There are a number of different types of ghosts and spirits. And there are many ways they may contact you, which may surprise you. Many people think ghosts are all the same, but the truth is… There are many more.

Ghosts are both everywhere and nowhere, stories would have us believe. Their existence is constantly being investigated, but highly doubted, yet despite that healthy scepticism ghosts feature prominently in our culture. They are in television and film, from "Harry Potter" to "The Sixth Sense." Ghost stories are told around campfires and found on bookstore shelves, in both fiction and nonfiction sections. Around Halloween, pop-culture images of ghosts haunt nearly every store, and hang as decoration in homes.

Ghosts even influence some of our everyday customs, in ways we may not recognize. "People used to believe a sneeze caused someone to expel their soul out of their body, and so 'God bless you' or 'Bless you' was used as a protection against the devil snatching your soul."

The Queen of all Ghost Stories

With such a varied and intriguing past it’s not surprising that the Queen Mary has been voted one of the Top 10 Most Haunted Places in America by Time magazine.

Get a detailed overview of the Queen Mary’s most haunted areas and paranormal hotspots. Explore the ship inside and out and hear stories about the ship’s most famous reported apparitions.

Among the ghosts reportedly still hanging around is an engineer who died in the ship's engine room, a "lady in white," and various children located throughout the ship including the 1st Class Pool (the tour stops at the entrance doors to the swimming pool, but does not go inside the pool area due to ongoing restoration projects).

Haunted Encounters is offered only during the day...but when the sun goes down, the spirits aboard the Queen Mary come out to play. Explore the legendary ship with a series of twilight tours and séances that explore the haunted past and paranormal activity that the Queen Mary is known for.

CASPER

While Bloody Mary spends her time in the ghostly realms waiting to be summoned to dark bathrooms so she can scare kids, Casper, who is best known as "The Friendly Ghost", is the white-outlined, smiling ghost who tries not to scare people.

THE DRURY LANE GHOST

There are many theaters in the Covent Gardens district in London's West End. Plays have been produced in that area for over 300 years, and some of the world's greatest actors have appeared there. Yet one theater is better known more for its ghost than its productions.

There is actually more than one ghost said to haunt Drury Lane's halls and wings, including those of several actors. The most famous, however, is a "Man in Grey" seen as a nobleman carrying a sword. It's not uncommon for a theater to claim a resident ghost treading the boards, and the Drury Lane ghosts carry on their part of theater tradition.

THE VANISHING HITCHHIKER

A classic example of modern folklore, often associated with the United States, but with parallel tales elsewhere in the world, the Vanishing Hitchhiker is often depicted standing by the roadside and disappearing without a trace not long after being picked up. One classic version points to the hitchhiker being the ghost of a local resident, killed not far from their home, but it has likely changed over the decades.

THE GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PAST

In Charles Dickens' famous novel "A Christmas Carol," cold-hearted miser Ebenezer Scrooge has a change of heart after being visited by several ghosts representing different eras of his life's Christmases (Past, Present, and Yet to Come).

Ghosts are often associated with life lessons and morality tales, and these spooks are no exception. The Ghost of Christmas Past sets Scrooge out on the road to rehabilitation by showing him visions of his past Christmases.

Sightings of Lincoln's Ghost in the White House 

First ladies Grace Coolidge, Lady Bird Johnson, and Jacqueline Kennedy, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands all said they encountered the ghost of Abraham Lincoln, or felt his presence, in the White House.

First lady Eleanor Roosevelt also reported feeling Lincoln's presence as she worked in her office in the Lincoln Bedroom, as if he were peering over her shoulder. And President Franklin D. Roosevelt's valet once ran screaming from the White House after seeing Lincoln's ghost, writes Dennis William Hauck in "Haunted Places: The National Directory."

Liz Carpenter, press secretary to Lady Bird Johnson, told author John Alexander that Mrs. Johnson believed she’d felt Lincoln’s presence one spring evening while watching a television program about his death. She noticed a plaque she’d never seen before hanging over the fireplace. It mentioned Lincoln’s importance in that room in some way. Mrs Johnson admitted feeling a strange coldness and a decided sense of unease. 

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White House staff have reported seeing the ghost of first lady Abigail Adams hanging laundry to dry in the East Room.

Staff have also reported smelling wet clothes and lavender laundry soap in addition to the ghost sightings, according to the White House Historical Association.

William Henry Harrison, who was the first president to die in the White House, was said to haunt the attic, which is now the third floor.

Harrison was president for just 31 days before his death in 1841. His ghost is said to have been heard moving around the attic of the White House. In 1927, the attic was renovated and turned into an expansion of the Executive Residence.

President Harry Truman reported several instances of paranormal activity during his time in the White House.

In June 1945, Truman wrote to his wife, Bess, about life in the White House during the first two months of his term.

"I sit here in this old house and work on foreign affairs, read reports, and work on speeches — all the while listening to the ghosts walk up and down the hallway and even right in here in the study," he wrote. "The floors pop and the drapes move back and forth — I can just imagine old Andy [Jackson] and Teddy [Roosevelt] having an argument over Franklin [Roosevelt]."

In 1946, he wrote Bess another letter after he heard a knock on his bedroom door but no one was there.

"I jumped up and put on my bathrobe, opened the door, and no one there," he wrote. "Went out and looked up and down the hall, looked in your room and Margie's. Still no one. Went back to bed after locking the doors and there were footsteps in your room whose door I'd left open. Jumped and looked and no one there! The damned place is haunted sure as shootin'. Secret Service said not even a watchman was up here at that hour ... You and Margie had better come back and protect me before some of these ghosts carry me off."

When President Ronald Reagan's dog Rex began barking at the doorway of the Lincoln Bedroom, he suspected a ghostly visitor.

President Ronald Reagan and first lady Nancy Reagan with Rex. Pete Souza/Pictorial Parade/Archive Photos/Getty Images At a 1986 state dinner, Reagan told guests that Rex had barked at the entrance to the Lincoln Bedroom and refused to go inside. Reagan's daughter and son-in-law also reported seeing ghostly figures in the bedroom.

President George W. Bush's daughters, Jenna and Barbara, heard opera singing and 1920s piano music coming out of a fireplace in their bedroom.

The daughters of President George W Bush, Jenna (left) and Barbara. Brooks Kraft LLC/Corbis via Getty Images "We knew that if anyplace was haunted, it was this house, but we tried to rationalize it," Jenna wrote in her 2017 memoir with Barbara, "Sisters First."

When White House butler Buddy Carter asked the girls how they slept, they told him about the mysterious singing and music that they heard.

"'Oh, Ms. Jenna, I believe you. You wouldn't believe what I have seen and heard over the years.' Buddy hasn't yet told me his ghost stories, but I keep hoping," she wrote.