Lemp Haunted Mansion, St. Louis, MO

The Lemp Mansion, listed as one of the ten most haunted places in America,sits on the outside of the Cherokee-Lemp District in St. Louis, Missouri, Orginally the mansion of the Lemp family it is now a Dinner Theatre, restaurant and Bed and Breakfast. Johann Adam Lemp introduced St. Louis first Lager in 1840 at his brewery near where the St. Louis Arch now stands. He served his beer from a Pub adjacent to the  Lemp’s Western Brewing Co. The lager and the Brewery made the Lemps mllionaires. In 1876 they built this mansion (it has a tunnel underneath that links to the caves that stored and cooled the beer.

According to Legends of America Website http://www.legendsofamerica.com/mo-lempmansion.html 

"When mechanical refrigeration became available, parts of the cave were converted for other purposes, including a natural auditorium and a theatre. This underground oasis would later spawn a large concrete swimming pool, with hot water piped in from the brewery boiling house, and a bowling alley. At one time, the theatre was accessible by way of a spiral staircase from Cherokee Street."

The Lemps were the makers of the original Falstaf Beer and also helped Anheiser Busch and Pabst get their starts. In 1901 the Lemps luck changed and from that time on they experience many tragedies in their family. Death of a son, good friend Frederick Pabst and eventually the suicide by pistol of William Lemp, Sr. The business went to his son who spent the family fortune on all kinds of decadence. An illigitimate son was hidden in the mansions attic his whole life (downs syndrome - his presence is known as the "monkey face boy"). In all four of the Lemp family would take their own lives.

It is said that the following ghostly happenings frequent the mansions:apparitions appear and vanish, voices and sounds come from nowhere, and glasses will fly through the air, a piano plays and lights turn on and off on their own. The three places that have the most activity are the Stairwell (someone running up), the attic (apparition of the monkey face boy") and the basement near the cave entrance, called the "Gates of Hell" by staff members.