1849 Greek Revival Ironmaster's Home with Lantern-Lit Ghost Tours
3419 Oak Lane, Altoona, PA 16602
Age
All Ages
Cost
$
Lantern tours are reported at $5.00 per guest. Standard museum admission set by the Blair County Historical Society; check the website for current rates.
Access
Limited Access
Multi-story historic mansion with stairs
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1849 · Greek Revival Architecture · Pennsylvania Iron Industry · Blair County Historical Society Headquarters
Baker Mansion sits on Oak Lane in Altoona, a three-story dressed-stone Greek Revival residence built between 1845 and 1849 by Elias Baker, co-owner of the Allegheny Furnace ironworks. Baker began the ironworks operation outside Altoona during a regional iron boom that powered the Pennsylvania Railroad's expansion through the Allegheny Mountains.
The house was designed for ostentation. Imported Italian marble fireplaces, hand-carved Belgian oak furniture, and ceiling-height pier mirrors signaled the Baker family's wealth at a time when most Altoona residents lived in modest furnace-worker housing. The Bakers occupied the mansion for several decades, raising children including Anna and David Woods Baker.
The house's later history is one of long vacancy. After the family's decline, the mansion remained closed until 1922, when it was reopened as a public museum. It is now the headquarters of the Blair County Historical Society, which maintains period rooms alongside rotating exhibits on Civil War history, regional transportation, and Victorian leisure.
The museum operates regular guided tours on weekends from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and offers special seasonal events including holiday programming and after-hours lantern tours. As of late 2025, the society announced the mansion would be closed for routine public tours until May 22, 2026, while still hosting private tours and events. In 2024, Forbes ranked Baker Mansion among the most haunted houses in each state, citing the long-running Anna Baker wedding-dress legend.
Sources
The Anna Baker story is the mansion's central legend. According to family and local accounts, Anna fell in love with a steelworker employed at one of the Baker ironworks. When her father Elias learned of the engagement, he objected on class grounds and arranged for the man to be transferred to a distant city. Anna refused every subsequent suitor and is said to have kept her unworn wedding dress for the rest of her life. She died in 1914.
The wedding dress is still on display at the mansion in a glass case. Members of the Baker family, and later museum staff and visitors, have reported the dress moving inside the case, with sightings concentrated around Halloween and full moons. Some visitors have also reported seeing the figure of a woman in a long white dress walking the upper hallways.
A second strand of the lore concerns David Woods Baker, Anna's brother, who died at approximately age 29 in a steamboat boiler explosion. Visitors have reported phantom screams from the mansion's basement and a figure dressed in what witnesses describe as a steamboat uniform.
In 2015, an Altoona Mirror reporter spent the night in the mansion as part of an October feature; the article documents firsthand accounts of unexplained sounds and atmospheric phenomena collected during that overnight. The Blair County Historical Society's lantern tours frame the legends as folklore, presenting them alongside the mansion's documented architectural and industrial history.
Notable Entities
A docent-led walk through the period-furnished rooms of Elias Baker's 1849 ironmaster mansion, including exhibits on Civil War history, 19th-century leisure, and Pennsylvania transportation. Visitors view the wedding-dress display tied to Anna Baker's story.
An after-hours lantern tour exploring the mansion's documented paranormal folklore, including the Anna Baker wedding-dress legend and reports tied to the basement and David Woods's death. Guides walk small groups through the darkened rooms.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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