The SAE House Ghosts of MU

The Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapter house at the University of Missouri stands on Oak Hill in Columbia, Boone County. Wikipedia describes it as a two-and-a-half-story Neo-Classical Revival brick building at 24 East Stewart Road, and the dark brick walls were painted white during the Wallace renovation. With its portico of six two-story stone Ionic columns, the house resembles a mansion more than a fraternity house, and for good reason: the property was a military academy, a women’s dormitory, and a hotel before becoming SAE’s home in 1929.

The land was first platted in Columbia in 1820. Accounts differ on whether it was a hospital during the Civil War: Wikipedia says it was, while the Columbia Missourian reports that historical documents have never confirmed the claim. By the early 1890s, the property housed Welch Military Academy, operated by John B. Welch. After the academy closed, the building served briefly as a women’s dormitory known as Welch Hall before being sold to real estate developer Judge Stewart in 1926 and converted into the Oak Hill Hotel. Sigma Alpha Epsilon purchased the hotel in 1929 and renovated it into its chapter house, guided by architect David Frederick Wallace, a University of Missouri student and fraternity brother.

Vox Magazine says the building burned down several times; Wikipedia details two major fires. An October 1907 blaze destroyed much of the upper floors, prompting the construction of a new Welch Military Academy structure on the same site. A second fire in 1965 consumed the roof and interior; the fraternity rebuilt almost exactly and rededicated the house in September 1966. The property was recognized by the Columbia Historic Preservation Commission in 2004 and added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 20, 2014.

Paranormal claims about the building center on its basement. Wikipedia describes much of it as original to the Civil War hospital, including areas that once housed a crematorium and morgue, and says that according to legend the bodies of dead soldiers were stored there. Scott Barger, the chapter adviser, told the Columbia Missourian the hospital basement is “an ongoing urban myth,” since no one had found documentation of a building on the site at that time. Fraternity members have long believed that strange happenings originate in the basement, which was dug for a house on the site that burned in 1907. Legends of America says Confederate soldiers are often seen in the basement.

The most famous ghost story involves an incident in 1947. That year, the new SAE pledge class at MU was required to spend the night in the basement as part of their initiation. According to Wikipedia, the pledges “experienced supernatural things” during the overnight vigil. Soon afterward, every member of that pledge class dropped out of MU and never returned to Columbia. Vox Magazine reported that it was the only year in the fraternity’s history at Mizzou without a pledge class. Legends of America adds that each member de-pledged the next day without explaining why.

In 1986, SAE began an annual Halloween haunted-house tradition on the property. Each fall, the pledge class transforms the building to scare visitors, drawing on the very legends they are told about. Vox Magazine reported that the haunted house is used for the fraternity’s philanthropy every year.

The house has changed hands several times since. The university suspended SAE on April 3, 2008, after a long history of disciplinary violations, and the house went to Acacia and then Tau Kappa Epsilon. SAE returned in the summer of 2012, was suspended again in 2018, and Alpha Sigma Phi was the tenant from 2019 to 2023. In the fall of 2023 SAE’s Missouri Alpha chapter took the house back and moved in again.