Circa-1740 Old City row house traditionally associated with flag-maker Betsy Ross; ghost-tour operators and a 2009 Ghost Hunters investigation report a colonial-dressed woman on the staircase and phantom sewing sounds.
239 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106
Age
All Ages
Cost
$
General admission ticket required; audio tour available. Check historicphiladelphia.org for current rates.
Access
Limited Access
Narrow Colonial-era staircase between floors; first-floor courtyard is accessible but upper-floor rooms are reachable only by steep stairs.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1740 · Traditional site of first American flag sewing · National Register-listed Old City landmark · Reinterment site of Betsy Ross (1976)
The front section of 239 Arch Street was built around 1740 in the Pennsylvania colonial style, with the stair hall and rear section added ten to twenty years later. The Georgian two-and-a-half-story brick house contains a total of nine rooms across three levels and a partially below-grade ground floor.
Elizabeth 'Betsy' Griscom Ross (1752-1836), an upholsterer by trade, is documented as having rented a house on Arch Street between 1773 and 1786. Whether this is the precise structure or an adjacent building demolished in the nineteenth century is debated by historians; the best archival evidence indicates her rented home was either this house or its immediate neighbor. The traditional account that she sewed the first American flag in this house was first publicized in 1870 by her grandson William Canby and gained wide currency during the Centennial of 1876.
By the late nineteenth century the building had deteriorated into a tenement and tavern. Beginning in 1898, the American Flag House and Betsy Ross Memorial Association raised funds for its preservation through a national campaign in which roughly two million Americans contributed dimes. In 1937 the building was donated to the City of Philadelphia and restored with assistance from radio-manufacturing millionaire A. Atwater Kent.
A private nonprofit organization, Historic Philadelphia, Inc., began leasing the property from the City of Philadelphia in 1995 and continues to manage the site. It is among the most-visited historic attractions in Philadelphia, with daily museum admission, audio tours, and a courtyard interpretive program. The remains of Betsy Ross and her third husband John Claypoole were reinterred in the courtyard in 1976.
Sources
According to Ghost City Tours and Philly Ghosts, the most frequently reported apparition is a woman in colonial-era dress seen on the narrow stairs connecting the floors of the house. Witnesses describe her as appearing solid before fading; descriptions consistently match popular depictions of Betsy Ross. Phantom sewing sounds - rhythmic stitching with no visible source - are reported in the parlor where the flag-making tradition is interpreted.
Additional accounts compiled by PA Haunted Houses and HauntedPlaces.org describe a woman crying at the foot of a bed in a lower-level room, voices and rustling from the basement, and physical contact reported by staff in the director's attic office. A former director reportedly felt a hand grab her shoulder; another staff member is said to have been frightened so badly she climbed out a window onto the flagpole.
The Syfy Channel program Ghost Hunters investigated the site for the December 2008 / Season 5 premiere that aired in 2009. According to NBC Philadelphia's coverage of the visit, The Atlantic Paranormal Society team led by Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson spent a full night at the house; the episode is the most widely cited media documentation of the building's paranormal reputation. Independent corroboration outside ghost-tourism sources is limited; the museum itself does not officially endorse the hauntings.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
Self-guided audio tour through the nine-room 1740 row house, including the parlor where flag-making is interpreted and the upper rooms where ghost-tour writers and a 2009 Ghost Hunters episode report paranormal activity.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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