Small town stories — July 2026

(serious) people of reddit who live in small towns, what is the main creepy event or legend that happened in said small town?

Tags: Iowa // college // Halloween // family // creepy // unexplained

Reply from u/Gorssky — Swope Hall

Here's one from my college town, specifically geared towards the college community since it took place on the campus, but the town talks about it and has even written articles about it in the local newspaper around Halloween. Apologies that it's a long story, but if you're looking for creepy tales that's kind of part of the experience.

The current state of Swope Hall

The town (very small, even with the college) where I went to college had a dormitory known as "Swope Hall" that was almost entirely unused. It was set up with single rooms (one student to a room) as opposed to the other dormitories which had two students to a room and the suites which were three connected rooms with two students to a room. Typically, the only people that inhabited this dorm were students that had issues with getting along with any of the roommates they paired them with or for students living on-campus during the summer. Otherwise, it was typically 1/2 - 3/4 empty all year round and very creepy.

The Swope family

The legend says that when the college was first started, one of the biggest donors was the "Swope" family, hence why the dormitory and some other of the university's assets were named after them. They had two children: a boy and a girl. Back in those days they didn't have the same safety regulations they do now and Mary Swope (daughter) had a nasty habit of eating the chips of paint (lead) she scratched off the walls.

The unfortunate legend of Mary Swope

Over the years, her sanity began to wane and she became more and more violent and erratic. Her parents feared her insanity would put a shadow over their name, so they chose to lock her up. Of course, doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with her because, again, there was a lack of understanding about the dangers of lead paints. So to protect their family, they kept her locked in her room upstairs.

The family began to avoid interaction with Mary as much as possible. They would simply feed her and keep her locked in her room. Even on holidays, they wouldn't let her come out to be with the family. Mary's sanity continued to devolve and she began to feel betrayed by her family. People who are crazy don't typically realize they're crazy after all. She thought they were being unjust and before long she couldn't take it anymore. She leaped out of the only escape available to her: the window. Mary Swope died that night and shortly after the surviving Swope family moved away.

Haunted history of Swope Hall

The family had difficulty finding a buyer for the house but being the wealthy family that they were this was no issue. When they were approached about donating to the college they donated the house and land it sat on. The house was torn down and the foundation was increased to become the first dormitory on the campus and thusly named Swope Hall.

But that wasn't the end of the Swope family legacy. Over the years students who have gone into, and even lived in Swope Hall, have reported a number of strange and unexplained phenomena. Mysterious cold breezes brushing past them. Doors opening or closing unexpectedly. Some have even reported seeing a strange visage of a young girl in an old-fashioned nightgown sitting in corners of unused rooms. Some have heard strange whispers but were unable to make out the words. One year, for a fundraiser, some students set up a haunted house in the dormitory, and part-way through the fire alarms were mysteriously activated forcing the fundraiser to end prematurely. The oldest dormitory remains, to this day, one of the college's most mysterious and creepiest places on campus.

The basement of Swope Hall

More info from OP: Oh! Also, two more bits of interesting information.

In Swope Hall they have a basement area. The half that's not blocked off is used for the laundry room. But the half that IS blocked off is the creepiest area I've ever seen in my life. I desperately wish I had taken a picture when I was there.

Basically, the locked door has a small window on it so you can see down the hallway. There are doors on the right side, and a window on the left that is half blocked (since it's underground) so it only let's a very small amount of light in. Two of the three doors on the right are open (for as far as you can see) and you can just make out some extra beds and dressers that match the ones that come with the rooms students stay in, so basically storage for extra equipment. You can tell no one has been in this area in a LONG time, outside of probably the RA getting a piece of equipment if a student breaks the one they have.

Something about the small amount of light and the fact that the wallpaper is a sort of dull lime green gives the entire hallway a REALLY creepy vibe. It kind of looks like in games and shows when they switch to night vision and everything is heavily tinted in green. I looked in there a couple of times and was immediately washed over with a sense of dread and started getting goosebumps. I'm not really a believer in the paranormal, although I'm always intrigued by the stories. But something about this area always creeped me the heck out.

I always, after looking in there, thought to myself, if I stare into that space for long enough something is bound to crawl out of one of those rooms and that's not something I want to deal with.

