Ghosts of Western
Introduction
It is said that many
ghosts, spirits and apparitions inhabit the 100-year-old campus of Western Kentucky
University. Civil War soldiers, construction workers, resident assistants and
students who have met tragic deaths haunt the Hill with the sights and sounds
of their spectral wanderings. Are these stories true? You decide. . . .
Menu: Introduction || Barnes-Campbell
Hall || Kentucky Building || Lambda
Chi Alpha House || McLean Hall ||
Pearce-Ford Tower || Potter Hall
|| Rodes-Harlin Hall || Schneider
Hall || Sigma Alpha Epsilon House || Van
Meter Hall ||
Find Out More || Graphics Page
Barnes-Campbell Hall
Opened in fall 1966 for 392 students, Barnes-Campbell has at least two things
in common with some of Western's other residence halls: it was named for two
regents, in this case Sheridan C. Barnes and Donald A. Campbell, and it has
those pesky elevators. Residence hall elevators, particularly when they malfunction,
have a way of inspiring students and resident assistants to attempt quick repairs.
Unfortunately, such amateur maintenance also has a way of dispatching its practitioners
to the hereafter. It happened in Barnes-Campbell Hall during spring break about
1968. One of the hall's resident assistants had just finished taking a shower.
Trotting along the fifth-floor (some say sixth-floor) hall in his bare feet,
he noticed the stuck elevator. He had been warned against correcting the problem
on his own but, heck, he had done it before. Just find an elevator key, pry
open the door, lean into the shaft, flip a switch and presto! No more long walks
up the stairs. This time, however, it didn't work. Maybe it was his slippery,
wet feet, but some say he hurtled down the elevator shaft to his death. Others
say he actually got the elevator working again, only to be crushed as it moved
down the shaft before he could get out of the way. Today, the ghost of the unfortunate
RA not only revisits the scene of his last duty, but has been held responsible
for other strange occurrences in the hall. One year during spring break, two
RAs returned from dinner to discover all the fifth-floor water faucets turned
on. Residents have reported seeing the elevator doors open on the fifth floor
late at night, but have wondered how the stop was made with no one inside to
press the button. The most chilling evidence of the ghostly RA, however, is
the trail of wet footprints leading from the showers to the elevator, and sometimes
to a vacant, locked room. Spring break is the best time to watch for these footprints,
as the doomed RA reenacts his fatal mission.
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Kentucky Building
Letters from GIs to their sweethearts during war. Family Bibles, with
generations of births and deaths carefully inscribed. Children's toys. Nineteenth-century
quilts. Photographs. Diaries. Clothing. Jewelry. Furniture. All these and more
can be found in the Kentucky Library and Museum, which for sixty years has preserved
historical materials relating to Kentucky and Kentuckians. Do the spirits of
the long-dead owners of these artifacts hover nearby, still attached to the
books, papers, clothing and amusements they valued in their lifetimes? Staff
in the Kentucky Building have reported a "feeling of being watched" as they
go about their duties. A weekend curator reported that she once glimpsed a vision
of a dark-haired man dressed in old-fashioned mourning clothes. A later photograph
of her taken in the building showed that this gentleman may have taken another
form: a mysterious white haze visible over her right shoulder. A student worker
has felt rushes of cold air and heard unidentifiable noises in the building.
Books in storage areas have inexplicably been found left open, as if a spirit
had been revisiting the life and times it once knew. During a visit to the Kentucky
Building, a psychic once explained that the artifacts it houses can carry "attachments"–associations
with the life of a particular person that have been imprinted upon them. The
energy given off by these attachments can be detected by inhabitants of the
living world in numerous ways–vaguely uncomfortable feelings, strange noises,
cold air streams, even actual apparitions. The psychic picked up the presence
of a female spirit in a stairwell, and an entire group of people, including
a child, in a storeroom. These presences aren't negative, she points out, just
curious–wondering, perhaps, how we came to possess their diary, letters, business
ledgers, favorite rocking chair, cigar case, old family photographs....
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Lambda Chi Alpha House
The Tudor-style house at 1504 Chestnut Street is home to the Lambda Chi Alpha
fraternity and, it is said, the spirit of a woman who was murdered in the house
many years ago. She was once seen running across the front lawn. A resident
came downstairs early one morning to find that she had lit a fire in the fireplace.
