has also found a way to pass the time while they are forever haunting. People in the area say that during shifts, a ghost that likes shoes and feet likes to arrange workers’ shoes in strange ways.
The workers say the shoes were put away in straight lines or moved to the other side of the room from where they began. People who work there and customers say the ghost tries to get clean and rubs people’s feet when they walk around barefoot. You’ve been warned; pick out your shoes after that.
7 The fire station in Key West
Today, it’s a museum with repeat visitors who are always interested.
Fire Station No. 3 is one of the oldest fire stations in the state of Florida. It was built in 1907, and because of its past, it has a ghost or two or three.
The old firehouse was going to be torn down in the late 1990s, but people in the area worked together to save it. Now, people can visit the Firehouse Museum. But tourists may experience more than just a tour of this old building; they may also see resident ghost Frank or one of the other ghosts that hang out there.
Frank doesn’t seem to have a reason for staying, but a Bahamian girl who appears often seems to show people around. Then she just vanishes into thin air after inviting people down the hall to a room with firehouse items on show.
Frank and The Girl are thought to be good spirits, but paranormal researchers and former workers have seen strange lights, felt unseen forces kick things, and seen pictures of people who aren’t in the photos.
6 The Bull & Whistle Bar
Drinks ring in the evening at the bar
The bartenders at this Key West spot have a lot of stories about phones that don’t work that ring or doctors asking for a drink. The first strange thing is a phone that was built into a wall during a makeover of the second-floor Whistle Bar. The phone isn’t tied to anything, but people say it still rings every once in a while.
There is a second eerie event on the second floor as well. A man is sitting at the bar, quietly waiting for a drink. His job has not been revealed to the bartenders, but they say he looks like a chemist. When they offer him a shot of vodka, he gladly takes it and continues his journey.
5. The Porter House
There is a doctor who tips his waiters.
If we’re talking about a ghost doctor, there is a serious Victorian house across the street from the Bull & Whistle that has features from France, the Caribbean, and New England. This is where Dr. Joseph Yates Porter lived. He was Florida’s first public health officer and worked to keep Yellow Fever in check in the state.
People say that Dr. Porter loved his home very much. He is said to have died in the same room where he was born. Even though he and his wife died when they were only in their early 30s, Dr. Porter stayed in the house he loved.
There are flats, offices, and a restaurant/bar in the Porter House now, and people say they have seen ghosts in all parts of the building. Some people in the area say that coins appear and are neatly stacked in odd places in their homes. Some people say they can hear group music in their homes.
Bartenders at the restaurants say that Dr. Porter likes to hang out at the bar and even gives the staff tips in dimes from his collection of coins! Maybe he’s also the ghost that looks like a pharmacist right across the street at Bull & Whistle? It looks like it will work!
4 The graveyard in Key West
There’s no doubt that cemeteries are common places, but this one is especially busy
Also known as “the island of bones,” Key West’s ghost stories are deeply rooted in the island’s past of being settled by Europeans, the slave trade, and terrible shipwrecks. The story goes that when conquistadors came to Key West in the 18th century, they found human bones all over the island.
Some people think the bodies were from fighting between native tribes, while others think the same people buried their dead on the island’s shores, where they would be exposed to the elements.
The graveyard on the island, where more than 100,000 people were buried from 1847 onward, would soon become part of this haunted past.
It is said that a lot of these people died quickly and sadly, and some of them were killed. These are the ghosts that wander the graveyard, bored and looking for someone to talk to.
3 The Guest House of Marrero
A kind spirit at a small hotel.
Marrero’s Guest Mansion is a beautiful Victorian mansion from 1890 to 1891 that was once the home of cigar mogul Francisco Marrero. It is now a boutique hotel for guests to Key West. The accommodations are charming and well-kept, and there is also a lovely spirit guide. If she likes you, that is!
The spirit is said to be Francisco’s wife Enriquetta Marrero, who was kicked out of the house after her husband died. She likes to watch over guests. If she likes the guests, she’ll either visit them with her strong lavender smell or just sit nearby to make them feel better. There is a friend in the room that Enriquetta doesn’t like? She will swing the chandelier around the room badly!
Want a Victorian mansion without the ghosts? The Victorian Guesthouses at the Southernmost Beach Resort were just opened after being completely redone. People can stay in rooms that are only for adults that have all the historical charm (but no friendly ghosts) and enjoy all of the resort’s modern but charming amenities.
2. Home of Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Hemingway was a great writer who died too soon. His famous home in Key West is truly lively.
In his later years, Ernest Hemingway had a lot of bad things happen to him, though some of them were his fault. It is well known that Hemingway liked his home in Key West. However, during his bitter divorce from his second wife, Pauline Pfeiffer, he lost access to his favorite southern vacation spot.
After two more marriages, Hemingway sadly killed himself in 1961. But not before telling his friends that he planned to live in his Key West house forever in the future.
In 1951, Pauline also died too soon after suffering from a brain tumor. People say that Pauline and Ernest still haunt their home. The ghost of Pauline likes to smoke her favorite brand of cigarettes in the yard or from the top of the central stairs and watch Ernest write.
Ernest is always writing on his typewriter, and people who come say they can hear the clacking of the buttons. He also likes to meet people on the veranda on the second floor. Another ghost, a six-toed cat, is thought to be the mother of the more than 50 cats that live on the grounds of the Hemingway Home today.
1. Robert the Doll
The Fort East Martello Museum now has a doll that follows him around like a ghost
This is more of a “what” than a “where” item. This person might be better described as a “who,” to be exact. Some say that an unknown “young girl” gave Robert “Gene” Otto a life-sized, fabric-stuffed doll when he was four years old. The doll could have been given as a nice gesture or as “retaliation for wrongdoing,” as some people in Key Western say.
Some say that the boy’s grandfather gave him the doll. Gene always kept the doll in its own room in the top of the house where he grew up and named it “Robert,” after himself. People who came to the house for decades said they could hear childish laughter coming from the doll’s room and vague footsteps when no one was upstairs.
Gene would blame Robert for “strange things” that happened to him. Later, the doll’s caretakers said that its face would change and it would move around the house by itself. Gene and Robert’s old home is now the Artist House, a lovely Victorian bed-and-breakfast. Robert lives in the Fort East Martello Museum, a defense from the Civil War that is now run by the Key West Art & Historical Society.
Many people who visit Robert the Doll write him sorry letters because bad things happen to them after they see him. This suggests that he is still up to his haunting tricks.