The Stain Of Margaret Shilling | Real Paranormal Incident

Hey All ! Ghost Spot is back after a long time with a new interesting mystery. We casually posted this on our Facebook Page and to our surprise this particular Facebook Post gave us a good reach. So we thought to give you a detailed info about this discussion.





On the concrete floor of an abandoned mental hospital known as The Ridges, there is a stain in the shape of a human body. Legend has it, the stain marks the spot where a patient, a woman named Margaret Schilling, died, after lying undiscovered for several weeks. This happened in 1979 and has drawn much speculation as well as curious visitors; forensic scientists recently tested the stain to determine whether it was caused by human decomposition.



The Ridges was originally known as The Athens Mental Health Center. It was built in Athens, Ohio, and first opened in 1874. Giant asylums like this one were common in America during this time, and since treatment mostly involved separating the mentally ill from society, they needed to be enormous to house many patients. The Ridges was designed to hold roughly 550 patients comfortably.



However, as the years passed, more people were admitted to the asylum. By the 1950’s, this hospital was way over it’s capacity; close to 2,000 patients crowded the asylum. However, even though there were so many patients, there were several wings and even entire floors which remained untouched and unrenovated as the years went by.

In one of these rooms, on the top floor of the hospital, remains the vestige of Margaret Schilling, a former patient who was found dead in this room, and is now the most notorious ghost said to haunt the asylum. There is a large stain, in the shape of a human body, in the room where she was found in 1979. There are many different myths surrounding her story; some believe she was a deaf-mute who found herself locked in the upstairs wing after getting separated from the staff. Supposedly she could not call out for help and instead, she died slowly in the room, alone.

However, in reality, she was simply a woman with some mental disabilities, who managed to get lost, lock herself in an empty ward, and was unable to escape. The date of her disappearance was December 2, 1978, and she was not found until over a month later, on January 12, 1979. When she was found, she was dead on the floor where the stain was, possibly as a result of heart failure due to exposure to extreme cold in an unheated part of the ward. She was also naked; she had removed all of her clothing, folded it neatly, and left it on the concrete floor beside her.

When they removed her decomposing body, they discovered that she had left a permanent stain on the concrete. It’s believed the stain was caused by her body decaying, combined with the sunlight hitting her body in the process. Although there have been many attempts at cleaning and removing the stain, it has remained. After that, people began to see ghostly images of a woman staring down at them from the windows that belonged to the room she was found in.



The stain is still there today and has been verified as caused by human decomposition by a team of forensic scientists, who tested the stain. The Ridges and the stain of Margaret Schilling have drawn thousands of visitors over the years, all in an attempt to see the stain and perhaps catch a glimpse of her ghost.


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