It was like some dark undefinable menace, forever dogging my steps, lurking, & threatening …"

Friday Night Fright at The Mount

On Friday nights from June through October, The Mount presents Friday Night Fright, a special guided tour of the most haunted parts of the estate. The 90-minute tour starts at the stables at 6:30, and ends at the main house. Please arrive 15 minutes early. We suggest you park at the main house. It is $20 for adults, $10 for students 16 years and under.

Please note there will not be a ghost tour on September 24.

Please note that it is not suitable for wheelchairs and includes about a half-mile walk with some steep areas.  Reservations are required.

Friday Night Fright is not recommended for children under 10 and children under 8 are not permitted on the tour.

Two helpful hints:  dress warmly and wear sensible shoes!  Please call (413) 551-5111 for reservations. Join us for a Friday Night Fright; who knows what strange experiences may lie in store?

“For the ghost should never be allowed to forget that his only chance of survival is in the tales of those who have encountered him . . . “

Sounds and Shadows …

It starts with the sounds. Creaking floors and slamming doors, fading footsteps down empty halls, whispered words in the wind. Sensations and shadows follow. A feeling of being watched, tingling taps on the shoulders, spectral shapes crouched in corners or gathered in front of fireplaces long gone cold.

These are just a few of the experiences related by visitors to The Mount, Edith Wharton’s hundred-year-old isolated retreat in the dark hills of the Berkshires. Tricks of the imagination in an old house once inhabited by a skilled writer of ghost stories … or something else?

When Jason Hawes, Grant Wilson, and the rest of the Ghost Hunters team came to investigate The Mount they found very significant indications of paranormal activity. Footsteps, voices, even a head peeping around a corner … just to prove what so many before them have claimed, that The Mount is indeed a center of ghostly activity!  

We are interested in hearing from anyone who has stories about The Mount and we will post them on our blog. Email them to info@edithwharton.org.

Then come, experience for yourself the hot spots of paranormal activity in the servants’ quarters, stables, and formal rooms on one of our special ghost tours. Call (413) 551-5111 for more information.

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History

The Mount has stood mute witness to stormy emotional currents from its very beginnings. Built in 1902 as a writer’s retreat, it was the scene of the final disintegration of the Whartons’ ill-fated marriage. Edith Wharton exiled herself to France and embarked on a passionate, yet angst-ridden love affair, and Teddy Wharton descended into years of mental instability.

Sold by the Whartons in 1911, The Mount became part of Foxhollow School for Girls in 1942. Residents reported unexplained noises and odd sensations while living in the old servant and family quarters. The school closed in 1976 and after several years of neglect Shakespeare & Co. used The Mount as both dormitory and theater. Actors reported not only odd noises, but also visions of figures in old-fashioned clothing calmly inquiring what they were doing there …

Ghost Stories

Edith Wharton was no stranger to the world of the supernatural. As a girl she was inordinately sensitive to forces she could never quite see nor escape. She was "haunted by formless horrors" and felt "some dark undefinable menace … I could feel it behind me, upon me; and if there was any delay in the opening of the door I was seized by a choking agony of terror."

Even as a married woman in her late twenties, she could not sleep in a room with a book containing a ghost story. She said she actually burned books containing ghost stories "because it frightened me to know that they were downstairs in the library!" Years later, after writing many ghost stories of her own she perhaps drew on these early fears when describing what makes a good ghost story:

"If it sends a cold shiver down one’s spine, it has done its job and done it well."

Find out if Edith Wharton and her beloved house can still make spines shiver.

Come to The Mount.