The legend of Green Man also known as No Face Charlie . He was a real person whose legend spread to many regions

Just like the legend of the 13 Bends Road the Green man Legend has some truth to it but it has been re told and adopted by other community's .
I remember hearing about the green man in  Allegheny County's South Park clear back in the 60's when I was a young kid he was supposedly a utility worker who got severely shocked and skin turned green and he
would hang out around a tunnel off Piney Fork Road

http://hauntsandhistory.blogspot.com/2007/12/green-man-of-south-park.html

Only problem there is absolutely no truth to him hanging out there or in north hills or anywhere else in Allegheny or any other county except Beaver County in the town of Koppel
He was a real person named Raymond Robinson

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Robinson_(Green_Man)

http://www.weirdus.com/states/pennsylvania/local_legends/green_man/

 http://www.lawrencecountymemoirs.com/lcmpages/17/ray-robinson-aka-the-green-man-koppel-pa

http://www.timesonline.com/charlie-no-face-the-life-and-the-legend/article_b87c3f73-9069-5d83-9a83-e8f7a02cc5db.html

http://whofortedblog.com/2011/09/26/green-man-true-pennsylvania-legend/

 

He was also known as no face Charlie and in fact was severely disfigured by an electric shock when he climbed a trolley bridge and struck a power line  as a kid .

My friend Joe Mallack 2nd from left with the green man Raymond Robinson

Greenman's Tunnel South Park

While he lived and only traveled the roads around Koppel in Beaver county mainly Pa 351 his legend has gone all over the place where people have meet him and how he was injured  all just made up story's and if you really did meet him in Koppel you would have to be well into your fifty's to have done so.
I traveled  sections of Koppel/New Galilee road many times as a kid  both days and nights as a short cut to Ellwood city where our family stayed with friends along Conequenessing creek and never ran into Raymond  until one nght when we where on our way home from new castle and I still use the road as I have customers in Beaver falls and Ellwood City  and I travel down Wallace run Road  Pa 551 and go over the bridge on Pa 18 which replaced the trolley bridge where Raymond was hurt and never knew this is where The Green Man legend came from till  I started working with an older electrician from beaver county  Joe Mallack 73  who personally knew Raymond  and would protect him  and one time he and his biker buddies took Raymond to Ohio for a beer  I found  this out while researching this article on Raymond .
So another legend busted unfortunately. But he did exist but no where outside the Koppel area  but still fun to tell your grand kids or scare a girlfriend so she holds you tight as you go check his tunnel

Shades Run and the Purple Gang is there any truth to the Legend in Penn Hills ?

My Friend the late Noel McCarthy known to everyone as Grizzly often told the story of Shades Run.
 It is located along Allegheny River Blvd just as you cross from city to Penn Hills and go over a concrete bridge .

Its all grown up this time of year but normally you can look up the Hollow.
Grizzly talked about a pack of Wild Dogs runs around it and how Body dumps and suicide victims where found there but he also talked about the Purple Gang or Purple Hood gang who conducted  mayhem and murder  in the  caves hidden among the weeds during the 1920's Boot Legging hay days

As you can see in the Google Earth Image its a very big very thickly wooded area some of it encompassed by the Former Government Run VA facility to the left .
While victims of foul play and suicides as well as walk away's from VA who lost there way and perished where  found in the area  as well as cases of wild dogs running free in area have been documented  .I can find nothing on the Purple Gang or Purple Hood Gang linking them to the area other than the notorious Purple Gang in Detroit which was loosely associated with the mob and had dealings  in almost every big city during boot legging days supplying booze   and possibly  did business with Larocca  Crime family here in its early days .
But almost all of the old mob of Pittsburgh have passed into history  and if the actual purple gang operated here other than to deliver booze to the city  I can find no evidence of it or the supposed caves

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1499&dat=19500203&id=WuMpAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ZyMEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5356,833005

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1129&dat=20001106&id=2rNRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=iG8DAAAAIBAJ&pg=7007,5350488

I am hoping I will run into an older Penn Hills resident who might be able to further fill in the story or legend .
and also some day I hope to explore the area to see if there are even any caves up there which is always a possibility with terrain in area but for now it seems more legend than fact. Like the 13 bends road across the river in Harmar Twp.

