The Haunting of America: Ghosts and Legends of America's Haunted Past

by Troy Taylor

Join author Troy Taylor in search of America's most haunted places and the strangest historical ghost stories ever told.
Travel to New England in search of Dudleytown; roam the haunted battlefields at Gettysburg; seek out the Jersey Devil in the Pine Barrens; hunt for ghosts in historic Mammoth Cave; wander through California's Winchester Mansion; get lost at the Bachelor's Grove Cemetery near Chicago... and that's only the beginning!

Travel all across the country in pursuit of spirits and let Troy Taylor introduce you to the places he considers to be America's Most Haunted. Little-known stories and famous haunted spots include Connecticut's Phelps Mansion; haunted Ellicott City, Maryland; the infamous Bell Witch of Tennessee; Louisiana's Myrtles Plantation; the Crescent Hotel in Arkansas; Alcatraz Prison in San Francisco Bay; San Diego's Whaley House; and many more.

Troy Taylor is the author of 40 books about history, hauntings, and the unexplained in America, including Haunted Illinois, Haunted Chicago, and Weird Illinois. Mr. Taylor is the president of the American Ghost Society, which boasts more than 600 active members in the United States and Canada. He is also a public speaker on the subject of hauntings and has spoken to literally hundreds of public and private public groups on the paranormal. Taylor is also the co-owner and manager of the Illinois Hauntings Tour Co., with tours in Alton, Chicago and Springfield and of the Bump in the Night Tour Co., which hosts overnight excursions to haunted places throughout the Midwest.

Genres: Paranormal, Ghosts, Nonfiction, History, Supernatural, Historical

365 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2001

Reviews

[Gaela Lalaland · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent look at American history with the added interest of ghost stories. Highly recommend. This one was easy to pick up and I was sad when I finished it because I looked forward to reading it each day. Also, forget haunted houses have you heard of haunted caves 😱😱😱😱

[Ken · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolutely fantastic tour of America's most amazing hauntings. What I really appreciated is that each subject is treated to a fair amount of researched history before the ghostly phenomena is discussed. Some of the topics were interesting because of the history (Ocean-Born Mary, Gettysburg, Alcatraz), some because of the truly inexplicable phenomena (Phelps Mansion, Summerwind), and some because Troy's research actually debunked commonly-held stories (Myrtles Plantation). The two that will stick with me the longest are the hauntings caused by cruelty to slaves (LaLaurie Mansion, the Old Slave House). At any rate, this is a must-read if you enjoy researched ghost reports. One negative is the lack of editing in certain places, so just ignore sometimes when the author repeats himself.

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author's use of exclamation points is really annoying.

[Kerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good book-- I love how Troy does the historical research on these places as well. It is just not yep people have strange things happen to them here.

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read relating to haunted locations and their history. The editing was definitely something to be desired. It was like a high school student was assigned the task. Otherwise, it kept my attention throughout.

[Kayce B · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just couldn’t do it. It read like a high school students paper where they repeat themselves every couple paragraphs in an attempt to make it longer.
I did appreciate the history behind the stories in the portion I was able to get through.

[Halli Villegas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some interesting ghost stories in here that I hadn't heard before. I am not crazy about the jokey tone the editor/author takes at times. It seems to be a feature of the series. I would enjoy it more if the stories were presented straight ahead without the wink wink asides at the end.

[MaryAnn Fritsch]

This is the most poorly written book I have ever read. It is so full of spelling and grammatical errors it is embarrassing. Fall River Press should take a look at their editing and proofreading processes. I can not even give this one star.

[Cheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, but not what I was looking for.

[Desiree · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mostly just repeats from what I've read elsewhere. There were some cool new things added in, though. It would be nice to have somethings clarified as rumor or legend instead of fact, though (particularly concerning the Bell Witch), and the typos were just everywhere. The editor really needs to fix a lot of apostrophes used to pluralize (esp. names), and other issues.

[Marianne Kwiatkowski-Yee · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love a good ghost story, and was looking for a little suspense. This particular book was incredibly boring. It was not well written, and read like a text book for a high school history class. The stories were interesting, but not very entertaining. Not to mention that the author's liberal use of exclamation points,I'm guessing to create excitement,was just annoying.