10 Places You Do NOT Want to Visit

Haunted houses during Halloween are overrated. These places, however, some may beg to associate with ”the real thing.”

Riddle House

Riddle House (Palm Beach County, Florida) was originally a funeral parlor. In the 1920s, the house became privately owned by Karl Riddle. Shortly thereafter, Joseph, one of Riddle’s former employees, committed suicide by hanging himself in the attic of the house.

Since that time, a number of bizarre instances have occurred, such as one man having a lid flung at his head. Today, men are no longer allowed in the attic. Other places in the house, apparently are also haunted, including several stories of furniture being frequently moved.

Helltown

In the 70’s, Boston Township was the site of a government buyout and subsequent mass eviction of citizens. The houses were intended to be torn down and the land used for a national park. However, the plans never quite manifested and legends to as why are about as numerous as the stars in the sky. 

Is “Helltown” a myth blown out of proportions? Who knows. We do know that the heavily wooded landscape is rarely entered to this date. The steep Stanford Road drop off, immediately followed by a dead end, is aptly named The End of the World. If you get stuck at this dead end for too long, according to ghost story enthusiasts, you may meet your end at the hands of many members of the endless parade of freaks patrolling the woods.

Satanists, Ku Klux Klan members, an escaped mental patient, an abnormally large snake, and mutants caused by an alleged chemical spill are all reported “guests” of this region.

Stull Cemetery

Stull, Kansas, a tiny, unincorporated town in Douglas County has a reported population of 20 people, reason enough to “put it off the map” if it wasn’t for this crazy story.

In the early 20th century, two tragedies rocked the tiny settlement. First, a father finished burning a farm field, only to find the charred corpse of his young son in the aftermath. The second incident involved a man went missing and was later found hanging from a tree.

The book Weird US has this to say on Stull Cemetery:

There are graveyards across America that go beyond merely being haunted and enter into the realm of the diabolical. They are places so terrifying that they say the devil himself holds courts with his worshipers there. The cemetery on Emmanuel Hill in Stull, Kansas, is one of these places.

Some believe that the cemetery is one of the seven gateways to hell, thus making the old church patrolled heavily (especially on Halloween) from unwanted intruders. The place so unholy, in fact, that some claim Pope John Paul II refused to allow his plane to fly over eastern Kansas on his way to an appearance in Colorado.

The Ridges

Originally known as Athens Lunatic Asylum, The Ridges was renamed after the state of Ohio acquired the property. Athens, alone, is apparently listed as the (gasp) 13th most haunted place in the world, thus already giving this joint some cred.

The most famous story at The Ridges is that of a 54 year old female patient who ran away and was missing for six weeks. She was found dead in an unused ward. The patient had taken off all of her clothes, neatly folded them, and laid down on the cold concrete where she subsequently died. Through a combination of decomposition and sun exposure, her corpse left a permanent stain on the floor, which is still visible today.

Humberstone & LaNoria

In 1872, the town was founded as a saltpeter mine and business boomed. However, after several heavy blows (including the Great Depression), the business declined and then collapsed in 1958. Consequently, the town of Humberstone and it’s surrounding towns were abandoned by 1960, officially making it a “ghost town.”

It is rumored that the dead of the La Noria cemetery rise at night and walk around the town, and ghostly images frequently show up in photographs in Humberstone. These towns are so terrifying that apparently residents of nearby Iquique refuse to enter them.

Byberry Mental Asylum

The Philadelphia State Hospital at Byberry, or known simply as Byberry, was the poster image for patient maltreatment. The hospital was founded in 1907 and quickly exceeded its patient limit. Due to its atrocious conditions and the sub-human treatment of its patients, the hospital was closed and abandoned in 1990.

It had since become a nuisance for the neighborhood, as it was a breeding ground for vandals, arsonists, Satanists, and urban explorers. It was demolished in 1996.

The terror here comes from the facts of the how the hospital was run. Human excrement lined the hallways, which were also where many patients slept. The staff was abusive, and frequently exploited and harassed patients. One patient had a tooth pulled without Novocaine, while another killed and dismembered a female patient.

