9.
PERM-36
During the Soviet era, millions of people were imprisoned in a network of forced labor
camps known as the Gulag.
The system peaked during Joseph Stalin’s rule between the 1930s and ‘50s and was
a key tool for punishing political dissenters, along with petty criminals and career convicts.
Some of the roughly 18 million people who spent time at gulags were sent to Perm-36
near the rural village of Kuchino.
Built in 1946, this so-called “reformatory camp” originally functioned as a timber
production facility.
In 1972, it became the primary camp for political prisoners.
This included anyone who harbored anti-communist sentiments or spoke out against the USSR,
people that Stalin considered the most dangerous.
Perm-36 became notorious for the harsh treatment of its prisoners, earning it a reputation
as the country’s worst political prison.
It was customary within the gulag system to impose the harshest work and the strictest
confinement on political prisoners.
For example, after Perm-36 was converted into a political camp, inmates were kept in closed
cells 24/7.
The prison closed in 1987, making it one of the last Soviet prisons to house political
dissidents.
It’s also one of the few former gulags that are still standing after most were destroyed
by the time the Soviet Union fell.
The buildings at Perm-36 were preserved in 1994 as a disturbing reminder of the terror
that the communist regime imposed on anyone who dared to speak against it.
From 1995 to 2014, the former prison operated as a museum dedicated to the history of political
repression.
It was forced to close after losing funding from the local administration amid allegations
that the museum exaggerated the brutality of what went on there.
In 2015, officials removed all negative references to Stalin from the museum.
Today, the property sits in disrepair and in urgent need of restoration to prevent the
buildings from deteriorating past the point of saving.
Was Stalin worse than Hitler?
8.
1992 WORLD EXPO REMAINS Nearly 42 million people visited La Isla de
La Cartuja, or Charterhouse Island, in Seville, Spain over six months during the 1992 World
Expo.
Over 531 acres (215 hectares) were used for the event, which commemorated the 500th anniversary
of Christopher Columbus’s departure from the port at Seville.
It took several days to tour the massive site, which featured pavilions and exhibits dedicated
to the event’s “Age of Discovery” theme.
After the Expo ended, its monorail track was removed, and many of the pavilions were demolished.
The property still contains some aging remnants of the event, including the monorail and cable
car stations, exhibits, a sphere, replicas of a space rocket, and a satellite.
It also has other decorative features that are deteriorating and reclaimed by nature.
The eerily quiet streets still feature the Expo’s seal.
Parts of the site have been repurposed into a modern amusement park and a research facility,
which starkly contrast their post-apocalyptic surroundings.
The vast, primarily disused parking lot serves as a reminder of the bustling crowds that
once flocked to the site.
Although the Expo drew massive crowds, it did little to benefit Seville, leaving the
city with decades of debt and a sprawling, disused site filled with decaying structures.
7.
OKOBIRA HOTEL The Okobira Hotel in Ebino City, Japan, hasn’t
operated in decades.
As a result, it’s become a dilapidated eyesore, and rumors claim it’s haunted.
In 2020, men in their 20s entered the abandoned hotel, perhaps to stave off pandemic boredom.
They went up to the 6th floor and were shocked to find a decaying corpse lying face-up in
a bed.
Unfortunately, the remains were too decomposed for police to make any immediate determinations
about the person’s approximate age or gender.
The body was later identified as a local resident who was in his 50s when he died.
It’s apparently common for abandoned buildings to stand for years or decades in Japan.
So last year, a reporter for The Mainichi set out to learn why so many structures stand
neglected after closing their doors.
Residents told the journalist that people had been trespassing into the Okobira Hotel
for years and that they wanted to see it torn down.
But the company that owned the building was dissolved, and the local government hesitated
to get too involved so they wouldn’t be responsible for the decaying building.
Demolishing it would be a risky move because it would be difficult, time-consuming, and
costly to go after the owner for the costs.
In the end, taxpayers could end up footing the bill.
In the meantime, the hotel is visibly falling apart and has become dangerous to enter as
it remains stuck in a legal limbo that keeps it standing for now.
6.
LAKE SHAWNEE AMUSEMENT PARK The Lake Shawnee Amusement Park in Princeton,
West Virginia, operated for 40 years from 1926 to 1966.
It was popular among locals from coal mining families.
