The Ghost of Chico Hot Springs

As Told by its Original Owner, Mike Art

Chico Hot Springs and Emigrant Peak

 Julie sat on the porch of her grandparent’s hotel rocking back and forth, staring out at Emigrant Peak casting its shadow across the Paradise Valley’s rolling hills.  She waited for her grandfather to finish his chores and continue telling her stories about their hotel and how their story about moving to Montana began. Chico Hot Springs is a hotel and spa in south central Montana, north of Yellowstone National Park.  The land is majestic, yet desolate.  No cars or buses roll by like the traffic in her home in Cleveland.  Just open spaces with occasional two-lane country roads slicing the yellow-brown hills. It’s certainly quiet and peaceful, she thought watching a hawk soaring into view.  Not like the eerie feeling she had last night in her room.  She had pulled the rocking chair that faced the window close to the night table so she could read from the bedside lamp. But when she got up this morning, the chair had moved.  It was back in front of the window facing the mountain.  How could that be?

She saw Grandpa Mike ambling across the lawn to meet her. She tried to imagine what he looked like back in 1973 when he bought the hotel.  He was still a big man—over six feet, with a handlebar mustache, an adventurous spirit, and an outgoing personality.  But she worried that this Montana adventure might have proved too much—both for him and for his family. Grandma Eve was a tiny woman with a strong face and a direct, no-nonsense way style.  It must have taken a lot of sweet talk to get her to move out here, she thought.

In the morning sun, Julie and Grandpa Mike climbed up the road leading away from the hotel up a hill to an open field.

“The weirdest thing happened last night,” Julie began. “The rocking chair in my room moved all by itself.  What do you make of that?”

“I know just how it happened,” said Mike.  “The first time it happened to me in that room was the autumn of 1973—the night after I bought this run-down bar and hotel. I hunted and fished this area with my buddies for years and loved its stark beauty.  So, when the old hotel came on the market, I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity for all of us.  Clean living.  The Great Outdoors! But after I bought the place, reality set in.  What had I done?  What would Grandma Eve say?  How would my kids like living out here in the wilderness of Montana?  Of course, I didn’t know it was so run-down when I bought it.  And I certainly didn’t know it was haunted!

“Paradise Valley has a lot of history,” Mike continued.  “The first settlers came here the 1860s.  They were miners and adventurers hoping to find gold. Instead, they found hot water.  In fact, the earliest written record we found was on January 16, 1885, in the diary of a miner named John S. Hackney who wrote, “I went out to the hot spring and washed my dirty duds.”

“The pioneers didn’t know that the real treasure was the hot water.  I didn’t know it either.  But later that night I got my first lesson.

“As I said, I was worried and anxious.  I tried to get comfortable in a small bed on the third floor of the hotel, but it was cold.  The boiler had been shut down because there were no guests.  And the blankets were skimpy. The only warm room was the hotel kitchen. An autumn wind blew through the valley making eerie whispers that rattled the windows and sighed through the empty hallways.  I lay there listening to all the new sounds wondering what your conservative Grandma Eve would have to say about my latest adventure.

 “The hotel had a long history.  Percie and Bill Knowles opened Chico Hot Springs as a boarding house in 1900.  Bill was known in the community for his gregarious nature and love of the outdoors.  My kind of guy!  Percie was a prim looking woman who wore a high collared, long-sleeved dress and pulled her hair back into a tight bun.  She wasn’t much of a talker, people said.  Bill bolstered Chico’s business with a saloon and lively dance hall.  Percie did not approve at all.  After he died in 1920, Percie shut down the saloon and transformed Chico into a health retreat. She envisioned using the healing hot waters of the springs to make Chico Hot Springs a health spa.  Instead of the wooden tubs that the miners used for bathing, she built a pool house to enclose a swimming pool and called it ‘The Plunge’.  She hired a well-known physician and touted the natural hot springs as a cure for everything from rheumatism to kidney trouble. For thirteen years the health center thrived.  But when the doctor retired, the business faltered.  Percie began to pass the hours sitting in a rocking chair in her favorite room on the third floor of the hotel with a view of Emigrant Peak.  Percie’s room is the very room you are staying in Julie.”

“Wow, this is getting scary,” said Julie.

“All of this ran through my mind that first night.  Finally, I fell into a deep sleep, exhausted both from the excitement of having bought the place and my apprehension over what would come next. 

“The wind kept howling and the night got chillier.  Sometime in the early morning hours, I was startled awake by a door slamming.  Thinking it was the wind, I lay there waiting for it to slam again, but nothing happened—at least not for the moment.  The wind whistled still louder, but I was certain that I also heard footsteps climbing the stairs.  Yes.  That’s what it was.  And they were getting louder—a woman’s footsteps.  Closer and closer until they stopped at my door.  I threw off the blanket and sat up feeling sweaty and cold at the same time. 

“Who’s there, I called.  Answer me,” I shouted, reaching for my pants and shoes. 

“As I stared at the door, the room took on a hazy glow like a fog descending over everything, and I noticed a faint smell of lilacs. Then a tall figure emerged through the haze—an older woman wearing a starched, high-collared blouse and a long skirt.  A strand of Indian beads hung around her neck falling below her waist, and she wore a small gold locket around her collar.  The smell of lilacs was strong now as she stood in the center of the room looking at me, not saying a word, her face blank.

“’ What do you want?’ I whispered.  “Who are you? Why are you here?

“Then I knew.  It was Percie Knowles. The ghost of Percie Knowles had come back to haunt the hotel.  My God, I had bought a haunted house!

“Percie moved to the window, sat down in the rocking chair, and stared into the night at Emigrant Peak framed in shadows of moonlight.” 

“I’ve come to tell you, Mike, to bring the waters back to life so they can give life again.  The waters are your fortune, and the earth will grow fertile for you.  You will thrive here if you do not abuse your gift.  Stand firm in your decision, work hard, and let the waters of health nourish your dream as they nourished mine,” she said.  And she was gone.  Just like that!”

Mike continued, “Stories of Percie’s stern ways still pass through the halls of the hotel. That smell of lilacs is carried on ghostly breezes that billow through the curtains in a room where no windows are open.  We’ve had many reports of pots and pans rattling in the kitchen at odd hours, doors slamming in deserted hallways, apparitions that float above the pool, and of a certain rocking chair in a third-floor room that is always found facing the window that looks out at Emigrant Peak.  She paid a visit to your Grandma Eve in the kitchen one night.  They seemed to like each other!

“Percie’s buried here you know. The gravestone at the old Chico cemetery reads  Percie Matheson Knowles, 1860 – 1941. Loving wife and mother.

 “I’m grateful to Percie.  She gave me the courage to move ahead.  We are reliving their past in a way, your grandmother and me.  But I’m certain Percie wouldn’t approve the saloon being rebuilt.”

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NOTE:  August 7, 2023 – NEWS:

Chico Hot Spring Hotel and Spa has just been purchased by Diamond Rock Hospitality Company for $33 million. The company’s news release states that the resort and ranch were bought “from corporate cash on hand.”  Diamond Rock plans to use a professional management company to run the resort “as well as to pursue many high return-on-investment opportunities including additional rooms and glamping, affordable workforce housing and renewable power.”

Facebook is crammed with comments about this outside corporation buying the hotel and destroying a well-loved Montana landmark. 

“Chico excursion!! Praying the new owners will embrace the ambiance…Great memories, been coming here for more than 50 years!!!”

There are dozens more Facebook comments mourning the loss of a special landmark filled with historic and personal memories that might well be destroyed by outside investors.