Local Folklore and Legends

In downtown Portland (OR), there is a certain area in which you can access underground tunnels that were apparently "shang-hai tunnels", used to kidnap people for conscription on ships. There are tours given there at night now, and there are accounts of bloodstains appearing on the stone walls and floor, and of "presences" being felt by those on the tour. I haven't been myself, but I'd like to visit them one day.

Here in Newfoundland, Canada, May 24th is celebrated just as much as any other holiday. Last year, my friends decided to take me camping at a place called Black Bank. I had only moved here from Nova Scotia a year and a half before, and knew nothing of this place. While we were there nothing out of the ordinary happened. I then posted some pictures on my website of the camping trip and received a frantic email from one of the friends I went with to look at a certain picture. I couldn't see anything, so I started asking everyone else to look at that picture and they all said, wow..that's really freaky...hmmmm..at that point I didn't understand why everyone else could see something and I couldn't. So then one friend said, well maybe if you turn the brightness up on your computer screen, you could see it. So I followed the suggestion and there in the background of this picture was a clouded looking face. We all tried to say things that it could be, but with each suggestion, there was always the reason why it couldn't be that. So then I started asking the locals for their opinions. Turns out that a man was buried there (god rest his soul) and doesn't like people on his property. My step uncle also told me that one night he walked his dog down near the actual grave site on the road, and his dog went out of control barking and growling. The dog then broke off of the chain and started to literally fight with something that was not seen by human eye. Many other stories have been told to me since, but that one definitely tops them all.

We have an old hotel here . The old Hotel Saskatchewan. I was reading some story there about the Royal Suite in that hotel.Some poor housekeeper was cleaning the Royal Suite when a curio cabinet door came open and a vase sailed across the room and crashed into her. There are ghosts in that old hotel, they say. Poor housekeeper. I dont know what she did.

i remember one from when i was little the story in my area "The faceless Lady of Waialae" Down the road from where i lived used to be Old Waialae Drive In. They would say they would see a woman in the ladies room with her hair flipped over brushing the back of her hair. she wore a nice green dress and had long black hair. no one would really pay any attention to it so the girls would go about using the bathroom. eventually the woman would finish brushing her hair and then she would flip her hair over to reveal she had no eyes, no mouth, and no nose. The reason people say this spirit haunted this place was because it was formally a site of a graveyard. in fact 1/2 of the grave yard site was still in tack. After the Drive In was torn down, people would spot a woman in a long green dress and long hair sitting at the bus stop. always with her back towards you. some have even had conversations with her. and of course when she turned around she would have no face.

One of the biggest legends here is about Alfred Packer. I can't remember the year but it was back when they still had covered wagons and people were going west to California. The group left a little late in the season, got cuaght by a terrible snow storm, and there was cannibalism, yum. At University of Colorado in Boulder, there was and Alfred Packer Grill. They served cafeteria style with a sandwich deli on the side. I don't know if olitical correctness has changed that situation, but it was my favortie place to eat when I was up there. That name just cried out for a feeding frenzy. LOL!

One of the biggest legends here in Tennessee, has historical , and fanatical values. It has spawned many camp-fire, scare the children type stories. It started in 1817 with a well to-do farmers family In Adams Tennessee, the Bell's. There was a poltergeist that terrorized the family, concentrating its efforts on the young daughter Betsy. Actual accounts from priests, pastors and clergymen from all over the state and surrounding states came to investigate. Its even written that Andrew Jackson himself visited the the Bell family. It's a phenomenal story. Based in true accounts and many many folk stories. If you are interested you will find it listed under The Bell Witch.

There is one around here (coastal South Carolina) about a girl named Alice. She was engaged to a soldier during the Civil War and he was killed. It's said that if you walk backwards 3 times around her grave, she'll take your ring off your finger. She is buried in the same cemetery as my best friend and Alice's grave site doesn't have any grass around it only dirt where people have walked backwards. It's eerie!

Im in Brazil and the indians here have a huge mix of folkloric tales, with each tribe contributing a different mythology and tale to the mix.

This one is in Denver North Carolina. Back when I was in highschool (mid to late 80's) it was a popular hang out. A girl was kidnapped from a store she worked at. Raped, killed and dumped in a creek. (that part was a true story) The creek was right below a graveyard. There was a little bridge over the creek. This was on a side dirt road with very little traffic. The story went that you had to park on the bridge. If you parked there a while, and then your car wouldn't start, then she was there. I never saw anything but I know people who swore they saw her. I did have fun one night. I took a girl down there. I had a straight drive truck. I tried to start it to leave, but didn't push the clutch in. When she saw the key turning but no motor coming on, she freaked out bad. She jumped out and ran up the road lol. She wasn't my gf or anything just a girl I knew. Her brothers were in the back of the truck laughing their butts off. The kids going down there got so bad they took the bridge out and now it just has a culvert to drive over.