She activates an alarm clock at midnight whenever a resident sleeps in a certain
room for the first time. She turns lights on and off and moves the brothers'
personal belongings when they are asleep. One well known incident suggests that
the ghost has literary aspirations. A brother awoke one night to the sound of
a strange noise. Investigating, he traced the sound to one of the rooms, but
it was locked from the outside. A light glowed under the door, however, and
from within the brother could hear the clicking of typewriter keys. Like so
many restless souls who met their end too early, this spirit seems to intend
no harm, but her activities have made some of the Lambda Chis nervous about
staying in the house without lots of their brothers for company.
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McLean Hall
Mattie McLean came
to Bowling Green from Mississippi in 1902 and enrolled at the Bowling Green
Business College. After graduation, she accepted a position as Henry Hardin
Cherry's private secretary–a position that, one observer noted, required the
diplomacy of Talleyrand, the firmness of Stonewall Jackson, and the patience
of Job. It didn't hurt to be a good stenographer, either. But "Miss Mattie,"
as she came to be known, was equal to the task. Students soon came to realize
that she was the power behind the throne, helping them with everything from
employment to landlord problems as she directed President Cherry's never-ending
stream of visitors and correspondence. One student recalled that she "absorbed
more shocks and soothed more ruffled souls than we will ever know." Another
said that when a student reached the end of his rope, she showed him how to
stretch the rope. When Miss Mattie retired in 1945, she left generations of
students with memories of her efficiency and loyalty–but when she died in 1954,
she appeared to leave something else behind. Although she used to live in Potter
Hall, some say that her spirit remains on campus, residing in–where else?–McLean
Hall, named in her honor and opened in 1949. Before McLean Hall went co-ed,
the women who lived there sensed Miss Mattie's presence. "She thinks of us as
her girls," insisted one. They could hear her strolling the halls, checking
up on things, looking out for them. Communications with Miss Mattie, via ouija
board, found her a friendly, motherly type. Sometimes, however, she liked to
play tricks on her girls and even appeared to them from time to time upon request.
No one has deployed the ouija board to find out what Miss Mattie thinks about
the current co-educational status of her hall. Perhaps she is handling the changing
times with her usual efficiency. But chances are, she's still watching out for
her girls.
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Pearce-Ford Tower
When the tallest building on Western's campus opened in fall 1970, it was already
said to be inhabited by a visitor from the beyond. He was a worker who fell
from the topmost floor down the elevator shaft during construction, and whose
body remains entombed somewhere amid the foundations of the structure. When
Pearce-Ford is closed for the semester, the elevators will run by themselves,
their doors opening and closing without anyone present–except, perhaps the ghostly
worker for whom their installation came too late. Once in place, however, elevators
can still malfunction--with disastrous results, as one of Pearce-Ford's early
residents learned. He was in the habit of going up or down to other floors to
use the shower. Emerging towel-clad from the bathroom one day, he pushed the
button for the elevator, stepped through the doors–and hurtled twenty stories
to his death. Each year, on the anniversary of the tragedy, ghostly wet footprints
appear as his spirit retraces its final walk. In the fall of 1994, tragedy again
struck Pearce-Ford when a construction worker was crushed to death in the building's
mechanical room during the moving of a 7,000-pound heating and cooling unit.
Since that time, when the air conditioning system rattles or malfunctions, the
ghost of the worker is said to be reminding residents of this unfortunate event.
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Potter Hall
Western's first residence
hall, Potter Hall (named for Western regent J. Whit Potter) was built for 250
students in 1921. It served as both a women's and men's residence hall, and
also housed the college cafeteria, before it was converted into an administration
building in 1994. Potter saw many generations of students pass happily through
its doors. But for one, college life could not alleviate her despair. The ghost
of Potter Hall would walk the floors, push aside furniture, make strange noises,
and call residents' names. Night clerks heard keys turning in locks and the
sound of change being inserted into a vending machine–even heard the drink fall–but
saw no one. Like the proverbial whistler in the graveyard, staff would pass
by one of Potter's basement storage rooms quickly and reluctantly, and never
at night. Trying to make sense of the mystery, some of the residents used a
ouija board to contact the spirit, who responded with alacrity, but also with
sorrow and bitterness. Her name, it is said, was Allison. Some years ago, she
had committed suicide by hanging herself in that basement room that everyone
seemed to avoid. She gave precise details of her death–the date, even the location
of the room where it happened. When the residents asked a housekeeper about
the incident, she was surprised by what they already knew, as the tragedy had
been carefully hushed up over the years. Since Potter Hall's conversion into
an administration building, Allison has been heard from less frequently but
a 1994 incident, where she loudly banged on the pipe in the room where she died,
suggests that, unfortunately for her tortured soul, she may still be "alive
and well."
