Click here and go to The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga’s Facebook page to vote for your favorite costume!
Get in the spooky spirit with these campus events this Halloween and check out Chuck Cantrell’s recounts of campus hauntings.
DRC’s Halloween Open HouseWhen: Oct. 31, 11 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Where: University Center 108DRC hosts an annual open house every Halloween where they open their doors to students and staff who would like to visit and learn more about what the center offers.
Join the DRC for a chili cook-off and vote on who makes the best in the office.
Costumes are welcome.
Keep an eye out for the staff, who will be dressed as your favorite Toy Story characters.
When: Oct. 31, 1-3 p.m.
Where: Library 1st Floor and Chamberlain Entrance
Admission: This event is open to the public.
You’re invited to visit the 1st floor of the Library, where materials and services and programs from throughout the Library will be on display. Trick or treat at the different tables and discover all the delights that the Library has to offer (plus pick up mini-candy bars!). Make an animation of yourself using the Studio’s equipment! Discover spooky delights from the Special Collections and University Archives! Learn about the scary amount of things you can get at the Library! Plus, there will be cake and coffee and a door prize draw for a $50 Starbucks gift card!Want a second chance to win $50 at Starbucks? Wear your Halloween costume and enter the Library’s costume contest! Visit the tent set up just outside the doors to the Chamberlain plaza. Photos will be uploaded to Facebook for voting, and the winner will receive a $50 Starbucks gift card. Click here to see the 2016 costumes for inspiration. Need more help? Check out the last few years’ worth in the Library’s Facebook photo galleries: 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, and 2010.
UTC Rotaract’s Gourds for Good
When:Oct. 31, 4:30-6 p.m.
Where:Chamberlain Field
Admission: $5; All ages are welcome. Costumes are encouraged!
Pumpkin decorating, face painting, pumpkin carving, raffles and caramel apples.
Join the UTC Rotaract Club this Halloween at Gourds For Good as we work to raise money, and support efforts of our colleagues’ work on water sanitation units in Dominica.
UTC Outdoors Halloween Climbing Event
When: Oct. 31, 8-10 p.m.
Where: ARC Climbing Wall
Students, Staff and Alumni with active memberships to the ARC are welcome to join UTC Outdoors for their Halloween Climbing Event where costumes are definitely encouraged.
When: Oct. 31, 9 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Where: Chamberlain Pavilion (between Derthick and the Library)
Cost: $2; or 2 for $3
Available in milk chocolate, milk chocolate with peanut butter and milk chocolate with rice krispies. Anyone is welcome to buy our homemade chocolate rats to support our local chapter of Psi Chi (International Honors Society in Psychology)!
Haunted Halls
by Chuck Cantrell
Hooper and Race Halls, 1952.
Could the hallowed halls of UTC be haunted?
Employees and students for years have reported things going bump in the night. Footsteps. Doors closing. Floors creaking.
Reports of parapsychological activity at UTC are limited to lighthearted stories and memories and most people give little merit to their validity. They have become part of the lore of the campus—threads in the ever-growing tapestry of a shared history.
Several stories circulate about footsteps in Hooper Hall. Could they be Groundskeeper John? You decide.
One of the oldest buildings on campus and former home of the science departments, Hooper Hall today houses administrative offices. In 1986 as the University was celebrating its 100th anniversary, a psychic—let’s call him “Steve”—was consulted about the ghost stories on campus. Steve has worked with law enforcement agencies across the country on missing persons and murder cases and had lived in Chattanooga for a very short time in 1986. His knowledge of UTC and the campus was very limited.
Hooper Hallway
Working with only a piece of paper with “615 McCallie Avenue”—the address of Hooper Hall—written on it, Steve offered impressions on what he “saw” at the location.
Steve claimed to see a man hanging himself in the location. He was surrounded by chemicals, and although he could identify the man as being named John, Steve could not see the man’s face.
Research into University history revealed that a man did kill himself in Hooper Hall, which was then the science building and contained large amounts of chemicals. In fact, the suicide occurred in a laboratory. A University groundskeeper who had worked on campus for 19 years killed himself on January 7, 1924. The man, whose name was John, used a gas hose around his neck to asphyxiate himself, and at the time he was found, his head was concealed by a quilt.
Steve got a lot of details right!
Parapsychologists explain that college campuses are fertile grounds for spirits. The camaraderie shared by fraternities, sororities, and other student groups might tend to attract former students’ spirits. Also, the spirits of former employees who worked at the University for a long time or who were particularly happy during their time on campus might be another draw.
In any case—believers and non-believers can take comfort that campus spirits are likely benevolent and attracted to campus for its good memories and feelings.
