October 29, 2010
AMARA HARTLEY BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION WITH MARKETING CONCENTRATION SENIOR
I took this photo because I work at Living History Farms and I was supervising the boy scouts while they were carving the pumpkins. I was thinking about how nobody takes photos of the inside of pumpkins.
Legend: Humphrey Center haunted by fire victim Jessica Brewbaker STAFF WRITER
Legends of Humphrey Center being haunted by a ghost named Sheila have been passed down for years. These stories are a reason Katie Ostrem, Manager of Alumni and Parent Relations avoids staying after dark for work. “I haven’t had any problems, but I also don’t plan on being in the building by myself when it is dark,” Ostrem said. Ostrem had been told the most widely accepted legend of Sheila, which Solveig C. Nelson, former Professor of English documents in “The Grand View College Reader.” According to “The Grand View College Reader,” a local girl snuck into her boyfriend’s East wing Humphrey Center dorm room in the early evening May 3, 1929. A fire started above the third floor and moved quickly. The couple chose to send the young man with the residents and have the girl follow after. But the girl never rejoined her companion after the residents left the building. Mysteriously a body was never recovered after the fire. After
the building was again habitable, heck out of here,” Luce said. mysterious sounds and sights were Sponheim also had an encounreported. Thus the tale of a ghost ter with Sheila this Sept. Up on third named Sheila was started. and a half floor she was exiting the This was the building. Sponstory that Autumn heim and her Luce, transfer admisYorkshire terrier sions counselor was met a security “I saw a white told before her expeguard on their figure crouched rience on a Sunday way downstairs. down in the this Sept. Luce was He told her that corner and it waiting for Carrie the building was was one of Sponheim, freshmen empty, and left. those things admissions counselor Writing an ethat creeped before going down to mail at her desk me out so the basement to get on first floor she badly I looked some popcorn. heard footsteps away as fast as “I saw a white in the main hallfigure crouched down way above her. I could” in the corner and “I went out it was one of those and my dog who Carrie Sponheim things that freaked had been runFreshman Admissions me out so badly I ning back and Counselor looked away as fast forth was froas I could. That weird zen and looking eerie feeling like up at the ceiling ‘somebody else is in this room with and I was thinking ‘Oh my gosh me,’ then when I saw that white fig- we’re going to die!’ so I grabbed ure it was like okay I’m getting the my dog and I talked to the ghost I said ‘Um, we’re not here to hurt you so if you could just do that again to let me know you’re here’ and there where footsteps again. So
I shut everything off and I left,” Sponheim said. The next night a security guard and two students came to listen for footsteps with Sponheim. Standing on the second floor hallway all four people heard footsteps overhead on the third floor. Bill Burma, vice president for advancement was told the story of Sheila and the fire by a guard one night. Burma described what happened after being told the story on his way to his third floor office. “All of a sudden I was not touching the computer and it was like someone was holding the period button down. I’ve never have any computer do that before or since. I’m pretty sure that was Shelia welcoming me to Grand View that night,” Burma said. Other origin stories for Shelia include: she hung herself after seeing her boyfriend get in a car with another girl, jumping out of a window and the tale that the legend of Sheila was fabricated for students by an English professor telling ghost stories.
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY CHAD KRIZ