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Rodes-Harlin Hall
Named for former Western regents John B. Rodes and Max B. Harlin, Rodes-Harlin
Hall opened to 400 women students in fall 1966. When the building was officially
dedicated in fall 1967, the dedication program boasted of its spacious lobby
and reception area and its general beauty and functionality. Rodes-Harlin has
had its problems over the years, including infestations of mice and more elevator
breakdowns in 2000 than any other building on campus. But there is said to be
a darker day in the hall's history which has given rise to a haunting. Like
Potter Hall, the tragedy of suicide visited Rodes-Harlin when a distraught female
student ended her life by jumping from the building's top floor. Afterward,
the girl's roommate would hear tapping on her door, but when she opened it no
one was there. Even now, the ghost of the dead young woman is said to appear
each year on the day of the suicide. Girls living on the ninth floor can also
hear the sound of her footsteps on the roof at the very spot from which she
leaped to her death.
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Schneider Hall
It was built in 1928 as West Hall and renamed White Stone Hall before being
named Florence Schneider Hall in honor of a former Western registrar and bursar.
Over its life, this stately Georgian Revival building has been home to the college
infirmary as well as to Army Air Corps cadets who trained here during World
War II. Its white limestone facade, however, is said to hide a singularly bloody
and maniacal deed. It was 30, 40, perhaps 50 years ago. Western was on spring
break and the campus was quiet, but two girls had stayed behind in the hall
to catch up on some schoolwork. One of them–we'll call her Judy–was in the wrong
place at the wrong time. As she worked quietly at her desk one night, a killer–some
say an escaped mental patient on a deranged mission–entered her room through
a window. Raising the ax he clutched in his hand, he brought it down savagely
upon Judy's head, then fled. Mortally wounded, Judy managed to crawl down the
hall to the room of the building's only other occupant. Weak and bleeding, she
scratched on the door for help while her friend huddled inside, too terrified
to open it. When she finally peered out the next morning, there was Judy's body,
an ax embedded in the skull. Some say there was no body, only a pool of blood
and the crimson stains of her fingerprints streaked across the door. But Judy
lives. She revisits the scene of her murder every spring break, although residents
have sworn to hearing her at other times of the year. She sits in windows, moves
furniture, turns alarm clocks and computers on and off and still scratches futilely
on doors, eternally trying to escape her killer.
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Sigma Alpha Epsilon House
In 1861 and 1862 both Union and Confederate troops could be found camped in
or near Bowling Green. Like so many soldiers who served in the Civil War, they
were more likely to fall victim to diseases–typhoid, dysentery, measles and
malaria, to name a few–than to battle wounds. Wherever the men encamped, it
was necessary for their officers to commandeer churches and houses for use as
hospitals. But these hospitals were hardly the antiseptic environments we envision
today. They were grim charnel-houses, home to primitive medical procedures and
unspeakable filth, where young men ended their lives in pain and fever, wishing
that their time on earth had been longer. One such hospital, it is said, was
the home at 1410 College Street that now serves as the Sigma Alpha Epsilon house.
The fraternity brothers there are said to share the house with the ghost of
one of the Civil War's departed soldiers, a tall, slender man in military cap
and overcoat who has identified himself (via ouija boad) as "Kevin." They see
him in mirrors and walking in translucent silhouette. More often, they hear
him treading over floors, opening doors, turning on appliances. As a group of
brothers watched nervously one night during finals week, he even activated their
telephone answering machine several times, then caused the phone to ring but
declined to speak at the other end. Kevin's favorite number is said to be seven,
and his presence has been sensed in the room bearing that number. But one brother
has also heard the locked door of room number four "open" to admit the ghostly
visitor. Kevin seems forever to be making his rounds, wandering mournfully over
the creaky floorboards where he and so many of his brothers lost their battle
with death.
Update: On April 7, 2005, fire destroyed the Sigma Alpha Epsilon House. Luckily,
no one was hurt, but it remains to be seen whether the ghost will accompany
the brothers to their new home . . . .
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Van Meter Hall
Before being named Van Meter Hall, the edifice
that crowns the Hill was known as the Administration Building. Inside is Van
Meter Auditorium, the site of countless lectures, concerts, plays, commencement
exercises and regular assemblies of the student body, known as "chapel," in
which President Henry Hardin Cherry would deliver inspiring orations. Construction
on this Classic Revival structure, named for Western benefactor and Chancellor
Capt. Charles J. Van Meter, commenced in 1909, with a skylight planned above
the stage of the 2,000-seat auditorium. One day, a workman who was perched on
the skylight looked up from his labors and spotted an airplane. What a novel,
and perhaps frightening, sight this must have been in early 20th-century Bowling
Green! Out of fascination--or perhaps shock--the unfortunate man became disoriented,
lost his balance, plummeted to the half-built stage, and died. Some wise folks
say this tragedy actually occurred in the 1940s, when the skylight was being
covered over. In any event, the workman's broken body left a large bloodstain
which, to this day, will appear as a ghostly red glow during events in the auditorium.
