Mark Twain said about traveling: “Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.” What about the ghosts, the spirits of the dead who hang around here just to give us the willies? They can travel wherever they want, right? What are they looking for when it comes to choosing where they want to spend eternity, an old haunt (I know, I know)? Maybe it's the unfortunate circumstances which one dearly departed is trying to correct or simply recover from? I don't know. Some day I will find out when I, too, will become one of the dearly departed but how I would get back to you with an answer is uncertain at this time.
Silas was kidding around with a Goatman legend the other day, kind of like the Mothman Prophecy which is one that is creepy because of things that actually happened to the people in Point Pleasant, West Virginia and not just a urban legend to scare kids. http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/bizarre/news-legacy-mothman I'm betting most of you know of these kinds of stories where you live and probably have even gone out to a deserted road and turned off the car lights to conjure up the spirits. Boys love doing this to girls and I am one who has been in that situation when I was a teen. Yeah, right, you laugh, you just go out and try it and see if you can keep from being so psyched out that you don't pee your pants! So, I'll admit, after Silas talked about Goatman, I was a little apprehensive at leaving my blinds open when I climbed into bed that night. Never one to like being closed in from the light of day, I was NOT going to give in to any inner fears. The bedroom is in the back of the house looking out to the woods. Wait, creepy things lurk in woods.
Anyway, according to Silas, Goatman was seen around Louisville but was heard to be heading south (laughs). This was a new one on me but I wanted to read about the urban legend so I did a bit of internet looking. Goatman legends are all over the place. I called him back to tell him about Goatman's Bridge http://www.goatmansbridge.com/ that is only a few miles from him in Texas. This is a good story and worth a trip over to see what's happening these days. As it turns out, so many people have seen spirits in this place near Denton TX (formally known as Alton) that there is a sign that the bridge is monitored by the Dallas Paranormal Society. http://dallasghost.webs.com/.
The legend is that Oscar Washburn and his family lived in a shack across the bridge where he was a goat farmer. He was a simple black man had put up a little sign on the bridge saying “This Way to the Goatman”. It was 1930s, the Klu Klux Klan still had a strong presence in North Texas. The Klan was not happy about that sign posted on a public bridge and one night in August 1938, they drove to the bridge and parked in the dark. Washburn was grabbed from his home and lynched over the side of the old Alton bridge in what is now known as Denton TX, a suburb of Dallas. The old iron bridge, built in 1884 had five foot railings so when the Klansmen ran off the bridge to look to see if Washburn was dead yet, they were horrified to see just a dangling rope and no body. They ran back to the shack to see if somehow he'd escaped death but he wasn't there so they murdered his family. Oscar's body was never found.
To this day, there are all sorts of apparitions on the bridge, in the surrounding woods and sightings are numerous. It's said you can park your car in the dark, turn off the lights and honk the horn and strange things will happen. People have reported hearing hoof beats on the bridge and splashes into the water directly underneath. The paranormal people have measured the temperature changes and set up tests which they say proves existence of activity. I'm feeling skeptical at the moment but if pressed to go at midnight and spend a few hours waiting for ghost to appear, I don't think I'd have the courage. Anyway, it's a cool urban legend and I think Silas should go over there and do some playing and filming---in the dark, with the lasers. Ooooweeeoooo
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