My dad who was ill with emphysema was unusually upset by what he had seen one day while he was by himself. He said that a lady in red had come into the den where he was laying on the couch and told him to come with her. He told her that he was not going with her and she finally said, "alright, but I will be back for you in a year". My dad was not a person to get upset easily or imagine things. However this rattled him and as we began to ask him more questions, he finally said he didn't want to talk about it any more. I guess he thought we thought he was just seeing things. I first thought he was dreaming, but knowing my dad, he would have known the difference. He said he could see the lady's red dress and her form, but her facial features were not clear. She was just a few feet from him. My dad was a Christian and I don't question his faith. He died in the hospital exactly one year from the date he saw her. Has anyone else heard of this happening to anyone?
UNEX Has anyone seen or heard of the woman in red?
- Thread starter Red Sky
- Start date
AngryBeaver
Contributing Member
When I was little I spent a lot of time at my cousin's house, and she thought their house was haunted, and she talked a lot about "the lady in red" by her bed at night. I am going to send her a link to this thread to see what she remembers.
VesperSparrow
Goin' where the lonely go
Never heard of this...but I have seen the last breath of life leave my patients' nostrils....I call it the mist....
the man in black........or the man with the black cloak
That is what all my residents see .....when the end is near.......many many times other residents see this in the nursing home and I am talking about many residents that don't even know Others residents have said THEY also have seen the man in black......also........have you ever heard of the cats in the nursing homes that "make rounds" with our nurses..........I have always paid attention to the cats.......they will "tell me" which residents are "sick" or are going to die......they stick close to the rooms.......some nursing homes the cats actually get up on the beds of the ones that are going to die soon.....or they circle in and around the room....... that is when you pay attention and it has always been the same thing...animals know....
I remember one night.........one of the cna's came to get me......one of her residents was scared out of her mind.......when i went to the room......this lady who is a calm.... (woman that never says much of anything...she mostly smiles and is quiet)......was Very upset......her eyes were "bugging out"....and she was dead serious........she was saying ..."DID YOU SEE HIM"?......."did you see that man in the black cloak?".....I am not kidding you ......I could "FEEL" this big cloud of some sort of cloak like being ...in her room.........I got really brave and said do not worry.....i took her hand..... (she was a very religious woman) and i said " JESUS is in this place.......... he WILL GO AWAY>>>>> ......and instantly that "cloud" was lifted......i could feel it behind me...as it left the room...... it felt very big....behind me...as it left.........i could feel her relax.........she closed her eyes and was calm........and yes......... not long after that ...another resident died........she died later that month .I have seen and noted many things working with elderly in nursing homes that NOOne would have believed had they not been working there too.............
That is what all my residents see .....when the end is near.......many many times other residents see this in the nursing home and I am talking about many residents that don't even know Others residents have said THEY also have seen the man in black......also........have you ever heard of the cats in the nursing homes that "make rounds" with our nurses..........I have always paid attention to the cats.......they will "tell me" which residents are "sick" or are going to die......they stick close to the rooms.......some nursing homes the cats actually get up on the beds of the ones that are going to die soon.....or they circle in and around the room....... that is when you pay attention and it has always been the same thing...animals know....
I remember one night.........one of the cna's came to get me......one of her residents was scared out of her mind.......when i went to the room......this lady who is a calm.... (woman that never says much of anything...she mostly smiles and is quiet)......was Very upset......her eyes were "bugging out"....and she was dead serious........she was saying ..."DID YOU SEE HIM"?......."did you see that man in the black cloak?".....I am not kidding you ......I could "FEEL" this big cloud of some sort of cloak like being ...in her room.........I got really brave and said do not worry.....i took her hand..... (she was a very religious woman) and i said " JESUS is in this place.......... he WILL GO AWAY>>>>> ......and instantly that "cloud" was lifted......i could feel it behind me...as it left the room...... it felt very big....behind me...as it left.........i could feel her relax.........she closed her eyes and was calm........and yes......... not long after that ...another resident died........she died later that month .I have seen and noted many things working with elderly in nursing homes that NOOne would have believed had they not been working there too.............
Malone Laveigh
Inactive
In my hospital, several veteran nurses I work with swear they have seen a little boy wearing knickers, about age 5 or 6, in one particular room. He always appears between 1:00 am and 5:00 am. The temp seems to drop in the room. He has been seen by many, many patients - some with family members rooming-in. He is said to quietly cry, and wander about the room, sometimes tugging at the foot of the bed. He never speaks, but whimpers. It upset so many patients, that they would hit their call lights, and ask the nurse to help "that little boy back to his own room." Several different times, family members actually walked to the nurses' station to tell them they "had a lost boy" in their family member's room. They don't turn the full lights on, so as not to wake the patient, but give strangely similar descriptions. When they return, he would be gone. This has occured over a period of about 20 years... It's always the same description, room, time... The boy never ages, and he is always wearing knickers. During daylight hours, there are never any sightings. However, the round wall-mounted clock falls off the wall, and the room gets cold. That clock has been replaced sooooo many times, and secured with screws that most would consider overkill. Anytime staff needs to be hospitalized - the "old-timers" refuse that room... 
Mrs. Malone
Mrs. Malone
American Rage
Inactive
LittleFish
Nearly Fearless
Brings to mind Emily Dickinson's, Dying: (ref. http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/fly.html )
Thanks everyone for all of your input. It is interesting to hear your stories. And Cappy I found the thread you were talking about in Unex, thanks. Michelle and Malone your stories are really eerie.
But guys, the fact that this "lady" talked to my father is odd, and her wearing red is different also. It doesn't seem to fit the normal "spirit" stories I've heard. I figured if it had happened to anyone else, some of you guys would have heard about it.
But guys, the fact that this "lady" talked to my father is odd, and her wearing red is different also. It doesn't seem to fit the normal "spirit" stories I've heard. I figured if it had happened to anyone else, some of you guys would have heard about it.
duchess47
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Man with the black cloak was what my son saw - way too many times.
What link?
packyderms_wife
Neither here nor there.
Yep just like seeing a white owl at noon, someone you know will soon pass from this world to the next.
K-
[SIZE=+2]The Lady in Red[/SIZE]
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
We didn't believe in ghosts, so when the fellow checking us in warned us that our room on the sixth floor was haunted, we just laughed. There were a lot of crazy people out there who believed in ghosts and wanted to stay in a haunted hotel, but Marie and I weren't two of them. I'd chosen the Mizpah for our weekend getaway because I'd like the description of the hotel and it amenities, not because it had a phantom.
Just for kicks, Marie asked the fellow who was supposed to haunt our room. He told us that it was a ghost called "The Lady in Red". She was a prostitute who was strangled by a jealous boyfriend and her tormented spirit still lingered in the hotel. She was said to follow guests around, and to play with the gaming equipment in the casino.
"A gambling ghost?" I asked laughingly. The boy glared at me, and I was sorry for making a joke about something he obviously believed in. We said a hasty good-night and went up to the sixth floor.
As we neared our room, Marie gasped and grabbed my arm. I stopped and looked at her. She pointed, wide-eyed, toward the far end of the hallway. Before our eyes, the glowing figure of a woman came hurrying toward us. I shivered superstitiously, my skin prickling in the sudden cold as she rushed passed us and walked right through the wall next to our room.
"Good lord, there really is a ghost in our room!" I gasped.
"I am not going in there," Marie said firmly. Her face was pale and her black eyes were wide with fear. "No way."
