Sutcliffe's Athletic Apparitions

Sutcliffe's Athletic Apparitions

Centre College (Danville, Ky. : 1918- )—Anecdotes
Centre College (Danville, Ky. : 1918- )—Buildings
Centre College (Danville, Ky. : 1918- )—History
Centre College (Danville, Ky. : 1918- )—Students
Ghosts—Kentucky—Danville
Haunted places—Kentucky—Danville
Haunted universities and colleges—Kentucky—Danville

An oral history interview about the paranormal activity in Sutcliffe Hall.

Taylor, Donald

2021/1/19

Hodges, Benjamin

All Rights Reserved

MP4

English

Oral History (literary work)

Hodges, Benjamin

Taylor, Donald

Sutcliffe Hall, Centre College, Danville KY

[00:00]
Ben: Hello, my name is Ben Hodges. Today I'm interviewing Donald Taylor who has
experienced some paranormal events on Centre's campus. So, I am here today with Mr. Taylor.
Today is January 19, 2021. We are recording this interview over Zoom, and today we'll be
discussing Mr. Taylor's experiences during his time working at Centre. So, to get started, Mr.
Taylor where do you work on Centre’s campus?
Don: I work through facilities management. I'm a general manager here over the custodial
department.
Ben: Okay can you describe what your daily responsibilities and duties are?
Don: Basically, what I do is I ensure that all the students’ areas are clean and safe. [01:00] Pretty
much I used to deal with general service department and also the recycling department but right
now I’m primarily focusing on custodials to make sure in this pandemic… to make sure that I
guess all the areas are safe and clean for you guys.
Ben: What's a typical day like in your job?
Don: I usually start out, you know, organize the day with my supervisor going through making
sure that everyone everyone is aware of what we need to be doing. It's one of those times to
where usually I work from like 7:30 to 4:00 and I’m usually working pretty much the whole
time. When I’m off at home you know if something happens overnight I make sure that we're
preparing the next morning to handle it as quickly as possible, but I guess I just make sure that
everything is just pretty much clean and sanitary.
[02:00]
Ben: Okay, then my next question is: have you experienced anything you would say would be an
unexplained or paranormal event on Centre's campus?
Don: Oh absolutely. Yeah. When I first started back in the 80’s, this was before they renovated
Sutcliffe Hall. When I first started that's where I worked at that was my--Sutcliffe was my first
building that I cleaned and back then we would come in after everyone went home around about
six o'clock and usually worked about 10:00 or 11:00, and one particular night we was stripping
and waxing floors and we had all parked our cars in the back of Sutcliffe Hall, and we had just
finished up about 10:00 [03:00] 10:30 and when we went out, we made sure that all the lights
doors and everything was secure, everything was cut off. And we all went to the back of
Sutcliffe Hall and we was talking just a little bit before we left for the night and we had to look
back and we noticed that the lights start popping on. So we decided to go back in because we
thought one some of the kids might have gotten into the building and we left the door unsecured,
something like that. We might want to make sure we weren't going to get in trouble, so we went
back to the gym and when we went into the gym and opened the door no one was there. But all
of a sudden, a basketball was rolling across the floor. Yeah. Kind of tripped us out so we start
searching the building to make sure that you know maybe someone might have heard us coming
up the back stairwell and took off running so we checked the building, couldn't find anyone
[04:00] so we closed the doors locked all you know cut off all the lights went back downstairs
went outside to our vehicles and all of a sudden, we look back up and the lights pops back on
again. We go back to the gym no one's there and seriously basketball rolling around on the floor.
Don't know how this happened so kind of tripped us out. So we cut off all the lights went back
downstairs now like I said never found anyone in the building went back downstairs stood
outside for a while the lights didn't come back on so we got in our vehicles and everyone left so
that was the first time something like that ever happened to us or to me anyway. And I never
heard of any stories of anything like that going on so it kind of tripped me out and I was like
yeah maybe someone's just playing jokes on this or something, but like I [05:00] said it was
really weird because we never found anyone. So the second time something like that happened to
me would come in and I started this I was starting at seven o'clock that morning and we had like
a general area that we would meet and get our schedules for them for the day and we'd talk about
what we're going to do and if there was any special details meet up and you know get those
taking care of any special projects but anyway that particular morning we coming in and we're in
our little break room area and we hear someone down in the racquetball courts playing
racquetball. I mean you could clearly hear the balls banging off the walls and someone's hitting
and then they sound like right foot I guess teeny shoes skidding and scuffling on the floor and so
where our custodial closet was it was probably maybe 20 feet away and [06:00] and so that was
my area to clean so we talked about what we're gonna do we all left the break room and I head
straight down to the wrecking ball courts to see who's playing black ball that early in the
morning. Well, there was no way that if anyone was there leaving the area, they could have
passed me without me seeing them, so I go down into the racquetball court and I notice when I
look inside the wrecking ball court area the lights are off no one's there. So I stepped through the
door and hit the light fixture and I touched the transformers, and normally if someone's been
down there playing the transformers would always generate heat and you would feel the heat off
the [7:00] transformers, but what I felt in that particular morning the transformers were still cool
to the touch. Open up the door what do I see? A racquetball rolling across the floor. No one
there. Serious business, and I’m tripping out because I think I’m going crazy. So I turn around
and I run upstairs to where the other guys were and I asked them, I was like: “Okay did we hear
someone playing racquetball this morning while we were talking?” and I was like, yeah, they
was like “Who was it?” and I’m like “There was no one there, lights were all, transformers were
