Patapsco Female Institute

The haunted ruins of a 19th-century girls' boarding school, now a historic park where ghostly apparitions of students in white gowns are regularly reported.

The Patapsco Female Institute stands as one of Maryland's most haunted ruins, a grand Greek Revival structure atop Mount Misery in Ellicott City. Designed by noted architect Robert Cary Long Jr. and built of rare yellow-tinted granite donated by the Ellicott brothers, the school opened January 1, 1837, becoming one of the first female academies in the South to offer a rigorous academic curriculum. Under the legendary educator Almira Hart Lincoln Phelps (who served as headmistress from 1841-1856), the institute trained young women aged 12-18 in chemistry, botany, mathematics, philosophy, and foreign languages—making it the first school in the country to teach math to girls. At its peak, 150 students attended, including Jefferson Davis's daughter Winnie and Thomas Jefferson's great-granddaughter Sally Randolph, who later became headmistress.

The Civil War devastated the school's finances as Southern families could no longer pay tuition. After struggling for years, the institute closed in 1891 and was converted into the Burg Alnwick Hotel, then a WWI veterans' hospital with 50 beds, a 1930s summer theater called Hill Top Theatre, and finally a nursing home. When Howard County ordered all wood removed in 1958 to prevent fires, the building was left a permanent ruin.

Three distinct ghosts are said to haunt the ruins. The most famous is Annie, described as a teenage girl appearing in various Victorian clothing—sometimes a day dress with high collar and petticoat, sometimes her nightgown, sometimes a fancier ball gown. According to legend, Annie Van Derlot was the daughter of a wealthy Southern plantation owner who desperately wanted to leave the school. Her letters home described her experience as an "incarceration." When she fell ill with pneumonia during a harsh Maryland winter, her family arrived too late. Witnesses describe her gazing toward the entrance, "eternally waiting for her family to arrive." In the early 1980s, a man who was sledding near the institute as a child saw Annie standing near large trees watching his family—she radiated "sadness and despair." Historian Rissa Miller notes that while the Annie Van Derlot story may be urban legend, a ghost named Annie does inhabit the site, most commonly spotted by dog walkers.

The Gentleman is a residual haunting in 1940s-era clothing who walks across a non-existent second floor and gazes out windows before vanishing. Miller explains residual ghosts "never change, never vary—they appear in the same place and will never turn and look at you." Chesapeake Shakespeare Company production manager Lauren Engler experienced overwhelming dread while locking up after a performance—her throat tightened with unexplained panic. Her colleague later saw a stern man in old-fashioned clothing at a first-floor window; he vanished after she screamed.

The Shadow is the rarest phenomenon: a shadow resembling a man appears beside witnesses, yet no physical form exists to cast it. Visitors report seeing a shadow next to them that vanishes upon direct observation.

Additional spirits include Miss Margaret, a former headmistress still making vigilant rounds. Witnesses see her in white garments at the top of the grand staircase, accompanied by the scent of lavender. A stern spirit haunts the kitchen area, insisting on orderly conditions. During a 2021 paranormal investigation, a spirit communicated through dowsing rods that she "had been quite happy at the school but had died there." Ghost hunters have photographed mysterious figures in third-floor windows where "humans today simply could not be."

Paranormal experts attribute the intense activity to Ellicott City's unique geography: the Tiber River crosses the Patapsco River here, creating what Miller calls a "liminal or thin space where the spirit world is closer." The composite granite containing crystal quartz is believed to hold and absorb energy. "We've got these things that all seem to coalesce at the same spot," Miller explains, "and it results in being extra haunted."