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Redemption Rock

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  Watch the video above or read it in article form below! Redemption Rock is a glacial stone outcropping, made out of granite, and in the shape of a flat topped ledge, on a ¼ acre reservation in Princeton, Massachusetts. It’s mere feet from the main road but still eerily quiet. If it’s not obvious yet, it’s also where teenagers go to make out and drink. Damn kids. Anyway, it also happens to be historically significant and a very important setting in the world’s very first bestselling book. Check it out for yourself and you’re going to see this inscription: Don’t touch it, though. You never know what some gross teenagers did to it. That inscription tells the story of the ransom of Mary White Rowlandson. This is really her story. Fitch Bits: Redemption Rock In order to fully understand the story of Redemption Rock, you really have to understand the cast of characters. It’s nothing without them and how they interacted during the long and brutal King Philip’s War and it all st
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Fitch Bits: The Sad Story of Ruth Blay

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This post was originally shared as a Facebook and Instagram "DID YOU KNOW" post. I share them and you can get in on the fun by liking my page at  Facebook.com/TheNewSlightlyOddFitchburg  and following me at  Instagram.com/SlightlyOddFitchburg ! Now onto the sad story! DID YOU KNOW that Ruth Blay was the last woman hanged in New Hampshire?   Say hello to Ruth Blay. She was the last woman to be hanged in New Hampshire and all she did was give birth to a stillborn child out of wedlock. There’s a lot going on here, so I’d like to talk in more detail later, but here’s a quick rundown:   Ruth Blay was a teacher and seamstress in 18th-century New Hampshire. She was born on June 10, 1737, and remained unmarried into her 30s. That would turn out to be a very bad thing for her.   She came down with a severe case of being pregnant in late 1767, which was a taboo thing for an unwed woman to do back in olde timey days. She continued to teach and carry on with her life until her 31st birth
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Location: South St, Portsmouth, NH 03801, USA
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Portsmouth, New Hampshire’s Haunted Red-Light District - Patreon Preview

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Welcome to this month’s patron exclusive post ! If you’re anything like me, you’ve already learned something new in the title, and there’s plenty more! Portsmouth, New Hampshire History Portsmouth, New Hampshire was first explored in 1603 and found to be home to a natural harbor that would allow big ships to use as well, a port. It was incorporated as a town in 1653 and given the name “Portsmouth”, but not for the reason you think. You see, it wasn’t given that name because it was a port, oh no. It was given that name in honor of the colony’s founder, John Mason. You know, John Mason, Portsmouth, makes sense, right? No? Oh yeah, that doesn’t make any sense. Wait, hold on, here it is! You see, John Mason used to be the captain of the English port of Portsmouth, Hampshire, England! Now it’s all coming together. They named the new town after his old workplace! It also turns out that ports have captains! You really do learn something new every day. Like, just yesterday, I learned that
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Location: Portsmouth, NH 03801, USA
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Fitch Bits: The Gloucester Sea Serpent

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  Watch the video above or read it in article form below! Fitch Bits: The Gloucester Sea Serpent DID YOU KNOW that Gloucester, Massachusetts has its own sea serpent cryptid? The waters around Gloucester and Cape Ann are said to be home to a 60 foot long, serpent-like creature with the head of a turtle! These sightings have been going on for many years, with the first occurring in the 17 th century. In 1638, just 18 years after the pilgrims landed in Plymouth rock, a feller name o’ John Josselyn made the earliest sighting. If you don’t know who that is, well, you’re not alone, but he was well-known in his time. He was a traveler to New England, and he wrote about what he saw and heard “with credulity.” Then there were a few hundred years’ worth of additional sightings, with the creature’s highest activity being recorded in the years between 1817 and 1819. These sightings were reported by fishermen and sailors with the descriptions always being pretty much the same. Sometimes th
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Location: Gloucester, MA, USA
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Fitch Bits: The Last Salem Witch Trial

