Site 165

I’m sure you have all heard of haunted houses, but what about a haunted campsite? I know just the place!

***

If you have ever been to Ohiopyle State Park in Pennsylvania then you know what a great place it is. However, at least one area of the park holds a dark secret. Back in the 1960s, when the park was was being constructed, there were some pretty wild occurrences there. In the extreme southeast corner of the park, not far from the Great Gorge Trail there is a small area of the park that seems to kill engines. Yes, you heard correctly, “engines.”

A man by the name of Mark Ruger cleared and leveled most of the lots on that side of the park. Mark was an intelligent man and highly skeptical about anything out of the ordinary. One day Mark was operating his backhoe while clearing out what is still, to this day, site 164. Something in his peripheral caught his attention. Mark looked over his shoulder to the area that would soon be site 165. Standing there among the trees was a Shawnee Native American man in full traditional dress. The two men stared at each other for moment before the Shawnee turned and headed down into the gorge. Of course, Mark immediately climbed down off his backhoe and ran after the strange man. But, Mark lost sight of him and was never able to pick up his trail. He couldn’t find tacks or anything else to indicate someone had been standing there.

Later that afternoon, Mark began work on site 165. Everything seemed to be going fine until Mark reached the center of the campsite. The engine on his backhoe suddenly revved way up then stalled. It wouldn’t restart. Mark climbed down to have a look at the engine. Upon closer inspection he found that the glowplugs were melted to the engine block. Mark was pretty upset. This was his personal backhoe, a brand new 1964 Dynahoe. The next day Mark had to get a friend to help him pull his backhoe out of the site and load it onto a flatbed trailer. Mark planned to take the big machine back to the dealer since it was still under warranty.

Once the dealer had his backhoe in the shop, Mark went to see his friend Eric Fuller who worked for the county. Mark needed to get the park job completed by the end of June or he would lose a lot of money on the contract. He talked Mr. Fuller into letting him use one of the county’s bulldozers for the rest of the week (people allowed that kind of thing back in the 60s).

Two days later Mark was back on the job site. Wouldn’t you know that after fifteen minutes, the bulldozer’s engine revved up suddenly then stalled. Again, upon inspection, it was found that the glowpugs were melted to the engine block. Needless to say, Eric and Mark weren’t friends anymore, and Mark never borrowed anything from the county again.

The dealership told Mark it would be at least two weeks before he would have his backhoe back. They had to replace the engine block. Mark was upset but he didn’t know what to make of the situation. He was a highly logical person and he decided it was just a tremendous coincidence. Eric Fuller had blamed Mark for the damage, saying that he overheated the engine by pushing it too hard. Mark knew that wasn’t the case. The work he was doing at the new state park was pretty simple compared to the heavy road construction contracts he usually got.

Mark was determined to get the job completed on time. The very next day he was out at site 165 with a shovel, a rake, a saw, and an axe. He did his best to get the site clear and level. He ran into a few problems though. For one, no matter what he did, the site just never seemed level. Also, when he stood near the center of the site he would become dizzy and disoriented. At one point, Mark let his shovel fall to the ground while he turned around to grab his axe. After grabbing the axe he spun back around to see his shovel standing upright! It wasn’t buried in the ground at all. In fact, he tip of the shovel was barely touching the ground, the darned thing was just standing there like a soldier at attention. After doing a few experiments Mark found that he could make the axe and the saw stand straight up as well. For some reason the rake refused to stand despite having the best foundation to stand on, the long flat edge of the metal rake. He could only duplicate the anomaly in this one spot.

A woman the locals called “Ms. Francis” stopped by the next day to take pictures of Mark standing different tools on end. The pictures hung in the park offices for years. I have tried to locate the pictures but have had no success. The park office was remodeled in 1989 and I don’t think anyone has seen them since.

Eventually Mark Ruger was able to get all the sites finished on time and the camp opened unofficially in 1965. The park was immediately a popular destination. Many families came up from Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Washington D.C. to escape the hustle and bustle of big city life.

One such family was the Gregersons, a young couple from West Chester with two young toddlers. The Gregersons just happened to be the first unlucky people who camped at site 165. Mr. Gregerson backed the family station wagon up into the site and began to unload all of their camping gear while Mrs. Gregerson kept the kids occupied looking at flowers and leaves on the ground. Once, the car was unloaded Mr. Gregerson got back in the car to pull it forward and park it for the weekend. However, the car wouldn’t start. Mr. Gregerson ended up pushing the car out of the campsite so he could set everything up for his family.

This immediately put Mr. Gregerson in a bad mood. He hurriedly put up the tent then left his wife and kids at the campsite so he could walk to the office and call a tow truck. Mrs. Gregerson was put off by her husband’s bad attitude and the fact that she was left at the site by herself with two young kids for about three hours. When she was just about ready to head to the office herself to check on her husband she saw him walking back toward the campsite. He looked angrier than ever. “Where have you been?” they both shouted out to each other at the same time.

Mr. Gregerson swore that he walked to the office, made a phone call, then walked right back. Only, when he reached site 165, his wife and kids were gone. He assumed they went for a walk to the restroom but he didn’t find them there. He then ended up walking the length of the park several times looking for his family.

