The Wright’s Arms, Offerton

Built around 450 years ago, the Wright’s Arms—later known as the Spice Tower—was long reputed to be haunted. In the late 1960s and 1970s, landlords Robert and Mary Higginbotham reported footsteps, tapping, swinging doors, and creaking floors in the empty building, while their dog Meg refused to climb the stairs. Later landlords spoke of a ghost called “Old May,” said to be the spirit of a murdered woman thrown down a nearby well. Others linked the haunting to a man who hanged himself in the 1930s. The pub closed in 2010 after a long and eventful history.