I didn't much feel like going in there either, but we had gotten a special deal for two nights, paid in advance and non-refundable. I didn't want to waste our money. In the end, I wrenched open the door, turned on the light, and investigated every corner, looking for the Lady in Red. She was gone.
Marie absolutely refused to set foot in the haunted room. In the end, I had to go down to the desk and request a room on another floor. The boy didn't say much when I told him we had seen the Lady in Red, but he gave me a know-it-all smirk that made me want to smack him, and assigned us to a room on another floor. Marie barely got a wink of sleep that night.
She kept waking up, afraid that the Lady in Red would come walking through the wall and do terrible things to us. We were up at dawn and had checked out of the Mizpah by breakfast time the next day.
From that day on, Marie always booked our hotels, and she always made sure that there were no ghosts anywhere on the premises before she made a reservation.
You can read more spooky Nevada ghost stories in Spooky Southwest by S.E. Schlosser.
http://www.americanfolklore.net/folktales/nv3.html
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
We didn't believe in ghosts, so when the fellow checking us in warned us that our room on the sixth floor was haunted, we just laughed. There were a lot of crazy people out there who believed in ghosts and wanted to stay in a haunted hotel, but Marie and I weren't two of them. I'd chosen the Mizpah for our weekend getaway because I'd like the description of the hotel and it amenities, not because it had a phantom.
Just for kicks, Marie asked the fellow who was supposed to haunt our room. He told us that it was a ghost called "The Lady in Red". She was a prostitute who was strangled by a jealous boyfriend and her tormented spirit still lingered in the hotel. She was said to follow guests around, and to play with the gaming equipment in the casino.
"A gambling ghost?" I asked laughingly. The boy glared at me, and I was sorry for making a joke about something he obviously believed in. We said a hasty good-night and went up to the sixth floor.
As we neared our room, Marie gasped and grabbed my arm. I stopped and looked at her. She pointed, wide-eyed, toward the far end of the hallway. Before our eyes, the glowing figure of a woman came hurrying toward us. I shivered superstitiously, my skin prickling in the sudden cold as she rushed passed us and walked right through the wall next to our room.
"Good lord, there really is a ghost in our room!" I gasped.
"I am not going in there," Marie said firmly. Her face was pale and her black eyes were wide with fear. "No way."
I didn't much feel like going in there either, but we had gotten a special deal for two nights, paid in advance and non-refundable. I didn't want to waste our money. In the end, I wrenched open the door, turned on the light, and investigated every corner, looking for the Lady in Red. She was gone.
Marie absolutely refused to set foot in the haunted room. In the end, I had to go down to the desk and request a room on another floor. The boy didn't say much when I told him we had seen the Lady in Red, but he gave me a know-it-all smirk that made me want to smack him, and assigned us to a room on another floor. Marie barely got a wink of sleep that night.
She kept waking up, afraid that the Lady in Red would come walking through the wall and do terrible things to us. We were up at dawn and had checked out of the Mizpah by breakfast time the next day.
From that day on, Marie always booked our hotels, and she always made sure that there were no ghosts anywhere on the premises before she made a reservation.
You can read more spooky Nevada ghost stories in Spooky Southwest by S.E. Schlosser.
http://www.americanfolklore.net/folktales/nv3.html
packyderms_wife
Neither here nor there.
It all depends on your ethnic origins. When my mother passed it was a white owl. When her spirit finally left the room/her body it was the flapping of bird wings that everyone heard. What is your ethnic background? This will play into what your father saw.
K-
The Lady In Red
From: Jessica (girlygirl92486@aol.com)
Story type: Ghost
Location: Michigan
Source: Form Submission
http://www.wirenot.net/X/Stories/Ghost/Ghost_L-M/lady_in_red.shtml
I was sleeping in the home of my father, when the door bell rang and it was a lady. She did not speak of any such nature of what her name was or anything like that. All she did was simply ask for my fathers name. I told her that it was Raymond. As soon as i said his name he woke up. He asked me who i was talking to and i said that their was someone there to speak to him. He looked around but the only person to whom he found was me and his roommate. I had told him that the lady was wearing a red dress with red shoes, a red hat, red earrings, a red purse and red nylons. He thought that i was crazy because he asked me if i was. i told him no i did not then out of the blue The Lady In Red had vanished into thin air. I later on went to the little corner store and i had seen that their was alot of red things in that store. Things that wern't their the night before. This happened when i first woke up around 8:30am on the 4th of October 1993. I believe that this was a ghost because of the fact that no one else say her but me.
From: Jessica (girlygirl92486@aol.com)
Story type: Ghost
Location: Michigan
Source: Form Submission
http://www.wirenot.net/X/Stories/Ghost/Ghost_L-M/lady_in_red.shtml
I was sleeping in the home of my father, when the door bell rang and it was a lady. She did not speak of any such nature of what her name was or anything like that. All she did was simply ask for my fathers name. I told her that it was Raymond. As soon as i said his name he woke up. He asked me who i was talking to and i said that their was someone there to speak to him. He looked around but the only person to whom he found was me and his roommate. I had told him that the lady was wearing a red dress with red shoes, a red hat, red earrings, a red purse and red nylons. He thought that i was crazy because he asked me if i was. i told him no i did not then out of the blue The Lady In Red had vanished into thin air. I later on went to the little corner store and i had seen that their was alot of red things in that store. Things that wern't their the night before. This happened when i first woke up around 8:30am on the 4th of October 1993. I believe that this was a ghost because of the fact that no one else say her but me.
Red Lady Of Huntingdon College................Posted by Two Spirit
Author: 47296 Category
Hauntings) Created8/20/2005 6:34:00 PM)
This post has been Viewed (5347 times)
The ghost of The Red Lady still roams the corridors of Pratt Hall! She can sometimes be seen in the front window of the 90-year-old building!
The ghost was a former student named Martha who had lived a sorrowful life which came to a tragic end in her room on the fourth floor of Pratt Hall, where the sorority chapter rooms are currently located. Martha was from New York, and she came to Huntingdon because her father's will specified that his daughter must attend her grandmother's-his mother's-alma mater. This alma mater had been Huntingdon when it was located in Tuskegee. Martha did not especially want to come to Alabama, but her father's fortune was large and she knew his deep love for his home state of Alabama. So, although knowing no one in this area, Martha reluctantly came to Huntingdon. She was dressed in red when she arrived, and she brought with her red draperies for her windows and a red spread for her bed as well as other accessories of the same color. From the beginning she refused to explain her apparent obsession with the color red to the other girls.
Being a stranger and shy as well as unhappy in her unfamiliar surroundings, she could not make friends among the students. They sensed that she was different from them and having heard she was wealthy, they mistook her shyness for disdain.
Martha sat alone and apart from them in the dining hall. She seldom spoke to her roommate, and when the girls dropped in to visit she seemed so cold and unfriendly they stopped coming. Truthfully, many of them had come out of curiosity to see the red prayer rug Martha had bought in Turkey and the odd little red figurines on her bookshelves.
Her roommate found the situation unbearable and asked the housemother if she could move out. The housemother granted this request and put someone else in the room with Martha, who became increasingly aloof and irritable. This second girl also left her after only a week.
This procedure happened again and again as one roommate after another found it impossible to live with the surly girl. At last the president of the dormitory, who was known for her ability to get along with everybody, moved in with Martha and did everything she could to make friends with her, but all efforts were futile. Martha had become embittered as well as withdrawn, and she seemed to resent the presence of this kindhearted girl.
