Try @ TXST

Giselle Kowalski:
Hi y'all. My name is Giselle, and this is Try @ TXST. Today's episode is for the thrill seekers, those with an affinity for scary stories, ghouls, spirits, and just flat-out creepy encounters. We're diving into the stories and legendary spirits that have inhabited our campus for decades. We start in Old Main. Imagine, you're by yourself working late into the night for your midterms. It's quiet. You're alone, you're focused, but you feel something lingering, lurking behind you. It's a lot cooler now. You look up from your papers, there's a window in front of you and you can see yourself in the dark reflection, but you can also see a figure. Then you turn around, there's nothing there. Totally chill, right? It's like, whatever. Yeah, whatever. I'm just delusional. Anyways, let's get into it.
So this is Sara Shields. Sara, can you tell me what you do here at Texas State?

Sara Shields:
Yeah, so I teach in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, in the Digital Media Innovation program.

Giselle Kowalski:
You work in Old Main, right?

Sara Shields:
Yes, I work in Old Main.

Giselle Kowalski:
Is Old Main spooky for you?

Sara Shields:
Old Main is spooky for, I think, everybody.

Giselle Kowalski:
OK, so let's dive into this already. So tell me about your spooky experience.

Sara Shields:
So I guess in undergrad, I didn't really have too much going on there, but you hear the stories that the RAs tell you whenever you're living in the dorm, and I actually lived in a learning community for the mass comm program. So everybody on our floor was in the mass comm program, and our RA, she was telling us stories about how somebody in Old Main fell over the stairs and died and it was haunted.
And I was like, oh my gosh, I have classes in that building. It's kind of weird.

Giselle Kowalski:
I heard that too, and that the whole building was, it was basically an open concept situation, and then they built over it. Did you hear that story?

Sara Shields:
I didn't hear that part.

Giselle Kowalski:
So they say that Old Main used to be a library at the top, so it was kind of circular and you can look down and see the bottom floor. So apparently she fell off.

Sara Shields:
Yeah, that's what I heard was that she fell over the stairs.

Giselle Kowalski:
That she fell over the stairs.

Sara Shields:
And so in my undergrad, nothing really crazy happened, and I do remember being, it just seems kind of creepy when you hear that, right? And you're in the building and you're like, what part of this? Where is she? And really, it wasn't until I was in the grad program and me and one of my friends in class, we were doing some kind of project together.
I think it was like a research project. I think at the time we were both TAs, and so we had access to some of the rooms. And our grad classes are at night. They're like 6:30 to 9:20 usually. Sometimes they get out early. I remember after class I was like, OK, let's work on the project. We'll go into one of the rooms we have access to. And I think it was on the second floor. I think it was 232 or 201. And so I don't know if you know where that is, but it's right next to the stairs. So you peep your head around and the stairs are right there. So you can see above and below. And so we were just hanging out in there, and at this point, there's no one in the building because it was really late. We still had access because we had key cards and stuff.
It's dark outside. There's no classes going on right now. All the classes have been let out, all the professors are gone, all the students are gone. And we were just in there doing our little project. And then we hear this aggressive running, either up or down the stairs. You can hear when somebody's on the stairs in Old Main. They're so loud whenever you're stepping on them.
And so you can hear when one person is there. And so it was a very loud, aggressive running. And we were like, who's in here right now? Maybe it's another one of our friends in our class who's upstairs or downstairs. And so we peeped around and there was nobody there. And if you know, you look out, you'll be able to see somebody above or below the stairs who's either going up or down. And so for us to not see a single person right by the stairs where that noise was happening, we were just like, what the heck is going on? And so we literally looked at each other, we were like, let's just leave. And so we literally packed up our stuff and didn't even finish what we were doing. We got out there. We had these really intense chills. We both were just like, that was really weird.

Kevin Gilley:
I'm Kevin Gilley. I'm the assistant to the Dean of the College of Fine Arts and Communication, not just mass comm, but the whole entire college. And I've been at the university, this is my 25th year.

Giselle Kowalski:
You're here today to tell me some ghost stories.

Kevin Gilley:
I am.

Giselle Kowalski:
And I know that it's about Old Main, which is also where I studied. So let's get into it. Tell me about your ghost story.