It had a Ferris wheel, swing ride, dance hall, race track, swimming pool, concession stands,
and overnight cabins.
Over the years, six people died at the park.
A young girl lost her life in the 1950s when a delivery truck backed up into the swing
ride while she was on it.
In another tragedy, a 9-year-old boy drowned in the swimming pool after his mother left
him unattended and his arm was sucked into a drain.
The pool was subsequently closed and filled in with sand o prevent any more deaths.
But the site’s disturbing connection with death dates back long before it became an
amusement park.
During the mid-18th century, two local families became embroiled in a heated land dispute
that eventually led to a massacre at the property.
The park was briefly reopened in the late 1980s but was soon shut down amid suspicions
of a Native American burial ground being on the site.
Archaeologists uncovered the skeletal remains of 13 people predating the arrival of European
settlers.
Today, the long-neglected property is a popular destination for urban and paranormal explorers,
who are eager to investigate rumors about the former park being haunted.
They want to catch a glimpse of its deteriorating rides and attractions, which were never dismantled.
What’s the worst amusement park you’ve ever been to?
Tell us about it in the comments.
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5.
CITADELLE LAFERRIERE Near Haiti’s northern coast, atop a mountain
called Bonnet a L’Eveque, Citadelle Laferrière is an early 19th-century fortress built under
King Henri Christophe.
He was one of the most important leaders of the country’s slave revolution.
Built by 20,000 formerly enslaved people over 15 years, it stood as a symbol of newfound
power and independence.
Designed to provide living quarters, storage space, and cisterns for 5,000 defenders for
up to a year, Citadelle Laferrière is the largest fortress in the Americas.
Its prime location was strategically chosen to make it difficult for enemies to attack.
The building was designed with the same concept in mind.
It has steep sides that drop off directly into the mountainside and a triangular front
wall that juts out toward the road, limiting the view of the structure’s profile.
The fortress was built to defend Haiti against a return of French forces, but this never
happened, and its 365 cannons were never used.
Today, Citadelle Laferrière is a historical monument and tourist attraction famous for
its breathtaking views of the surrounding landscape and coast below.
But some visitors have reported feeling spooky vibes as if it might be haunted, leading one
person to describe the fortress as “one of the most awe-inspiring, yet creepy places
I’ve ever been.”
4.
EASTERN STATE PENITENTIARY In Philadelphia, the abandoned Eastern State
Penitentiary is considered by some to be the most haunted correctional facility in the
U.S. During its operating years from 1829 to 1971, it housed some of history’s most
notorious criminals, including Al Capone and bank robber Willie Sutton.
The prison was famous for its heavy use of solitary confinement and appalling mistreatment.
In addition, inmates endured unimaginably harsh punishments, including the so-called
“water bath,” which involved being submerged in water and left in the frigid winter cold
until ice formed on the person’s body.
Prisoners were tightly bound to a device called the “mad chair,” cutting off their circulation
and damaging their limbs, often to the point that they required amputation.
In what’s known as the “iron gag,” an inmate’s hands were tied behind their back
while they were forced to wear an iron collar that tore at their tongue and mouth and caused
them to bleed profusely if they tried to move.
Perhaps the most torturous punishment at Eastern State Penitentiary was a pitch-dark underground
cell called “The Hole.”
It took sensory deprivation and solitary confinement to a whole new level, depriving prisoners
entirely of human contact and the most basic amenities.
There was no toilet, and the cell’s occupants received very little food while they languished
in the dark, losing their sense of time and their grip on reality.
The prison scaled back on solitary confinement in 1913 because of overcrowding and ultimately
closed in 1971.
Ever since then, it’s been a popular attraction among history and paranormal enthusiasts.
Stories of hauntings date back to the 1940s and bear eerie similarities, with certain
parts of the prison being known for specific supernatural activities.
In Cell Block 12, for example, visitors, staff, and inmates have all reported hearing echoing
voices and laughing, while ghostly faces are known to grace the halls of Cell Block 4.
As Ben Bookman told National Public Radio, Tour guides are not so quick to label the
site as haunted.
He explained they don’t want to exploit the prison’s “dark image” and pointed
out that the prisoners who suffered there were real people and that it’s important
not to make fun of or glorify their experiences.
3.
HOTEL DEL SALTO The Hotel del Salto was built in 1923 as an
upscale residence for architect Carlos Arturo Tapias in San Antonio del Tequendama, Colombia.
