Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh

One of Pittsburgh's oldest libraries, opened in 1895 thanks to Andrew Carnegie's philanthropy. The stunning Beaux-Arts building in Oakland is known for both its architectural beauty and paranormal activity, featured on Ghost Hunters.

The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh in Oakland opened in 1895 as a gift from steel magnate Andrew Carnegie to the city. With a building this old, strange stories have inevitably emerged over the decades. Three distinct ghost stories haunt the stacks and halls of this grand institution.

A local city judge who frequented the library after it opened became a regular among the books until one day, for unknown reasons, he hanged himself in the stacks. After his body was discovered and removed, staff began reporting mysterious writing appearing high on the ceiling near the spot of the hanging noose. The writing is always the same: "Sentio Est Hic," Latin for "Judge is Here." A second spirit belongs to a workman who was electrocuted while installing the electrical box the day the library first received electricity. Staff in the basement have seen a man standing next to the electrical box who suddenly disappears when approached. Perhaps most unsettling, books throughout the library have a mind of their own, spontaneously dropping from shelves or moving themselves from one location to another.

The Carnegie Library of Homestead, a sister branch founded by Carnegie in 1898, is considered one of Pittsburgh's most notorious ghost hunting locations. "Ghost Hunters" filmed there in their seventh season, capturing EVPs of a woman screaming in the music hall and a voice saying "don't put the book back." Investigators also captured a "black mass" creeping around the music hall balcony.