Beyond The Bridgewater Triangle

Curse of the Bridgewater Triangle?

One of the most popular theories on why the Bridgewater Triangle powerhouses so much paranormal activity is that Chief Metacom, aka "King Philip," cursed the land that the war that would be named after him was fought on. Specifically, the area that stretches from Narragansett Bay to Weymouth, Massachusetts.

The concept of a native cursing land is a highly unlikely one, according to members of the Wampanoag tribe. To the Wampanoag, land and the tribe were ONE. To curse one would certainly curse the other.

After years of delving into research about both the war and the Bridgewater Triangle, as well as the history of the ancient civilization that survived for thousands of years before the white man came to America, I have come to the personal conclusion that the curse of King Philip legend came from the imagination of poet John Greenleaf Whittier in his 1831 classic, "Legends of New England." Specifically, from this passage on from a poem entitled, "Metacom."

Yet, Brother, from this awful hour The dying curse of Metacom Shall linger with abiding power Upon the spoilers of my home. The fearful veil of things to come, By Kitchtan's hand is lifted from The shadows of the embryo years; And I can see more clearly through Than ever visioned Powwah did, For all the future comes unbid Yet welcome to my tranced view, As battle-yell to warrior-ears! From stream and lake and hunting-hill, Our tribes may vanish like a dream, And even my dark curse may seem Like idle winds when Heaven is still—No bodeful harbinger of ill, But, fiercer than the downright thunder, When yawns the mountain-rock asunder, And riven pine and knotted oak Are reeling to the fearful stroke, That curse shall work its master's will! The bed of yon blue mountain stream shall pour a darker tide than rain—The sea shall catch its blood-red stain, And broadly on its banks shall gleam The steel of those who should be brothers Yea—those whom one fond parent nursed Shall meet in strife, like fiends accursed—And trample down the once loved form, While yet with breathing passion warm, As fiercely as they would another's!"

Here is the poem in it's entirety:

Metacom

By

John Greenleaf Whittier

[Metacom, or Philip, the chief of the Wampanoags, was the most powerful and sagacious Sachem who ever made war upon the English. He had all the qualities of a high statesman—a noble monarch, and a courageous warrior. The rude majesty of untamed and unchastened nature was never more boldly developed than in the character of Metacom. He had the elements of a giant mind—the unformed chaos of a world of intellect. He perilled his all in one fast enterprise—in one mighty effort to shake off the White Vampyre which was draining the life-blood of his people; and had his enemies been any other than the stern settlers of New-England, they must assuredly have fallen. The War of King Philip forms a dark page in the history of New-England.—It is red with blood,—with the blood of the strong man and the meek and beseeching woman, and the fair-haired child, and the cradled infant.]

RED as the banner which enshrouds The warrior-dead, when strife is done,A broken mass of crimson clouds Hung over the departed sun. The shadow of the western hill Crept swiftly down, and darkly still, As if a sullen wave of night Were rushing on the pale twilight—The forest-openings grew more dim, As glimpses of the arching blue And waking stars came softly through The rifts of many a giant limb. Above the wet and tangled swamp White vapors gathered thick and damp, And through their cloudy-curtaining Flapped many a brown and dusky wing—Pinions that fan the moonless dun, But fold them at the rising sun!

Beneath the closing veil of night, And leafy bough and curling fog, With his few warriors ranged in sight—Scarred relics of his latest fight—Rested the fiery Wampanoag. He leaned upon his loaded gun, Warm with its recent work of death, And, save the struggling of his breath That, slow and hard, and long-suppressed,Shook the damp folds around his breast. An eye, that was unused to scan The sterner moods of that dark man. Had deemed his tall and silent form, With hidden passion fierce and warm, With that fixed eye, as still and dark As clouds which veil their lightning spark—That of some forest-champion, Whom sudden death had passed upon—A giant frozen into stone! Son of the throned Sachem!—Thou, The sternest of the forest kings,—Shall the scorned pale-one trample now, Unambushed on thy mountain's brow, Yea, drive his vile and hated plough Among thy nation's holy things, Crushing the warrior-skeleton In scorn beneath his armed heel, And not a hand be left to deal A kindred vengeance fiercely back, And cross in blood the Spoiler's track!

