Ghosts across Kentucky

12. The Vanishing Hitchhiker

Chap-rer 12 TheVanishing Hitchhiker Mygrandmother never did saywhat she'd consider right-down lies. They're either stories that she's heard or things that actually happened to her, I'm just not sure. This story is one that her uncle had told her that happened back in the late 1800s. And there'd been some talk of haunted woods. The woods are still there. They're along Kino Road in Barren County. What happened was that, even years before my grandmother's uncle had lived in this area, a young doctor and his wife had moved there. The doctor caught her with another man, so the doctor took her out one night and chopped her head off And there were stories told about people going through these woods and they would hear a bunch of noises, like a bunch ofhorses coming through. Well, they'd get off the road out ofthe way, but nothing but a gust ofwind would come through. It so happened that one night my grandmother's uncle was going through these woods to somebody else's house. He heard this noise that sounded like a bunch ofhorses running by. And so he pulled his horse and buggy offthe road. Well, nothing but a gust ofwind went by. He got ready to start the horse up again, but the horse wouldn't go. He tried and tried but the horse just wouldn't budge. All ofa sudden he heard this lady's voice beside him say, "Can I have a ride?" He turned around, and there was this young lady standing on the other side of the carriage. He responded, "Sure, hop in." The Vanishing Hitchhiker 211 So the young woman hopped in, and the horse started up by itself. They were just traveling along, and grandmother's uncle asked her, "Where do you want to go?" She said, "Well, when I get to the place I want to go, I'll hop out." He said, "Well, I'll have to know where you're going so I can stop when I get there." And she said, "Don't worry about it." So they went on and on, and he started to think there was something odd and strange about this woman, because she just seemed weird and eerie. Finally, he decided to try to strike up a conversation with her, but when he turned toward her she had her head sitting in her lap. She was just sitting there with her head in her lap. As they approached this old graveyard my grandmother's uncle was just scared spitless, didn't know what to do. When they got to the graveyard, the horse just stopped by itself; just as if it knew what to do. The lady got out of the carriage, thanked my great uncle, then walked into the graveyard and disappeared. Then the horse just took off running! Even that horse was scared. 2. "GhoST Rides Horse behind Rider" Back in 1955, I was riding horseback in the dark, up through a holler here in Hardin County. I was going home after being at a friend's house for a visit. I guess it was about 11:00 p.m. As I was passing between two cliffs, something pounced on the back of my horse. I turned around to look see what it was, but nothing was there. I got scared, so I kicked the horse into a fast gallop. As the horse was running down the road, I suddenly felt two arms wrapped around me, and some hands gripping my chest. I could feel the pressure of each finger as it made an indention into my chest. I looked around again when the moon was shining, but could still not see anything there on the horse with me. When I finally reached my house and got off the horse, this thingthis hitchhiker-also got off, because the pressure was no longer there. I was very scared but never knew what that thing was that hitchhiked up behind me on my horse. 3. "The Girl \%0 Keeps Vanishing" We have a little restaurant in town that all the teenagers refer to as the Greasy Spoon, or Ptomaine Palace. But a long time ago, it was referred to 212 Ghosts across Kentucky as the Sturgis Cafe. We get a lot oftraveling salesmen in here. My dad and I were up there...