Sallie House

Michael Cromen Finney, an immigrant from County Cork, Ireland, came to Atchison in 1856, served as the town wharfmaster, and in 1866 bought two lots in Atchison, one of which became the site of the Sallie House, built between 1867 and 1871. He died in the house at 10 p.m. on September 27, 1872, and his funeral was held there a few days later. Wikipedia, Clio and Believing the Bizarre put the Sallie House at 508 N 2nd St, while World Ghost Towns places it at 508 North 3rd Street and says Dr. Charles Finney built it to serve as his family’s home and his medical office. A member of the Finney family owned the house continuously until 1939, and Agnes Finney True lived there for the rest of her life, dying in the house at midnight on November 28, 1939.

Dr. Charles C. Finney, Michael’s son, earned his medical degree in 1894 from what one source calls Beaumont Medical College and another calls Beaumont Hospital Medical College in St. Louis, then opened his Atchison office in the Martin Building at Fifth and Commercial. No substantial evidence supports the claim that he practiced medicine at the home.

The legend giving the house its name holds that a young girl named Sallie was brought to Dr. Finney for emergency surgery, which versions differ between appendicitis and an earache, and died on the operating table because anesthesia had not taken full effect. Property records, death certificates and newspaper archives contain no documentation of such a child. Debra Pickman herself reported this story as false in 2008.

According to Clio, Tony and Debra Pickman were the first occupants to document paranormal activity. Accounts differ on when they moved in, the winter of 1992 in one telling and 1993 in another, while the couple was expecting their first child. Debra said strange events began within weeks: lights dimmed, the dog growled at the nursery door, temperatures dropped and electronics malfunctioned. In the summer of 1993 Tony found stuffed bears in the nursery arranged in a circle on the floor, and when the couple put the bears back and left, a bear that had sat on a chair for months fell to the floor, which happened again when they repeated the experiment. When Tony and Debra contacted previous tenants, one tenant mentioned her daughter’s imaginary friend, Sallie, and the Pickmans, who already suspected a child ghost, started calling the entity Sallie. Tony also claimed he saw an apparition of a young girl, which he later sketched.

The activity escalated dramatically. Witnesses reported shadows, candles lighting themselves, and objects floating. Tony Pickman began experiencing what he described as physical attacks, and deep scratches and burns appeared on his arms, back, and torso in front of witnesses.

The house gained national attention through the Fox show Sightings, though sources date the crew’s visit differently: November 1993 in World Ghost Towns, 1994 in Believing the Bizarre. Clio says the crew visited four times, and that Tony’s shirt caught fire and deep scratches appeared on his arms, back and stomach; Believing the Bizarre says the team documented eleven separate attacks in one night.

A cleansing ceremony in October 1994 failed, and afterward Tony had eight deep scratches and heard incessant commanding voices. Then an entity pushed him on the stairs hard enough to break the railing, and within two weeks in October 1994 the Pickman family fled.

Skeptical observers note that no historical record supports any element of the Sallie legend: not a child’s death, not a doctor operating in the home. The only documented “Sallie” connected to Atchison is Sallie Isabelle Hall, an African American woman born in 1871 who lived nearby; her age and ethnicity do not match the child spirit described by witnesses.

Daytime tours and overnight investigations are offered by appointment, and all visitors sign liability waivers. Accounts differ on who handles bookings: one site says the Atchison Chamber of Commerce manages the house, while another sends visitors to Haunted Atchison Tours and the Atchison Historical Society. Ethel Anderson, who owned the home from 1958 to 1990, insisted it was not haunted until her death in 2000. Hauntpedia says paranormal investigator Renae Leiker purchased the Sallie House in 2016, while Wikipedia says the house was listed on Zillow for $1 million in February 2016 and taken off the market in November 2017. In 2021 Kansas City Magazine called Atchison the “most haunted town in Kansas.”