With Halloween just around the corner, I took it upon myself to brave the inner depths of this school so I could share with you the spookiest, most horrific parts of St. Olaf that will drop-kick you into the Halloween spirit.
Seeing as St. Olaf has been dubbed the 6th most haunted school in the midwest by the website Mysterious Heartland, and the Dean of Students reportedly has a ghost file to keep track of these residents, let’s first look at the haunting sites.
Thorson Hall: Students living in Thorson have reported some strange sights over the years, with one of them being the infamous sighting of the red cap boy. Students would see a young boy in a red cap, occasionally with his phantom dog, as well as apparitions of two young men sitting at the end of their loft in the middle of the night.
Hilleboe Hall: There have been reports of children singing and a mysterious someone playing the piano. As well, there is the creepy chapel located in the hall, which replaced a single room that has a particularly bloody history. The woman in Hilleboe who first lived in this room was fine at first, but then her neighbors began complaining a few weeks later about screaming noises from the woman’s room. The college disregarded it, and she stopped leaving her room until she jumped out her window. The police later found notes that the woman wrote the woman detailed hearing the voice of another woman telling her of her own pain, and urging her to kill herself. A few years later, St. Olaf reopened the room after passing the paranormal acts off as schizophrenia. A similar story occurred to a similar woman. Noises in the room began a few weeks into the semester, and the new resident locked herself in her room until the police got a search warrant for her room, and the girl was found dead. Notes were found again, this time detailing the screaming voices of two women. It is worth noting that this is also the hall that has a spooky old grave in the woods parallel to it. Hilleboe is honestly just a supernatural mess.
Kelsey Theater: The building’s namesake, Miss Kelsey, died here. Since then, she has been seen post-mortem playing the piano onstage.
Mellby Hall: In Mellby, apparitions have been spotted of a man and woman outfitted in Victorian style. Many believe the ghost of Agnes Mellby, the building’s namesake, is the source of most of this paranormal activity.
Ghosts not exciting enough for you? Let’s tune in to the spooky side of St. Olaf’s everyday life.
Was that the eerie moans of ghosts haunting the night or simply the moans of yet another drunk student at the Pause?
Was that worms in your salad, or—oh, nope that was definitely worms.
Whether you’re getting spooked by the supernatural or simply by the clumps of hair in the showers, there will still be nothing more terrifying this Halloween season than the release of your midterm grades.