Attempts to clean or replace the stage flooring have proven futile, as the stain
"soaks through" and reappears. But this ghost also reclaims his body and makes
his presence known to horror-stricken students. "It stood motionless, staring
at me," recalled one. "Its face contained no emotion or expression, yet its
blank stare penetrated me. Its body seemed to be engulfed in a strange blue
light." Other witnesses have described a man in his 50s, or just a figure in
white. The ghost is sometimes content just to make mischief--turning on lights,
knocking over music stands, opening and closing curtains and moving furniture.
Staff of the Office of University Relations, which moved into Van Meter Hall
in 1997, arrived at work one morning to find a large table inexplicably moved
to the opposite end of the lobby. They have also experienced strange computer
"glitches" which they can only attribute to the ghost's "fascination with technology."
Variations of the story describe the ghost differently: as a young actress who
committed suicide, or a hermit who lives in a cave beneath the stage, or Henry
Hardin Cherry himself. Who knows what other explanations will come to mind for
those who have "never felt alone in the building?"
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You can find out lots more about Western's ghosts by
visiting the Kentucky Building and reading the material that has been collected
in University Archives and in the Kentucky Library's Folklife Archives.
Here's a sampling of the material
in University Archives' vertical files on "Ghosts" and "Myths":
College
Heights Herald Articles:
Season for shivers, February 23, 1971
Boo!! Van Meter ghost haunts Western's actors, May 2, 1972
Ghost of Van Meter, November 5, 1976
Tales of Horror, October 29, 1981
Things that go bump on the Hill, October 29, 1987
Ghosts go Greek prowling sororities, fraternities, October 27, 1988
The Haunting of the Hill, October 25, 1990
Believe it or not, September 29, 1992
Greek Goblins: Some fraternity houses spooked by ghosts, October 29, 1992
Western's legends more about fear, haunting, death than truth, April 8, 1997
Thrill on the Hill: Ghosts, spooks haunt Western, October 30, 1997
Xploring the unexplained, October 15, 1998
Legends of Western, October 26, 1999
Talisman
Articles:
A Legendary Hill, 1978, p. 24
Speaking of Spooks, 1986, p. 66
Ghosts and good luck, 1993, p. 113
Other Articles:
Ethereal fingers know all the right buttons to push, Lexington Herald-Leader,
October 25, 1999
Spooked, Western Kentucky University Alumni Magazine, Fall 1997, p. 8
Tales of visitors past haunt area buildings, Park City Daily News, October 31,
1982
Region has its share of legendary spooks, Park City Daily News, November 30,
1996
The Spirits shake the Master today, Park City Daily News, October 30, 1999
University Relations has new 'haunt' in Van Meter Hall, On Campus, August/September
1997, p. 5
Here's a list of things you
will find in the Folklife Archives:
Dana Lynn Albrecht, "Ghosts, Fact or Fiction?" (FA 86)
Jo Carol Bailey, "Western's Ghost" (MSS 1972-379)
June Baskett, "Folklore collection: scare stories found in girls' dormitories"
(MSS 1972-270)
Bob Blanton, "A Collection of Ghost Stories" (MSS 1970-95)
David Frank, "I saw it, I swear I did: the ghost of Van Meter" (MSS 1979-20)
Nelson Graham, "Ghost Tales" (MSS 1972-267)
Connie Lee Holman, "The night owl: night clerking in a college dorm" (MSS 1978-43)
Sandra Horn, "Interview with psychic practitioner Terry Langford discussing
supernatural occurrences
at the Kentucky Building" (FA 125)
Danny Johnson, "Ghost Stories" (MSS 1970-96)
Brian R. Loader, "College Horror Tales" (MSS 1972-62)
Janet A. Maltry, "Reminiscence - Ghost-like manifestations in Potter Hall" (FA)
Lynwood Montell, "Ghost stories collected by Campbellsville College students"
(MSS 1972-441)
Judith Snow, "Ghost Stories" (MSS 1973-7)
Supernatural Folklore Collection (FA 74)
Kim E. Watrous, "Supernatural Legends" (MSS 1978-160)
Jason Williams, "Two ghost legends from Western Kentucky University" (MSS 1972-433)
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of Library Special Collections, Western Kentucky
University.
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