Mystery Houses

Mystery Hills, Mystery Houses, Mystery Shacks, Mystery Holes...........Places full of Mystery.  An ancient tradition of the American Roadside, these are places where the rules of gravity do not apply.  They are inter-dimensional anomalies that only appear within the confines of tourist destinations.

For the uninitiated, these mysterious locations are enclosures where unknown forces affect gravity and the human body.  Water flows uphill, balls roll up uphill, and everyone leans at a weird angle like that one Michael Jackson video.  When it comes down it, they are pure touristy fun.

The first Mystery House I visited was Big Mike's Mystery House in the tourist paradise of Cave City, KY.

In addition to containing a mystery House, Big Mike's is also home to beloved fiberglass dinosaur "Big Moe".

Inside, guided tours of the Mystery House were given for a bargain basement price of 50 cents.  Past framed pictures of optical illusions the guide leads you into the mysterious "Space Room".

Immediately you realize something is off.  Walking in a straight line is difficult your body seems pulled towards one of the walls.  The Guide then leads you into his room of tricks.  Unexplained illusions include a hallway that makes your girlfriend seem gigantic.

And no, I don't know these people.

Other tricks include balancing a chair against a wall with its legs on a small ledge.

And then there is the classic Mystery House lean, demonstrated her by my son.

It was short, but satisfying and well worth the 50 cents.

The Bee-based tourist attraction Bee City in Cottageville, SC has a small mystery house known as the "Bee Crazy Fun House" (There is no humor like Bee Humor).

This was probably the least inspired of the Mystery Houses I have been to, there was no guide, and no lights, just some slanty floors and water running uphill.

The most mysterious thing that occurred in the Bee Crazy house was the fact that while taking the above pictures the auto-focus on my old camera permanently stopped working.  Damn you, Mysterious forces.

Last week me and my daughter made our way to Mystery Hill in Blowing Rock, NC.

Mystery Hill is your classic roadside Mystery attraction.  Like every good mountain attraction, the back story behind Mystery Hill is based around Moonshine.

The tour begins with the guide talking about a mysterious figure named "Grandpa" who noticed strange occurrences in his orchard.  We then get a look at Grandpa's still.

We then get to look at the Revenuer that he buried alive.

You can tell he is still alive, because his animatronic feet are still twitching.  Children are then welcome to pose for a photo op inside an out-house with the murderous Grandpa.

We are then brought into the main Mystery room.  We are greeted by a Wax Issac Newton, warning us to not break any laws.

And then the fun begins.

The mysterious effects are oldies, but goodies.......Let's take a look.

Mystery Hill also contains some bonus mysteries such as this magic faucet......

And this magic light bulb.....

Also included is a Native American Museum.......

Which contains 50,000 arrowheads, which is indeed a lot of arrowheads

The Carpetbagger

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Searching for Harrison Mayes on the Rattler

Now for the past several years I have made it somewhat of a personal mission to track down every existing Harrison Mayes Cross that is still standing.  If you are not familiar with Harrison Mayes and his crosses, please go over and read my article on Mayes HERE.

In short, Mayes traveled all across America planting concrete signs with religious messages.  So far I have photographed 10 of these signs that are still standing in the wild (Some I came across myself, others I was tipped off on).

Now, recently I given a tip about something I have never even known existed:  a Harrison Mayes BARN.  Mike Curtis tipped me off that this barn was located on the Dixie Highway in Del Rio, TN.  I was so psyched I had to head out there to see it myself.  And so I did......

I headed out on NC-209, which apparently has recently been dubbed "The Rattler".

Huh?  Okay, I'll go with it.  I have nothing against giving cool names to roads.  It appears this is inspired greatly by the notorious "Tail of the Dragon", a famously curvy road that is beloved by motorcyclists.  The swag for the "Tail of the Dragon" is incredibly popular and this is likely an attempt to capitalize on this.

Never the less, I set out on this newly christened curvy road.  How curvy?  Check it out.



