ELIZABETH VREDEVELT
STAFF WRITER
4/1/2024
Starting Fall 2024, Residence Life will now be offering guided ghost tours around campus. Current and prospective students will have the option of the walking tour or Witching Hour Exclusive bundle which includes an overnight stay in the basement or attic of the building of their choice.
To kick off the tour, visitors will pay a visit to Gelston Hall where Mary Gelston, the first Dean of Women on campus and the namesake of the building, is known to haunt the dorm.
“That stuff scares the heck out of me. I don’t mess with it,” said Associate Director of Residence Life Nicholas Benjamin. “If you treat her nice, she’ll be really kind to you. If you treat her mean, it’s coming for you,” said Benjamin.
Connected to Gelston Hall lies the Tyler-Van Dusen Campus Center; both the next stop on the tour and home of the lesser-known Joe’s ghost which resides in and around the former c-store and grill known as Joe’s Place.
“The lights in the back randomly would turn on and off,” said Stevie Moran who worked in Joe’s Place for four years. “When we would have our team huddle, there would just be wheezing next to you, like deep wheezing.”
However, visitors need not fear as “the Joe’s ghost [is] always friendly,” according to Garrett Carmen, a former Joe’s Place employee who believes he saw the ghost once while he was working alone.
Across the street at the Model United Nations House, another possible haunted location awaits visitors. “I have rosaries on my door, I’m Catholic, [and] they started swinging back and forth,” said Claire Neeb (’25) about one night when the vibes seemed off. Catholic chaplain, Father Paul Werley, has visited the house at least once to address the paranormal activity.
Still on South Campus, the Phi Mu Alpha house is also known for its ghostly inhabitants. “You could have all the doors locked; you could have the windows locked, go to bed, you’re there by yourself, and you will hear footsteps in the living room,” said Joe Cosentino (’25). “I’ve heard voices in the basement before… I don’t like being there alone.”
Visitors on tour will have the privilege of walking through sorority houses that are said to be haunted, including the Phi Sigma Sigma house. The house has a prankster ghost that “will knock on one door and then run to the other one” said Gwen Magiera (’25). Magiera also noted that the house has been blessed twice by Interfaith Chaplain, Katrina Pekich-Bundy.
Compared to many of the buildings around campus, the Oscar E. Remick Heritage Center for the Performing Arts is very new, as it opened in 1993, but the relatively new location is also rumored to host its own “Phantom of Strosacker Theater.”
There is an old theater tradition of leaving at least one light on overnight in theaters for technicians and crew members and, on occasion, also for mischievous spirits. Unfortunately, Strosacker Theater has no such “ghost light, but “the ghosts love to chill there,” said Magiera.
While the Alma College campus may never settle the debate about whether the college really is haunted, one thing is certain; whether visitors choose to stick with the more (boo)-sic walking tour or upgrade their stay to an overnight in a building of their choice, any tour they gho-(st) with will surely allow them to have a time to remember over and over again. You might even say the fun will be… haunting.
Happy April Fools’ Day!
The Almanian: News 
Mitchell Hall has a ghost. I was at a summer camp there in the early 1970s, and they put teenagers in Mitchell Hall, and the ghost was on the ground floor level. My room was a few doors down from the common room, and it was a scary experience.
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