1920 Golf Club Linked to an Unsolved Murder
2415 Crissinger Road, Marion, OH 43302
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Private club membership required for most access. Public golf and dining available — check website for current rates.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Paved paths, clubhouse, golf course
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1920 · Unsolved Murder · True Crime · America's Most Wanted
Marion Country Club was built in 1920 and has since served the Marion, Ohio community as a private golf, dining, and social venue. The 18-hole course and clubhouse at 2415 Crissinger Road are the facilities that have operated without significant interruption for over a century.
In 1981, a 19-year-old woman named Annette Huddle, who worked as a secretary at the club, was raped and murdered. Her body was recovered from the Olentangy River. A cook at the club, Paul Steven Mack, was identified as the primary suspect. Despite the investigation, insufficient evidence prevented prosecutors from charging him. Mack left Marion and disappeared.
The case appeared on America's Most Wanted and Unsolved Mysteries, drawing national attention without producing an arrest. A book titled Tainted Roses by Margie Danielsen documented the investigation and the community's decades-long wait for resolution. A tipster in Marion eventually helped locate Mack.
Mack was convicted in California for the 1987 murder of Karen Baird, a beauty queen he had drugged and left to overdose. He died in a California prison in 2018. Before his death, he confessed to his attorney that he had also killed Annette Huddle, providing details investigators said only the perpetrator would have known. Marion County authorities formally closed Annette's case following that disclosure.
The club was named in Unsolved Mysteries and America's Most Wanted in connection with the murder case and continues to operate as a functioning private club.
Sources
The paranormal dimension of the Marion Country Club is secondary to the documented criminal history, but it exists. Local sources, including the Ohio Exploration Society's Marion County documentation, note that witnesses have reported sensing or observing a female figure on the golf course and in the clubhouse. The presence is attributed to Annette Huddle.
The reports lack the specificity of more thoroughly documented hauntings — no investigation transcripts, no named investigators, no equipment readings appear in the available sources. What persists is a general community awareness of the case and a sense, held by some who work and visit the club, that the grounds carry a residual weight.
The resolution of the case in 2018 — after 37 years — gave the story a conclusion that was neither triumphant nor entirely satisfying. The man who killed Annette confessed to a lawyer and died in prison. There was no trial, no public accountability, no formal closure ceremony. Whatever that ambiguity means for the community's relationship with the site remains unresolved.
Notable Entities
The Marion Country Club clubhouse dining room operates Wednesday through Sunday. The building stands on the same grounds where the 1981 murder of secretary Annette Huddle went unsolved for nearly four decades — resolved only in 2018 when the suspect confessed from a California prison before dying.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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