Crybaby Bridge
Encyclopedia
Crybaby Bridge is a nickname given to some bridges. The name often reflects an urban legend
Urban legend
An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...

 that the sound of a baby can be, or has been, heard from the bridge. Many are also accompanied by an urban legend
Urban legend
An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...

 of a baby or young child/children being killed nearby, or thrown from the bridge into the river
River
A river is a natural watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, a lake, a sea, or another river. In a few cases, a river simply flows into the ground or dries up completely before reaching another body of water. Small rivers may also be called by several other names, including...

 or creek
Stream
A stream is a body of water with a current, confined within a bed and stream banks. Depending on its locale or certain characteristics, a stream may be referred to as a branch, brook, beck, burn, creek, "crick", gill , kill, lick, rill, river, syke, bayou, rivulet, streamage, wash, run or...

 below.

Rogue's Hollow

One of many purported crybaby bridges is located near Doylestown, Ohio
Doylestown, Ohio
Doylestown is a village located atop the highest point in Wayne County, Ohio, United States. The population was 2,799 at the 2000 census. Doylestown is served by a branch of the Wayne County Public Library.-History:...

, in an area known as Rogue's Hollow. This bridge is located on Galehouse Road, between Rogue Hollow Road and Hametown Road. The bridge spans Silver Creek. Deep in Rogue's Hollow, this road previously led from the bottom of the hollow (Hametown Rd.) to the top (Rogue Hollow Rd.). The bridge is only approachable from Hametown Rd. from October to May, as the steeper portion of the road is seasonally closed to prevent accidents. The bridge is property of the Rogue's Hollow historical society
Historical society
A historical society is an organization that collects, researches, interprets and preserves information or items of historical interest. Generally, a historical society focuses on a specific geographical area, such as a county or town or subject, such as aviation or rail. Many historical...

, which also owns the adjacent Chidester Mill.

Rogue's Hollow Historical Society
"Map to the Mill" link refers to the bridge; road and creek are visible in "Chidester Hill" photo.

Map: 40.94111°N 81.67528°W

The Screaming Bridge of Maud Hughes Road

Maud Hughes Road is located in Liberty Township, Ohio
Liberty Township, Ohio
Liberty Township, Ohio may refer to:*Liberty Township, Adams County, Ohio*Liberty Township, Butler County, Ohio*Liberty Township, Clinton County, Ohio*Liberty Township, Crawford County, Ohio*Liberty Township, Darke County, Ohio...

. It is reputed to have been the site of many terrible accidents and suicides. Railroad tracks lie 25 feet below the bridge, and at least 36 people are said to have been reported dead on or around the Maud Hughes Road Bridge. Ghostly figures, mists, and lights have been seen, as well as black hooded figures and a phantom train. The legend says that a car carrying a man and a woman stalled on top of the bridge. The man got out to get help while the girl stayed. When the man returned, the girl was hanging on the bridge above the tracks. The man then supposedly perished with unexplained causes. To this day, many people have reported hearing the ghosts' conversations, then a woman's scream followed by a man's scream. Another popular and typical Crybaby Bridge story says that a woman once threw her baby off the bridge and hanged herself afterwards.

Map: 39.394551°N 84.410427°W

Egypt Road, Salem

Although the bridge is off of Egypt Road, it is actually on what used to be West Pine Lake Rd., which now dead-ends to the east of the bridge. Legends attribute the crying baby to one that fell in and accidentally drowned. The closed road remains as an access way to high voltage utility lines.

The "baby cries" can be heard at night or during the day.

Map: 40.929744°N 80.829978°W

Chardon Township

This crybaby bridge is in the area of the melon heads
Melon heads
Melon Heads is the name given to legendary beings and urban legends in parts of Michigan, Ohio, and Connecticut generally described as small humanoids with bulbous heads who occasionally emerge from hiding places to attack people...

. The bridge is on Wisner Rd. just north of Kirtland Chardon Rd. A large section of the road is permanently closed; the bridge lies just before the south end of the closed section.

Helltown

The local urban legend regarding Helltown
Helltown (Ohio)
Helltown is an area in Boston Township, Summit County, Ohio, known formally as "Boston, Ohio". Local legend associates the area with Satanists and hauntings...

 includes a crybaby bridge, located on Boston Mills Rd.

