James Hauntings
It’s almost Halloween, and it’s time to explore another area of haunting on campus: James Hall. James, like Cline, is known by its residents to have a ghost, and this ghost is one that William Morrison, Assistant Director of Res Life, had a first-hand encounter with. He shared with me a written version of his encounter, stating that this incident took place in 2016, when he was a rising sophomore here at Centenary. Like many of the RAs that have spooky experiences on campus, William’s story takes place during RA training in the summer before the semester starts. He was stationed on the second floor of James Annex with an RA named Kelsea Keyes, and while staying up late one night, he heard a knock at the door:
I walked toward the suite hallway, and asked who it was (because Momma ain't raise no fool). I heard a very scared voice from the other side of the door:
"It's me, Kelsea."
"Kelsea? What's going on?" I asked as I was still stumbling to the door after putting pants on.
"Willllllll, I'm scared..." I opened the door to a highly distressed Kelsea Keyes clutching a blanket, "Can I stay with you tonight? I can just sleep on the floor or on your futon. I just don't want to go back to my room."
He let her in, and she began to explain she was hearing noises that she thought were ghosts. William didn’t believe her, as he didn’t believe in ghosts, but he still let her stay since she was scared. After getting ready for bed, he lays down, only to hear a scratching noise coming from the ceiling. William rationalized it as a tree outside, despite Kelsea’s fear, and told himself it was an old building, and the noise was probably just a pipe . . . until they began to hear rattling. William kept telling himself it wasn’t ghosts, but all of a sudden, a door down the hall (supposedly empty of students) slammed shut. They both jumped up, and immediately called DPS, recounting to the officer the scratching, rattling, and door slamming:
Kelsea and I formed a huddled mass as we crept in terror behind the DPS officer as he went through the floor opening the suite and room doors. At one point, he opened a door, and looked back at us, hiding behind the door for fear of what might jump out at him, and he smiled.
"Is this a joke?" He offered.
"No, no!" We both insisted, as we recounted what we heard.
Without the proof of anyone else in the dorms, the officer left, and the two tried to go back to sleep . . . which William found difficult, as he began to hear a whirring noise. But, he decided to just go to sleep. Kelsea left the following morning, and William got ready for the day:
At one point, I was by the mirror closest to the door, at my dresser drawer, and I don't know what possessed me to look up. But I noticed on the ceiling. "TINA" scrawled on the ceiling right above my head.
And thus is the origin for the name of the infamous James ghost, Tina. William and Kelsea recounted the story to their fellow RAs, and William’s mom. William’s mom had stayed in the dorm previously while awake with insomnia, and she told William there was no scratched name anywhere she could see. There are no records of any students dying in James, nor is there any rhyme or reason to their being a ghost there—and yet, many students have had similar experiences to William. Oftentimes, residents will hear shuffling in the attic or doors slamming, and some even hear someone pacing up and down the stairwell.
I can attest to Tina’s existence, as I had my own weird experiences in my James Annex dorm Freshman year. Oftentimes, I would hear furniture moving in the attic late at night (2 or 3 in the morning even!), when there is nothing in the attic upstairs minus one or two chairs. My roommate, Siobahn Stanley, never experienced any disturbances in our room, but one night, while getting dressed, I witnessed a balloon Siobahn had gotten for her birthday moving across the ceiling and coming towards me when there was no air coming from the vent. Startled, I yelled for it to stop, and it did, only a few feet away from where I was. Later, I would find out at the campfire of spooky stories Katherine and William had last year, the dorm William had experienced in was none other than my own, room 225.
Is there a ghost in James? Perhaps. If you live in James, you’ll have to decide for yourself. “Was it an omen? A prophecy? Who can say?” William writes. “But from that moment on, Tina the Ghost of Annex can still be heard slamming doors in vacant halls if you catch her on the right night.”
Special thanks to William Morrison and Kelsea Keyes for their stories! If you have a ghost story/paranormal experience of your own, let me know here: mcaruthers@my.centenary.edu
