Class Dismissed: A Road Trip to Texas’s Haunted Schools (Part 1)
Grab your backpack and hone your pencils, because Texas classrooms have more than just chalk dust left behind. From empty campuses where you can still imagine kids at recess to old schoolhouses guarded by night guards, Texas’s haunted schools are rich in spooky history and local legends. If you’re interested in ghost hunts in old gyms or want to join a twilight tour through historic halls, this guide will show you the eeriest schools across the Lone Star State.
1. Angelo State University — San Angelo
Angelo State University was founded in 1928 as San Angelo College, a two-year junior college managed by the San Angelo Independent School District. It became Angelo State College in 1965 and awarded its first bachelor's degrees in 1967. The university joined the Texas State University System in 1975 and later moved under the Texas Tech University System Board of Regents in 2007. The building at the heart of its most famous ghost story, Hardeman Hall, is named after the senator who helped create the university.
The Central Ghost Story: Leandra Morales and Hardeman Hall
This one has real documentation behind it, not just campus legend. On the night of April 22, 1978, a student called Robert Mark Wagner called San Angelo police saying he'd found a body in Room 200 of the Hardeman Building (which was once home to the campus photo lab). Upon arrival, police discovered freshman Leandra Morales viciously beaten and stabbed three times. Wagner claimed he'd heard moaning as he was leaving the photo lab and found her struggling to breathe. Investigators were doubtful, but by the next morning Wagner had confessed. He was convicted and sentenced to 25 years.
Employees have since reported a variety of paranormal experiences including footsteps in vacant hallways, a man and woman arguing faintly, and a phantom figure on the staircase. Staff and students in Hardeman Hall have described:
Footsteps in deserted hallways
Sounds of a man and a woman arguing, heard with no one around.
A ghostly female figure with dark hair in a white dress, often seen late at night.
Radios turning on by themselves (even while unplugged) and elevators moving with no one operating them.
Visiting
ASU is a public university campus in San Angelo, and you can walk around during the day. Hardeman Hall is an active academic building, so you can view it and walk the halls during normal operating hours, though it's an office/classroom space rather than a tourist stop.
Salado College Ruins
2. Salado College Ruins — Salado
Salado College was founded in February 1860 as one of the coeducational, degree-granting schools—unusual for the era—and opened without church or state funding. Classes began in a temporary building in February 1860 with 75 students; the permanent two-story building's cornerstone was laid in July 1865. The Panic of 1873 and the rise of state-funded colleges gutted enrollment, and Colonel Elijah Sterling Clack Robertson personally bought the college in 1877 to save it from foreclosure. He died in 1879, the state charter lapsed in 1880, and the college closed for good in 1885.
Afterward, the building became Thomas Arnold High School, a private school, from 1890 until it closed in 1913, then served as a public school until 1924. Fires in 1901 and 1902 destroyed it, but it was rebuilt each time. A final fire in 1924 ended the school for good, as the town could not afford to rebuild. Only the west wall and part of the east wall remain. The ruins were later stabilized and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985. Today, the site, called Salado College Park, is open to the public.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
Salado College doesn't have a well-documented, specific ghost story (no named apparition, no dated incident). I spoke with a couple of locals who said they had heard about light anomalies, shadows, and inexplicable sounds coming from the ruins. What exists is more atmospheric folklore:
The "suspicious" fires — Local legend in Salado describes the 1901, 1902, and 1924 fires as suspicious, with arson suspected but never proven. That unresolved mystery is the closest thing to a "legend" tied directly to the ruins, though locals have speculated about the fires' cause.
Salado's broader haunted reputation — The town itself punches well above its weight in Texas ghost lore, most famously around the Stagecoach Inn just across the street. The college ruins get swept into general "Salado is haunted" roundups and ghost-town lists, but without a specific reported apparition or incident tied to the site itself.
Visiting
Kiddo and I visited the ruins easily while staying at the Stagecoach Inn across the street. Salado College Park (423 S. Main St., Salado, TX) is free and open to the public, within walking distance of the town's shops and restaurants. It's a straightforward daytime stop — no tours needed, just the stabilized ruins on their hilltop setting.
3. Sam Houston State University (Austin Hall) — Huntsville
Sam Houston State University’s history predates its official founding. The campus was first home to Austin College, a Presbyterian school whose main building, Austin Hall, was built in 1851. This makes it the oldest university building still in use west of the Mississippi. When Austin College moved to Sherman, Texas, in 1876, the empty campus and building became available, which led to the founding of SHSU.
