Growing up, did you have any local/regional folklore about any of the following?

Question

Covered Bridges
Amusement Parks (including abandoned ones)
Hellhounds (black dogs, shuck, etc.)
Werewolves (or similar creatures)
Halloween

Please provide a location. Thanks!!

Answer 1

"Castle Danger" was supposed to have a ghost appear over a waterfall on Old Stage Rd just west of my town. The name came from a period book called Castle Dangerous but the actual location was the site of an old double log cabin built in the early 1830's and was the site of the first elections in Grundy county.



Having the "mystique " of the I and M canal and all the Irish immigrants that built it and dying of yellow fever etc. probably added to the ghost part but this cabin was also a roadhouse and inn and reportedly there were killings and robberies there.Old Stage road was main route that Lincoln used to get to his debate with Stephen Douglas in Ottawa, Illinois from Morris.( yes, we have a building that " Lincoln slept here".



A little further down the road was an abandoned silo and it had all the typical stories of the " Hook Man" attacking lovers parked there.Typical urban legend stuff.



The only thing that has more cachet is the haunted Aux Sable cemetery. Apparently there has been a few paranormal investigations there. That is east of my town of Morris about 5 miles. That, you can find on the Internet. All of this is in Illinois and you may be able to get some of this info from History of Grundy County or " haunted Illinois" web sites.

Answer 2

I'm from South Jersey, Cape May, and yes, the Jersey Devil was feared by all. But I lived near a beach called Higbee's Beach, and there was always talk about a red eyed monster there. Some said it was the spawn of Mother Leeds and the Devil (aka the Jersey Devil), others think it was a barnacle encrusted pirate.



I now live on Virginia's Eastern Shore, and here we have the Trollick. Looks like a monkey. Some have described it with long red hair, others describe it as snow white. We also have the black cat, thought to be a huge feral cat, or some say, a panther. That is, in fact, true to a point. There was actually a huge black cat that attacked a woman in Chincoteague just a couple years ago. But how big is big?



There is also a nature trail nearby, that many people run their golf carts down to get to a little private beach. More often than not, the electrical systems fail on this trail for a while, and people are stuck until mysteriously the batteries start functioning again. It only happens with electric carts--Gators, and gas powered carts get through just fine. A ghost hunting group came to check out the trail, but couldn't find anything. Of course, though, they were on foot. LOL

Answer 3

I think we all did. I grew up in PA & there are still some covered bridges there. There have always been stories of a woman in a white dress or nightgown haunting the bridge, looking for her lover who died there, or she died there, depending on who's telling it.



Abandoned amusement parks- Still someone/something living in the funhouse. Anyone who goes there to explore the legend dies.



Hookman- We still have a lot of railroads, too, and there is suppopsedly a man on the tracks with an old kerosene lamp waving it on the tracks to warn of danger.



We had another hookman legend, which I understand is universal. A couple is "parking" on a hill in a remote spot. They've heard of a warning about an escaped mental patient who has a hook for a hand. Somehow, they hear noises, get scared & take off & when they stop, there's a bloody hook in the handle of the door.



Another variation- The couple is "parking". They hear a noise outside & the guy goes to investigate. The woman is scared, but eventually falls asleep. When she wakes up, she hears a scraping on the roof of the car & the police are there. They tell her to get out of the car & don't look up. She looks up & sees her dead boyfriend in the tree above the car with his arm hanging down far enough for his fingernails to scrape across the roof of the car. (I understand this one is universal, also).

Answer 4

No but there is a rural road in Oklahoma that you can go to the bottom of the hill, put the car in neutral and the car rolls backwards up the small hill. I've known people who did that and they were freaked out. In SE Oklahoma there are reports of a Ape-like Bigfoot creature who breaks small trees over and they have found fur in the area. Some of the natives there have that in their folklore for many years and there was a segment on one of the cable channels that included it.

Answer 5

I'm from New Jersey, northern. There is the Jersey Devil for southern NJ. We also had Hooker Man which I thought was a nationwide urban legend, but I've met a lot of people from all over, and not everyone knows what I am talking about. Some do, but some don't so it seems to be a hit and miss legend.



Jersey Devil

http://www.theshadowlands.net/jd.htm



Hooker Man

http://www.weirdnj.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=17&Itemid=28

Answer 6

Not really a legend but I have taken many a girl to see the submarine races out at our local lake. Just can't understand it, no one has ever seen the subs!

Also been on several snipe hunts. Spent lots of nights out in the woods with a pretty girl.

Answer 7

We had a Spook Woods and Bridge. A girl was supposedly to come out of the woods then go stand on the bridge at night. Was out there a lot & never seen her though!

Answer 8

No superstitions other than the normal Christian folklore: Talking snakes, and man swallowing fish, world wide flood, earth is 6000 yrs old.

Answer 9

Serial killer Ed Gein is from my area and as children we were always warned that he might get us. He was from Plainfield Wisconsin and the character Norman Bates came from him for the movie Psycho.

Answer 10

Cat house, down by the ocean front.