Kansas City Missouri

Hotel Savoy

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Spirits who reside here go about their daily schedules.

Murder has caused two restless spirits. One wants justice in her unsolved case, and another wants to continue to work here.

Another spirit took a liking to another living resident and made himself at home.

DESCRIPTION

Hotel Savoy Kansas City is now part of the Tapestry Collection by Hilton, since 2025. The Hotel is a six floor, red brick building with a wing, which was added in 1905, and has the restaurant and bar on the first floor. It was built in 1888, in a European, Italian Renaissance design.

Under Hilton’s ownership, it is no longer a step back in time, but was transformed into a modern, upscale hotel, offering accommodations and amenities that Hilton’s patrons expect, and to be competitive with what other Kansas City fine hotels offer. This change was guaranteed to bring in the funds needed to maintain it, and bring profit as well, hoping to attract upper class folks who are willing to spend on their accommodations, with Hilton perks.

With the exception of the bar and grill restaurant which remain in their historic 1905 Italian Renaissance design, and remnants of the Italian Renaissance style, with its 18 ft ceilings, art nouveau stained glass windows and ceramic tiles on the first floor, gone is the total Italian Renaissance style in the other parts of the hotel.

Woodwork was painted white in the lobby and on the staircases, and probably in the hallways. The 120 rooms were remodeled with the same layout and bathroom style. The higher priced rooms have more living area, and the layout was changed.

Gone are the antique beds and furniture, replaced by Hilton’s modern beds and couches, end tables, and other items, including desks. New showers, carpeting, sitting areas in some, curtains and other amenities have pleased their upscale guests, making the Hotel Savoy a popular, high class hotel once more.

All the guest rooms have iPhone docking stations and flat-screen televisions, wired and wireless internet access, cable, and pillowtop beds with down comforters and Frette Italian sheets.

Maybe Hilton will be the ones to bring back the rooftop garden and party area, to take advantage of the view of the city. Other Hilton Hotels have this perk on their roofs.

HISTORY

This is the oldest, continuously operating hotel in the country, west of the Mississippi. Because of its central location, it always had people interested in owning it, because its location made it easy to walk to the central city.

The story of the Hotel Savoy started with Dr. Joshua Thorne, who chose a great location, the bustling intersection of Ninth and Central Streets, near the center of town. It was a five story, brick hotel which opened with great success. In 1890, Dr. Thorne leased it to George W. Reynolds, whose dream was to create a European-style hotel, and provide the perk of offering their guests a first-class cafe.

Later in 1890, yet another leaseholder took control, Dudley Rhoades. While he continued the hotel’s European-style, he opened rooms at the reasonable price of $1 per day.

In 1892, Dr. Thorne decided to sell the property for $200,000 to Messrs. Ingalls & Ashley of Chicago, apparently just in time. A year later, the hotel suffered financial hardship, and the hotel property wound up in receivership and foreclosure.

It was sold to W.A. Jamison and his partner John Arbuckle in early 1894, who had great plans! They changed the name to Hotel Savoy, but kept it European style establishment with a cafe.

In 1896, Jamison and Arbuckle had the funds to start developing their dream hotel with significant renovations and expansions, bringing the hotel up to modern standards that would attract people with money. Their changes worked because a year later another floor was added, to accommodate more guests.

In 1904, the Arbuckle Bros., now the sole owner, bought the property next door on the hotel’s west side. In 1905, $175,000 was used for improvements and the construction of a western wing which added six floors containing 100 rooms and a gorgeous Italian Renaissance, old world restaurant and bar, with murals and beautiful wooden booths, wainscoting, and walls.

The restaurant and bar proved to be wildly popular with Kansas City residents, as well as guests and travelers, a love that kept the hotel going through the years, in hard times as well up to the present day.

It was a very fashionable place up through WWII. The hotel then became run down, fell into disrepair, and finally turned into a flop house. Fortunately, entrepreneurs soon came along and saw a vision of what it could be, and thought of new ways to put the building to work.

One such dreamer, Don Lee, came along in 1963. He knew he could do the needed maintenance and upgrades by finding a way to bring in more funds.

For thirty years, he ran a low-rent residential building, saving some of the money for a future renovation. His goal was to renovate the hotel into a European style Bed and Breakfast, with rooms for travelers and apartments for permanent residents.

In 1974, Lee applied, and the Hotel Savoy was listed on the National Register of Historic Places, giving his property protection from future developers who may have wanted to tear it down.

In 1990, Don Lee started by renovating, room by room, slowly working on his European style Bed and Breakfast, while still renting rooms to tenants. In 1993, he started to renovate in a big way, now fully on the road to achieve his dream.

During the summer of 2006, Tom and I stayed in this historical, grand old hotel bed and breakfast, and loved the vintage aura of the place.

We stayed in one of the newly restored rooms on the 5th floor, and enjoyed a seven course breakfast in the restaurant, which was the best we have had in a bed and breakfast establishment.