Illinois

Illinois is home to several crybaby bridges, most notably one outside of Monmouth, Illinois
Monmouth, Illinois
Monmouth is a city in and the county seat of Warren County in the U.S. state of Illinois. It is the home of Monmouth College and contains Monmouth Park, Harmon Park, North Park, Warfield Park, West Park, South Park, Garwood Park, Buster White Park and the Citizens Lake & Campground. It is the host...

. Many stories surrounding this bridge are similar to the folklore motif, although one tale particular to this location involves a speeding car full of impetuous youths who struck and killed a fisherman as he cast a line into the creek. Another popular story is that an elementary school bus plunged off the side of this bridge during a flood.

Oklahoma

In Alderson, OK, near McAlester, the bridge is located at the end of Alderson Road and has been known to legends of a woman who was raped by her father several times and would throw her unwanted infants off the bridge. Local residents have reported sounds of babies crying underneath the bridge late at night and also the glowing image of the woman has been seen numerous times floating over the rocky bed of North Boggy Creek.

In Moore, OK, approximately 2 miles east of Sooner Rd. on 134th St. there is a collapsed and abandoned bridge. Legend of a woman and infant in their vehicle falling through the wood of the bridge during late-night hours, a few days later the vehicle and remains were discovered by law enforcement patroling the area. As for the bridge, it was never repaired and the road was therefore deemed unsafe and was closed off to vehicles, the cry of the baby is rumored to be heard during over-night hours.

In Kellyville, OK, approximately 1.63 miles east of the Slick/Kellyville Road on West 181st street on the north side, there is the original bridge abutments off of the new road. Legend of a woman and her infant child driving down the road trying to escape her husband. The woman's car ran off the bridge and the baby was never found. Legend continues that if the bridge is visited at midnight the baby's cry can be heard and sometimes accompanied by a strange blue light .

Maryland

There is a purported "Crybaby Bridge" off Beaver Dam Road in Beltsville, near the Department of Agriculture's Beltsville Agricultural Research Center. It is in or near the areas where the legendary goatman has reported to have been seen.

There is another on Governor's Bridge Road, in Bowie. This bridge is a late 19th/early 20th century steel truss bridge; legend states that a woman and her baby were murdered in the 1930s. It is also said that in the early 20th century, a young woman was impregnated, but not married. In order to avoid judgement by family and peers, she drowned her baby in the river. Purportedly, if one parks one's car at or near the bridge, a baby can be heard crying; sometimes a ghost car will creep up from behind, but disappear when the driver or passenger turns around to see it.

In Weird Maryland: Your Travel Guide to Maryland's Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets, authors Matt Lake, Mark Moran and Mark Sceurman include three first-person narratives of crybaby bridge experiences in Maryland. The locations mentioned are the Governor's Bridge Road bridge discussed above, one on Lottsford Vista Road and a third unspecified, but possibly described the Lottsford Vista Road bridge as well. The latter narratives make mention of purported Satanic churches near the bridge and appearance of the Goatman.

Lufkin

Jack Creek, a stream west of Lufkin, has for years been known as Cry Baby Creek, supposedly because a women and a baby died when their auto veered off a wooden bridge and fell into the steep creek. Annette Sawyer of Lufkin, who directed us to the bridge, said visitors who come to the site at night claim they have heard sounds resembling a baby crying. One visitor supposedly found the imprint of a baby’s hand on her auto window after returning from the bridge.

Port Neches

"Sarah Jane Bridge" on East Port Neches Avenue in Port Neches, Texas
Port Neches, Texas
Port Neches is a city in Jefferson County, Texas, United States. The population was 13,601 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Beaumont–Port Arthur Metropolitan Statistical Area.- History :...

 is said to be the bridge from which a baby of the same name
Baby Jane
Baby Jane may refer to:* What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, a 1960 novel by Henry Farrell** What Ever Happened to Baby Jane , a film based on the novel, starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford** Baby Jane Hudson, a character from the above work...

 was thrown into the alligator-infested water by a man who had murdered the child's mother. It is said Sarah Jane can be heard crying from the water when one stands on the bridge on hot summer nights. The child's mother, a headless ghost wandering the woods nearby, can also be heard whispering "Sarah Jane" as she searches the forest with a lantern. The legendary Sarah Jane is Sarah Jane Block, who lost no children and lived to the age of 99.

