Strange Roadside People

From TinWiki.org

The Strange Roadside People in this article include Leatherman, the Roadside Robot/Spaceman, and the Red-Headed Hitchhiker who are all reported in New England and parts of New York too.

Roadside and a telephone box

1 Leatherman
2 Roadside Robot/Spaceman
3 Red-Headed Hitchhiker
- 3.1 Sightings
- 3.2 Possible Identity
4 External Links

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Leatherman

The man known only as Leatherman

Old Leatherman they call him because all he wears is leather outfit made from other miscellaneous leather clothing. He first appeared in the 1860s and until his death in 1889, he kept living his life the way he has for decades. He makes a journey, in a clockwise direction, creating a 365 miles long route in cities and towns in New York and Connecticut. This circuit is completed every 34 days, being very predictable, he was almost like a calendar for the people who recognized him. He was not a begger, he was a very kind man and offered others food, matches, and tobacco. Leatherman, a Frenchman who spoke no words, lived in caves and to this day, we still don't know exactly why he was so fixed on his route and why he wore only leather - there are only theories Maybe he just tried to get the best out of people and understand life or even, pay up his karmic debt and add meaning to his life.

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Roadside Robot/Spaceman

The Roadside Robot or Spaceman was first mentioned on Spetember 5, 1967, in the Hartford Courant. The event took place in the night on Route 44, in Avon, Connecticut, right by Talcott Mountain. The first report came at 11:30pm Sunday night where the driver says he saw this "robot" or "spaceman" trying to hitch a ride. There are other witnesses, all describing the spaceman as having a one-piece silver suit and a reflective metal helmet concealing it's head. They describe the robot/spaceman as walking in a stiff manner, which to the eye, would get your attention. The Avon police were called up, but found no trace of this mysterious spaceman.

Donald LaSalle, Director of the Talcott Mountain Science Center was informed of the incident next day, and found it a bit comical and so he didn't investigate any further. The most obvious explanation that is was just a teen prank or something along the lines of that, but there is still ambiguity to the real culprit.

What is weird is that few people thought it was simply a hoax. Many of the motorists deduced it was an ET, but, there is no evidence that it was extraterrestrial.

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Red-Headed Hitchhiker

An artist's rendering of the Red-Headed Hitchhiker

The notorious hitchhiker who is only spotted on a 5-mile stretch of Route 44 between the towns Seekonk and Rehoboth, Massachusetts. The first sighting occurred in 1969, but attention of the Red-headed Hitchhiker was much more well known in 1994, when the book "The New England Ghost Files", was published by Charles Robinson. He uses pseudonyms for each witnesses names as he put each into the Witness Protection Program, so making the stories difficult, if not impossible to validate.

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Sightings

The first sighting in 1969 happened at around 11:30pm. The man looks at the passenger-side window and sees a face up against it and thinks it's very strange since he is traveling a 50mph. He noticed the red hair, a plaid shirt, and a unnerving smile on the man/ghost. When the man stopped and pulled over, the red-headed man was gone and he told Mr. Robinson, "That incident as left me shaken-up for the past 25 years". Another incident happened on February 25, 1981 where a woman was driving to Seekonk the thought she hit the red-haired man as he just materialized out of thin air. She didn't notice a sound although she hit him, but to check for damages and for the man, she got out of the car and saw not one sign of his physical body. She did hear though, a menacing laughter coming from the woods right nearby the route. On October 16, 1984, at approximately 10:00pm, a couple's vehicle broke down. The man went to search for help while the woman sat in the car waiting. The man approached a red-headed guy sitting next to the road and asked him where the nearest phone was and repeated the question after Red didn't respond. Then he started grinning more and laughed seemingly uncontrollably, so the man fled, but heard the laughter switching locations and following him a couple hundred feet. When he came back to the car he found out his wife had been taunted by Red via the radio, calling her by her name and laughing wickedly. She got out of the car and stood still until her husband came back.

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Possible Identity

Although it's not certain, there may be an identity to this red-headed ghost. A person from Rehoboth area has put effort into interviewing witnesses and she has found a person that could be the hitcher--a farmer from the same area who matches the same physical appearance. The theory seems promising, but their personalities are completely different, so the mystery remains on who the Red-Headed Hitchhicker really is.

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