Classes began that October with 110 students and four faculty members; however, the school's first president, Bernard Mallon, died just eleven days after opening. SHSU is now the third-oldest public institution of higher learning in Texas, and Austin Hall — inherited from Austin College — remains its oldest building.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
Austin Hall — The oldest, most storied building on campus has multiple supernatural reports: a maid reportedly seen in a 3rd-floor window; a young boy said to appear in the same window; and claims that the spirit of Sam Houston himself walks the halls.
Peabody Library — Widely called the "most haunted" building on campus, reports include seeing an apparition of a woman in a long, high-necked black dress, styled like the early 20th century. Her identity is unknown because her face is never quite visible; however, many believe she was one of the school's early librarians.
Belvin-Buchanan Hall and Elliott Hall — Campus lore attaches unverified accounts of a female student's suicide to Belvin-Buchanan, and a young woman's murder to Elliott Hall.
Visiting
SHSU is a public university campus in Huntsville, and you can walk around during normal hours. Austin Hall and Peabody are working academic buildings, not tourist attractions, so that you can see and walk by them, but there isn’t a formal ghost tour. It’s more about exploring the campus and admiring the oldest building west of the Mississippi.
4. Southwestern University — Georgetown
Southwestern University is Texas's oldest university, with heritage tracing to 1840. The school opened in its permanent home of Georgetown in October 1873, and the Texas Legislature formally chartered it under the Southwestern name in 1875. It's the second-oldest coeducational liberal arts college west of the Mississippi and, at 180-plus years old, it's had plenty of time to accumulate campus ghost lore.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
Mabee Hall (dorm) — Reports include feeling something touching them and hearing disembodied voices.
Mood-Bridwell Hall is named after Dr. Francis A. Mood, the university’s first Regent. According to legend, his wife Sue was buried in the cemetery behind campus, but his friends thought the couple should be together. The story goes that they secretly moved his remains at night and buried him next to her, though there’s no historical record to confirm this. Today, the building, over 120 years old, is known for doors that creak open and slam shut on their own.
Brown-Cody Hall — Student reports include seeing shadows and hearing a tennis ball bouncing on the floor above every night at 3 a.m. — the "witching hour" — with no one ever found upstairs.
Clark Hall — A common report is seeing a woman with glowing hair in a white nightgown on the third floor, who walks silently and vanishes into a wall.
Visiting
Southwestern is a private university campus in Georgetown, open to walk around during the day. The residence halls (Mabee, Brown-Cody, Clark) aren't open to outside visitors. Still, Mood-Bridwell and other academic buildings are viewable/walkable as part of general campus access.
5. St. Edward's University — Austin
St. Edward's University traces back to 1872, when Bishop Claude Dubuis of Galveston learned that a lady named Mary Doyle intended to leave most of her 498-acre South Austin farm to the Catholic Church for an educational institution. He invited Reverend Edward Sorin — the same Holy Cross priest who founded the University of Notre Dame — to Texas, and Sorin established St. Edward's Academy on the farmland in 1877. For its first decade, it was a modest, homespun school. That changed in 1885, when it received an official college charter.
St. Edward’s faced many challenges: a major fire destroyed most of the campus in 1903, but the university rebuilt it by that fall; later, a tornado caused more damage. The university was an all-male, Holy Cross-run school for many years before opening to women in 1966 through Maryhill College. In 1970, Maryhill fully merged into St. Edward’s, making the university coeducational. Today, it is Austin’s only Catholic university and one of Texas's most architecturally impressive campuses, so it’s no surprise it has collected many ghost stories.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
The Falling Monk of Main Building — The most iconic of St. Edward's legends. While painting one of the upper floors of Main, a gust of wind reportedly pulled a monk's canvas out an open third-floor window; it is said he leaped for it and he fell to his death. Students report hearing moans and wailing from the top floor and sometimes describe a shadow figure.
The Trampled Student — This is one of the university's oldest stories, dating back to 1877. A student was reportedly struck and killed by a horse-drawn carriage on what is now a campus road. Students driving that stretch at night have described hearing horses followed by a loud thud, as if their wheels just passed over something.
Mary Moody Northern Theatre — One story holds that a female student took her own life in the theater after being assaulted on campus; another story tells of a young man who hanged himself, with witnesses reporting the sound and sight of a body swinging on ropes that aren't actually there. Other reported experiences include shadows walking into walls and feeling seen.
Theresa Hall — A child apparition, described as 10-12 years old with long black hair and a white dress, has been reported to approach students and ask if they want to play. Some people believe her name is Danielle. Other reports include catching whispers and seeing lights flickering on and off.
