These seven spooky Kansas stories will give you chills in the night

Kansas can get pretty scary.

According to legend, the Sunflower State has a Gateway to Hell and a homicidal man with a horribly disfigured face.

Ghosts are said to haunt places that include a Hutchinson library, a Lyon County bridge, a North Topeka cemetery — and even the Kansas Statehouse.

Here are seven spooky Sunflower State stories that are sure to give you the creeps.

Church of the Damned

The large, abandoned church building at 1600 S.W. Harrison in Topeka was a magnet for vandals, ghost hunters and homeless people — until it came to a fiery end.

Rumors of supernatural activity at the church were so widespread that it was featured in "Church of the Damned," a 2009 episode of the former A&E reality TV series, "Paranormal State."

The program's investigators were thwarted when one was "physically attacked by a demon" there, said aetv.com.

The church building was 94 years old in August 2013 when its deteriorating condition prompted the Topeka City Council to order it demolished.

But before that could be done, the building was destroyed by a raging, intentionally set fire in October 2013.

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The Hamburger Man

Legend has it that the Hamburger Man, a monstrous creature with a mutilated face, roams the sand hills north of Hutchinson at night looking for smooching teenagers or other victims to chop up for hamburger meat.

Hamburger Man stories have been around since at least the 1950s, Lisa Hefner Heitz wrote in her 1997 book, "Haunted Kansas."

The Hamburger Man is most commonly thought to have gotten that name because of his face, which is said to have become disfigured in an accident, Hefner Heitz wrote.

"Shunned by society and scorned as a monstrous creature, the Hamburger Man fled to the sand hills and built his pathetic abode to live out the rest of his life in desolate surroundings," she wrote.

There, the Hamburger Man is said to chop up "those individuals foolhardy enough to be out after dark in the area, or worse, crazy enough to look for him or his house."

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Statehouse Spooks

On July 7, 1965, a distraught, 43-year-old woman named Eileen McClain set her lit cigarette on a marble slab 150 feet above the rotunda inside the Kansas Statehouse, then mounted a nearby ledge and leaped to her death, the Topeka Daily Capital reported.

The Statehouse is rumored to be haunted by McClain's ghost in the area where she landed and in its basement area, where the sound of unexplainable footsteps and crying can be heard, says hauntedhouses.com.

The Statehouse is also said to be haunted by the spirit of a worker accidentally killed in a fall while helping build it as his payday approached near the end of the month in which he died.

A nearby resident has heard a hammering sound coming from the dome, hauntedhouses.com says.

That sound is thought to be that man's ghost, working at night in hopes he'll be able to finish his job and collect his pay, that site says.

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Bird Bridge

Sandy Bird, 33, was initially thought to have died accidentally after her body was found in 1983 near her overturned station wagon beneath Rocky Ford Bridge in the Cottonwood River east of Emporia.

But that site became known as "Bird Bridge" after authorities concluded she was killed as part of a scheme in which her husband, Lutheran minister Tom Bird, and his lover and secretary, Lorna Anderson, teamed up to kill their spouses.

Both subsequently served prison time on convictions for murder.

"In the years that followed, people claimed to have heard Sandy Bird’s ethereal screams at the bridge, her footsteps walking along the bridge," the Emporia Gazette reports.

Bird Bridge over the years has consequently attracted groups of thrill-seeking teenagers trying to get a glimpse of her ghost, it said.

The Albino Woman

The Albino Woman, a ghostly figure in white with pink or red eyes, a pale complexion and long white hair, has long been said to wander the area of Rochester Cemetery at 1200 N.W. Menninger Road.

Numerous versions of the Albino Woman legend exist, and are actively and eagerly told by Topekans of all ages, Hefner Heitz wrote in "Haunted Kansas."

The Albino Woman legend has changed over the years in a manner that reflects "the concerns of different individuals and different generations," according to Hefner Heitz.

The Albino Woman was initially described as a harmless spirit who rose from her grave and walked the cemetery grounds with her poodle, Hefner Heitz wrote.

But as the years passed and the saga spread, she wrote, the character grew increasingly malicious, with stories telling of attacks and even killings.

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The Ghostly Librarian

Librarian Ida Day Holzapel moved to California, promising to eventually return to Hutchinson.

Though Holzapel died in the Golden State, legend has it that she did come home — to haunt the Hutchinson Public Library.

Holzapel was Hutchinson's head librarian from 1915 to 1925 and again from 1947 to 1954, when she left to take a librarian's job in California, then died in an auto accident on her first day on the job, the Hutchinson News reported.

Legend has it that Holzapel has since haunted the library, including roaming a section of its basement, watching over the building and making sure it is run correctly, the News said.

Whenever a book falls off a shelf or something else unexplained happens, staff members there simply blame it on Holzapel, the News said.

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The Gateway to Hell

"Legend of Devil Haunts Tiny Town," said the headline for an article published in November 1974 in the University Daily Kansan, the student newspaper at the University of Kansas.

The piece told of how the cemetery in the tiny community of Stull in western Douglas County was thought to be one of two places on earth where the devil appears in person twice a year.

Much to the consternation of those living in the area, curiosity seekers began visiting the cemetery in droves to check out rumors that Stull Cemetery was the site of a Gateway to Hell.

In 1992, the rock band Urge Overkill made that cemetery the focus of a record.

Continued trespassing and vandalism there forced those running the cemetery during the 1990s to install a chain-link security fence around its grounds, Hefner Heitz wrote in "Haunted Kansas."

Tim Hrenchir can be reached at (785-213-5934 or threnchir@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: 7 of the creepiest Kansas stories to share around Halloween, October