Happy Halloween! The National Association of Scholars—which you should join—held its annual board meeting this past weekend in Denver. It was a delight to finally have that long-anticipated conversation about artificial intelligence (AI) with my colleagues—in person.
AI is everywhere these days. It makes headlines in higher education as students turn to it for everything from writing essays to having a digital study partner. Minding the Campus contributor Joe Nalven has curated a lineup of articles on the subject, exploring how it might be used in art. And David Kane just recently asked if professors can outsmart AI. Some of my colleagues think AI is mere hype, while others, myself included, fear we’re staring into the abyss of an AI takeover. My brother—a PhD candidate in math at Texas A&M and a for-funsies coder who might join the intelligence community—put it this way: “No one knows what they’re doing; they’re coding us all to h**l.”
So, is AI just a passing fad, or are we unwittingly paving the way for our own doom? This Halloween, I decided to run a little experiment. Just how well can AI spin a tale about a real spooky campus folklore? Below, you’ll find the prompt I fed into ChatGPT, asking it to weave the eerie story of Smith College and the haunting of Lucy Smith, who lost her heart to the British General Johnny Burgoyne before he vanished to Ireland. What follows is ChatGPT’s unedited essay:
Prompt: Craft a chilling, journalist-style essay about the real haunting stories at Smith College, drawing from verifiable sources and folklore, with a word count below 600 words. The narrative should vividly depict the eerie events surrounding Johnny Burgoyne and Lucy Hunt, weaving in firsthand accounts from students, staff, and alumni. The tone should be suspenseful and unsettling, immersing readers in the haunting atmosphere of Sessions House. Conclude with a thought-provoking message, exploring how these legends resonate with students today, touching on themes of love, loss, and the lingering effect of history on campus life.
Output: The Haunting of Smith College: Ghostly Echoes of Sessions House
Smith College, nestled in Northampton, Massachusetts, is an institution brimming with both academic prestige and ghostly lore. Chief among its haunted buildings is Sessions House, a charming Georgian residence that has been home to more than its share of strange happenings. Generations of Smith students and staff have spun tales of encounters with specters that defy easy explanation. Two ghostly figures dominate these accounts: British General Johnny Burgoyne and Lucy Hunt, whose tragic story continues to haunt the halls.
Sessions House, built in 1751, carries the weight of the American Revolution within its walls. Its most famous legend is that of Johnny Burgoyne, a British officer held prisoner during the Revolutionary War, and Lucy Hunt, the American daughter of the house’s original owner. The story goes that Burgoyne and Hunt shared a forbidden love, meeting secretly in the cramped, dusty passageways beneath Sessions House. They were discovered, however, and separated. Broken-hearted and haunted by unfulfilled love, they are said to remain in Sessions House, trapped in a ghostly loop.
In whispers across campus, students still recount encounters with Lucy and Johnny. One alumna from the 1980s recalls staying late to study in her room when she felt an icy draft that made her blood run cold. The light flickered, and she heard faint footsteps, distinctly out of sync with the steady hum of campus life. Another student, a junior in the early 2000s, recounted a spine-chilling experience while exploring the basement on a dare. “It was like a whisper in the walls—someone murmuring my name. I felt the temperature drop and saw a flicker of shadow move past me.”
Facilities staff share stories of the ‘haunted room’ in Sessions House, where the lightbulbs mysteriously burn out more quickly than anywhere else, and the atmosphere feels thick and heavy. “When you’re in there alone, you know you’re not really alone,” one maintenance worker said, shaking his head. “People say it’s Johnny looking for Lucy, roaming the halls, or Lucy weeping quietly by her window.” Both students and staff describe the same uneasy sense of being watched, of seeing a figure from the corner of their eye that disappears when they look directly.
One of the most enduring parts of the Sessions House legend is the story of “the Lovers’ Stairs,” where Johnny and Lucy allegedly met in secret. Students and alumni claim that, at night, if you stand on the stairs alone, you might hear whispers or even catch the scent of lavender, Lucy’s favorite flower. A resident from the 1990s reported hearing a knock at her door late one night, only to find no one there. Moments later, her bedside candle flickered out, and a chill settled over the room. “It was like someone was saying, ‘We’re still here.’”
Sessions House, for all its charm, has a unique way of unsettling even the most skeptical visitors. Some believe that Johnny and Lucy’s ghostly bond speaks to the unbreakable connection between people and place. Each autumn, when the days shorten and shadows stretch, the college is reminded of these legends through eerie occurrences: the faint echo of footsteps, a door creaking open, the quiet murmur of voices in the stillness of the night.
For many Smith students, the tales of Sessions House embody themes of love and loss, of the lingering presence of history, both celebrated and tragic. The ghostly couple represents a form of resilience, a reminder that, even in the pursuit of knowledge and progress, the past’s mysteries remain unforgotten. Johnny and Lucy’s spirits serve as a haunting emblem of the college’s heritage—a reminder that some stories, once part of a place, can never fully fade away.
Despite some glaring factual errors, this essay is well-crafted. If a contributor had submitted it to me, I would have simply asked whether they sourced the quotes accurately; if they did, I’d be ready to publish it. Yet, what’s truly chilling is its knack for conjuring up fabricated facts to achieve the broader goal of the prompt—don’t you think? Share your thoughts in the comments. And since it’s Halloween, feel free to share your own campus ghost stories.
Image created using Chat GPT — “Create a spooky image for Minding the Campus’s Halloween feature, depicting a robot arm emerging from a grave. The scene should evoke an eerie atmosphere, with dark shadows and a misty background to enhance the haunting effect.”
