There are many superstitions surrounding the Quad, but one in particular caught the eye of Mary Barile — so much that she dedicated a chapter to it in her book, “The Haunted Boonslick: Ghosts, Ghouls and Monsters of Missouri’s Heartland.”
Listen | Chancellor Emeritus Richard Wallace describes the grandfather clock that chimes on its own.
Listen | Chancellor Emeritus Richard Wallace recounts a ghostly incident in the residence that frightened a couple of guests.
The legend of a ghost wandering the chancellor’s Residence on the Quad dates to the 19th century. According to an 1890 Columbia Missouri Herald article, “eerie lights and shadowy figures waltzed” in the house after the 1874 death of the university president’s wife, Alice Read.
Read was popular around campus, and Barile called her death “very upsetting” to the community. Despite Read’s death, legend has it that her ghost has never left the house.
Chancellor Emeritus Richard Wallace, who had an office in the building, also pointed to several unexplainable circumstances, such as a grandfather clock — without a working mechanism — that began to chime on its own. Another ghostly incident caused a professor to run shrieking through the house, telling Wallace to “brick it (the residence) up!”
In recent years, an elevator added in the most recent renovation has been known to run without occupants. Missing electronics and flashes of light also have spooked visitors and residents.
Despite the spooks, Barile, associate director of the Office of Grant Writing & Publications, believes that if the ghost of Read does indeed haunt the residence, she is a happy ghost. “Apparently, Alice does not want to leave her home. I call it her permanent homecoming,” Barile said, laughing.
Wallace said he was never been petrified by any of the strange happenings. Instead, he gets a good laugh whenever he recalls the scared professor who insisted Wallace not allow anyone into the residence.
“I don’t have an explanation, but for some odd reason I found it very amusing, and it is a story I’ve told many times,” he said.
Despite the “unexplainable” experiences he has encountered, Wallace remains a skeptic about whether the residence is haunted, though he doesn’t rule it out.
“To claim that something doesn’t exist, whether ghosts or something else, presumes a knowledge base that most of us don’t have,” Wallace said. “So I always leave open the possibility. Though I’m not convinced, that doesn’t mean I’m certain that it’s not there.”
A brief history
Residence on
the Quad
The Residence on the Quad was completed in 1867 and underwent restorations in 1979. The most recent renovation was finished in 2006.
The residence is the oldest building on campus. Switzler Hall – the oldest academic building – was built four years later.
The residence is built on the site of an earlier house completed in 1843. During the Civil War, the commanding officer of Union soldiers, Col. Lewis Merrill, lived in the house for a short period. On Nov. 28, 1865, the house was destroyed by fire.
After the fire, the Missouri legislature set aside $10,000 — the first state appropriation to the university — for a new residence and other improvements on campus. In 1867, the $8,000 home was completed, and President Daniel Read and his family took up residence. Since then, it has been home to MU presidents and chancellors and the site of a birth, a death and three weddings.
— Catie Lau
Sources: Anne Deaton, Office of The Chancellor, MU website