Kevin Gilley:
So the first one occurred, I had been working in an event one night, and it was for a concert we had in Evans. And I did the setup for that for the back of house service for the artist. And then in breaking it down, I bring it all back to the office and get it cleaned up and all that and put away. And I was in my office, and Old Main has these big, big, big old doors, and there's a light, a glass cutout above the door. And in the cutout, we decided to put over some masking to kind of shield it. So you get the shadow, but you don't get the direct people looking into your office. So I was getting ready to leave and someone walked by the window and was going down the long part of the hallway towards the dean's front door. I was to the west of the dean's office at that point in time. And I opened the door and I was literally reaching for the doorknob when they walked by. And I get out there and there's nobody there.

Giselle Kowalski:
Oh.

Kevin Gilley:
Nobody. I actually walked down, because it was really late. I walked down to the dean's office. There's a little cutaway, and I looked there. There was nobody, no footsteps, no nothing. Just you could clearly see that it was an individual walking right by, and there was no one there. I walked all the way down to men's room, looked, came back, locked my doors, locked Old Main. And that was the only incidence I had like that.
Then we had, the second incident occurred when we were in the hallway and I was working with Liz McDonald, who was a coworker. And Liz had also had seen a couple incidences as well in her tenure there. She's now retired. But we're putting up these big poster boards in the display cabinets and they have glass on them. And I had just finished polishing the glass, and someone walks by so close that I could feel them walk by. And I said, "What do you think?"
And I turn around and there is absolutely nobody there, but you could feel them brush by you. And there was nobody there, but there was clearly an image, and I thought it was Liz. She was still inside the office, not in the hallway with me. And so I went and I grabbed her and I said, "Come out here. Come out here." I said, "Something just walked by me." She said, "I know! It happens to me. It happens to me." And I said, "Really?" She said, "Yes, I'll be sitting at my desk and I'll feel somebody standing behind me." And she said, "Then I'll turn around and there's nobody there." She said, "But I could feel them and I can smell them, what they smell like."

Giselle Kowalski:
Smell them.

Sara Shields:
Yes.

Giselle Kowalski:
Did she describe the smell?

Sara Shields:
She didn't at that point in time, but she said it was a interesting oakey cologne kind of smell, if I remember correctly. She said it was kind of an oakey smell, very heavy oak smell. And I was like, Hmm. Never had the smell. I've had the feeling of somebody walk by me, but clearly seeing that image in the glass walk by me, thinking it was her, and it wasn't her. It was absolutely nobody there.

Giselle Kowalski:
It seems dark things are around every corner in Old Main, but those aren't the only spirits on campus. Let's saunter on down the steps, underneath the rustling trees, past the shadowy quad to the admissions building, also known as the White House. There's an unseen entity that tends to disturb those who find themselves alone.

Holly Bazaldua:
My name is Holly Bazaldua. I am the admin assistant for the vice president of University Advancement. My first job here at the university was over at the Admissions Office at the White House, and I used to work as a data entry assistant. When you walk into the White House, you walk in and then to the left side is this little sunroom area. And they used to have two desks there. And I used to be in one of those. So I started working here back in 2009. And when I first started here, well, there at admissions, I met the admin there and she was like, "Oh, let me tell you about our resident ghost." And I was like, "It's the new girl thing." They're just trying to ...

Giselle Kowalski:
Spook you.

Holly Bazaldua:
Yeah. So I was like, "OK, what's going on?" And she's like, "Well, we have a ghost that lives here in the White House. And he sometimes creeps people out. He'll turn on computers, he'll move chairs. You can hear him sometimes." And I'm like, OK, right. Whatever. I don't really believe in ghosts. I've had experiences, but they're something else. So time went on, and there was one time I used to ride into work with my mom and she was going to pick me up that evening. So five o'clock came around, everybody left for the day, and I'm sitting there by myself in the sunroom. Now the sunroom faces the windows and my back faces the door. And so I'm sitting there and I'm still trying to do some work stuff, and I couldn't, cause I had this uneasy feeling like somebody was watching me.
And so I keep turning, and I keep turning, and there's no one there. And I'm like, it's just me. It's just my mind. So I packed up all my stuff. And when you walk to the admissions office, there was desks one after the other. The admin sat on the first one, and there was three more desks behind her. That's where students sat, the student workers did. And I went and sat on one of the student desks. So I'm sitting there and I'm playing on my phone, and I keep hearing, they had chandeliers up on the top, and I keep hearing the little clinking sound, clink, clink, clink, clink, clink. And so I'm like, what is that? And so I'm turning around looking, and I look up and you can see the chandelier just like clink, clink, clink. And I was like, is the AC on?
And so I'm looking, and then the other one does it, and I'm like, ah, someone must still be here. So I'm like, OK, I'm going to go up there and tell them, hey, I'm here. So nobody will get freaked out. So I go and I go around and I go upstairs, and as I get to the first landing, I notice everything's dark. So I keep walking and I go all the way to the top and I'm like, "Hello, hello?" And nobody's answering me. So I get to the very top and I look, and I look down the hallway, and it's dark. I'm like, no. So I just pack up on my stuff and I run outside. I lock the door and I sit down outside in the steps, and a little bit later my ride comes. So I get on my ride, and we're going. And as we're leaving, I turn back and there's a light up on upstairs on the second floor.