After all her efforts at friendship had failed and after she found herself growing depressed and despondent, the dormitory president packed her belongings and prepared to leave. Just as she was about to go, Martha, who had not known of her imminent departure, returned to the room. With a look of defiance she said, "So you couldn't stand me either - like all the rest of your stuck up friends. I was beginning to think you really wanted me to be your friend but you hate me just like the rest. Well, I'm glad to be rid of you! Take your things and go! But I'll tell you one thing, my dear: for the rest of your life you'll regret leaving this room." The house president was disturbed by this bitter outburst but in the midst of her many activities she soon forgot about Martha's prophetic words.
The sad girl, abandoned by the person she believed to be her only friend, formed the habit of wandering into the rooms where the other girls were congregating, but her presence cast a chill upon the groups and they would soon find flimsy excuses for leaving her alone. Then, with a feeling of alienation from all humankind, she would return to her solitary sleeping quarters, where she would wrap herself in her red bedspread and retreat from the whole world.
Later, her behavior became even more strange. She would wait until the lights were out and then she would visit one dormitory after another, never saying a word but staring into space as if she were in a trance. As time passed, she took to walking up and down the halls during the darkest hours of the night. Often she would alarm the girls by opening and closing their doors, then hurrying away to resume her pitiful promenade.
One evening after Martha had not appeared for classes or meals all day, her former roommate, the dormitory president, had a guilty feeling and decided to go see her, thinking that this time she might be able to help Martha in some way. As she neared Martha's room at an isolated corridor at the top floor of the building, she noticed the first of the now famous flashes of red shooting out into the corridor, down from the room's transom as so many have since seen. She opened the door and screamed. Girls from all over the fourth floor of Pratt rushed from their rooms to see what was wrong.
They found the dormitory president lying in a faint within the doorway of Martha's room. Not more than three feet beyond her lay Martha, dressed in her red robe and draped in her red bedspread, with blood around her on the floor. Martha had carried out her threat by slashing her wrists and bleeding to death.
This happened a long time ago, but students at Huntingdon say that on the date of Martha's suicide each year rays of crimson light flash down from the transom of her room, and the Red Lady in her bizarre clothing returns to haunt the corridors of Pratt Hall.
http://www.unsolvedmysteries.com/usm428078.html?t=Hauntings
Author: 47296 Category
Hauntings) Created8/20/2005 6:34:00 PM)This post has been Viewed (5347 times)
The ghost of The Red Lady still roams the corridors of Pratt Hall! She can sometimes be seen in the front window of the 90-year-old building!
The ghost was a former student named Martha who had lived a sorrowful life which came to a tragic end in her room on the fourth floor of Pratt Hall, where the sorority chapter rooms are currently located. Martha was from New York, and she came to Huntingdon because her father's will specified that his daughter must attend her grandmother's-his mother's-alma mater. This alma mater had been Huntingdon when it was located in Tuskegee. Martha did not especially want to come to Alabama, but her father's fortune was large and she knew his deep love for his home state of Alabama. So, although knowing no one in this area, Martha reluctantly came to Huntingdon. She was dressed in red when she arrived, and she brought with her red draperies for her windows and a red spread for her bed as well as other accessories of the same color. From the beginning she refused to explain her apparent obsession with the color red to the other girls.
Being a stranger and shy as well as unhappy in her unfamiliar surroundings, she could not make friends among the students. They sensed that she was different from them and having heard she was wealthy, they mistook her shyness for disdain.
Martha sat alone and apart from them in the dining hall. She seldom spoke to her roommate, and when the girls dropped in to visit she seemed so cold and unfriendly they stopped coming. Truthfully, many of them had come out of curiosity to see the red prayer rug Martha had bought in Turkey and the odd little red figurines on her bookshelves.
Her roommate found the situation unbearable and asked the housemother if she could move out. The housemother granted this request and put someone else in the room with Martha, who became increasingly aloof and irritable. This second girl also left her after only a week.
This procedure happened again and again as one roommate after another found it impossible to live with the surly girl. At last the president of the dormitory, who was known for her ability to get along with everybody, moved in with Martha and did everything she could to make friends with her, but all efforts were futile. Martha had become embittered as well as withdrawn, and she seemed to resent the presence of this kindhearted girl.
After all her efforts at friendship had failed and after she found herself growing depressed and despondent, the dormitory president packed her belongings and prepared to leave. Just as she was about to go, Martha, who had not known of her imminent departure, returned to the room. With a look of defiance she said, "So you couldn't stand me either - like all the rest of your stuck up friends. I was beginning to think you really wanted me to be your friend but you hate me just like the rest. Well, I'm glad to be rid of you! Take your things and go! But I'll tell you one thing, my dear: for the rest of your life you'll regret leaving this room." The house president was disturbed by this bitter outburst but in the midst of her many activities she soon forgot about Martha's prophetic words.
The sad girl, abandoned by the person she believed to be her only friend, formed the habit of wandering into the rooms where the other girls were congregating, but her presence cast a chill upon the groups and they would soon find flimsy excuses for leaving her alone. Then, with a feeling of alienation from all humankind, she would return to her solitary sleeping quarters, where she would wrap herself in her red bedspread and retreat from the whole world.
Later, her behavior became even more strange. She would wait until the lights were out and then she would visit one dormitory after another, never saying a word but staring into space as if she were in a trance. As time passed, she took to walking up and down the halls during the darkest hours of the night. Often she would alarm the girls by opening and closing their doors, then hurrying away to resume her pitiful promenade.
One evening after Martha had not appeared for classes or meals all day, her former roommate, the dormitory president, had a guilty feeling and decided to go see her, thinking that this time she might be able to help Martha in some way. As she neared Martha's room at an isolated corridor at the top floor of the building, she noticed the first of the now famous flashes of red shooting out into the corridor, down from the room's transom as so many have since seen. She opened the door and screamed. Girls from all over the fourth floor of Pratt rushed from their rooms to see what was wrong.
They found the dormitory president lying in a faint within the doorway of Martha's room. Not more than three feet beyond her lay Martha, dressed in her red robe and draped in her red bedspread, with blood around her on the floor. Martha had carried out her threat by slashing her wrists and bleeding to death.
This happened a long time ago, but students at Huntingdon say that on the date of Martha's suicide each year rays of crimson light flash down from the transom of her room, and the Red Lady in her bizarre clothing returns to haunt the corridors of Pratt Hall.
http://www.unsolvedmysteries.com/usm428078.html?t=Hauntings
Haunted Halls
Libby Tucker
When I was a graduate student at Indiana University, I became acquainted with BarBara Lee, an exorcist who was one of Linda Degh's most interesting informants (Degh 2001: 274-290). Having received a telephone call from a student in Eigenmann Hall about a possible haunting, BarBara asked if she could walk through the building with me.
Eigenmann was the residence hall where I lived and worked as a Resident Assistant. I had dealt with many complaints – loud music, insensitive roommates, and burnt-out light bulbs – but I had never been asked to help find a ghost before.
BarBara led me to the fourteenth floor, where she suddenly cried out and pressed her back against the wall. "There's a student here!" she told me. "He jumped out of his window, and he wants to push me out the window too!" Pointing to a nearby door, she said, "There's a funeral wreath hanging there. This is his room." While a few passersby and I watched, she spoke directly to the deceased student, saying, "Let's send you to heaven. You don't want to be earthbound. Let's send you there, okay?"