cool, there was no way they could have passed me, there was no one there so how did they get
out of the building?” and everybody was like “You're messing with us.” and I’m like “No, no.
There was no one down there this morning.” And so, everyone goes down with me and that's like
that's just really weird because I know what I heard this morning while it was in there, but we
never did find out what the mystery was. You know I heard stories about some of the other
buildings like Stuart Hall and stuff like that and I had actually worked at Stuart hall late at night
cleaning blowers you know laying wax and things like that [08:00] and I had never experienced
any kind of I guess strange phenomenons going on. Now I did have a friend that worked there
that would tell me the stories like he would be walking down the little hallway on the first floor,
and during that time it was like a bookstore, and he said he would have the and turn around there
was a book laying in the middle of the floor. He'd go back to pick up the book put it back in
place get ready to walk off and behold that same book would be laying in the middle of the floor.
Now of course, like I say, I never experienced anything like that. Sutcliffe was the only place
that I ever experienced anything like that so those were pretty much my stories. After that to this
day, like I said I’ve been here for four years, I’ve not seen or heard anything since, but of course
I’m not in any of the buildings late at night or anything like that and I haven't heard any of my
new custodians [09:00] tell me any strange happenings going on either.
Ben: So, how would you say these experiences you had shaped your work? How does that affect
your daily life?
Don: I’ll be honest, at night I would not lie if I had to come in late at night I always wanted to
make sure that someone worked with me. I was I was really nervous especially at Sutcliffe to
come in at night and do floors or anything that like that by myself, so I’d always make sure that
if we were assigned to do something like that that I had a partner to be with me just in case
something like that happened. That I wasn’t experiencing this on my own and people didn't think
I was crazy when I shared these stories, yeah.
Ben: Okay. So, a general question but would you say that these [10:00] experiences have like
shaped you into more of a believer in ghosts? Or were you a skeptic before? Or are you still a
skeptic?
Don: You know when I was a little boy my parents would always tell me these ghost stories, and
of course you know I never believed in them because I think I always believed that my parents
would tell us these stories to keep us close to the house at night so that we wouldn't venture off.
So I was always really skeptical of stuff like that, but I think as I’ve gotten older I think that
there are certain things that, yeah, maybe that there's things that I don't know about that do
happen. So yeah I guess I am more of a believer now.
Ben: Okay, and how would you say these experiences change what you think about Centre's
Campus?
[11:00]
Don: You know Wayne, I’m sorry Wayne King, used to be our director and you know he would
always tell stories about things like this like those ghost stories, and he was a firm believer, so I
think that over the years a lot of people have grown to believe that the campus does have some
history as far as paranormal activities going on. So I think there's a lot of people out there that
really truly believe this stuff so I think center has a rich history of paranormal activity going on.
Ben: You mentioned that you haven't had any experiences in a while. Is that right?
Don: Yes.
Ben: Okay, would you say that would you say that then the renovation [12:00] of Sutcliffe
maybe, changed something about the place?
Don: That, that could be a possibility, you know that that that very well could be a possibility…
Or maybe during that time you know like say what we're talking 30 years ago, I’ve kind of did
some research about the buildings, and I’ve heard stories where there was supposed to be a
trainer a long time ago that had come in and committed suicide in the area in the building. I don't
know if that was true that was just one of the stories that I’d heard. That it maybe his spirit was
still lingering around. I don't know.
Ben: Then, I guess one of my final questions I guess would be have you heard any other
interesting ghost stories from like other buildings?
[13:00]
Don: Like I say, the only one was Stuart Hall was the only place that anyone has ever shared like
I said one gentleman he would always tell me strange stories about hearing footsteps, books
falling, things of that nature. Now at Stuart Hall at one point it was a funeral home. As a matter
of fact, one of my best friends passed away and he was probably one of the last people that I
remember being laid to rest up there. I do remember going up to his visitation and his body was
cut you know who had it in the casket made up so to me that was kind of a weird thing knowing
that that was a funeral home and that was the last place that I’ve seen my best friend, so but in
none of the other buildings I’ve never heard of anything like that going on.
[14:00]
Ben: And then my last question is what places are important to you?
Don: Honestly you know like say when you've been here this love I think Centre as a whole is
important to me you know I love the college when I first started here I told my uncle he was the
boss over the custodial department, and when I first started I was like you know I’m only going
to be here like a couple of weeks I this is not a place I want to call home. And it seemed like after
getting to work here and getting to know the students you know you kind of fall in love with the
surroundings, and all the people, and so 40 years later it's kind of hard to hard to leave so I can't
say that there's one particular place I favor over another here. I love Centre as a whole, you know
the people are great [15:00] my experience throughout the years with all the students coming
through I think all the kids I’ve ever come in contact with were just really awesome. I’ve had a
lot of good memories, you know I’ve always worked at homecomings and I’ve had students that
maybe had graduated four or five years before come back looking for me to introduce me to their
families, and stuff like that so I’ve had a lot of good experiences through my years here at
Centre.
Ben: Thank you so much for agreeing to do this interview!
Don: Oh, thank you for asking!
Ben: All right, so with that I’ll stop recording.
[15:43]
END OF INTERVIEW

MP4

15:43