Of all the places in Lauderdale County that are said to be haunted, the most widely known is probably the Grand Opera House at Meridian’s MSU- Riley Center for the Performing Arts.

The more than 100-year-old theater, like many older theaters, has been reputed to house benevolent spirits for many decades, but the current legend may have begun when former Opera House director Elliott Street began to bring attention to the building in the 1980’s.

“I guess in a way it started when I was dating (a girl) and I decided to take her (into the Opera House) one night after a date … At the time I hadn’t started collecting any oral histories yet, so I had no record then of any spirits or any ghosts, but almost every theater has a pet theater ghost,” he said.

“So (my date) and I went up on the stage, and being of the right gender, she deserved a special tour by the executive director. And I cannot say that I did not wish that she would get scared and hopefully the male in me could step forward and be the protector!

“Anyhow, we were there on stage and we walked back through the big metal fire doors, where no lights had been rigged yet, so it was really dark. I was making my way, with a flashlight, over to one of the little pull-chain light bulbs, and this was in mid-summer, and I walked into a cold spot. I looked down and the hair on my arm was standing up. Now I don’t know if that was my own fear that rushed through me and made my hair stand up, or if it was something else, but somehow or another, I had never seen my hair stand up quite like that.

“So I stopped – really still – and at that point (my date) says, ‘Oh! There’s a female spirit!’

“And I said, ‘How do you know that?’

“And she says, ‘Because, it means us no harm and it doesn’t mind us being here”. So that’s when I said, ‘Uh, why don’t we go somewhere else.’”

Street also tells the story of a woman who came to the Opera House to ask him for a tour. During the tour, he says, they walked past a wooden staircase and the woman exclaimed that she used to sneak into the Opera House during her break and eat lunch on the staircase. She claimed to Street that on more than one occasion she heard the sound of a lady singing, though she knew herself to be alone in the building.



It was after his own experience with “the Lady,” says Street, that he began to think of the woman whose portrait appears above the stage as the resident lady spirit of the theater. This image, a woman’s face framed by flowers, became the logo for the Opera House.

Though some, like Street, believe the woman in the portrait and the one who haunts the theater to be the same person, others have suggested that she is Lillie Langtry (also known as Lily Langtree), an actress and vocalist of the early 1910s whose trademark, according to current Riley Center director Dennis Sankovich, was a flowering similar to that which adorns the portrait of the woman. Neither theory can be proved nor disproved, and the woman’s identity remains a complete mystery. Surprisingly, I have heard no one suggest that the woman in the portrait is both Lillie Langtry and the spirit that haunts the theater.

Sankovich has encountered numerous people who believe the theater is haunted. Perhaps the most notable person to feel the presence of spirits there was New Orleans ghost hunter Bloody Mary.

The dubiously named Bloody Mary has twice visited the Opera House, says Sankovich, and both times has professed the presence of not just one, but many, benevolent spirits there.

“Bloody Mary came to the Opera House before we began construction on it and said she felt spirits here… She came back a second time with [a big group of people] and took photos with a digital camera. A lot of the photos had these orbs in them that she said were images of the spirits … I took some pictures myself which also had the orbs in them. At first I thought, ‘it must be lens flare’. But after looking at the pictures more closely, they couldn’t have been lens flare …There was nowhere that they could have been coming from.”

The most impressive of the photographs, according to Sankovich, contained an “orb” that, when enlarged, appeared to contain the shape of a face. The “orbs” are small, perfectly circular, emanations of light that dot the photographs. These kinds of phenomena are often found in photos taken in places that are reputed to house spirits.

According to Sankovich, Bloody Mary was also impressed with the high amount of positive energy that she felt the spirits radiated. This is one phenomenon that believers and non-believers alike will agree on – the theater has a strong positive vibe.

“Most of the performers that play here are struck by – they just love the feel of the theater,” says Sankovich, “Hal Holbrook said it was one of the two best theaters he’s ever played in”.

While Sankovich hasn’t heard a performer mention feeling a supernatural presence in the theater, many of the staff swear that the place houses spirits, he says, “We have one staff member who says that he felt a hand touch his shoulder when he was in the theater, but turned around to find that nothing was there … Whenever we have an electrical short or a phantom flickering light bulb, we’ll say, ‘the ghost is talking to us.’”

Perhaps it is worth mentioning that one way in which the stories conveyed by Street and Sankovich always match is that they all describe feelings of benevolence and positivity. Also, although disembodied singing and flickering lights do come in to play, none of the stories describe an apparition visible to the naked eye.

But Sankovich says he is neither convinced nor unconvinced as to the existence of spirits in the theater, mentioning another theater in which many swore that the groans and bangings of the radiator system were actually those of ghosts. Street, too, never states whether or not he sincerely believes in the existence of the “Lady”. They are both happy, however, that the legend brings publicity to the theater, they both enjoy the mystery and novelty of “the Lady” (or ladies), and are both mystified by some of the unexplained phenomena in the theater that many attribute to ghosts.

The bottom line? As Sankovich puts it, “It’s all in good fun.”

