HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena, as catalogued
+ 2 further entries on record
Six-story 1910 Tourtellotte and Hummel building on Lower Main, renovated 2013 into apartments, tavern, salons, and ballroom; legends center on a peaceful woman in Room 136.
1109 W Main St, Boise, ID 83702
Research updated September 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Public access to Owyhee Tavern and ground-floor retail. Apartments, salons, and meeting/event facilities operate by appointment or reservation.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Modern accessible entrances after the 2013 renovation; ground-floor businesses ADA-accessible.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1910 · 1910 Tourtellotte and Hummel six-story hotel · Original 125-room hotel with rooftop garden, restaurant, and dance floor · Ore-Ida Foods corporate floors (1960s) · 2013 adaptive-reuse renovation to mixed-use apartments, tavern, salons, and ballroom
The Owyhee Hotel was built in 1910 by Boise architects Tourtellotte and Hummel - the same firm that designed the Idaho State Capitol and a long list of other landmark Boise buildings - on the south side of West Main Street between 11th and 12th. The six-story building originally held 125 guest rooms.
The Owyhee's most-discussed early-twentieth-century amenity was its rooftop garden, which combined a restaurant, dance floor, and bar with live entertainment. According to Haunted Rooms America and FrightFind, the rooftop was a popular Boise destination from the hotel's opening through about 1940.
In the 1960s the Ore-Ida Foods corporation purchased the top three floors for office use. Ownership changed again in 1992, when the entire building returned to hotel operation. The Owyhee underwent a major adaptive-reuse renovation in 2013, after which it ceased operating as an overnight hotel and was reconfigured as a mixed-use property with apartments, ground-floor retail and food and beverage (the Owyhee Tavern), two hair salons, and meeting and event facilities including a ballroom.
The building is part of the Lower Main Street commercial cluster of Tourtellotte and Hummel designs and serves as the departure point for the US Ghost Adventures Boise Ghost Tour, which walks east on Main toward the Idanha, the Belmont Barbershop site, and the Egyptian Theatre.
Sources
The Owyhee's named-room case is Room 136. According to Haunted Rooms America, FrightFind, and the US Ghost Adventures Boise top-ten list, a guest staying in Room 136 with her husband woke during the night to find a female apparition standing in the room. The witness reportedly described feeling calm rather than frightened, and the figure then faded away. The story is the anchor of the building's gentler haunting tradition.
A second strand of reports attaches to the building's vertical circulation. Staff, guests, and (after the 2013 renovation) tenants describe the elevators moving on their own - rising and descending with no occupants - and televisions in guest rooms and apartments turning on and off without input.
Reports of footsteps and shadow figures cluster in three additional areas: meeting and ballroom space, the lobby, and the basement. The descriptions are typically of full-body apparitions glimpsed briefly, or of footsteps, doors opening to reveal no one, and a feeling of being watched. Haunted Rooms America summarizes the overall character of the reports as 'ghostly activities including spiritual energy and full-bodied apparitions.'
The Owyhee is the departure point for the US Ghost Adventures Boise Ghost Tour, which integrates the building's lore with stops at the Idanha Hotel, the Belmont Barbershop site, and the Egyptian Theatre on Lower Main.
Notable Entities
The Owyhee is the starting point for the US Ghost Adventures Boise Ghost Tour, which then walks down Main Street through the Lower Main historic cluster.
Eat or drink at the Owyhee Tavern on the ground floor of the historic building, with a clear sightline to the lobby and elevators that figure in the resident apparition stories.
See current room rates and availability at The Owyhee.
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