Legend has it that White Lick Creek Bridge in Danville, Indiana, just west of Indianapolis on Highway 36, is haunted by the ghost of an Irishman. "Dad" Jones was one of many Irish immigrants hired in the 1850s to build a bridge across White Lick Creek. He died tragically in the process, and his spirit is said to linger there to this day.
Drowning in a Vat of Concrete
As the story goes, the workers were building wooden frames to support the bridge and pouring concrete inside. One afternoon, Dad Jones happened to be standing on a wooden platform above the frame when it collapsed, plunging Jones into the wet cement below. His fellow workers were at a loss to help him as he slowly sank. The doomed worker could reportedly be heard hammering his fists against the wooden sides of the vat until he ultimately suffocated.
Deciding What to Do with His Remains
The man was surely dead, but was his fate to remain encased in the vat of cement forever? The company in charge supposedly debated for several hours, ultimately refusing to retrieve the man’s body and ordering that work be continued, in spite of objections by some of the workers.
The Bridge Is Destroyed, but the Spirit Isn’t
For years thereafter, local residents reported that the sound of the man’s final screams as he was pitched into the concrete that slowly swallowed him up could be heard in the night. They also claimed to hear the sounds of hammering coming from inside the concrete pylon. Eventually, the bridge was torn down and replaced (the concrete foundations of the original trestle can be found a short distance away from the new bridge), but people continue to report seeing an apparition of the man walking through the nearby woods, especially when the moon is full.
