A silver boomtown, a hotel that briefly became a cancer clinic, and a village that renamed itself after a headless horseman. The spookiest cities in the US have stories that do not need a ghost to be memorable. Here are 12 cities and towns where the legends are fun, the history is real, and we keep the two clearly labeled. It is an editorial selection in no particular order, so the numbers are just for navigation.
A quick note on the ghosts
Reported hauntings are folklore and personal accounts, and we cannot verify them, so think of them as campfire stories. The dates, numbers and events in the history lines come from the sources we link. Anything labeled legend or lore is a story people tell, not a proven fact.
The spookiest cities in the US at a glance
City
Known for
New Orleans, LA
Above-ground tombs and voodoo lore
Salem, MA
The 1692 witch trials
Savannah, GA
Moss-draped cemeteries and ghost tours
Gettysburg, PA
A Civil War battlefield
Virginia City, NV
A historic silver boomtown with saloons and ghost stories
Tombstone, AZ
The famous 1881 gunfight
Eureka Springs, AR
A hotel with a very strange past
Estes Park, CO
The hotel that inspired The Shining
Austin, TX
The most reported ghost sightings in one 2026 study
Deadwood, SD
Wild Bill Hickok and a gold rush
Weston, WV
A vast former psychiatric hospital
Sleepy Hollow, NY
The Headless Horseman
12 spooky cities and towns, in no particular order
John Buford and John Reynolds memorials at Gettysburg National Military Park | Photo: Better Living
1New Orleans, Louisiana
Some cities have a few haunted spots. New Orleans has whole neighborhoods of them, with walking tours. Stroll past white tombs stacked shoulder to shoulder, add a little voodoo lore and a lot of humidity, and every shadow starts to look suspicious. Nomad eSIM’s 2026 ranking put it first, with 147 Tripadvisor ghost-tour listings, so you will not be short of company after dark.
The real history: those tombs echo the city’s French and Spanish roots, and 64 Parishes says flooding probably kept them in use. St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 opened in 1789 on low ground at the edge of town, and Marie Laveau (1801 to 1881), a voodoo practitioner, is buried there. Bring a little New Orleans home with our seafood gumbo recipe.
2Salem, Massachusetts
Salem’s story is one of the darkest chapters in American history, and the town carries it today, from its museums to its Halloween crowds. Local lore says the ghost of Giles Corey, who died during the trials, appears before disasters. That is a legend, not a documented fact.
The real history: more than 170 people were accused in the Salem witchcraft crisis of 1692 and 1693, according to the Peabody Essex Museum. Nineteen were hanged at Proctor’s Ledge, Giles Corey was pressed to death, and 25 innocent people died in all, including some who died in prison. The Library of Congress places Corey’s death in September 1692. The accusations began in Salem Village, a
