Editor’s note: For Halloween, we asked our readers to share the scariest things they’ve experienced in our area. Readers came through with shivery accounts of mysterious occurrences, including this one below.
Picture it: October in Asheville, 1994. I was in high school and had heard the story about Helen’s Bridge. But the myth about it was that if you turn your car off under the bridge and call out Helen’s name, it would not start back up.
So, some friends and I drove up there for a little spooky fun, and I turned the car off. And lo and behold, the car did not start back up. I could not believe it. It was so scary. It was pitch dark and close to midnight, the story of Helen fresh in my mind. I was like, “This is it.”
Then I looked down, and my car was still in drive. So I put it in park, and it started. LOL. So, the legend may or not be true, but it is still a neat bridge to drive to with a great ghost story tied to it.
— Nancy Sutton
Asheville
Some years ago, my daughter was interested in “the paranormal” and wanted to go on ghost tours, got a paranormal research kit for her birthday, and had all manner of books on psychic phenomena, lost civilizations, ghost stories, cryptids, etc. I mentioned to her some of the local legends, including that of Helen’s Bridge, and so one evening after taking her to Fuddrucker’s for her favorite hamburger, I drove her up to see the bridge.
I had also told the bit about saying “Helen, come forth” – and, while sitting up there in the autumn twilight, my wife jokingly repeated the incantation and then yelped in pain. She said felt like she had just gotten slapped across the side of the head so hard that her left ear popped and rang. Of course it may have been the elevation combined with the remnants of a sinus infection she’d recently had – but she still steadfastly refuses to go near the place, even in broad daylight, to this day!