Haunted Athens, Ohio - the Pentagram of Cemeteries

In a story that has been passed down for years by students of Ohio University and townspeople of Athens is that the town is the center of a pentagram of cemeteries. The cemeteries are the five largest in Athens County and have been measured to find out that they are each equal distances apart, only off by a quarter of a mile. The cemeteries that form the points of pentagram are:Simms, Hanning, Cuckler, Higgins, and Zion. But wait! Some say there are 10 cemeteries instead of five that form the pentagram. And depending on who you talk to in Athens, the center of the pentagram is either The Ridges Asylum or it is Wilson Hall on the Ohio University campus. Which ever part of the campus is in the center of the campus is considered to be a spiritual hot spot and a safe zone away from spirits. So which do you believe?

While the legend has been muddled by different opinions of which cemeteries make up the pentagram and what lies in the center of the pentagram (or if it even exists at all), it is still interesting to consider since the Koons had success with contacting spirits and stories of ghosts and the occult are so prevalent in Athens. The original version of the story, and the most told by people in the town of Athens, is that the pentagram is made by the cemeteries of Simms, Hanning, Cuckler, Higgins, and Zion. In the center of these cemeteries is Wilson Hall, a dormitory that is haunted by a not-so-quiet spirit. Of course, you could add the other five lesser known cemeteries to it, but then the legend gets hard to pass down to freshman. If you wanted to go with the skeptics, there are close to 300 cemeteries in Athens. Of course you could pinpoint five and draw a pentagram from it and put whatever building you want in the middle. That may be true skeptics, but what's the fun in that? So I'll share the first version I heard. No skepticism and no extra cemeteries.

The pentagram consists of five cemeteries. Out of Simms, Hanning, Cuckler, Higgins, and Zion; Simms and Hanning are the most popular of the cemeteries. These are the one's that people have encountered ghosts and other weird happenings. Simms Cemetery was named after John Simms, the local hangman. If you wander too far into the cemetery, he'll tell you to "Get out!" and most are more than happy to oblige. In the cemetery, near a rocky ridge is a tree that was once used as the gallows. The marks from the hanging ropes can still be seen on the tree. People report seeing John Simms wandering the graveyard, but most of the time people claim that they see the spirits of the executed and sometimes people hanging from the tree. Whatever you believe, I don't think it's a place you would want to see alone.

Hanning Cemetery is the other famous haunted cemetery that is part of the Athens Pentagram. Some people have witnessed the spirit of a man in a robe in the cemetery. Not only do you see him, but screams and other ghostly noises can be heard coming from him. Hanning Cemetery is know mostly known for it's occult activity. Some say a young man took a Ouija Board there and it foreshadowed his death. Others say that the young man's friends had gone up to Hanning Cemetery and contacted his spirit. The name of the young man is David Tischman, a deceased Ohio University student. To this day, people say that you can still contact him in Hanning using a Ouija Board. I haven't been daring enough to try yet.

According to the story that is most told about the Pentagram of Cemeteries is that Wilson Hall is the center of the pentagram. There are two Wilson Halls on the campus. The popular one is the dormitory on the West Side of the campus. In the Wilson Hall dormitory, a girl had killed herself in room 428 after being haunted by a ghost. Like most good ghost stories, her blood could not be washed off the wall and had to be painted over. The very next year when new students moved in they started to hear noises and apparently the blood seeped through the paint. Room 428 has not been used since and is now a boiler room. This Wilson Hall is usually cited as the center of the Pentagram.

The other Wilson Hall is on the College Green of the campus. It is one of the oldest buildings on campus once used as a dormitory and now houses some of the offices for Ohio University. In the hours I spent in there trying to get my classes straightened out, I never experienced any thing out of the ordinary and people don't talk of it as being haunted. It could possibly be the most peaceful building on campus. Between the two, I would pick Wilson Hall dormitory as the most haunted, but not the center of the pentagram. The center of the pentagram is supposed to be peaceful and safe, much like the Wilson Hall offices.

Whether you believe that there is a pentagram or not surrounding Athens, it is still a great story of Athens history that has been passed down over the years. Many people get their introduction to the ghosts and spirits of Athens and Ohio University through the stories surrounding of the pentagram of cemeteries. This theory of the pentagram is going to be debated for years as it has been, but there is much more that lurks in Athens, Ohio.