Spirits of Tudor Hall: Make Plans to Visit Tudor Hall in 2026

The historic Tudor Hall is a fascinating piece of our nation's history. When you visit, you'll connect to the story of the Maryland Booths who left their mark on America forever. You'll walk where they walked, lived, played, worked and dreamed. When you visit, this part of history comes alive.

The property and first floor of Tudor Hall will be open to visitors for tours and talks in 2026 at 1:00 & 2:00 PM on the dates listed below. This year all general tours will be at 1:00 PM. The special talks will be at 2:00 PM.

April 12 & 26; May 3 & 17 & 31; June 14 & 28; July 12 & 26; August 9 & 23; September 6 & 20; October 4 & 18; November 1

Tudor Hall is located at:
17 Tudor Lane, Bel Air, MD 21015
The cost of each Special Talk and each regular tour is $5.00 cash for those age 13 and older.
For more information:
443-619-0008 or SpiritsOfTudorHall@gmail.com

The following are the special talks at 2 PM:

April 12

John Wilkes Booth's Sister Asia and Her Children

by Lisa Samia

April 26

Confronting Bad History – Did John Wilkes Booth Escape Justice?

by Francis Gorman

May 3

From Ford's to the Potomac: John Wilkes Booth on the Run

by Jim Garrett

May 17

From the Potomac to Destiny: John Wilkes Booth on the Run

by Jim Garrett

May 31

Lincoln, Shakespeare, and the Brothers Booth

by Michael Anderegg

June 14

Grief, Celebrity, and Redemption: Edwin Booth and the Rebirth of American Theatre

by Elizabeth Reese

June 28

Lincoln's Final Hours

by Kathryn Canavan

July 12

The Weapons of John Wilkes Booth

by Jim Garrett

July 26

John Wilkes Booth on Stage and Screen

by Kate Jones

August 9

Patriarchal Patriot: Richard Booth, father of Junius Brutus Booth

by Kate Jones

August 23

John Wilkes Booth's Sister Asia and Her Children

by Lisa Samia

September 6

The Assassination of President Lincoln and John Wilkes Booth’s Bizarre Second Act

by Francis Gorman

September 20

First Daughter: Rosalie Booth, the Eldest Sister of John Wilkes Booth

by Kate Jones

October 4

Lincoln's Final Hours

by Kathryn Canavan

October 18

Almost Like Being There: A Conversation about Digging Deeper into Primary Sources Surrounding the Lincoln Assassination

by Michael Kauffman

November 1

The Plot to Abduct Lincoln: John Wilkes Booth's First Plot

by Jim Garrett

Below are the speakers for 2026:

Michael Anderegg is professor emeritus of English, University of North Dakota. His books include Lincoln and Shakespeare, Orson Welles, Shakespeare, and Popular Culture and Cinematic Shakespeare.

Kathryn Canavan is an independent researcher and the author of Lincoln’s Final Hours: Conspiracy, Terror, and the Assassination of America’s Greatest President. She started her journalism career as a crime reporter. She eventually worked as reporter or editor in four states and was a National Health Journalism Fellow at USC’s Annenberg School. To get a story, Canavan has reported at gunpoint, lived with the Moonies, negotiated with a killer and joined Tug McGraw in the Phillies dugout.

She began researching the unintended consequences of the Lincoln assassination in 2009. Lincoln's Final Hours has been featured on CSPAN and PBS Newsworks. She explores the effect that one extraordinary night had on the ordinary Washingtonians who witnessed what happened inside Petersen's Boarding House on the night President Lincoln died there. Their eyewitness accounts provide telling new details about the assassination. Some went on to lead lives that are the stuff of novels, and others came to sad ends.

Jim Garrett gets to do what he loves . . . History. He is a lifelong student of history and for the last 10 years plus has shared his love of history with people from around the world. For his entire life, he has been an ardent student of American History concentrating on the Civil War era and the Lincoln Assassination. Beginning in the early 2000's, he was a volunteer at Ford's Theatre, lectured at conferences, including the Department of the Interior, been on radio and co-authored two books and written numerous articles. Now semi-retired, he spends his time with Unscripted Tours of Washington, which is rated the top tour company in Washington by Viatour, the parent company of Tripadvisor. Unscripted Tours is also listed in the top 20 tours in the nation by Viatour as well.

