The Ghosts of Millikin

Millikin University was founded in 1901. Being well over 100 years old, Millikin has drawn a wide range of people to its campus over the years. Its age is responsible for the number of traditions around campus and the legacy off campus. With just how old Millikin is, what if some of the people attracted aren’t exactly people at all?

There have been rumors and stories spread for years about the many different ghosts that seem to linger in different spots around campus. Whether you believe in ghosts or not, there are stories from people who do believe that might change your mind. Two believers being a former student and a current faculty member who both spoke to me about their ghostly experiences on campus.

Strange Sightings in Shilling and Blackburn

Shilling Hall

When asked if she believed in ghosts, 2023 Millikin graduate, Sydney Griggs, did not hesitate to say, “Yes, a million percent. There’s too much history at Millikin and in Decatur in general to not be at least a little haunted.” 

For Sydney, she only started to believe in ghosts after her first experience in Shilling Hall. Students at Millikin have seen and spread photos that allegedly show a very pale figure that wanders in Shilling, particularly on the staircases. No one seems fully sure of who that figure is or what it wants, but it's believed that this ghost-like figure is friendly and harmless, but how can anyone be 100% sure? 

One thing for sure is that the ghost who is supposedly a resident of Blackburn Hall with the students is not so friendly. From Sydney’s experience, the scariest things she ever experienced on campus happened during her time living in Blackburn Hall as an RA. Dorms are meant to be students' safe spaces while at Millikin, but the ghost at Blackburn Hall seemed to be set on making Sydney’s dorm anything but safe.

Objects would fall off her shelves without warning in ways that shouldn’t have been possible. Nightmares kept her up every night when she used to have peaceful sleep otherwise, only to hear weird noises and knocking from her bathroom. She says that the room had a very “peculiar and unsettling energy.” 

By far the scariest experience during her time at Millikin happened one Halloween night in 2021. Looking out the window from her 2nd floor dorm in Weck Hall, she saw someone or something moving in a weird, non-human way outside of Shilling. “They were looking straight down at the ground with their neck bent at a weird angle,” she says. 

At first, it seemed funny. She and her friend had a good laugh, making fun of the strange figure. Who walks like that during the middle of the night with their chin tucked to their chest and their eyes completely focused on the sidewalk? But then the figure suddenly turned directly towards them at the exact moment they laughed, even when her blinds were barely open enough for anyone to see inside. 

She says, “They appeared to be faceless and then disappeared out of nowhere right after it looked our way.” To this day, she’s still unsure what that figure was, how it saw her, or heard her laughter when it was so far away.

Even simply walking around campus at night apparently feels scary, like you are being watched. She says, “I used to avoid Shilling after dark entirely because it felt too spooky.” Even with this, she also says, “It can be fun to share stories, but it also freaks me out as a big scaredy cat.”

Theater Ghosts and Mysterious Melting

Students aren’t the only people on campus, so these ghostly experiences aren't reserved just for them. Faculty also have seen or heard things that are unnatural, usually in all of the same places students have mentioned seeing ghosts. One major place being Albert Taylor Theatre, which is inside one of the oldest buildings on campus. It is said that there is a very well-known ghost of a young girl who walks the halls of Albert Taylor Theatre. One faculty member, Gail Fyke, says, “She haunts it and she’s pretty well known. You had to put candy out if you wanted her to leave your performance alone and not have something go wrong.”

Albert Taylor Theatre

Interestingly, she also spoke about the older dorms on campus like Blackburn Hall, the same place that created nothing but fear for the former student. Blackburn is a residence hall located by Public Safety and Shilling Hall. It's infamous as well, even if its ghosts aren't as widely known on campus like the one in Albert Taylor, since not everyone steps into the residence halls. 

Gail says, "I've not been in those dorms, but I hear about them all the time.” While she had no strange experience in Blackburn, she still had scary experiences of her own. She says, “My office got like 120 degrees and stuff melted. He goes, ‘No. This stuff did not come up from heat. I’m not really sure what, but it’s not from heat.’”

With a campus that is now 127 years old, it's almost inevitable that there would be some strange things happening around such an old campus. Every student seems to have had an experience, and if not, they know about other’s experiences and the crazy legends among students. Faculty also know these legends, spreading them even more. Whether you believe in these legends or ghosts, can all of it be shrugged off as mere coincidence? Or is there some validity to all of these stories and experiences?