He started,—for a sudden shot came booming through the forest-trees—The thunder of the fierce Yengeese: It passed away, and injured not; But, to the Sachem's brow it brought The token of his lion thought. He stood erect—his dark eye burned, As if to meteor-brightness turned; And o'er his forehead passed the frown Of an archangel stricken down, Ruined and lost, yet chainless still—Weakened of power but strong of will! It passed—a sudden tremor came Like ague o'er his giant frame,—It was not terror—he had stood For hours, with death in grim attendance, When moccasins grew stiff with blood, And through the clearing's midnight flame, Dark, as a storm, the Pequod came, His red, right arm their strong dependence—When thrilling through the forest gloom The onset-cry of "Metacom!" Rang on the red and smoky air!—No—it was agony which passed Upon his soul—the strong man's last And fearful struggle with despair.

He turned him to his trustiest one—The old and war-tried Annawon—"Brother!"—The favored warrior stood In hushed and listening attitude—"This night the Vision-Spirit hath Unrolled the scroll of fate before me; And ere the sunrise cometh, Death Will wave his dusky pinion o'er me! Nay, start not—well I know thy faith—Thy weapon now may keep its sheath; But, when the bodeful morning breaks, And the green forest widely wakes, Unto the roar of Yengeese thunder, Then trusted brother, be it thine To burst upon the foeman's line, And rend his serried strength asunder. Perchance thyself and yet a few Of faithful ones may struggle through, And, rallying on the wooded plain, Strike deep for vengeance once again, And offer up in Yengeese blood An offering to the Indian's God."
Another shot—a sharp, quick yell—And then the stifled groan of pain, Told that another red man fell,—And blazed a sudden light again Across that kingly brow and eye, Like lightning on a clouded sky,—And a low growl, like that which thrills The hunter of the Eastern hills, Burst through clenched teeth and rigid lip—And, when the Monarch spoke again His deep voice shook beneath its rein, As wrath and grief held fellowship.
"Brother! methought when as but now I pondered on my nation's wrong, With sadness on his shadowy brow My father's spirit passed along! He pointed to the far south-west,
Where sunset's gold was growing dim, And seemed to beckon me to him, And to the forests of the blest!—My father loved the Yengeese, when They were but children, shelterless,For his great spirit at distress Melted to woman's tenderness—Nor was it given him to know That, children whom he cherished then, Would rise at length, like armed men, To work his people's overthrow. Yet thus it is;—the God, before Whose awful shrine the pale ones bow, Hath frowned upon, and given o'er The red man to the stranger now!—A few more moons—and there will beNo gathering to the council tree—The scorched earth—the blackened log—The naked bones of warriors slain, Be the sole relics which remain Of the once mighty Wampanoag! The forests of our hunting-land, With all their old and solemn green, Will bow before the Spoiler's axe—The plough displace the hunter's tracks,The morning star sat dimly on The lighted eastern horizon—The deadly glare of levelled gun Came streaking through the twilight haze And naked to its reddest blaze, A hundred warriors sprang in view—One dark red arm was tossed on high—One giant shout came hoarsely through The clangour and the charging cry, Just as across the scattering gloom, Red as the naked hand of Doom, The Yengeese volley hurtled by—The arm—the voice of Metacom!—One piercing shriek—one vengeful yell, Sent like an arrow to the sky, Told when the hunter-monarch fell!

And the tall Yengeese altar stand Where the Great Spirit's shrine hath been

Yet, brother, from this awful hour The dying curse of Metacom Shall linger with abiding power Upon the spoilers of my home. The fearful veil of things to come, By Kitchtan's hand is lifted from The shadows of the embryo years; And I can see more clearly through Than ever visioned Powwah did, For all the future comes unbid Yet welcome to my tranced view, As battle-yell to warrior-ears! From stream and lake and hunting-hill, Our tribes may vanish like a dream, And even my dark curse may seem Like idle winds when Heaven is still—No bodeful harbinger of ill, But, fiercer than the downright thunder, When yawns the mountain-rock asunder, And riven pine and knotted oak Are reeling to the fearful stroke, That curse shall work its master's will! The bed of yon blue mountain stream shall pour a darker tide than rain—The sea shall catch its blood-red stain, And broadly on its banks shall gleam The steel of those who should be brothers Yea—those whom one fond parent nursed Shall meet in strife, like fiends accursed—And trample down the once loved form, While yet with breathing passion warm, As fiercely as they would another's!"

