Lincoln Park Former City Cemetery · Biograph Theater (1934 Dillinger shooting site) · Chicago Loop Prohibition-era vice district · Red Lion Pub (1882 building)
US Ghost Adventures operates its Chicago program under the local consumer brand Windy City Ghosts (windycityghosts.com), alongside listings on the company's own usghostadventures.com/chicago-ghost-tour/ page. The flagship product, currently marketed as 'Embers of the Windy City: Chilling Chicago Ghost Tours' and previously as 'Windy City Ghosts: Hauntings of Chicago,' is a roughly one-hour, one-mile walking tour through Lincoln Park -- a North Side neighborhood built atop the footprint of the city's displaced 1840s-60s city cemetery. Tours depart nightly at 7 PM and 8 PM from the Tin Man statue at Oz Park, 2021 N Burling Street, rain or shine, and are capped for an intimate group size; pets are welcome and alcohol is not permitted on the walk.
The company separately runs the Chicago Gangs and Mobsters Walking Tour, a roughly 1.5-mile downtown Loop walk covering the city's Prohibition-era organized-crime history, including sites tied to Al Capone, Johnny Torrio, and Jim Colosimo. This product's current verified meeting point is 100 E Jackson Drive in the Loop. This listing consolidates that USGA-branded product with the formerly independently-domained Gangsters and Ghosts Tour (gangstersandghosts.com), a Loop-district walking and minibus tour launched around 2017 that met at the Royal Sonesta Hotel (71 E Wacker Drive) for its walking version and the Palmer House Hilton (17 E Monroe Street) for its seated minibus version, priced at $36 adult / $34 senior / $26 youth / free under 6. Note for adjudication: the live gangstersandghosts.com site does not itself display US Ghost Adventures branding or disclose common ownership the way the operator's other white-label sites (e.g., LA Ghosts) do, and its historically documented meeting point (Royal Sonesta Hotel) differs from the USGA-branded Loop tour's currently verified meeting point (100 E Jackson Dr); this consolidation follows the campaign's prior research finding that gangstersandghosts.com is USGA-owned, but the two products' operational details do not fully reconcile and should be spot-checked before further build-out.
Sources
- https://usghostadventures.com/chicago-ghost-tour/
- https://windycityghosts.com/chicago-ghost-tour/
- https://gangstersandghosts.com/
- https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g35805-d18717490-Reviews-Windy_City_Ghosts_By_Us_Ghost_Adventures-Chicago_Illinois.html
- https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g35805-d13454414-Reviews-Chicago_Gangsters_and_Ghosts_Tours-Chicago_Illinois.html
- https://www.viator.com/tours/Chicago/Gangsters-and-Ghosts-Tour-in-Chicago/d673-61552P8
ApparitionsPhantom footstepsPhantom voicesCold spotsResidual haunting
On the Lincoln Park route, the operator recounts reported phantom children's handprints and patient moans at the former Grant Hospital site, supernatural activity tied to a ceremonial dagger at the bar now called the Golden Dagger, and phantom apparitions and phantom children in the balconies of the Biograph Theater, where John Dillinger was shot by federal agents on July 22, 1934, after being identified by the so-called 'Lady in Red,' Ana Cumpanas.
On the Loop-district Gangs and Mobsters route (absorbing the former Gangsters and Ghosts Tour), the operator recounts Chicago Outfit history tied to Al Capone, Johnny Torrio, and Jim Colosimo, alongside reported paranormal activity connected to the 1903 Iroquois Theatre fire and the 1915 Eastland disaster, both of which caused hundreds of deaths in the Loop and riverfront area. The absorbed Gangsters and Ghosts material also names Holy Name Cathedral, the Palmer House Hilton, and the former Royal Sonesta Hotel meeting point as stops with reported staff and guest activity.
All of this is the tour operator's own marketing material, not documented history independently verified for this listing; it is included here as a description of what the tours cover, not as an endorsement of any specific claim.
Notable Entities
John Dillinger (Biograph Theater)
