HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena — as catalogued
+ 1 further entry on record
Built circa 1865, this Paducah dining room carries the history of a family defined by robbery and tragedy — and the spirit of Stella Cohen Peine, who died alone upstairs in 1980.
103 Market House Square, Paducah, KY 42001
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Restaurant pricing; check Stella's Paducah website for current menu and hours. Ghost tours that include Stella's are separately ticketed.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Downtown Paducah restaurant in historic building; street-level entry.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1865 · Paducah Commercial History · Kentucky Haunted Dining · Market House Square History
The building at 103 Market House Square in Paducah dates to approximately 1865 and takes its public identity from the Cohen family, who occupied it for generations. The structure sits on Market House Square in Paducah's historic downtown, a block associated with the city's 19th-century commercial core.
The Cohen family history documented by Stella's Restaurant includes two significant tragedies. In the 1920s, Carl Cohen — a son of the family — was attacked during a robbery and beaten so severely that he sustained permanent disability. Decades later, his sister Stella Cohen Peine remained in the building as other family members moved on. She died upstairs in 1980. The official cause of death was heart attack, but accounts from the restaurant's own historical narrative note suspected malnutrition, suggesting she had been living in neglect or isolation in the building she had occupied for so long.
The building was eventually converted into Stella's Restaurant and has become one of Paducah's better-known dining establishments. The Food Network has referred to it as the most haunted restaurant in Kentucky, a designation that has contributed to its profile in regional tourism. It is a standard stop on the River City Ghost Tour run out of Market House Theatre, and Paducah ghost tour guides have called Stella Cohen Peine the most documented spirit in downtown Paducah.
Sources
The paranormal activity at Stella's clusters around the dining room and the upper floor where Stella Cohen Peine spent her final years. Staff and diners report a consistent set of phenomena: chairs shifting position without anyone nearby, salt shakers and condiments tipping over without contact, and lights flickering without an identified electrical cause. Cold spots — localized drops in temperature with no obvious source — are among the more frequently noted experiences.
The more specific report involves a figure observed at a locked storage window within the building — a woman looking out, visible to those in the dining room, in a space that is not accessible during service hours. This detail, like the dripping-wet apparition at the RiverPark Center, has the kind of specific architectural grounding that tends to persist in local legend rather than dissolving into generic haunting claims.
The Food Network has publicly called Stella's the most haunted restaurant in Kentucky. River City Ghost Tour guides, who bring groups through the building as part of a walking tour of downtown Paducah, describe Stella as the most documented spirit in the downtown district — a claim that reflects the volume and consistency of accounts from a building actively in use by dining staff and customers.
Notable Entities
Eat in the historic C.C. Cohen Building, where the Cohen family's history of tragedy — Carl's near-fatal robbery and Stella's solitary 1980 death upstairs — forms the backdrop for reported paranormal activity including moving chairs, tipping salt shakers, and cold spots.
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