The Headless Bride: A Yellowstone Ghost Story
Hey there, Jackson guests. Welcome to Flat Creek Inn. Grab some hot chocolate from the C-store, pull up a comfy blanket, and settle down in front of the fire, because we've got a spooky ghost story to tell on this cold autumn night. As the sun slips away and the fire burns brighter, listen up. Our tale tonight comes from just down the road, in Yellowstone National Park. The Old Faithful Inn, as a matter of fact. We've talked about it before, but you haven't heard this part.
But our story actually begins far away from here, in New York City. There lived a young woman who was part of a wealthy shipping family. Her life was planned out from the start—debut in society, marry well, smile for the papers. But she, unfortunately, had other ideas. When the time came, she rejected every eligible young bachelor who came calling and instead fell in love with an older servant who worked in her family’s house.
As you can imagine, this caused quite a scandal. Her parents were furious. Her father accused the man of scheming for money and position, and when his daughter refused to change her mind, he gave the couple a wad of cash and banished them from New York forever.
They set out west on their honeymoon, eventually arriving at the Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone. But by then, the husband had gambled away their newly given money, leaving them nothing to start a new life, and the happy couple was anything but happy. The bride realized her father had been right all along. When she finally shelved her pride and telephoned home to ask for help, her father refused to give her a single penny.
That night, the couple fought. Guests later recalled hearing raised, angry voices through the thin wooden walls. Afterward, the husband stormed out into the cold, leaving the door locked behind him. That was the last anyone ever saw of him. Perhaps he managed to find passage away from the inn and started a new, unremarkable life elsewhere. Or perhaps he staggered into the cold in a drunken haze, sprained his ankle, and froze, unable to make it back to the inn. We will never know. What we do know is that days passed before the staff dared open the locked door. Inside, the room was pure chaos—clothes scattered, furniture overturned, and a dark metallic odor in the air. Worst of all, in the bathroom lay the bride’s body, pale and bloodless in a bathtub streaked with red.
Her head was missing.
Search parties combed the surrounding forest, unable to find a trace of her ne'er-do-well husband. Her family back in New York hushed up the whole affair; in their uptight society, scandal was worse than grief. For them, that was the end. But the story, of course, has a darker epilogue.
A few days later, musicians were rehearsing in the Crow’s Nest, a jumble of stairs and catwalks at the very top of the lofty inn. They complained of a foul smell. When someone went to investigate, they found it: the bride’s head, hidden among the rafters, curls matted and eyes wide in frozen terror. How it had gotten there, nobody could guess. Nor did they want to.
After the burial, the Inn returned to normal ... or at least, everyone tried to go back to business as usual. But one night, near midnight, a lone clerk sitting up with a book heard soft footsteps echoing through the lobby. When he looked up, he saw a figure descending high above from the Crow’s Nest—a pale shape in white, glowing faintly in the moonlight.
In her arms, she cradled her head.
She drifted down the stairs, crossed the corridor, and vanished through the door of her old room.
They say she still walks there, when the clock strikes twelve, retracing her final steps through the Old Faithful Inn—forever searching for the man who left her, seeking the rest of what he took from her.
***
This post is brought to you by Flat Creek Inn, an inn with the proud distinction of never having had anyone get murdered there. The story was adapted from Spooky Yellowstone by S. E. Schlosser.
Ryan Kunz is a copywriter and freelance writer who writes on a variety of topics, including media, the outdoors, and whatever else strikes his fancy. He would have pointed out to the headess ghost that her husband probably wasn't in their old room anymore. Maybe go look out in the woods?
