Le Soleil d'Hiver

The Montour Trail is a last resort for me.  It's typically too crowded.  But if you pick a chilly gray December day, with the slightest dusting of snow on the ground, you probably won't run into anyone.  Besides, the stretch from US-22 northward to Imperial is---though postindustrial---somehow otherworldly...in a good way.  If not for a hint of seedy Appalachian neglect, the little settlements along the trail would have a toy-like quality, reminiscent of the miniature Christmas villages of a toy train set.

Mingo Creek Church

Another historic church, again Presbyterian, since the Scots-Irish were the only Europeans courageous or fatalistic enough to settle the Pennsylvania frontier.  There's still an active little church on this spot, though its current building isn't much to look at.  The original log structure--above--was a constant meeting place for the leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion, and it's mentioned in many books of local history.

This is about three miles south of Finleyville, on the edge of the Monongahela Valley.  There is a lot of history around Finleyville, some enormous old houses and interesting ruins.  If I were a ghost-chaser (which I'm not), I'd definitely spend some more time in this area.  

Click to enlarge.  

Like many small rural congregations, Mingo Creek is currently served by a "lay pastor," who saw me poking around the property.  He was kind enough to miss a Steelers game in order to give me a tour.  Mingo Creek Church's cemetery has some of the oldest graves in this region.  John Hamilton--whose grave is here--was a prominent figure in the Rebellion.  

I like any cemetery with graves dating back to the 1700s.  

Mayview State Hospital

Mayview State Hospital is closed, and venturing onto the grounds will get you arrested.   But since this article was first published in November of 2011, it's received a lot of visits, and so I thought I would update it and add some more photos.  The demolition of all these buildings is now well underway.  

These pictures were taken in September of 2010.  The first time they were published online, I got a message from The History Channel asking permission to use them. 

Unfortunately, the West Coast lady who asked to use the photos was actually working on a documentary about another famous and now defunct mental hospital near Pittsburgh: Dixmont State Hospital. C'mon, Californians, who confuses Mayview with Dixmont?  

How many frantic adieus were said at this ominous portal?

Regionally, both Mayview and Dixmont have  evil reputations.  Dixmont might be a little more infamous because of the successful patient revolt that supposedly took place there.  But there's nothing left of Dixmont except a cemetery.  Mayview, though disused, is mostly still there.  It's currently being demolished, and it's guarded 24 hours.  I ended up on the grounds of Mayview accidentally--of course.  I was just walking down the railroad tracks when I crossed a bridge over Chartiers Creek (top photo) and stumbled onto the grounds.  I even picked apples in an abandoned yard as a few cars drove past me.  I guess I looked like I belonged there...

The sign at the door of All Faith Chapel reads "One More Year."  Is it the title of a sermon or a simple lamentation?  And shouldn't it be "All Faiths Chapel"?  Some of the oldest buildings were in very bad repair when I visited.  They had clearly been abandoned for a very long time.  I would have loved to get inside to see how mental illness was treated in the days before psychotropic meds: electric shock therapy, steam closets, water treatments....Click on any photo to enlarge it.  

Of course, once I realized that I must be on the grounds of the famed Mayview State Hospital, I looked for the quickest way out.  I mean, I'm a respected professional man; it wouldn't look good if I were caught trespassing on private property.  (S&J in no way condones or promotes trespassing.)  I did have to dodge a few security guards on my way out, hiding behind trees and in doorways.  And I ended up seeing a lot more of the campus than you would expect from a person who's just looking for the exit... 

Some of the old staff residences looked pretty interesting, too.  The farmhouse--second to the last photo--is the oldest building on the grounds, I think.  If my historical research is correct, it predates the institution, which was founded in 1893.  The City of Pittsburgh--which operated the hospital prior to its becoming a state institution--originally purchased the land from a struggling farm, and my guess is that the farmer occupied this house.  The sort-of stately brick homes were occupied by administrators and doctors.

McDonald Trestle

This is the the McDonald Trestle, a well known landmark along the Montour Trail.  

This is where the less groomed Panhandle Trail passes under the Montour Trail.
The Panhandle Trail doesn't get as much traffic or maintenance, but I like the fact that it's an interstate trail, leading well into the West Virginia Panhandle.  

The Montour Trail, by comparison, does a semicircle around the Pittsburgh urban area from Clairton, on the Monongahela, to Coraopolis, on the Ohio.  

Both are "rail trails," old coal railroads that pass through the grittier areas of small towns, old mining villages, and industrial complexes.  

And yet, they pass through open countryside, too, some of it pleasant.  The bleak November landscape is a companion on the journey.   

The Power of Suggestion

November at Hillman State Park, aka Bavington Game Lands: my constant retreat.

