Behind Locked Doors

words and photos by Audrey Campbell

Maybe it’s my mile-wide spooky streak, but I’ve always been enchanted by Hamline’s basements. I’ve delighted in its hospital-like floor tiles, tangled power cables, and endless locked doors. This mild obsession has prompted a couple of questions: What are behind Manor’s locked basement doors, and what have they been used for in the past?

I’ve walked through the basement countless times as a resident of Manor, but last month I made several pilgrimages with a more critical eye. I walked down the marble steps into the basement and entered the west wing. Doors lined either side of the corridor with a tangle of red and white pipes and caged electrical wires running half the length of the ceiling.

To my right, the hall dead-ended with a single, brown door. This leads to the underground tunnel that connects Manor to Sorin Hall, which are part of a wider system. According to Hamline’s archivist, Candace (Candy) Hart, these tunnels had been previously used for special events, like the Haunted Hallway, but are now “locked up.”* When I placed my hand against these doors, I could feel a slight breeze from the other side. When I put my eye to the crack, I saw a pink and orange figure spray painted onto an overhanging beam.

I turned away from the tunnel entrance. The Peer Wellness Educators' office was just to my right. It's slightly off the beaten path in a sunshiny room with its own fireplace. In 1991, this was slated to be a recreation room with pool tables.^

Numerous office spaces line the hall, used by student orgs such as Hall Council, Programming Board, and the Fulcrum Journal.+ Across from the congregation of lonely furniture. I sat there for a moment, reminded of past meetings. According to the Oracle in 1991, these offices were teaming with even more student activity back then. A new floor plan had just been laid out, assigning two or more orgs for every office. The Art and Lit Review shared a room with MPIRG (Minnesota Public Interest Research Group), and French Club shared elbow room with AsiaWatch.^

I saw a curious thing as I walked past these office doors last month. One of them was open, and someone had left a pile of stuff outside. Inside, the room was carpeted, and I could see dorm furniture. This contrasted starkly with the tile floor and grubbiness I had come to associate with these rooms. I soon found out the reason for this anomaly. In the early 2000s , some of these offices were converted into dorm rooms for international graduate students.**

I walked down the hall, passing a box of Kleenex left in the center of the floor. Tucked inthe middle of the corridor, a doorless room like a gaping mouth leads to the bike locker.

An abandoned office chair sits in the center as if waiting for someone to sit in it. A dark hallway branches off to the right, dead-ending with another door. I suspect this leads to Manor’s kitchen back when the Manor Main Lounge was a “Refectory” or dining room.^^

In order to learn about the more distant past of Manor, I visited the basement of Bush Library. I passed through a pair of double doors with glowing glass panes, down a white hallway and to the left, into a cramped room filled with old Liners and floor-to-ceiling shelves, smelling faintly of flowers and vanilla. This perfume likely belonged to Candy. I hung my coat on a rack next to some unexplained hard hats.

As I perused the materials Candy laid out for me, I found what I was looking for: the March 10, 1922, edition of the Oracle. It contained an article which described in detail a brand new women’s dorm built in the style of an English manor house. A self-proclaimed “Cub Reporter” narrated this article, anxious to report the quantities of building materials that were used (e.g. “200, 201 bricks,” and “4,200 lights of glass”). He laid out the details of the building, speaking of the refectory as well as the kitchen below it, the “two dry storage rooms” and one “vegetable room.”

Despite their mundane uses, there is something magical about these basement spaces.

I walked to the east end of the hall, into the carpeted realm of university offices, such as Counseling and Health Services, Human Resources, and Payroll. This area was designated for remodeling in 1995 in order to pave the way for Counseling and Health Services, the Career Development Center, Human Resources/Payroll, and the Business office to move in.++

This was part of a wider phase of remodeling planned in ’91, which helped modernize Manor by updating the security and wiring.***

Despite their mundane uses, there is something magical to me about these basement spaces–something strange, random and forgotten, like an empty box of Kleenex left in the middle of a hallway. Maybe this is why people say that Manor is haunted. You can feel the lives of hundreds of people come and gone.

***

*Hart, Candace. Personal interview. 20 February 2019.

^Gebhard, Susan. “Manor basement space decided hard work but ends well.” The Oracle, 14 February 1991. P. 1.

+Gutierrez, Javier. “Manor Lower Level.” Received by Audrey Campbell, 29 March 2019.

**Bethke, Meghan. “HUSC accepts Res Life proposal to exchange The Oracle, 10 December 2002. P. 5.

^^"Here Are Some Foolish Facts." The Oracle, 10 March 1922, P. 1-4.

++Thorston, Jennifer. “Renovation of Manor basement leaves student groups homeless.” The Oracle, 17 November 1995.

***“Manor House slated for renovation.” Hamline Inquiry, 1991.