HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena — as catalogued
+ 1 further entry on record
An 1871 French Second Empire lumber baron's mansion in Evansville, where ghost walk dramatizations include Edward Reitz — the son who drowned in Utah's Green River in 1892.
224 SE 1st St, Evansville, IN 47713
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Museum admission fee for guided tours; check website for current rates. Ghost walk tours booked separately through Haunted Historic Evansville.
Access
Limited Access
Three-story 1871 mansion with original staircases; not fully accessible
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1871 · French Second Empire Architecture · National Register of Historic Places · Evansville Lumber Industry History · Reitz Family — John Augustus Reitz · Ohio River Valley Victorian Architecture
John Augustus Reitz arrived in Evansville in the 1840s and built a substantial fortune in the lumber trade, which he expanded into real estate and other commercial interests. By 1871, when construction began on the house at 224 SE 1st Street, Reitz was one of the wealthiest men in southern Indiana. The mansion was designed in the French Second Empire style, characterized by its mansard roof, elaborate dormers, and formal symmetry — a deliberate architectural statement of mercantile success.
The Reitz family occupied the house through several generations. John Augustus died in 1893, leaving behind a household that had already experienced grief: his son Edward Reitz drowned in Utah's Green River in 1892. Edward's death — a young man's accident in a distant western state — left the family without its expected heir and introduced an element of tragedy into what had been a portrait of Gilded Age prosperity.
The house passed out of family ownership and through various uses before a preservation effort in the 1970s established it as a house museum. The Reitz Home Museum today operates regular tours of the restored interior, which retains original Reitz family furnishings and period-appropriate décor. The home was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a significant example of French Second Empire domestic architecture in the Ohio River valley region.
Sources
The Reitz Home appears on the Haunted Historic Evansville ghost walk circuit, where it serves as a stop featuring the dramatized presence of Edward Reitz, whose 1892 drowning in Utah's Green River left the family without a surviving heir. The ghost walk employs historical dramatization rather than pure paranormal claims, but the distinction can blur: tour participants and museum staff have both reported phenomena that preceded and exist independently of any theatrical framing.
Accounts from staff members describe jiggling doorknobs in rooms that have been locked and confirmed empty, unexplained smells — particularly floral scents associated with Victorian perfume — in areas with no ventilation from outside, and brief auditory phenomena including footsteps and voices in the upper floors during non-tour hours. One account describes an apparition in period dress observed on the main staircase and then absent when the viewer turned for a second look.
Evansville Living Magazine covered the house's paranormal reputation in the context of a broader piece on haunted Evansville locations, citing the combination of the Reitz family's documented tragedies and the building's preserved Victorian character as the context for persistent staff and visitor reports. The museum handles the paranormal dimension with the same historical register it applies to the Reitz family's lumber fortune — as part of the documented story of people who once lived in the building.
Notable Entities
Guided tours of the 1871 French Second Empire mansion take visitors through restored Victorian period rooms furnished with original Reitz family pieces and period-appropriate artifacts. Tours cover the house's architecture, the Reitz lumber family history, and the documented paranormal reports from staff and visitors.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
Indianapolis, IN
Hannah House is an 1858 Italianate mansion at 3801 Madison Avenue on the south side of Indianapolis, built by Alexander Hannah, an Indiana businessman who returned wealthy from the California Gold Rush. The property is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Macon, GA
Built between 1855 and 1859 for businessman William Butler Johnston at a cost of approximately $100,000, the Italian Renaissance Revival mansion at 934 Georgia Avenue has been called the 'Palace of the South' and is a National Historic Landmark. The Felton family held it through the Civil War period; Confederate general Henry Gray Felton occupied it during the war. The Hay family acquired the house in 1926 and donated it to The Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation in 1977.
Charles City, VA
Benjamin Harrison IV built the current mansion at Berkeley Plantation in 1726, making it the oldest three-story brick structure in Virginia. The plantation became the birthplace of President William Henry Harrison in 1773 and the ancestral seat of a family that produced a signer of the Declaration of Independence and two U.S. Presidents. During the Civil War, General McClellan used the mansion as his headquarters and the cellar held Confederate prisoners.