Mrs. Gregerson was indignant. She swore up and down that she hadn’t gone anywhere for the past three hours. Soon a tow truck showed up to haul the Gregerson’s station wagon to a local mechanic. Needless to say, the young couple spent the rest of the evening in terrible moods. They sat in silence glaring at each other over a cold can of pork ‘n beans while the kids squirmed and fussed. Both were glad when it time to put the kids down for the night.

Mr. and Mrs. Gregerson sat around the fire for a while. Eventually they made up and apologized for being so angry. Mr. Gregerson held his wife close. They decided they would do their best to enjoy the rest of the weekend and not worry about the car. After sometime they became sleepy and went to bed.

A couple of hours later they were both awakened by the sound of someone talking in what sounded like a foreign language. It was a male voice that sounded muffled, but not too far away. Mr. Gregerson called out, “who’s there”. The voice stopped immediately. The young couple was pretty freaked out but, thankfully, the kids were still asleep.

As they were both nearly back to sleep, they heard a yell come from down in the gorge. It sounded not quite human, almost ape-like. Soon they could hear footsteps around their tent. Again the couple was pretty freaked out. They sat there nervously staring at each other in the dark. What happened next really startled them. The Gregerson’s youngest son suddenly sat up and started saying something that sounded like “naythaway-yamah” over and over. Mrs. Gregerson rushed over to her son. As soon as she touched the boy he fell back to sleep, breathing loudly. The Gregersons spent the rest of the night lying awake listening to one terrifying sound after another.

In the morning, as the bleary-eyed couple was cooking breakfast over the fire, a man drove up in their station wagon with a pickup following close behind. The man got out of their car and introduced himself as the local mechanic. He also introduced his teenage son who followed him over in his truck. The mechanic explained that when he went to check out the car there absolutely nothing wrong with it. He looked the car over anyway but said it was “in fine shape”. Mr. Gregerson offered the man money but he refused saying he was just happy to help. As the mechanic and his son were driving away he saw Mr. Gregerson hurriedly tossing all of the family’s camping supplies in the back of the station wagon. The Gregersons were gone ten minutes later.

The park rangers soon became worried. Not one person ever stayed on site 165 more than one night. Some people would ask to be moved to other sites but most would just leave in the middle of the night, or as soon as the sun came up. Sometime around fall 1967 the park decided to close site 165. Over the next few years, people in nearby sites reported strange events events like glowing orbs floating around or small rocks falling from the sky in the area around site 165. In 1971 when the park officially opened, the sign for site 165 was taken down and all of the numbers were shifted down. The current site 165 is actually the old site 166, and so forth.

Eventually things settled down and the old site 165 was forgotten. Only a few of the older employees of the park remembered it when I started my research. None of them were actually working there at the time of the incidents, but they had heard the stories. This was in October of 1998 when I was there.

***

UPDATE

In 2003 I got a phone call from an ex park employee who lived in Hutchinson. He told me that there had been a new development with the original site 165. Three teenage boys had cut through the old site on their way down to the Great Gorge Trail instead of using the path. Suddenly, one of the boys vanished. The other two boys panicked and ran back to their parents. No one seemed to believe their story. People started searching all over the park and in the gorge but the boy was nowhere to be found. The park rangers were called, then the local police. As the sun was setting someone spotted the boy walking back toward camp. He was covered in dirt from head toe and his hair was a mess. The police questioned the boy but didn’t much from him.

According to the boy’s account he was walking with his friends when he heard a buzzing noise then saw a flash of light. The next thing he remembered was walking down the road as the sun was setting.

It sounds like whatever was happening at the old site 165 in the sixties is still happening. If you’re ever at Ohiopyle state park enjoy the scenery as you hike. But, you might want to stay away from the old site 165.

Lucid Lucy

For those of you who don’t know what lucid dreaming is I will explain it like this. When you are dreaming, if you suddenly realize you are dreaming, then you have become lucid. Once you are lucid in a dream you have the power to control every aspect of your dream. Many people practice lucid dreaming on a regular basis. In their dreams, experienced lucid dreamers can fly, jam on-stage with their favorite rock band, or even eat a tasty meal at a fancy restaurant. Your mind is your only limit once you learn to control your dreams. There are thousands of books and websites dedicated to the subject.

Lately, I have been hearing some rumblings on the message boards across the internet. It seems that someone, or something, has begun to haunt the dreams of lucid dreamers. You might think I’m talking about a simple nightmare but that would be incorrect. Remember, a lucid dreamer can control every aspect of their dreams. Whatever this thing is, it is invading the lucid dreams of people and bending their lucid dreams to its own will.

The lucid dreaming community isn’t quick to discuss this in the open. They are afraid that newcomers to the practice might be scared off. I have had the opportunity to discuss this face to face with several experienced lucid dreamers. What they’ve told me is pretty frightening.

I’ve changed some names here to protect people’s identity.

***

I met the man I’ll call “John” at South of the Border in South Carolina. I had been doing some work for a man in Florence, South Carolina. John lived in Red Springs, North Carolina, about an hour away from Florence. South of the Border seemed like the perfect in between place to meet. If you have been there then you know exactly what I mean. The place has that old roadside attraction charm that ensures a cheesey good time, even if the decorations are a little racially insensitive.

