SMETHPORT — The McKean County American Legion Riders Post 976 will sponsor a Haunted Jail from 5 to 8 p.m. Sunday at the McKean County Historical Society’s Old Jail Museum at State and West King streets in Smethport.
There is no admission fee.
Those who attend are to use the King Street entrance. A display will be located at the former cell block on the first floor, where Ralph Crossmire was hanged in 1893 after a jury trial found him guilty of killing his mother, but the main attractions will be in the old jail cells downstairs in the “dungeon.” Crossmire’s cell was one of those.
Attendees will receive a bag of treats before exiting on the State Street side.
The Old Jail Museum provides the perfect setting for such a Halloween event. Long said to be haunted by Crossmire’s ghost, the jail that closed in 1990 is found on some of Pennsylvania’s top ten most haunted places. One such list placed the building as high as sixth.
At the time of his hanging in front of his cell — some reports say the hanging was conducted indoors because of the cold December weather in 1893, while others say it was to reduce the size of the crowd — Crossmire, who had claimed his innocence ever since his arrest, said he would return to haunt the place if the sentence was carried out.
According to a March 9, 1894 article in the McKean County Miner, a prisoner informed a visitor to the county jail that the place is haunted. In the cell formerly occupied by Crossmire, an inmate “was twice driven out of his bed by a tall white ghost. When the inmate twice attempted to clutch at it, there was nothing but air to clutch.
Since the cell door was not locked, ‘the inmate ran shrieking from the place as if a hundred demons were after him.’ He woke up the other prisoners with his yells.
I saw enough here myself the other night to convince me that the jail is haunted, and I tell you right here I would rather spend a year in state’s prison than a month here. Other prisoners were of the same mind.
‘Ralph always told us he would come back if he could,’ said a prisoner who is serving a long sentence, and I guess he is keeping his word.’”
This is just one account of the haunted jail. Others have been reported by guards and other prisoners, and museum volunteers.