Francis J. (Frank) Gorman practiced law as a trial and intellectual property attorney. He represented Green Mount Cemetery in the Kline v. Green Mount Cemetery trial and appeal. He is Of Counsel at the Gorman & Williams law firm. He is a member of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a recipient of the Lee A. Caplan Award for Pro Bono Services. Frank graduated from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service and its Law Center. He is the author of Confronting Bad History: How a Lost Cause and Fraudulent Book Caused the John Wilkes Booth Exhumation Trial and has written law review and blogs on legal topics and on history. He resides in Baltimore with his wife, Pat

Kate Jones is a 19th century murder researcher, speaker, and living historian who specializes in the Lincoln assassination, the Lizzie Borden murders, and the case of the "Devil in the White City" multi-murderer, Dr. H. H. Holmes.

She has presented on different aspects of the Lincoln assassination for several organizations including the Surratt Society and Fort Lesley J. McNair. Kate also speaks about the events of 1865 through her work at the Dr. Samuel A. Mudd House Museum and Historic Port Tobacco Village.

Michael Kauffman: Author Jonathan Yardley once wrote in the Washington Post Book World that Michael W. Kauffman "has been studying Lincoln generally and the assassination specifically for 40 years, and he appears to know the subject better than anyone else now alive."

Combing through archives all over the U. S., Canada, and the U. K., Kauffman uncovered a staggering number of previously unknown sources to produce American Brutus: John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracies (Random House, 2004), which historian David Herbert Donald called "by all means the best" work on the Lincoln assassination. The Wall Street Journal named it one of the five best books ever published on political violence, and Civil War Interactive placed it high on their list of the Most Important Civil War books ever published.

Kauffman had long been a fixture in Civil War studies, with contributions that appeared in Civil War Times, the Washington Post, American Heritage, Blue and Gray, and dozens of other publications. He has lectured throughout the United States and the U. K., and has appeared in documentaries on A&E, The Learning Channel, the History Channel, National Geographic, Discovery, and Travel Channels.

American Brutus was his first major book, and it appeared in the Best Books lists of nearly every major media outlet in the United States. It was optioned for a 9-part miniseries on HBO.

Elizabeth M. Reese is a historian in the Washington, D.C. area whose research is focused on public memory, family ties, and grief. Her work has been published in TIME, the Journal of the American Revolution, the New York Times, and can be seen on C-SPAN. Elizabeth was awarded the Scott Hartwig Public History Fellowship at the Civil War Institute in 2015 and the America 250! Commendation Medal in 2024. Elizabeth is the Senior Manager of Public Programs & Interpretation at Woodlawn & Pope-Leighey House and holds a Master of Arts in American History from Gettysburg College. She is currently working on a manuscript exploring how Edwin Booth's grief transformed American theatre and contributed to national healing post-Lincoln assassination.

Her first book, Marquis de Lafayette Returns: A Tour of America’s National Capital Region, was published by The History Press (imprint of Arcadia Publishing) in 2024.

Lisa Samia is an award winning Poet & Author who loves American Civil War History. Her latest accomplishments are being selected as the National Parks Arts Foundation's Artist in Residence for Gettysburg National Battlefield Park & National Parks Service Artist in Residence for Manassas National Battlefield Park, both for poetry.

She has presented her poetry at the American Civil War Museum, Richmond and Appomattox, Manassas National Military Park, The Gettysburg Civil War Round Table, The Seminary Ridge Museum, the Gettysburg Heritage Museum, the New England Civil War Museum, and more.

Lisa is also an avid author and speaker on John Wilkes Booth and his sister Asia Booth Clarke. She has appeared multiple times at Tudor Hall in Bel Air, MD (Booth Family Home) and at the Civil War Round Table Congress (via Zoom) to a sold-out audience. Her recent endeavor is researching and writing a biography of the life of Asia Booth Clarke, Sister to John Wilkes Booth, A Woman of the Civil War.

Plan to visit Tudor Hall for each of the exciting educational special talks in addition to taking the regular tours.