Just n time for Halloween in 1903, newspapers were calling the mystery of ghostly hand print that appeared on a window pane in Fall River, Massachusetts a "a striking Spiritualistic manifestation." Hundreds flocked to the home of one Thomas Cross--an "enthusiastic believer in cult" and known Spiritualist--to inspect the mysterious hand print. The print was believed to have been left by the late Mrs. Cross, also an active Spiritualist. One of the Cross' daughters refused to believe in the "other side" and it was to her that hand print first appeared. It was theorized that the ghost of Mrs. Cross was making one final attempt to convince her daughter that there was indeed an afterlife. The Cross family claimed that the hand print could not be removed from the glass. Even after repeated efforts, the stubborn hand print could not be erased. Even acid had been applied to the window in a final attempt after using conventional window-washing methods. Acid did not even prove strong enough to remove the ghostly print. The Cross family claimed that any effort used to remove the hand print would only result in the hand print standing out more prominently. A local newspaper reported on October 29, 1903:

"On a pane of glass in a kitchen window can be plainly seen what appears to be the imprint of a woman's hand, the palm, the fingers and thumb, and even the lines of the palm being distinctly visible. All efforts to remove the imprint have failed...The fingers are spread wide apart, and the knuckles are large as though the hand had been used to hard work. The more enthusiastic among the believers in Spiritualism who have witnessed the phenomenon do not hesitate to say that they detect the mark on the third finger showing where the wedding ring was long worn.

Mrs. Cross died two months ago. She too was an ardent Spiritualist, but the children, of whom there are six...know little of the doctrine. The oldest, a girl of 19 years named Elliza, is skeptical of the faith of her parents, and Spiritualists interpret the appearances of the hand on the window glass as a sign to the doubting daughter from the mother.

The hand was discovered by the girl as she was washing the window, and repeated efforts have failed
to erase the imprint. Hot water and soaps, acids and muscular effort have so far served only to make the hand stand out more plainly.

"The merely curious who have visited the place have bent their energies to finding an explanation of the mystery and have even gone so far as to remove the window from its place to permit a more thorough examination. One after another have given up the puzzle.

Mr. Cross does not attach great importance to the matter, as he says he is accustomed to receiving still more wonderful communications from the departed."

SACHEM ROCK FARM: MONUMENTAL HISTORY, MURDER & WAR

Not only is Sachem Rock Farm--owned by the town of East Bridgewater and the site of the East Bridgewater Senior Center-- the precise spot where first inland Native American land sale in the United States was made, it is also the site of the of one of the nine homes in East Bridgewater to burned to the ground by King Philip’s warriors in King Philip's War. It’s no surprise the Latham farm was first to be attacked. With this house, it was personal. Robert Latham’s wife, Susanna was a Winslow--a name that was almost royalty in the colony. Susanna’s mother was the famous Mary Chilton, the first woman to step on American soil off of the Mayflower. Her father was John Winslow, the brother of the esteemed Governor Edward Winslow. But more importantly…her other uncle was General Josias Winslow of The Plymouth Colony Militia, the captor and suspected murderer of Alexander, King Philip’s elder brother.

Robert Latham was a well respected man, even serving as town constable at the time of the war. The fact that not ten years earlier, Latham and his wife Susanna were charged and found guilty of murder seemed to do little to effect the Latham’s social standing in the colony.

The Murder

In 1659, Robert and Susanna were charged with the murder of their servant, John Walker. In the book Plymouth Colony: Its History and People 1620-1691 it says of the crime: "On 31 January 1654/55 a coroner's jury was called to view the body of Latham's servant boy, John Walker." The jury found that the body of John Walker was blackish and blew, and the skine broken in divers places from the middle to the haire of his head, viz, all his backe with stripes given him by his master, Robert Latham, as Robert himselfe did testify; and also wee found a bruise of his left arme, and one of his left hipp, and one great bruise of his brest; and there was the knuckles of one hand and one of his fingers frozen, and alsoe both his heeles frozen, and one of the heeles the flesh was much broken, and alsoe one of his little toes frozen and very much perished, and one of his great toes frozen, and alsoe the side of his foot frozen; and alsoe, upon the reviewing the body, wee found three gaules like holes in the hames, which wee formerly, the body being frozen, thought they had been holes; and alsoe wee find that the said John was forced to carry a logg which was beyond his strength, which hee indeavoring to doe, the logg fell upon him, and hee, being downe, had a stripe or two, as Joseph Beedle doth testify; and wee find that it was some few daies before his death; and wee find, by the testimony of John Howland and John Adams, that heard Robert Latham say that hee gave John Walker som stripes that morning before his death; and alsoe wee find the flesh much broken of the knees of John Walker, and that he did want sufficient food and clothing and lodging, and that the said John did constantly wett his bedd and his cloathes, lying in them, and so suffered by it, his clothes being frozen about him; and that the said John was put forth in the extremity of cold, though thuse unabled by lamenes and sorenes to performe what was required; and therefore in respect of crewelty and hard usage he died.