The room had a vintage bed with a canopy, and a historic charm of the 1800s era. The restaurant and bar were restored to their 1905 Italian Renaissance style.

By the end of 2013, 21C Museum bought the hotel. Before escrow closed, disaster occurred. In 2014, there was a fire in the kitchen due to the negligence of a cook. Fifty-four million dollars of smoke damage was done to the other rooms of the hotel. The restaurant was heavily damaged, including the priceless Italian Renaissance murals.

The new owners took control of the property, assessed the damage, and closed the hotel and grill for two years until it was repaired, which included the restoration of the damaged murals. It opened again under a new name, 21C Museum Boutique Hotel. The owners’ dream was to display art on the walls of the European style Bed and Breakfast, which they achieved during the years of 2016-2024.

Hilton bought the property in 2025, transforming the 21C Museum Boutique Hotel into an upscale modern establishment, with chic design and amenities that their upper class patrons expect.

While they claim that they left elements of the original design, the rooms resemble their other Hilton Hotels. The restaurant and the bar remain as they’ve always been, since it was built in 1905, attracting a lot of patrons from the local Kansas City folks.

It became a first rate hotel in the early 20th century, and it has returned to being a first rate hotel aimed at business folks and the well-to-do today.

HISTORY OF MANIFESTATIONS

The building has long had a reputation in its history of having an atmosphere of generalized spookiness. Rumors of incidents/sightings have been reported by tenants throughout the history of the Hotel Savoy.

Spirits who have loved a place while alive, sometimes like to move in and reside in the afterlife, willing to share with the living their space.

Morgan House, MA (The spirits of the Morgan family shared their home with new owners and their families, even trying to be helpful).

Duff Green Mansion Bed and Breakfast, MS (The spirits of Duff, Mary and their three children share their home with the staff, guests and other spirits who call this place home).

Waverley Plantation House, VA (The spirit of Evelyn Bird was a gracious hostess while alive and as a spirit, continues to share her home and offers hospitality to people who live there).

Hotel Savoy, MO (Several spirits who were tenants or guests who died here, still enjoy the hotel and their rooms, and are willing to share with the living).

People who were murdered sometimes like to continue on the best they can as spirits, restless because their lives have been taken from them.

Hotel Kahler, MN (While the Candy Heiress was brutally killed by Mafia thugs, her spirit finds some peace at her favorite hotel).

Glensheen Mansion and Congdon Estate, MN (After Elizabeth Congdon and her nurse Velma Pietela were brutally murdered by daughter Marjorie’s boyfriend, their spirits are able to enjoy their estate, focusing on all the good things that are happening there, not dwelling on their unpleasant ends).

Bissman Building, OH (The traumatized spirit of Peter Bissman’s granddaughter, nine-year-old Ruthie, was assaulted and brutally murdered in the building’s basement and found in a pickle barrel. She finds comfort through interacting with the spirit of her aunt, living people, and finding ways to play).

Hotel Savoy, MO (In 1990, a manager was murdered by two of the hotel’s dishwashers. His spirit continues to do his duties the best he can without a body).

If their murder is unsolved, their spirits may want to tell who killed them before they can rest.

The Lumber Baron Inn and Garden, CO (Two young female roommates were viciously murdered when it was a low rent tenement. Their killer was never found, and their spirits wait for justice).

Ashley’s of Rockledge, FL (Ethel Allen was violently murdered, but her killer was never caught. Her spirit haunts here, showing the living how she was killed).

Scarlet O’Hara Pub, FL (Mr. Collee had built one of the houses that make up the pub for his wife, who left him for another. His wife’s new lover killed Mr Collee in his bathtub because he had found another woman to love. He shares his unhappy story with patrons and staff, while playfully getting his own chuckles).

Hotel Savoy, MO (Betsy Ward was a tenant who was found drowned in her shower. It is thought that someone attacked her and caused her demise. Her spirit is restless, and wants to tell her story).

MANIFESTATIONS

The known spirits described here, lived or worked in the building from 1987–1993.

ROOM 505:The Spirit Of Emily Ward

Her spirit remains restless due to the way she died in her shower, a probable death by a murderer who got away with it.

She wants to tell her ending, and is trying to figure out how to do so.

She seeks justice, and her killer is finally caught.

Initial Experiences with Emily

In the early years after her death, she tried to get the living’s attention, by activity that pointed to the shower.

Larry Freeman moved into room 505 in Sept 1990, after it had been newly renovated.

He had gotten out of the shower-bathtub, leaving the bathtub curtain open.

While he was brushing his teeth, he heard the water running in the shower, and when he turned around, the curtain was wide open also.

This happened three more times in succession. In between each incident, Larry turned off the faucet tightly and closed the curtain.

He ran to the manager after the 4th time.

Betty Loves Jazz!

Sean Byrnes, the manager, also has a 5th floor apartment. As he was walking past Larry’s apt.#505, he heard Jazz music playing and thought Larry was home.

