New Jersey got ranked America’s least haunted state, and the Jersey Devil has some explaining to do. The Garden State finished dead last in a new Halloween ranking, below all 49 other states and Washington, D.C.
Happy Halloween, New Jersey. You’re the least haunted state in America.
A new study by Action Network ranks New Jersey at 51st out of 51 total jurisdictions for the likelihood of spotting a ghost. With just 43 total points out of a possible 255, the state falls below all other states and even Washington, D.C.
Notably, New Jersey is the legendary home of the Jersey Devil, a winged, hoofed creature said to have been born in 1735 to a woman known as Mother Leeds and to have haunted the Pine Barrens ever since.
Now, how did the Garden State hit rock bottom? Action Network scored all 50 states and D.C. on five factors: reported ghost sightings, cemeteries, haunted locations, ghost towns, and Google searches for ghost-related terms. They measured each factor per 100,000 residents, awarding 1 to 51 points per category.
New Jersey’s numbers were grim for a state with its reputation: It has just 12 ghost towns, or 0.13 per 100,000 residents, ranking 49th. By comparison, South Dakota has 246.
It logged 1,110 reported ghost sightings, or 11.9 per 100,000 residents, ranking 46th. Maine, the top state, posted 58.1.
It has 2,250 cemeteries (24.2 per 100,000 residents), ranking 44th.
It has 64 identified haunted locations (0.69 per 100,000 residents), ranking 43rd.
Even its best showing, ghost-related Google searches, landed only 35th, at 310 monthly searches per 100,000 residents.
In other words, New Jersey’s own residents aren’t seeing many ghosts, aren’t living near many ghost towns, and aren’t even googling them very much.
The Jersey Devil has inspired books, documentaries, and a professional hockey team. Its legend has outlasted nearly three centuries of skeptics. But a formula that counts sightings, graveyards, haunted sites, abandoned towns, and search interest per resident doesn’t score folklore.
A creature that lives in stories, and not in the datasets, simply doesn’t count.
Meanwhile, West Virginia took first place with 209 points, followed by South Dakota, North Dakota, Iowa, and Montana. The Mountain State won largely on cemeteries.
New Jersey’s neighbors didn’t fare much better, though: New York ranked 48th and Connecticut 47th. Pennsylvania came in at 32nd.
The ranking is a data exercise, not a paranormal audit. It measures what can be counted, using sources such as FindAGrave, GhostsOfAmerica, FrightFind, and Google Keyword Planner. It cannot prove that New Jersey is free of paranormal activity, and Action Network presents the project as Halloween fun.
So New Jersey may have lost the numbers game. But the Pine Barrens are still out there, and so, officially, is the Devil.
