 Is he still out there? Picture by frogDNA, Creative Commons License Imagine that you’ve been transported back to 1970. It would look both strangely similar and different from today. You certainly wouldn’t be seeing cell phones or cybertrucks, but you would see still people wearing bell-bottoms, pornstar moustaches, and feathered hair (but all unironically back then). If you turned on the radio, you’d hear I’ll be There by The Jackson Five, Layla by Derek and the Dominos, and Lola by The Kinks, not on an oldies station, but on the American Top 40 hosted by Casey Kasem (which also started this same year). Now picture yourself parked in a nice car in a remote location in the woods outside of Washington, DC. It's almost Halloween, and you and your main squeeze are parked right next to a small bridge. It’s very dark. Your car engine is running, maybe to keep the car warm enough for any disco-era shenanigans you have planned, or maybe – and more innocently – you just want to keep the radio on so you can hear that wild new song by The Carpenters. It seems like a nice night regardless.  Underneath the infamous Bunny Man bridge But alas, your sexy 70's tranquility is then traumatically disturbed. You can’t believe your eyes. Are you losing your mind? Out of the darkness, you both see a grown man wearing a bunny suit. They guy is hopping mad (see what I did there?), literally frothing at the mouth in anger, and screaming at you. As he gets closer you can make out the word “trespassing” in his unhinged tirade, but little else. Then, as if he was a dwarf from Lord of the Rings, he lobs an axe through your window, shattering it into a million shards. Terrified, you jam on the accelerator and bolt out of there as quickly as your non-unleaded gas can take you. You've just met the Bunny Man.  Is this the axe???? This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. Image by KeeferC (2004). Before the internet, stories like this might stay purely regional. It would be far more difficult for “Slender Man” and other tales to grab hold of the public consciousness without online forums. Back in the 1970s, strange stories like this got passed along and elaborated upon through word of mouth, some eventually becoming “urban legends”. Not surprisingly, there quickly became several variations of "The Bunny Man" bandied about at teenage sleepovers or to help pass the time in junior high Algebra classes. He became even more threatening as time went. Just a few years later, hushed whispers – usually made across the teenage frequencies – gave him an origin story. The Bunny Man was now an escaped mental patient and psychopath. The gentleman was responsible for several deaths in the area, sometimes hanging them upside down from the bridge in similar fashion to what the Italians did to Benito Mussolini and his mistress at the end of World War II. Along with murder, The Bunny Man also was said to have a penchant for animal mutilation. Just heaving axes into car windows was just so 1970…  Shot of the famous bridge. What lagomorphic dangers lurk in the surrounding forests? We must say that this is a great story that one of us even heard while living on the other side of the country. It’s got just about everything a good urban legend needs and is, franky, just a lot of fun to think about. But, as is well-known, skeptics and researchers generally take all the fun out of everything. Such is the case with this rascally rabbit. Most of the stories associated with the Bunny Man are apparently pure bunk. The only one with any truth to it is the introductory story. For those of you interested in a more reasonable, less fun take on the matter than the Bunny Man stringing up dead bodies all over Fairfax County, please read this: https://research.fairfaxcounty.gov/local-history/bunnyman However, if we’re being honest, we much prefer the legend. It's kind of fun to imagine that the Bunny Man is still out there, wearing a fur suit matted with the blood of his victims, fantasizing about all the delicious vengeance he'd like to mete out on those dastardly people who dared to trespass near his precious bridge. He may very well be sharpening his axe and giggling to himself as we type this paltry prose... Travel Tips: If you want to visit this easy to miss one lane bridge in Clifton VA, you would never guess how close you are to DC. For all of its association with malevolent ax-wielding tomfoolery, it’s a lovely place nestled between open fields, babbling brooks, and some pretty opulent mansions. It’s truly a beautiful area, but we could imagine it taking on more of a Blair Witch vibe at night.  Beyond the bridge, this part of Virginia is very pretty and includes many small historic towns, wineries, breweries, and farm markets. You’re driving along a winding mountain road late at night. The radio is once again playing that song from The Breakfast Club that you’d sooner forget and you’re becoming sleepy. You change the station in the hopes of hearing some invigorating Pantera, but you are instead treated to that terrible song from Katy Perry about her transforming herself into a lion or tiger or something. If you don’t get some stimulation, you could fall asleep and slip off the road into the valley below. Should this happen – and if you survive – your Geico payments are going to go through the roof. As you ponder this dilemma, you suddenly spy what looks to be a woman standing alone on the side of the road. She’s hitchhiking. Though you realize that this is fairly odd behavior in 2024, you must admit that you momentarily forgot that you were tired. Maybe chatting with a stranger you pick up on the side of the road could help pass the time until you get into town? What could go wrong?  