NEWPORT, Ky. — “Newport is Haunted.”

That’s something individuals can decide whether or not to believe. But it’s also the name of a tour they can go on in Newport to learn about the city’s haunting history.

If they were to look up at the bell tower at the Campbell County Courthouse at night, they might just see something sinister.

It’s one of the many things that Miranda McGee Bratton says has converted her from a paranormal non-believer.

“I didn’t really believe in it until I actually started doing these tours. And now I am 100%, one gazillion percent a believer, which is why I carry protective things with me all the time, because of things I’ve seen doing these tours,” Bratton said. 

The tours Bratton gives are haunted historical walking tours. There are no paid actors jumping out to scare participants.

“That being said, we’re in these areas that have a lot of trapped energy from the ghosts of the past,” Bratton said. “I have seen figures. I’ve heard voices. I’ve heard giggling. Phantom giggling is terrifying, by the way, when you’re in a dark tunnel.”

Bratton is director of tour operations for American Legacy Tours. She started working for the company in 2019, and claims to have had many experiences that convince her ghosts are real.

“Just weird feelings that made me be like ‘there is something else,”’ she said. “Sometimes really weird things happen. And we have no control over that. And that’s why you have to sign a waiver when you come on our tours.”

The “Newport is Haunted” tour is a 90-minute walk around town, past buildings, such as the Campbell County Courthouse, with troubled histories.

“One of the reasons Newport is so haunted is because it was like gangster central. This was Vegas before Vegas happened. And for all the gangsters from Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, etc., this was Switzerland, so they all converged here, and then proceeded to do a lot of really nasty things. That’s why there’s so many ghosts here,” Bratton said. “We get a group of psychics to walk around. They walked around Newport, and all their equipment was going off, and one psychic, he just started shaking his head and muttering, ‘there are so many.’ He estimates there’s 100 ghosts per corner here in Newport.”

The courthouse may be host to a good amount of those ghosts, but there are two notable ones that immediately come to mind for Bratton.

“This is where the murderers of Pearl Bryan were hanged. She was a woman who got into a bad relationship, and ended up being decapitated. They’ve never found her head. But her murderers were hanged right here in 1897. They erected a special gallows here on the back lawn. And they even kept the gallows up in the basement of the Campbell County Courthouse for years as a warning about what would happen if you did something like this,” she said. 

When hanged, the two men didn’t die right away, Bratton said.

“They actually took a few minutes to die, and it was very painful. And that’s why: what goes around comes around,” she said. “The main murderer, Scott Jackson, when they said, ‘Do you feel sorry about it?’ All he did was smile. And a lot of people think up in the bell tower here, you often see a smiling apparition, so I guess he still doesn’t feel bad about it.”

Tools like EMF monitors and a ghost radar app on her phone help Bratton convince the skeptics on her tours. She had success with one particular guest.

“He was making fun of it the whole tour, and then he went into these tunnels in the dark, and behind him, he heard a sigh. He did not say a thing for the rest of the tour. Because he was basically terrified,” she said.

She even gave a demonstration.

“Okay, there’s a ghost right behind us. Oh, it just moved. It’s moving around us right now actually,” she said, using the app outside of the courthouse. “There it is! She’s right there, and I don’t know what she’s doing right in front of us.”

She’s also got some eerie pictures in her phone from tours over the years featuring menacing figures and strange blurs.

“You see something like this, or you hear someone call your name in a dark tunnel or in a dark theater or like coming out of a building like this, then you believe,” Bratton said.

Other stops along the tour include Otto Printing.

“People who work there will literally not go into the second level room. Because there’s a small child there, and occasionally balls will bounce down the stairs,” Bratton said. “What is that about?” 

There is also the Thompson House, formerly known as the Southgate House, where a ghostly woman is said to stand in a window, looking toward the Ohio River where she lost her husband to a tragedy, waiting for him to return.

“There’s a weird feeling in there. I would not go in there alone. I’ll tell you that,” Bratton said.

After stirring all these spirits up night after night, Bratton says a little prayer at the end of every tour, just to be safe.

“To ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged beasties, and things that go jump in the night, good Lord deliver us. There’s a reason I wear my little protection around my neck,” she said, holding her cross. “So nothing follows me home.”

Even then, she said it’s sometimes hard to shake that feeling.

“Newport is Haunted” is one of five different haunted tours American Legacy Tours guides in northern Kentucky and Cincinnati. There is also “Covington is Haunted,” “Queen City is Haunted,” “Mount Healthy is Haunted,” and “Nightmare on Elm Street.”