Anyways, John and I slid into a booth at Pedro’s Diner and we ordered our meals. John wasn’t what I pictured when I thought of an experienced lucid dreamer. He was a big-framed man with a powerful handshake and simple country charm. John wasn’t eloquent or particularly gifted at relating his experiences to others (he tended to start and stop his stories, then pick up in the middle after telling the end) but what he related to me on that cool and breezy November day had an impact on me.

John, who is now in his early forties, said he started lucid dreaming around the age of 15. He didn’t plan on become a lucid dreamer. He just had natural knack for realizing when he was dreaming and then taking control of those dreams. He didn’t even know it was called lucid dreaming was until he read about it in the local library one day when he was much older.

Over the last few years John had become a regular on the lucid dreaming message boards. He gave great advice on how to become, and stay, lucid in dreams. People began to take notice of what John was saying. In his own little virtual community, which was based solely around the concept of lucid dreaming, John was an expert, maybe even a celebrity.

All of that had changed about a year and a half ago when John met “her”. One muggy May night as John lay asleep in his bed he began to dream that he was outdoors at a classic car show. John walked around the car show having a great time looking at all of the cars. At some point a gentleman came up to John, in his dream, and said that he really liked John’s 1949 Ford Bueller. John realized that there is no such thing as a “1949 Ford Bueller.” He noticed the man was wearing a nametag so he leaned over to read it. Sure enough, the letters on the nametag were moving around and he couldn’t make out the name. As has happened so many times before, John realized that he was dreaming and became lucid. Now John was in complete control of this dream.

John stood around for a moment trying to decide what to do. Eventually he walked up to a red 1966 Pointiac GTO and climbed in. He started the car up and listened to the rumble of the engine. “This car is sweet!” he said to himself. John then thought of an oval track surrounding the car show and suddenly there it was! He took off in a cloud of dust and headed out to the track. The car drove wonderfully. After a few minutes John realized that he could drive any car he wants to. He exited the track, climbed out of the car, and began to look around at all of the other cars to see which one he would drive next.

At this point in John’s dream, the crowd present at the car show to started to act a little strange. He could see there was a commotion in the distance. People were starting to stop and look over in one certain direction, a few were pointing. Then a young man came running past John. Next a scared looking woman ran by. John was confused. A second man sprinted by, as he ran past John he yelled “she’s coming this way!” People started to turn and flee all around.

None of this concerned John. Losing control of a lucid dream can happen anytime. There are some tricks that experienced lucid dreamers know that will stop this process. John started off with one of the more simple methods to regain control of his dream. He looked down at his hands and began to say firmly to himself, “I wish to remain lucid, I wish to remain lucid” over and over several times. For an experienced lucid dreamer like John this is usually enough to regain complete control. However, John noticed the crowd around him was still in a paniced state and people kept running past him to get away from the commotion. As John was looking down at his hands saying the simple phrase, “I wish to remain lucid”  over and over a man ran into John and they both tumbled down.

Now, at this point, John was a little stunned. Nothing like this had ever happened in one of his lucid dreams. He still seemed to be losing control. In addition to this, the sudden fall to the ground had hurt a quite a bit. The man that knocked him over looked at John. John thought he was going to apologize. Instead, the frightened man shot John a look of desperate fear, pulled himself up off of the ground, and ran off into the crowd.

John stood up and dusted himself off. He was done playing around. John began to run in circles as fast as he possibly could. This is a bizarre trick that he learned years ago to help him stay lucid. Running in tight circles rarely failed to hand the reigns of control back over to the experienced lucid dreamer. As he was doing this several more people slammed into John at once and he was thrown back to the ground.

This time John was a little unnerved. He seemed to be in new territory as far as his lucid dreaming experiences went. As he made an attempt to stand he was knocked over again. The crowd was in a full panic. He could hear people screaming, “She’s here! She’s here!”

Finally, as the crowd thinned around him and disappeared into the distance John was able to get back on his feet. There were a few more people running in his direction but he had a much better view of the scene. That was the first time he saw “her.” Above the heads of the fleeing crowd he saw a tall, thin woman with blood red hair headed his way. She was extremely pale and had black eyes that pierced John’s soul, even from a great distance. Another man who was running past John tripped and fell just to John’s left. He looked up at John and said, “She’s coming for you, you idiot.” then the man got up and sprinted away.

John looked back toward the tall, pale woman. Again those eyes seemed to cut right through him! An older, heavy set woman who was have trouble breathing ran past John. As she did, she scolded him saying, “Don’t ever look her in the eyes!” Then the woman continued on her way.

At this point, John still wasn’t completely sure what to make of the situation. In his mind, this was still just a simple lucid dream that he had lost control of. If he couldn’t change the attitude of the crowd perhaps he could change something else. There was a black 1969 Camaro sitting nearby. John stared at the car for a moment and willed it to be red. Poof! Like magic the car was red. Then, he looked over to an old Stingray. He willed it turn into a Volkswagen Bug. Poof! The Stingray turned into a Bug.

