Holly Theater
Built as a movie house and opened in July 1948 with a Georgia marble facade and seating for 500, the Holly Theater anchored downtown Dahlonega until television thinned its crowds in the 1960s; it was restored in the 1990s and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2002, today operating as a nonprofit live-theater venue. Cast and crew have long claimed they are not alone in the dark house, telling of unseen spirits who slip in to watch rehearsals and play small tricks, flicking the stage lights on and off and shifting props between takes. The best-known of these is a friendly ghost the company nicknames "Eddie," rumored to be the celebrated 19th-century actor Edwin Booth, brother of Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth, who is said to keep a permanent seat in the balcony. Visitors have reported glimpsing a silhouette moving through the prop room in the small hours, lending the old marquee a quiet, watchful air long after the audience has gone home.
📍 69 W Main St, Dahlonega, GA 30533, Dahlonega, GA · Get directions