Collected from Barb Scherer by Linda Morgan in 1968. This is one of a series of interviews collected by Linda Morgan in the late 60’s about “The Black Lady of Stepp Cemetery.” These interviews have been heavily edited for grammatical and spelling errors by someone, presumably the collector, for an unknown purpose. More of Linda Morgan’s can be accessed through the Indiana State University Folklore Archives.
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This artifact appears to be a transcription of a verbal story told to the collector by the informant. It has been heavily edited by someone, including multiple spelling changes and word insertions that either were absent from the telling or that got left off of the transcription. It is possible that this is the “A” text of the tale collected by Linda Morgan, and that the more commonly known story about the woman sitting in the Warlock’s Seat is a “B” or “C” text.
As has been previously stated, this is one of a series of collections by Linda Morgan about the Lady in Black within Stepp Cemetery. The story appears to be one passed around the Martinsville area based on the opening line offered by Barb. Based on the lesson offered by the tale about not driving fast, it’s possible that it was originally told as a cautionary tale to teenagers like those mentioned in the story.
This tale is an outlier from the rest of the collection given the direct interaction the Lady has with people within the story. She arrives to warn teenagers not to make the mistake of her daughter. Besides this outlying aspect, however, the tale contains all of the makings of a “Lady in Black” story, fitting well within the genre. The woman experiences a tragic death, and she returns to the scene to haunt it dressed in funeral garb.
One of the strongest connecting threads through all of these stories no matter when they are told is the importance they hold to their community. Some serve as warning tales to a community’s youth in order to protect them from making potentially deadly mistakes. Others stress the identity the community has rooted itself in, especially self-sufficiency and independence. On top of the community importance, the stories always follow a basic formula that allows one to create other stories within the genre. There is a woman who experiences tragedy in some way, and she returns to the site of that tragedy to haunt the area. Oftentimes, she does not interact with the world around her, but when she does, it is to scare trespassers from the area of her haunting.
As time has passed, it appears that the ghost’s origin has become more vague while her actual character has developed. For example, the 2007 radio program does not offer the same depth of explanation that the 1968 or 1983 examples offer, but it does provide a name which is not mentioned in the older tales. The 2017 telling appears to combine elements of the old and the new while also adjusting the story to fit more into the established lore of IU. The Dunn Cemetery and the family buried there is already a well-known part of campus, so making the Lady in Black a member of the Dunn family provides a backstory that both explains why she shows up in the cemetery and helps her to fit into IU’s campus a bit more easily than she might have if she remained wandering the Stepp Cemetery.