Black-and-white view of Main Hall at the University of Montevallo, a three-story brick building with a tall central pavilion, in 1993

University of Montevallo – Montevallo, AL: Condie Cunningham and the Main Hall Fire

Southeastern US Haunted Schools

On the night of February 4, 1908, a fire in Main Hall at the Alabama Girls’ Industrial School, now the University of Montevallo, badly burned a 16-year-old student named Condie Cunningham. She died two days later, on February 6. Her death is documented, and it is the foundation of the best-known ghost story on the campus. The legend and the record are different things, so this guide keeps them apart.

Condie Cunningham and the Main Hall fire: what is documented

Main Hall was built in 1897 to 1899 and has served as a women’s dormitory. According to the student newspaper The Alabamian, Condie and her roommate were making hot chocolate (or fudge, depending on the teller) over an alcohol flame when the curfew bell rang. In the rush to clean up, the flame was knocked over and her nightdress caught fire. Accounts differ on small details like these, but the date of the fire and the date of her death are consistent across the sources reviewed.

The university archives and the Carmichael Library hold records of the event, including a Birmingham Age-Herald clipping dated February 6, 1908, reproduced on a library blog. The Alabamian reports that fire escapes and a water tank were added to Main Hall in response, so that a tragedy like hers would not be repeated. The Archiving Montevallo collection notes that there are no known images of Condie Cunningham.

The legend: a flaming face in the door

The ghost stories begin after the fire. The Alabamian says the first reports of sightings in the hall came in 1909, with residents describing a young woman running and screaming in the corridors. The best-known detail is the door to her former room. In the story, the wood grain showed a girl’s face wreathed in flames. The door was replaced, the image came back, and the room was eventually sealed.

This part is folklore. A door said to be the last of them is kept in the university archives and has been displayed in the library around Halloween, according to the Alabamian and the library’s 2012 blog post. Visitors who want to see it should ask the Carmichael Library first, because no current display schedule was found.

Palmer Hall, Reynolds Hall and the other campus legends

Palmer Hall was dedicated on April 26 to 28, 1930. The university’s own admissions history names Warren, Davis and Knight as the architects. It houses the auditorium used for College Night, a student tradition that began in 1919 and grew into the Purples-versus-Golds musical competition. The campus legend is of a friendly ghost nicknamed “Trummy” who is said to predict the winner by swinging the stage battens toward one side of the house at the final dress rehearsal. That is a good story and a good example of how a legend attaches itself to a tradition. It is a story, not a record.

Reynolds Hall dates to 1851, when it was built for a private boys’ school, according to The Alabamian. It was later one of the first instructional buildings of the girls’ school and carries the name of Capt. Henry Clay Reynolds, the first president. The legend says Reynolds still walks the building, moving his portrait around and appearing as a blue glowing figure. A popular explanation holds that he lingers after being asked to step down as president in 1899. The building did not carry his name until 1925.

King House: a brief note

King House, built in 1823 by Edmund King, is among the oldest buildings on campus and was deeded to the school in 1908, according to its National Register of Historic Places nomination. It is better known for a ghost story about a figure carrying a lantern and a shovel. The story is only part of the history. The house was built through the forced labor of enslaved people, and the student newspaper itself has written that the ghost story can push that history out of view. The Montevallo Legacy Project traces many of the King House tales to elderly formerly enslaved residents who told them to white students and teachers in the early 1900s. That history deserves more room than a section in this post, and it may get its own article later.

What the record says

Several popular claims do not survive a check against the sources.

  • King’s gold and the Yankees. The legend says King buried gold to keep it from Union soldiers. Both the National Register nomination and The Alabamian put his death in 1863. The nomination says General Wilson’s headquarters was in the house during the 1865 raid, two years after King died. The newspaper itself calls the story unlikely. Reports also differ on how King died, with some saying illness at 82 and others a falling tree limb.
  • “Trummy” in Palmer Hall. The Alabamian describes him as a designer of the building whose name was left off the cornerstone. The university’s published history credits Warren, Davis and Knight as architects and does not mention a Trumbauer. No support for the design story or the cornerstone claim was found in the sources reviewed.
  • A Civil War hospital massacre at Reynolds Hall. The Alabamian calls the hospital claim baseless. It also notes that other documents place Captain Reynolds in Virginia during the war, and the hall was not named for him until 1925.
  • The flaming face itself. The fire and the death are documented. The face in the door is tradition, and no record of it was found beyond retellings.

The Ghost Walk

A student ghost tour and scary-story contest was held on October 30, 2024, as reported by The Alabamian. An earlier walk led by the library director, who said the aim was to set the stories straight, was reported by the Shelby County Reporter in June 2011. No later date was found, so check with the university before planning a trip around one.

Visiting

The central campus is a National Historic District, and the university’s visitor page says visitors are welcome to walk the quads. The self-guided tour begins at Reynolds Hall, which houses Admissions, with tour parking on Highland Street. Main Hall is a residence hall, and no public interior access was verified for it, King House or Palmer Hall. King House’s interior in particular is not known to be open to walk-in visitors. Carmichael Library allows any individual into the building, with UM ID required after 9 p.m. Please respect students’ residences and privacy.

Sources

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Top image: Main Hall at the University of Montevallo, Alabama, 1993. Photo: Jet Lowe (Historic American Engineering Record, Library of Congress), public domain, via Wikimedia Commons