The "Devil's Elbow" outside of Altoona, Pennsylvania. It's probably the favorite haunt of the Ghost of Wopspy and the site of many fatalities. As she falls more clearly in line with your headlights, you notice that she’s wearing a white dress, is fairly attractive, and has long black hair flowing over her shoulders. Though not exactly dressed for hiking in the mountains at night, she probably has an interesting tale to tell. On a whim, you stop the car, put on your blinkers, and invite this mysterious lady into your car. She gets in the back of the car as if you were her Uber driver. Odd. Oh well, if this helps avoid a sleep-driving incident, you can tolerate a bit of haughtiness. You then slam on the gas pedal to get the car moving before you get rear-ended by another driver. When the engine quiets down, you try to engage the lady in a bit of light conversation. No response. As you peek at her in the rearview mirror, you notice that she’s completely ignoring you. Sadly, this is starting to feel like junior high school all over again... You glance back, more closely this time, and notice that she has a disappointed, wistful, almost melancholic expression on her face as she stares out the window. You are just about to ask her if she’s OK when you notice that a big turn is coming, so you focus on the road so that bad things don’t happen. After you pass the curve, you return your attention to the dour hitchhiker and, looking back in the mirror, come to the startling realization that she’s gone(!!).  A wooded area hiding the few remains of the Wopsohonock Hotel, destroyed by fire in 1903. How can this be? Did she pass out on the floor? Could she have jumped out of a moving car without making a sound? You are deeply unsettled, so you stop at the first pullover you see and get out. You search the back seat of the car only to find that crumpled old Taco Bell bag from last week and an old box of sun-bleached Kleenex. No hitchhiker. There’s not even a single strand of her long black hair… Strange tales like these have been told about a short stretch of highway near Altoona Pennsylvania for decades. In fact, for one of us, this was the very first ghost story they ever heard. As with many ghost stories attached to a particular area, there are some variations. There are people who claimed to have seen the lady walking and there are also stories of her getting in the front seat. We’ve also heard that she screams a lot, and if you hear three screams from this ghostly lady in white, you die. Pretty dramatic stuff for a small city in Pennsylvania Even though Altoona isn’t big, it has had a pretty interesting history. It’s primarily known today for Boyer Candy Company – the makers of Mallo-cups (i.e., like Reese’s peanut butter cups but with coconut marshmallow replacing the peanut butter) and Clark Bars, which taste like peanut butter and toffee coated in chocolate. Altoona is also home to the Railroaders Memorial Museum and is the birthplace of Sheetz convenience stories. However, it’s probably most famous for the Horseshoe Curve, a massive set of three train tracks that spans two ravines and is shaped like – you guessed it – a big horseshoe. It was such a key piece of US infrastructure that Hitler sent a German U-Boat to Long Island that dropped off four Nazis with sabotage on their mind. Their dastardly plan was to destroy the curve. This secret mission even had a name: Operation Pastorius. Fortunately, the Nazis failed after the FBI caught wind of the plot.  The Wopsohonock Overlook. Among dark tourists and paranormal investigators, though, the Altoona area is far more famous for being the haunt of the “White Lady of Wopsohonock (Wopsy) Mountain” or, more simply, “The Ghost of Wopsy”. But how did she come to mess with people dumb enough to pick up hitchhiker’s while driving? Shortly after the horseshoe curve was created, a fancy hotel was built high on the beautiful Wopsohonock mountain right outside of Altoona. More like a resort, this hotel was quite posh, with 60 rooms, a bowling alley, shooting range, etc. It also had a four-story lookout tower that, on a clear day, afforded unobstructed views of several different Pennsylvania counties. However, to get to the Hotel or the lookout tower, you had to drive either a car or horse-drawn carriage up a very treacherous road. At a key point, if you deviated from the road, you would have a steep (i.e., deadly) drop down to the valley far below. This part of the road has been called “The Devil’s Elbow”. Multiple deaths resulting from vehicles careening off this road have been documented for years, and local police still struggle to deal with the aftermath of these unfortunate incidents. The dangerousness of the Devil’s Elbow remains despite the more modern metal guardrails. It should therefore surprise no one that the Ghost is associated with the Elbow.
