Two Wheel Oklahoma

Keetonville, Oklahoma is near my hometown of Catoosa, Oklahoma and I have had an interest–perhaps an obsession–with the beautiful yet mysterious Keetonville Hill ever since I heard about the legend of the Cry Baby Bridge when I was a teenager.

However, what has caught my attention about Keetonville recently is that there is a new show called, “Two Wheel Oklahoma,” which recorded a portion of a show in Keetonville.

Two Wheel Oklahoma states the following about their show:

Two Wheel Oklahoma is a television program featuring the unique destinations and backroads of Oklahoma. Brad Mathison and Rex Brown are your hosts for this scenic tour of life off the beaten path.

Co-hosts: Rex and Brad Oh… and they ride motorcycles to get there.

To date four episodes of T.W.O. have been produced. On October 3, 2009 these pilot episodes began airing on KMYT-41 in Tulsa.

Episode 2: OK 20 features the segment on Keetonville, Oklahoma. Nice to know that others out there have an interest in this great area of Keetonville even if the interests are slightly different.

I do not know. I do plan to confirm this information. Rufus Keeton was born as Rufus Keaton on February 22, 1875 in Horse Cave, Kentucky. He either changed his name or someone misspelled his name because he is later known as Rufus Keeton. Rufus Keeton died on November 8, 1958 in Puyallup, Washington.

Rufus Keeton worked on the Union Pacific Railroad. He became a celebrity for winning a strongest man on the railroad competition. He started a small settlement which later became the town of Keetonville. Keetonville still exists but is not much of a town anymore. Parts of it have been absorbed by Catoosa, parts by Claremore, and parts by Owasso.

Hopefully I have stumbled across some accurate historical information about this small town of Keetonville, which I have taken an interest in after writing some short stories that take place there.

This bridge is associated with a legend of the cry baby bridge. This legend has two primary versions. One of the versions is family appropriate and the other version is not. This legend takes place on Friday, June 13, 1924. A mother, with her infant, had gone to town for supplies. Her home was located on the hill south of the Boggy Creek Bridge. The town store was north of the bridge.

A storm brewed while she was gone. As she raced back home in her horse drawn carriage lightning struck and scared the horses just as she was crossing the bridge. The horses bucked knocking over the carriage. The mother quickly regained her balance but had lost hold on her baby. Panicked she began searching the bridge. She could hear the baby crying but she could not find her. Screaming at no one in particular she demanded to know, “Where is my baby?”

Thinking she heard the baby crying under the bridge she went to the side of the bridge and looked over. She lost her balance, fell into the creek, and was washed into the Verdigris, never to be seen again.

The other version asserts that a young girl was with child and without husband. Her strict family became ashamed of her. She was abused, beaten, and harassed for her sin. Being tormented throughout her pregnancy by her family and some town folks she went to the Boggy Creek Bridge on Friday, June 13, 1924 after giving birth. She took her child and tossed it over the bridge. Then she stepped onto the bridge railing and jumped into the creek. She and her baby were washed away into the Verdigris, never to be seen again.

Regardless of which version is told the final portion of the legend asserts that if you park your car on this bridge on a Friday the thirteenth and turn the motor off, you can still hear the baby crying. Then if make sure to keep your car keys with you but leave the car unlocked and go to the edge of the bridge and yell three times, “I have your baby” a soft blue glowing orb will appear on the bridge.

Since you do not really have the baby, however, this ghostly mother will become outraged and lock the doors in your car. Sometimes she causes the car horn to honk.

This is, of course, just folklore and fun. Unfortunately, the bridge is no longer accessible but the legend still circulates from one generation to another in the town of Catoosa, Oklahoma. Almost every bridge from the early 1900s in Oklahoma has a Cry Baby Bridge story. The interesting thing about this Catoosa story is that a date is given for the event.