He met Larry, however, in the lobby as Larry was coming home from work and told him of the music.

It turned out that the music wasn’t coming from Larry’s clock radio, but from the flip-on radio by his washing machine, which is always set to a classic rock ‘n roll station, as it was in the morning when Larry was listening to it.

The knob on the radio had been turned all the way over to the jazz station & had been flipped on. No one else has a key to apt. #505, but Larry and Sean.

She Moves Toward the Bedroom

A few months later, Larry always closed the sliding oak door, (gravity-tilted to keep it shut), which was between his bedroom and living room.

One night, around 11:30, he heard the door slide open, and no one was there. The apartment had no signs of break-in, and the outer door was still locked.

Her Personal Appearances

Her old apartment is now a hotel room.

She has gotten bolder in her quest to tell her story.

She has graduated to actually appearing in front of guests, like she just stepped out of the shower, dripping wet.

In recent years, guests have seen the apparition of Betty by their bedside in #505.

1987 Sighting of the Spirit of Fred

Reid Shaylor, a young waiter, lived on the third floor. While visiting his friend, Kathy, (who worked at the Lobby desk), at her fourth floor apartment, had a visit from Mrs. Lightner, who lived across the hall from Kathy.

She asked to borrow a cup of sugar. Since Kathy didn’t have any, Reid got a cup from his apt. and went to Mrs. Lightner’s door.

He heard her talking to someone, while he knocked on the door. Reid then pushed the door open and saw a man, standing right beside her, who was wearing a 1930 double-breasted suit.

The man was very gray and was in an outline form, but could be seen clearly. He then disappeared.

Kathy, who was standing behind Reid, saw him too. “That’s my dead husband, Fred,” said Mrs. Lightner.

Reid Shaylor’s Spectral Admirer

For about a month after this sighting, Reid would come home from work and find cassettes and record albums which had already been put away, laid out on his bed, like someone was trying to decide what to listen to.

Reid felt unexplained cold spots in his apartment.

Every morning, Reid locked his closet chifforobe. Every afternoon when he came home, it would be unlocked.

Every Sunday morning, in the Catholic tradition, Reid would light candles. When he came back from church, the candles would be blown out.

It is theorized that Fred Lightner, (the dead husband), took a liking to Reid because he got his wife the cup of sugar, and thus came to visit him in his apt. on the third floor.

The spirit of the Restaurant Manager

After he was murdered in 1990, his killers were caught, but his spirit still wanted to work at a place that he loved.

He continues as a spectral supervisor, performing his old duties, and the new ones he has assigned himself, striving to help the living kitchen manager and staff.

He continues to supervise the staff and kitchen workers, who feel his unseen presence staring at them.

General Activity

Reports of voices, shadows, and doors opening and closing have all been reported in room 505 or on the fifth floor hallway.

Throughout the hotel, guests have heard doors opening and closing, heard footsteps, and seen shadow figures going about their business.

PARANORMAL FINDINGS

Personal experiences abound throughout the hotel’s history.

Early witnesses include Sean Byrnes (manager), Larry Freeman (tenant), Reid Shaylor (waiter in the hotel restaurant and one-time resident, moved out after incidents), and Kathy O’Dell (former employee and resident).

Information was collected from the above witnesses & Margaret Barber, who doesn’t believe in ghosts, but had information relevant to the incidents involving #505.

When we stayed there on the fifth floor, we heard footsteps going down the hall at 4:00 am.

STILL HAUNTED?

Yes Indeed!

With the exception of spirit Fred Lightner, who moved on when his wife died, all the spirits mentioned above still stay in their favorite places. Betty needs to talk to a medium who could hear who killed her, so Betty could leave her death behind her and go to the light. The murdered kitchen manager still wants to work at the hotel.

LOCATION

219 West Ninth Street,
Kansas City, Missouri

Hotel Savoy is centrally located in Kansas City, close to the Kansas City Convention Center, being only a seven minute walk. Other places of importance to guests are also close by. Crown Center is only 1.6 miles away. T-Mobile Center is a fifteen minute walk, and LEGOLAND Discovery center is 1.9 miles from the hotel.

SOURCES INCLUDE

https://savoykc.com/
Hotel Savoy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savoy_Hotel_and_Grill#
https://avionhospitality.com/avion-hospitality-awarded-management-of-newly-rebranded-hotel-savoy/
https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/experiences/missouri/kansas-city-ghost-stories-mo
https://theclio.com/entry/39893 https://savoykc.com/
Savoy Hotel and Savoy Grill (1888-2014); The Savoy at 21c and 21c Museum Hotel Kansas City
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPMK-DVCAEs Haunted Story Time -Hotel Savoy Betsy Ward in room 505, drowned in the shower – suspicious.

Our Haunted Paranormal Stories are Written by Julie Carr

Our Photos are copyrighted by Tom Carr

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