John had a newfound feeling of power. He was in control after all! He turned toward the approaching tall woman and tried to simply wish her away. A wave of nausea and confusion swept over him in an instant. He tried again. This time he nearly blacked out. She was still walking slowly toward him. Cars were literally crumpling or melting away as she casually strode past them. She was clearing a path to John’s position.

The last few remaining people ran past John and instructed him to do the same. “You can’t fight her!” the last one yelled as he flew past. John clenched his fist. “Great idea” he thought, “That is exactly what I am going to do!”

John picked up a car with his mind and flung it at the woman. As the car hit her it simply melted into two pieces and she walked right through it unfazed. Next, John imagined he had an old Browning Automatic Rifle like the one his grandfather carried in World War II. He raised the gun, took aim, then opened fire. Boom! Boom! Boom! This was a very satisfying weapon to fire he thought to himself. He decided he would shoot this gun again in future lucid dreams. Boom! Boom! Boom, until the clip was empty. Surprisingly, the BAR had no effect whatsoever. He might as well had a squirt gun.

She was close now. John could feel the icy cold glare of her stare cutting through his very being. Now, for the first time, he was worried. He could only think about getting away from those black, life-sucking eyes. John ran around the side of a car and squatted down. Maybe she wouldn’t see him. Maybe she would pass him by. The air was quiet and still. John sat there contemplating his next move. He looked up nervously through one of the car windows. She was standing just on the other side! From his vantage point he could only see part of her lower half. She had some kind of weird tight fitting skirt with vertical red and white stripes. “What a strange being!” he thought to himself. Then he wondered why he thought of her as a “being” and not a woman. His thoughts were interrupted by something that made him “jump out of his skin,” as he put it. Her long, pale bony hand was reaching straight through the car! It was just about to close around his neck!

John startled himself awake and sat up in his bed with a scream.

As we looked over the dessert menu John told me that it took him awhile to initiate another lucid dream after that first experience. Without fail, every time he has become lucid in a dream “she” shows up. John doesn’t know what to call her. She never looks the same. Sometimes she is pale. Sometimes she is dark black. Sometimes she has green skin. Sometimes her hair is black. Sometimes it is white. She always wears the most ridiculous clothes. But, she is always tall, always skinny, and always has those solid black eyes that pierce like a silent scream. John said it really didn’t matter what she looked like. He could feel her presence. “No one else feels like her” he said cryptically. He said he has battled her time and time again. She never reacts, she just simply presses forward. The experienced lucid dreamer said he has turned the ground beneath her to a deep crevice. He has covered her with nets. He has bathed her in walls of fire. Still, she presses on toward him and grabs for his throat. He always wakes up just before her fingers touch him.

“I can’t really sleep anymore” John said with sad eyes as he stared out at one of the big rigs parked outside the window. He explained to me that when he dreams it is so easy for him to become lucid because he has practiced the art for so long. If the least little out of the ordinary thing happens in a dream he will then suddenly realize he is dreaming and he quickly becomes lucid, whether he wants to or not. Then “she” appears.

“I take lots of sleeping pills these days” he says as we finished our flawn. “I’ve lost my job, my house, my passion for life. I don’t like to dream anymore.”

Indeed.

As I drove back to Florence, I felt sorry for the man whose dreams were now his nightmares.

***

I’ve gotten similar stories from the handful of lucid dreamers I have interviewed. Always they are haunted by a tall, thin woman with solid black eyes. “Razor Black”,one woman who I’ll call “Susan” told me, if there was such a color. She assured me it was a color she knew all too well these days. Susan said Lucy looks different in every dream. But always tall, always thin, and always those solid black eyes.

Lucid Lucy. That is what people on the message boards have named her. I’ve never met her. But, Lucy has made me rethink my own experiments with lucid dreaming.

I’ll wrap the story up by saying that I recently met a woman from Massachusetts who I’ll call “Rhonda”. Rhonda is one of those New Age, psychic types. I don’t really know what to think of Rhonda’s beliefs but she has some unique ideas about Lucid Lucy. She says she met Lucy once during an Astral Projection. Rhonda said that Lucid Lucy is an entity from another reality. She explained that Lucid Lucy is looking for someone that is a “match”, whatever that means. Supposedly, when Lucid Lucy finds the right candidate, she will be able to use that person to jump to our dimension. Right now, according to Rhonda, the only people who can see Lucid Lucy are the people that are able to create their own realities, lucid dreamers being the most common. Rhonda doesn’t know if Lucid Lucy is even capable of such a jump. But, she said, the entity is bent on trying.

***

UPDATE! It’s seems this story has resonated with a lot of my readers. I never realized so many of you were lucid dreamers. It looks like Lucid Lucy isn’t just preying on the lucid anymore! Some of you have pointed out that people have been describing a being identical to Lucid Lucy on popular dream interpretation websites. These people are really beginning to get frightened. They want to know what this thing is. If you are ever in a dream and you see a tall, thin woman with jet black eyes you might want to pinch yourself to wake up. Lucid Lucy just might be looking for you!

