The 7 Most Haunted Places In New Mexico

Say you were picking the most haunted state in the Union by slogan. You could find yourself in New Mexico. There’s a reason people call it the Land of Enchantment! If that weren’t enough to persuade you, we’d cite the fact that there are at least three different eras of ghost stories emanating from this state: the relatively modern days, the pioneer days, and the dinosaur days! Now, just in case you’re a ghost-loving tourist who’s still on the fence about visiting this wondrous and wild Southwestern state, let us persuade you. How? By telling you about the 7 most haunted places in New Mexico, of course!

Blackjack Ketchum’s Grave

Do you like a Wild West flavor while enjoying your New Mexican ghost tales? Then you can’t do better than to visit the cemetery that holds train robber Blackjack Ketchum. Like a lot of ne’er-do-wells of the era, Blackjack’s strange moniker belied a mean disposition. That disposition only got meaner when old Blackjack was hanged in the year 1901. (By some accounts, his head popped right off.) And if his ghost hung around, he only got angrier finding out that his was the last official hanging in New Mexico’s history. The practice stopped when New Mexico officially became a State of the Union in 1912. Visit the Clayton Cemetery and head straight for the middle. Clayton was divided into Protestants on one side and Catholics on the other. Since neither sect wanted to claim Ketchum, he lies on the borderline, under the path through the graveyard.

Address: Clayton, NM 88415

Web: Clayton County Cemetery

Dawson Cemetery

Near Cimarron, you’ll find another noted cemetery. This one is considered one of the most haunted and haunting places in the State of New Mexico: Dawson Cemetery. In 1913, Dawson Mine was the site of one of the most deadly coal mining disasters in US history. Over 250 men perished in an accidental explosion. The mining town of Dawson limped along until an eerily similar disaster occurred ten years later. Now, the only sign there was ever a prosperous city here are the gravestones. For TV buffs, Netflix’s Godless depicted these events.

Address: Raton, NM 87740

Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu

Ghost Ranch is one of the world’s most famously-captured landscapes, inspiring and serving as the subject of many of the works of the great American painter Georgia O’Keeffe. Its deep canyons, distinct for their variety of colors, contain over 130 million years’ worth of fossil record and geological information. The very oldest dinosaurs are preserved here, right out in the open where you can see them. And if ancient human ghosts are more your thing, Ghost Ranch showcases traces of early humans going back as far as 8,000 years.

Ghost Ranch is a stunningly beautiful hiking and camping location. And you can literally scope out dinosaur bones on your way to the trails. Stop by Ghost Ranch’s dinosaur quarry, which has produced the largest collection of dino fossils in history. The very first dinosaurs, those from the Triassic period, can be viewed here at the quarry, not to mention the world’s only complete skeleton of a Coelophysis — a small, skinny carnivorous reptile that grew to about ten feet long. (Coelophysis also happens to be New Mexico’s state fossil!)

Address: 280 Private Drive 1708 Highway, US-84, Abiquiu, NM 87510

Web: Ghost Ranch

Hotel Parq Central, Albuquerque

This well-appointed central Albuquerque building wasn’t always a hotel. Built in 1926, it has served for most of its history as a hospital — one with a storied psychiatric ward. The building has a new life as a rather trend-setting city hot spot complete with a swaggy rooftop bar. Yet the clientele sometimes report cold spots, and the feeling of being watched by something inhuman.

This matches with what older “tenants” of Parq Central have claimed. Senior citizens who were once patients of the hospital say they’ve had that same eerie feeling of invisible eyes upon them. They claim too that they’ve been suddenly shoved or thrown by invisible forces, or heard voices while alone.

What’s great about this haunted location is you can stop by for a drink or even book a room. Wandering the deserted hallways in the wee small hours of the night is, shall we say, optional.

Address: 806 Central Avenue SE, Albuquerque, NM 87102

Web: Hotel Parq Central Albuqerque

The KiMo Theater

The KiMo Theater, a rare Pueblo-Deco-style historic theater built in 1927, is rumored to have a resident poltergeist. In the ’50s, a water heater explosion caused several casualties. Sadly, this included the death of a mischievous tyke who shouldn’t have been there named Bobby. He was just six years old at the time.

The staff of the KiMo claim that ever since that accident, bizarre and inexplicable things have happened both onstage and behind the curtain: the lights flicker. The electricity cuts out and comes back on. Doors slam themselves open and shut, and the backstage rigging has unwound itself, causing disarray in the light, sandbags, and scenery.

There’s such an element of mischief to it, the people in the plays that go wrong have come to believe this poltergeist must be the irrepressible Bobby.

Theater people love a ghostly tradition. To appease Bobby, they leave a box of donuts for him in the boiler room on opening nights.

Address: 423 Central Ave NW, Albuquerque, NM 87102

Web: https://www.cabq.gov/artsculture/kimo/history-of-the-kimo/about-the-theatre

The Lodge at Cloudcroft Resort & Spa

Amidst the mountains near Alamogordo sits a palatial place to hang your hat for a few nights. Yet it was once rugged and bare-bones: The Lodge at Cloudcroft began life in the 19th century as a rough-and-tumble stopping point on the Alamogordo and Sacramento Mountain Railway.

The ghost who stayed longer than a few nights here is Rebecca. This crimson-haired chambermaid died on these grounds in the 1900s, when her husband, a lumberjack, caught her cheating and murdered her. Present-day visitors to the Lodge have reported flickering lights, furniture moving of its own accord and fires suddenly springing to life in unattended fireplaces. Just the sort of tricks a slain chambermaid might choose to haunt the living.

The owners of the lodge have embraced Rebecca’s spirit, rather than fear her. Her actions are more playful than menacing. (In fact, some people think Rebecca might be trying to “flirt” with eligible men across the spectral divide.) The Lodge at Cloudcroft even features an on-site restaurant. It’s called Rebecca’s.

Address: 601 Corona Pl, Cloudcroft, NM 88317

Web: The Lodge at Cloudcroft

Union County Courthouse

Let’s follow Blackjack Ketchum to his next haunt: the courthouse where he was hanged. They say the cell where he awaited his fate has been ice cold from that day to this — an oddity in this arid state. The truly superstitious might see Blackjack’s ghostly hand in the destruction of the courthouse by a tornado in 1908. Yet even in the “new” courthouse constructed in 1909, people say they have seen his silhouette — with and without a head — in the halls. Others describe strange, floating orbs, bobbing after them as they tried to escape. Those who have felt Blackjack’s presence warn: you may consider them crackpots. But should you find yourself in the courthouse at closing time on a windy winter’s night, scoff at Blackjack Ketchum’s ghost at your own risk!

Address: 100 Court St, Clayton, NM 88415

Web: History of Union County, New Mexico