The creepy SECONDARY chapel at underneath Swope Hall

And finally, there's actually a really creepy chapel BELOW the main chapel building which also has a creepy vibe to it. We used it once to film a "cult/horror" video once for Halloween. Scared the crap out of some dude who thought we were sacrificing cats or something. Just a fun-fact there.

Notes

• ”the town talks about it and has even written articles about it in the local newspaper around Halloween”
• Mary Swope (daughter) had a ”nasty habit of eating the chips of paint (lead) she scratched off the walls”
  • Mayo Clinic: Lead Poisoning info
• ”So to protect their family, they kept her locked in her room upstairs.“
  • The history of ”disappointment rooms”
• The Hauntings of Swope Hall: Fact or Fiction?

Location details

• Setting: Swope Hall at Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa

(serious) people of reddit who live in small towns, what is the main creepy event or legend that happened in said small town?

Tags: India // crime

Reply from u/Oluminitotonicalvary — (Hit on small town in India):

Lived in this town for about 4 years. I'm pretty sure it's not even a town, but for the sake of the story we'll call it a town. About 40 houses in that town, when we moved there for the serenity. All of us knew each other, our families and our backgrounds etc.

We planned on visiting my parents for a few days so I went to our immediate neighbours to ask them to check on our house till we came back. Surprisingly, our neighbours weren't home, some stranger was there instead. I asked him what he was doing at their house, and he told me that he was one of their cousins and even told me how they were related and told they asked him to take care of the house while they went on a trip. Usually they'd let me know beforehand if they were going out of town for a few days, but I brushed it off thinking they might've already asked this cousin to take care so they didn't bother telling me. So I asked him to check on our house occasionally while we were away, and came back home to pack our stuff for the travel. Girlfriend asked me why it took so long so I explained to her what happened. She told me they never mentioned this cousin to her once in their previous conversations, but we didn't think about it too much and packed and left for our parents'.

Two days later, while we were still at my parents' house, I got a call from the town's sheriff's office asking if I was in the town. Told them I wasn't, and they told me to stay away from the town for a few weeks, and continued to tell me what happened while we were away.

The day after we left, there was a coordinated hit on our town, as some sort of a Guerrilla mission to wipe the town to teach the local government a lesson. The guy who claimed to be a cousin of our neighbours was actually a soldier for their cause running a recon on the town to see how many people live in that town. He kidnapped and tortured and killed the neighbours. Luckily the local government caught on to this hit before it happening and countered it with the help of the army. We went back after a month to make sure our stuff was okay and then decided to move out soon after.

Turns out half the people in that town were guerilla soldiers trying to get people to populate the town enough for our governments to give a shit about, so when they do plan these hits going about killing the town occupants, they're gonna directly mess with the government as the govt wouldn't have seen it coming.

Notes:

• “Don't wanna go into specifics, but it was in India. Search naxal attacks on Google, you'll find many articles regarding many more incidents like this. It is still an ongoing guerilla warfare among these people and the government.”
• Timeline of Naxalite-Maoist insurgency
• Human Rights Watch: POLICE KILLINGS AND RURAL VIOLENCE IN ANDHRA PRADESH (PDF)

(serious) people of reddit who live in small towns, what is the main creepy event or legend that happened in said small town?

Tags: Malaysia

Reply from u/deleted — (Malaysian legend of the Pocong):

There is an urban creature in my country called the "Pocong" it'a basically a dead body wrapped in cloth from head to toe leaving the face space open and usually shamans or witch doctors use these spirits for their own benefit. During 2019 one pocong went rogue and travelled to 3 different states. It became sort of like a local meme. There were even pics of the sightings going viral on Malaysian Twitter. Creepy yet funny when you think abt how it became a local meme lol.

According to traditional beliefs, the soul of a dead person will stay on the Earth for 40 days after the death. If the ties over the shroud are not released after 40 days, the body is said to jump out from the grave to warn people that the soul needs to be released. After the ties are released, the soul will leave the Earth forever.

I mean, that's like a 2/10 as far as scary ghosts go. You literally remove the ties, and then the spirit departs peacefully.

Notes:

• Pocong Wikipedia
• Southeast Asian supernatural beliefs and folklore (detailed FB post)
• BBC Indonesia: Terror of ghosts – Begal, prank content or political conspiracy?