Oracle Online

“Dan is like my brother,” Richart said, “He would be the only one who would be in my room at that time of night.”

The next day Aschenbrener denied he was at the house, saying he was on campus all night, Richart said. Strangely, she said, when she talked to him, he was wearing a white shirt with blue lettering and khaki pants throughout the day.

A simple mistake in perception? Richart doesn’t know. She could only describe her feeling that night as “the circulation [in the room] stopped.”

Richart said her television turns on randomly, when she’s nowhere near the remote. When she approaches it, the television turns off. Richart admits the house’s age might be a factor (it was built in the 1920s, she said), and maybe the timing could be attributed to electricity breaks. But nothing else turns on and off without explanation, she said.

Well, nothing else except for the garage door, which occasionally rises and falls without command, resident Molly Sullivan said.

“We’ll be outside smoking and [we’ll see] the garage door open,” she said.

Strange activity has also occurred in the kitchen.

Resident Shanelle Evens said that a cupboard door swung open once, stopping suddenly a few inches shy of her cheek. She has no explanation.

A few days later, Sullivan was awakened by the sound of the rocks on her windowsill hitting her floor. It sounded like someone had pushed them off the ledge, she said. When she turned on the light, the stones were scattered across her floor. The door and window were shut.

Regardless, the women said they have fun with the unknown presence. They’ve named their ghost Sophia. Why? It just fit, they said.

Non-resident Matt Thiboldeaux has seen things, too. In late October, he said, he saw two shadows, one out on the locked and bolted second-floor porch. A few days later, he was walking past the second-floor mirror when “a white blur” passed behind him. Both times Thiboldeaux did a double-take, and both times whatever he saw was gone.

On Jan. 22, Thiboldeaux was standing in the foyer and glanced toward the dining-room table. He saw a huge, broad-shouldered figure sitting erect at the head of the table. When he looked back, the figure was gone.

Nine days later, Thiboldeaux, while using the upstairs bathroom, saw in a window a reflection of an arm and knee hanging over the bathtub rim. When he looked in the tub, Thiboldeaux said, the image was gone.

The ghost seems, for the most part, to be harmless. Only junior Owen Waller has been injured in unexplained events.

On Jan. 16, Waller said, Evens was telling stories about Sophia, and he started cracking jokes about ghosts. Moments later, the bar stool he was sitting on broke.

Later that night, after getting a different chair, the 205-pound Waller was “running my mouth again,” and the second chair shattered into “a bunch of pieces.” A nail jutting from the chair scratched his back. “It was really creepy,” he said.

To this day, Waller said, he’s uncomfortable about going in the house, and he certainly won’t mention Sophia’s name again.

Current landlord and Hamline alum Jamyr Meyers bought and closed on the house in late 2002, and he now rents to the women. He lived there until four of the residents moved in last year in May (the other two,
Richart and Sullivan, moved in September). During his stay, Meyers said, he never experienced any strange behavior.

Despite their claims, the women maintain they’re not crazy.

“I now look over my shoulder when going upstairs,” said resident Karin Engin. “There’s definitely something here, but it’s not harmful.”