This was my introduction to the phenomenon of haunted residence halls, which has become well enough known to merit many entries in Dennis Hauck's Haunted Places: The National Directory (1994). Mason Winfield, a collector of New York folklore and author of Spirits of the Great Hill, says that theaters and college campuses are among the most common haunted places. According to Winfield, "it seems as if every college campus anywhere has one alleged haunt" (2001:54). Simon Bronner's Piled Higher and Deeper: The Folklore of Student Life includes sections on suicidal ghosts, resident ghosts, lovers' ghosts, and Greek ghosts (1995:148-156). Campus ghost stories can be found in folklore archives, in folklore journals, in books, and on the Internet. Of all of these sources, the Internet is the most readily accessible, although some texts found on the Internet may lack credibility and offer little or no informant data.
During my twenty-five years of teaching at Binghamton University, I have collected many ghost stories from students. Some of the stories are legends, but most are personal experience stories. Almost without exception, the student narrators have been passionately interested in their encounters with the paranormal. Many of them have chosen ghost stories as the subject of their end-of-term projects. On other campuses as well, excitement about meeting ghosts seems to be very common.
Why are campus ghost stories so popular? Some students have told me that they like the excitement of discovering ghosts in their own residence halls and other campus buildings. There are, of course, many horror movies about hauntings. Ever since The Exorcist came out in 1973, stories of spirit possession have captured the popular imagination. (Before 1973, BarBara Lee called her exorcisms "de-possessions"). New York State residents have been fascinated for more than two decades by The Amityville Horror (1979). Even though the exterior of the haunted house in Amityville has been remodeled, teenagers still drive past the house to look for ghosts. Other towns have their own haunted places – houses, cemeteries, schools – that teenagers like to visit. Some students have become expert at investigating haunted places by the time they arrive at the college of their choice.
The tellers of many ghost stories are freshmen and sophomores, relative newcomers to the halls of academe. These students, busy adjusting to the pressures of college life, are in a liminal state: between adolescence and adulthood, they seek completion of the college degree that will give them safe passage to future success. In some ways, the early years of college provide an initiatory experience similar to the three-part initiation that Victor Turner describes in his classic The Forest of Symbols: a going-in, a seclusion period with age-mates, and a coming-out, upon which the initiate is recognized as having gained higher status (1967:13).
On their first day of college, students arriving at their new residence halls must say goodbye to their parents and siblings. Assembling all the essentials of daily life – televisions, microwave ovens, computer – they must learn a new way of life in which people close to their own age serve as educators. Roommates, suitemates, and floormates are important companions, but the most influential advisor on many college campuses is the Resident Assistant. Armed with useful information, ready to offer guidance and referrals to experts, the RA helps the initiate become accustomed to college life. Four or five years after the residence hall's opening day, those students who entered as freshmen will walk across a stage to receive their college diplomas. Once they have completed the ritual of Commencement, they will begin their new lives as adults. The cycle of initiation will have come full-circle.
In some respects, the first two years of college offer an experience similar to what children go through during pre-adolescence. As I found while doing the fieldwork for my dissertation, "Tradition and Creativity in the Storytelling of Pre-Adolescent Girls" (1977), pre-adolescents often enjoy taking risks, pushing back the boundaries of the comfortable and secure to experiment with things that seem dangerous and frightening. At slumber parties and on camp-outs, the pre-adolescent girls with whom I did my dissertation research enjoyed telling scary stories, "calling back" spirits and monsters, and playing Truth or Dare. They reveled in eating junk food and staying up as late as they could, breaking many of the rules their parents usually set for them.
For new college students, the residence hall offers a setting very similar to the pre-adolescent slumber party. There are no parents to insist upon an early bedtime; the vending machines are full of candy and soda, and nearby pizza places offer late-night delivery. Free to entertain themselves once their studying is done, students may choose to watch movies on TV, play computer games, or surf the Internet together. Sometimes Ouija boards come out from under beds and spirits are summoned or ghost stories are told. Most students' encounters with ghosts take place after midnight, during moments of solitude. Late at night, the residence hall becomes a place where brushes with the supernatural are anticipated, even welcomed.
To understand the ease with which students often welcome the supernatural, it is helpful to consider some insights offered by Barbara Walker in the introduction to her book Out of the Ordinary: Folklore of the Supernatural. Walker explains that "we live in an imprecise and ambiguous world, which in its inexactitude allows for the awesome, the inexplicable, the wondrous" (1995:1). In a statement that seems especially relevant to college students, she says, "There is a leap of faith necessary whenever we adhere to any system of thought, whether it means relying on pi or some other unknown." For some people – college students among them – the supernatural becomes a "natural part of life" that influences attitudes and behaviors (1995:2).
Americans visiting colleges in Great Britain may find that ghosts are taken for granted. When I traveled through England and Scotland with my family in 1998, every bed and breakfast establishment where we stayed had a reputation for being haunted. In Oxford, where we stayed in an old building near Magdalen College, a newspaper article about the resident White Lady was posted beside the bathroom door. Walking through the more scenic colleges, we discovered that the ghost of Merton College was Colonel Francis Winderbank, shot in 1645 after surrendering to Oliver Cromwell. Archbishop William Laud was known for kicking his head around the library of St. John's College; the face of Dean Liddell appeared on a wall of Christchurch Cathedral, and a secret tunnel connecting The Chequers and The Mitre contained ghosts of monks who had died there and had been making scratching noises ever since. All of these ghosts are described in detail on a Web page from the Oxford Student (http://www.oxfordstudent.com/2000-11-09/features/3). Considering how highly the British value their resident ghosts, it is not surprising that J.K. Rowling made Nearly Headless Nick, Peaves the Poltergeist, and other ghosts of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry prominent characters in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (1997).
In the United States, the older the campus, the greater the likelihood is that a ghost will be on the prowl. Harvard's Thayer Hall was once a textile mill; its ghosts are said to wear Victorian clothing and to enter or leave through doors that no longer exist. At Yale, a spectral organist in Woolsey Hall plays music that has been heard by both students and staff members (http://www.hollowhill.com/colleges/Nelist.htm). At Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, students claim acquaintance with Helen, who died in the influenza epidemic of 1918. Students at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa have reported moans from the ghost of the only female graduate of the university who died in World War I (http://www.theshadowlands.net/places/iowa.htm). At Gettysburg College, ghosts of Civil War soldiers get credit for knocking posters off walls and appearing in residence hall rooms. On ghost walks, popular tourist attractions in Gettysburg, listeners learn that ghosts have a particular fondness for the college's buildings.
At many American colleges, ghosts are associated with suicide. Sather Tower at the University of California at Berkeley is said to be haunted by the ghost of a student who leaped to his death from the tower in the 1960s. In the late 1960s, a photographer took a picture of a ghostly hand on the grass near the tower (Hauck 32). A story from Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa tells of the ghost of a woman in the late 1800s who fell down three flights of stairs in College Hall, broke her neck, and died instantly (http://www.theshadowlands.net/places/iowa.htm). At Huntington College in Montgomery, Alabama, the ghost of the Red Lady haunts her former room in Pratt Hall; known for her obsession with the color red, this student was found in her room dressed in her red robe, underneath a red blanket, covered with bright red blood from her slashed wrists (Hauck 1994:7). As Simon Bronner notes in Piled Higher and Deeper, students stories tell of many more suicidal women than suicidal men: if there's a pattern to the finger-pointing stories, it's that the revenants were vulnerable young women meeting a tragic end, often by their own hands (1995:151). College is not just an extended slumber party, a time for amusements and discoveries; it is also a stressful initiatory period when students must prove that they can succeed. Telling stories of suicidal students points out the danger of self-destruction; it also differentiates storytellers from victims. Further collection and analysis of college ghost stories may help to explain why so many victims of suicide in the narratives are women.
