HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena — as catalogued
+ 2 further entries on record
Idaho's oldest hotel, an 1866 building in the Silver City ghost town, still open summers for off-grid overnight stays and long named on haunted-Idaho lists.
Jordan St, Silver City, ID 83650
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Room rates for overnight stays; meals and drinks available in season. Reserve by phone/text or email well ahead, as the hotel runs a short summer season.
Access
Limited Access
Remote ghost town reached by an unpaved mountain road (high-clearance recommended); the 1866 building has stairs and period construction, and operates off-grid.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1866 · Originated 1866; a wing was moved by oxen from Ruby City when Silver City became county seat · Often called the oldest hotel in Idaho · Closed around 1942 as the mining town emptied · Restored from 1972 by Edward Jagels over nearly three decades · Part of the Silver City Historic District (National Register of Historic Places, 1972)
Silver City grew up after the 1864 discovery of silver and gold near War Eagle Mountain in Owyhee County, and at its 1880s height it held roughly 2,500 people and some 75 businesses. The Idaho Hotel's history runs alongside the town's. In 1866, when Silver City became the county seat, a wing of an existing hotel in the rival camp of Ruby City was taken apart, loaded piece by piece onto sleds and skids, and dragged up the snow-and-ice-covered road by oxen to be rebuilt in Silver City.
The hotel expanded across the rest of the century. By 1898 a large addition with a new dining room and additional bedrooms was finished, and the building gained spring water, bathrooms, and an updated kitchen. As mining wound down after Idaho statehood in 1890 and small-scale work tapered through the World War II years, the town emptied out. The Idaho Hotel closed around 1942, and by the 1940s only one permanent resident remained in Silver City.
In the spring of 1972, Edward Jagels bought the deteriorating hotel and spent close to thirty years restoring it before the property changed hands again in 2001. That same year the townsite and surrounding land were listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Silver City Historic District, a roughly 10,240-acre district of about 70 privately owned standing buildings.
Today the Idaho Hotel operates seasonally, offering rooms, meals, and drinks in a building kept much as it was a century ago. It is regularly described as the oldest hotel in Idaho.
Sources
The Idaho Hotel turns up on nearly every list of haunted Idaho lodgings, including coverage by KIVI-TV and OnlyInYourState. The most-repeated story holds that two men died in a shootout on or near the hotel's front steps in the late 1800s, and that their presence is still felt around the entrance.
A second story attaches to a former owner identified in local retellings as O. D. Broombaugh, said to have lived in one of the upstairs rooms and to have died by suicide there while seriously ill. Out of respect, the specifics are left aside; what circulates among guests is simply that the room is associated with an uneasy feeling and reports of being touched at night.
Beyond those named stories, visitors and staff have described phantom piano music, voices and laughter from rooms known to be empty, footsteps on the wooden floors when no one is upstairs, and small objects moving. Regulars in the lore are given nicknames by guides and guests.
The present operation treats the building as a working historic hotel rather than a paranormal attraction, and reporting has noted that the ownership has been skeptical of the ghost claims. Whatever one makes of the stories, the setting does most of the work: a near-abandoned mining town reached by a rough seasonal road, with a hand-restored 1866 hotel run off the grid.
Notable Entities
Book a room in the 1866 hotel and stay overnight in a roadless-feeling mining ghost town. The building runs off-grid with limited modern amenities, and guests have long traded stories of footsteps and other activity in the upper rooms. Reserve directly with the hotel.
Drive in for the day to walk the preserved townsite and stop at the hotel for a meal or drink in season. The hotel and surrounding district are part of the Silver City Historic District on the National Register.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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