HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena, as catalogued
+ 2 further entries on record
Grand Hotel Rebuilt — Site of the Swamper's Silver Tunnel and Persistent Basement Haunting
417 E. Allen St, Tombstone, AZ 85638
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$
Free to enter as a bar and restaurant. Ghost tours are separately ticketed.
Access
Limited Access
Historic building with basement access via stairs; uneven floors in original sections
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1880 · OK Corral Fighters — Night-Before Lodging · 1882 Tombstone Fire Survivor · Earp Era Saloon
The Grand Hotel opened September 9, 1880, with an invitation-only ball that drew Tombstone's mining and law-enforcement elite. The building featured sixteen bedrooms fitted with solid walnut furnishings, walls hung with oil paintings, and a lobby lit by three elegant chandeliers. It was the most substantial hotel in town at the time.
Among the Grand Hotel's documented guests in the fourteen months before the fire were Wyatt Earp, Virgil Earp, Doc Holliday, and — notably — Ike Clanton and the McLaury brothers, who were registered guests on the night of October 25, 1881, the evening before the gunfight on Fremont Street.
The Tombstone fire of May 25, 1882, destroyed most of the building above grade. The surviving structure — seven arches and the main floor joists — was rebuilt as a saloon. The original long bar, a surviving fixture, was moved to the main floor and remains in place today as Big Nose Kate's Saloon.
The name honors Mary Katherine Harony (known as Big Nose Kate), Doc Holliday's companion, though she was not documented as a guest of the original hotel. The bar has operated under the Big Nose Kate's name since at least the mid-twentieth century and remains one of the most visited stops on Allen Street.
Sources
The Swamper was a handyman employed by the Grand Hotel and later the rebuilt saloon. He was given basement lodgings as part of his wages — an arrangement that, according to the venue's own documented history, gave him years of unsupervised access to the underground mine tunnels beneath Tombstone. He allegedly spent that time excavating a private shaft toward a silver vein and extracting ore ounce by ounce. The date and circumstances of his death are not independently documented.
Staff at Big Nose Kate's have reported a figure in overalls — solid enough in peripheral vision to be mistaken for a living person — near the basement stairs and the bar end closest to the mine entrance. Reports include objects moved or thrown from shelves, bottles relocated, and the persistent sensation of being followed in the basement. Workers describe leaving whiskey as an informal offering; the practice predates the current management.
The basement also sits on what was historically used as a temporary morgue during the silver boom — bodies of shooting victims were stored there before transport. Investigators who have worked the space report EVP captures and battery drain consistent with other documented mine-shaft-adjacent sites in the region.
Notable Entities
The saloon is open daily for food, drinks and live country entertainment, with free posed photographs behind the bar, on the piano or with a cowboy or saloon girl. The original long bar — a surviving Grand Hotel fixture alongside surviving arches and floor joists — is on the main level. The basement, which connects to old mine shaft tunnels, is accessible to patrons; the operator reports paranormal activity in the building.
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This Tombstone tour includes Big Nose Kate's Saloon on its route.
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Tombstone, AZ
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Bisbee, AZ
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