7-11 clerks murder during robbery in Wilkinsburg goes 30 + years with no answers

The store along  1614 Penn ave in Wilkinsburg  now an independent C store was once part of the 7-11 food store chain and it has been the subject of numerous Hold ups over the years but in 1982 it was the scene of a murder .The stores owner Eustace Durado 52 was found stabbed in the store by a neighborhood youth who stopped in to shop when he found Eustace stabbed and having  bleed to death on the floor by  unknown assailants

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19820323&id=FdgcAAAAIBAJ&sjid=914EAAAAIBAJ&pg=6837,3497076

Its is one of the oldest cold cases in the eastern suburbs  of Pittsburgh  and there has been absolutely no leads who or why. 

The store now has a security window for after dark and cameras something it did not in 1982

When security cameras where still very expensive Black& White  and not very good in quality.

Thousands ride past this store daily as they go down Penn Ave the original US 22 /30 to the city to work 

but at night its isolated with few close homes mostly apartment buildings that sit back from the road.

Hopefully some one will come forward with information but this was just as the mills went down and people scattered to all points of the country So unless there is a DNA match some day it will go down as unsolved. 

A Treasure supposedly hidden in Mckees Rocks before the Revolutionary War

Seems beside all the bad things that go on in McKees Rocks  there is rumor of a fortune hidden some where in or around the burial mound said to be cursed.
Supposedly  it is the collected wealth of John McKee who McKees Rocks is named after
who took up sides with the french and Indians against the British and  who disappeared into the Ohio river with a jump from a cliff never to be seen again .

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19011016&id=IRAbAAAAIBAJ&sjid=kEgEAAAAIBAJ&pg=3547,6671999

Now mind you this is all rumor and nothing more than a sensational article in a newspaper and its not the only story of fortunes waiting in hiding to be reclaimed  hidden away during the various wars which took place in early america or stolen by highway bandits  to later be picked up particularly in Fayette county also known as Fayettenam for a reason. 

But with all these storys about hidden treasures you think by now with all the coal mining and property development which has gone on it would have been found by now but there may well be some day some one with a metal detector out looking for coins and such just so happens to come across just such a find.

Unfortunately thou its mostly old forgotten grave yards and building foundations found not treasure but you never know. 

Butler County Girl vanishes in 1985 with out a trace

It was a cold snowy day when  8 yr old Cherrie A. Mahan
got off her school bus on Corn Planter Road in rural  Winfield Twp  after a long day at school and vanished into thin air never to be seen again despite a massive manhunt by the entire community for her.

There has been no trace or contact its like she was just sucked into a vortex
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19850223&id=jKccAAAAIBAJ&sjid=GGIEAAAAIBAJ&pg=4863,3874822

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1129&dat=19950726&id=6dhRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=im4DAAAAIBAJ&pg=3638,6125357

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1129&dat=19870825&id=Cp5SAAAAIBAJ&sjid=IG4DAAAAIBAJ&pg=2195,6893514

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19851204&id=Fd4cAAAAIBAJ&sjid=CGMEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6405,4582685

The only possible clue to her disappearance a van with a skiing scene on it kids report was in the area

Unfortunately there was a van like this driving around a woman owned which had nothing to do with the case which caused even more confusion 

Still a very rural area of butler county despite development

One weird twist to this whole case is the name of the road she disappeared  on
Cornplanter Road .
It might mean a farmer planting corn which there is plenty of in Butler County .
But there is also a legend and curse that goes with this name the name of a great Seneca Indian Chief  Corn Planter whose grave was disturbed when the Allegheny was flooded to make the Kinsua Dam  and is said to have put a curse upon the land.

 http://www.examiner.com/article/kinzua-dam-a-paranormal-hotbed

The Allegheny River passes right thru Butler County .

Coincidence?