Ghosts of college residence halls tend to haunt certain spaces: bathrooms, hallways, elevators, stairwells, and basements. None of these spaces are occupied for long periods of time. People go down the halls, up and down the stairs and elevators. They make brief visits to the basement and go to the bathroom when nature calls. In children's ghost stories, bathrooms and basements are prominently featured; college students also look for ghosts in those sporadically inhabited places (Tucker 1980). One particularly vivid bathroom ghost story from Churchill Hall at Southern Oregon State College tells of a freshman who "caught sight of motion from the corner of his eye in the mirror next to him. The door of one of the stalls started to swing back and forth; dust swirled; water fell with "drop-drop-drop" sound effects, and a puddle of water accumulated on the floor. Perplexed by this experience, the freshman went back to the bathroom later on, bringing a Twix bar for the ghost (http://www.pinn.net/~royaloak/stories/bathroom.htm).
In the late 1990s I collected a story of a bathroom ghost from Kathryn, a student of mine at Binghamton University. Kathryn told me that she had stayed overnight in O'Connor Hall when she was visiting Binghamton as a high school senior, trying to decide where she would go to college. Paying a visit to the bathroom in the basement late at night, she discovered a little girl with long hair and a pale face. "What are you doing here?" she asked the little girl. The little girl did not reply. Later, Kathryn discovered that no children had been in the building that night. "I decided to come to Binghamton in spite of that," she told me with a smile. Before matriculating at the university, she had passed her first test: a test of courage.
Sometimes bathroom ghosts appear in off-campus apartments. Lydia Fish recently told me about a haunted shower stall that troubled two female students at Buffalo State College in the early 1970s:
They'd wake up in the middle of the night and the showers would be on full-blast. Because of the way it was constructed, the shower stall would overflow, and the landlord would be very cross about this. The first time, the grls were willing to believe that one of them had done it. They decided, "We have a sleepwalker!"
They tied their thumbs together to see if one of them got up, but neither of them did, so they decided the shower stall was haunted. I think you cold describe this as a poltergeist. The girl's Italian grandmother came in with charms and did an exorcism. They weren't having trouble any more when I talked to her. I think the movie The Exorcist had something to do with this.
This story shows how water that resists human control can be interpreted as the presence of a ghost. I have collected several other stories in which gushes of water from faucets or shower heads signal a ghost's mischief, and I hope to collect more.
Bathroom ghost stories were common in ancient Greece. Plutarch's Cimon tells of the haunted bathhouse at Chaeronea, where a bandit had been murdered; visitors to the bathhouse heard groans and viewed terrifying apparitions (Felton 1999:36-37). According to the classicist Campbell Bonner, the belief that demons haunted baths was widespread in ancient Greece and continued to flourish in Egypt through medieval and modern times (1932: 203, 207-8). In ancient Greece, some spirits were identified as revenants, others as divine or semi-divine apparitions or demons. The prevalence of both friendly and threatening figures at rivers and other places with flowing water helps to explain the connection between baths and ghosts.
In Asia, bathroom ghosts are notorious. Sally, a student of mine in the mid-1990s who grew up in Korea, was terrified of going to the toilet when she was a child, because she had heard stories about a ghost there:
People would say, "Well, there is a hand that will come out of that pit and ask you whether you want a white tissue, a red tissue or a yellow tissue. They said you had to pick a bright one – otherwise, it would take you down to the pit, and you'd die.
Some children died in bathrooms in Korea before the advent of modern plumbing; the footholds were perilous for small feet. Stories told of young unmarried women who committed suicide in bathrooms. For women and children, the bathroom represented peril and uncertainty.
J.K. Rowling includes a bathroom ghost, Moaning Myrtle, in her second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (1999). Harry, Hermione, and Ron discover that a small, serpent-shaped engraving on a faucet opens the passageway to a mysterious underground chamber beneath the girls' bathroom. Inside the chamber, the Basilisk offers a dangerous but thrilling challenge. For Harry and his friends, entering the Chamber of Secrets requires courage, but talking to Moaning Myrtle is easy; she is a familiar member of the Hogwarts community. Similarly, college students often learn to recognize ghosts as relatively harmless figures that offer important tests of bravery and skill.
In the spring of 2001, I took the members of my introductory folklore class to the sub-basement of O'Connor Hall, where, according to campus legendry, a ghost had revealed itself three years before. Reaching up to clean a light fixture, Alice, one of the residence hall's janitors, had suddenly felt chilled and fainted, falling off her stool. After she regained consciousness, she claimed that a ghost had caused her fall and refused to clean the sub-basement again. Students who had heard this story began to tell of encounters of their own, and a complex cycle of local legends and personal experience stories developed. Visiting the site of Alice's fall with my students, I told them a few of the stories.
As we stood in the sub-basement, we noticed that a chilly breeze was blowing toward us from a locked door marked "DANGER," and loud noises were coming from the space behind it. Although these loud noises seemed to be part of the building's heating system, the combination of noises and a breeze intrigued the students.
Late that night, without my knowledge, some of the students went back to the basement with a flashlight and chisel, determined to open the door marked "DANGER" and discover the origin of the ghost. Fortunately, they did not succeed in opening the door. I learned about their expedition in a paper written by one of the students.
While residence halls are some of the most popular sites of campus hauntings, other buildings also harbor ghosts: chapels, libraries, administration buildings, theaters, and others. Campus theater lore is especially rich and varied. Rockwell Hall at Buffalo State College contains a theater that was sealed off for a long period of time; during those years, legends of spectral sounds and lights circulated on the Buffalo State campus. One student collector wrote, "In many theatres there is a thing known as "The Spirit of the Theatre" which dwells in the building. It brings good luck to any show that plays there. To keep the spirit from leaving you have to leave at least one light on that casts light on the stage" (Drexelius 1973).
This spirit of the theater resembles spirits of sacred places in ancient Greece.
By practicing certain restrictions – never wearing green or yellow, never looking into mirrors over anyone else's shoulder, always saying "Break a leg" rather than "Good luck" – students and other actors pacify the spirit of the theater, ensuring good luck for their performances.
This is just a brief sampling of the treasure trove of campus ghostlore. I am working on enlarging my collection of campus ghost stories and would be grateful for contributions. My e-mail address is ltucker@binghamton.edu. Thanks very much.
http://faculty.buffalostate.edu/fishlm/articles/tucker.htm
Libby Tucker
When I was a graduate student at Indiana University, I became acquainted with BarBara Lee, an exorcist who was one of Linda Degh's most interesting informants (Degh 2001: 274-290). Having received a telephone call from a student in Eigenmann Hall about a possible haunting, BarBara asked if she could walk through the building with me.
Eigenmann was the residence hall where I lived and worked as a Resident Assistant. I had dealt with many complaints – loud music, insensitive roommates, and burnt-out light bulbs – but I had never been asked to help find a ghost before.
BarBara led me to the fourteenth floor, where she suddenly cried out and pressed her back against the wall. "There's a student here!" she told me. "He jumped out of his window, and he wants to push me out the window too!" Pointing to a nearby door, she said, "There's a funeral wreath hanging there. This is his room." While a few passersby and I watched, she spoke directly to the deceased student, saying, "Let's send you to heaven. You don't want to be earthbound. Let's send you there, okay?"
