YATES MEMORIAL HOSPITAL
Former Hospital — Ketchikan, Alaska
Status: Historic site · Access: Access unknown
Dossier: https://haunthunt.com/place/yates-memorial-hospital-ketchikan-alaska/

Early hospital building undergoing preservation work.

Yates Memorial Hospital is a former hospital in Ketchikan, Alaska. Early hospital building undergoing preservation work. Historic Ketchikan documents conversion from clergy housing to a hospital, including a 1909 hospital expansion. Reported lore and claims include: Klees says some restoration workers avoided the upstairs because of an unsettling feeling.

Yates is the only — the 'Seattle to Juneau' that's the sole hospital, the '12 beds' that's the boom town served. The 'clergy house' is the converted — the '1905 built' that's the mission's home, the '1909 repurposed' that's the Dr. Yates honored. The 'missionary nurses' is the few — the 'handful' that's the staffed alone, the 'dire circumstances' that's the women led.
The '11 Most Endangered' is the named — the '2020' that's the national list, the 'roof failing' that's the 15 years vacant. The 'many lives' is the reused — the 'magazine, Chamber, mortuary' that's the tenants passed, the 'nearly burned' that's the several times. Yates is the saved — the 'Historic Ketchikan bought' that's the '26 purchase, the 'restore to 1905' that's the plan declared.
The file keeps Yates: the only hospital, the nurses' handful, the endangered list, and the purchase finally.
Yates Memorial is the archive's Alaska file — the frontier's only hospital, nearly lost.

WHY THIS FILE MATTERS
Yates Memorial is the archive's Alaska file — the boom town's sole hospital.
A building keeps its survivors — the file's suggestion being that Yates's hold is the endured: the 'Seattle-Juneau' that's the only care, the 'nurses alone' that's the women led, and the '11 endangered' that's the rescue earned.

FILED CLAIMS — 1 on record, reported not verified
· [Media reported] sensed presence: Klees says some restoration workers avoided the upstairs because of an unsettling feeling. Upper floor is where the accounts cluster — the site's own map of where to look. The reports at Yates Memorial Hospital are the site's second history — unofficial, unverified, and stubbornly retold. Media accounts carried the story further than the evidence ever did. The account appears in 'AK: The mystery behind Ketchikan ghost tours'. The reports keep the place on every haunted list it qualifies for.
  source: AK: The mystery behind Ketchikan ghost tours (https://alaskapublic.org/news/2017-10-13/ak-the-mystery-behind-ketchikan-ghost-tours)

HISTORY — 2 documented facts
· Historic Ketchikan documents conversion from clergy housing to a hospital, including a 1909 hospital expansion. Yates Memorial Hospital's past is on record — the entry belongs to the verified layer beneath whatever lore attaches. This belongs to the verified spine of the entry, the layer everything else is measured against. The detail is preserved in 'Yates Memorial Hospital historic building report'. It's the sort of fact that gives the haunting reports their context.
· A preservation update reports Historic Ketchikan’s purchase in late 2023 and subsequent foundation stabilization. The site's documented history is the record the rest of the file stands on. It's verified history: the dossier's load-bearing detail. The detail is preserved in 'Forward Momentum: Updates for 8 Previously Listed 11…'. The entry's timeline holds it; the lore holds the rest.

SOURCES — 3 cited
· AK: The mystery behind Ketchikan ghost tours — Alaska Public Media / KRBD
  https://alaskapublic.org/news/2017-10-13/ak-the-mystery-behind-ketchikan-ghost-tours
· Yates Memorial Hospital historic building report — Historic Ketchikan
  https://www.historicketchikan.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Yates-Memorial-Hospital-Final-1.pdf
· Forward Momentum: Updates for 8 Previously Listed 11 Most Endangered Historic Places — National Trust for Historic Preservation
  https://savingplaces.org/stories/forward-momentum-updates-11-most-endangered-historic-places

—
HauntHunt is a research archive. Claims are filed as reported — documented where sources exist, marked as folklore or unverified where they do not.
Methodology: https://haunthunt.com/methodology/ · Corrections: https://haunthunt.com/report/