Doyle/East Hall's Protective Nun — It is believed to be haunted by a nun who reportedly opposed the school's decision to make her all-girls dorm co-ed. It is thought that she turns on showers and generally causes trouble for male residents.
Premont/Dujarie Hall — It is said someone died after slipping in the showers, but his body was not discovered for a week. The ghost is blamed for slamming doors and turning on showers.
Basil Moreau Hall's Shadow Figure — Students report a shadow-person glimpsed only peripherally, and who often becomes hostile if spoken to directly.
Visiting
St. Edward's is a private university campus, open to walk around during the day. You can see the Main Building and the Mary Moody Northern Theatre as part of general campus access, and the theater hosts public performances if you want a legitimate reason to be inside after dark. Residence halls aren't open to visitors from outside the university.
Looking for a ghost tour in Austin? Check out Original Austin Ghost Tours!
6. Toyah High School — Toyah (ghost town)
Toyah began in 1879 when W.T. Youngblood moved his family from Midland and set up a tent trading post. The Texas and Pacific Railway arrived in 1881, transforming Toyah into a boomtown of tents, saloons, and restaurants. In 1885, a drunk Reeves County sheriff was shot dead by Texas Rangers in a saloon gunfight that also resulted in the death of one of the Rangers. In 1896, former sheriff George "Bud" Frazer was shotgunned to death mid-card game by his rival "Killin'" Jim Miller, ending a long feud. In 1906, a Black man named "Slab" Pitts was lynched by a mob for living with/marrying a white woman. In addition, Toyah had barred Black residents from living within 180 miles of town, and this was a hate-driven murder, not folklore. You can find more info at Lynching of “Slab” Pitts.
The town's first school opened in 1894 as a one-room building. A large brick school was subsequently built in 1912 that served as both elementary and high school. By 1914, Toyah had peaked at almost 1,100 residents, with churches, banks, and a hotel. Toyah then lost its shipping business to nearby Toyahvale, and the Great Depression further gutted the population, down to about 500 by 1930 and 150 by 1980. A catastrophic 2004 storm dumped eight inches of rain in two hours, breached the town's dike, and flooded the remaining buildings. Today, Toyah has roughly 50 residents, and the old high school sits vacant and roofless.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
The main legend at Toyah High School is about the "black-eyed children," mysterious figures said to walk Toyah’s empty streets at night and look into the windows of the few people still living there. Toyah is one of the few places in Texas where this story is tied to an actual, aging building rather than just a rumor.
Abandoned homes, various deserted businesses, and rusted-out cars give it a post-apocalyptic atmosphere that lands it on Texas "most spooky abandoned places" lists.
Visiting
This one comes with some real warnings. Toyah is almost completely abandoned and is a private town, not a managed historic site. No official tours, no protective fences, and buildings are falling apart, with collapsed roofs and broken glass. Photographers say you can access it from public streets, but exploring here is risky, and much of what’s left is still private property.
I encourage you to take photos from the outside rather than enter the school. This site is dangerous. PLEASE USE CAUTION AND COMMON SENSE IF YOU CHOOSE TO DO ANYTHING MORE THAN PHOTOS FROM THE OUTSIDE!
Source: Linda Shenton Matchett, “Traveling Tuesday: Avenger Field”
7. Stephen F. Austin State University — Nacogdoches
The Texas Legislature created Stephen F. Austin State University on March 2, 1915, to honor Stephen F. Austin, the "Father of Texas." The campus sits on part of Thomas Jefferson Rusk's homestead, another Texas founding father, bringing another layer of Texas history to the ground itself.
The school opened on September 18, 1923, with 158 students, initially using Nacogdoches public school facilities until its own campus was ready in May 1924. Today, SFA is one of only four public universities in Texas that remain independent of the state's larger university systems.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
Chester of Griffith Theatre — SFA's most famous and most affectionately regarded ghost. Chester haunts the Turner Fine Arts Auditorium in the Griffith Theatre Building, with sightings going back to 1967. Some say Chester was a construction worker who fell to his death while Griffith was being built. Theater students describe him as a cheeky prankster, blaming him for lights and equipment malfunctioning mid-rehearsal. Other reported experiences include cold spots, unexplained footsteps, and light anomalies appearing in the darkened auditorium.
Griffith Hall (dorm) — Campus legend holds that a female student died by suicide, jumping from a third-floor window after using a Ouija board. Residents report the shower room lights flickering, her apparition appearing at the end of the hall, and disembodied footsteps running down the south wing in the wee hours of the morning. The building's elevator is said to reliably skip the third floor — the floor where the incident is said to have occurred.
