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Heavily Investigated

She checked in five weeks after the grand opening and never left. In May 1928, 22-year-old Leone Jensen stepped off the roof, and guests have sworn she's been drifting the hallways and materializing at bedsides ever since. But Leone isn't alone — the hotel rose atop the city's first schoolhouse, and people still hear children laughing in the basement after dark, still catch small shadows darting at the edge of the corridor. Stand in one of those long, chandelier-lit halls long enough and you may start to feel like the guests here outnumber the ones who checked in.

Built atop Phoenix's first public schoolhouse and opened March 19, 1928, the Hotel San Carlos was the Southwest's crown jewel — its first high-rise with elevators, first with air conditioning, a seven-story magnet for Golden Age Hollywood royalty like Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, and Mae West. It was designated an Arizona State Historic Landmark in 1974 and remains the city's only operating historic boutique hotel. The official record is all elegance and milestones. The unofficial one began the morning Leone Jensen made the front page of the Arizona Republic — barely five weeks after opening night.