The Land Sale

1661. Massasoit dies. The peaceful era between colonist and Indian was over. After his brother Alexander is allegedly poisoned by General Josiah Winslow in 1662, it is now perfectly clear to Massasoit’s son, Metacom (commonly known by his English name “Philip”) what the intentions of the people who had arrived upon the shores of a land that had already been inhabited for 10,000 years just 40 years before: They wanted it all and did not play by any rule understood by the Wampanoags.

The native name for Sachem Rock was Wonnocoote. Up until the turn of the 20th century, locals still referred to Sachem Rock Farm as “Cootah Hill.” In 1649 Massasoit met with reprentatives of Duxbury at Sachem Rock. It was on March 23, 1649, when Chief Massasoit unknowingly traded miles of fertile land enriched by the waters of The Matfield, Hockomock, and Town Rivers as well as West Meadow Brook for mere provisions for his tribe. Seven coats, nine hatchets, eight hoes, twenty knives, four moose skins and 10 yards of cotton is what the Wompanoags were paid for the territory of Bridgewater. The implications of a “land sale” was unfathomable to the Native American psyche at this time. The concept that land could be regarded as ‘ownable’ was unfamiliar one to the Wompanoags. It is no wonder that Sachem Rock, the very site of this monumental land sale has been witness to tragic events that date back to King Philip’s War in 1676.

On April 9, 1676, the Natives crept up Satucket Path to the Latham farm. Robert Latham’s house would be the first of nine houses to be destroyed by fire that day, the natives sparing only one dwelling…that of Nicholas Byram. Byram settled in East Bridgewater in 1662, and during that time it seems he broke the strict law of the colony not to sell cider or any other spirits to the red man. Breaking the law earned him one of the only surviving houses in the Bridgewater area after King Philip’s War.

Today, a stone marks the very spot Latham house stood before it was destroyed by arson.

This horror story that sounds like an episode from "Dexter" broke on Sunday December 28, 2014, when the remains of two women were discovered in a heavily wooded, highly remote area in Brockton, not far from Ames Nowell State Park.

Local papers reported that the women's remains were "stacked" atop one another, the top being the dismembered body of 20-year old Brockton woman, Ashley Mylett. The remains that lie beneath Mylett were identified as a 51-year old Linda Schufedt, living in nearby Quincy at the time of her disappearance last six months prior.

When a local man walking his dog in the woods not far from his house stumbled upon a pile of severed body parts, including a foot, a calf, and an arm, at first he though it was a dead animal.

BROCKTON – A 27-year-old Brockton man was walking through the woods behind his North Quincy Street home Sunday afternoon when he saw something out of place.“I was cutting a path so I can walk the dog and I go hunting out here,” said Peter, who asked that his last name be withheld because of the gruesomeness of the incident. “I saw something pink. I thought it was a dead animal because there’s a lot of poaching back here or maybe insulation because it was pink and lot of people dump trash back here.”What he saw when he looked closer shocked him. It was the dismembered body parts of a woman – a foot, a calf, part of an arm – that were cleanly cut and had appeared to have been put there recently.

Officials announced Monday that the gruesome discovery was the remains of two people that had been placed on top of one another. One set of remains had been there significantly longer than the other.Peter walked out into the woods with an Enterprise reporter and photographer Tuesday to where he made the discovery. He showed three photos on his cell phone he took Sunday of some of the body parts. The Enterprise obtained one of the photos and is withholding the image because of its graphic nature.He pointed to a wet part of the ground surrounded by briar patches, downed tree branches and a stone wall about 50 yards away from his backyard Tuesday morning.

“When I saw it, I didn’t want to stay around here that long because there was no rot to it. It was all chopped up, you could see the limbs, how nice and neat they were cut,” Peter said. “The guy that put it there put a fold-up chair on it and then put a bunch of wood on it so you can’t see it from the main path.”“All I know is I didn’t want to touch anything. I went in the house and told my sister and I dialed 911,” he said.

Police responded immediately to the scene and began the arduous task of careful excavation of the site, further revealing the skeletal remains of a second body directly underneath the severed body discovered by the man called "Peter" in the article cited.