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  Watch the video above or read it in article form below! Fitch Bits: The Last Salem Witch Trial DID YOU KNOW that the last Salem witch trial took place in 1878? "Witchonthefloorsayswhat?"   Yeah, so most people think the Salem Witch trials ended in 1693 after 19 women and one man were executed but think again! Just because one kind of crazy gets shut down doesn’t mean another one doesn’t take its place. So, it all started in May when a woman named Lucretia L. S. Brown decided to accuse a feller name o’ Daniel H. Spofford of “attempting to harm her through his ‘mesmeric’ mental powers.” That kind of sounds like he was trying to seduce her, but that’s not the case. You see, both people were Christian Scientists and that’s where most of these shenanigans started. "Yes, my name is Lucretia. You got a problem with that?" Christian Science was founded by a hot little minx named Mary Baker Eddy. She also wrote The Christian Science Monitor, Christian Science Sentinel, The
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Location: Salem, MA, USA
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Fitch Bits: Haunted Lake, New Hampshire

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This post was originally shared as a Facebook and Instagram "DID YOU KNOW" post. We share them weekly and you can get in on the fun by liking us at  Facebook.com/TheNewSlightlyOddFitchburg  and following us at  Instagram.com/SlightlyOddFitchburg ! Now on to the haunting story! DID YOU KNOW that New Hampshire has a lake so haunted it's actually named Haunted Lake, in Francestown? Okay, first the legends! Two travelers met at the lake and decided to work together. Then, you know how it goes. You start fighting with a coworker, one thing leads to another, and you end up killing each other. Also, the year is 1741. Then there's a story about a feller name o' David Scoby from Ireland. He moved to the lake and supposedly found the remains of one of the guys in 1780, and now their sprirts can't rest. Scoby, at least, is real. He built and ran a gristmill on the lake for many years until the water claimed his life. He died at the age of 86 in 1829. He was moving logs a
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The Gravity Hill of Greenfield, Massachusetts

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  The Gravity Hill of Greenfield, Massachusetts Okay, so here we are! Halloween is around the corner, the leaves are changing color, Slightly Odd Fitchburg: The Odd and Haunted History of Central Massachusetts is available in both paperback and Kindle , and gravity is pulling cars uphill instead of down! Good stuff! Oh, what’s that last part? Damn. I was hoping you were going to ask about the book I wrote that was published by Weird Darkness Publishing instead. Whatever, that’s fine. It’s not like we put a ton of work into it or that you can find it on Amazon or through WeirdDarkness.com or that it's super fun and guaranteed to make you more attractive or anything. Yeah, let’s talk about the other thing instead. Le Sigh . So, yeah, there’s a hill in Greenfield that makes cars roll uphill when they’re just sitting there in neutral! It’s a whole lot of fun and there’s a video later, but first, let’s talk about the fact that you’ve heard about this sort of thing before. Here
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Location: Shelburne Rd, Greenfield, MA, USA
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Fitch Bits: The Six Sailor Hangin'

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This post was originally shared as a Facebook and Instagram "DID YOU KNOW" post. We share them weekly and you can get in on the fun by liking us at  Facebook.com/TheNewSlightlyOddFitchburg  and following us at  Instagram.com/SlightlyOddFitchburg ! Now on to the odd story! DID YOU KNOW that six pirates were all hanged, on the same day in Boston, back in 1717? The whole thing revolves around the Whydah. That was the pirate ship captained by a feller named Black Bellamy. He and his crew of around 110 were transporting a stolen cargo of 20,000 LBS of gold which is, you know, a lot. Anyway, legend has it that Black B. had it bad for a woman named Maria Hallett of Cape Cod. He was supposedly stopping by to get his doubloons polished when a fierce storm rose up and sank the ship, along with its gold and crew. Black Bellamy, along with over 100 of his pirates were swept into the ocean and drowned. How do we know that? Well because the bodies washed up on the shores of Cap
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