It’s not difficult to see why the Casts chose Cascia Hall as the setting for their vampyre finishing school. At the heart of the Cascia Hall complex sits the original monastery, which dates back to the school’s founding by the Order of Saint Augustine in 1926. Even the newer constructions follow the same neo-French Norman style of architecture, thus lending an atmosphere of Old World history and gravity to a campus not yet a century old. The founders named the school for Saint Rita of Cascia, Italy, and the imposing Saint Rita of Cascia Chapel occupies a key position on its grounds. In the Casts’ novels, this becomes Nyx’s Temple at the House of Night.
Cascia Hall’s appearance sets it apart from the rest of Tulsa. First, its castle-like buildings and towers differ from the other noteworthy constructions in the region; in fact, they look positively medieval, as if they predate the rest of the city and state. (Thus Zoey, during her first tour of the grounds in Marked, thinks to herself, “I swear, a moat would have looked more like it belonged there than a sidewalk . . .”) Second, the forty wooded acres of the campus divide it from the residential neighborhood in which it sits. Although entrances to Cascia Hall exist on both South Yorktown Avenue and South Utica Avenue, the South Utica entrance remains closed except during athletic events. The school thus appears to be as exclusive geographically and architecturally as it is academically and financially. To mainstream Tulsans, this isolation lends the place a certain (dare I say Gothic?) mystery. Tucked away, secretive, and utterly distinctive, the campus offers the perfect home for the supernatural or paranormal—in short, for the Casts’ vampyres.
The Philbrook Museum of Art
Together the Philbrook Museum of Art and its grounds seem to have emerged directly from a book of classic legends. As a very young child, I accompanied my parents to an outdoor evening showing of Camelot on the Philbrook’s manicured lawn, and I recall that it was difficult to tell where the fictional kingdom of Camelot ended and the real grounds of the Philbrook began.
Waite Phillips, I think, would’ve been delighted at this. One of three brothers who made their fortunes from Oklahoma oil, Waite Phillips (1883–1964) wanted his seventy-two room home and its twenty-three acre surroundings to seem like a piece of Italian history transplanted to contemporary Tulsa. Completed in 1927, Villa Philbrook is a masterpiece of Italian Renaissance design. Its elaborate gardens mimic those created by Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola for the Villa Lante in 1566, following the Mannerist style of the Italian High Renaissance long appreciated for its intellectual sophistication and symmetry rather than its naturalism. The gardens, like the villa itself, reflect conscious craftsmanship and delicate artistry.
It’s easy to understand why Aphrodite chooses the domed gazebo at the foot of the garden for her Samhain ritual in Marked. After all, there could hardly be a more dramatic setting for a drama queen. Technically, the “gazebo” is a tempietto, a circular Renaissance temple, and it serves as the focal point of interest from the Villa Philbrook’s back terrace. The museum’s garden and paved walks all point directly to the structure, and the small pool before it reflects back the image of its long white columns. As readers discover, Aphrodite’s ritual for the Dark Daughters and Sons goes badly wrong there, and in the aftermath the Philbrook gazebo becomes the setting for Zoey Redbird’s unplanned debut as a future High Priestess. It seems appropriate that Zoey finds herself, in her words, in a setting like “a magical fairy kingdom” when taking her first steps as a leader specially chosen by her Goddess.
The Casts return repeatedly to the remarkable location of the Philbrook Museum to further the plots of their novels. In Betrayed, for example, police find the mangled body of Union football player Brad Higeons in a stream on the Philbrook grounds. In Chosen, Zoey picks the Philbrook gazebo as the place to reunite with her once dead and now drastically altered best friend, Stevie Rae. Never does the Philbrook appear to be a threatening place in its own right; the only concern any of the characters seem to feel is that of attracting the attention of human security guards after museum hours, and this rates more as an inconvenience than a threat. Instead, the sheer exoticism of the place seems to heighten already powerful emotions, from dread and terror to joy and triumph.