Mays Hall — It is said this building was once a hospital with a morgue in the basement (when the campus operated as a military training site) before it became a residence hall. However, some sources dispute the morgue claim. Reports here are cold spots and an intense sense of unease tied to the building's institutional past. There is also a rumored 1940s-era ruined bomb shelter on site.
Visiting
SFA is a public university campus in Nacogdoches, and you can walk around during the day. Griffith Theatre hosts public performances, so you can actually experience Chester's pranks by attending a show. The residence halls (Griffith Hall, Mays Hall) aren't open to outside visitors. Still, they're viewable from the outside as part of normal campus access.
Source: Stephen F. Austin State University - Mays Hall 11, Haunted Places
8. Texas State University (Old Main) — San Marcos
Old Main is Texas State's founding building, and until 1908 it was the entire campus. Construction began in 1902 on Chautauqua Hill (now the heart of the university), with Governor Sayers on hand to lay the cornerstone. The building opened for the first classes on September 9, 1903, with 18 faculty members and 300 students enrolled.
The second floor once had a large auditorium with a decorative cathedral ceiling and a stage for assemblies, plays, and presentations. Old Main was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, and restorations in 1993 and 1994 restored its original red-gabled roof. Today, students know the building as the home of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication and the College of Fine Arts.
The Ghost Story: The Lady in White
According to campus legend, in 1908 a young woman either fell or jumped from the open third-floor balcony. One version says she learned her boyfriend was killed in World War I and could not handle her grief. Another version claims she was a student who died by suicide after failing her classes. No one knows for sure whether she jumped or fell, and no one has proven the truth.
Students today report seeing a woman in white on the third floor — the same floor where the fall reportedly happened. Sightings and unexplained sounds around that floor are common enough that the "Lady in White" has become a fixture of Texas State's campus ghost stories.
Visiting
Old Main sits on a public university campus and is viewable and walkable anytime.
Olde Park Hotel at night
Our last investigation back in 2022.
9. Olde Park Hotel — Ballinger
The Olde Park Hotel has served many purposes over the years. Built in the 1880s, it is believed to have been a bunkhouse or lodging for railroad workers and cowboys. Later, it became the Three Sisters Hotel, then a general store, meeting hall, courthouse, boarding house, saloon, medical facility, funeral parlor, and brothel. Some say it was also used for bootlegging during Prohibition. Local legend even claims that outlaw John Wesley Hardin once visited its saloon. However, there is no evidence of this; a family purchased the property in 1922 and named it what it is today: Olde Park Hotel. In more recent years, it passed to owners Dan and Connie Lafave, who opened it to the public for ghost tours and overnight stays; in 2025, ownership shifted again to Chad and Leslie Wandel, who've taken on restoring the building.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
The Lady in White / Phantom Lady — The hotel's signature apparition, seen drifting through hallways in a Victorian-style gown. Some people believe she was a guest who met an untimely end; others believe her to be a part of the hotel's brothel past.
Room 4 — Guests report a sudden temperature drop, an overwhelming impression of being watched, unexplained knocking on the door and walls, and electromagnetic field (EMF) readings that spike without cause or explanation.
The Doll Room — The hotel boasts several "haunted" dolls that appear to move on their own. The room is often described as one of the building's most unsettling rooms.
Sounds and physical activity — Heavy footsteps described as sounding like cowboy boots; men's and women's voices; doors that open, close, and lock on their own; and reports of guests being touched.
Visiting
Unlike most sites on this list, the Olde Park Hotel operates as a working paranormal attraction, offering public ghost tours and overnight stays. It's been featured on multiple paranormal shows, so it's a legitimate location. My team and I have been there multiple times, and I imagine we will stay there again.
Source: Stephen F. Austin State University - Mays Hall 11, Haunted Places
10. Baylor University (Carroll Science Hall) — Waco
Baylor University is the oldest continuously operating university in Texas, chartered by the Republic of Texas on February 1, 1845 — signed into law by President Anson Jones. It grew out of an 1841 push by Robert E. B. Baylor, James Huckins, and William Milton Tryon to establish a Baptist university in Texas. The school opened in 1846 in Independence, Texas, with preparatory classes starting that May and full college coursework following in June. Baylor subsequently relocated to Waco in 1886. Main Building (1887) and Georgia Burleson Hall (1888) were the first two structures raised on the new Waco campus and remain today.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
Carroll Science Hall — The Ghost of Rufus Burleson — President Rufus C. Burleson oversaw construction of Carroll Science Hall, but died before it was completed. Students have reported seeing his apparition on the building's staircase.