Another interesting note is that names have been used in relation to the Catoosa Cry Baby Bridge story. Those names are Bessie and Clissie. Nothing much was thought about this, just that someone took creative license and embellished a bit. Oddly though some people have reported that when they listened to the wind blow through the truss bridge they did not hear a baby cry but a woman whispering the name, “Clissie.”

A cemetery near the old bridge had two unmarked graves until 1952. The inscriptions read, “Unknown.” In 1952 two red bricks were placed on those unmarked graves. Inscribed into one of the red bricks was the name, “Bessie” and inscribed into the other red brick was the name, “Clissie.” Before that, according to a cemetery groundskeeper, a single rose was left each June on those unmarked graves. After 1952 no roses were left again.

There are thousands, if not millions, of Cry Baby Bridges and stories throughout the United States of America. Most of these stories are about old wooden bridges on country roads with minimal traffic. A common element of the story is an unwed mother who disposes of her baby on the bridge to keep from being shamed by the community. Another common theme is about a mother and baby who die in a tragedy on the bridge.

The stories serve as a way for young adults to entertain themselves late at night by parking on an old bridge and telling a spooky tale. I did not realize how many people are actually interested in Cry Baby Bridges. Although there are some duplicates a Google search submission contains nearly 500,000 results. This indicates that the Cry Baby Bridge story interests people, which may be good for my story.

Anyway, what I have listed here is a link to a YouTube video of some clever yet amateur film makers that made a video in the tradition of The Blair Witch Project. There is some loud screams on this video, so if you are in a public place use caution with the speaker volume.

The story is about a Bigfoot sighting in Keetonville, Oklahoma. There are two elements in that story which have fascinated me for several years: Bigfoot and the Keetonville Bridge.

My interest in Bigfoot started at an early age. I saw a picture from the Patterson-Gimlin film of a Bigfoot on a tabloid cover. I later saw a few episodes on the Six-Million Dollar Man television show which had a Bigfoot character. I also saw the movies The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972) and Harry and the Hendersons (1987) which were about Bigfoot. Over the years I have viewed some other low budget films about Bigfoot.

After The Georgia Bigfoot Body Hoax in 2008 I was ready to put a story together about a Bigfoot mystery. The other element which is a critical piece to my story is the Keetonville Bridge.

Keetonville is a small town in Oklahoma between Tulsa, Owasso, Catoosa, and Claremore. There is a road called Keetonville road which is the main street in Keetonville. That road curves up, down and through the hills of Keetonville. It is the old truss bridge on this road that has fascinated me since high school.

The first time I saw this bridge was when a friend of mine had told me an urban legend about Cry Baby Bridge. I know now that almost every town throughout the United States has a story about a Cry Baby Bridge. The Keetonville Bridge was the topic of the Cry Baby Bridge urban legend in the Tulsa area. The area around the Keetonville Bridge and the Keetonville road is beautiful and peaceful. It is a country area with a few homes, a few farms and a lot of fields, trees and space. It is a perfect place for something to hide which makes a great place for a mystery.

A few years ago I had thought of a story about some campers in Keetonville encountering a Bigfoot but I could not get the story to work right. I started doing research about Bigfoot sightings in Oklahoma. I discovered Oklahoma has had only a few sightings and most of those sightings were around the Kiamichi Mountains. I, of course, wanted to write a story that took place in Keetonville which is near my home town of Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Perhaps if I make bundles of money in the future I can afford a lengthy visit to the Kiamichi Mountains and write another Bigfoot story. Interestingly (and I hope to attend someday) Honobia, Oklahoma, which is in the Kiamichi area nicknamed ‘Bigfoot Country’, has a Bigfoot Festival each October.

So despite the fact that Keetonville has probably never had an actual Bigfoot sighting that is where my story takes place. The good news for my story, though, is that there really is a Boggy Creek that flows through Keetonville.

I will admit that Boggy is a common name for creeks and there are several Boggy Creeks throughout the United States. The most famous of all the Boggy Creeks is in Fouke, Arkansas. To learn more about Bigfoot online, read the information provided by Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigfoot.