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Gone Haunting: Exploring the Use of Mission-Based Ghost Tours in Historic House Museums

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Gone Haunting: Exploring the Use of Mission-Based Ghost Tours in Historic House Museums Gone Haunting: Exploring the Use of Mission-based Ghost Tours in Historic House Museums Emily R. Alvey A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Arts University of Washington 2017 Committee: Jessica Luke Scott Magelssen Marc Miller Program authorized to offer degree: Museology ÓCopyright 2017 Emily R. Alvey University of Washington Gone Haunting: Exploring the Use of Mission-based Ghost Tours in Historic House Museums Emily R. Alvey Chair of Supervisory Committee: Jessica J. Luke, Ph.D. University of Washington Museology Program Abstract Struggling historic house museums (HHMs) are in need of tailored, innovative programs to increase visitation rates and maintain financial solvency. The purpose of this study was to explore the use of mission-based ghost tours for revenue in various HHMs to determine guiding practices for this type of museum programming. In-depth interviews with museum professionals involved with creating and administering ghost tours, participant observations of the tours, and document analysis of promotional materials and internal reports provided insight into the logistical considerations, motivations, and ways of connecting ghost tours to mission from three HHMs. Study results suggested that ghost tour programs have the potential to be designed for museums of different sizes, and that they can be designed with multiple types of educational content. Additionally, this study suggested that ghost tour programs can be financially lucrative for HHMs, they can help sustain visitorship through reaching new audiences, and it is possible to ensure that ghost tours in HHMs are reflective of their educational mission. The results of this study offer house museum professionals some suggestions on designing and implementing their own ghost tours—one type of innovative programming. GONE HAUNTING Acknowledgements First, I would like to thank the museums involved in this study: the Woodruff-Fontaine House Museum, the John Wornall House Museum, and the Whaley House Museum. I am very grateful for their participation and support; they helped to make this study successful. I would also like to thank my committee for all of their help and encouragement along the way: Scott Magelssen from the University of Washington Drama Department, Marc Miller from the University of Washington School of Marine and Environmental Affairs, and finally my chair Jessica Luke. I would like to thank the other members of my thesis group for all of their support and care throughout this process. Their encouragement was invaluable this year. Finally, I would like to thank my family for all of their love and support over the years. I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish any of this without them. GONE HAUNTING Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1 Problem Statement and Research Questions ............................................................................... 3 Significance ................................................................................................................................. 3 Chapter 2: Literature Review .......................................................................................................... 5 House Museum Attendance and Financial Issues ....................................................................... 6 The Creation and Enjoyment of Ghost Stories ......................................................................... 11 Museums and Tourism, Historic Site Interpretation, and the Importance of Site Authenticity 15 Ghost Tourism .......................................................................................................................... 18 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................ 24 Chapter 3: Methods ....................................................................................................................... 26 Research Sites ........................................................................................................................... 26 Description of Sample and Data Collection .............................................................................. 28 Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................ 29 Ethics ......................................................................................................................................... 29 Limitations ................................................................................................................................ 29 Chapter 4: Results and Discussion ................................................................................................ 31 Research Site 1 .......................................................................................................................... 31 Research Site 2 .......................................................................................................................... 33 Research Site 3 .......................................................................................................................... 35 GONE HAUNTING Research Question 1: What is the nature of ghost tours in historic house museums and how are they implemented? .................................................................................................................... 37 Research Question 2: Why do historic house museums offer ghost tours as a type of programming? ........................................................................................................................... 46 Research Question 3: How are the ghost tours offered by historic house museums related to the mission of the institutions? ................................................................................................. 50 Chapter 5: Conclusions and Implications ..................................................................................... 56 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................... 56 Implications ............................................................................................................................... 60 Bibliography ................................................................................................................................. 64 Appendix A: Interview Guide ....................................................................................................... 67 Appendix B: Interview Quotes ..................................................................................................... 69 Research Question 1 ................................................................................................................. 69 Research Question 2 ................................................................................................................. 77 Research Question 3 ................................................................................................................. 82 Appendix C: Document Quotes .................................................................................................... 88 GONE HAUNTING 1 Chapter 1: Introduction The Stanley Hotel in Estes, Colorado, a rumored-to-be haunted historic hotel and the one which inspired Stephen King’s iconic novel The Shining, hosts as many as 24 sold-out ghost tours every day in their summer season and as many as 14 per day during their off-season.1 At $28 a person, these tours bring in a significant amount of revenue for The Stanley while educating tour-goers on the hotel’s past. The tours intertwine local legends and spooky stories from past guests and staff with the history of the hotel’s founder, F.O. Stanley, famous guests who have stayed there throughout the hotel’s years of operation, and its importance to the history of Colorado. As a whole, historic house museums are struggling to remain financially secure.2 Like The Stanley in a few key ways, historic house museums are typically sites that have some sort of historic significance, and are opened to the public for the purposes of conveying the stories of the sites’ former occupants. The two differ in that unlike places like The Stanley, most house museums are nonprofits which manage their institutions under an overarching mission statement, and for historic houses the scope of history from which to draw from for programming tends to be even narrower, often focused primarily on one specific family, unlike The Stanley which can draw from the histories of its larger population of guests. While writing about historic site visitation, Max van Balgooy writes that between 2002 and 2008, visitation rates for historic 1 Rebecca Lattanzio, “Stanley Ghost Tour Popular with Park Visitors,” Our National Parks, published May 6, 2011, http://www.ournationalparks.us/west/rocky-mountain/stanley_hotel_ghost_tour_popular_with_park_visitors/. 2 See Max van Balgooy, “NEA Survey Reveals Patterns in Historic Site Visitation,” Engaging Places, published March 5, 2013; Michelle Zupan, “The Scary Truth Facing Historic Houses,” American Association for State and Local History, published October 28, 2015; J. Freedom du Lac, “Struggling to attract visitors, historic houses may face day of reckoning,” The Washington Post, published December 22,
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