Tennett Texas

A couple of years ago, as I was on my way to a convention in Austin, Texas. I found a quaint state park to camp at overnight in Somerville, Texas. While eating supper at a diner there, some locals told me the legend of Old Man Harvey. I couldn’t wait for the convention in Austin to be over. The last day there, I packed my camper and headed straight back to Lake Summerville. I spent two weeks there camping and interviewing the locals about Harvey. I did what research I could and talked to some real nice folks. What follows is an accurate re-telling of the legend of Old Man Harvey, as he is called around those parts. The convention was nice, but the Highlight of my trip ended up being my time spent learning about Harvey Schoepke.

***

In the late 1880s Harvey Schoepke was born in a small logging community known as Tennett, Texas. Tennett was very small. The residents had tried to get their own post office established but there just didn’t seem to be enough people to justify it. Tennett was unique in that it was the only location in the area where logging on any decent scale was possible. Most logging took place sixty or seventy miles to the east in the Piney Woods area. The area around Tennett is mostly rolling pasture land. However, there was once several square miles of beautiful hardwood forests there. John Tennett moved into the area in the 1850s and started a small saw mill. He called the area Tennettville, but that name never stuck. The locals just came to call it Tennett.

By the time Harvey was born, logging in the area was already on the decline. The families that lived in Tennett did their best to eke out a living from the land. Harvey and his friends had a great childhood playing around the backwoods creeks and small farms that made up the tiny community. Of course, there were always lots of chores to do, and there were countless days spent in the one room schoolhouse learning letters and math. But these drudgeries were always counterbalanced with barefoot fishing trips to the local watering hole or swimming naked in the creek.

As Harvey grew older, many of his friends moved away. Farms were sold. Farmhouses were overgrown and slowly reclaimed by the land. But Harvey never left Tennett. This was his home. He felt like he was a part of the land. Every day he worked outside from sunup to sundown. Every year his beloved community shrunk around him.

By the time Harvey was in his seventies he knew Tennett would soon be gone for good. Harvey’s phone didn’t ring often. But, when it did, there was always news of another funeral. Tennett was litteraly dying away. In fact, no one even called the area Tennett anymore. Tennett was now just a few lonely cow pastures outside the town of Somerville.

A few weeks after his 76th birthday, Harvey was out in the field repairing a barbed wire fence. He began to have severe chest pains. Harvey knew immediately that he was in bad shape. The thought crossed his mind that he should go inside and phone an ambulance. But, as he stood up and looked around he changed his mind. All that he had once known and loved was gone, overgrown by the uncaring briars and vines of time. Harvey decided that if he was going to die, then under the hot Texas sun in his own fields was as good a place as any. He had never left this area in his life. If he went to the hospital now, Harvey was afraid they might make him go to one of the big hospitals in Houston.

Harvey continued his work for a while longer. When he could stand the pain no longer he stood up and began to walk around the old home place. Slowly the old man was losing touch with reality. If anyone had been around to see him there they would have seen an old withered man stumbling and mumbling incoherently. He stood there with sunken bloodshot eyes surveying the lonely landscape. He then began to turn around and around. As he looked out at the empty fields he saw houses grow up out of the twisted thickets covered in muscadine grape vines. He saw family and friends emerge like mists from the shadows of the oaks overhanging the creek. Tennett was back! Large salty tears streamed down his wrinkled cheeks and fell to the dusty clay ground. Harvey felt like he was nine years old again! The old man collapsed into the waiting arms of the sacred ground he loved so dearly.

A family from Spring, Texas owned some land nearby. They used to come up on the weekends and fancy themselves as cattle ranchers. This day, as they passed by the Schoepke place, they saw the old farmer laying dead in his front yard. When the coroner showed up he said Harvey had been dead for two days.

Now, this was back in 1962 when Mr. Harvey Schoepke died. His land went to some distant relatives from Katy, Texas. They came out to the old home place only once. While there they stripped out everything of value from the house then left the place to the grasshoppers and coyotes. Not long after, the property, and all the other land in the area was bought up. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was working on a dam to create a lake nearby. All of the structures in the area were bulldozed down, along with the old Schoepke place.

One warm April morning in 1967 the waters came rolling in. The empty fields and scattered oak trees that had once been Tennett, Texas were washed away and covered over by the rising tide of progress. The water slowly continued to rise until it came to rest at the site of the old Schoepke place. Gentle waves of indifference lapped at the newly formed shoreline. This was where Harvey Schoepke once lived. However, no one knew or remembered Tennett, Texas or the people that once lived their lives there. No one remembered Harvey Schoepke, the man who lived and died in this one spot.

I reckon the construction here started about 1979. The old Schoepke acreage, at the edge of Lake Somerville, was located on the backside of the lake, away from the busy marina and fishing boats filled with eager anglers seeking bass trophies. This made the area desirable to wealthy families from Houston who were looking for a quiet weekend home. A gated community was started and several nice houses were built along the shore.

The Morris family was the first to notice the little boy that roamed up and down the shore in the early mornings or the cool of the evening. He looked to be about 9 years old and could always be seen wearing an old tattered pair of overalls with the legs rolled up to expose his bare feet. The child seemed happy and carefree, wandering up and down the shoreline poking at frogs or chasing dragonflies. Cynthia Morris came to realize that the little ghost boy was a harmless spirit and she enjoyed the rare glimpses she caught of him.