Acting swiftly, investigators identified the newer remains as 20-year old Ashley Mylett--last seen by her mother around four weeks before--within days; and one week after the discovery of the older skeleton remains, forensic specialists were able to identify the body as belonging to 51-year year old Linda Schufedt, a woman with Brockton ties who had recently moved to nearby Quincy. Schufeldt disappeared last summer, sometime between late June and early July.

Ashley Mylett.

Linda Schufedt.

Even though almost thirty years separated these two woman, both shared a life of living on the outskirts of society and were prone to "disappearing acts," a common denominator the killer surely knew. Both women had a history of substance abuse, particularly heroine. Did these woman become so lost in their addiction that they turned to prostitution? Is that how he got them? Is he a drug dealer, or just someone who hangs around the sections of Brockton where people go to get high looking for people he knows will get into his car with him? Speculate is all we can do right now. I do know that the area where these poor women's bodies were dumped is a place of dark energy, occult worship and mystery with its strange rock walls and chambers. Raccoons and dogs have been found skinned and hung from trees. Another time, a deer was found skinned and dismembered, something Abington police even admit was "odd." Hiking that land with a friend last fall left me sick. I felt horrible, overwhelmingly evil energy there. I felt like like I couldn't breath...like my lungs were being crushed. Even though the area is archaeologically fascinating....I would never go back. I was horrified to learn of the murders and dumping of these women. And chilled to the bone when I looked at a map of where we hiked last fall and noticed how close we were the spot where these two innocent women who should still be alive today were so carelessly discarded. I wish evil didn't exist. But it does. And right now it could be wearing the mask of the nice guy next door who takes your trash barrels out for you every week. Scary times here in the Bridgewater Triangle.

“On still nights the evil glitter of fox fire or the demonic cackle of a barred owl sent chills up the spines of the early settlers. Hordes of crows rose each morning for the guts of the swamp to ravage farmers corn. And from time to time, young girls merrily picking blueberries along the fringes found themselves ‘drawn farther and farther along unfamiliar paths seduced by the increasing size of the berries until at last they were lost and claimed by the swamp forever."

Native Americans named the swamp “Hockomock” hundreds, perhaps thousands of years ago. Hockomock in the Algonquin word for “place where spirit’s dwell.” The Indians had tremendous respect and awe for the swamp and regarded it as a “magical” place. There being no swamps in England, the colonists had a different take on the swamp. They were terrified by it. The fear that Hockomock Swamp instilled in the colonists of the 1600s inspired the nicknames “The Devil’s Swamp” and “The Devil’s Bowl.”

Hockomock Swamp is known as the “heart of the triangle.” Many Bigfoot, Thunderbird and monster snake sightings and other creatures have been witnessed just outside of the swamp and many believe that these creatures live within it. Others consider these creatures “spirit entities” that seldom appear in our realm. People have reported seeing everything from a four-foot high panther with glowing red eyes to ghosts of Native American spirits. One of the local legends is of a turtle “as big as a Volkswagen beetle“. Hockomock Swamp, along with Freetown Forest was named one of the USA Today’s “Top Ten Great Haunts” in 2008. Freetown Forest is in Freetown, the southeastern apex of the triangle. It is place filled with negative--many even say evil--energy. The forest is most famous for its murders--especially those of committed by satanic cults. To this day satanic activity is taking place in the forest and it is not uncommon to see the “hooded people” practicing rituals there. Hockomock Swamp is also a place where satanic activity is said to occur and every once in awhile, you will come across a tree in the swamp with strange markings. Voodoo is also practiced in the swamp. The word “Hockomock” is Algonquin for “place where spirits dwell.” The colonists called it “Devil’s Swamp,” no doubt because they feared the unknown terrain of the New England swamps. These thick, seemingly unsurpassable wetlands filled with wolves ready to attack, quicksand, and the sounds of nocturnal animals screeching in the darkness had the colonists scared out of their minds. One of the first recorded order of business for Bridgewater in 1659 was to order wolf traps to place around the swamp. Legend has it that more than a few colonists who entered the swamp, became disorientated and never came out. Many people have reported getting lost in the swamp, even those who are familiar with the terrain. Just two years ago two seasoned hunters suddenly became disorientated and lost their way. The two men had a terrifying ordeal being lost in the once familiar swamp for hours before being found.　

