Stranahan House Ghosts Include First Owners, Frank and Ivy

May 4, 2010
Jill Stefko

Frank Stranahan Committed Suicide in a Waterway - jusben

Stranahan House Museum is the residence of six known ghosts and an angry spirit. People have experienced them, as well as other paranormal phenomena.

The Stranahan House, built in the early 1900s, is one of Fort Lauderdale's most haunted houses. In 1893, Frank Stranahan moved to the city to manage the overland mail route from Lantana to Coconut Grove. In 1900, he married Ivy Cromartie. When he committed suicide in 1929, Ivy stopped all of the clocks in the house, as was the custom then. Shortly after the house became a museum, the parlor clock began to tick on its own. More paranormal activity would follow.

Frank and Ivy Stranahan

The Stranahans have been called the first family of Fort Lauderdale. He can be compared to a protagonist in a Greek tragedy. He was an achiever, philanthropist and man of great power.

Stranahan established the first post office in Fort Lauderdale. The place became a trading post, ferry service and bank. Stranahan was one of the major land owners in the area and donated large portions of his land for public use, including sites for a hospital and Stranahan Park.

Ivy was the town's first school teacher and an activist for human rights. Their home that Frank built for Ivy was a center of activity for their community.

Frank Stranahan’s Tragic Death

Despite all of the Stranahan’s accomplishments and social life, Frank suffered from major depression. In May, 1929, he was hospitalized for what was, then, called a “nervous breakdown.”

On June 23, 1929, he strapped an iron gate to his ankle and jumped into a nearby waterway. The authors of many accounts about his suicide attribute his downfall to his financial ruin during the Great Depression, however historians, while they mention other depressions prior to the major one, attribute the start of the Great Depression as October 27, 1929, when the stock market crashed.

After his death, Ivy spent the rest of her life on the upper floors of the house, while she rented the first floor to restaurateurs. She died in her upstairs bedroom in 1971.

Stranahan House Ghosts

Many people aver that Frank’s ghost rose from the waterway and returned to his home and haunts it. Witnesses reported hearing loud bangings after he died. People have sighted Ivy’s phantom, accompanied by the strong scent of her perfume.

The bedroom where Ivy died is haunted. Beds are made and unmade. When the bed is straightened up for the night by the housekeeping staff, they return the next day to find an impression as if someone sat on it, although the room had been vacant.

The third floor attic is also the site of mysterious or paranormal activity. Staff has reported presence of a spirit and feeling a gelid hand touching them on their backs. Some believe it’s Ivy’s ghost who touches them. Other ghosts that have been sighted in the house and on the grounds are those of Augustus Cromartie, Ivy’s father, who died in her bedroom years before. There have also been reports of encounters with Ivy’s brother, sister and an Indian servant girl.

Angry Spirit of Stranahan House

Homeless people, who used to sleep on the vast exterior porch area before it was fenced off, reported encounters with this entity who banged so loudly on the structure’s walls that they couldn’t get sleep.

One man said he was chased away from the porch by an unseen furious spirit who only stopped the pursuit when he reached the property’s boundary line. The spirit is unnamed. Could it be Frank? The banging began after he died.

Stranahan House Museum

The Stranahan House, restored to its 1913 ambiance, was named to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973. It’s an attraction for history buffs and ghost enthusiasts.

Some say that its guided historic tour is like a journey to an earlier time. There are ghost tours in October. Skeptics have been known to believe that ghosts exist after visiting the museum and experienced a paranormal incident.