This was my introduction to the phenomenon of haunted residence halls, which has become well enough known to merit many entries in Dennis Hauck's Haunted Places: The National Directory (1994). Mason Winfield, a collector of New York folklore and author of Spirits of the Great Hill, says that theaters and college campuses are among the most common haunted places. According to Winfield, "it seems as if every college campus anywhere has one alleged haunt" (2001:54). Simon Bronner's Piled Higher and Deeper: The Folklore of Student Life includes sections on suicidal ghosts, resident ghosts, lovers' ghosts, and Greek ghosts (1995:148-156). Campus ghost stories can be found in folklore archives, in folklore journals, in books, and on the Internet. Of all of these sources, the Internet is the most readily accessible, although some texts found on the Internet may lack credibility and offer little or no informant data.
During my twenty-five years of teaching at Binghamton University, I have collected many ghost stories from students. Some of the stories are legends, but most are personal experience stories. Almost without exception, the student narrators have been passionately interested in their encounters with the paranormal. Many of them have chosen ghost stories as the subject of their end-of-term projects. On other campuses as well, excitement about meeting ghosts seems to be very common.
Why are campus ghost stories so popular? Some students have told me that they like the excitement of discovering ghosts in their own residence halls and other campus buildings. There are, of course, many horror movies about hauntings. Ever since The Exorcist came out in 1973, stories of spirit possession have captured the popular imagination. (Before 1973, BarBara Lee called her exorcisms "de-possessions"). New York State residents have been fascinated for more than two decades by The Amityville Horror (1979). Even though the exterior of the haunted house in Amityville has been remodeled, teenagers still drive past the house to look for ghosts. Other towns have their own haunted places – houses, cemeteries, schools – that teenagers like to visit. Some students have become expert at investigating haunted places by the time they arrive at the college of their choice.
The tellers of many ghost stories are freshmen and sophomores, relative newcomers to the halls of academe. These students, busy adjusting to the pressures of college life, are in a liminal state: between adolescence and adulthood, they seek completion of the college degree that will give them safe passage to future success. In some ways, the early years of college provide an initiatory experience similar to the three-part initiation that Victor Turner describes in his classic The Forest of Symbols: a going-in, a seclusion period with age-mates, and a coming-out, upon which the initiate is recognized as having gained higher status (1967:13).
On their first day of college, students arriving at their new residence halls must say goodbye to their parents and siblings. Assembling all the essentials of daily life – televisions, microwave ovens, computer – they must learn a new way of life in which people close to their own age serve as educators. Roommates, suitemates, and floormates are important companions, but the most influential advisor on many college campuses is the Resident Assistant. Armed with useful information, ready to offer guidance and referrals to experts, the RA helps the initiate become accustomed to college life. Four or five years after the residence hall's opening day, those students who entered as freshmen will walk across a stage to receive their college diplomas. Once they have completed the ritual of Commencement, they will begin their new lives as adults. The cycle of initiation will have come full-circle.
In some respects, the first two years of college offer an experience similar to what children go through during pre-adolescence. As I found while doing the fieldwork for my dissertation, "Tradition and Creativity in the Storytelling of Pre-Adolescent Girls" (1977), pre-adolescents often enjoy taking risks, pushing back the boundaries of the comfortable and secure to experiment with things that seem dangerous and frightening. At slumber parties and on camp-outs, the pre-adolescent girls with whom I did my dissertation research enjoyed telling scary stories, "calling back" spirits and monsters, and playing Truth or Dare. They reveled in eating junk food and staying up as late as they could, breaking many of the rules their parents usually set for them.
For new college students, the residence hall offers a setting very similar to the pre-adolescent slumber party. There are no parents to insist upon an early bedtime; the vending machines are full of candy and soda, and nearby pizza places offer late-night delivery. Free to entertain themselves once their studying is done, students may choose to watch movies on TV, play computer games, or surf the Internet together. Sometimes Ouija boards come out from under beds and spirits are summoned or ghost stories are told. Most students' encounters with ghosts take place after midnight, during moments of solitude. Late at night, the residence hall becomes a place where brushes with the supernatural are anticipated, even welcomed.
To understand the ease with which students often welcome the supernatural, it is helpful to consider some insights offered by Barbara Walker in the introduction to her book Out of the Ordinary: Folklore of the Supernatural. Walker explains that "we live in an imprecise and ambiguous world, which in its inexactitude allows for the awesome, the inexplicable, the wondrous" (1995:1). In a statement that seems especially relevant to college students, she says, "There is a leap of faith necessary whenever we adhere to any system of thought, whether it means relying on pi or some other unknown." For some people – college students among them – the supernatural becomes a "natural part of life" that influences attitudes and behaviors (1995:2).
Americans visiting colleges in Great Britain may find that ghosts are taken for granted. When I traveled through England and Scotland with my family in 1998, every bed and breakfast establishment where we stayed had a reputation for being haunted. In Oxford, where we stayed in an old building near Magdalen College, a newspaper article about the resident White Lady was posted beside the bathroom door. Walking through the more scenic colleges, we discovered that the ghost of Merton College was Colonel Francis Winderbank, shot in 1645 after surrendering to Oliver Cromwell. Archbishop William Laud was known for kicking his head around the library of St. John's College; the face of Dean Liddell appeared on a wall of Christchurch Cathedral, and a secret tunnel connecting The Chequers and The Mitre contained ghosts of monks who had died there and had been making scratching noises ever since. All of these ghosts are described in detail on a Web page from the Oxford Student (http://www.oxfordstudent.com/2000-11-09/features/3). Considering how highly the British value their resident ghosts, it is not surprising that J.K. Rowling made Nearly Headless Nick, Peaves the Poltergeist, and other ghosts of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry prominent characters in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (1997).
In the United States, the older the campus, the greater the likelihood is that a ghost will be on the prowl. Harvard's Thayer Hall was once a textile mill; its ghosts are said to wear Victorian clothing and to enter or leave through doors that no longer exist. At Yale, a spectral organist in Woolsey Hall plays music that has been heard by both students and staff members (http://www.hollowhill.com/colleges/Nelist.htm). At Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, students claim acquaintance with Helen, who died in the influenza epidemic of 1918. Students at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa have reported moans from the ghost of the only female graduate of the university who died in World War I (http://www.theshadowlands.net/places/iowa.htm). At Gettysburg College, ghosts of Civil War soldiers get credit for knocking posters off walls and appearing in residence hall rooms. On ghost walks, popular tourist attractions in Gettysburg, listeners learn that ghosts have a particular fondness for the college's buildings.
At many American colleges, ghosts are associated with suicide. Sather Tower at the University of California at Berkeley is said to be haunted by the ghost of a student who leaped to his death from the tower in the 1960s. In the late 1960s, a photographer took a picture of a ghostly hand on the grass near the tower (Hauck 32). A story from Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa tells of the ghost of a woman in the late 1800s who fell down three flights of stairs in College Hall, broke her neck, and died instantly (http://www.theshadowlands.net/places/iowa.htm). At Huntington College in Montgomery, Alabama, the ghost of the Red Lady haunts her former room in Pratt Hall; known for her obsession with the color red, this student was found in her room dressed in her red robe, underneath a red blanket, covered with bright red blood from her slashed wrists (Hauck 1994:7). As Simon Bronner notes in Piled Higher and Deeper, students stories tell of many more suicidal women than suicidal men: if there's a pattern to the finger-pointing stories, it's that the revenants were vulnerable young women meeting a tragic end, often by their own hands (1995:151). College is not just an extended slumber party, a time for amusements and discoveries; it is also a stressful initiatory period when students must prove that they can succeed. Telling stories of suicidal students points out the danger of self-destruction; it also differentiates storytellers from victims. Further collection and analysis of college ghost stories may help to explain why so many victims of suicide in the narratives are women.