By Jennifer Jacob

special to the star



Of all the places in Lauderdale County that are said to be haunted, the most widely known is probably the Grand Opera House at Meridian’s MSU- Riley Center for the Performing Arts.

The more than 100-year-old theater, like many older theaters, has been reputed to house benevolent spirits for many decades, but the current legend may have begun when former Opera House director Elliott Street began to bring attention to the building in the 1980’s.

“I guess in a way it started when I was dating (a girl) and I decided to take her (into the Opera House) one night after a date … At the time I hadn’t started collecting any oral histories yet, so I had no record then of any spirits or any ghosts, but almost every theater has a pet theater ghost,” he said.

“So (my date) and I went up on the stage, and being of the right gender, she deserved a special tour by the executive director. And I cannot say that I did not wish that she would get scared and hopefully the male in me could step forward and be the protector!

“Anyhow, we were there on stage and we walked back through the big metal fire doors, where no lights had been rigged yet, so it was really dark. I was making my way, with a flashlight, over to one of the little pull-chain light bulbs, and this was in mid-summer, and I walked into a cold spot. I looked down and the hair on my arm was standing up. Now I don’t know if that was my own fear that rushed through me and made my hair stand up, or if it was something else, but somehow or another, I had never seen my hair stand up quite like that.

“So I stopped – really still – and at that point (my date) says, ‘Oh! There’s a female spirit!’

“And I said, ‘How do you know that?’

“And she says, ‘Because, it means us no harm and it doesn’t mind us being here”. So that’s when I said, ‘Uh, why don’t we go somewhere else.’”

Street also tells the story of a woman who came to the Opera House to ask him for a tour. During the tour, he says, they walked past a wooden staircase and the woman exclaimed that she used to sneak into the Opera House during her break and eat lunch on the staircase. She claimed to Street that on more than one occasion she heard the sound of a lady singing, though she knew herself to be alone in the building.



It was after his own experience with “the Lady,” says Street, that he began to think of the woman whose portrait appears above the stage as the resident lady spirit of the theater. This image, a woman’s face framed by flowers, became the logo for the Opera House.

Though some, like Street, believe the woman in the portrait and the one who haunts the theater to be the same person, others have suggested that she is Lillie Langtry (also known as Lily Langtree), an actress and vocalist of the early 1910s whose trademark, according to current Riley Center director Dennis Sankovich, was a flowering similar to that which adorns the portrait of the woman. Neither theory can be proved nor disproved, and the woman’s identity remains a complete mystery. Surprisingly, I have heard no one suggest that the woman in the portrait is both Lillie Langtry and the spirit that haunts the theater.

Sankovich has encountered numerous people who believe the theater is haunted. Perhaps the most notable person to feel the presence of spirits there was New Orleans ghost hunter Bloody Mary.

The dubiously named Bloody Mary has twice visited the Opera House, says Sankovich, and both times has professed the presence of not just one, but many, benevolent spirits there.

“Bloody Mary came to the Opera House before we began construction on it and said she felt spirits here… She came back a second time with [a big group of people] and took photos with a digital camera. A lot of the photos had these orbs in them that she said were images of the spirits … I took some pictures myself which also had the orbs in them. At first I thought, ‘it must be lens flare’. But after looking at the pictures more closely, they couldn’t have been lens flare …There was nowhere that they could have been coming from.”

The most impressive of the photographs, according to Sankovich, contained an “orb” that, when enlarged, appeared to contain the shape of a face. The “orbs” are small, perfectly circular, emanations of light that dot the photographs. These kinds of phenomena are often found in photos taken in places that are reputed to house spirits.

According to Sankovich, Bloody Mary was also impressed with the high amount of positive energy that she felt the spirits radiated. This is one phenomenon that believers and non-believers alike will agree on – the theater has a strong positive vibe.

“Most of the performers that play here are struck by – they just love the feel of the theater,” says Sankovich, “Hal Holbrook said it was one of the two best theaters he’s ever played in”.

While Sankovich hasn’t heard a performer mention feeling a supernatural presence in the theater, many of the staff swear that the place houses spirits, he says, “We have one staff member who says that he felt a hand touch his shoulder when he was in the theater, but turned around to find that nothing was there … Whenever we have an electrical short or a phantom flickering light bulb, we’ll say, ‘the ghost is talking to us.’”

Perhaps it is worth mentioning that one way in which the stories conveyed by Street and Sankovich always match is that they all describe feelings of benevolence and positivity. Also, although disembodied singing and flickering lights do come in to play, none of the stories describe an apparition visible to the naked eye.

But Sankovich says he is neither convinced nor unconvinced as to the existence of spirits in the theater, mentioning another theater in which many swore that the groans and bangings of the radiator system were actually those of ghosts. Street, too, never states whether or not he sincerely believes in the existence of the “Lady”. They are both happy, however, that the legend brings publicity to the theater, they both enjoy the mystery and novelty of “the Lady” (or ladies), and are both mystified by some of the unexplained phenomena in the theater that many attribute to ghosts.

The bottom line? As Sankovich puts it, “It’s all in good fun.”