Ghoul school

The Department of Folklore and Ethnomusicology will not be holding its annual Ghost Walk due to scheduling conflicts, much to the dismay of Folklore Graduate Recorder Chris Roush, who promised the event would return next year. But IU students and employees don’t need the walk to continue to share spooky campus tales from Ballantine to the business school.\nIU Police Department officer Chad Werner said he had odd experiences in both the Kelley School of Business and Ballantine Hall during his time as a cadet in the IU police training program.\nWerner said that while patrolling the fifth floor of Ballantine at about 9 or 10 p.m. in 2005 with another officer, the doors began to rattle as if someone had grabbed the handle. Werner said those rooms, about seven in all, had no windows, and the doors were locked. When he and the other officer got to the last door, a professor working late was inside. He hadn’t heard anything. \n“I’d heard stories of people seeing the ghost of a janitor,” Werner said of the incident. \nThe business school also has its share of paranormal activity. Once, Werner said, he was doing a routine check at 4 or 5 a.m. in a large lecture hall on the second floor. He said he walked into the room halfway and heard a door open, then footsteps. The sound of a seat going down then punctured the silence, but no one was in sight. Later, in another part of the building, he heard a woman’s “ear-piercing squeal” coming from a stairwell. \nWerner’s experiences aren’t uncommon. For years, students have passed down stories about various campus buildings such as La Casa and the Indiana Memorial Union, but much more lore focuses around residence halls. \nSophomore Rainelle Bumbaugh has lived on the sixth floor of Read Center since her freshman year, one of the dorms known most for being haunted. Bumbaugh said she’s heard two stories on the haunting. One involves a Resident Assistant named Paula who jumped off of the open air walkway at the end of one of the wings on Dec. 12 in the 1980s. Another variation involves an angered medical student who murdered his girlfriend and hid her body in the basement.\nBumbaugh said during her first night in the dorm, she jolted herself awake just before falling asleep. She was facing the wall, and had the distinct knowledge that someone stood in the doorway to her room.\n“I just thought it was weird, and then a few days later someone told me the story,” she said, adding that nothing strange has occurred since. \nVarious stories involving ghost activity have come from the Indiana Memorial Union, especially the old section, said IMU Marketing and Communications Manager Kelly Carnahan. That part of the building, built in 1932, includes the Student Activities Tower, which is home to the most paranormal activity in the building, Carnahan said. \nActivity in the tower involves building employees hearing gleeful laughter, footsteps and furniture moving around in rooms. Carnahan said employees see the presence as non-threatening. \n“It doesn’t really bother them,” she said. “They think it’s just interesting.”