Ghosts of college residence halls tend to haunt certain spaces: bathrooms, hallways, elevators, stairwells, and basements. None of these spaces are occupied for long periods of time. People go down the halls, up and down the stairs and elevators. They make brief visits to the basement and go to the bathroom when nature calls. In children's ghost stories, bathrooms and basements are prominently featured; college students also look for ghosts in those sporadically inhabited places (Tucker 1980). One particularly vivid bathroom ghost story from Churchill Hall at Southern Oregon State College tells of a freshman who "caught sight of motion from the corner of his eye in the mirror next to him. The door of one of the stalls started to swing back and forth; dust swirled; water fell with "drop-drop-drop" sound effects, and a puddle of water accumulated on the floor. Perplexed by this experience, the freshman went back to the bathroom later on, bringing a Twix bar for the ghost (http://www.pinn.net/~royaloak/stories/bathroom.htm).
In the late 1990s I collected a story of a bathroom ghost from Kathryn, a student of mine at Binghamton University. Kathryn told me that she had stayed overnight in O'Connor Hall when she was visiting Binghamton as a high school senior, trying to decide where she would go to college. Paying a visit to the bathroom in the basement late at night, she discovered a little girl with long hair and a pale face. "What are you doing here?" she asked the little girl. The little girl did not reply. Later, Kathryn discovered that no children had been in the building that night. "I decided to come to Binghamton in spite of that," she told me with a smile. Before matriculating at the university, she had passed her first test: a test of courage.
Sometimes bathroom ghosts appear in off-campus apartments. Lydia Fish recently told me about a haunted shower stall that troubled two female students at Buffalo State College in the early 1970s:
They'd wake up in the middle of the night and the showers would be on full-blast. Because of the way it was constructed, the shower stall would overflow, and the landlord would be very cross about this. The first time, the grls were willing to believe that one of them had done it. They decided, "We have a sleepwalker!"
They tied their thumbs together to see if one of them got up, but neither of them did, so they decided the shower stall was haunted. I think you cold describe this as a poltergeist. The girl's Italian grandmother came in with charms and did an exorcism. They weren't having trouble any more when I talked to her. I think the movie The Exorcist had something to do with this.
This story shows how water that resists human control can be interpreted as the presence of a ghost. I have collected several other stories in which gushes of water from faucets or shower heads signal a ghost's mischief, and I hope to collect more.
Bathroom ghost stories were common in ancient Greece. Plutarch's Cimon tells of the haunted bathhouse at Chaeronea, where a bandit had been murdered; visitors to the bathhouse heard groans and viewed terrifying apparitions (Felton 1999:36-37). According to the classicist Campbell Bonner, the belief that demons haunted baths was widespread in ancient Greece and continued to flourish in Egypt through medieval and modern times (1932: 203, 207-8). In ancient Greece, some spirits were identified as revenants, others as divine or semi-divine apparitions or demons. The prevalence of both friendly and threatening figures at rivers and other places with flowing water helps to explain the connection between baths and ghosts.
In Asia, bathroom ghosts are notorious. Sally, a student of mine in the mid-1990s who grew up in Korea, was terrified of going to the toilet when she was a child, because she had heard stories about a ghost there:
People would say, "Well, there is a hand that will come out of that pit and ask you whether you want a white tissue, a red tissue or a yellow tissue. They said you had to pick a bright one – otherwise, it would take you down to the pit, and you'd die.
Some children died in bathrooms in Korea before the advent of modern plumbing; the footholds were perilous for small feet. Stories told of young unmarried women who committed suicide in bathrooms. For women and children, the bathroom represented peril and uncertainty.
J.K. Rowling includes a bathroom ghost, Moaning Myrtle, in her second book, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (1999). Harry, Hermione, and Ron discover that a small, serpent-shaped engraving on a faucet opens the passageway to a mysterious underground chamber beneath the girls' bathroom. Inside the chamber, the Basilisk offers a dangerous but thrilling challenge. For Harry and his friends, entering the Chamber of Secrets requires courage, but talking to Moaning Myrtle is easy; she is a familiar member of the Hogwarts community. Similarly, college students often learn to recognize ghosts as relatively harmless figures that offer important tests of bravery and skill.
In the spring of 2001, I took the members of my introductory folklore class to the sub-basement of O'Connor Hall, where, according to campus legendry, a ghost had revealed itself three years before. Reaching up to clean a light fixture, Alice, one of the residence hall's janitors, had suddenly felt chilled and fainted, falling off her stool. After she regained consciousness, she claimed that a ghost had caused her fall and refused to clean the sub-basement again. Students who had heard this story began to tell of encounters of their own, and a complex cycle of local legends and personal experience stories developed. Visiting the site of Alice's fall with my students, I told them a few of the stories.
As we stood in the sub-basement, we noticed that a chilly breeze was blowing toward us from a locked door marked "DANGER," and loud noises were coming from the space behind it. Although these loud noises seemed to be part of the building's heating system, the combination of noises and a breeze intrigued the students.
Late that night, without my knowledge, some of the students went back to the basement with a flashlight and chisel, determined to open the door marked "DANGER" and discover the origin of the ghost. Fortunately, they did not succeed in opening the door. I learned about their expedition in a paper written by one of the students.
While residence halls are some of the most popular sites of campus hauntings, other buildings also harbor ghosts: chapels, libraries, administration buildings, theaters, and others. Campus theater lore is especially rich and varied. Rockwell Hall at Buffalo State College contains a theater that was sealed off for a long period of time; during those years, legends of spectral sounds and lights circulated on the Buffalo State campus. One student collector wrote, "In many theatres there is a thing known as "The Spirit of the Theatre" which dwells in the building. It brings good luck to any show that plays there. To keep the spirit from leaving you have to leave at least one light on that casts light on the stage" (Drexelius 1973).
This spirit of the theater resembles spirits of sacred places in ancient Greece.
By practicing certain restrictions – never wearing green or yellow, never looking into mirrors over anyone else's shoulder, always saying "Break a leg" rather than "Good luck" – students and other actors pacify the spirit of the theater, ensuring good luck for their performances.
This is just a brief sampling of the treasure trove of campus ghostlore. I am working on enlarging my collection of campus ghost stories and would be grateful for contributions. My e-mail address is ltucker@binghamton.edu. Thanks very much.
http://faculty.buffalostate.edu/fishlm/articles/tucker.htm
plantman
Veteran Member
Brings back memories...a lot of times, depending on the person, at least in my family, there are complaints of seeing way too much of the goings on in the next realm over. My Dad complained of a big tall bald guy with a mean face. He was bed ridden and it really freaked him out. He called my Mom who's family is used to such things...and she told him to go away. He said he's still here, she got real mad and said you go away right now I mean it. My Dad relaxed and evidently the guy went away. Lots of stories like that for him.
My Mom after her stroke and heart attack, about a month later *she was 90 percent blind* and in a nursing home, said that she saw a midget wearing a suit hanging out by the bathroom. We asked her how she could see him, she said, I don't know, but he's just hanging out there. We asked if he was bad and she said no, he just was there for some reason.
Last thing she saw before she went was her Mom.
