We did a poll a couple of months ago asking residents all across Orange County about the ‘urban legends’ or stories that they’d heard growing up, or had seen for themselves.  What we got were stories about everything from strange lights, a ‘goatman’, and, more amazingly, security camera footage of an unknown apparition!  Was it a ghost? Continue reading and see the videos for yourself!

ORANGE/COVE AREA – 

“l’m not sure of the real name,” wrote Chick. “In the curve where the road through Cove meets Border Street, it continues on running past the soccer fields, parallel with Sabine River. You could see blood down the middle of the road at night where 2 men were chained together and drug behind a vehicle until death. There were numerous stories why that victim was drug. 

“One, he was a drunk sailer who was robbed, 2, he was a man who had raped someone’s daughter,  3, A.man was having an affair with a man’s wife. Probably more. You could only see the blood driving north, not south.”

ORANGE AREA – Crybabies and Knife Fights: 

Kevin wrote about ‘Crybaby Bridge’ on Bancroft Road. It seems every small town in every state has one of these bridges as a legend, and Orange is no exception. 

“I grew up around the curve from Cry Baby Bridge… Story is, at midnight you can hear a baby cry.  Sat out there many nights at midnight with no luck .. I’m guessing it was a cougar/panther making its rounds. Back then, that was pretty sparsely settled territory.”

Carlos remembered an elderly woman with a story, who once lived next door to him:

“She’d run a boarding house on Border Street. She’d tell us a story about a man who’d been disemboweled in a knife fight on Border street and when the moon was full, he could still be seen running down Border Street holding his intestines.”

LITTLE CYPRESS –  Glowing Orbs: 

Chick also recounted what he called ‘the Legend of Wilkerson (Wilkinson) Cemetery’: 

“I have seen.the glowing green balls floating across the ground there myself, while in High School, and more than once. Nothing like having a Mustang full of screaming girls, back then when there was nothing at the end of that lonely road, but an old cemetery.”

VIDOR/PINE FOREST AREAS – Goatman and Werewolves, Witches and blue feet:

“Of course we all know the legend of the goat man in Vidor,” recalled Dusty. “Oh I seen him myself off 1132 about 5 years ago – my brother and I were lucky we made it out alive.

“Some say he’s a demonic entity, others think he’s an insane woodsman with a taste for human flesh, nonetheless if you find yourself alone in the woods at night, and you hear a bleating screech… run. He stands nearly 7 feet tall with a mutilated goat head where a human face should be, the worst part is, you’ll smell him before you see him. A putrid, rotten stench.”

There are claims of black magic and animal worship in the area of 4 Oaks Ranch Road (outside of Pine Forest), according to a reader named Cindy.  Not only do you have to worry about that, but there is a Bigfoot to watch out for – claims of hearing strange howls and “knocking” sounds while fishing at the Neches Saltwater Barrier. According to lore, the knocking sounds are a way Bigfoot communicates. (Or would it be Bigfeet?)

Within the same area, off of Lakeview Road, there is a cemetery located, appropriately, on Coffin Road. Walking through this cemetery after a rain could cause your feet to turn blue in color.

“We would go to read the old headstones. Back then they were buried in pine boxes also embalmed,” remembered Monica. “When it was wet and we walked through, Dad said the embalming fluid that seeped into the ground would turn our feet blue.”

As far as werewolves….well, see this story from The Orange Leader, from the 1970s: https://orangecountystories.com/the-creature-of-tram-road/ 

WEST ORANGE – 

“I got these recordings off my security cameras about a year ago and never put them on Facebook,” Cory began. “I don’t think it’s bugs or anything like that as I haven’t had anything like it before or since. If you tend to believe in the paranormal this is right up your alley. Anybody that has a good theory or has caught anything like this let me know.”

What followed Cory’s post was a series of black and white videos showing a misty white “smoke” moving around the cars in the driveway, up the sidewalk, and to the front porch of his house in West Orange. What at first looks like somebody vaping, or smoking, quickly becomes something more as you see the mist move in different directions and within a set formation – not just a cloud of smoke/vape.  

“I got notifications that there was movement on my cameras and these are the ones I saw,” he said of the videos. No one smokes or vapes in his home and certainly no person was seen on the footage.  

On only TWO occasions out of the years he’s lived in the home has this phenomena happened. The first was on 2/8/21 and the second on 2/10/21. Note the time stamps on the videos – late hours of night and early hours of the morning.

Cory wrote that nothing out of the ordinary had happened in their home either before, during or after he caught – whatever he caught – on camera. 

“Sometimes my dog barks at nothing in the dark or looks at the ceiling for no reason, we joke and say it’s the ‘ghost’. I have a hard time saying I believe in ghosts but who knows. 

“One night last week, the griddle parts of my stovetop flew into the middle of the kitchen at like 1 o’clock in the morning, but I just kinda brushed it off as the cat, but he’s never done anything like it before, and the grill parts are pretty heavy for a cat to throw across the room.”

Was it a ghost? Is there a Bigfoot (Bigfeet?)? Supposedly there are blue feet if you walk in the wrong cemetery, but one thing for sure – there are MANY stories in Orange County. And we’re just getting started telling them.

(This is Part 1 of a series….more spooky stories to come!)