The White Eagle Saloon and Hotel

The White Eagle Saloon and Hotel

I have very different expectation when I stay in an American Hotel as opposed to staying in a European hotel, but the one thing that is the same is my insistence on having a private room and bathroom.  Last year when my husband took me to Portland to see a Black Sabbath concert I broke that rule.

Our original plan was to fly in see the concert then spend one night and fly back home, we only really needed a bed to sleep in. Of course I immediately started looking for haunted hotels in the area and came across the White Eagle Saloon and Hotel. It looked perfect; an old building with a haunted history, but it also came with shared bathrooms. I decided to break my own rule and just enjoy the experience; after all it was only for one night. Later when I found out my son and his girlfriend were going to drive up and meet us I opted for a second room for them and a second night for all of us.

The White Eagle was opened in 1905 by two Polish immigrants as a place for other immigrants to come after a long day working on the nearby docks. It is said that the upstairs housed a white brothel and the basement housed the brothel of color, there is also rumors of an opium den and alcohol being served during prohibition. The saloon earned the nick name “Bucket of Blood” due to nightly bar fights and tales of unsuspecting victims being shanghaied, drugged, and taken through the tunnels under the city (known now as the Shanghai Tunnels) to waiting ships where they would wake up at sea. There are dark tales of women being kidnapped and sold into sexual slavery or kept prisoner in the basement and forced into prostitution.

At one point the owners of this saloon/hotel had closed the second floor rooms off after witnessing the entire 13 doors slam shut and hearing a women sobbing in one of the rooms. Today these 13 rooms are rented out for a reasonable cost.

Two ghosts are reported to haunt the second floor of this establishment, Rosie a prostitute who is said to have been killed by her boyfriend after he proposed marriage and she refused because she was frightened of what her boss the owner of the brother and saloon would say and do. A number of previous guests have reported hearing Rosie crying.  Sam is the ghost of a 10 year old boy who was taken in and housed on the second floor; he worked cleaning to pay for his room and board and later died in his room. There is a plethora of ghost stories surrounding The White Eagle, my own is as follows.

We checked in early, the staff was kind enough to give us our room well before check in time as we had been up all night flying. The room was just as it was advertised, small with a sink and double bed and not much else. I expect it still looks very much like it did during its days as a brothel. My son and his girlfriend had the room directly across the hall from us; I noticed right off that the doors liked to close themselves if I did not use something to keep them open. Music was heard coming from below our room, I thought nothing of it as there is a bar underneath the rooms I assumed it was the nights band warming up, however when I went downstairs to get coffee from the bar it was closed and there was no one inside, certainly not a band. My husband and son admitted to hearing the same music, really it was just a few notes that were played over and over again at various times during our stay, always the same notes, always when the saloon downstairs was closed and presumed empty.

This was a fun place to stay, the bed was comfortable, the outdoor patio was delightful to sit on for a drink, and the saloon served delicious coffee and food. I never saw anyone else on the floor with us, so the shared bathroom was never a problem. I did hear someone in the room next to mine on the second day, but since I never saw them I cannot say for sure if it was a guest or a ghost.