St. Cloud is known for; having bad traffic on Division Street during rush hour, amazing Val's french fries, our giant Gopher chair, our Division 1 hockey team and so many other wonderful things. But, like anywhere in the world, when you start to peel back the layers you find the creepy, the haunted and the unsolved mystery in our area. Here are a few things that make this area anything but ordinary to say the least.

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1. We have a forgotten island.  Believe it or not, there's an island in the Mississippi called Sportsman's Island complete with buildings, ball fields and a playground. Now, it's all overgrown and looks like a ghost town. It was once a thriving island that hosted many company picnics and community functions.

2. Our prison wall is the second largest man-made wall in the world. It's second only to the Great Wall of China.

3. Stephen King named St. Cloud one of the most haunted places in the world when referenced in his movie "1408". King claims that a mysterious lady threw her baby down a well. The Stearns History Museum has reached out to King for comment, but he has never returned an answer.

4. We are home to two forgotten graveyards. Property owners reported finding human remains in the neighborhood of 3rd Street North and Cooper Avenue. There was a second unmarked graveyard  where St. Cloud State University's library and Performing Arts Center currently sit as well as in some of the surrounding neighborhoods in the area also known as Block 26.

5. We're on the path of the Smiley Face Killer. It's a strange phenomenon, white college-age men go missing for days, sometimes weeks, only to be found drowned in a body of water somewhere after a night at the bar. Most of the deaths happen along Interstate 94 stretching from Minnesota toward New York since the late 1990's. It's just a theory, but some people buy into it.

6. Haunted colleges--Saint John's University's Stella Maris Chapel is said to be one of the most haunted places on campus. It's legend that a monk was rowing a bell to the chapel when the boat tipped and the monk drowned. Students report hearing the bells from across the lake at midnight. St. Cloud State University is also said to be haunted by a former student who hung herself in Shoemaker Hall's meat locker after she became pregnant by the school's janitor. Students who live in the dorm have reported strange happenings they say is the work of the female ghost.

7. Vampire Murder--St. Cloud’s Beaver Island Trail was the site of the infamous Vampire Murder. It was a national news story about three teenagers involved in the murder of a homeless man. One of the teens licked the man's blood from the knife that was used to kill him.

8. Murderer among us--Susanne and Mary Reker went missing in St. Cloud while on a trip to the store for school supplies. The Reker sisters were found nearly a month later murdered in Quarry Park. Their killer has never been found, although authorities have suspects.

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