By Tim Binnall
If you've ever wanted to be the proprietor of a haunted hotel, you are in luck as just such an establishment has gone on the market in Wisconsin. Located in the small town of Humbird and reportedly built over 150 years ago, the Humbird Hotel Bar & Grill features six guest rooms, a tavern, and, if the accounts of visitors to the property are true, all manner of spooky spirits. "People have experienced supernatural things in there," says realtor Julie Bahnub, who noted the paranormal activity in her listing for the property, though conceded that "I'm not sure if it’s a positive or negative" for prospective buyers.
While it is understandably difficult to confirm whether or not a site is haunted, the hotel has perhaps the closest thing to a proverbial certification by way of multiple investigations which have been conducted there by the organization Supernatural Investigators of Minnesota. During one of their visits this past June, the group captured photos of an eerie black shadow that seemingly materialized in a hallway and their prior investigations produced a handful of undeniably spooky EVPs. Beyond the ghost hunters' material are a myriad of accounts from people who have stayed at the hotel and reported seeing spirits as well experiencing the unsettling sensation of being watched by some kind of presence in the room.
Sharing one story told to her by the building's current owners, Bahnub recalled how "they were sitting in the bar and there was this hanging light and it started to move when they were sitting below it. One person got up and stopped it from moving and said he could feel the force of somebody pulling it, so he sat down and it just continued to spin." The history of the hotel, which was built in 1869, has been somewhat lost to time, though the realtor speculates that it may have once served as a brothel due to its isolated location in a remote part of the state. The current asking price for the property is $279,900 and that includes all of the furnishings, the liquor license, and, yes, the ghosts.