According to this creepy tale, “Cropsey” lurked beneath the abandoned Willowbrook State School for children. In some versions of the tale, Cropsey was an ax murderer; in others, he was a monstrous boogeyman. In both, he was a murderous creeper hunting for lost children. And, sadly, he was based on a real murderous creeper. His…
The story of the Alice Killings is one of Japan’s most famous urban legends, as well as one of its newest. The legend revolves around a series of killings that supposedly occurred between 1999 and 2005. The victims had no relationship to one another, and the killings seemed unrelated in every way, but they shared a haunting…
The legend of the Pink Lady ghost – a crying 17-year-old woman wearing a pink gown haunting the old Yorba Cemetery – is well known far beyond the county. Her terrible anguish is over an untimely death from a buggy accident after her prom in 1910, or so the legend goes. Many others believe her…
Is Black Star Canyon the site of an Indian massacre by Spanish conquistadors, as a local legend suggests, or a skirmish between fur trappers and natives in 1831? Other than the ghost stories, little is known about Black Star Canyon except that it was part of a mining operation in the late 1800s. Now many…
Name: Robert Jeffrey (“Jeff”) Pelley Date of Birth: December 10, 1971 Claim to Infamy: On Sunday morning, April 30, 1989, four members of his family were found shot to death in their home. More than seventeen years later, Jeff Pelley was found guilty of their murders. His only known motive was that he wanted to…
Name: Michael Dean Overstreet Known Aliases: (none) Date of Birth: November 18, 1966 Claim to Infamy: On September 7, 1997, Overstreet abducted, raped, and murdered 18-yr-old college student Kelly Eckart. Her partially-nude body was found four days later in a ravine at Camp Atterbury. Indiana Connection: A native of Boggstown, Kelly had just finished her…
Name: Herbert Richard “Herb” Baumeister Known Aliases: Brian Smart, Brian Stats Date of Birth: April 7, 1947 Claim to Infamy: Eleven bodies were found on Baumeister’s estate. He also suspected of being the I-70 Strangler. Indiana Connection: Herb was born and raised in Indiana, where he continued to live and hunt humans until shortly before…
April 28, 1978 – Divorced mother Terry Lee Chasteen was taking her three small children – Misty (5), Stephen (4), and Mark (2) – to the babysitter when another driver motioned for her to pull over. Terry pulled to the side of I-465, and the man pulled in behind her, explaining something was wrong with…
Sightings of a phantom “lady wearing blue” were reported decades ago at the El Toro Memorial Park Cemetery and at Black Star Canyon. But this legend is most linked to the site of the famous Irvine Ranch House, where Kathryn Helena Irvine, the daughter of James Irvine II, died of complications from childbirth at a…
This historical landmark has an unusual history: part aged juzgado (court and jail); part 200-year-old-plus home. Today it is a restaurant, where the jail cell is now a wine cellar and a private dining area, and another ghostly legend stalks. This legend has no name, just a headless monk sometimes carrying an ax, walking by…
