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Tours

1. Spooky Season Tour

   Maybe you believe in ghosts, maybe you don't, but the stories featured on this ghost tour have rooted themselves into the chapters of Miami's history.

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   1. Bad Chemistry

      Following his appointment in 1885, Professor of Chemistry Henry Snyder became one of Miami's most popular faculty members. Undistinguished in either appearance or demeanor, Professor Snyder owed his notoriety in no small part to his wife Minnie, a flamboyant and outgoing woman who loved the spotlight.

      On the morning of September 14, 1898, the community was shaken to its core when Harry's dead body was discovered in the Brice Hall chemistry lab, an empty beaker next to him. It has been said that the concoction he mixed up was difficult to analyze but contained enough poison "to kill an army."

      Most observers at the time felt the Professor had committed suicide, but that conclusion became suspect when shortly after, Minnie remarried, tying the knot with young William Pugh, Professor Snyder's laboratory assistant who possessed a background in chemistry and knowledge of poisons. Following the marriage, they immediately moved to Columbus.

      Was Henry Snyder's death the suicide of a despondent man, an accidental self-poisoning by a stressed-out scholar, or do circumstances suggest something more sinister? Did Minnie know, or suspect, more than she was willing to tell? Did Minnie and William contrive Henry’s death? We'll never know.
      
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   2. Thobe's Fountain

      Oxford stonemason Harry Thobe was known as Miami's self-styled number one sports fan. Harry was loved by the student body, but his headline-grabbing antics were a frequent source of misery for Miami administrators.

      In the early 1900's, he gave Miami a fountain, built with his own hands and lovingly maintained it for most of his life. Unfortunately, the fountain quickly fell into disrepair after his death and was eventually replaced by a plaque and a monument.

      Legend has it that the spirit of Harry, who always wanted to be the center of attention, still resides at his fountain's former site, ready and willing to greet those who pass by. All you have to do is stand west of the fountain, facing the nearest oak tree, and call his name. If you do, Harry's spirit will supposedly answer you by echoing his name back.
      
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   3. Reid Hall Murder

      Located where the Farmer School of Business now sits, Reid Hall was the site of a gruesome crime that occurred decades ago.

      On the night of May 9, 1959, Reid Hall RA Roger Sayles was shot and killed while attempting to break up a quarrel between two men. According to accounts of the crime, the dying Sayles fell bleeding onto a nearby door, leaving two bloody handprints. His assailant fled to a phone booth on the second floor of Ogden Hall where he ended his own life with a shot through the head.

      It is claimed that Sayles' handprints could be seen, preserved with varnish on the Reid Hall door upon which he fell dying in 1959.
      
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   4. Disappearance of Ron Tammen

      On the 19th of April In 1953, 20-year-old sophomore Ronald Tammen was dutifully studying in his Fisher Hall (now Marcum Hotel) room. About 8 p.m., Tammen left to pick up linens from the hall manager because someone had left a fish on his bed. Ninety-minutes later, when Tammen's roommate returned to the room, the door was open, the lights on, the radio playing, and Tammen's psychology book was open on his desk.

      Though Tammen's car was still parked outside, he was nowhere to be found. Local police searched the campus extensively for the next weeks and months, and even the FBI was called in. A woman in nearby Seven Mile recalls a young man knocking on her door about midnight on April 20, asking directions to the nearest bus station. But no one ever saw or heard of Tammen again.

      When students returned to campus in November of 1953, voices were heard in the night where the Formal Gardens are today. The students who followed the voices claimed to see strange, ghostly figures running speedily, only to vanish in the trees.

      When Fisher Hall became a campus theatre in 1958, students and faculty reported similarly strange phenomena ... lights dimming for no reason, chandeliers swinging, objects moving, and visions of a body being dragged and buried in the hillside.

      So what did happen to Tammen? Did he run away to escape something? Was he murdered, his body buried or hidden away from campus? His disappearance remains perhaps Miami's biggest unsolved mystery to this day.
      
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   5. Ghosts of Wilson Hall

      In 1882, before Miami was the main attraction to Oxford, “The Oxford Retreat” was a private hospital for the treatment of "mental and nervous diseases, alcoholic, and narcotic inebriety." The hospital contained several buildings, one of which was "The Pines" annex. The Pines was set apart from the main building to house women who were not only affected mentally, but who also had “nervous disorders, alcoholic, or narcotic addiction."

      The Pines became Wilson Hall when it was leased to Miami as a residence hall in 1936. It was said to be haunted by former patients. Wilson Hall was raised in 2019.
      
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   6. Ghost of Helen Peabody

      Western Female Seminary Principal Helen Peabody, an outspoken opponent of coeducation, was especially protective of her students and always suspicious of the Miami men who occasionally, and not always innocently, wandered onto Western property.

      It is not hard to imagine how Helen would have reacted to the sight of Miami men freely roaming the corridors of the Hall that now bears her name. In fact, it appears that Ms. Peabody may have done far more than merely turn over in her grave.

      According to some witnesses, her spirit leaves the tomb occasionally to watch over the women of Peabody Hall and to haunt the men who now dare to walk its corridors. Those who have seen her claim that Helen Peabody remains in death, as she was in life, a very formidable woman.
      
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   7. Ghost Biker

      It is well known that a drive on the roads surrounding Oxford can be dangerous, and sharp curves, oncoming traffic, speeders, and drunken drivers may not be the only things waiting for you on your trip.

      According to one legend from the 1940s, a young Oxford man was riding his motorcycle on Oxford-Milford road, traveling to propose to his girlfriend who lived on Earhart Road.

      Fate intervened before the cyclist arrived at his destination, however. Missing a sharp turn at an accelerated speed, the motorcycle flew off the road, and the cyclist was decapitated by a barbed-wire fence. It is said that death did not deter the young man, but that he is still trying to reach his girlfriend's house to pop the question.

      In order to see him today, you can drive to the girlfriend's old Earhart road home, currently owned by a Mr. Falk, and park facing south. If you flash your headlights three times, you may see the headlight of the ghost motorcycle focusing straight ahead, only to disappear as it approaches the fatal curve. If, by chance, the cycle light does not disappear, it is recommended that you drive away quickly in the opposite direction!
      
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