This fits well with the reputation the Philbrook enjoys among Tulsans. After an apparently happy tenure in Villa Philbrook, Waite Phillips donated his home to the city in 1938 as a showcase for his eclectic and extensive art collection. The museum opened in 1939. No guidebook or ghost tour marks the Philbrook as a “haunted” place, and yet a quick Google search will reveal half a dozen Tulsa-based blogs that report vague, unusual happenings there: painted portraits whose eyes follow visitors, for instance, or outdoor sculptures that turn their heads to watch passersby. None of the accounts suggests anything malevolent or unwelcoming—or even particularly specific. But it seems that some Tulsans want to think of the Philbrook as too grand, too spectacular to be contained by the natural, normal laws of the everyday world. In short, it’s an ideal spot for the Casts to use in their supernatural, paranormal reimagining of Tulsa.
The Union Depot
Another key Tulsa landmark that appears often in the House of Night series is the Union Depot. This heavyset, imposing structure offers a contrary note to the architectural chorus of downtown Tulsa. Some of the surrounding buildings sprang up in the oil boom days of the 1920s and reflect the extravagance of that time, from the Gothic Philtower, complete with leering gargoyles, to the elegant Philcade building, adorned with wrought-iron embellishments. (Both buildings were named for Waite Phillips.) A number of the structures reflect early art deco sensibilities—so many, in fact, that Tulsa once was called “Terra Cotta City” because of the terra cotta art deco tiles carved in geometric and zigzag patterns that grace both the exteriors and interiors of the buildings. Even today, travel guides such as 2010’s Insiders’ Guide to Tulsa by Elaine Warner include special art deco tours of downtown Tulsa.
After the Stock Market Crash of 1929, however, architectural tastes changed. The Tulsa Union Depot was built in 1931 and represents what’s known as the PWA (Public Works Administration) art deco style. Its solemn lines project calm stability, almost severity, rather than flashy extravagance, but the design still boasts the classic art deco zigzag pattern. The sheer scale of the structure certainly suggests permanence, and the size was needed, for in its heyday the Union Depot served three separate railroads and their passengers. After closing its doors in 1967, the proud building sat empty and deserted for years. Looters stripped its interior, and the deteriorating roof collapsed.
Here the Casts’ version of Tulsa diverges from actual Tulsa history. Today the Union Depot, fully renovated, houses the impressive Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame and the Tulsa Symphony Orchestra. In the House of Night series, however, the depot remains empty and forlorn. In Zoey’s words from Betrayed, “It looked like something that should be in the Gotham City of the Batman Dark Knight comics.” Stevie Rae describes it in Tempted as having a “Blade Runner meets Amityville Horror” look.
The Casts accomplish several things by reimagining the Union Depot in this way. First and foremost, the idea of that elegant yet austere building sitting dark and ravaged is downright spooky. Not many people would be lining up to take a midnight tour, I can assure you. The city might be too young to boast the ageless, windswept moors of Wuthering Heights or the legendary castle of Dracula, but this depiction of the depot adds to the notion of Tulsa—especially Tulsa at night—as an old, forbidding, haunted place straight out of a classic Gothic romance.
The authors’ choice also enhances the story line most closely linked to the Union Depot in the novels, that of the self-imposed exile of the red vampyres who live beneath it. The abandoned depot represents something dead, decayed, and absolutely wrong, which is exactly how readers first view the once deceased and now transformed red fledglings. This Gothic sense of wrongness is doubly potent for Tulsa readers, who recognize that the depot isn’t in this dire condition in “real life.” The disturbing unnatur
alness of the neglected depot mirrors the disturbing unnaturalness of these vamps, their origins, and their dark appetites.
Last, leaving the Union Depot abandoned frees the space to be used for events in the books. The most spine-chilling action there occurs in the fifth novel of the series, Hunted, when the leader of the rogue red vampyres, Nicole, and her followers trap Stevie Rae on the roof and leave her to burn to death in the morning sun. Rephaim, the Raven Mocker who owes Stevie Rae his life, saves her. The dark towers and intimidating lines of the depot roof offer the perfect backdrop for the dramatic betrayal, near murder, and remarkable rescue.
These events couldn’t have taken place if the Casts had used the current restored depot instead. Even if the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame and Tulsa Symphony Orchestra employees and visitors somehow had remained oblivious to red vampyres living in the tunnels below them, and vampyre fledglings using their toilets and showers, I’m guessing they would have noticed a red vampyre High Priestess smoking on the rooftop and a Raven Mocker climbing in the trees. By emptying the Union Depot, the Casts open it up to their alternate universe and the tales it contains.
