Haunted Atchison Trolley Tours 200 S 10th Street Atchison, Kansas 66002 (913) 367-2427     (800) 234-1854 First Saturdays in May - August plus Fall evenings  -  reserve early admission was $14/person all ages in 2009

Dubbed the "Most Haunted Town in Kansas" in the 1997 book Haunted Kansas: Ghost Stories and Other Eerie Tales, for several years Atchison, Kansas has offered Haunted Atchison Trolley Tours by the Chamber of Commerce in September and October.

The tours are so popular that motor coach tours supplement the trolley and they are still unable to to handle the demand. The 1 hour ghost tours are offered Friday - Saturday evenings in September, and additional evenings through October. The tours leave the Visitor Information Center in the 1880 AT&SF freight depot at 200 S. 10th Street.

This reporter took the Haunted Trolley Tour and made the photographs on this page in 2004. The tour was fun, but would have been more effective if the guides provided all the commentary instead of the slightly cheesy tape recording. 

Since these pages devoted to the Haunted Trolley Tours are among the most popular at KansasTravel.org, I repeated the tour in 2007. Several of the locations visited changed, and the tour guide said they could do three days of tours with haunted locations in Atchison. Either my taste or the recorded message had changed, I enjoyed the recorded portions of the tour more in 2007. My only complaint is with the online ticket booking system - it has several problems.

No one reported seeing a ghost during either tour, and while the guides describe some of their own experiences with Atchison's many haunted locations, they didn't say that there were ghost sightings on previous trolley tours.

Other Haunted Atchison activities in 2009 include private psychic visits, clairvoyant performances, history & mystery guided walking tour, private home visits, on-site investigations, tarot card reading, and a haunted cemetery walking tour (September 12 & October 13, advance tickets required). The trolley tours sell out early, so contact the Atchison Chamber tours as early as possible at (800) 234-1854, or trolley@atchisonkansas.net. Tickets are $13 for all ages, plus a $1 fee per transaction.

A Ghostly Dining Experience is a new activity for 2009 and it earned some high marks during the first run earlier this summer. On-Site Investigations give visitors a chance to do a real paranormal investigation with an experienced team. Offered October 9 and 23rd, the charge fro the evening is $51.

Other trolley tours are available though out the year. Contact the Atchison Chamber of Commerce for details.

The first house on the 2004 tour was the McInteer Villa on Kansas Avenue. It was built by Irish Immigrant, John McInteer in 1890. John was a skilled harness maker. Among the activities reported in this house are lights in the tower which has no lighting, ghostly figures appearing in the tower windows and in family photographs. When things are active, there are footsteps, other noises and doors slam shut. The guide on the 2007 tour is a friend of the family and had several stories to share. The McInteer Villa is just one of 24 buildings in Atchison on the National Register of Historical Places. Many of the homes are included on the tour of haunted houses. Different angle of the McInteer Villa. One of the most famous haunted Atchison homes is the Balie (B. P.) Waggener home on N 4th Street. Built in the mid 1880's by a railroad attorney and politician. Legend is that Waggener became wealthy through a pact with the devil and the gargoyles were place on the roof to honor the pact. The second owner of the home is reported as attempting to remove the gargoyles, but fell to his death on the staircase. When the Travel Channel did a segment about haunted Atchison, Kansas, they brought paranormal investigator Sueanne Pool and Verle Muhrer to the Waggener home. Pool and Muhrer walked around the home and claimed to have felt the presence of ghosts and picked up the presence of ghosts on their special equipment. The Atchison Daily Globe says that the "current owners – Paul and Marsha Adair – say that the figures are not gargoyles, but griffins that watch over the house." The B. P. Waggener home  is another building on the National Register of Historical Places. This vacant lot in the 1100 block of Riley Street was once a road house. The road house may have been the eastern terminus of the Pony Express during the last few months of its brief existence. Some people report hearing the sound of fiddle playing and dancing coming from this location. Although haunted house missing from Atchison's Haunted Trolley Tour in 2004, the Old Hoof & Horn at the Riverhouse Restaurant (I think the name is too long) has been added to the tour. I dinned at the Old Hoof & Horn  earlier in 2007 and have to say I like the place more for the atmosphere and view of the Missouri River, than the food.  During that visit, I asked my server about the ghost, and she told me that a female ghost has been seen in the ladies rest room. She hadn't see the ghost, but had experienced a mirror flying off the wall and breaking, and a cell phone flying of a table and across the room. .

copyright 2004-2010 by Keith Stokes