At Notre Dame, students usually reside in the same dorm for at least their first three years. This fosters a great sense of community among the dorm residents. Out of that camaraderie has grown signature dorm events – at least one annual event in which most residents help to organize for the entire campus to enjoy, while also usually raising money for charity.
Ghoul John Morgan playing a piano at Carroll Hall’s Haunted House, 1988
For one night a year in late October from the 1980s until 1997, Carroll Hall’s signature event was the Haunted House. Residents converted their secluded home on St. Mary’s Lake into the laboratories of mad scientists, operating rooms of sadistic surgeons, and torture rooms of dungeon guards. Students would trek across campus to the remote dorm and wait in long lines in the cold to wander the transformed halls for a good scare.
Advertisement for Carroll Hall’s Haunted House in the Observer, 1992/1029
According to accounts online, several female visitors to Carroll’s Haunted House accused some of the residents of groping them in the dark halls in 1997. This led Student Affairs to decide to terminate the tradition. Since then Carroll Hall had developed another signature event: A Carroll Christmas, which includes karaoke carols, cookie-baking contests, and a toy drive.
Sources:
Dome yearbooks 1985-1998
“Carroll Hall History,” www.verminnet.com
“Hall Portrait: Carroll,” by Mike Connolly and Brigid Sweeney, Notre Dame Magazine, Autumn 2002
“Carroll Hall to Host Annual Christmas Event,” by Sarah Felenstein, Observer, 12/04/2009
GDOM
Observer, 10/29/1992