HAUNTED PLACES / California
THE QUEEN MARY,
LONG BEACH.
A Cunard liner of 1936, a troopship through the Second World War, and since 1967 a hotel and museum in Long Beach, California: her history, what people report aboard, and how to visit.
The history
The Queen Mary was built for Cunard White Star by John Brown and Company at Clydebank, Scotland. Launched on 26 September 1934, she left Southampton on her maiden voyage on 27 May 1936: 1,019 feet long, just over 80,000 gross tons, with Art Deco interiors across three classes.
In March 1940 she sailed for Sydney and was fitted out as a troopship. Painted grey, she was called the Grey Ghost. On one crossing in July 1943 she carried 15,740 soldiers and 943 crew, 16,683 people, still the record for a single ship. By the end of the war she had carried more than 800,000 service personnel.
On 2 October 1942, north of Ireland, the Queen Mary was zigzagging at about 28 knots with some 10,000 American troops aboard when she struck her escort, the light cruiser HMS Curacoa, and cut it in two. Under orders not to stop in waters where U-boats hunted, she steamed on with a damaged bow. By the usual count 338 of the cruiser's crew died and about 100 were rescued.
Cunard retired her in 1967. The City of Long Beach bought her, and she arrived on 9 December 1967. The aft engine room, with watertight door 13, was kept as an exhibit. She opened to visitors on 8 May 1971, the first hotel rooms followed in 1972, and on 15 April 1993 she was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
A 2017 condition report found the ship in serious disrepair. She closed in March 2020, the lessee went bankrupt, and in June 2021 the City of Long Beach took her back into its own hands. After urgent repairs, tours resumed in full on 1 April 2023 and hotel stays on 12 May 2023; the hotel has since grown from 100 rooms to 200. The venue calls this the New Golden Era and lists restored Promenade Deck flooring and a new archive museum. In 2026, the 90th year since the maiden voyage, the Queen Mary 2 called at Long Beach on 2 February, the ships' first meeting in 20 years.
What people report
The ghost stories gathered after the ship was moored, and Wikipedia notes they multiplied in the 1980s. The most repeated concerns the first-class swimming pool, drained for decades and seen from a viewing area on R Deck which the venue says many believe to be its most haunted room. Guides and guests describe a girl they call Jackie: laughter, splashing and a child's voice in an empty tiled room. Some tellings put her in the second-class pool instead, and no source says who she might have been.
Two accounts attach to men who did die on the ship. In 1966 an eighteen-year-old crewman, John Pedder, was crushed by watertight door 13 in the engine room; visitors there report a young man in coveralls near the door. A senior second officer, William Stark, died after drinking cleaning fluid by accident, and staff describe an officer in uniform on the upper decks. A woman in a long dress, the Lady in White, is said to appear in the Queen's Salon.
Stateroom B340 has the longest file: knocking at night, lights and taps turning on by themselves, covers pulled off the bed. The venue points to a log entry from September 1949 recording a passenger found dead in the cabin. The room was taken off the hotel's list in the 1980s, reopened on 13 April 2018, and has taken guests since 13 September 2024. The murder legend attached to it was, according to author Nicole Strickland in the Crescenta Valley Weekly, invented by employees in the Disney years. Wikipedia finds no murder recorded aboard; skeptic Joe Nickell puts the collection down to pareidolia and daydreaming.
Accounts of hauntings here are folklore and entertainment, not verified events.
On television
Most Haunted came in 2005 for a two-part visit, "The Queen Mary (Part 1)" and "(Part 2)", first shown on 19 and 26 July 2005, and Ghost Hunters followed with "RMS Queen Mary" on 5 October 2005. Ghost Adventures opened its tenth season aboard with "Queen Mary" on 4 October 2014.
BuzzFeed Unsolved: Supernatural spent a night aboard in 2017 for "The Haunted Decks of the Queen Mary". Watch the BuzzFeed Unsolved visit on the BuzzFeed Unsolved Network's official channel. In 2026 Project Fear filmed an overnight investigation aboard and a night in Stateroom B340. Watch the Project Fear visit on the show's official channel.
Visiting and running your own session
The Queen Mary is open daily as a hotel and museum at Pier J, Long Beach. Most exhibits are open from 10 in the morning to 8 at night, and everyone aboard needs an admission ticket or a room key. Guided tours include a History Tour, a Haunted Tour, a Belowdecks Tour, the hour-long Haunted Encounters tour, the two-hour after-hours Paranormal Ship Walk, and the Graveyard Tour after midnight on Fridays and Saturdays for ages 16 and up. Check the venue's site for hours and tours before you go.
To stay the night, B340 is sold as a paranormal stateroom, and in September 2026 three more themed rooms joined it as the Paranormal Passage. Dark Harbor, the ship's Halloween event, runs on select nights from 18 September to 1 November 2026. The venue bars professional cameras and recording equipment; a phone is not on that list, but stay on the tour route. The pool, the engine room and B340 are places where people died or where crews worked through a war; speak of them plainly and leave them as you found them.
For a session, a stateroom at night is the natural choice: still, carpeted, away from the restaurants. A steel ship is one large magnetic object, so expect an unusual magnetic reading; the session learns the room's normal in its first five seconds. Set the phone on a flat surface away from the television and the lamps, and leave it be.
Try a session there
Run a Spirit box session aboard with Spooky Box. The phone's sensors decide the moment and chance decides the word, and each word shows its reason on the screen. Record the session as audio or video and replay it afterwards from any word.
Read next
- The Winchester Mystery House, San Jose: a widow's sprawling house and what the tours report.
- Alcatraz, San Francisco: the island prison and the accounts of rangers and visitors.
- Taking a phone on a ghost hunt: what its sensors can and cannot measure, and how to run a session.
- The Spooky Box home page, and every place on this site.
Sources
- RMS Queen Mary on Wikipedia: construction, war service, Long Beach and the alleged hauntings.
- Guided tours at queenmary.com: tours, paranormal attractions, hours and policies.
- Long Beach Post, 25 March 2023: the reopening of tours and hotel rooms after the repairs.
- National Register of Historic Places, reference 92001714: the 15 April 1993 listing.
Questions
Is the Queen Mary really haunted?
Nobody can say. The accounts here, from the girl in the pool to the knocking in B340, are reports and folklore passed between staff, guests and guides, not verified events. Wikipedia notes that no murder is recorded aboard and that most deaths on the ship were from natural causes.
Can you stay overnight on the Queen Mary?
Yes. The ship has been a hotel since 1972 and reopened for stays on 12 May 2023. Stateroom B340 and the three Paranormal Passage rooms are sold as themed paranormal stays. Book through the venue's own site.
Is the Queen Mary open to the public in 2026?
Yes. Tours resumed on 1 April 2023 and the hotel on 12 May 2023. Most exhibits are open daily from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., everyone aboard needs an admission ticket or a room key, and Dark Harbor runs on select nights from 18 September to 1 November 2026.
Spooky Box is paranormal entertainment. It uses device sensor activity and a word engine to create atmospheric sessions. Generated words and sensor readings do not establish the presence of spirits or verified communication.