One day, when Amy, Cynthia’s youngest daughter, was eight, she was able to get close to the boy while playing alone out by the water. Cynthia had never told Amy about the young ghost boy out of fear it would frighten her. Amy asked the boy if he wanted to play with her. He told her yes he did but he had to go home soon. When Amy asked where he lived the little boy pointed to the water. She assumed he meant the other side of the lake and did not question the boy further. After playing together for twenty minutes or so Amy heard her mother calling her from the house. Amy told the boy she had to go. As she turned to leave she asked the boy his name. He replied “Harvey”. With that the girl turned and left.

Cynthia Morris was setting the picnic table on the back deck getting ready for dinner. “Where were you?” she asked her daughter.

“I was playing with Harvey” replied her young daughter innocently.

“Who is Harvey?” Cynthia asked.

Amy pointed around the back corner of the house to where the shoreline was. Cynthia leaned around where she could get a full view of the water. As she did, she saw the little ghost boy disappear behind some tall grasses. Cynthia smiled to herself. She had wondered for some time what the little ghost boy’s name was. She waited many years tell her daughter that her playmate that evening was a spirit.

Families moved in, and families moved out of the small gated neighborhood on the backside of Lake Somerville. Time rolled on. As the years went by people began to talk about Harvey, the little ghost boy that wandered the area. Some had gotten close enough to ask him where he lived. He always replied “Tennett”. No one had any idea what that meant. One day, a man from Sugarland saw the boy and asked him where his parents were. He pointed out to the lake then disappeared. Things like that happened from time to time around the neighborhood. All of that changed in the late 1990s when a new “Cynthia” bought the Morris lake house.

A grouchy old woman named Cynthia Hodges moved into the Morris house. It was immediately clear to the rest of the small community that their newest member was going to be a pain. She complained about everything, dogs barking, kids playing, trash pickup, unmowed (in her view) lawns. “Lord she was an awful woman” a former neighbor told me. Anyways, when Cynthia Hodges realized that a ghost wandered up and down the shoreline behind her house she decided she would have none of it. Heaven help the little community if she didn’t start complaining about that also.

Ms. Hodges tried to get the board to pay for someone to come out and “banish” the spirit, as she put it. Of course, the board refused such a ridiculous request. Undeterred, Ms. Hodges decided she would find her own ghost expert to come out and “cleanse the land.” Then she planned to send the bill to the board once the deed was done.

Cynthia Hodges couldn’t have found a more sketchy “paranormal expert” if she tried. She had a man who called himself “Maxwell” come down from Austin and stay at her house for a week. Maxwell was a lanky, bent-over, pervert-looking, toupee-wearing scam artist who dabbled just enough in the black arts to give anyone who came into contact with him a permanent case of the willies - at least that’s what her former neighbors told me.

The last night Maxwell was at Cynthia Hodges house he declared that he needed to perform some sort of séance on the back deck of the house. He planned to lure the spirit to the house then entrap it so he could “banish it forever.” Those are the words he used which, unsurprisingly, is just what Ms. Hodges wanted to hear.

At sundown, Maxwell began some ridiculous ritual that went on for several hours. As shady a man as Maxwell was, he must have known at least a little bit about what he was doing. Eventually, a scared looking little boy who called himself “Harvey” appeared in their midst. Maxwell told the spirit to leave and never return. The little ghost boy looked like he wanted to leave the porch and run to the shoreline but he was trapped by some kind of spell or trap Maxwell had set up. The longer Harvey was trapped there on that porch, the more scared and desperate looking he became. After some time, a look of realization entered the little boy’s eyes. He wasn’t in Tennett, Texas. He wasn’t at his home. He didn’t recognize this place. He didn’t recognize anything anymore. The image of the little boy before them transformed into a sad looking old man. Then he was gone.

No one in the neighborhood ever saw the little ghost boy again. Just in case you’re wondering, Cynthia Hodges died on the back deck about a year later from a massive stroke. This may be the end of the story, but I’ve heard from some that there is an old man who wanders the back country roads between Burleson and Washington counties late at night. If you stop to offer him a ride he will climb in your car without saying a word. When you ask him where he is headed he will turn and look at you with big, sad eyes. As he disappears into a gray mist he whispers the words “Tennett, Texas.”

The Harvester

This is a story a fellow told me once back when I was living up around Eufaula, Georgia. I did some research and tried my best to get the facts straight.

***

In the late 1940’s Jerry and Paula bought a small farm in rural Georgia. Jerry had served in the war and now made a living working on transfer trucks. Paula worked as a school teacher at the local elementary. Jerry converted one of the old barns into a shop for working on trucks. He was the only person for miles around that had the knowledge and experience to repair the large vehicles. The couple had a great life together until one fateful morning in the late winter of 1952.

On this particular day, Paula was at work and Jerry was plowing the fields getting them ready to plant the season’s crops. Jerry was riding atop his old Ford tractor when he noticed an International Harvester truck from the 1930s pull up in front of his shop. Jerry shut down his tractor and crossed the dusty field headed to where his shop sat next to the quiet country lane. As he rounded the corner, Jerry saw the beat-up old truck sitting in the driveway. No one seemed to be around. Jerry glanced around the shop, which he always left open during the day. No one was there. He circled around the truck. The bed of the old International Harvester was a simple wood frame built sturdy and tall to hold whatever load could be piled high. It was presently empty and Jerry could see plainly that no one was in the back of the truck either. Now the young farmer was perplexed. He called out to see if the stranger who drove up to his farm would answer him, but the only reply he received was the late February winds whipping through the trees.

