FRANKLIN CASTLE

from PARANORMAL TOURISM PUBLICATION

by yanfarley

THE HAUNTINGS

CLEAVELAND, OHIO

The house was built in 1881 by Hannes

Written by Milo Kappelhoff

Tiedemann,

a German immigrant who moved into it with his wife and surviving two children. It received the name due to the street it was built on, Franklin Street, and has had many different owners since it was originally built. The original owner, Hannes Tidemann was quite the rumored figure. The house was built with a lot of secret tunnels and passageways, for unknown reasons, but it is said that his wife used them to avoid Hannes’s tantrums and outbursts. There were also multiple stories going around that he was cheating on his wife, guilting and forcing women into sleeping with him, and even eventually killing these women. After Tidemann eventually passed, having outlived even his grandchildren, the house went up for sale.

The next owner’s were the Romano family, who had always been fascinated by the property. While the family was renovating their two children started talking about the “other children” they started playing with, whom the parents thought may have been the deceased children of the Tidemann family. On top of that they started to hear organ music, despite not owning one, along with footsteps, glasses, and the occasional random turn on of random ceiling lamps. They consulted a priest and were told that “evil spirits” were living in the house, making them resell the house in 1974.

The property was then purchased by Sam Muscatello, who planned to turn it into a church. After realizing that a haunted house didn’t sound very appealing to the local religious folk, he tried his best to turn it around and profit off it. He offered tours, night stays, and eventually searched the secret passage ways for more things. Sadly the only thing he discovered were human remains and after taking his story to the media the tourists started coming in less and less. The strange behavior continued and guests reported hearing a woman get suffocated, feeling as though they are choking, and hearing babies cry. source: velveT casTle

All the hauntings helped bring some of Tiedemann’s crimes to light. He is said to have strangled a maid named Rachel after she refused his advances, hanged his niece Karen in order to “put her out of her misery” and slaughtered someone with an ax in one of the secret passageways behind the ballroom. On top of that a later resident of the home allegedly experimented on and killed 12 babies.

AfterMuscatello sold the house it was bought by Michelle Heimburger who was determined to restore it but was unfortunately unable to due to the fact that half of it burned down in November 1999. In the following years it was turned into a club, abandoned and then used as a shooting location for “adult video content”. Following some more years of abandonment it was bought by Chiara Dona Dalle in 2011, who turned it into a family home. Nowadays you can book an overnight stay at the castle for anywhere from $175 to $245 and take tours of the place.