I was driving my Toyota Corrolla, instead of a motorcycle, so the curves may not have had their full effect.  I did however enjoy the view.  This road is full of amazing old barns.......

 As well as some awesome old houses.....

And old broken down vehicles.....

 Check out this deer head mounted on a porch....

Or all these old rotten pelts nailed to a barn.....

 Look at this Donkey hanging out at a church....

Check out this out built on top of a big old rock....

Or this old school elementary school sign.....

I passed through the town of Luck, NC......which as far as I can tell consists entirely of one abandoned building.....

I passed the state line into Tennessee, where this delightful bar in a single wide trailer sits..........

Finally making my way into Tennessee I finally located the Harrison Mayes Barn, and it was amazing.....

I lettering and verbiage unmistakably belong to Hayes.   And what made this even sweeter is that I stumbled upon ANOTHER Mayes Barn a few miles down the road.

To make things even sweeter, 3 days later I photographed another Harrison Mayes cross in Ruth, NC.  This was different then the traditional concrete crosses as was made out of corrugated steal.

I know there are more of these signs (and maybe even barns) out there, I just need to find them.

The Carpetbagger

I love hearing from people please comment below.  Also, feel free to email me at jacobthecarpetbagger@gmail.com

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Cherokee, NC Abandoned Neon with Adam the Woo

Hey You All!  Recently I had the honor of adventuring with Adam the Woo as we hunted for abandoned neon signs in Cherokee, NC.

Check out Adam's video and go over to his channel and subscribe!

Did you watch the video?  Good.  While we found a great collection of neon signs, Cherokee is in a state of change.  With the continued expansion of the Harrah's casino and its massive tower motel the old motels and tourist traps are quickly vanishing.  Here are some signs that have vanished in the past 10 years.

This sign was in the video, but for some reason it had been painted solid yellow.

Here is the Cherokee Trader back when it was lit up....

Here are both sides of the Martonian before it was completely overgrown, you can see clearly how "conditioned" is spelled wrong on one side and wrong on the either.

And here is the big Chief back in better days.....

Here is one of the original cabins from Mac's Wigwam Village.   You can see they used to be MUCH smaller.

And just in case you wanted another look at the rotten faced old bear.....

Believe it or not, there used actually be another outdoor taxidermy bear a few doors down.....

And of course, here is the random triceratops before his most recent paint job.....

To check out my original article about Cherokee go HERE.

For a look at "Chiefing" in Cherokee go HERE.

The Carpetbagger

I love hearing from people please comment below.  Also, feel free to email me at jacobthecarpetbagger@gmail.com

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Check out my Youtube Page and my Flickr Photostream, where all this got started.

Hillbilly Hall of Fame Induction: The Tremors

I would like to proudly induct "The Tremors" into the musical wing of the Hillbilly Hall of Fame.  The Tremors are a Rockabilly band out of North Carolina. 

They embody the Hillbilly spirit, which can be found on their new album "Old-Fashioned Hillbilly Feud".  Its a great album, especially the title track

And check out the image inside the CD cover.

That's a severely messed up Hillbilly with a bad case of Rynophimia............

If you doubt their Hillbilly cred, just check out their back story.....

Listen, if you dare, to a story so bizarre that it has been known to make women faint and grown men shriek in terror! Out of a time-rotted tomb crawls an unspeakable horror, The Tremors, the Scourge of the South...
The dark and twisted tale of the tremors begins in 1957, when AWOL marine and cough syrup addict, Stretch Armstrong (drums), met escaped mental patient, Jimmy Tremor (guitar, vocals) and former alligator wrestler, Slim Perkins (bass), at "The Happy Gizzard" a tar-paper shack that served as the local honky-tonk for the citizens of Sibly, NC. The trio was often seen blasting out the new Sun records of Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins on the club's jukebox.

