The Odyssey Hour or Marian Hall was once the home of the Flint Tavern Hotel, a once-grand establishment that has become one of Flint’s most haunted locations. If you Peak around the corner and look to the south east corner of Martin Luther King JR Ave, built in 1927, this six-story low-rise hotel was designed by Charles N. Agree to catch the overflow from the much larger Durant Hotel. Its brick exterior lined the corner of Detroit Street and Third Avenue, and it quickly became a bustling hub for travelers.

The Flint Tavern boasted a grand lobby, a restaurant, the Tavern Pharmacy, and several small retail stores on its first floor. With 200 finely decorated rooms, the hotel thrived, offering a touch of luxury just steps away from the downtown shopping area. But as the years passed, the hotel’s fortunes faded. By 1958, The Flint Tavern Hotel closed its doors, only to be reborn a year later as Marion Hall, a residence for the elderly.

Marion Hall served Flint’s elderly population for decades, providing a safe haven close to the city’s amenities. But with time, the halls of the former hotel saw many residents take their final breaths within its walls. By the 1980s, Marion Hall moved to the suburbs, leaving the building vacant once more.

The building didn’t stay empty for long. Odyssey House, a drug rehabilitation center, took over the space, seeking to serve those struggling with addiction as Flint’s economy crumbled and crime spiraled out of control. But the echoes of the past never left.

Today, if you visit the old Tavern Hotel, you might hear screams echoing through the ground floor by the elevator shaft on a quiet morning. Others have reported seeing the shadowy figure of a man entering and leaving the elevator on the fifth floor. Locals believe this ghostly figure is Theodore Schroeder.

The story of Theodore Schroeder is a tragic one. In June 1928, just months after the hotel opened, Schroeder was sent to make final adjustments to the newly installed elevator. While standing on a girder between the two shafts, he stepped back and fell five floors. His body broke through safety boards on two different levels before hitting the ground, resulting in his immediate death from a skull fracture. The 49-year-old man’s sudden and violent end has left a permanent mark on the building.

But Schroeder is not the only spirit believed to haunt the Flint Tavern. On the sixth floor, the spirit of a little girl has been known to join living children at playtime. No one knows who she is or where she came from, but her presence adds to the eerie atmosphere of this once grand hotel.

As you stand here today, you might feel the chill of the past, the lingering spirits of those who met untimely ends within these walls. Listen carefully, and you might just hear the distant echoes of the Flint Tavern Hotel’s haunted history.