Aside from the notorious uptown,Halloween party, fest season, and the famous people who have attended Ohio University (cough, there's way more than Logan Paul), OU is well known for many lingering spirits. Although many believe these haunted claims just come from drunken students who are seeing things, there is definitely some evidence as to why this small town campus may be so haunted.
The Ridges, formerly known as Athens Lunatic Asylum, was around from the mid-late 1800's to the early 1990's. In this time, the asylum housed those suffering from an array from mental disorders. Years before the asylum shut down though, a patient named Margaret went missing. After her disappearance, she was found dead with the blood from her decomposing body leaving the notorious "stain" which remains there today.
Wilson Hall is a dorm on West Green and is said to be one of the most haunted dorms on campus. This may be due to the rumors that a student who lived on the fourth floor once practiced astral projection and consequentially died.
Another rumor is that in Crawford Hall on South Green a girl was killed after falling out of the fourth floor of her window, which has led to explainable occurrences in that hall since.
Some of these are fact (Margaret dying at The Ridges), some of these are rumors which may be fact or fiction (Wilson and Crawford Hall deaths), no matter what, some OU students are certain that there are spirits or something lingering on campus.
Here are some of those accounts.
Lincoln Hall, 2018, Kaylee. It was an ordinary night. I had just gotten back from my Thursday night astronomy class which went until 10:00 P.M. My roommate didn't have Friday classes, so she left that Thursday evening to go home for the weekend. Ironically, the instructor I had for this astronomy class had worked at the asylum before it had closed. This specific night we somehow got on the topic of ghosts. He said in all his time there, which was quite a few years, he had never experienced anything paranormal. Little did I know that night I'd have my first paranormal experience.
Upon returning to my dorm, I had gotten into my bed and turned off the lights. I was watching YouTube on my phone, but was settling down because I had an 8 A.M. class the next day. Suddenly, I heard a snap. I turned my iPhone flashlight on (I didn't feel like getting up because I had just assumed it was nothing), but then saw our blinds which had been down all semester had retracted back up. It took some force to get those blinds up, too. I was scared and slept in the laundry room, but brushed it off and told myself maybe a screw was loose.
The weekend went by and I was able to sleep somewhat better. Sunday night, my roommate returned, although I had already told her about what had occurred by then. She was spooked, but not as drastically as me since it didn't occur to her. That night, I heard her rustling around a lot. The next morning I left for class and returned. She told me she couldn't sleep much last night because she got down from her lofted bed to use the restroom, and our garbage can was moved 2-3 feet from where it usually is. I could tell she wasn't trying to scare me or lie.
The last instance happened another few days later. This specific day we got back from class at the same time, upon turning the lights on, we found three scratches by the switches. I tried using my nails, a pencil, anything I could find to see what could have left such prominent marks. Nothing was able to scratch the wall that deep.
The remainder of the year there were no more occurrences (at least in our dorm). We believe it was a spirit passing through
Jefferson Hall, 2001, Chris. Fall quarter 2001 (maybe late October). I was watching a movie with a friend at Jeff Hall. She lived on the top floor of one of the wings (as opposed to the four floors in the center). As we were watching the movie, we started to hear noises as if somebody was dragging something heavy, say a desk or bookshelf, across the floor above us (again, she was on the top floor). At first I thought it was just me, but then she paused the movie and asked if I could hear anything. At this point, along with the noise, it also sounded like a girl was sobbing to herself.
I walked out into the hallway to see if anybody was up and moving around, but being late at night, everything was quiet. I walked back into her room when suddenly the dragging stopped, followed by a loud thud. It then sounded as if the girl who was sobbing screamed and ran away.
My friend ended up staying at my room that night in Perkins hall.
Both of these incidents occurred on East Green in very close proximity with each other, during October, 17 years apart. Both times the instances occurred when it was a normal, unprovoked night. These are only a couple of the thousands of paranormal experiences that have occurred at Ohio University.
