From the outside, the 18th- century villa atop a hill in New York City’s Harlem neighbor- hood looks like a charming mansion promising a trip back into American history. But learn a little about the villa’s dark past—the lonely old woman who spent her final years holed up in the mansion, slowly sinking into insanity—and then the Morris - Jumel Mansion feels less like something from the history books and more like a plot from a horror movie. And that’s before the woman’s ghost appears on the porch. In these pages, you’ll get up close and uncomfortable with this spirit and all her ghostly cohorts across the U.S. Climb the steps into houses where the specter of death lingers in every room. Unbolt the heavy doors to prisons and mental health hospitals where the inmates and patients still cry out in pain. Venture into the fog of war for tales of soldiers who keep fighting long after falling in battle, wander through haunted cemeteries and churches God couldn’t save, and explore the museum collections that send chills down the spine. And get ready to check into historic hotels where turndown service might be provided by a ghostly specter. These are America’s scariest places.