Tag Archives: dorm ghosts college ghosts

Haunted Freshman Dorm

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Cupertino, California

1. TEXT/TRANSCRIPTION

“So this happened to my sister when she was a freshman in college. She told me that she always felt really uneasy in her dorm room. Like, every night she would get this weird feeling, like someone was watching her. Not just sometimes, but every night. She didn’t see anything at first, but she said it was hard to sleep, and she couldn’t shake that heavy, creepy feeling.

Then one night, she was lying in bed and felt the same thing, so she looked out the window. And she swears she saw someone staring back at her. But the wild part is, she lived on the seventh floor. There was no balcony, no ledge, nothing. Just this figure, staring right at her from outside the window.

She obviously freaked out. And later on, she found out that someone had died on her floor years before she moved in. After that, everything made a little more sense to her, but it was still super disturbing. She doesn’t really like to talk about it much.”

2. CONTEXT

“She told me this after she moved out of that dorm. I think she didn’t want to scare anyone while she was still living there, but after she left, she opened up about it. It’s not something she jokes about either, like, she really believes what she saw.

It’s one of those stories that our family always talks about now, but not in a ‘haha, spooky’ way. More like, ‘Wow, that actually happened to her.’ She’s still kind of uncomfortable when she remembers it. It definitely stuck with her.”

3. INTERPRETATION

This story gave me chills when I first heard it, not just because of the creepy image of someone staring into a 7th-floor window, but because of how real it felt to the person telling it. The emotional weight and fear in her sister’s experience really stood out to me. It reminded me that ghost stories aren’t always about what’s visible, sometimes it’s about the atmosphere, the tension, the feeling that something isn’t right.

There’s something deeply personal and psychological about the idea of being watched while you sleep. That sense of vulnerability, especially in a space that’s supposed to feel safe, like your dorm room, heightens the impact of the story. When she finally sees something, it becomes a visual confirmation of what she’s felt all along. That moment turns her unease into fear, but also into belief.

What makes the story even more meaningful is the historical layer, that someone had died on that floor years earlier. It connects her personal experience to a larger, possibly hidden history of the building. It also speaks to how haunted places aren’t just abandoned mansions or creepy woods, they can be everyday, lived-in spaces like college dorms. Places where young people are supposed to feel free and excited are suddenly connected to past trauma, making them feel unfamiliar and unsafe.

To me, this story reflects how personal folklore can develop in intimate spaces. It also shows how fear, especially when validated by later discoveries, can reshape how someone understands their own memories. Whether or not there was really someone at the window, the belief in that moment, the fear, the isolation, the later context of death, gives the story emotional and cultural power.

Ghost of Curry Hall

TG is a 25 year old graduate student and cultural forensic anthropologist. She grew up in Maryland and currently resides in Tennessee. She was an active member at her university.

Context: TG claims that she had heard this story many times while studying undergrad and that although she has not experienced it personally, many of her friends have encountered the ghost first hand.

Transcript (discussed over the phone):

Collector: What is the background story of the ghost?

TG: Basically, while they were building the two freshmen dorms, Frazer and Curry Hall, they were doing some electrical work but they didn’t put the elevators in yet so the elevator shafts were just very deep dirt holes. One of the workers had brought their toddler to the site, which was a big mistake to begin with. The worker put the child down for a second and the toddler rolled into the elevator shaft in the hallway of the 10th floor and died. Plenty of people I know have said that in the same hallway of Curry, you can hear a child’s laughter and it was very disturbing.

Collector: Do you believe in the ghost?

TG: I believe in ghosts so yes. While it’s possible that students just hear laughter and assume it is the ghost, I don’t think it’s impossible.

Thoughts/Analysis: Although ghost stories are legends and therefore may or may not be true, the impact they have on people’s lives is very real. As the informant discussed the fact that students in Curry Hall could actually hear child’s laughter is something that they will tell their friends, family, and children. That is shown by the informant being told this story by her friends. This shows how legends spread and how socially influenced they are. This account by TG can even be considered a memorate, where personal experiences of residents turned into campus folklore.

University of Iowa Dorm Ghost

“Now it’s recording”
“So last summer, I was in Iowa, in a, in the University of Iowa, for a summer program, and there were a bunch of kids who I was among in this huge dormitory , and we were the only people there. On the third floor. And apparently there had been ghost stories just circulating around that place, there had been some shady characters there in the past, and after a while a few people started complaining about noises and things, just shutting doors and the usual things, but then, well what is interesting is when people went in the shower, this happened to me as well, they start…they heard somebody sing , then when they came out there was no one there, so everyone was just freaked put because of that, because it happened , separately on a few occasions, when there was no one else in the building. And that was basically it. “
“Alright, do you remember what they were singing?”
“It was just a tune, I didn’t recognize it. It was just regular shower noises. I didn’t really pay attention until I realized that there was nobody there. So that was fun.”
“Is there a specific death or story that goes with that?”
“There was, I don’t, I don’t remember it specifically but there was somebody in that dormitory who either got murdered or committed suicide around the place that we were. Ah, and yeah that was there. But that was a hundred years ago, I think 1910 or something. It was an old building too. So yeah, nothing too exciting.”
A simple Google search for “University of Iowa Ghost Stories” brings up 136,000 results. This particular story falls in the pattern of many other college related ghost stories. A dormitory, a suicide or murder victim in the dormitory, and old school, and a student legend base around it. The reoccurrence of the shower incident, and the multiple witnesses, add credibility to the story. The story isn’t very long but it is traditional and seems that it could be true.