Six Bridgewater Triangle towns spanning two counties--Plymouth and Bristol--get to lay claim to Hockomock Swamp: Easton, Raynham, Taunton, Bridgewater, Norton and West Bridgewater. Nearly 5,000 of its16,900 acres (nearly 27-square miles) are managed by the Hockomock Swamp Wildlife Management Area. At its heart, the swamp is a dense tangle of briar and trees, quicksand and mud, a vast no man’s land, with many parts—no doubt—having never been encroached upon by human feet. “Ice that forms through the winter months in some areas of the swamp is insulated and shaded from the warming, spring sun. Gradually, during early summer, it melts, and the resulting cooler temperatures offer refuge for sub-arctic plants and animals not indigenous to this area.” In sharp contrast, the past 50 years have seen major commercial development to the outer borders of Hockomock Swamp and swathes have been cut through the swamp to create highways such as Routes 24 and 495.

The Hock is host to animals not indigenous to southern Massachusetts, such as Cow Moose, black bears, Africal Sevrel and mountain lions. The tales of animals not indigenous to the area--yet have appeared here—are not told as loudly as the tales of animals not indigenous to this world,, for many believe that Hockomock Swamp is home base for a host of fortean creatures including giant pterodactyl-looking Thunderbirds, Bigfoot, anaconda-sized snakes, and giant monster black dogs.

Many people who have explored The Hock have reported abrupt feelings of terror and dread, coupled with the distinct feeling of being watched. Disorientation and losing track of time is another not so uncommon occurrence. Satanic cults, priests and priestesses of voodoo, and brothers and sisters of witchcraft are rumored to use parts of the swamp for ritualistic sacrifices and as places of worship. People who live on its fringes certainly have seen and heard it all, from strange human-like screams bellowing from the depths of the swamp, to reports poltergeist activity in their very homes. Some report the frequent appearance of “spooklights” lights hovering above the trees and larger, stranger lights coming from the area of the swamp.

This is what one Bridgewater Triangle resident had to say about growing up on the fringes of Hockomock Swamp: "The neighborhood kids often talked about feeling watched in the swamp, and hearing something bulling through the forest, knocking down trees. We'd also heard of people actually hearing loud, bloodcurdling screams. It wasn't until I was maybe ten or eleven that some friends and I experienced these things for ourselves...along with a whole slew of other phenomenon: disembodied voices, trees being "thrown" at us while deep in the woods, what looked like large human footprints in the corn fields, ghostly forms, strange lights, a strange squeaking sound that seemed to be coming from a plastic toy (a Native American head), that seemed to respond to questions and things we were saying), cult activity, you name it."

Others have reported experiences have the strange phenomenon of being out in the swamp in the middle of the afternoon, only to have it inexplicably turn into night. Here is one of those reports: "It happened a couple of time. I'd be by myself in the swamp near the Prospect Hill Extension. Sundown during deer season is usually between 5 and 6 o'clock. I went to the deer stand and in the swamp it seemed to get dark like an hour before it should have. I'd walk back to the street and it would still be light out." He added: "I lived in that area for over 17 years. I grew up in the swamp exploring it every day. But I always got this weird feeling that I was being watched when I would be coming back from the deer stands after sundown."

Another man who grew up in the triangle area had this to report: "I am very familiar with the Hockomock Swamp. I used to live in West Bridgewater. I have been deep that swamp many times, hunting. I never saw or experienced anything unusual until one day, when I has camping with a buddy on the Town River. We noticed something weird was going on in the sky. There must have been at least 20 of these crazy-shaped aircraft with all kinds of crazy lights going overhead, just above the trees. They weren't high up at all. We couldn't figure out what they were. They were silent. No sound at all. And they were not normal aircraft. That's for sure."

By Kristen Good

John Stanga is in his mid-fifties now and far away from the Bridgewater Triangle, having settled in North Carolina as an adult. But not a day goes by where Stanga does not think of most bizarre night of his life, when he and childhood friend witnessed a double whammy of a Class A Bigfoot sighting followed by a strange purple beam that shot down from the sky in South Weymouth. (A location about three miles from the northern tip of the area delineated as "The Bridgewater Triangle.")

