Tuesday. November 4. 1997
BC Has Its Own Haunted House!
Campus Life 5
by Walter Hackett
So, what have you heard about
Ross Hall? It may be some sort of cin-
ema-created imagination fluke, but I
know that the first time I saw the old,
seemingly dilapidating, gray building
sitting atop the hill behind the baseball
field I felt an uneasy feeling in the pit
of my stomach. There is just something
about Ross Hall that stirs Norman Bates
images, and plants seeds of supernatu
ral presence in the mind. Of course,
there are rumors and stories of ghosts
within the history of Frances H.E. Ross
Hall, ghosts that bang on pipes, ghosts
that mysteriously move alarm clocks,
books, and other items around rooms,
and others.
The most common rumor sur
rounding Ross Hall is that it may have
been a hospital and morgue during the
civil war. The actual building is not
nearly old enough to have served this
purpose, however, it is possible that the
house was rebuilt on the foundations
of an older structure. The story is that a
soldier, wounded from battle, and a
nurse who had saved his life fell madly
in love and planned to be married. Just
before the soldier was to be released,
the building caught fire and burned
November Schedule of Events
3-Faculty recital: Amy Shook, 8Pm
6-Region X-Country Champs
Student Fall Concert, 8Pm
7-All Night Videos, 9Pm, Coltrane
9-BCO, 3:30
FUM Church
Campus Worship
10-Gospel Choir Tryouts, 7Pm
11-Author Yung Krall, 8Pm
Men’s B-Ball, 7Pm
13-Pianist Joan Yarbrough, SPm
14-Laser Tag Lock-In, Asheville
15-Men’s B-Ball, 3Pm
Women’s B-Ball, 7Pm
16-Campus Worship
18-American Clarinet Quartet, SPm
Women’s B-Ball, 6Pm
19-Men’s B-Ball, 7Pm
20-Rich Ames, Magic/Escape Artist
Sierra Club, 7Pm
21-Disco Dance, lOPm, Coltrane
22-Open Campus Day
Women’s B-Ball, 2Pm
23-Campus Worship
24-Women’s B-Ball, 6Pm
25-Thanksgiving Break!
Women’s B-Ball, 6Pm
30-Back to School!
down. Supposedly, the soldier ran into
the burning building to save his love
and both were bumed to death in the
flames. It is said that both wander the
halls of Ross Hall, one ever in search
of the other, never to connect.
The written history of Ross
Hall is very elusive and of thin subject
matter. No one knows exactly when the
building was built. The land was owned
by a Mr. Earle, who was a farmer, and
was sold in 1905 to the Zachary family
who planned to use the house as a sum
mer home for tourists. It is supposed
that the Zachary’s built half of the
building that now stands. There is no
real evidence as to whether the family
lived in the house year round or rented
it for part of the year. In 1921, by the
money raising efforts of Francis Ross,
treasurer of the Brevard Institute, the
house on the hill was bought by the
college for use as a Boys Dormitory.
Thirteen rooms were added to the thir
teen already standing (a rather sugges
tive figure for a house like Ross Hall)
and students lived there at until at least
1935. In its years of ownership by the
college the house has served as a
President’s home, faculty apartments,
storage, and is now home to Brevard’s
Wilderness Education department
headed up by Clyde Carter.
According to Jeimifer Jaynes
in a 1991C/ano« , “many people have
experienced sensations tha something,
though non-living is in their presence.”
Anyone who has lived in Ross hall will
attest to the haunted and even scary
nature of Ross Hall. There is one ghost
named “danker” who, in the dead of
winter, will beat on the radiator pipes
to no end. Mrs. Francis Ross herself is
said to visit the gouse as well to take
care of those who live there. It is
mmored that members of the Zachary
family still reside within the walls of
Wilderness Ed Aquires New Professor
by Chrystal Rollison
Along with the construction
of the new performing arts center,
Brevard College faculty
has a new addition.
Mark Wagstaff has
joined the Outdoor Wil
derness Leadership
Program after recently
receiving his doctorate
in Education from Okla
homa State University.
Although Wagstaff pre
fers smaller towns than
Brevard, he is enjoying
the vast national forest.
In the wilderemess pro
gram, Wagstaff s spe
cialty will be teaching
experiential education
and leadership skills.
As for BC’s curriculum
he states, “There aren’t many choices
for this type of degree, it prepares
people as professionals to work in a
I
located in Ross Hall
The Brevard College Literary Magazine is
getting started on it's 1997-98 book. The
magazine consists of Poetry. Prose. Short
Stories. Photos. Art of any kind, and pretty
much jny sort of crcati\ e anything will
be considered. Turn in submissions to Di.
Mamlett, Jamie Tomasello. or Walter Hackett.
Submissions can also be sent through College
Mail toBox5591Bor5767G.
Ross Hall. I have personally heard a
first hand account of someone sitting
in the first floor lobby of Ross when a
translucent young man carrying books
came mshing through the room, out the
front door, slamming it behind him on
his way to a class that may have taken
place fifty years ago. It has been said
that the whole Brevard College campus
is haunted, and there are definately
many accounts of plausible interactions
with ghosts, both good and bad. Neva
Corbin, in the 1972 Pertelote, tells of a
ghost that sits on the front porch of Ross
Hall, looking over the college and all
it’s inhabitants and “threads the
particulars of each human destiny at
Brevard College into the whole of
exhistance, and dreams the dreams of
ideals as yet unrealized.” There is
defmately an underlying inner working
to the way Brevard College runs that
has brought us all here together to leam
from this remarkable place and all of
its remarkable people.
number of related jobs such as guides,
environmental educators, and leaders
in wilderness
therapy.” In the future
Wagstaff forsees
growth and possibly
a graduate curriculum.
“It’s amazing how
people are seeking us
out now that outdoor
pursuits are so popu
lar. We expect our
graduates will be
people who will make
a difference.”
NOTE- All students
are invited to visit the
Wilderness Program
★
Vietnamese Author
To Visit College
by Walter Hackett
As part of Brevard College’s
yearly theme. Explore the Rim, the
college’s Season’s Series brings to the
campus Yung Krall, Vietnamese author
of the novel “A Thousand Tears Fall
ing”, a tme story of a Vietnamese family
tom apart by war, communism, and the
C\A.
Ms. Krall grew up in south
Vietnam throughout the French occu
pation and subsequent U.S. ivolvement
in the Vietnam War. Her Father was a
leader in North Vietnam’s communist
government that eventually forced his
family to leave the country and settle in
America.
Yung is scheduled to speak in
Dunham Auditorum on Veteran’s Day,
November 11, at 8:00PM. The presenta
tion is free to the public and any addi
tional information can be aquired by
caUing 704-884-8333.