LIZZIE BORDEN BED & BREAKFAST, Fall River, Massachusetts

Death, New England–style: After a breakfast of bananas and johnnycakes and a stroll in town, return home to receive 40 whacks with an ax. This was the nature of Andrew Borden's last day on earth, a day guests at the Lizzie Borden B&B can relive in most of its particulars, save the actual ax blows. Borden was murdered on August 4, 1892, along with his second wife (pictured). Suspicion has always fallen on their daughter Lizzie, though she was tried and found not guilty. Unlike the typical hotel-cum–murder site, however, the owners of Lizzie's former digs play up the Borden deaths, and the ambiguity that still surrounds them, giving the Lizzie Borden House a dash of creepiness to go with the cheesy feeling of a 19th-century theme park. The Greek Revival house in the Massachusetts industrial town of Fall River contains six bedrooms; fans of gore can pay $200 a night to sleep in the bedroom where Abby Borden, Lizzie's stepmother, was found hacked to death. Lizzie's own bedroom is also available for the same price, if the idea of getting into a likely murderess's head appeals. A prominent Lizzie-didn't-do-it theory has Bridget Sullivan, the family maid, taking the hatchet to her masters after they asked her to wash the windows on a particularly hot day; her attic room, at $175, is one of the house's cheaper pleasures.

Lizzie Borden Bed & Breakfast
Tel: 508 675 7333

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