At a dinner party last evening, an acquaintance asked me where I do most of my hiking.  I told him that lately I've been pretty much restricted to the little-known Hillman State Park.  He asked, a little incredulously, "Do you go out there alone?"  When I told him that I do, he said, "The woods is kind of spooky out there, isn't it?"  My reply was dismissive.  "Oh, poorly reclaimed strip mines are always kind of spooky.  It's a beautiful place."  He wasn't convinced.  Then my acquaintance proceeded to tell me about a friend of his who won't ride his mountain bike at Hillman anymore because the last time he was there by himself, he got the distinct and frightening impression that he was being chased by someone he couldn't see.  

Of course, I explore "eerie" places just for fun.  If you're frightened by bleak countryside and rundown buildings, then Southwest Pennsylvania is no place for you.  You'd have to stick to a few brightly lit suburban shopping centers and upscale neighborhoods, but these too are beleaguered islands in a sea of old towns, old factories, old countryside.  Some of it's scenic--even lovely--but especially from November through April, much of this region is a little ghostly.  And so, as I explored a new area of Hillman today, I couldn't help but find it just a little bit spookier than usual.  I guess it's just the power of suggestion.  

It always sounds as if there's someone following you in the woods in late autumn.  Leaves fall.  Animals rattle the dry vegetation on the ground.  The wind blows.  I only chanced across three cyclists on the trails today, despite the fine weather.  It was a little creepy, but I enjoyed the "exposed" feel of crossing large, grassy clearings and leafless gray woods.  Every season has its beauty, and every place does, too...if your eyes are open to it.   

The Rev. Dr. John Anderson, Absentminded Scotsman

Here we are again at the famed Service Church in Beaver County.   Notice how the cemetery rises steeply up the hillside beyond.  The two little outbuildings on the right are indeed outhouses.

Since my last posting, I've learned a bit more about the history of this place--which was founded in 1790, just one year before the start of the Whiskey Rebellion.  The current structure (aside from the ugly white addition) was built in 1800.  From 1790 until 1800, the congregation and seminary met in log structures.

The Rev. Dr. John Anderson came over from Scotland with his aging mother, who died crossing the ocean and was buried at sea.  Anderson tried to land himself a parish in the Philadelphia area, but despite the lack of clergy in those days, he couldn't get hired.  Folks didn't like him.  He was a small, scholarly man with a high-pitched voice.  Most found him too otherworldly.

And so he made for the furthest frontier, where he eventually got a position at the fledgling Service United Presbyterian Church.  Since he was such an academic type, his superiors asked him to teach classes for clergy in training.  (Up to this point, clergy training had been done under the apprenticeship model.) And so he lectured four hours a day in addition to his parish duties.

It's said that he was an absentminded professor.  Once, while riding on horseback to an ecclesiastical convention, he was engrossed in a book, and he allowed the horse to simply follow the road in front of it.  As the sun began to set, he looked up and realized that he was lost.  He hurried to the door of the nearest house and knocked.  His wife opened the door; it was his house at Service Church.  Left directionless, the horse had walked in circles for hours and never taken the dithering Scotsman far from home.

Service Church, 1790

This is the historic Service United Presbyterian Church, founded in 1790.  Service Church is located in southern Beaver County.  In 1794, a Presbyterian seminary was created at Service Church, under the auspices of a scholarly-but-socially-awkward Scotsman, the Rev. Dr. John Anderson...who is buried in the adjacent cemetery.  The institution that Dr. Anderson founded is still in existence on Highland Avenue in Pittsburgh.  Don't tell Princeton, but Pittsburgh Theological Seminary is the oldest Presbyterian divinity school in the United States, and arguably the third oldest seminary of any denomination on the continent (outside Mexico).  

The cemetery at Service Church is a favorite with ghost chasers.  Some of the graves here date back to the last decade of the 1700s.  Veterans of the Revolutionary War and the Civil War are buried here, as are some fairly well known figures in Western Pennsylvania religious history.  Modern lovers of the "paranormal" claim to experience every kind of ghost and mysterious presence here: absurd animals, hooded figures, a silent "watcher in the woods."  

I don't mean to sound judgmental, but I suspect that anyone who senses a ghostly presence in this place is merely a noisome soul who doesn't know what to make of silence.  There's a deep and sacred hush here, and many people don't know how to interpret an absence of busyness and clamor.  Far from the eeriness described by many lovers of the paranormal, I felt an intense peace in this place, almost a reverent calm that spoke of holy things.  It was similar to the feeling I've experienced on old battlefields and in the cathedrals of Europe.  Early in the 20th century, Rudolph Otto studied the phenomenon of "daemonic dread," and he called it the most primitive precursor of religious feeling.  Now, it's true that some religious feeling can be downright creepy.  The trances, the glossolalia, the ecstatic utterances of the mystic or Pentecostal.  These religious states can be found on the outer fringes of Islam, Judaism, and Christianity.  But I suspect the seeming creepiness at Service Church is merely the "daemonic dread" that descends on noisy souls who find themselves in a profoundly silent place.