Lonesome Lock

THE CHILLING TALE OF LONESOME LOCK

In 2006, my husband and I witnessed mysterious lights at Lonesome Lock, which is located off the Towpath trail in an isolated area of Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Hearing other people's accounts of "fairy lights" recently made me re-evaluate what happened that night.

I believe their stories harbor corroborating details in regard to our strange time. More challenging than I thought it'd be (surprise, surprise), I was inspired to tell our story by doing a quick build.

Many years ago, my husband and I decided to go cycling on the Towpath at midnight. It was our third trek there, and we thought we could loosely investigate any paranormal activity at Lonesome Lock. Though we had a flashlight and a mini recorder, we just decided to sit and observe without those tools. This was WAY back in the days before all of the fancy equipment was popular and/or widely available, so our eyes, ears, and gut were our guides.

The entire story and the creepy history of Lonesome Lock unfolds in the YouTube video (posted below), but in essence: We were sitting in complete darkness on the east side of Stumpy Basin off of the Towpath. This area has a lot of swampy, dense brush and is bordered by the Cuyahoga River.

Suddenly, bright green/white rapidly-strobing sparkles started to manifest in the air, forming an egg-shaped orb. It was floating about 2'-3' in the air above the southeastern edge of the lock where the terrain gets dangerous - especially in pitch-black conditions. All points considered (and the video is more of a case file than a build), fireflies were not present in September and could not produce that effect. No LED's or hobby drones capable of it either back in 2006.

As the lights intensified, the atmosphere became extremely foreboding. Animals darted out of the brush at the same time; maybe they felt what we were feeling? We hightailed it out of there a mile and a half back to the car, while trying to figure out what just happened.

It has remained a weird memory for both of us but the more I heard others talking about their "fairy light" experiences, the more this occurrence made sense to me.

The Towpath Trail

Lock 31, or Lonesome Lock

Southeastern edge

Facing north

Facing southeast

Recreating what we saw (in the video)

Of course we started with insulation foam, as it is fairly easily moldable into a stone look.

Texturing with a wire brush

Texturing with a foil ball

I didn't realize how difficult this would be to build, since I have limited space. I decided to only make the portion of the lock where we were sitting that night when the lights manifested. In reality, this structure is 90' x 15', so I had to scale it down to 1:72. And again - it's not even the entire thing!

Maybe when we move and I have more room I'll rebuild it, since the larger the model = the better the photographs.

Final stone texture

Quick build = corrogated cardboard

Dark foam board for the ground

Using coffee stir sticks for a makeshift sturdy frame

Dry Dex joint compound to smooth out the seams, then sanding

Good old black acrylic

Trying to figure out how in the name of Jesse James I'm going to create these shapes?

Dry Dex joint compound to add texture

Sanding to prep for painting and weathering

I was going to use the same leopard spot technique as I used on the foam "rocks" for the Hellier tunnel, but I quickly abandoned that plan.

Using a small sponge and applying an acrylic black wash, letting it run down into the texture of the "rock"

After a first pass of light grey dry brushing, painting on some more streaks

Last pass of light grey dry brushing to highlight the texture and edges

The top of the lock's surface

Since this was just a quick build to tell the story, I'm just hot gluing the pieces down

HOT GLUING TIP: For foam and meltable material, use the lower temp setting on your hot glue gun.

Ask me how I found this out, lol

Get a silicone brush, they said. It is more economical than buying chip brushes, they said. This thing didn't work very well. Maybe if the PVA glue was thinned out it would have been better.

And believe it or not, the static grass applicator has a learning curve.

I was originally just going to use an old cell phone to project the mysterious lights through this little cutout but I changed this piece later to sit at 90° and reflect off of a piece of angled plexiglass.

I gathered some twigs from outside, sprayed them with 3M adhesive, and dipped them in fake foliage to make trees. Said foliage doesn't like to wash off your hands when soaked with 3M adhesive. I mean, so I've heard... *ahem*

Trying to make it look all foresty. This scene was harder to create than I thought.

The cell phone will be hidden away in this little compartment made of EVA foam.

I decided to change the cutout piece to face inwards so I could place a piece of plexiglass to project the video off of.

You can see the camera light reflected off of the hidden plexiglass. This is where the mysterious "lights" will manifest.

I found a video of floating lights on YouTube

The structure is comprised of cardboard and EVA foam walls making it easier to move the phone in/out for photos

Hiding the phone in the compartment

And there we have a quick build of haunted Lock 31 on the 308-mile stretch of the Erie Canal.

The south side of the lock

If I were to do this over, I'd make the top slab thinner and use better mini foliage.

Dime for scale :)

In case you're short on time or you don't feel like watching me 3M* my fingers to fake foliage, here's the Reader's Digest version. Either way, it's guaranteed entertainment.

*For the record: This is the first time I've used 3M. Normally, I just super glue my fingers together. You know the drill.

Thank you for being here! I'd love to hear your stories. Feel free to send questions or comments in the Contact section! Till next time...

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse