These Arlington haunts aren’t your renovated building, pay at the door, create the haunts between the hours of 8 pm and 1 am we’re talking about. No ghostbuster. These are the real thing.

Here the undead really does go bump in the night.

We’ve researched some of the stories and legends around the area and picked five that sound like great goosebump-inducing delights just in time for Halloween. Feel free to read these with the lights on.

Number One – River Legacy Park

At River Legacy Park are several places rumored to be haunted. One of them is Hell’s Gate, along a shady trail through swampland.  It’s a great place for ghost hunting because it involves so many varied stories. There’s the mystical hobo who comes to your car and taps on your window just before disappearing, the confederate soldier who died there and still runs around scaring people, and the ghosts that inhabit the old bridge where a car took a wrong turn and crashed, killing the occupants.  It’s a great place for ghost hunting because it involves so many varied stories. There’s the mystical hobo who comes to your car and taps on your window just before disappearing, the confederate soldier who died there and still runs around scaring people, and the ghosts that inhabit the old bridge where a car took a wrong turn and crashed, killing the occupants.

Local legend has it that it was along this trail that captured Union spies were marched on their way to be hanged. Here, phantom sobs and prayers are heard, and along the walkway, folks have seen an apparition of a Confederate general with red hair (it’s always the gingers).

There’s also the Screaming Bridge. That sounds safe except in a very scary, dangerous, and unsafe way. Here a carload of football players is said to have crashed head-on with another car and burst into flames, falling off the bridge to their deaths.

How fast were they going?!

The road is now closed to cars, but some reports mention seeing a mysterious fog and glowing tombstones in the water under the bridge, bearing the names and death dates of the deceased. 

Altogether you have in River Legacy Park nearly everything a ghost hunter could ever want!

Number Two – The Belair Theatre Artisan Center

The Belaire Theatre, located at the Belaire Plaza shopping center, was opened April 8, 1966, with Hayley Mills in “That Darn Cat”. It was twinned on July 2, 1976. On May 8, 1987, it became a four-screen theatre.

The Belaire Theatre which closed in 2000, has been home to the Artisan Center Theatre since 2005. The Artisan Center presents family-friendly live theatrical productions in a theatre-in-the-round format.

Despite the center’s fun and family-friendly atmosphere, some members of the Hurst community refuse to step foot inside the theater.

What makes them feel this way?

They believe is it haunted by several spirits. Some are friendly.

Some are not very friendly at all.

Sightings include a young female ghost who several people claim to have actually interacted with and also a male spirit named Neil is not a very nice entity at all.

There are frequent reports of unexplained sounds around the theater, disembodied voices, faucets that come on and off by themselves, and flickering lights.

Other, more gentle ghosts, allegedly include a little girl, who is seen walking in and out of walls, and a former employee who died of a heart attack while working one of the projectors.

When these spirits do not appear as full-bodied apparitions, they make their presence known in other ways, such as messing with the lights and turning water faucets on.

Number Three – Del Frisco’s Double Eagle Steakhouse

Originally built in 1890, this high-end restaurant was the location of a bathhouse, probably for the upper-class. You can see immediately that great care was taken at some point to restore some of its original glamorous allure. The massive ceilings, lovely woodwork, and Grecian columns are definitely turn-of-the-century fancy decor, offering a lovely atmosphere for relaxation and social functions.

Perfect for an evening out, perfect for a scene from the movie, ‘Clue’ or ‘Lonesome Dove’, and absolutely perfect for the ghost who calls this luxury dining hall home.

This ghoul is apparently an unlucky winner of a gambling hand. 0ne that would be his last.

Spirit of Angry Murder Victim

This entity of a gentleman makes his presence known in the banquet halls, and the upstairs bar.

He has appeared to the living wearing 1890s/turn-of-the-century gentleman’s attire.

He patrols the banquet halls and upstairs bar, perhaps looking for his cowardly killer.

Perhaps a cool breeze is felt as he passes the living, or his footsteps may be heard.

Number Four – The Texas White House

This 1910 building is now a bed-and-breakfast inn. It’s definitely not as grand as the Del Frisco Eagle Steakhouse nor are there legends of football players exploding into fireballs on a bridge like on River Regency Park. No one has heard of an angry man named Neil taunting people who come to visit.

This is merely a quaint house, a white house that’s old and now a B&B,

The owners and employees, do talk about one ghost who is said to visit the Lone Star Room. The apparition of a man has been seen here, and his presence has been felt moving around in the room by some guests.

They even pride themselves on the fact that the reports say that the original owner, Mr. Newkirk, is reported to have a “happy presence” in his old bedroom. He seems to be pleased with the way his house is being run and the way the guests are treated.

There have been (that we know of), no reports of slamming doors, screams in the night, or lights flashing on and off.

The owner’s blog recounts an incident where a few women traveling alone, may have felt a “presence” in the room, a “lifting off the bed” or a “feel as if he walked past me.”

Would you stay in a house, though, that is known to be haunted? Is the White House enjoying a full guest register or the friendly ghost sad that he’s scaring the patrons away?

Happy to say that not only are they doing well, but they have guests that actually request to stay in the Lone Star room because they want to experience some type of supernatural force!

There are those who don’t want to stay in the main house at all, and request the “unhaunted” carriage house in the back yard!

Haunted guests, unhaunted guests, and everyone in between all agree on one thing. Come morning they’ll be in the dining room for the amazing breakfast spread!

Number Five – Arlington Hall

The stately building near the intersection of Arlington Boulevard and South George Mason Drive may no longer be home to military codebreakers, but it’s still a place of mystery.

In 1927 Dr. William Martin founded the Arlington Hall Junior College for Women. The rolling 100-acre campus included an award-winning riding club, and the stately Arlington Hall itself was home to many enviable social events including dinners, teas, balls, and formal dances.

In 1942 the Arlington Hall Junior College for Women quietly became the secret headquarters for the Signal Intelligence Service, a department dedicated to breaking German and Russian codes. Unbeknownst to the men and women working to end the war, the KGB had already infiltrated the center, spying via a long-time analyst who had defected to the U.S.S.R. After the Signal Intelligence Service expanded and transferred its headquarters, the building began its third life as a research center, and then as a satellite office for the State Department in 1989.

The building still holds its secrets – not only the unexploded Civil War-era rifle shell found sitting precariously under the hall during an excavation in 2008, but the unexplained noises that occupants hear in the quietest hours.

It is said that if you are downstairs when it is silent, and you know you are alone, you will hear footsteps above you, walking across the hard floor and then stepping onto the carpet and continuing their journey. If you go upstairs to investigate, you’ll see a young woman in a floral dress walking into and out of the women’s powder room on the way to a party. She stops to check her make

Whether you believe in the supernatural or not, ghosts and ghouls and all things that go bump in the night have one thing in common.

They always make a great story!

Happy Halloween Everyone!