Through Ohio State's 135 years there have been many ghost stories - but few are as prominent as the hauntings in Pomerene Hall.
"Pomerene was built in the early '20s and resembles a castle," said Dorrie Wells, the fiscal officer for the School of Physical Activity and Educational Services. "The three staircases in the building provide for abundant access and a good means to avoid detection. Pomerene (Hall) is a perfect place for a ghostly presence to reside."
Pomerene Hall is home to numerous offices, the Mirror Lake Cafe and the Lady in Pink.
John Faul, manager at Mirror Lake Cafe, said a professor died before Mirror Lake was built. He committed suicide because of a business venture.
"His wife vowed to never leave the spot where he died. Then OSU built Pomerene Hall here and she was very upset about it," Faul said.
The couple is rumored to haunt Pomerene Hall together - the husband only in the building but his wife, the Lady in Pink, sometimes lingers on Mirror Lake too, Faul said.
"Supposedly, late at night when you're down at the lake and you look up at the window you will see a lady in a pink ball gown," Faul said.
Wells said the Lady in Pink "has been seen in the back hallways and in the windows of the grand lounge as well as skating across Mirror Lake late at night."
Students do not need to be scared of the Lady in Pink, Wells said.
"Our Lady in Pink does not scare. She is quite the tease," Wells said. "Ghostly steps are occasionally heard by people burning the midnight oil. When they try and track down the footsteps they always seem just around the corner, but you can never catch up to them."
A few years ago when computers in Pomerene had just gotten voice boxes, students heard them saying "HELLO? HELLO?," Wells said.
Years ago, university police officers were walking through Pomerene Hall in the dark with flashlights, said Krista Winger, exam scheduling coordinator in the Office of Disabilities, whose husband is a university police officer and told her the story.
An officer was walking around and all of the sudden something grasped their ankle, she said.
"They had just come up to the edge (of a hole in the floor from construction) and something grabbed them and stopped them," Winger said. "When they shown the flashlight down there was nothing holding their ankle but they were about ready to go over the edge."
"That was my favorite. That person who got stopped from going over the edge," she said.
Winger, who works in the basement of Pomerene Hall, said she sometimes hears noises when she is working by herself or when it is dark.
"I don't want to know what that is," she said. "I'm not going to go check it out."
Whether Pomerene Hall is haunted by the Lady in Pink no one will ever know. But Wells has one suggestion for everyone who passes through the building.
"If you are in Pomerene Hall - late at night when the building has quieted down - listen for those footsteps that you can never track down to a person."
Erin C. Donnelly, Lantern campus editor, contributed to this article.
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