HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena — as catalogued
A 1906 Tonopah bank building, scarred by an embezzlement scandal, reborn as a hotel
330 Main Street, Tonopah, NV 89049
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Boutique hotel rooms; rates vary by season. See hotel website for availability.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Restored multi-story 1906 masonry building on Tonopah's historic Main Street, with a stone-walled basement speakeasy.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1906 · Nevada Mining Boom Architecture · 1907 Financial Panic · State Bank and Trust Company Building
The building that is now the Belvada Hotel was constructed in 1906 at the height of Tonopah's silver-mining boom as the home of the State Bank and Trust Company. Architect George E. Holesworth designed it in a Classical Revival style with Chicago-school influences, and for a time it shared with the Mizpah the distinction of being one of Nevada's tallest buildings.
Its career as a bank was short. Roughly four months after completion, the nationwide financial panic of 1907 swept through the country. The State Bank and Trust failed, and its owner, Thomas Rickey, was arrested and indicted for embezzlement. The premises were taken over and reorganized, operating afterward as the Nevada First National Bank of Tonopah.
Over the following decades the structure passed through several uses and eventually became the Belvada Apartments, the name that stuck to the building. By the early 21st century it had fallen into serious disrepair and faced possible demolition.
Fred and Nancy Cline of Cline Cellars — already the restorers of the Mizpah Hotel across Main Street — acquired the building reportedly for a token sum and undertook a multi-year renovation beginning around 2017. They preserved the original bank vault and the stone-walled basement, and reopened the property in 2020 as the Belvada Hotel, a boutique companion to the Mizpah. The building is associated with the National Register listing for the State Bank and Trust Company Building.
Sources
The Belvada's paranormal reputation is quieter than its across-the-street sibling, the Mizpah, but it centers on one consistent location: the basement. The lowest level of the building retains its original stone walls, glass-block sidewalk skylights, and the old boiler, and it is the space most associated with the bank's early years and the 1907 collapse.
Visitor and ghost-interest accounts report a shadow figure moving in that basement, along with the general unease people describe in old below-grade spaces. The reports are anecdotal and tied to a single recurring claim rather than a documented investigation, which is why this entry is held for further corroboration even though the building's history is well established.
The surviving bank vault adds to the atmosphere. Tying the lore to the documented past, the basement and vault are the rooms where the building's brief, scandal-ended life as a bank is still physically legible, and that is where the haunting reports concentrate.
Sleep in a restored 1906 Beaux-Arts bank building on Tonopah's Main Street, sister property to the Mizpah Hotel across the street. The original bank vault survives in the building, and the stone-walled basement — site of the reported shadow figure — now holds the Boiler Room speakeasy. Book directly through the hotel's website.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
Tonopah, NV
The Mizpah Hotel in Tonopah, Nevada was constructed in 1905 at a cost of $200,000, financed by mining magnates George Wingfield, George S. Nixon, Cal Brougher, and Bob Govan. The reinforced concrete and stone structure was Nevada's tallest building until 1927. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1978, fell dormant in 1999, and reopened in August 2011 after a $4 million restoration by Fred and Nancy Cline.
Tonopah, NV
The Mizpah Hotel opened in 1907 in the silver-mining boomtown of Tonopah, Nevada. With five Victorian-styled floors it was the tallest building in Nevada for the next 25 years, featuring all-electric lighting, steam heat, and the first electric elevator in the western United States.
Eureka, NV
The Jackson House opened in 1877 in the silver-mining town of Eureka, built by Irish immigrant Andrew Jackson to serve the boomtown's wealthier residents. The two-story brick hotel advertised itself as the only fireproof hotel in Nevada — a claim tested when fire swept downtown Eureka and the building survived. Renamed the Brown Hotel in 1907, it was restored in 1981 and again called the Jackson House.