Sulphur Springs

"Crybaby Bridge" its behind Game Stop (by walmart) the second turn to your left. No Existing names for the baby or mother have been found. Reports are you can hear a baby crying or screeching. You can also feel someone touch your shoulder. Another report is if you bring baby powder and put it on your car, usually you will see the mother and the baby's handprints.

South Carolina

There is a "Crybaby Bridge" on High Shoals Rd, just south of Anderson, SC. High Shoals Road crosses the Rocky River at the high shoals point. The bridge which crosses the river is known by locals as Cry Baby Bridge. The local legend (which is repeated in nearly every county in South Carolina) tells of a woman and her infant who died in a car crash off the bridge. By crossing the bridge halfway and repeating a chant, one can hear a baby cry, or a woman scream, or see a ghostly car pass. The story of Cry Baby Bridge has certainly reached urban legend status.
The bridge in South Carolina was built in Virginia in 1919,brought to Charleston S.C. to connect two counties together..In 1952 it was brought to Anderson South Carolina,The new bridge replaced the older bridge that had been there.It is about 194 feet long and about 17 feet wide.Shortly later locals called it Cry Baby Bridge.
A old Grist mill sat below the bridge along the Rocky River in 1840,and ran until about 1900's.
In 1894 a electrical plant was built there by W.C.Whitner.It gave the Anderson County the nickname The Electric City.One of the generators from the electric mill is still on display in Anderson County.
The bridge has many changes through the times,from no bridge,to wooden bridge,to the well know Iron Railed Bridge called Cry Baby Bridge to now modern cement bridge that now runs beside Cry Baby Bridge,it still remains a part of Anderson County's history and a famous land mark.

Georgia

There is an alleged "Crybaby" bridge in Columbus, Georgia
Columbus, Georgia
Columbus is a city in and the county seat of Muscogee County, Georgia, United States, with which it is consolidated. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 189,885. It is the principal city of the Columbus, Georgia metropolitan area, which, in 2009, had an estimated population of 292,795...

. The story goes that some children died around the bridge (accounts vary as to whether their death was accidental or intentional), and that at night their cries can be heard and a woman can be seen walking along the edge of the woods. Other phenomenon reported include footsteps and the feeling of an 'evil presence.' It is also alleged that if you put baby powder on the hood of your car and stop there, you will see baby footprints in the powder.

Alabama

Take a turn off of Kali Oka Road in Saraland, Alabama, go carefully around Dead Man’s Curve (so named for the numerous fatal car accidents) and you will be heading towards Cry Baby Bridge and the Kali Oka Plantation. The plantation may look familiar to independent film buffs as it was used as the location for the horror film “Dead Birds,” where a mix of demonology and voodoo create a horrible place to stay the night in post-Civil War Alabama. There is an eerie aura around the plantation house and the smaller house that was once the slaves’ quarters. Some have said they have seen a woman in white lighting candles in a window. Others have spotted a hulking African American man, believed to have once been a slave on the plantation, walking the Kali Oka Road. These two ghosts, it has been said, are the reason you can hear a baby cry at night on the bridge just down the road.

The woman was the mistress of the plantation house, and her husband was an abusive, cold-hearted master. The giant was a slave and the Mistress’s lover. One night, the master of the house followed his wife as she entered the slaves’ quarters just behind the plantation house. He caught them in a lovers’ embrace, pulled them apart and at knife-point, forced the slave to a tree where he was chained up. Both of his hands were cut off for daring to touch the master’s wife, and he was left to die as a warning to others. Afterwards, the mistress of the house discovered she was pregnant. According to local tradition, she delivered a baby boy in the woods and drowned him in the nearby creek, where Cry Baby Bridge crosses today. Now, they say, one can hear the baby cry as his poor, innocent body touches the cold, running water in a constant repetition of his mother’s desperate betrayal. The slave still walks the road, looking for the son he’ll never know on the mortal plane.

But there is another version of the story, too…

Some believe the Master actually showed favoritism towards his behemoth slave. After the master’s death, however, the wife was the one who tied him up to the tree because she hated him so much. Insanely jealous, she supposedly left him tied to the tree in front of the house so that she could watch as he died a slow death.

