LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — As we all eagerly await fall temperatures to arrive, that also means Halloween is creeping up quickly.
If you’re looking for some spooky experiences in central Arkansas, the new owners of an old historic home in downtown Little Rock are offering up a unique experience.
The Fee House is located at 1900 Broadway Avenue. It's stood there since 1890; first owned by the Pierce Family, and then the Fee Family, who lived there for decades, according to Ginger Beck with the group Abandoned Arkansas.
"There are things that have happened that lead us to believe there might be some paranormal activity,” Beck said. “And since it's been empty for so long, we're kinda getting in on the ground floor and letting people come in and actually do ghost-hunting.”
So, what kind of paranormal activity are we talking about here? Below is an excerpt from the history Beck gathered for Abandoned Arkansas:
“Accidental or tragic death seemed to follow the Fee Family. Frank Sr. seemed to have the most normal “accidental” death. In 1922, at 62 years old, he was on a business trip to Michigan and suffered a fatal heart attack.
Nine years later in 1931, however, a much more tragic end came to the matriarch of the family, Mamie at age 56. According to an email from her granddaughter Patrica Bell, daughter of Katherine, Mamie was in her dressing room one evening:
“We had an open grate (for heating the room) and my grandmother had washed her hair and she was in her nightgown drying her hair, over the stove — her gown caught fire — the made [sic], Amelia, was the only one with her — she rolled her in a blanket, to smother the flames. She was burned — she would tell no one. Edward was to be married at that time, and she didn’t want to spoil his marriage plans, so she kept her plight to herself. After the wedding she got so bad, she did go to a hospital, for the burns, but it was too late. From this she died. She was a good Christian Scientist — many the time she would call someone to pray that I would get well. Maybe that, too was a reason she didn’t go to the hospital sooner.”
After the shock of Mamie’s death, the family was clearly distraught. Less than a year later in 1932, daughter Katherine, age 28, died by drinking poison. The newspapers reported this horrific death as a “mistake,” claiming Katherine said she had a headache while she, her husband, and two of her brothers were playing cards in the parlor. The official story is that in her attempt to take some medicine to relieve her headache, she inadvertently drank acid. She was dead by the time her brothers and her husband were able to get her to the hospital.”
The Fee House’s new owners, Drew and Mark Counsell-Short are planning to restore the home and turn it into a bed & breakfast over the next five years. They recently remodeled the Carriage House in Little Rock and live in it on-site.
But in the meantime, they’re embracing the Fee House’s history are hosting ghost-hunting tours with Abandoned Arkansas.
“We had our first event last night and we caught some really interesting stuff on both camera and audio,” Beck said.
"If you don't believe in ghosts, then you can just come and look at this old cool house because it’s going to be a showplace. It's going to be a beautiful bed and breakfast that is going to be great for the city of Little Rock and downtown Little Rock."
If you’re interested in attending an event at the Fee House, you can visit its Facebook page HERE.
You can also learn more about the history of this and so many other historic Arkansas places HERE.