Does this look familiar to anyone?
From The Red & Black:
On March 1, 1972, UGA student Stanley Park Haddock was found hanging deceased and badly decomposed in room 112 in the southern wing of Joe Brown Hall.
According to a March 2, 1972 article from the Athens Banner-Herald, Haddock’s body was found after a janitor went to investigate a foul odor on the first floor of the building. Cleaning of Haddock’s dormitory proved to be impossible, and the entire wing where the body was discovered was sealed off.
The circumstances surrounding Haddock’s death were never fully clear. It is still unknown whether his death was suicide or an accident. Regardless of the specifics, Haddock’s death has left Joe Brown Hall home to a lot of heartache and unanswered questions.
The “stairs to nowhere” are a most unusual byproduct of the hall’s devastating history. In the southern wing of the building, there is a stairwell that leads to a bricked-up doorway with a photo of a hallway hung in front of it.
It is said that this doorway was sealed due to university officials being unable to completely clean Haddock’s room after his death, leaving it unusable. However, this has never been confirmed or documented.
“Every time I go past the staircase I get the worst sensation,” said Margaret Lonsway, a junior environmental health science major. “It’s awful … It just feels like the place would be haunted.”
Lonsway had multiple classes in Joe Brown Hall for their minor in German. In 2021, they had a hybrid class that offered the option to go to class in person or on Zoom. After attending class in person one time, Lonsway opted to attend online for the rest of the semester.
“After one visit I stopped going because I hated the building so much,” Lonsway said.
Students and faculty have reported hearing knocking and footsteps coming from the sealed wing of the hall, as well as a foul smell, according to the Southern Spirit Guide.
Even beyond these three halls, reports of ghostly activity and otherworldly interactions have popped up all over UGA’s campus.
“There’s no way campus is not haunted,” Lonsway said. “It’s so old — there’s just no way.”
As a young music major, our saxophone teacher, Kenneth Fischer, had an office there and I used to go over there some weeknights for lessons when I was coming up in high school. Can’t say I ever recall any spooky feelings…there again, I never saw this door in my days there, and may have thought different about it had I know. Gives me the heebie jeebies just looking at it.
You know any good ghost stories from you days in Athens?
I had drama in a classroom on the lowest floor, the window faced the bus stop on Baldwin st. Never had a creepy feeling or heard about the sealed door.
I was at UGA 79-87 (I enjoyed my time) and I’ve never heard this story before. I assume this was north campus? I spent all my time at the south end of south campus.
Sad case of auto-erotic asphyxiation is what the UGAPD patrol shift commander on that day explained to decades of police recruits at the Northeast GA Police Academy for decades when teaching about accidental deaths.
Not something they would publish back then. Better left as unexplained.
I recall there being some ghost stories on and around campus but am drawing a blank. Maybe more comments will revive my memory but I do recall they were “common knowledge”. Old unsolved murders was likely the theme.
Never heard about this one, but did hear that Waddell Hall was haunted due to a murder/suicide that took back in 1918 or so. Something along the lines of a student from a prominent Georgia family had gotten his townie/local girlfriend “indisposed” as the saying goes…
Never set foot in Joe Brown Hall, and had to look up where the heck it was. Must have walked by it a thousand times and never thought twice about it, even though I took a few classes in Park Hall and 1 at the Fine Arts Building across the street. Which reminds me…
This might be an offseason topic: what class did you take at UGA that was completely random and still enjoyed?
For me, I was 1 credit hour short of graduating on time so my advisor suggested University Chorus. I was a Poly Sci major and am tone deaf as a rock. Went the 1st day to Fine Arts and the girl taking roll was cute, so I’d hang out and do the Red & Black crossword every day. I even went to sing in a concert (had my own tux to wear so why not?). Cute girl was surprised I showed and that I kept coming to class. Said she had a boyfriend, but would mark me present the rest of the quarter. And that’s why I never learned to sing…
Mine was a class where we learned how audio was prepped in studios for shows. We were given a roll of audio tape that was a talk show and we got to splice it randomly to make the two people say some hilarious stuff. That’s ancient wisdom now, since it can all be done digitally.
I remember that! I had a couple of classes in Joe Brown Hall, and around 1985 I took a picture of that stairway to show my dad (class of ’52)
I heard a lot of guys had some burning, haunting memories of Effie’s.