Austin’s Trip with Larry
His chilling experience with the “Lady in White”
Over the years, my close friend Austin and I have gone to many “haunted” or mysterious places. I enjoy visiting locations surrounded by folklore, as they have always fascinated me. During our late teens and young adult years, we often found ourselves driving up to Wopsononock late at night, looking for the Lady in White at a very sharp turn known as “Devil’s Elbow.” More often than not, we didn’t see anything and would eventually make our way to the Wopsononock overlook. Many of our nights were spent parked in the pull-off. He and I mostly would just talk about our daily lives and plans for the future. I cherish those moments. Even when the occasional cop was called because it was a place where rebellious teens frequently went to do things that were not family-friendly or as Dom put it “wrestling” with each other minus clothing, we still enjoyed ourselves.
We would often pick up friends to tell ghost stories and talk about the hotel that once stood at the top of the mountain, called the “Wopsononock Hotel.” It only stood for 12 or 13 years before it burned down due to a wildfire. On one of those occasions, our friend Dom tagged along with us. It was much like the other trips. Unsuccessful in finding the “Lady in White,” we set out for the overlook. Dom hung out of the sunroof and goofed off as usual. He did that quite often when I drove. I picked him up and drove him back and forth between school and work. He worked with me at the Hut because I got him a job there. Not to get off topic, but one day, while goofing around, he and Kaleb decided to strip down to their underwear in the back of my car and moon people as we left school. Dom and I share many memories that he wont forget, like that night up at Wopsy, or the time he called me in June of 2019 needing a ride home from work. I was out drinking and carrying on, but I still went to pick him up. On the way to his house, I hit a raccoon and had to pull over because I had a mental breakdown. Dom had to crouch down on Reservoir Road at 9 PM beside a dead raccoon and a hysterical me to calm me down.
That night was very eerie. I get chills just thinking about it. We sat up at the overlook for about an hour in my 2009 Subaru Legacy GT. The three of us talked and carried on. A strange fog descended upon us, and we began to scare ourselves as we talked about ghosts and the unconfirmed but rumored Native American people who scalped others at the top of Wopsy and Indian Peak in Claysburg.
It was around 11:30 PM, and we decided that we would leave and drive down past Penn State Altoona to head to Sheetz. Austin was on edge and felt very uncomfortable. He has always said he has psychic abilities and that the spiritual world seems to attack him; he struggles when we go to places that have the “presence” of spirits.
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As I started my car and turned around to head in the opposite direction, my car shut off, and my 6-disc CD player/radio went crazy. It was spitting CDs out at record speed and changing stations in a very disturbed/evil way. We were all very disturbed. Austin jumped out of my car and was planning to walk down the eerie mountain. Dom quit acting like a fool, and I was just trying to get myself back to reality after what we had just witnessed.
My car wouldn’t start, and we were on Lookout Road. Dom and I said that we would probably need to push my car out to the main road and call a tow truck. Austin stood outside of my car and refused to get back in. Dom and he began to push my car. They pushed it about 25 feet, and I had them stop so I could try to start it again. It started, and Dom got in the front seat, but Austin refused. He was dead set on walking down the mountain and getting picked up by someone else. He walked about 75 feet or so and decided he would get in if Dom moved to the back seat. So Dom moved, and Austin sat up front in the passenger seat. Austin was as white as a bed sheet and sat in complete silence for the entire ride down the mountain. I kept looking over, and he was just staring into the rear-view mirror with a terrified look in his eyes.
After we made it to Sheetz, Austin finally pulled himself together. He explained that a woman in a white “wedding-looking” dress was in the back seat of my car and that she rode with us part of the way down the mountain. I, of course, didn’t believe him because I had looked into my rearview mirror and didn’t see anything other than the ominous fog and part of Dom’s body. But he was 100% sure that she was in my car. Austin vowed he would never go back up with me and he hasn't.
Many stories point to the white lady and her origins and one will never know her exact story.
We know that she haunts Devil’s Elbow, a legend often linked to the real-life 1926 fatal car crash of Margaret Gray. Local tales describe her variously as a fleeing bride searching the dark ravine for her decapitated husband, a grief-stricken mother who took her own life while hunting for a lost baby, or a newlywed killed in a carriage wreck. Over the years, witnesses have spotted a sorrowful figure in a soaked white dress holding a lantern in the fog, or a shivering hitchhiker who vanishes from the backseat as cars round the sharp bend. Even lovers parked near the overlook have reported terrifying sounds of something clawing the roofs of their cars.
