In the heat of summer during the 3rd grade of my childhood, my parents moved us from Tyler, Texas to a huge home in the effluent Dallas suburb of University Park. White Rock Lake wasn’t too many miles away from “The Bubble”, the nickname for University Park garnered from the way people there strive to never let the sun set on the gold age of the 1950’s. Like the other kids in the area, I eventually road my bike over to White Rock Lake to sightsee. Eventually climbing the rungs upward to Highland Park High School, a bike became a car and simple sightseeing became wistful hours of girl watching.
We all heard about the legend of The Lady of White Rock Lake that supposedly haunted the place. The story goes that a girl drowned there in the 1920’s after leaving her prom to go drinking with her boyfriend out on the lake. Her ghost was rumored to roam the lake in a white dress, looking for a ride to take her to her parents house in a nearby neighborhood. It was whispered that those who happened upon her never suspected a thing until she vanished out of their car seat as the driver pulled up to the home, leaving only a puddle of water as her unique calling card.
During the later part of the 1970’s it was always part of the “pilgrimage” many of us teens went on to drive around and see if we could give the stone cold hitcher a ride. Everyone said she wandered the lake at night but none of my friends or I ever got lucky enough to get even a glimpse of her wet, pale form. We eventually wiled away our time cruising around the lake jamming to loud rock and hooking up with more of the alcoholic variety of spirits.
Then one day rumors started flying at school. Someone said they had seen Satanists dancing naked one night in a lonely cemetery a couple of miles from the lake! Cheap thrills were a mainstay and the adrenaline laced element of diabolical goings on eventually prompted a few of us to check it out. So, when a friend dared people to check out a house and cemetery where Satanists supposedly did their evil deeds, I proudly boasted I didn’t believe it, wasn’t afraid, and had no problem going.
Flagpole Hill is one of the highest points in the area near White Rock Lake. The park there was a well known make out spot where you could park and explore the woods thronging it. It was close to midnight when a fairly fearless guy in the passenger seat guided me past the park toward a nearby street where a weird dark house supposedly stood.
Hot naked satanic girls cavorted wildly to the beat of bass drums in our drunken, feverish brains. Hormones and intoxicants kicked horrors to the curb as we determined to do our duty and catch sight of any skyclad pagan lasses. Caught up by overeager imagination, better judgment had likewise fallen to the wayside.
I drove a brief maze of side streets looking for the place. Finally getting the nod to turn down a street, darkened by branches arching overhead like knarled fingers, a cold chill passed through me as I aimed the car toward the end of the even darker cul-de-sac. Dread crossed the face of the guy beside me as we slowed down in front of the place he pointed out.
The two-story house was bleak and unlit, sitting beside an unkempt, tomb stone strewn cemetery. Almost rolling to a stop, it was hard shaking off my alarm when I got the impression of shadows flitting about between the moonlit graves. I instantly knew it was time to go when the dude behind me suddenly cried that he saw red eyes peering at us from one of the black window panes.
My shaking foot hit the gas instinctively. I was slapped into raw survival mode as we unanimously realized we'd ventured too close to some bad mojo. Whipping the car around, we shot out of there like a bat out of hell!
That’s when things got even stranger.
Everything seemed to go into slow mo when something hit the side of my car with a loud - Wham! Eyes wide open, none of us saw a thing as we started freaking, rushing toward the entry of the cul-de-sac. Just then, something impossible loomed up large in the beams of my car headlights.
A huge bolder, as big as a knocked over shopping cart, sat smack dab in the middle of the road, totally blocking our only way out!
My rational mind said this couldn’t be, but it was. In a desperate flight or fight mode (praying someone was watching over us), instead of slamming on the brakes, I put the peddle to metal. Gunning the car, at the last second I jerked the steering wheel to the left, roaring off the side of the road and into the ditch. Streaking past the gigantic rock, my old Thunderbolt Grease Slapper hit the bottom of the ditch and miraculously was hurled back up onto the road!
I still marvel at the entire situation. For one thing, it’s frankly impossible for a bolder so big to have gotten into the middle of the shadow swallowed road in less than a minute. Yet, what creeps me out most of all is recalling how sickly my friend looked as he pointed at the dent on the side of my car, a dent that looked unmistakably like the paw print of some sort of enormous beast!
Believe me or not. There are sites on the net where completely independent reports still are posted of strange goings on around White Rock Lake. So if you find yourself driving late at night in Dallas, and see the exit off Northwest Highway to Flagpole Hill, keep your eyes on the road and your foot on the gas.
R.I.P.
Lance Oliver
April 2007
orbhunterx@yahoo.com
Thu Jan 31, 2008 4:46 pm
