Chestnut Ridge, 'The Twilight Zone of Pennsylvania,' is the setting for strangeness - pennlive.com
By: pennlive
For evil genius who was unable to read my link.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Eric Altman, paranormal and cryptozoology investigator, discusses the "Mysterious Chestnut Ridge" at the 2022 Albatwitch Festival in Columbia. (Marcus Schneck | mschneck@pennlive.com)
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- Marcus Schneck | mschneck@pennlive.com
It's known as "The Twilight Zone of Pennsylvania" or "The Disneyland of the Paranormal." Sometimes it's simply "The Mysterious Chestnut Ridge."
It's the westernmost ridge of the Alleghenies, rising in southern Indiana County and continuing to the south-southwest for approximately 75 miles, stretching Westmoreland and Fayette counties and on into West Virginia. It gradually fades into a series of hills about 5 miles southeast of Morgantown, W.Va.
Eric Altman, a 42-veteran investigator of Bigfoot and other paranormal phenomena, said it’s been the setting for strange lights, strange creatures, hauntings and just about every other form of strangeness.
If you’ve heard about anything in the world of the paranormal, something remarkably similar most likely has been reported by someone on the Chestnut Ridge.
“UFO sightings happen on a weekly basis,” said Altman. “Bigfoot, dogman, thunderbird, big black cats, alien cats, strange anomalous ghost lights, orbs, mini-orbs, large triangular craft, cigar-shaped, disc-shaped, Christmas decoration-shaped craft.”
He noted, “Things like this happen on the ridge.”
Chestnut Ridge includes Kecksburg , home to the Dec. 9, 1965, UFO incident in which something from the sky crashed into woods near the tiny village 30 miles southeast of Pittsburgh after a fireball had been reported from across the eastern U.S. and Canada.
But less famous UFO sightings were reported back in the 1950s and 1940s, something “flying low just over the treetops, just over the villages,” noted Altman.
Thunderbirds, “large, black birds with wingspans of 8 to 20 feet,” sometimes described as pterodactyl-like. Reports of a dragon flying over the region surfaced in 2016.
The first Bigfoot report came off the ridge in 1931. Additional reports have continued to the present.
A pair of emergency medical service personnel reported seeing one cross a road at Indian Head, Fayette County, at 12:30 p.m. May 20, 2021. It crossed the 24-foot-wide, two-lane road in three strides and disappeared up an embankment, leaving behind a “horrible smell of dead, rotting animal,” according to Altman. He investigated the next day and found a set of impressions in the grass leading up the bank.
Nearly a year later, at 10 p.m. on May 13, 2022, a similar sighting of a road crossing about 3 miles from the 2021 report was reported.
“A large canine carrying a dead animal in its mouth” was reported at Laurel Summit in fall 2019. Large, black, mountain lion-like felines were reported numerous times in the spring and summer of 2020.
In addition, noted Altman, “we’ve got dozens and dozens of haunted locations, including Jumonville Glen, the southwestern Pennsylvania site where colonial Virginian soldiers under the command of Lt. Col. George Washington and French soldiers exchanged the first shots of the French and Indian War on May 28, 1754.” He said sounds of musket fire and battle and sightings of ghostly solders have been reported.
“Countless, countless haunted locations riddle the ridge,” he said.
Altman asked, “Is the Chestnut Ridge a portal or doorway to the unknown? Is it just urban legends and campfire tales? Is it something about the geology? Will the mystery ever be solved?”
The same questions have occurred to another long-time Chestnut Ridge paranormal investigator and friend and colleague of Altman, Stan Gordon, author of “ Creepy Cryptids and Strange UFO Encounters of Pennsylvania. Bigfoot, Thunderbirds, Mysteries of the Chestnut Ridge and More. Casebook Four .”
“Historically, Fayette County in southwest Pennsylvania is one of the most active areas in the state for ongoing mysterious encounters. This is especially true of locations that border or take place on the Chestnut Ridge,” noted Gordon, who has recorded and investigated hundreds of reports of the unexplained on and near Chestnut Ridge.
Pennsylvania’s most widely known UFO incident – the Kecksburg crash – and one that Gordon has investigated for more than four decades lies within the zone of influence of Chestnut Ridge.
Both Altman and Gordon were featured in the paranormal filmmaker Seth Breedlove’s 2017 Sci-Fi documentary, “ Invasion on Chestnut Ridge .”
Breedlove, who investigated many of the reports from the ridge, described his film as “delving into one of the most intriguing, and unusual areas this side of the Bermuda Triangle. The film will tell the tale of the Kecksburg UFO crash, the Uniontown Bigfoot/UFO sightings, encounters with a large, prehistoric bird in Keystone State Park and much more. ‘Invasion on Chestnut Ridge’ will be the first feature film to document this hotbed of paranormal activity.”
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I grew on the border of the Chestnut Ridge Region. Both UFOs I saw were near the region
people that have been abducted, brain scanned, and probed are required to wear red ball caps now...
maga = my ass got alienated
funny...I was never abducted. I don't think they like me
lucky for you. no abduction = no probe.
Anyone who has ever had a colonoscopy has been "probed"
if I'm asleep, it didn't happen...
LMAO
Interesting read. I think I want to do more research on that area sometime soon, as all those phenomenon raises questions no one seems to have answers to. I'm thinking maybe ethaline gas?
I think it might be a portal to another dimension
well go there then and find some people to vote up this article...
That would be singularly novel. There was some 'profit' on TikTok saying 4 teenagers would find a portal to another dimension this year. He's never been correct on anything he's predicted before, but maybe he's correct here.
Hmmmm, sounds intriguing or crazy depending on your point of view.
I think that gitchi sabe might live there.
Is that the Indian word for Big Foot?
Anishinaabe for The Big People -
Not exactly he is a huge creature that lives deep in the forest (like big foot) but in our mythology, he is the teacher of honesty.