By Jasmine Durst
For years, people in the alumni house have sensed a female presence, and for the longest time, only women would experience it before two of the men in the building had their own personal experiences. Staff named the ghost Jenny due to an investigation in the past where a club member was working with dowsing rods, and it pointed to the name Jenny on a list of names on the wall.
Cindy Scholl is the annual fund specialist and works at the alumni house, and she shared the following stories from her years at the alumni house.
Several people heard typing coming from one of the offices when no one was there, which stopped when someone got up and walked towards the office. People have also reported shadowy figures, apparitions, papers shuffling, a snowman statue getting turned, and disembodied voices.
Scholl said, “A few weeks ago, a co-worker saw a woman walk by her office. She thought it was me (long blonde hair and a red top), but when she got up and came to my office, she realized I had a different color top on. I had been in my office the entire time. Plus, the person she saw had walked the opposite direction.”
Another story explained that when one alumni house staff member was coming back to the office, he saw a student sitting at our front desk through the window, but when he opened the door and walked in, he realized there was no one there.
A few years ago, Campus Safety received a phone call from a 911 dispatcher saying they kept receiving 911 calls from one of the extensions in the building. When they came to check it out, there was no one in the building and nothing unusual with the phone. The incident was dismissed as a “spoofing” situation but never confirmed.
A worker also heard a noise from the other side of the divider in his office, though when he got up to check it out, he discovered a box full of envelopes where the envelopes were falling forward slowly, one at a time, like someone was flipping through them.
Scholl said, “No one has ever felt scared or threatened by whatever or whoever is here. We simply coexist. And hey, if she wants to help out with the workload, we are happy to have her.”
Susquehanna University Paranormal Club decided to do an investigation on Feb. 26, 2026, from 7-9 p.m. Francis Rogai, the historian of Paranormal Club, shared the following information about his findings about the alumni house.
Around 1900, the land may have been owned by the App or Schoch families, and at least between 1900-1990, the university purchased it or had the deed to build the house. From at least 1990 to 2003, the building was used for staff and professor housing, and it was not until 2004 that it was transitioned into the Office of Advancement.
The Office of Development/Advancement is split into three departments: Annual Fund, Alumni Engagement, and Major Gifts, which coordinate fundraising efforts for the university and alumni outreach.The “Development” name was held in the 1990s, and its commitment was to reach out to alumni who had lived at least since 1884.
While investigating the Alumni House, the Paranormal Club split into two teams to cover upstairs and downstairs simultaneously to find overlaps with the spirits.
The main instrument of communication between club members and spirits is a spirit box. A spirit box is a device that rapidly scans radio frequencies to create white noise and audio fragments, which paranormal investigators believe spirits can manipulate to communicate in real time.
According to group one, covering downstairs first, the spirits recognized the name Richard Woods, a previous resident of the house. “No, oh no” was a common deflection whenever anyone in the group asked about how the spirit died, and one spirit even said there was a spirit outside.
They communicated with spirits on both floors, and the spirits acknowledged when people left saying things like “Gone,” “Where are you going?” and “Don’t leave.”
According to group one, there was a clear “Yes, please” when they asked the spirit if the groups should switch. Group one confirmed there was a spirit who liked helping Christina with accounting and fundraising.
They got a name that started with a W, and the ghost responded to the name Wynonna. They later confirmed she was not the blond ghost.
With group two, there were several voices, including a little girl saying “Hello” and an adult male spirit saying “Yup” on the spirit box. One of the spirits said “Yes, I did” when asked if they ever worked at Susquehanna University. Another asked for a ball to be rolled towards it.
As a member of the investigation myself, I had gotten ill in one of the rooms upstairs, which happened to be the one closest to the upstairs bathroom. “You know when you get so upset that your body starts heating up and you get tears in your eyes? That’s what it felt like.” I collapsed against a cabinet and then again against the doorframe before I had to stop investigating for about 15-20 minutes. I sat with Cindy and calmed down.
At the same time as when he hit the cabinet and the doorframe, the spirit box said “Dead” and “One down.”
The Paranormal Club meets every Thursday from 5-6 p.m. in Apfelbaum Hall. The club welcomes new members every semester!