Now Jerry was really confused. He bent down to look under the truck. No one was there. He circled his shop, thinking someone must have stepped out back to relieve themselves. No one was there either. He looked up and down the lane to see if he could catch a glimpse of someone walking away. Still, no one. Jerry stood for a moment dumbfounded. After some contemplation he decided to climb back atop his tractor and finish plowing the field. He figured maybe the owner would show up and wave him down so Jerry could take a look at a some problem with the truck.

A couple of hours passed. Jerry finished his work in the field and decided to go have some lunch. He circled the truck and the shop once more to make sure no one was waiting for him. There was no one there. He called out once more. There was no reply.

Jerry sat alone in silence eating his egg salad sandwich. From where he was sitting in his kitchen he could see the side of his shop and the rear half of the old International Harvester truck. As he finished up his sandwich, Jerry decided he would phone the sheriff and have him come out and take a look at the truck. Jerry picked up the phone and then dialed the operator. Within a couple of minutes he was explaining the situation to the sheriff over the static-laden line. The sheriff told Jerry he would stop by later that afternoon to check it out.

When Paula came home there was her husband and the sheriff going over the truck. Jerry explained the situation to his wife. She didn’t seem too concerned and left the two men to their work. They noticed only a couple of odd things about the truck. For one, the key was jammed into the ignition. And two, there was a small puddle of water on the floorboard despite no obvious leaks or rain in the past several days. The sheriff took down the numbers off of the truck. He told Jerry that it would take up to a couple of weeks to get the owner’s information. The sheriff felt like someone would show up before then and instructed Jerry to call him when the owner of the truck turned up.

And so, the old truck sat in front of Jerry’s shop for a couple of days. Eventually someone else showed up with another truck for Jerry to work on and he had to move the old International Harvester. He climbed up into the cab. The small puddle of water was still on the floor. This intrigued Jerry because the windows had been rolled up tightly and there had been no rain for some time. The truck cranked up easily and ran well for such an old work horse. Jerry moved the truck off to the far side of the shop so it would be out of his way. He worked the rest of the day not giving the old truck a second thought.

Late that night, Jerry and Paula awoke to the sound of a truck starting up outside. Jerry told his wife to stay put. He grabbed his trusty Winchester 30-30 and his 6 volt flashlight and rushed out the door hoping to catch either a thief, or the owner of the International Harvester. Paula sat in the dark listening. The sound of the engine stopped. Then for several minutes there was only silence.

Soon Jerry returned looking pale and a little confused. Paula sprang out of bed and asked him what happened. Jerry fumbled through the house and made his way into the kitchen. He sat down at the table and asked Paula to brew some coffee. She asked him again what happened but he demanded some coffee first. Paula was upset. Jerry was never demanding with her. But, she could see her husband was visibly shaken. Jerry just sat there with his head in his hands staring at the table.

Later, over a nervous cup of coffee, Jerry explained what happened when he left the house to investigate the sound. He said that as he walked out the door he could see the headlights and taillights of the old truck lighting up the front and back of the shop. He could hear the truck running and he just knew he was going to catch someone in the cab. However, just before he rounded the corner of the shop, the lights cut off and the engine sputtered a few times then died. He told Paula how, as he rounded the corner, the truck was just sitting there eerily silent and still. Jerry had jumped on to the running board and shone his light in the cab expecting to see someone. But, he couldn’t see anything at all because the windows were all fogged up. He had flung the driver’s side door open but no one was there. He then began to walk around the truck shining his light around to see who was about. No one was there he told her. On a whim he decided to feel the tailpipe. It was ice cold. He then explained that he had popped open the hood of the truck to feel the headers. They were cold as well he said. Then, as he stood there, bent over under the hood, trying to figure out what was going on, he heard what sounded like someone trying to taking in a deep breath. But it sounded like they were choking on water.

Jerry stopped telling the story at this point. Paula wide-eyed asked him to continue. As Jerry sat the now empty cup of coffee down Paula noticed his hands were trembling. After a few moments of staring at the wall Jerry continued slowly, “I turned around real fast when I heard that sound, as I did, I hit my head on the hood and the flashlight fell to the ground. As it fell, I saw, standing there behind me, an old man wearing coveralls. Every inch of him was wet and water was dripping from his beard. He just stood there gasping for air. Then, my flashlight hit the ground and shattered. As the light went out, the man disappeared. I- I think I may have met the owner of the truck.”

Paula was scared out of her mind. Over the next few days she managed to come up with logical explanations for what her husband had experienced. Soon, she had it all figured out. A truck had driven by the farm late at night waking them both up. Jerry had rushed out, still half-asleep and mistook the lights of a truck driving off in the distance for the old International Harvester. Then, he had hit his head a little too hard and disoriented himself enough to think he had seen a ghost. It all made sense to her now. With this revised story in her her head she was able to sleep peacefully over the next few weeks. In fact, she just about forgot the whole incident.