May all you be similarly blessed and may the parasite spirits that want to trip you up when you go be banished.
My Mom after her stroke and heart attack, about a month later *she was 90 percent blind* and in a nursing home, said that she saw a midget wearing a suit hanging out by the bathroom. We asked her how she could see him, she said, I don't know, but he's just hanging out there. We asked if he was bad and she said no, he just was there for some reason.
Last thing she saw before she went was her Mom.
May all you be similarly blessed and may the parasite spirits that want to trip you up when you go be banished.
Some of these 'visions' may the result of psychotropic drugs, such as Zyprexa. Although banned in Japan for causing diabetes in less than 2 weeks (and there have been large lawsuits), Zyprexia is often given to elderly patients because Medicare/Medicaid will pay for it and Ely Lilly gives perks to the physicians who prescribe it. A physician gave it to my mother, along with about 9 other drugs, after she had hip joint replacement. My mother reported seeing a little girl in the room and she would follow the little girl with her eyes, as I watched. She would then talk to the little girl.
After I demanded to see what drugs they were giving her and we eliminated about 6 - 7 of them, including Zyprexa, the problem ceased, the little girl was gone. (The physician said he gave Zyprexa to all his elderly female patients. That's how Lilly makes billions while they ruin peoples' lives. After the person gets diabetes, Lilly will sell them diabetes drugs.)
After I demanded to see what drugs they were giving her and we eliminated about 6 - 7 of them, including Zyprexa, the problem ceased, the little girl was gone. (The physician said he gave Zyprexa to all his elderly female patients. That's how Lilly makes billions while they ruin peoples' lives. After the person gets diabetes, Lilly will sell them diabetes drugs.)
I am Scottish, Irish, and English. I am familiar with the Irish folklore of the banshee, but I never considered that in this instance because the woman did not wail.
He was not taking any drugs like that. This happened about 25 years ago. I do know that drugs can cause people to see things, but he was not taking anything at that time that would have caused that reaction.
Very interesting, Maher. My father built the house, so there was no history of ghosts in it. The land, however, had an old barn and an outhouse so I would assume there had to have been an old house on it at one time. And there was a particular place on the land that when you walked into that area, there was a very strange sense of quiet and a sense of safeness, so unusual that you wanted to stay, but the strangeness of it made you leave. I never experienced that feeling anywhere else on the land.
BornFree
Came This Far
Red ...1 st chakra...of power
About 3 years ago at the age of 56 I had asked to see my spiritual guides. I was always challanging the Creator for visual aids. One morning before I was completely awake but very conscience two people came into veiw, I could see theie faces (Older than me) but I couldn't see their hands or feet and they had a wispy deep red smokey cloak about them. They told me that they had known me from the beginging of time. Their acceptance was unconditional no matter what I did or who I was at the time....I had a flood of relief, and felt Loved unconditionally knowing we would meet again, also knowing they would always be there.
Red is the first chakra, It represents the power you have over your life and shows up when you have issues in that area. We all do, some just a bit more that others. I wouldn't fear the red dress or cloak. I would take it as a moment to re-look your life and check out your guilts or fears in life, like acceptance that others have of you ( in your own mind ) and fix it...... Breath easy, It's not such a bad thing......
About 3 years ago at the age of 56 I had asked to see my spiritual guides. I was always challanging the Creator for visual aids. One morning before I was completely awake but very conscience two people came into veiw, I could see theie faces (Older than me) but I couldn't see their hands or feet and they had a wispy deep red smokey cloak about them. They told me that they had known me from the beginging of time. Their acceptance was unconditional no matter what I did or who I was at the time....I had a flood of relief, and felt Loved unconditionally knowing we would meet again, also knowing they would always be there.
Red is the first chakra, It represents the power you have over your life and shows up when you have issues in that area. We all do, some just a bit more that others. I wouldn't fear the red dress or cloak. I would take it as a moment to re-look your life and check out your guilts or fears in life, like acceptance that others have of you ( in your own mind ) and fix it...... Breath easy, It's not such a bad thing......
Ambleside, I appreciate your comments, but my belief in my Heavenly Father, his Word and His son Jesus Christ do not allow me to entertain "spiritual guides."
I'm sure you are very sincere in your belief; however, there are evil spirits that can seem bring you all the knowledge you desire, but they didn't create the world and they are dangerous. The One who makes the wind blow, makes a great oak tree grow from a little acorn, makes all animals, makes all people, makes the weather, all from the same elements that he created, and loves me so much that he was willing for his only Son to die for my sins is the only One to guide me. And with Him on my side, whom do I have to fear?
I'm sure you are very sincere in your belief; however, there are evil spirits that can seem bring you all the knowledge you desire, but they didn't create the world and they are dangerous. The One who makes the wind blow, makes a great oak tree grow from a little acorn, makes all animals, makes all people, makes the weather, all from the same elements that he created, and loves me so much that he was willing for his only Son to die for my sins is the only One to guide me. And with Him on my side, whom do I have to fear?
Chair Warmer
Membership Revoked
Why not? Do you believe in angels and that guardian angels may exist? Do you believe some angels can be appointed assignments to oversee people and possibly steer some situations in people's lives toward certains outcomes?
My life has been saved a couple of times by them, literally, and I believe in Jesus Christ too.
I do understand concern over putting more faith in spririt guides than God because it's Him who is the utmost top authority.
Mrs. Chair Warmer
Of course I believe in angels. I do not call them "spiritual guides." I also do not believe in Hinduism of which chakra is a part. I do, however, feel that people have the right to believe as they wish and it is not up to me to judge them. I hope this clarifies things.
Chair Warmer
Membership Revoked
Ok I see. I think maybe spirit guides are to some people what guardian angels are to others? I was wondering if there may be Christians who don't believe in guardian angels, just out of curiousity is all.
I'm not all that familiar with some religions like what chakra is but I've read about how colors may have an effect on people. Green is used in hospitals because it supposedly has a healing effect and blue is supposed to influence respect so that's why police officers wear it. I find it interesting and even though I may not agree with others' religious principles I find there may be beneficial knowledge in their culture for me to learn from.
Mrs. Chair Warmer
I dont know if this is relevant or not, but my "first dad" died when i was 15. He died in May and the lilac bushes were in full bloom. As he was terminal and we knew he was hours from death, we called our priest. when the priest came to sit with us, he went out into the yard and cut some of the lilacs and brought them into the house. the whole house soon smelled like lilac. As the years went on, during stressful times in my life, i would smell lilac for no apparent reason. I do not ever buy lilac anything...no perfume, lotion...nothing because it reminds me of my dad, so there is no explanation. i have come to believe it is my dad reminding me he still loves me and watches out for me. In the early part of December (2 months ago) i started to smell lilac ALL THE TIME! it has been 30 years since my dad died and if i smelled it 25 times, that was alot. BUT in December, i would smell it several times a week.......i was out at my wood pile gathering wood, in the grocery store, in my laundry room, in a public bathroom! no explanation. At Christmas dinner, my brother, sister and I were talking and i mentioned the lilacs smell and the frequency. they agreed it was our dad. my brother and i both had after death incidents with our dad and my brother told me he believed that dad was still around, and that he was looking forward to seeing him again. three weeks later (3 weeks ago), my brother had a massive heart attack and died. it was sudden and unexpected. i cant help but wonder about the lilacs i kept smelling in december. i have not smelled them since and i am so sad and heartbroken.....almost like if i could smell them, then i would know that my brother is ok. i miss him so much, and i hate how things are now.