John Stanga contacted me in 2011 with the following account:

“I want to relay this story about, for the lack of a better term, “Bigfoot” sighting me and my best friend Dave had in September 1972 in South Weymouth, Massachusetts. The date was Friday, Sept. 29, 1972 at about 7:30 pm. Dave and I were 14 years old at the time and had known each other since 1st grade. What happened that night is as follows:

Dave’s family just moved to a new neighborhood they were building behind my street (Courier Street). His family lived in my neighborhood before that. That’s how we knew each other for so long. We were walking around his street (Lintric Drive) which is a loop. We all hung up there because there weren’t many houses up there yet, especially on the farm side of his development and we went to school with other kids up there. We happened to run into his 15-year old sister, who was babysitting one of the kids who lived there. Dave’s sister wanted to go over to the old farm field and smoke a cigarette. The incident happened at the old farm field. The field was part of a large horse farm, but not kept up. The grass probably stood three-feet high. The field was between my street, a new elementary school (Union Street Elementary School), and Lintric Drive. There was a pond in the field to one corner and woods on three sides. Other fields, heavier woods, swamps, and creeks went on for quite a distance plus there was a sandpit and the Old Swamp River out in those woods. Dave’s neighborhood was built over the dirt access road that used to be the right of way to the farm. Most of it was still there in 1972.

We walked over to the farm field using the old dirt road.

Because of the lights around the school, the field was quite brightly lit once your eyes became accustomed to the available light. The vegetation between the school and the field was low enough at that time to allow a lot of light into the field. We stood in a circle under one of the two large trees that stood on the field. I stood facing Dave, with the school to my left. Dave was busy talking to his sister when I heard or sensed something was with us in the field and at the same time it caught my eye. It was to the left of me, no more than 30 to 50 feet away! It was a large, hairy creature walking parallel to the school to my left. It kind of looked like a gorilla, but was huge. I remember it had huge shoulders and head. The shoulders looked to me like they were six to eight feet off the ground. The head just went into them, maybe with a slightly conical shape, with no real neck to speak of. Its arms were quite long and the legs short. It looked hairy, but was really just a dark shape against the lights of the school.

It crept in short movements. By that I mean it put its arms out, hands down on the ground, and then moved its back legs forward about the same distance... I saw it do this a few times. I never saw it walk upright. Although the creature was silhouetted in the light, I could tell it was watching us. I believe it did not want us to see it and was trying to move quietly through the grass on the edge of the field. It did not make any sounds. It had large shoulders, no neck and a large head. The body was heavily built. The head profile looked like the “Bigfoot” in the 1967 Patterson film when it turned and looked at them as it walked away. Needless to say I must have looked freaked out and turn to look at Dave who also looked the same. I said to him,” do you see that” and he said “yeah”. We just started to run away up the dirt road by to his neighborhood. We didn’t even say why we were running to his sister. Naturally she and the kid ran when we did. Once we got safely back to Lintric Drive and stopped running Dave’s sister asked why we ran. When we told her, she called us a couple of jerks and though we were trying to just scare her. She went back to the house she was babysitting at and Dave and I hung out in front of a house that was under construction that bordered the field.

There was a small strip of woods between the house and the field. It was right in front of the sighting spot. We wanted to go back and see if the creature was still there, but were too afraid. We heard some noise, wood banging or wood being knocked around at the house under construction and decided that it was in our best interest to leave the area and see if we could find some of our other friends to tell them what we saw and maybe to go back there "in force". As we were walking back to a house where our other friends usually were hanging out at, things got weirder if you can believe it.

After walking maybe a couple of hundred down Lintric Drive, the second strange thing happened that night. We had a beam or a ray shoot in front of us. It was higher than the tree tops, but went right across our path. It looked like a black light stretched across the sky because it was purple. It was bright but did not illuminate anything. It was almost like it was a solid rod of purple light. It actually hummed and had a feeling of power to it. Very strange!

It lasted only a second or two, but truly shocked us. I’d say it was like 6” in diameter and shot across the sky like a laser beam. We lived less than a mile from the South Weymouth Naval Air Station which was active at the time. I would say the beam would have to cross over the air base and maybe even came from it. I lived around that base for over 30 years and never saw any beams come from the base before or after that event. I never saw anything like the beam or the creature again. We were always in those woods and fields AT ALL HOURS after that and never saw anything else strange or unexplained ever again.

Unfortunately the farm field, woods, and sandpits are gone, all developed, although the field remains as a golf course. I cannot say if the creature and the light beam were related, but they happened within 10 minutes or less of each other. Dave and I always felt the creature was not of the world and the beam had something to do with it. That is only our speculation though. There has not been one day in my life that I have not thought about that night. It is probably good to note that Dave and I did not take drugs or drink alcohol and were completely straight at the time of the incident. Of course, most people never believed us and still don’t. I swear that all of the above is true to my best recollection.”