One day, a couple of weeks later, Jerry was out working in the shop on a Saturday. He realized that he needed a part in order to complete the job he was working on. He climbed in his old Chevy pickup but it wouldn’t crank. Jerry looked his old pickup over but he didn’t really have the time to figure out what the problem was. He wanted to get to town quickly before the local dealership closed. He was about to get in his wife’s car but then he looked down at the grease on his clothes and thought better of it. That's when the idea hit him. The International Harvester was sitting there unused with at least a half tank of gas.

Jerry walked over to the truck. He paused for a moment as he thought about the ghostly encounter he had a few weeks back. It was a bright and sunny March morning. The sun and the chirping birds made the experience seem a world away now. Jerry decided that maybe his wife was right about him imagining the ghost man. He swung the driver’s side door open to find a small puddle of water on the floor board.

Paula had just pulled a loaf of raisin bread out of the oven when she heard a knock at the door. As she rounded the corner Paula could see through the old lace curtain that it was the sheriff. She opened the door.

“Good morning sheriff.”

“Is Jerry around?”

“He’s working out in the shop. Is something wrong?”
 
A dark, yet confused look crossed the sheriff’s face. “Well, I- I found out where the truck came from.” The sheriff said slowly. Then he paused, “I didn’t see Jerry out in his shop... or the truck.”
 
Paula was confused. “You mean Jerry’s truck?” she asked. It wasn’t uncommon for Jerry to head off for a quick trip to town without telling his wife.

“No ma’am, the International Harvester, it aint there.”

Paula ran out of the house quickly with the sheriff following right behind. She had a terrible feeling in her stomach. Sure enough, there was Jerry’s Chevy truck sitting there, but the International Harvester was gone. Paula couldn’t imagine why Jerry would go anywhere in that old truck.

The sheriff had a worried look on his face. He decided to tell Paula what he had learned. He related to her that the truck had come from up around the Gainesville area. The owner had brought the truck to an old man who owned a shop there. The truck needed to have some repairs done. The shop owner was never paid for the work and ended up keeping the truck for quite sometime. One day, when the old shop owner needed to move something heavy, he decided to use the big truck instead of his own. He and the truck were found several days later at the bottom of a lake. Apparently, the old man had run off the road, down an embankment, and straight into the lake. After the body was recovered the truck was hauled from the lake and sat at a salvage yard for months... until it disappeared. That’s the part no one understood. The truck was too badly damaged from all the water to ever run again. It just mysteriously vanished one night, like somebody climbed in and drove it away. It didn’t make any sense. “That was almost a year ago” the sheriff concluded.

Late the next afternoon Jerry’s body was pulled from a local cow pond. It seems Jerry must have lost control of the truck and over corrected. The truck cleared a fence and continued until it disappeared under the murky waters. A small herd of cows were the only witnesses. Several days later the truck was hauled out and taken to a local salvage yard.

Paula was devastated. Once the young school teacher started working again she had to alter her route to work in order to avoid passing by the salvage yard. She just couldn’t stand to see that damned old truck. Eventually, Paula sold the farm and moved to Atlanta. She remarried and had four kids with her new husband. She thought of Jerry often, but their days together seemed so distant, as if they were part of a past life.

One day, in 1982, Paula was traveling with her husband along the highway headed to the beach for a much-needed weekend break. The ride was long and she soon drifted off to sleep. Paula dreamt she saw Jerry driving away from their old farm in the big International Harvester truck. He was waiving goodbye to her with a sorrowful look on his face, as if he knew he would never see her again. She was suddenly startled awake.

“Relax” her husband said to her. I’m just pulling off the interstate for gas.

Once they stopped, Paula decided to go in and use the restroom. When she inquired about the location of the lady’s room the man behind the counter handed her a key and informed her it was located outside, around the corner of the building. Paula stepped back out into the breezy summer afternoon. As she rounded the corner of the service station the aging woman froze in place.

Sitting there before her was an old 1930’s International Harvester with a wooden bed. It looked identical to the truck. A set of wet footprints led away from the truck and disappeared into a abandoned lot next to the gas station.

A few moments later the visibly shaken woman handed the keys back to the store manager. A look of concern crossed his face.

“You alright mam?” he asked her.

“That truck,” Paula asked slowly “the old International Harvester, who’s truck is that?”

“I was hoping someone could tell me” the manager said. “It’s been sitting there empty since I came into work this morning.”

***

I heard a long time ago that the old truck was finally towed to a junkyard in the city of Fairhope, Georgia. When I passed that way a few years back I decided to go find the old 1930’s International Harvester so I could take some pictures. After some searching, I found the yard and pulled in. A greasy old man greeted me at the gate. I explained to him what I was looking for. He said he knew the truck well. He said I could drive back and see it but the lot was big and it might be easier if he just hopped in with me to show me where it was. Before I could object (the nice old man had a ripe odor), he was opening the passenger door and climbing in. We drove through the yard dodging piles of scrap metal and various other junk as we snaked our way to the back.

“It’s just around here” the nearly toothless man said as we rounded a large pile of old gas pumps. “There’s a tree growed up through the front of it...” he began to tell me as we made our final turn.

The old man’s eyes went wide. The tree was there. The truck was gone.