I attended SMU and lived in Winona from birth to college graduation. One of my parents also worked there for over 25 years… I also lived in Heffron Hall the summer before my sophomore year, to work on campus.

I never felt hauntings in Heffron, just the temperature being way too hot (due to no AC). Whoever posted the story at the top of the page has a very exaggerated interpretation…. the Pat Marek story in Winona Post is correct. Google “Pat Marek Heffron” if you want to know the truth.

There are also stories of St. Yon’s Hall (the music building out in back) having priests committing suicide in the building, and the “demon door.”

These are the other confirmed deaths I know of on campus:
- Late 80’s, Rm 116 Benilde Hall. A freshman named Jay Johnson took 19 shots on his 19th birthday, and his friends dumped him in his bed face up. He died in his sleep and now the health center is named after him… I had a close friend live in that room, and he said the lights and the TV would turn on and off. A girl a year older than me also said she saw weird stuff there.
- 3 students and 2 alumni died on March 1st, 1997 in a terrible accident. Their Jeep went into the Mississippi River and were “missing” for several days. I have not heard any ghost stories about this death however.
- A student hung himself in Heffron in the early 00’s… it’s on 4th floor, all the way down the left hall, and looking out the window on that end it’s the room on the left. They had no one live there for a few years, then just recently began filling that room.

Has anyone thought about the fact that maybe some chick pissed in the toilet and had their period?

Has anyone checked the pipes to see if there is bad rust? It could make the water turn red.

Just because you hear footsteps doesn’t mean someone isn’t there. This seems like a bullshit to me. Further proper investigations should take place.

wel to me it look like you do not have a ghost but a sick man who haveing a good time with all the kids but your story is a joke so stop makeing things up and find us something real

what is the SW Brown story? i saw his site today but i cant find anything about the story..

Just So everyone reading this has a full and legit understanding of heffron hall…i live here in winona mn, i have been in heffron hall. i know that the story goes deeper than what this site says. Yes there were two priest fighting for head positions here at this university. One of the priests resided in the hall itself before it became dormitory. The priest was in his room and at some point was reading the Holy Bible. The bible remained open when he fell asleep and the bible lay on the table beside his bed. The following morning when someone went to wake the sleeping priest, they found his body in sleep position, charred. The bible too, had been found burned.no fowl play was suspected, and no one was ever charged with the crime. The other priest had no involvement. The only freaky part was that the bible when later examined, had only one section not burnt. The section was in relation to what had happened to him, and since then things have been reported to still be happening to the students within the dorms. I had a friend who switched dorms because she felt like someone was watching her, and she heard things she couldn’t explain. I know the place is haunted and the spirit of the ghost is in those halls…and as long as the university stands….he will be there. He still is.

The story on S.W. brown is crazy…..crazy but real. This is what i know by my own real experience. He was supposedly a warlock. At some point in his death he cast out a curse on the city of winona stating that anyone to live here will never be able to leave. This town is a F****** blackhole. I have lived many places and still somehow, my mom when i was a kid always came back here….and well thanks to her…..here i still am. Now the haunting experience part. In woodlawn cemetary, he has a crypt that is high on the bluff, on the right upper side of the location. Now people in this town are rude and because of this supposed curse, people still hate him. His gravesite is the only site i have ever seen people disrespect so bad. People throw trash into his crypt, they have tried to burgalarize it, and have just tried in general to f*** the place up, and all the other gravesites are beautiful and well taken care of. In this cemetary the place is maintained by staff, and by the families of the dead. This particular grave however is almost forgotten. Never any flowers, or stops from family morning his passing, or even regarding it for that matter. On many occasions me and a good friend of mine used to go out there and it was our special interest. Some locals who know the stories of the cemetary will tell you that if you take digital cameras and try to take pictures of certain spots the camera will die. Even one with a full battery will all of a sudden shut off. I have a million and one pics of the S.W. site, and for what showed up on film i think i am lucky to have the pictures. the first one is of my friend standing in the front looking into the gated middle section of the crypt, no one around here, and this was at about dusk. Now know i took these with her disposable camera (so i couldnt look back at what i took), midsummer, at around dusk. the next picture is strange. Facing the crypt dead on- there is a soft grassy like small hill that wraps around it leading into the bluff. the 2nd pic, i took dead on with her still in the picture, she is just turning her head around to look at me, and in the corner of the developed film, you see a smoke like fog creeping into the upper left corner at the top of the crypt. In the third developed picture you see her looking at me and the smokey fog creeeps down further and thicker around the left side of the hill surrounding the crypt, the other side is crytal clear. the fourth picture, its what scared us. the fourth picture is a gray haze, with just a hint of clearing to make out my friend standing by the entrance of the crypt, it was as if he knew that we were there and still by some means didnt want for us to have those pictures. Before the pictures were taken we spent alot of time out at his grave because Woodlawn is beautiful during the summer and is quiet and peacful. We enjoyed spending time out there, like a world outside of winona talking and discovering its mysteries. to the point that like the families of the dead we cared for his gravesite, picking up the disaster people turned his eternal home into. If i could tell you more about him i would, but between my best friend and i we isnt a monster. She even has two pieces of his crypt in her room. Two tiny pieces that are now charms for necklaces (like a token from a lost family member-not like cults and demon worship bullS***). Dont judge her either if you think that taking a part of him with her is wrong…….so is trashing a holy burial site on sacred ground with trash spit and vandalism.
We respect the dead….why cant other people?

I am a SMU student and I have lived in Heffron for more that a year. I can tell you tried and true that Heffron Hall IS NOT, IS NOT, IS NOT haunted. It is a fabrication. I love the story and I really want it to be true, but it is false. Also that sick M*^%#$ Fu*$!@ that said the priests were after boys is wrong, wrong, and sick in the head. The story is 100% true, and it has nothing to do with young boys as this is, and always has been a COLLEGE, not a school for young children.
The Story remains the same, and true, and Heffron, unfortunately, is not haunted.

Samantha R.
Please email me, I would love to discuss SW Brown
missionorange@hotmail.com

Thanks
Ryan

I’m having difficulty finding images of the “Demon Door” online, but I know for a fact that the Demon Door is real. I have seen it and I am searching through a huge pile of Mini-DV tapes with video footage of that very door. I hope that tape is in my pile! If I remember correctly, the wood grain of the door has a large “cloaked figure” with two angry looking faces hovering over his shoulders. I remember the faces resembled a cross between that of a bat’s and a dog’s.

I also heard that they have tried to change that door on several occasions, and each time, faces would later appear in the natural curves of the wood grain, and that they have finally given up on spending money replacing that cursed door. I kinda hope it is still there!

Do you know of any existing photographs of that door?