Old Idaho Penitentiary — Siberia and the Gallows Room
A territorial prison of 1870 that grew into 101 years of confinement — now a state historic site whose own official FAQ page asks “Is the Old Idaho Penitentiary haunted?” and answers carefully, while selling ghost tours.
Case File No. 252
FILE 01 The Legend
Built of sandstone quarried by its first inmates in 1870, the Old Idaho Penitentiary operated until 1973 — escapes, scandals, a 1971 riot over living conditions, and ten executions between 1878 and 1957 (hanging, then firing squad). Its harshest wing was “Siberia,” solitary cells of unheated concrete; the Gallows Room in the maximum-security cellhouse kept the state's gallows. The state historical society runs the site today, and its visitor FAQ addresses the hauntings directly: paranormal teams including Ghost Adventures have investigated, and many visitors report voices, touches and a heaviness in Siberia and the Gallows Room specifically.
FILE 02 The Sightings Log
Staff and visitors describe voices in the cellblocks, unexplained footsteps in the long corridors, and an oppressive atmosphere in solitary. The site's official programming leans in — twilight tours, paranormal nights, and cemetery tours to the prison graveyard where more than half the markers read “Unknown,” some names absent from any register.
FILE 03 The Skeptic’s File
The historical society itself concludes there is “no conclusive evidence” of ghosts — the FAQ is an honest state-agency answer that still sells tickets. An unheated stone solitary wing is genuinely oppressive, and “Unknown” gravestones reflect administrative neglect rather than mystery. The documented misery of a century of confinement is the story; the ghosts are Boise's well-run October revenue.