Also called “The Mansion of Tequendama Falls,” it sat perched on a steep cliff overlooking
the breathtaking nearby waterfalls that the area is known for.
The mansion featured tall windows and other luxurious aspects of French architecture that
were popular among society’s “upper crust” at the time.
It became a hotel for wealthy travelers in 1928 and remained in business until the early
‘90s when it was abandoned because of contamination of the nearby Bogotá River.
Plans to build an 18-story structure in its place never came to fruition, and over the
following years, the building fell into disrepair.
After the hotel closed, the property gained notoriety for the alleged string of suicides
that happened there, leading to rumors that it was haunted.
But the site was no stranger to death by the time the suicides started happening.
Local legend holds that the indigenous Muisca people jumped from the top of the 515-foot
(157-meters) Tequendama Falls while fleeing Spanish Conquistadors and that those who made
the leap turned into eagles during the descent and flew to freedom.
Some believe that the story may have inspired some of the people who took their own lives
to do so at Tequendama Falls.
In 2013, the building was renovated and reopened as a science museum by ecologists from the
National University of Colombia’s Institute of Natural Science.
2.
RAYNHAM HALL In Norfolk, England, there’s a 400-year-old
country house where the ghost of someone known as the Brown Lady is rumored to wander the
halls.
Known as Raynham Hall, it was built over 15 years, starting in 1622.
Its most famous resident was a prominent early 18th-century statesman named Charles Townshend.
He married Lady Dorothy Walpole, the sister of Britain’s first Prime Minister, Robert
Walpole.
Legend has it that Townshend, who was known for his volatile temper, caught Dorothy cheating
on him with an English nobleman named Lord Wharton.
To keep his wife from continuing the affair, Townshend is said to have locked her in various
rooms throughout Raynham Hall, where she remained trapped until her death from smallpox in 1726.
The first reported sighting of her ghost, nicknamed the “Brown Lady,” came in 1835
during the Christmas festivities at Raynham Hall.
Two visitors claimed to have seen her lurking in her old-fashioned dress as they approached
their rooms.
Another noteworthy sighting happened the following year when a paranormal skeptic named Captain
Frederick Marryat asked to stay in the haunted room to prove that local smugglers were behind
the strange activity at the property.
Much to Marryat’s surprise, the Brown Lady approached him with a lantern in hand and
a malicious grin on her face.
Then, right as he was about to pull the trigger on his pistol, she vanished.
In 1936, Country Life magazine claimed to have captured a photograph of the Brown Lady.
It became one of the most famous alleged ghost photos of all time.
Many visitors have claimed to see the Brown Lady in the years since, while others still
believe that the supernatural presence is a fabricated tourist trap.
What do you think?
1.
SENSABAUGH TUNNEL Tucked into the Tennessee wilderness along
narrow, winding roads outside the city of Kingsport, a disused, graffiti-covered tunnel
sits on what was once a hill.
Known as the Sensabaugh Tunnel, it was built during the 1920s when the hill was blasted
apart to make way for a bend in the road.
The tunnel was paved so that traffic could pass through it and supported the railroad
tracks that ran above it.
It was built on land purchased from a local family called the Sensabaughs, who lived in
a nearby house and helped with the construction.
During the 1960s, stories began to spread about the tunnel allegedly being haunted,
and they continue to this day.
At first, teenagers who hung out near its entrance reported hearing eerie noises, such
as screaming and crying, coming from within the structure.
Not long after that, rumors circulated about a vagrant stealing a baby from the Sensabaugh
home.
Another story claimed that Ed Sensabaugh, the head of the household, went crazy and
murdered his family inside the tunnel.
A woman supposedly disappeared one night after her car broke down near the tunnel, and she
went to the Sensabaugh home seeking help.
Supposedly, if someone shuts their engine off inside of the tunnel, they’ll hear shrieking
laughter and terrifying cries, and they may even catch a glimpse of a tall, dark figure
with red eyes.
Some even claim to have found tiny handprints on the outside of their car after driving
through the tunnel.
No records exist of any murders occurring within the tunnel or the abandoned Sensabaugh
home, which still stands nearby.
It remains a hotspot among paranormal enthusiasts hoping to experience a terrifying supernatural
encounter.
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