In one of the more popular origin stories for the Ghost, a young couple in a forbidden romance (of course), decides to elope. The drive down the treacherous pass and skid their car off the devil’s elbow. Both perish from an accident, and the woman’s spirit continues to haunt that stretch of highway today, searching in vain for her lost lover.
Another story describes how, before the lady became a ghost, she was stood up on her wedding day. Wracked with grief and embarrassment, she soon died in an automobile crash and was burned to death. Beset with a post-mortem desire for vengeance, she now lurks in the area, bothering potential lovers who park at the lookout. If you hear her scream three times, you and your lover will die. So, make sure to turn up some romantic Pantera songs whenever you're necking in the Wopsohonock. However, local historians trace the original story for the “ghost” all the way back to 1926. The tale goes something like this… A man and woman were bootlegging moonshine from Cambria County into Blair County. Their car skidded off the road and fell down the embankment of the Devil’s Elbow. The woman, (we’ll call her Mrs. G to protect relatives who still live in the area) died in the hospital shortly after the crash. The man in the car (Mr. T – not the one with the mohawk) wasn't her husband, however, and some salacious rumors soon began to spread. Interestingly, the man survived and, after being cleared of manslaughter charges, later became prominent in Altoona politics (it turns out that Ted Kennedy’s Chappaquiddick scandal was not really that unique after all). According to Dr. Jared Frederick, a historian at Penn State’s Altoona campus, this tale has many features of what helps create a good ghost story. Namely, there is an abrupt death, lost love (i.e., Mrs. G had a husband and five children she would never see again), and a potential miscarriage of justice. We would also throw in the fact that a dangerously famous location and the potential for flapper-era salaciousness doesn’t hurt either. Therefore, it’s possible that the spectral hitchhiker and terminal screamer famous around this lonely stretch of Pennsylvania highway might just be the disembodied spirit of Mrs. G clad in alabaster white and meting out vengeance for that potential miscarriage of justice. We’re not quite sure what righting wrongs has to do with scaring driver’s out of their wits and killing couples who make out in parked cars, but we’re obviously not fancy paranormal investigators. We’re just a couple of dark tourists who enjoy a good ghost story every now and then. Feel free to post if you have any of your own. Directions The Wopsohonock lookout can be found on the aptly named Look Out Road in Dysart, PA 16636. Even though the four-level lookout tower burned to the ground (along with the Wopsohonock Hotel) in 1903, you can still get scenic views of the area. It is particularly nice when leaves change color in the fall. You can find the Devil’s Elbow nearby (i.e., on the way back to Altoona). If you REALLY want to find the exact location, just ask a local or do a quick online search. We would publish the coordinates, but we don’t want to encourage people to do what we did (i.e., hang out of the car taking pictures while driving) and feel responsible for any deadly aftermath that might ensue. Please don’t try this for yourselves, we’re professional degenerates. Side Trips The Horseshoe Curve is a short drive away and would be a shame to miss if you're in the area. If you fancy a drink after ghost-hunting, the Knickerbocker Tavern (3957 6th Ave, Altoona, PA 16602) has an incredible selection of bourbons and other spirits and a very nice, relaxed atmosphere. Should you have children or just want to act like one, you could visit DelGrosso’s Amusement Park and Laguna Splash Water Park in nearby Tipton, PA |
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