Is the Atherton Hotel at OSU Haunted? Stillwater's 1950 Campus Hotel and Its Quiet Corridors

The Atherton Hotel at OSU is a 69-room hotel tucked inside the Georgian-style Student Union in the middle of the Oklahoma State University campus in Stillwater. It opened in 1950 as the Union Club, is said to have been the first hotel purpose-built inside a university student union, and is run with the university’s hospitality school, so many of the staff are students. It has been a member of Historic Hotels of America since 2005.

Its place among the haunted hotels in Oklahoma rests on years of guest stories: glowing lights and shadowy figures in the long hallways, lights switching on by themselves, doors that open, close, lock and unlock, and cold breezes in still corridors. The hotel’s own general manager told the student newspaper in 2017 that nothing has ever been documented. This is a gentle, curious stay rather than a famous haunting.

The ghosts of The Atherton Hotel at OSU

Lights and shadows in the hallways

Most stories about the Atherton come from its corridors. The hotel sits on the upper floors of the Student Union, and its hallways are long and, late at night, very quiet. Guests have described mysterious glows and shadowy figures moving at the far end of a corridor, then nothing there when they look again.

The original version of this guide noted that the hotel has drawn reports for many years and has been looked at by researchers more than once. No investigation results have been published.

Doors and lights with a mind of their own

Other reports are more domestic: lights in rooms turning on and off by themselves, doors opening and closing, and doors locking or unlocking without anyone touching them. Some guests also mention a sudden cold breeze rushing past them in the corridor.

The Student Union is a big 1950 building with plenty of ducts and air handling, and the student newspaper pointed out a windpipe that sometimes makes frightening noises. Any of that could account for a breeze or a sound.

What the hotel says

In 2017 the O’Colly, OSU’s student newspaper, asked the hotel’s general manager, Josh Barnard, about the rumors. “It’s just an old building that has a little bit spookiness attributes to it,” he said. “I have heard about the rumor, but I haven’t confirmed anything. We don’t have anything that is documented.”

That honesty is worth keeping in mind. The Atherton is on haunted hotel lists because of guest stories, not because the hotel claims a ghost. The same article listed Edmon Low Library, with its red-haired woman, and a fraternity house on Monroe Street as the campus’s other haunted buildings.

The most haunted rooms and places to look

• Garden View and Terrace View rooms: The standard rooms, overlooking the campus. No particular room appears in the ghost stories.
• The Presidential Suite: The hotel’s top suite, in a building that has hosted Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan, Coretta Scott King and Bob Hope.
• The guest corridors: Where the lights, shadows and breezes are reported. Walk them late in the evening when the Union is closed.
• Ranchers Club: The hotel’s cowboy-themed steakhouse, opened in 2005, with the State Room Lounge for a drink.

History of The Atherton Hotel at OSU

The Atherton sits inside Oklahoma State University’s Georgian-style Student Union, a building long billed as the largest student union in the world. When the Union Club hotel opened inside it in 1950, it was billed as the first hotel built into a university student union and was nicknamed the Waldorf of the West.

The original hotel had 81 rooms and suites, with what were then modern comforts: automatic elevators, circulating ice water and parking next door. It became a working classroom for the university’s School of Hotel and Restaurant Administration, which still runs it with professional managers. The hotel’s own guest list runs from Presidents Harry Truman, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush to Coretta Scott King, Ethiopia’s Emperor Haile Selassie, Bob Hope and, fittingly for a hotel with ghost stories, the horror star Vincent Price.

Between 2001 and 2004 the hotel was renovated from lobby to roof. It was renamed The Atherton Hotel at OSU after Bill Atherton, an OSU graduate who was the main donor and led the fundraising. The Ranchers Club steakhouse opened in 2005, the same year the hotel joined Historic Hotels of America.

A further $20 million renovation began in 2014 and was nearing completion in 2016. It cut the number of rooms to 69 to make a boutique-style, full-service hotel, and added the event rooms now used for weddings, dinners and university functions.

Tips for a haunted stay

• Avoid home football weekends and commencement unless you are going for them; the hotel fills up and prices jump.
• Midweek outside term is the quietest time to walk the corridors.
• Book dinner at the Ranchers Club, then a drink at the State Room Lounge.
• Pair the stay with a look at Edmon Low Library across campus, the subject of OSU’s best-known ghost story.
• Guthrie’s Stone Lion Inn is about 45 minutes southwest if you want a stay that leans into its ghosts.

More haunted hotels nearby

• Stone Lion Inn, Guthrie: a 1907 Victorian mansion that is Oklahoma’s best-known haunted B&B
• The Skirvin Hilton, Oklahoma City: the 1911 grand hotel and the legend of Effie
• Noble House, Watonga: a 1912 boarding house B&B with footsteps on the roof
• Haunted hotels in Oklahoma

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the hotel’s own website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as guests, staff and local historians tell them. Read how we rate haunted hotels.

• Wikipedia: Atherton Hotel at Oklahoma State University
• Historic Hotels of America: The Atherton Hotel at OSU
• The Atherton Hotel at OSU: Dive into our history
• Wikipedia: Student Union (Oklahoma State University)
• O'Colly: Haunted buildings on OSU's campus (2017)

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