Stanga’s incredible story is intriguing on many levels. Weymouth borders the Bridgewater Triangle apex town of Abington to the north. Lintric Drive is a mere three and a half miles from Abington. Weymouth--and many other towns surrounding the delineated map of the Bridgewater Triangle--could certainly qualify as inclusion as part of southeastern Massachusetts’ “Bridgewater Triangle,” based on bizarre and unexplained activity, archaeological mysteries, and Native American sacred grounds.

Many UFOs have been reported seen whizzing through the skies over Massachusetts’ south shore over the years and many of those sightings have been reported by local newspapers. The published UFO sighting that we are interested in right now though, is the one published in July of 1972. The article appeared in The Boston Globe with the headline, “Up In the Sky: Not a Bird, not a plane. Not superman either--it’s a UFO” on July 5, 1972--just two months before John Stanga’s encounter.

On the evening of July 3, 1972 residents all around the south shore witnessed a large shiny object in the sky.The Weymouth Naval Base received numerous calls by alarmed witnesses seeking answers about what the object might have been. But Weymouth Naval Base could provide no answer to appease their fear and curiosity.

“South Shore residents were still talking excitedly at Fourth of July barbecues and cocktail parties about a weird, unidentified flying object they saw Monday in the evening sky. ..it was apparently the first mass UFO sighting since a rash of flying saucers appeared over New England back in 1966.

Paul Kamp, 45, of Dog Lane road, Marshfield, was among the first to see whatever it was.

I looked up and saw it too--a triangular shaped object that looked like one big wing,” he said. “It was translucent and I thought I could see blue sky through it, but its edges were white and well defined...it remained in sight for 45 minutes and then disappeared in cloud cover.”

Kamp said about 25 of his neighbors could verify they saw what he saw.

He and other South Shore residents reported the UFO sighting to the South Shore Weymouth Naval Air Station.”

“All I can say is we received maybe 15 calls between 8 and 10 p.m., about a silvery, triangular transparent object moving west,” said a duty officer at the air station. “We don’t know what it was.

News Crew Mystified By Equipment Malfunctions While Touring Bridgewater Triangle Hot Spots

When Fox25 reporter Melissa Mahan contacted me last month to ask me to take her and the film crew out to some of the hotspots of the Bridgewater Triangle, I was happy to oblige. It sounded like an adventure...and an adventure it certainly turned out to be. On August 7, 2014, Fox 25 featured the Bridgewater Triangle on a Zip Trip to Bridgewater. (Fox25's Zip Trips are live broadcasts from a various featured Massachusetts towns.) Fox25 filmed the town tour of Bridgewater on August 4. I met the crew near Bridgewater State University and we set off for our first location. And that's when the trouble began.The shot should have been easy: Fox 25 reporter Melissa Mahan driving into dirt parking spot in the Mazda Zip Trip Car, stopping, opening the door and introducing herself to me. But the shot wasn't easy. We had to do at five takes due to "technical difficulties."

The microphones had failed on camera. Jennifer, the camera woman, kept trying different microphones and to her bewilderment, those all failed too. Finally, she took out an old fashioned microphone, shrugged her shoulders and said, "This is how we do it old school ." The crew was half laughing, half genuinely spooked. I was the only one NOT surprised. After all, we were in a hot spot of the Bridgewater Triangle and camera malfunctions, battery drains and equipment failure isn't an UNUSUAL occurrence here.

The last time I had been to Styles & Hart Conservation area--the site of an infamous Bigfoot encounter in 1978--I found a dead bird hanging from a tree, a large ring of quartz stones and a 1950's Pepsi bottle sticking straight up out of the ground (it was worth $75!) It would take a lot to surprise me.
Next we all caravaned back into our cars and headed to our next location on the other side of Bridgewater, to the town line of Raynham. Lake Nippenicket is a body of water that has had so many tragedies over the years, swimming has been banned in this lake that has an average depth of a mere three feet. I was taking them to one of THE heaviest energy spots in the whole of this bizarre area called the Bridgewater Triangle, so what happened next did not surprise me either. Heading down a long dirt road into the infamous Hockomock Swamp, Jennifer's Go Pro camera started to malfunction. She said it "just went nuts" and started flashing and going static. Again...I was not surprised.

When the Zip Trip episode aired, I was FINALLY surprised. They used all that happened with their equipment malfunctions for the piece. I thought that was daring and I loved it. Here is a clip from the Fox 25 Zip Trip visit to the Bridgewater Triangle and my little adventure with Melissa Mahan.

To see the whole Zip Trip Segment of the Bridgewater Town Tour, click here.