Stull Cemetery

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Stull Cemetery is the town cemetery of the town of Stull, Kansas. It is located between Topeka and Lawrence, just northwest of Clinton Lake.

1 Stull history
2 Legend
3 Headline text
4 Stairway to Hell
5 Resident response
6 References

[edit] Stull history

Stull was named after its original postmaster, Silvester Stull (19 March 1862 - 4 July 1931). Silvester reared 11 children near Stull with his wife, Mary Bertha Koehler. When they retired, they moved to Orange Co. California, where Sylvester died. He is buried at Fairhaven Cemetery in Orange Co. California. Stull was first settled by 18 people who organized the Evangelical Emanuel Church. The land for the church was donated by Jacob Hildenbrand. The pine tree which was deemed to be 100 years old or so in 1952 was thought to be planted around the time the church was built in 1867. The headstone that was split by the roots of this tree had the names of Bettie and Frankie Thomas who both died in 1879. Stull had two major tragedies in the 1900s. The first was when a small boy whose father was burning a field of tall grass was killed by the fire. They later found the boy's charred remains out in the field. Tragedy struck again when a man who was reported missing was later found hanging from the limb of the pine tree. Stull also had a road when natural gas came through in 1905 called Devil's Road, which was adjacent to the Kraft Store.

Stull Cemetery has gained notoriety due to its listing in various occult and haunting reference guides as being one of seven Gateways to Hell in the United States.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Legend

At midnight on Halloween, the Devil is said^{[citation needed]} to manifest himself in true form and exit into our world.

[edit] Headline text

[edit] Stairway to Hell

It would seem only logical to many conservative Christians that if Hell exists somewhere underground, that there must be some access port that connects it to the earth's surface. One urban legend states that just such a stairway exists in Stull, KS. This is a very small town about 15 to 20 miles outside of Lawrence, KS. The gateway to Hell is rumored to be in or near a collapsing church in an ancient cemetery. The tale apparently originated in an article in a University of Kansas student newspaper. 2 The theme was picked up on a recording by an alternative music group Urge Overkill; the album cover had a picture of the cemetery and church.

There are a number of tall tales related to this area: Satanists burned the church down. Satanists have held rituals there and may still be doing this. Time magazine reported that the pope asked that a plane he was flying in, during his 1993 visit to the U.S., bypass eastern Kansas because the area was so unholy that he didn't even want to fly above it. If you take two glass bottles, use them to make the sign of an inverted cross, and throw them against the church building, they will not break. Others suggest that any bottle thrown against the building will not break. Even though the roof has collapsed, rain will not enter the building; it rolls off to the side as if the roof were still in place. You can go down the stairway and return quickly; only a few minutes will seem to pass. But you will emerge into the world two weeks later. So, be sure to feed your cat well before visiting Stull. There are conflicting stories about when the gateway to Hell is accessible: some people say that it is always open; others claim that it only can be entered on Halloween night or an equinox. Witches were once executed near the church by hanging. 3,4

It is very doubtful that any of the above are in any way accurate.

(Take from http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_cul9.htm)

[edit] Resident response

The residents don't like the tourists who show up on Halloween, and the Sheriff patrols the place hourly. The small number of residents do not always treat visitors kindly, especially when their intentions are questionable.The 2002 collapse of the abandoned church has given to a decline in the number of visitors.