{"id":8226,"date":"2019-10-28T16:27:40","date_gmt":"2019-10-28T20:27:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/?p=8226"},"modified":"2019-10-28T16:27:42","modified_gmt":"2019-10-28T20:27:42","slug":"haunted-monmouth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/haunted-monmouth\/","title":{"rendered":"Haunted Monmouth"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

When it comes to haunted historical locations, some of Kathy Kelly\u2019s favorites are right here on the campus of Monmouth University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn this area, there are a lot of isolated ghost stories and isolated ghosts associated with significant or very private events,\u201d says Kelly \u201917M, owner of Paranormal Books & Curiosities in Asbury Park, New Jersey. \u201cAnd I think it serves as a reminder of just how long this community has been here and how much we\u2019re at the epicenter of early American history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consider, for instance, Wilson Hall. According to Kelly, long before it was an aesthetic staple of the University\u2019s campus, Wilson Hall\u2014or Shadow Lawn, as it was known at the time\u2014was the home of Hubert Templeton Parson and his wife, Maysie, both of whom \u201csuffered much in its halls.\u201d Having made their fortune in the world of mercantile, the Parsons were, as Kelly puts it, nouveau riche, and never quite fit in with the blue bloods of Monmouth County.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo\nmansion could make them fully acceptable, and they felt the sting of that,\u201d\nsays Kelly. \u201cThere\u2019s a certain amount of historical sadness around their\nstory.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hubert\nParson was the second president of the F.W. Woolworth Company, and he and his\nwife invested their entire fortune in collecting European art and furniture.\nWhen Parson died after the stock market crash of 1929, his wife attempted to\nsell their extensive collection\u2014only to find out each and every artifact was a\nvirtually worthless fake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\nthink there\u2019s a part in each of us that can have compassion for that,\u201d says\nKelly, who once conducted a seance inside Wilson Hall as a way to raise funds for\na scholarship program. \u201cIt\u2019s the American dream of struggling to move from one\nclass to another and realizing the utter irrelevance of your character.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\nthe person most often attributed with haunting Wilson Hall is Parson\u2019s\nunmarried sister-in-law, Bertha Gasque, who loved the mansion and lived there\nas the family\u2019s housekeeper. It is said that this lonely, solitary woman can be\nfound roaming Wilson Hall late at night, tending to the daily chores she once\nmaintained during her living years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\ndid an investigation of Wilson Hall and I can tell you that it truly is a\ngracious building that the University should be incredibly proud of,\u201d says\nKelly. \u201cThere\u2019s a real weight of history in it when you walk through. You feel\nguided\u2014as if you\u2019re not walking the halls alone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Top<\/em>: Wilson Hall. Above<\/em>: The library’s grand staircase. <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

And then there\u2019s the Murry and Leonie Guggenheim Memorial Library, which served as the namesake couple\u2019s summer home during the first half of the 20th century before it was conveyed to the University in 1960. According to Kelly, Leonie Guggenheim can be found walking down the middle of the library\u2019s grand staircase between 11 o\u2019clock and midnight every evening. This\u2014along with other abstract paranormal sightings\u2014is why the library is often cited as one of the Top 10 most haunted libraries in the United States<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Want one more? Well, Kelly says\nthat the campus police department building\u2014which was once the summer home of\nlegendary boxer Jack Dempsey\u2014also has its share of haunted tales, including\nsightings of a mysterious woman in white descending the stairs at odd hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think these are all wonderful resources for the University. Not from a financial standpoint, but rather as a way of connecting Monmouth University to the larger community and its history,\u201d says Kelly. \u201cPeople take a lot of pride in their ghosts, and it\u2019s through these haunted histories that we gain access to private, historical moments.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more about how Kathy Kelly \u201917M examines the past through the lens of the paranormal.<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kathy Kelly \u201917M, owner of Paranormal Books & Curiosities, reveals the haunted history behind several campus landmarks. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":8228,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"image_focus":"","hide_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"thumbnail":"\"\"","catString":"Uncategorized","issue":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/60"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8226"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8226\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8544,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8226\/revisions\/8544"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monmouth.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}