Urban Legends: The Vanishing Hitchhiker

An unusual thing happened on August the 10th 1976. a man was driving past the cemetery late at night when he saw a young woman in a white dress cluching the bars of the cemetery gate from inside the cemetery grounds. The man reported her to the police saying that some one was locked inside the cemetery. Officers who investigated found no one inside, however, two of the iron bars of the gate where the girl had be standing were found pried apart and bore what seemed to be human handprints melted into the metal. After these events the cemetery gates drew a lot of attention from visitors and townsfolk. So much so that the damaged bars of the gate had to be removed and replaced with a new set in order to draw people’s attention away from the cemetery.

There have been many attempts over the years to try and find the true identity of Resurrection Mary. Over the years there has been many road accidents involving young women with either the name Mary or something similar.

Pele

Pele, known as Madam Pele, is a Hawaiian goddess who has been seen in ghostly forms throughout the centuries. There are many different myths surrounding her origins. In one of these she came from a family of deities which she left for Mauna Loa. Once there she dug until she came to the molten centre of the mountain, creating the Kilauea crater. When the volcano is quiet she lives inside the crater and cares for her family of fire god, but before an eruption she descends to warn the islanders of the coming danger.

Pele appears in many different forms, from a young girl to an old woman. She can be either hot or cool to the touch. Her hair might be black, red, white or silver. Her most common form is that of a beautiful young woman dressed in a red muumuu.

Pele’s appearances follow the usual vanishing hitchhiker pattern. She is seen normally at night, standing or walking along a lonely road. It is normally advised to stop and offer her a lift as ignoring her normally results in death or destruction in a up coming eruption.

The first recorded appearance of Pele was in 1925. This time she was disguised as an old woman walking along the roadside. Two cars passed her without offering her assistance. The third car saw her and stopped to offer her ride. She got in and as they drove up the road they passed the two cars which had driven past her earlier, both had stalled at the side of the road. When the man reached his destination he told the old woman that he would contain to where she wanted to go. When he got no answer he turned around to find the back seat of his car empty and the old woman gone. There have been many different stories similar to this surrounding Pele, in many of these she is in the form of a young girl or even warning drivers of up coming road accidents.