| CHRISTMAS PARADE 2009 |
| Payne Road Bridge This infamous dirt road, now paved, has spawned many a curious visitor over the years, including me. There are numerous stories surrounding this haunted place, still in spite of all its various versions, one thing holds true-there is definitely something unnatural about this place. According to legend, tobacco farmer Edward Payne, a man well known for his prejudice and quick temper, and who upon hearing about his daughter's pregnancy by one of his slaves, went mad, killing his entire family (and the slave) before hanging himself from a nearby tree overlooking the bridge. There has been speculation that Payne also dabbled in devil worship, and this was his sacrifice to Satan. The bridge was said to be built using the bloody floorboard planks from the infamous Lawson house, just several miles to the West, where Charlie Lawson shot and bludgeoned his own family to death before taking his own life on Christmas Day, 1929. The Lawson account is told in the popular books “White Christmas, Bloody Christmas” and its follow-up, “The Meaning of Our Tears”, written by Bruce Jones and Trudy Smith, and the documentary “A Christmas Family Tragedy.”The story also goes, that if you stop your car on that bridge and turn the engine off, it will not restart. Lots of visitors there have reported headlights of a 1930’s era car following them out of the area and then disappearing once they’ve turned off the gravel road. Many other accounts also retell of lights being seen in the abandoned house nearby, dark figures seen skulking about, wisps of children singing “Ring Around the Rosy,” images of dead children floating in the nearby creek, and small handprints being discovered in the dust on your car after stopping on the bridge. Some of these haunted tales include him drowning his baby in the family well, which some claim to hear crying. Other accounts say the hauntings are the result of the slow, agonizing death of a driver who wrecked his 1930-something car in one of Payne Road's deadly curves. One resident of the house there is said to have committed suicide by igniting a stick of dynamite clasped between his teeth. In the mid 1990’s, it is said that a prostitute from nearby Winston-Salem was murdered and found tied to a tree there. It is also rumored that a caretaker, living in the house to prevent unwanted trespassers or vandalism, accidentally shot and killed his girlfriend there while cleaning a gun, and then killed himself later while awaiting trial. The abandoned house was also rumored to be a haven for Satanists conducting rituals there because the local Sheriffs avoid the locale after dark. |