Leap Castle

Although it was built by the O’Bannons in the late 15th century, the castle was taken over by the ruling O’Carrolls, to whom the O’Bannons were subject. After the death of Mulrooney O’Carroll, a fierce sibling rivalry erupted, including the brutal murder of one of the brothers - a priest - in his own chapel, in front of the family, by the other brother.

The castle is rumored to be haunted by a vast number of spirits, including a violent, hunched beast known only as the “Elemental.” It is most recognizable by the accompanying smell of rotting flesh and sulfur. While renovating the castle, workers discover an oubliette, which is a dungeon accessible only through a ceiling hatch, into which prisoners are thrown, then forgotten and left to die.

Shades of Death Road

Shades of Death Road is located in New Jersey and winds through seven miles of its countryside. While there is no definitive clues as to the origin of its eerie name, Shades of Death Road is in fact its actual name. 

Some say that murderous highwaymen would rob and kill those along the road. Others say the reason was because of violent retaliations by the locals against the very same highwaymen, resulting in their lynched corpses being hung up as a warning.

Gruesome history and spooky name aside, you have much to fear along this byway. South of the I-80 overpass lies an officially unnamed lake, that most will tell you is called Ghost Lake.

According to personal testimony posted on Wikipedia:

One day during the 1990s, some visitors found hundreds of Polaroid photographs scattered in woods just off the road. They took some and shared them with Weird NJ, which published a few as samples. Most of the disturbing images showed a television changing channels, others showed a woman or women, blurred and somewhat difficult to identify, lying on some sort of metal object, conscious but not smiling. Local police began an investigation after the magazine ran an item with the photos, but the remainder disappeared shortly afterwards.

Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum

This former high school was converted, in 1975, to Security Prison 21 by the Khmer Rouge. The prison was used as a base to torture and murder prisoners. However, the Khmer Rouge leaders paranoia soon caught up with them, and they began shipping people from their own ranks to the prison. Many prisoners were tortured and tricked into naming their family and associates, who were them also arrested, tortured and murdered.

The ghosts of the estimated 17,000 victims of Tuol Sleng (in Cambodia) continue to roam the halls, and odd happenings around the place are often attributed to them. Only 12 people are thought to have survived. Posted below are the actual regulations of the prison:

1. You must answer accordingly to my question. Don’t turn them away.
2. Don’t try to hide the facts by making pretexts this and that, you are strictly prohibited to contest me.
3. Don’t be a fool for you are a chap who dare to thwart the revolution.
4. You must immediately answer my questions without wasting time to reflect.
5. Don’t tell me either about your immoralities or the essence of the revolution.
6. While getting lashes or electrification you must not cry at all.
7. Do nothing, sit still, and wait for my orders. If there is no order, keep quiet. When I ask you to do something, you must do it right away without protesting.
8. Don’t make pretext about Kampuchea Krom in order to hide your secret or traitor.
9. If you don’t follow all the above rules, you shall get many many lashes of electric wire.
10.If you disobey any point of my regulations you shall get either ten lashes or five shocks of electric discharge.

The Mines of Paris

The seemingly infinite tunnels that run below the streets of Paris should not be confused with the Catacombs of Paris, the famous underground ossuary. Exploring the mines is illegal and penalties include heavy fines.

Why?

The mines are now unkempt, unpatrolled, and unsafe. As far as legends go, ancient cults and creatures patrol the depths. Spirits dwell in the infinite shadows, and if one wanders deep enough, and survives, they may even enter Hades itself.

The tunnels stretch for close to 600 kilometers throughout the Parisian underground, and most of them are unmapped. Saying it is easy to get lost is an understatement. It is nearly impossible not to get lost. Many parts of the catacombs are hundreds of feet below street level. Some hallways are flooded, or are so narrow you have to crawl through them. There are holes that drop hundreds of feet, and manholes that are unreachable, luring unwary urban explorers in with false promises of freedom.

Thanks to ListVerse for the information.