Haunted Colleges and Universities by Tom Ogden

Author:Tom Ogden
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781493012404
Publisher: Globe Pequot

RANDOLPH-MACON COLLEGE

204 Henry Street, Ashland, VA 23005; (804) 752-7200; www.rmc.edu

Randolph-Macon College was founded by the Virginia Methodist Church in 1830, making it the oldest Methodist-run institution of higher learning in America. The coed, liberal arts school has approximately 1,300 students and offers four-year degrees in more than thirty-five programs.

Several buildings at the college have had a reputation for being haunted, but only a few have specific stories attached to them. The best-known tales concern Washington and Franklin Hall, constructed in 1872. The building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. An elderly man in a late nineteenth-century tuxedo has been observed staring out of windows, and two men in turn-of-the-twentiethcentury attire have been spotted in the halls. Sometimes instead of encountering a humanlike figure, people see a gray cloud or mist. Other phenomena in the building include creaking floors, lights that go on and off unexpectedly, and papers that blow off tables when there is no breeze.

Mary Branch Hall was completed in 1906. Windows and doors open and close by themselves, and there are unidentifiable noises. Curtains and shelves fall without being touched, and objects move themselves. The third floor and the basement are especially troubled. Some think the events—almost all of which happen after dark—are caused by the unsettled spirit of a girl who allegedly hanged herself from a pipe in a bathroom.

Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity house was built on the foundations of a military hospital that burned down during the War between the States. Like other places of a certain age, there has always been the odd noise now and then, but the building is also haunted by the ghost of a Civil War soldier. (Some versions of the legend say there is more than one spectral soldier.) The strange thing is, the phantom is only ever seen from the waist up as he moves around the building. Perhaps the hospital stood lower, and the soldier is still walking on the old, long-gone floorboards.

One other spot at Randolph-Macon requires a Ghost Alert. A young man who died on the stretch of railway that runs along the edge of campus has apparently never left the tracks. As part of a hazing ritual, he was put into a box that was then placed on the railroad tracks. No, he wasn't struck by a locomotive—nothing that ghastly. Instead, the stress or fear was probably too much for him, and he died of a heart attack. Now he walks the rails, warning others to stay off the tracks.

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