MYSTERIOUS AMERICA

Morton’s BMW Motorcycles presents Dr. Seymour O’Life’s MYSTERIOUS AMERICA

HAUNTED PENNSYLVANIA

ISTHIS PENNSYLVANIA’S MOST HAUNTED BRIDGE?

The thing is with hauntings …

You really never know what you have ‘til it smacks you in the face.

Stories abound around the eastern part of Pennsylvania; but we were startled to learn that this one particular bridge was just it bit more haunted than the rest. I picked this up from our friends at Atlas Obscura – one of the most interesting websites around.

For those who have ridden around Van Sant Airport you have likely crossed this bridge many times. But now we will just call it the Crybaby Bridge.

Have you ever heard the stories that have made this the most haunted bridge in the Keystone State?

As the legend goes, many years ago a young woman got pregnant out of wedlock. Her family wanted nothing to do with her and her child. So upset was she by this that after giving birth, she crept out in the middle of the night with her baby in her arms and headed to the nearby bridge. Once there, she ung her baby into the water and then hung herself from the bridge’s rafters.

This particular legend refers to the Van Sant Bridge in southeastern Pennsylvania, but different iterations of it are associated with several different so-called “Crybaby Bridges” across the United States. Whatever the particular details might be, the core elements of the myth remain the same: a child (or multiple children) met an untimely death at the bridge sometime in the past; the bridge is therefore now haunted, and the haunting manifests in the form of ghostly cries of the departed children that can still be heard to this day.

In the case of the Van Sant Bridge, the story goes that if you park your car in the middle of the bridge you can hear not only the wail of the poor forlorn babe, but also the toes of the hanging woman scraping your car roof. One intrepid ghost hunter, however, surmises that the crying sound actually comes from red foxes that apparently inhabit the area.

That can’t be right.

The bridge was built in 1875 and spans Pidcock Creek. It is also known as Beaver Dam Bridge. Apart from the unwed mother of the crybaby legend, the Van Sant Bridge is also reputed to have been a hanging place for horse thieves.

Are they not all?

So even in these days… superstition and rumor hold sway.

Why ride through something boring, when you can travel through something that might be amazing?

But there are other interesting haunts in the Keystone state.

For sure there are tea pot and shoe homes galore…The Haines Shoe

House in York, The Reading Pagoda in Reading, Koontz Coffee Pot in Bedford… but none of them are haunted. At least to our knowledge.

But there are some roads that have become legendary – for all the wrong things.

Irwin Road in Allison Park

Irwin Road is known in local legend as Blue Mist Road. Located in North Park near Pittsburgh, it is home to multiple ghoulish spirits. You can see in the picture above that it’s pretty innocuous by day… But the entire area is said to be shrouded in blue mist by night... Two lovers’ headstones in an adjacent cemetery are said to touch under the full moon. An old building foundation is said to be the old home of a witch, and another house is said to be a home populated by little people who will chase intruders. A dog-deer-human mutant is also said to live in the woods and will chase or harm any person who creeps too far into its territory. It’s like a spooky party.

Cossart Road in Chadds Ford Township

This creepy area just north of the Delaware border is so infused with ghostly tales that M. Night Shymalan lmed his 2004 horror movie, “The Village” in a nearby eld. Rumors state that a white house hidden in the woods on Devil’s Road, of cially named Cossart Road, was home to a wealthy, incestuous family called the DuPonts (Yes, those DuPonts), who it is said resorted to inbreeding in order to keep their fortune within the family. “The Cult House” was used as a place to perform incestuous marriages and as a place to hide deformed offspring. The trees in the area are dramatically bent away from the house, as if they are trying to escape. Piles of animal corpses have been discovered in the area by visitors.

It is a very eerie road.

Hansell Road in Buckingham

Mysterious glowing orbs have been said to appear in the forest on Hansell Road. The bizarre phenomenon has no known logical explanation. Some observers have said the orbs are like eyes, while others have compared them to oating lanterns.

Try riding your machine around these things!

Spooky stuff and things that go bump into motorcycles in the night are in every state in the nation. Perhaps it is time for you to search them out in your own state and nd your own piece of Mysterious America. ,