“The truth must dazzle gradually”

While many legends have circulated at Eastern University about ghosts haunting the old Walton Manor buildings, most students now seem to regard them as jokes, merely fictions that people of older years believed.

However, I think the view that these are merely legends is an incorrect assumption. 

Everything seemed normal during one of our last Old Testament classes in Walton 3. It was the end of Fall Semester 2024, and all of us were itching to see the end of classes for Christmas Break. Despite it only being ten in the morning, the day was already surprisingly dreary. At the time, we all thought it was just the blustery winter weather that so affected the atmosphere of that room. 

Normally, class opened with us reciting a poem together. We tried to memorize and recite three poems that semester, but all struggled with the last one: Emily Dickinson’s “Tell the Truth Slant.” 

We did not begin class that morning with the poem, and although Emily writes that “success in circuit lies,” our success did not lie in us circuiting around the poem. Although the wind picked up around us, making the windows creak with its blow, we still felt safe inside, and continued on with class.

However, that was not to last.

The wind grew even stronger. We realized that we’d forgotten the poem, but attempted to carry on class anyways. And yet, our attempt to remain undistracted was to no avail! The wind blasted against the windowpane–and the window flew open! 

All our pages were hurled about the room, our books blown shut! 

We’d all joked about a ghost haunting Baird Library or Baird Reading Room, but in that moment, we realized the truth. The ghost at Eastern University actually lived in Walton 3. We tried to laugh it off, to joke about how it was all because we didn’t say the poem that morning. 

And perhaps, it was indeed because we didn’t say the poem that the ghost made her first appearance that morning.

My friend got up to fasten the window tight, and we moved on. 

Later in class that morning, we joked again about the poem and the wind, and before we knew it, again! The window blew open again, letting another gasp of frigid air into our classroom. This seemed like more than a coincidence. 

Those strange wind gusts happened twice that morning in Old Testament and another night when I was up late working in the classroom. Every time, it seemed to herald the strange realization that perhaps, the room was not the little lovely place it felt like on a sunny afternoon.

During the winter, in other Old Testament classes, we heard strange creaks and thumps from the ceiling above us. We shrugged these inexplicable noises off at the time, but now I wonder if they coincided with other moments when we forgot to recite our poem. 

These off-kilter noises, blustery wind gusts and other strange happenings don’t surprise me. Where better for a ghost to live than a classroom, with gargoyles lining the walls, and a great old stone fireplace that no one uses anymore? The room echoes with the laughter of ages past, music from parties thrown by the Waltons and the very breath of life lived in opulence. Even if a ghost didn’t inhabit it, I think Walton 3 would feel haunted. 

Legends have circulated around the university for years now about Mr. Walton’s ghost haunting the campus. Some explain that he simply couldn’t bear to leave his dear estate. Perhaps it was his ghost that morning, though, I wonder if perhaps, it was actually his wife that we met on that grey morning in Walton 3. As I’ve not met the ghost beyond her surprising appearances through the wind gusts, the noises, and the strange feeling I have that I’m not really alone when I study late into the evening in Walton 3, I can’t know for sure. But perhaps, someday she’ll reveal herself. 

Perhaps, as Emily Dickinson writes in that fateful poem, “The Truth must dazzle gradually Or every man be blind –”, and this ghost knows that the truth of her existence must dazzle us gradually…for there’s no going back once we’ve seen such a sight.

So, I beg you all, be careful whenever you walk into Walton 3, and be careful especially not to forget to recite your poetry as you enter. For, who knows? You might indeed find yourself being accosted by the ghost like we were: the ghost that haunts Walton 3. You might shrug off this warning, or think it funny, but, like we all learned that day in Walton 3, perhaps that flippancy will only lead to greater difficulties.