Chico Hotsprings 2020

Ghost Hunt

Chico Hotsprings 2020

By Elies Adams
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Chico Hot Springs Resort is rooted in the legend of the American West. It began with the vision of a prim Victorian lady named Percie (Matheson) Knowles and her rugged husband William E. Knowles. On June 20, 1900, they opened the Chico Warm Springs Hotel with a grand affair that included a brass band, a ball and an elegant tea.

At first it was a modest boarding house that catered to fortune-seekers who mined gold claims in nearby Emigrant Gulch. Chico’s hotel offered respite from the challenges of hard rock mining, sleeping in tents, eating campfire meals and washing their “dirty duds” in the creek. The guests were promised a clean bed, hot bath and fresh strawberries with every meal for a fee of only $6 a week.

What the Knowles learned is that people will travel far for a good soak and a fine meal. The business grew from 10 rooms to 20 in the span of just a few years. The lovely two-story clapboard building boasted a full-service dining room with white linen tablecloths and fine china. A swim in the 40-foot-long and 6-foot-deep covered hot springs “plunge” cost just 10 cents. Bill and Percie offered entertainment, dancing and lawn games on the broad front lawn. A horse-drawn carriage shuttled guests from the Emigrant train stop the three miles to the hotel. Word spread and Chico quickly became a destination for travelers from Livingston and en route to Yellowstone National Park via the Northern Pacific Park Branch Line.

Business boomed, and by 1914 Chico offered accommodations for up to 60 guests. Mrs. Knowles became known for her refinement, excellent cooking and fastidious manner. She had been a teacher who came West to work at the one-room school house at Old Chico. She was a prohibitionist and a suffragette. By contrast, Bill gained a reputation as a friendly and boisterous host. He was a rancher, hunter, and excellent promoter of Chico. He built a dance hall on the hill above the hotel and was rumored to have turned a blind eye to rumrunners and teetotalers alike. All were welcome at Chico!

After Bill Knowles passed away, Percie pursued her original dream of running a health spa. By 1912 she stopped serving alcohol on the property. By June of that year, she procured the reputable services of Doctor George A. Townsend. The good doctor promoted the restorative elements of the mineral pools, vouching the healing waters as a cure for rheumatism, kidney disease, skin problems and other internal ailments. He treated patients with symptoms as innocuous as the common cold and as complicated as brain surgery. The latter drew positive recognition throughout the state and as far as North Dakota, Minnesota as well as some Eastern states.

By 1914, Dr. Townsend’s services merited a new addition at Chico: a 20-room hospital wing was built onto the northeastern end of the hotel. The building accommodated 24 patients and included a lab, operating room, and six examination rooms. Dr. Townsend practiced at Chico until 1925 and was best known for performing one of the region’s first brain surgeries.

Despite Percie’s objections, the dances on the hill continued. Old-timers still tell stories about the crowds on the hill overflowing from the dance hall. Guests were encouraged to stay overnight, hunt game on the vast acreage and fish in the trout pond. A 5-acre garden serviced the desires of diners and a row of deluxe tents were set up behind the main building to accommodate the overflow. It was the high time for Chico Hot Springs.

Following Dr. Townsend’s retirement, Chico became more of a health spa than hospital. Paradise Valley remained a thoroughfare for Yellowstone travelers by car until the 1930s and the Great Depression when business nearly stopped. Percie Knowles was worn down by the demands of the large property. Ultimately, she succumbed to mental illness and was sent to the state hospital, where she eventually passed away in 1941. In Percie’s absence, her son Radbourne and his wife Agnes Sophia took over the property with the help of several dedicated longtime employees and family friends, but ultimately sold it in 1948.

Through the years, Chico changed hands several times with owners who rebranded it as a church camp; guest ranch; bed and breakfast; boutique hotel; roadhouse; retreat center; romantic inn; and, finally, destination resort and spa. Neglected, the property fell into disrepair. It was rescued by Mike and Eve Art in 1973. The Art family raised two daughters in Paradise Valley and worked to grow the business. They launched the restaurant with Chef Larry Edwards and put Chico on the map for fine dining during their 40 years of ownership.

Today, owner Colin Davis and his family carry on the legacy that started in 1900. Focused on offering fantastic service and value, the Davis family is committed to refining the experience at Chico. Just as the first proprietors learned, Davis knows that folks will still travel far for a good soak and a fine meal.

Haunted history

In May 1986, two night watchmen at this resort hotel came upon the nebulous form of a young woman hovering near a piano in the third floor Lounge. Only the upper body of the white ghost appeared, the rest tailed down to nothing. The face of the peaceful apparition stared right at them for several minutes, enough time for one of the guards to grab a camera from a nearby table and snap a photograph. Only a tiny white spot on the film showed up where the ghost had stood. The same apparition had been seen by guests several times in the past, but this was the first time the Lady in White was photographed. In 1990, two other security guards followed the Lady in White from Lobby to the hallway leading to Room 349, where the presence has been reported by many employees and guests. An antique rocker in the room always ends up facing a window, no matter in which room it is placed.

Other unexplainable things happening include an old family Bible that stays open on a wooden bench in the Attic and never collects any dust. The most likely cause for all the activity would be Percie Knowles, the stubborn wife of the man who built the hotel in 1900. After her husband’s 1910 demise, she changed it into a first-class healthcare center. She died in 1941, but her resilient spirit lives on.

Our experiences

We have heard the lots of voices and had strange EMF spikes in the room 349 as well. I had a piece of equipment move on its own and we could not explain it.

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