Cry Baby Bridge also has multiple legends as to why one can hear a baby cry when you cross it at night. Some say a bunch of kids were playing on the bridge when they knocked a boy into the creek, where he downed. There are a few versions that a woman and her baby had a tragic accident. In some versions, she escapes and doesn’t even try to save the baby, in others, both she and the baby die. Those who follow logic claim that the sound is actually the wind blowing across the pipes that lay beneath the bridge, but that does not explain why cars have so much trouble crossing the bridge at night. Cars will stall, lights will go haywire, and some have even reported that their cars have moved from one end of the bridge to the other without any earthly aid.

Some have tried to get physical proof of the bridge’s haunting by sprinkling baby powder on a car from bumper to bumper. Wait inside the car for a few minutes, then go out and look. Some say that you will see a toddler’s hand and footprints. Another, much more satisfying twist on this (some have suggested) is to send a passenger out to sprinkle the car with baby powder. When they get out, drive away, leaving them alone in the dark to experience the bridge for themselves for a few frightening minutes. But we would never suggest such shenanigans….

No one knows which, if any, of the stories are true. Everyone does agree, however, that there is something definitely otherworldly in this area of Alabama. The plantation house has been relatively recently purchased and renovated by a family who do not seem bothered by the ghosts that haunt Kali Oka Road.

Controversy

In 1999, Maryland folklorist Jesse Glass
Jesse Glass
-In America:Glass first began to write and publish experimental poetry in c. 1972. Starting in 1976, he edited and published the mimeographed Goethe’s Notes Magazine and Goethe's Press from his family home in Westminster, Maryland...

 presented a case against several crybaby bridges being genuine folklore
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...

, contending that they were instead fakelore
Fakelore
Fakelore or Pseudo-folklore is inauthentic, manufactured folklore presented as if it were genuinely traditional. The term can refer to new stories or songs made up, or to folklore that is reworked and modified for modern tastes...

 that was knowingly being propagated through the internet.

According to Glass, nearly identical stories of crybaby bridges in Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

 and Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...

 began to appear online in 1999, but they could not be confirmed through local oral history or the media.

Among Glass' examples was the story of a bridge located in Westminister, Maryland, which concerned the murder of escaped slaves and African American children. It's located specifically on Rockland Road, just off of Uniontown Road outside of Westminster's city limits past Rt. 31. In the 1800s, the story held, unwanted black babies were drowned by being thrown off this bridge. Regional newspapers, such as the American Sentinel and the Democratic Advocate, which usually covered racially motivated murders of the period, make no mention of the events described online.

However, in their book Weird U.S.: Your Travel Guide to America's Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets, authors Mark Moran and Mark Sceurman relate the story of a purported crybaby bridge on Lottsford Vista Road between Bowie and Upper Marlboro, asserting that this bridge has "made believers out of many skeptics." The text included from their informant makes no mention of escaped slaves but does repeat a familiar component of such legends: an out-of-wedlock birth.

See also

  • Fakelore
    Fakelore
    Fakelore or Pseudo-folklore is inauthentic, manufactured folklore presented as if it were genuinely traditional. The term can refer to new stories or songs made up, or to folklore that is reworked and modified for modern tastes...

  • Urban legend
    Urban legend
    An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...

  • Infanticide
    Infanticide
    Infanticide or infant homicide is the killing of a human infant. Neonaticide, a killing within 24 hours of a baby's birth, is most commonly done by the mother.In many past societies, certain forms of infanticide were considered permissible...

  • La Llorona
    La Llorona
    La Llorona is a widespread legend in Mexico, Puerto Rico and Central America. Although several variations exist, the basic story tells of a beautiful woman by the name of Maria killing her children by drowning them, in order to be with the man that she loved. When the man rejects her, she kills...

  • Ode to Billy Joe (film)
    Ode to Billy Joe (film)
    Ode to Billy Joe is a 1976 film with a screenplay by Herman Raucher, inspired by the 1967 hit song by Bobbie Gentry, titled "Ode to Billie Joe" ....

  • Westminster, Maryland
    Westminster, Maryland
    Westminster is a city in northern Maryland, United States. It is the seat of Carroll County. The city's population was 18,590 at the 2010 census. Westminster is an outlying community within the Baltimore-Towson, MD MSA, which is part of a greater Washington-Baltimore-Northern Virginia, DC-MD-VA-WV...

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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