Armstrong Browning Library — The library holds personal possessions of poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and her ghost is said to appear at various points on the second floor. Legend says, an electrician was crushed to death when an elevator he was working on plunged from an upper floor. He is the one blamed for the elevator's persistent malfunctions and reported activity in the basement.
Brooks Residence Hall — In the early 20th century, a student who regularly played violin on the fifth floor reportedly died of the flu. Afterward, students in the hall repeatedly heard violin music with no legitimate cause.
Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum — Located near campus in Waco, this museum houses Bonnie and Clyde's actual guns alongside the weapon of the Texas Ranger who helped ambush them. Staff have reported hearing disembodied footsteps, seeing shadows, and hearing the sound of firearms clicking at night.
Visiting
Baylor is a private university campus in Waco, open to walk around during the day. The historic Quadrangle (including Georgia Burleson Hall and the area around Carroll Science) is publicly accessible, and Armstrong Browning Library operates as a public research library and museum with regular visiting hours. Brooks Residence Hall remains an active dorm and isn't open to outside visitors. The Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum is a separate public attraction that requires ticket purchase if you want to round out a Waco haunted-history trip.
11. University of Texas at Austin (Littlefield House) — Austin
The University of Texas was created by the Texas Constitution of 1876 but didn't open until 1883. The cornerstone of the original Main Building was laid in November 1882, and the university formally opened September 15, 1883.
One somber chapter belongs in any honest chronology of the campus: on August 1, 1966, a gunman opened fire from the observation deck of the UT Tower killing more than a dozen people in what's considered one of the first mass campus shootings in U.S. history. It remains a defining, tragic event in the university's story, and it's worth acknowledging with the respect and gravity it deserves rather than folding into ghost-story content.
Ghost Stories and Hauntings
The Littlefield House — Built in 1893/1894 for cattle baron and Confederate veteran George Littlefield, the Victorian mansion sits on the northern edge of UT's campus and now houses university offices. UT's most enduringly "haunted" building, and unlike Old Main, this one isn't debunked. After George's death, Alice lived in the house another 15 years before bequeathing it to the university.
The hauntings attributed to it are extensive: unexplained piano music and singing (believed to be Alice, who was an accomplished pianist), objects moving on their own, an apparition believed to be a former housekeeper, and faces have been observed in various windows. Alice reportedly suffered severe anxiety and paranoid episodes later in life. Legend says she was confined to her home for her own safety, although there is nothing that validates or confirms it. Staff and visitors report seeing her apparition on the second floor and hearing disembodied footsteps on the stairs. The house is closed to the public today, used only for offices and university events.
The UT Tower — The Tower opened in 1937, standing just oveer 300 feet tall. On August 1, 1966, Charles Whitman climbed to the 28th-floor observation deck and opened fire on the people below, killing 16 (later counted as 17 when a victim died decades on from his wounds, plus an unborn child) and wounding more than 32 — one of the first mass shootings on an American campus. He was killed by Austin police officers Houston McCoy and Ramiro Martinez.
The deck closed for a period of time for repairs, then it reopened. Sadly, the tower would see a string of suicides before the university closed the observation deck to the public permanently in 1974, citing both the shooting's legacy and the suicides. It stayed closed for almost 25 years until President Larry Faulkner reopened it in 1999 with the deck now enclosed by a webbed safety barrier. A memorial garden near the turtle pond lists the victims' names.
The haunted claims.
They're modest compared to other UT Austin sites you've covered. There have been reports that security guards stationed on the deck describe lights flickering and fading with no cause……..some guards allege they've had encounters with Whitman's spirit.
Visiting
UT Austin is a large public university campus, open to walk around during the day,. The Littlefield House sits at the northwest edge of campus at Whitis Avenue and West 24th Street — you can view its exterior and famous Himalayan cedar tree, but it's closed to public entry, used strictly for offices and events.
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Step into corridors where history whispers between lockers and chalk dust holds secrets—our haunted schools are classrooms of the uncanny, perfect for curious minds and brave hearts. Explore aged auditoriums, creaky stairwells, and forgotten classrooms where stories of restless students and lingering lessons come alive after dusk. Come for the architecture and history, stay for the spine-tingling tales that turn every desk into a portal to the past. Bring your camera, your courage, and an appetite for the eerily educational—these schoolyards of spirits are waiting to teach you something unforgettable.
Make this beautiful day count!
Annette