The Tulsa Tunnels
Beneath the buildings of downtown lies one of the most fascinating features of the real Tulsa landscape, a complex system of underground tunnels. Local legend has it that these tunnels were created to move alcohol during Prohibition, which began nationwide in 1920 and continued in Tulsa until 1957. I remember hearing these stories, and so does Heath Luck, Zoey’s on-again, off-again human boyfriend/consort. I have no doubt that the tunnels did prove very handy to bootleggers at various times in Tulsa’s history, but they actually had their origin in a different and more legitimate cause. Apparently construction began on the tunnels in the early 1930s to move freight between some of Tulsa’s businesses. According to Alice Froeschle, owner of Bandana Tours, Waite Phillips (the same millionaire who built Villa Philbrook) soon adapted them for his own purposes.
It seems that in the 1930s, Phillips began to feel a bit nervous about walking the streets of Tulsa unprotected. This might sound rather paranoid, but considering the events of his day, it’s understandable. In 1932, the baby son of wealthy aviator Charles Lindbergh was kidnapped from his home in New Jersey, and even though the Lindberghs paid ransom, the infant was murdered. Somewhat closer to home, notorious criminal George “Machine Gun” Kelly abducted the wealthy Oklahoma City oilman Charles F. Urschel from his home in 1933. Kelly held Urschel hostage until he received a ransom payment. Waite Phillips did not want to become the next victim in the headlines of national newspapers. He felt more secure knowing that he and his colleagues and loved ones could walk from one place of business to another using private routes below the city streets, and thus had the Tulsa tunnel system expanded.
The tunnels both in reality and in Tulsa folklore differ from those described in the House of Night series, but not as much as one might think. It’s true that the tunnel system is less extensive in the real Tulsa than in the city reimagined by the Casts. Visitors to the Union Depot today, for example, will find clean, bright pedestrian bridges for their convenience rather than rusted gratings leading down to shadowy subterranean passages. Furthermore, many of the tunnels that do exist and remain open are in excellent repair. Well lit and decorated, these tunnels are used by Tulsa professionals as part of their daily routines.
But enough mystery—and, let’s face it, creepiness—surrounds the tunnels to make them excellent tools in the Casts’ mythologizing of Tulsa. When downtown public relations professional Andrea Myers led a guest tour for readers of the Tasha Does Tulsa blog on February 22, 2010, she admitted that some portions of the tunnels remain dank and wet to this day, with rotting ceiling tiles dripping water into buckets. She also noted that random doors appear in the tunnels without signs to identify them, doors that seem “to not have been opened for decades.” Legends feed on such things.
Teri French, the founder of Tulsa Spirit Tours, relates in her 2010 book, Tulsa’s Haunted Memories, several fantastic stories linked to downtown Tulsa tunnels and drainage systems. According to French, traditional tales about the Tulsa underground include rumors of satanic rituals, animal sacrifice, and other occult activity. One repeated story tells of the discovery of a temporary shrine to the ancient goddess Isis that allegedly appeared one day and disappeared the next. Although such rumors remain unsubstantiated, they refuse to die. All of the tales agree that strange people may be involved in dark deeds beneath the downtown streets of Tulsa.
The Casts harness both the real and the folkloric elements of the tunnels to craft their mythology. The tunnels first appear in the second book of the series, Betrayed, and they play an important role in all of the subsequent novels to date. When readers initially encounter them, they serve as the dark lair of the sinister red vampyres who have captured and tormented Heath and are preparing to kill him. In Heath’s words, the tunnels are “more like caves . . . They’re dark and wet and disgusting.” Zoey’s experience there confirms the reader’s opinion: the tunnels are bad news, peopled with frightening creatures and dangerous to anyone who ventures into them.
Over time, however, the reader’s understanding of the tunnels evolves just as Zoey’s does. When Stevie Rae regains her humanity and becomes the High Priestess of the red vampyres, the tunnels change outwardly to echo her inner transformation. They become a sanctuary to Stevie Rae and her followers, with comfortable individual bedrooms and homey touches—not to mention some high-end interior decorating thanks to Aphrodite’s credit cards. The red vampyres feel most secure underground, and Stevie Rae draws special strength from there, as well, thanks to her Goddess-given earth affinity. Zoey and her friends even find the tunnels a source of refuge at the end of Untamed and remain there during part of Hunted. When the tunnels become contested ground in Burned, readers appreciate how much is at stake, and Stevie Rae’s ultimate victory there brings with it a poignant relief.
