Exploring Architectural History: the haunted house you never dreamed of
Written by Lilli Donohue, Photographs by Katie Burke
Oglethorpe House is mainly home to upperclassmen, but there are some exceptions. Perrin Smith, a third-year writing student, lived in O-House over his sophomore year and found that there were more than just students living in the repurposed hotel. He as well as many others claim to hear footsteps, shouting and other spooky things around the dorm. SCAD students are not the only ones though. Visitors who stayed in the building while it was a hotel, then known as the Downtowner Motor Inn, were aware of this supernatural activity. SCAD bought the Motor Inn in 1990 and was then converted into dorms.
As with many supernatural experiences, Smith’s happened around 3 a.m. “We heard laughing,” he said. Footsteps, pacing around the room with nobody to commit to the noise frightened Smith and his roommates. People would also see wet footsteps on the floors. There were also other happenings around the building. “Everyone accused each other of shouting,” said Smith. This was a common occurrence. Obviously noise complaints are not unusual in a college dorm, but Smith and his roommates were fast asleep before the complaints of shouting arose. Other neighbors would hear it too. The rooms that were supposedly being loud always denied it, citing the ghosts of O-House.
All of these occurrences can be attributed to a few different ghosts. The most famous one was laid to rest in Savannah’s famous Bonaventure Cemetery. The ghost of Gracie Watkins, the little girl who also appears in the cemetery, is said to be found wandering around O-House. She has been seen as a transparent form in the hallways or in rooms. Also, there are claims of a mysterious sound like a stool scraping across the floor in room 416. People have also reported the sound of a marble dropping and rolling, which would make sense if it was the ghost of a little girl like Gracie Watkins.
Before all of these spooked students, O-House was meant to offer a no-frills, cheap place to stay for the night. The Downtowner locations were strategically placed near a large hotel or convention center in hopes that business would spill over in their direction. Downtowners were built all across the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s. As motor inns and downtown life were on the rise, so was the chain. The company stayed in business until 1993. Savannah’s Downtowner was bought by the college in 1990, coinciding with the downfall of the chain. O-House was one of the earlier dorms at SCAD since the university was founded in the very late ‘70s.
Much like the rest of SCAD, there is much more to the building than what meets the eye. Next time you pass by O-House, keep an eye out for Gracie Watkins or the other ghosts!
