Milton Hershey's 1933 Spanish Colonial Resort Still Attended by Its Builder
100 Hotel Rd, Hershey, PA 17033
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$
Room rates range from approximately $399-$629 per night. The hotel is an AAA Four Diamond resort. Check thehotelhershey.com for current availability and pricing.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Fully paved; hilltop property with ADA accommodations
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1933 · Historic Hotels of America · Great Depression-Era Construction · Spanish Colonial Revival Architecture · Milton S. Hershey Philanthropy
By 1932, Milton S. Hershey had already built a company town around his chocolate factory: streets named after cities in his raw-material supply chain, a school for orphaned boys, a department store, a stadium, a bank, an amusement park, and a community center. The hotel was conceived as the crown of this philanthropic infrastructure — a world-class resort that would draw visitors to Hershey and provide employment at a time when the Great Depression had gutted most American construction.
Hershey gave his architect, D. Paul Witmer, a single postcard depicting a hotel in the Mediterranean that he and his wife Catherine had stayed at and admired. Witmer's task: scale that 30-room property up to 170 rooms while preserving its character. The result is a Spanish Colonial revival building with terracotta roof tiles, mosaic floors, Moorish archways, and an exterior loggia that wraps the main facade. The hotel sits atop Pat's Hill, looking down on the chocolate factory and the town Hershey built below it.
The grand opening dinner on May 26, 1933 drew 400 guests. Milton Hershey was 75 years old. He would live until 1945 and remained closely involved with the hotel and his broader philanthropic enterprise throughout his final years. The Hotel Hershey is listed on the Historic Hotels of America program, operates as an AAA Four Diamond resort, and has 276 rooms.
The Hershey Community Archives maintains extensive documentation of the hotel's history at hersheyarchives.org, and the hotel's own history page documents the Mediterranean inspiration and construction details.
Sources
The Hotel Hershey's paranormal reputation is organized around its founder with an unusual specificity. The characteristic detail is the cigar smoke — fresh, fruity, appearing without a smoker, in locations including the wine cellar and general guest areas. Staff members hired decades after Milton Hershey's 1945 death have independently reported the smell without prior knowledge of his tobacco preference. The flavored cigars are documented in historical accounts of Hershey's habits. The correspondence between the reported smell and the recorded preference is what gives this particular account its staying power.
Philly Ghosts documented the hotel's legends in detail. According to those accounts, both Milton Hershey and his wife Kitty have been reported as presences moving through the hotel's public areas — checking that the property is properly maintained, greeting guests. The framing is domestic and proprietorial rather than threatening: a couple who built the place continuing to oversee it.
Room 301 carries the highest concentration of specific disturbances. Multiple guests, in accounts recorded independently, have described waking during the night with the distinct sense of a figure standing over them. No visual apparition is consistently reported — the phenomenon is sensory rather than visual.
Doors opening and closing without apparent cause, footsteps in the wine cellar and elsewhere in the building, and unexplained sounds throughout the property fill out the documented account set. The hotel has not, to date, marketed a ghost tour or investigation program — the paranormal reputation exists alongside the resort's luxury positioning rather than as a separate offering.
Notable Entities
Stay overnight at the 276-room Spanish Colonial revival resort atop Pat's Hill in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Room 301 carries the strongest reputation for anomalous activity, with guests reporting the sensation of a presence standing over them while they sleep. The cigar smoke attributed to Milton Hershey — who favored flavored cigars — has been reported in the wine cellar and throughout the property.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
Genoa, WI
Big River Inn dates to either 1879 or 1896 (sources vary) in Genoa, Wisconsin. The building originally functioned as a restaurant before evolving into a combined inn and restaurant. It now operates as Water View Inn, maintaining its paranormal reputation while serving contemporary hospitality functions.
Las Vegas, NV
The Aladdin Hotel opened in Las Vegas in 1966 as a major resort and casino property. The hotel underwent renovations and continued operations until its closure in 2003. Planet Hollywood Entertainment acquired the property in 2005, completely renovating and reopening it in 2007 as Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino. The 7th floor Panorama Suite emerged as the property's most paranormally active location during Aladdin Hotel operations.
Orrtanna, PA
The Cashtown Inn was built in 1797 at what was then a turnpike tollbooth community 8 miles west of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. In late June and early July 1863, Confederate General A.P. Hill used the inn as his headquarters in the days immediately before the Battle of Gettysburg; General Robert E. Lee also visited the building during the campaign. The inn's basement served as a field hospital during and after the battle.