Giselle Kowalski:
And you had turned them all off.

Holly Bazaldua:
They were off to begin with. When I got up to the top, it was dark. The hallway, it was dark. There was nothing there, and the light was on. So the next day I tell Ms. Joy, our admin, Joy, and I'm like, "You're never going to believe it." And so I'm rattling the whole story off and she's like, "Yeah, remember I told you. He turns on the lights. He likes to turn on lights." So it was just creepy.

Giselle Kowalski:
Fun fact. The admissions resident ghost, his name is Gus, which stands for Ghost Upstairs. He may have run us out of the admissions building, but we're not done just yet. We still have one more legendary location to visit. Sterry Hall, also known as Scary Sterry. It's one of the oldest dorms on campus.

Emily Lohr:
So I am Emily Lohr. When I was a student, I was Emily Tripannier. I was a pretty active student leader on campus, so I was in a lot of organizations.

Giselle Kowalski:
That's awesome.

Emily Lohr:
And I was also an orientation leader as well. So I used to actually give the midnight ghost tours during orientation. I had experiences all over campus, not just in Sterry. The top two would be Sterry and probably Derrick Hall. So Sterry Hall was my freshman year. I lived on the first floor, but I had friends on all the different floors. And pretty much the story behind it, a woman committed suicide in the showers, on I think, the fourth floor of Sterry. And so there's a lot of activity within the building. A lot of people report seeing a girl walk down the hallway and disappear through doors that are closed. She's usually wearing a really long blue nightgown and has long either dark brown or black hair, is the way that she's normally described. On the fourth floor showers will turn on by themselves, sinks will turn on by themselves.
There's one toilet in the community bathroom on the fourth floor north side, that is in the corner against the wall, and it will flush by itself. And there's no sensor to make it flush. And that stall always looks dark even though there's a light over it. And so a lot of us, yeah, a lot of us wouldn't go to the bathroom alone. We'd always go together. Or we'd have, we called it shower parties where we would all fill the shower stalls at the same time and shower at the same time so that no one was alone.
But the spookiest experience that I specifically had, was going up the stairwell on the northwest side, and I was with a couple of friends, and one of the lights in the hall was flickering, and one of my friends kind of jumped to tap it to make it stop flickering. And they knocked the light cover off and there was no light bulb.

Giselle Kowalski:
What? So did you ever actually encounter that ghost that you told me about in Sterry on the fourth floor, or did you just hear about it?

Emily Lohr:
No, we encountered it. We would see it. We would see it walk down hallways. It would look like just somebody that was living there would walk down a hallway and you would think it was somebody, but then they'd walk through a door that was closed. Several of my friends and I also had a reoccurring dream where she would walk into our room, make eye contact with us, say nothing, and then turn around and walk back out. And we all had this dream over and over and over again while we were living in Sterry. And we didn't know that we were all having it until a year later when we started talking about it. And it was like, yeah, I had this weird dream. It was like you had that dream? I had that dream too. And we all had it several times. So yeah, it was just super weird.

Giselle Kowalski:
Oh my god! Unseen figures sounds in the night. A reoccurring nightmare that sends shivers down your spine. Next time you wander through the halls of Texas State, keep an eye out, watch your back, and pray the roaming spirits find another innocent Bobcat to terrify.
Thank you to Sarah, Kevin, Holly, and Emily for sharing your stories with me. And thank you for listening to this episode of Try @ TXST. Make sure to tune in next time to learn more about something else you can try on campus at Texas State. And also remember to follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube at TXST.
This podcast is a production of the Division of Marketing and communications at Texas State University. Podcasts appearing on the Texas State University Network represent the views of the hosts and guests, not of Texas State University. Again, I'm your host, Giselle Kowalski, and I'll see you next time.