I grew up in a small town in Scotland called Linwood and there was an abandoned old church there. The story went that a woman who was married to the original minister of the church had an accident during the building of it and her dying words were that if the church was ever destroyed she would come back and haunt the entire town. I was about 11 years old when they tore it down, and I remember laying in bed that night, in the fetal position, unable to sllep for fear of the ghost coming to my house....LOL

I am not sure if this is considered folklore or not but here goes. When my husband was much younger, he and a friend were drinking in a graveyard. He swore that he saw a Civil War soldier come riding towards their car on a horse. I think he left tracks getting out of there and to this day will not go into a graveyard after dark. He later found out that it was said that others had seen the Civil War hero riding on his horse in that graveyard and they weren't inebriated. No one had to convince him of this.

here there's an old folklore about maria makiling who was a fairy that likes to be with people. when people need something they go to her and ask for help but the people seem to abuse her so ahe got angry and shut the people out of her and never go down from the mountains to be with people again.

i just remembered that in my mother's province, there is said to be a ghost that drowns people when they swim to the middle part of the river. when my family and my cousin visited the province in Samar, we went swimming to the same river. my cousin doesn't know how to swim. And she hung into my sister's body as they swam into the middle area of the river. when they reached the middle, my sister was being pulled down and almost couldn't breathe and my cousin was in panic. my dad saved them from drowning. my sister said that there was like a whirling of water going on in the middle part. is it just an undercurrent, or part of the old people's beliefs?

we have lots of folklore and legends here in the Philippines, legends of how men came to be, of ancient warriors and enchantments one legend states of how the ilang-ilang got its fragrant flowers, the ilang-ilang is a tree with sweet smelling flowers here in the Philippines it was said that one stormy night, two butterflies were wet and ask to pass the storm under the leaves of the mango tree, but the mango tree refused, so did the dapdap the acacia offered shade but its leaves folds during the rain, finally the ilang-ilang who once didnt have flowers offered shade and so as a reward for its good deed, the ilang-ilang was granted a sweet smelling flower

We live a short distance from Salem, MA and have frequented Laurie Cabot's magic shop,hoping to say hey to her, but she's never been there.Otherwise Salem is just a generally spooky kind of place.There's also a pipe organ playing ghost at Mt Holyoke college in South Hadley I havent caught up with yet.Maybe I'll go west a little and start looking for the headless horseman next?

There is this story about an old man that was run over by a speeding car onthe highway.Apparently to this day his ghost still runs along side speeding cars causes them to have accidents.

I live in Bridgewater, Ma. USA My town is one of the many towns in the Bridgewater Triangle.. Here is some info about it. THE BRIDGEWATER TRIANGLE: Massachusetts' paranormal "hot spot" Low-flying UFOs, Bigfoot creatures, cattle mutilations, Indian curses and ghostly apparitions. These are just a sampling of the wide range of paranormal phenomena that are constantly occurring in the area of Massachusetts known as the Bridgewater Triangle. First described by researcher Loren Coleman in the 1970s, the Triangle is an area of about 200 square miles that includes the towns of Abington, Rehoboth and Freetown at the angles of the triangle, and Bridgewater, West Bridgewater, North Middleboro, Segreganset, Dighton, North Dighton, Berkley, Myricks, Raynham, East Taunton, and Taunton inside the triangle. Unexplained phenomena are also common in the towns just outside this region. The center of this mysterious area is the Hockomock Swamp. Its name comes from the Native Americans, who called it "Devil's swamp" or "Place where spirits dwell". At 5,000 acres, this swamp is one of the largest of its kind in the entire northeastern U.S. Some parts are considerably remote and it is not difficult to imagine how some of the strange things reported there could continue to elude detection through the years. Many residents of local towns report having strange feelings about the swamp, and there is a strong local superstition that evil paranormal or satanic activity goes on there. My brother and his friends camp in the Hockomock Swamp once a year to investigate.

I will tell my own experience.Iam from a village here in south india,5 years back i was in to pharma business where i use to do a taxi tour & sell the items.One day i was sleeping in my relatives place which is a remote place house was in a forest,that night i had a horror dream in wich a ghost with a horrifieng face was trieng to press my neck,with a difficulty i escaped & suddenly i got up & then relaxed again as it was a dream.Next day i started my work left the place in the morning,it was 11.30 in the night when i compleated my work & going back to my home which was 100kms away when my taxi was crossing a forest suddenly a man well dressed asked for a lift to a near by place i picked him & we were travelling when nearing to the mans place say about 5kms behind he asked me to drop i asked him why he said i dont want to harm you iam the same man who was in your dreams yesterday,i was shoked & immidiately asked driver to stop the car i just dropped & drove the car home non stop.from that experience now i never stop the car while travelling in the night.This is my experience,please ignore any english misstakes.

This is supposed to be a true story although I never witnessed it myself. Its the story of the Red Light. It is located in a swampy area in Northwest Oklahoma, north of Waynoka near the Cimarron river. The story goes; on certain nights near a collapsed bridge where the ranchers dispose of cattle carcasses, you can see a red light that moves around on its own, and it is even been told that the light moved toward a car and removed the paint. Many believe it to be swamp gas and may be, but it doesn't explain the red color of the object. I have been to the area and it is very spooky but I've never seen it.

i havent really gotten into this stuff but it sounds very interested i would like to see what people say also.