Menger Hotel originally opened in 1859 by German immigrant couple William and Mary Menger in San Antonio, Texas just adjacent to the Alamo Plaza. Upon settling in America in the 1840s, Mary ran a wildly popular boarding house, in which her future husband also worked at. William would also go on to create a neighboring brewery that could very well be the first one in the state. These successful businesses would lead to the construction of a luxury 2-story hotel with 50 rooms cut from limestone. Named after its initial proprietors, Menger Hotel officially opened on January 31, 1859. Even more, the building sits on the original battlegrounds and mission terrain of the Alamo, where many lives were lost during the Texas Revolution. Many violent acts occurred there, including Sallie White’s murder, leading to the site becoming considered to be extremely haunted. Sallie was a 19th century chambermaid who was shot by her abusive husband in 1876. Subsequently, she passed away on the third floor. Guests and staff often note the spirit of a maid in period garb carrying towels or folding linens in the hallways. Theodore Roosevelt was known to patronize the Menger Bar to recruit his Rough Riders for the Spanish-American War. Visitors and staff now report smelling tobacco or seeing translucent apparitions of Roosevelt and his men there. Captain Richard King also once practically lived at the hotel and died in his suite in 1885. His spirit, along with residual sights of 19th century cattle ranch documents, is still reported in his namesake suite. In total, over 30 ghosts have been documented to still haunt the Menger Hotel, especially in the suites.
