I know my AZ friends will want to know how the Bird Cage scored. This building in Tombstone, AZ was built in 1881 and ran nonstop 24-hours a day/7 days a week for eight years. There was drinking, gambling, prostitution, and when all is said and done 26 people died in this small building.
I admit in doing my research putting off this particular location because I had doubts it could meet the criteria and yet I know that it's got a heavy body of evidence for haunting. If you recall the "Ghost Hunters" episode at the Bird Cage it was an entirely insane night. They had an extension cord thrown, the sound of music picked up on EVP, loads and loads of booted footstep sounds, card shuffling, and let us not forget--a full body apparition seen by the group leaders, Jason and Grant who both described the same woman to their team on separate interviews. It was one of the stand-out episodes in my memory. I don't know why I waited so long to get to this particular location but perhaps this says something about my point system, because if a location in the desert in AZ (we're talking no-man's land) can have the right elements, that's pretty amazing.
The Bird Cage Theater scores like this:
1. Under a mile from a train track.
2. Under a mile from a stream (as well as arroyos/dry washes)
3. Land is sedimentary rock and dry washes contain silver from mine washout.
4. The building is masonry with a rock fascia.
5. The building is older than 50 years.
6. The building has a history of death/trauma.
Optional point: The Bird Cage Theater is also less than one mile from the Boot Hill Cemetery.
I have to say that I'm impressed so far with how the scoring goes. I'm still not entirely sure that railroads don't just appear where folks need them. Tombstone is a very dry area and the mining was the thing that brought folks there, but once it was a boomtown, the railway would appear. The railway didn't appear in Tombstone until 1903. By then, the murders at Bird Cage had already occurred. So, did it become haunted once the railway showed up, or was it reported before then? I can't find reports of people complaining of hauntings in the turn-of-the-century, but during that time period around 1890-1920 it remained empty and unused, so with no one there to report hauntings, it's hard to verify if there was activity once the train track arrived or not.
So far as I've found in research, the appearance of train tracks could be incidental. Of course, the water wasn't what brought folks to Tombstone, as they barely could find enough water to mine silver. It was the appearance of silver that brought them there, so my assumption that water sources dictate homesteading may not be always applicable.
The mystery grows...