Whether the source of whispered stories or the stuff of everyday routine, the tunnels under downtown Tulsa have played an important role in the city for nearly eighty years. Just as Tulsans find the tunnels a source of both fear and protection, so the Casts use the tunnels alternately to represent threat and safety.
The Gilcrease Museum and Home
Arguably the most noteworthy Tulsa landmark that the Casts feature in their books, at least in terms of local legend and folklore, appears later in the House of Night series: the Gilcrease Museum and its grounds are not mentioned until the end of the sixth novel, Tempted. Stevie Rae decides that the mansion on the museum property is the perfect place for Rephaim to hide while recovering from his injuries. As she explains, the Gilcrease mansion’s reputation ensures that Rephaim won’t be discovered or disturbed: “And here’s the best part—it’s super haunted! . . . so if someone sees or hears something weird—meaning you—they’ll freak and think it’s just more ghost stuff.”
Most Tulsans, I think, would agree with Stevie Rae’s logic. While the Gilcrease Museum is famous for housing one of the world’s most impressive collections of artwork and artifacts related to the American West, the Gilcrease Museum grounds are infamous for altogether different reasons.
Thomas Gilcrease (1890–1962) became a multimillionaire when oil was discovered on the land allotment he received as a member of the Creek Nation. While in his early twenties, he grew enamored with a mansion he saw being built of native sandstone from the Osage Hills in west Tulsa, and he bought the home and the eighty acres surrounding it. This became known as the House on the Hill, or Tom’s House. He later built a second structure on his property to serve as a museum, and in 1949, the Thomas Gilcrease Institute of American History and Art opened.
For many years Gilcrease found success and fame as a businessman, philanthropist, and collector, but he failed to find domestic happiness. His first marriage to the Osage sweetheart of his teens ended after sixteen years; his second marriage, to a nineteen-year-old Cherokee Tulsan and Miss America, lasted less tha
n six. While Gilcrease traveled the world in the 1940s, his home became an orphanage for Native American children. Gilcrease later returned to live in Tom’s House, and in 1962, he suffered a fatal heart attack there and was buried in a mausoleum nearby. Today the grounds of the Gilcrease Museum consist of the museum itself, the Gilcrease mansion and mausoleum, and 460 acres of land, including twenty-three acres of themed gardens designed to complement the museum’s collections.
According to Tulsa tradition, Thomas Gilcrease still walks his property. The Gilcrease Museum therefore remains a staple for area ghost tours. In Tulsa’s Haunted Memories, Teri French relates multiple cases of supposed sightings of Gilcrease in the museum, the gardens, and the mansion. She suggests that Gilcrease’s ongoing appearances may explain the supposedly notorious turnover rate among the property’s night staff.
Tom’s House, in particular, continues to capture the imagination of Tulsans. In the House of Night series, the Gilcrease home, like the Union Depot, sits deserted. In Tulsa today, the mansion is empty but in reasonable repair, and visitors may tour certain rooms. If the Casts have altered its condition somewhat for the purposes of their plot—it would, after all, have been more difficult for Rephaim to go unnoticed if museum patrons were touring his hideout—they nevertheless stick closely to Tulsa folklore regarding the mansion’s unearthly occupants. Just as Stevie Rae claimed, the house itself does have the reputation of being one of the most haunted buildings in Tulsa.
In April and May 2002, the Paranormal Investigation Team of Tulsa (PITT) conducted two publicized investigations of the mansion assisted by the Oklahoma City Ghost Club. According to both organizations’ websites, the team members drew similar conclusions based on their experiences as well as the readings and recordings they gathered. These conclusions agree with the legends that say Thomas Gilcrease isn’t alone in visiting his home. The investigators claim that the spirits of several children also remain in the house, quite likely the ghosts of youngsters who lived there when it was an orphanage in the 1940s. Some of the footage from this investigation ran on local news channel FOX23, reinforcing and rekindling the stories surrounding the site.
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