By SUSAN JONES
Jodi Kraisinger decided long ago that she wasn’t taking any chances when she entered Pitt–Greensburg’s Lynch Hall in the evening.
“Anytime I would have evening activities, I would go back into Lynch Hall and I would say ‘Commander, I’m just coming in to get my thing so that I can go home. I won’t be very long, and then you can have a good night,’ ” said Kraisinger, who is the campus’ director of university relations and institutional advancement and whose office is in the former mansion of Lt. Commander Charles McKenna Lynch. “And so I was never really bothered by anything.”
But others on the campus — faculty, staff, students and alumni — have heard and seen things in the 100-year-old building that they can’t explain, Kraisinger said. As part of the annual Blue & Gold Celebration next week, Monongahela-based Revenant Entity Paranormal Society will lead tours through Lynch Hall from 8 to 10 p.m. Sept. 28, with the goal of “discovering the spirits and ghosts who have made their presence known throughout the years.” Pre-registration is required for the tours.
The Tudor-style mansion was built in 1923 for Lynch and his family, who named it Starboard Light. Commander Lynch died in the home in the summer of 1963. The next year, the house and surrounding property were sold to Pitt as a home for its Greensburg campus, which had been holding classes for two years in the Vogel building on North Maple Avenue.
The building was renamed Lynch Hall to honor the family and has had a variety of uses since, including as classrooms and a gathering place for students. Today, it serves as the campus’ administration building and houses the offices of the president, community outreach, conferencing, human resources, university relations and institutional advancement and the Center for Applied Research.
Kraisinger first led the paranormal group through the building in early August, so they could get a sense of the layout and “if there was any energy, or anything in the building.” She said they picked up a lot of energy near what used to be the commander’s bedroom.
She also shared with the group some of the stories she’s heard over the years. Kraisinger said they often hear the pipes clanging loudly, but, “Are we hearing it because the building is old or are we hearing it because someone’s there?”
“Colleagues have said that they know for sure that they were the only people in the building, but they had heard footsteps above them,” she said. Another colleague said she was in the building for an alumni association board meeting, “and all of a sudden the pipes just kept pounding. … And she finally said, ‘Commander, we know you’re here; you don’t have to tell us.’ And after that, no more pipes were banging.”
Students have reported seeing the commander outside when they run by Lynch Hall and others have seen someone leaning against the railing in the window above the entrance. Kraisinger said one now-retired campus security officer refused to go into Lynch Hall at night by himself.
A now-retired secretary had straightened up all the chairs around a conference room table after a meeting then went into another room, and when she returned the chairs were all askew.
A 2008 story in the Tribune-Review recounted how a group of students used a Ouija board during the week before Halloween to try to contact spirits in the basement of the mansion. The students and the reporter heard running water and pipes clanging, even though there was no one else in the building, and when they asked the spirit if it wanted them to go, “GET OUT” was spelled out on the board.
The paranormal investigators told Kraisinger that they captured an image of a woman and child on their cameras during the August tour, “which we’re still trying to figure out.” In the basement, the group felt some unfriendly energy, she said. In the attic, the investigators had a box they said the spirits could talk through.
“We heard the expression, ‘I want to get out,’ ” she said. “And it sounded like it came through that box. … It didn’t sound like the voice of anyone else. That just made me pause and say, ‘OK, I don’t know what’s happening here, but I’m just going to stand here closer to the door and the exit.’ ”
Kraisinger said slots for the tours, which leave every 10 minutes, are filling up quickly, with a mix of students, staff and alumni planning to attend.
“It’s just a fun thing to think about and see could it possibly be true,” she said.
Other Blue & Gold Celebration activities include an art show, a campus food drive, a bonfire, Brunch with Bruiser, a campus picnic and festival, and more. See the full schedule here.
Susan Jones is editor of the University Times. Reach her at suejones@pitt.edu or 724-244-4042.
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