Journal of the Bizarre

This week, Journal of the Bizarre brings you a real-life "ghost" story, as told by our contributor Marlin Bressi.  If you have a true ghost story you'd like to share, or a story about an unusual or unexplained event, send it to our editor at


Located in wild and scenic Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, is a popular trout stream called Muncy Creek. I had fished every mile of this stream, from its confluence with the Susquehanna River near the site of the 18th century Fort Muncy, to the stream's headwaters in Sullivan County, three or four wiles east of the sleepy village of Nordmont.

Now, most trout anglers will tell you that the best way to work a stream is by starting at the headwaters and fishing your way downstream, as to not "spook" the fish. In this manner, you are able to approach the fish from behind, since they often position themselves with their heads pointed upstream in order to snatch any food which is floating down. However, f…

Since 2011, loud booms and flashes of light have been reported all over America.  UFOs? Secret military operations?  The truth, unfortunately, is far more mundane. 



Since 2011, hundreds of reports of mysterious booms and flashes of light have been reported from every corner of the country, from California to Florida, from Rhode Island to Alaska.  In some of these cases, these explosions have been accompanied by sightings of military helicopters.

Linda Moulton Howe, host of Earthfiles and frequent guest on Coast to Coast AM, has done a terrific job of cataloging these events on the Earthfiles website.  Many of these mysterious booms have been reported to police and government agencies, but the responses indicate that no one really knows the cause of these events.  Even more interesting is the fact that, in spite of the window-ratting and ground shaking tremors, there is no USGS record of seismic activity in these areas during the time the booms took place.  This would indicate that the …

Out of the thousand of ghost stories which come from Pennsylvania, few are as popular as the story of Headless Allison, a decapitated apparition said to haunt the roadside of Duboistown and South Williamsport in Lycoming County.  So famous is this ghost that the story of Allison's Grave has appeared in countless books over the years (such as Weird Pennsylvania, by Matt Lake).  Allison's Grave has also been frequented by "paranormal investigation"  groups for television audiences.  (We use the quotation marks because we believe that many of these groups give real researchers a bad name.  Research consists of more than prowling around with video cameras... it involves, well, research).  One such paranormal investigator is Craig Rupp (and Lycoming County native), whose 13 years of ghosthunting experience has led to appearances on the Travel Channel and the Discovery Channel.

There has been much speculation over just who exactly the Allison is in this oft-told tale whic…

Lanza Prosecutor Stephen Sedensky Lies to Public.... Again.


Today, Danbury State's Attorney Stephen Sedensky III- the prosecutor in the case against Adam Lanza- stated that he will not release information about Adam Lanza's mental health.  This comes on the heels of a recent statement made by a spokesperson for the office of the chief medical examiner in Connecticut, who said that Lanza's toxicology report will not be made public.  While failure to disclose such information to the public does not prove a conspiracy, it certainly does little to dispel rumors that December's Sandy Hook massacre may not have happened quite the way it was reported.  Combined with the fact that authorities have refused to release as much as one screen capture of Sandy Hook video surveillance footage, and lingering questions about why Adam Lanza's Social Security death record lists his date of death as December 13 (one day before the shooting), it's little wonder why conspiracy theor…