Whitewater has definitely earned its reputation of being a spooky city, more specifically for the haunted creepiness of the UW-Whitewater campus.

Granted the name Second Salem, Whitewater is home to its fair share of the paranormal. Ghost sightings are a frequent occurrence on the campus and quite a few magical items are rumored to exist in the area.

One notable ghost is a little girl in a white dress. She runs around some of the older dorms such as Lee and Knilans, skipping down the halls, running into students’ rooms and giggling while she does so.

The majority of the ghosts rumored to hover around campus are building-specific and tend to be more on the peaceful and passive side, such as the librarian in Knilans Hall who opens the elevator for those passing through.

Other well-known campus ghosts includes the metal shop ghost in the CA, who creates an unexplained hammering and moving of chairs, the woman in the red dress in Wells basement, and a ghost of a young boy who jumps up and down the stairs by the vending machines in Andersen basement.

I personally have had my own slight paranormal experience. While I’m not someone who tends to be convinced by this kind of thing, my experience was beyond creepy.

My first semester on campus, I was in one of the practice pods in the CA. At this point in time, I tended to stay really late practicing until I had to drag myself back to the dorm to sleep. For the most part, these late practice sessions were pretty uneventful. It was usually just me alone, or one other person in a pod farther down.

The pods are generally quite cold, especially at that point in the year, though this evening got far colder than I’d ever felt it. I heard the light sound of piano coming from another pod, though I hadn’t heard anyone practicing for maybe an hour or so. The lights were still off in all of the other rooms in the pod I was in, but there was definitely music coming from one of the other rooms. This happened on and off multiple times throughout the night and since then, I’ve never stayed in the CA past eleven.

In addition to all of the ghosts rumored on campus itself, some items rumored to exist on campus are their own level of spooky.

There are two books that have been said to be hovering around the campus. One is similar to the fashion of the horror movie, The Ring. In The Ring, there is a tape which causes the death of the viewer seven days after viewing it. The similar book is an unknown novel said to lead to the eventual unfortunate demise of anyone who reads it. The second is a grimoire, rumored to belong to the old witches of Whitewater, hidden deep within the Andersen library, hiding it’s dark spells from students and the community.

Some chalk these mysterious occurrences up to the triangle that three graveyards make around Whitewater, some say it’s the ancient burial grounds we are situated on, while some blame a curse on the city. In the end, no one can quite pinpoint what makes our campus so haunted.

– Kaylee Pryble

  Arts & Rec Editor