By 1958, the boys had their own band and toured extensively on the "Chitlin' Circuit" of the deep south. Then came the fateful night in Birmingham, AL when the band was paid entirely in booze, resulting in the alcohol poisoning deaths of all three members. When the bodies were shipped back to Sibly, the townspeople refused to let the Tremors be buried in the sacred ground of the church cemetery. As the stand-off between the next of kin and the towns-people ensued, the corpses began to mummify (probably due to their over-zealous consumption of "Pappy's corn juice" as Jimmy puts it) and the Tremors were soon back in show business touring with "Col. Bolt Upright's Cavalcade of Freaks and Oddities" out of Shreveport, LA. "The Zombie Hillbilly Band", as they were billed, was a strong draw (better than they ever did when they were alive) until the 1970's, when freak shows went out of public favor.

In 1981, the band was "abducted" (for a sum of $50) from Col. Upright by extraterrestrials, from the planet Zorcon, who had recently received broadcast transmission of new singing sensation, Elvis Presley, and had set out across the universe to bring back a rock'n'roll specimen. Telepathically sensing the vibrations of the "big beat" from Stretch's left hand, the aliens re-animated the boys, feeling that the "mummy" angle gave the band a much needed gimmick.
Once again the Dixie-fried deviants were drawing crowds at their new home in the Zorconian Museum of Natural History. The Tremors were number one on the inter-planetary charts and there was even talk of a feature film. They had the galaxy in the palms of their hands and then disaster struck. Broadcast transmissions of the Beatles on the "Ed Sullivan Show" reached Zorcon and the Tremors were returned to earth and exchanged for a band with a more "mop-top" appeal.

Now, I didn't do any fact checking, but it seems pretty legitimate to me.  Check out more on the tremors at http://www.tremorsrockabilly.com 

 
The Carpetbagger

I love hearing from people please comment below.  Also, feel free to email me at jacobthecarpetbagger@gmail.com

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Check out my Youtube Page and my Flickr Photostream, where all this got started.

Hanging out at the Road to Nowhere with Adam the Woo

 While Adam the Woo was in town we went to check out the Road to Nowhere.

Subcribe to Adam's Youtube Channel!   He also does a Daily Vlog.  He is always traveling and always finding awesome stuff.

My post about the Bridge to Nowhere can be found HERE.


The Carpetbagger

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Dr. John Romulus Brinkley

Check out the Carpetbagger's new video on Youtube.





For previous post on the good Doctor head HERE.

 
The Carpetbagger

Please feel free to email me at jacobthecarpetbagger@gmail.com
Please add me on Facebook and Instagram. Also, check out my Flickr Photostream and Youtube Page.

Adventures with Adam the Woo

I was fortunate enough to spend the last few days cruising around with Adam the Woo.  For those of you not familiar with Adam, he is a traveler of the American road who posts his adventures to his Youtube channel.  He also does a vlog every single day, which is now in its 3rd year.

I had the pleasure of meeting Adam this summer when he visited Pigeon Forge.

This time we met up at the Cherokee Indian reservation.  The first order of business was tracing the final scene of the Werner Herzog film Stroszek.  While the movie is filmed primarily in Germany, the final scene takes place in the touristy mountain town of Cherokee, NC.  If you haven't seen the movie.  You should.  If you don't have time, just watch the last 8 minutes.  It will blow your mind.  Truly a bizarre moment in cinema.  Check it out.

Here I am with Adam as we trace the through this final bizarre scene.



The following day we started things out with a trip to the abandoned Bear Pits.



Check out the 7:17 point.  I think I have found my new theme song.

Keep checking Adam's Youtube channel, as I helped him in shooting some videos for his main adventure channel. 

It was really cool to be able to hang out with Adam after following his videos.  I totally admire his adventurous spirit and his shared passion for roadside weirdness. 

The Carpetbagger

Please feel free to email me at jacobthecarpetbagger@gmail.com
Please add me on Facebook and Instagram. Also, check out my Flickr Photostream and Youtube Page.