A jail that has sat empty for decades opens its cells to the public this Saturday, when the Historic Gilchrist County Jail in Trenton runs its sixth annual Fall Festival — free admission, noon to 8 p.m., with a paranormal “spooky zone,” survivalists from Discovery’s “Naked and Afraid,” trick-or-treating, vendors, food trucks, and tours of the jail itself.
One of the teams setting up in that spooky zone is Trinity of Shadows, an all-sister paranormal investigation team based in Florida — and this Saturday is their first-ever in-person community event under that name. The sisters are running a booth with meet-and-greets, a chance to listen to real paranormal evidence they’ve recorded on past investigations, a spot to swap your own ghost stories, and some basic equipment education for anyone curious how a real investigation actually works.
The jail they’re setting up in front of is the real draw on its own. It dates to the late 1920s, and last year it became Trenton’s only nationally recognized historic site. Owner Lee Irwin bought the building in 2021 and, after initially considering turning it into a haunted attraction, decided to restore it as a history museum instead — a “time capsule” brought back to roughly its 1960s appearance rather than gutted and modernized. The Fall Festival is one of the only times of year the public gets to walk the same halls and cells former inmates once did.
The daytime hours — trick-or-treating, vendors, the museum tours — are genuinely kid-friendly. The paranormal programming itself is tame (no jump scares or haunted-house actors), but it leans more toward tweens and up just by subject matter — ghost stories and talk of recorded evidence aren’t a toddler’s idea of fun.
It’s a real drive from Hernando County — Trenton is about 86 miles from Brooksville, roughly an hour and 35 minutes up US-19/US-98, out past Chiefland toward Gainesville. If you’d rather stay local and still get a dose of dark history, Brooksville’s own guided night tour of its downtown murders and arsons is a lot closer to home.
Good to know: Historic Gilchrist County Jail, 313 NW 2nd St, Trenton, FL 32693. Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026, 12-8 p.m. Free admission.
Follow Trinity of Shadows on Facebook for updates, or to see them in action before Saturday.