Enigmatic 'Figure in Black' due on Cape Cod in December

He woke up in a Boston Hospital with total memory loss. His wound, a massive TBI that nearly split his brain in two, was said to have been the most damage ever, to a person who managed to survive such an injury. 

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Though never fully recovered, he was compelled by eerie 'headquakes' to board the train at Gray Gables, the welcome mat to Cape Cod. From there he would try to get to Provincetown before New Year's Day, 1911. Provincetown - the end of the line; where he was certain he'd find out what manner of ill fate had befallen him.
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And yet, he was unable to keep from getting off the train at every one of the stops along the route, to help people in trouble more desperate than his own.
Twenty-one stops to Provincetown, if he could last that long.
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Cape Cod's Figure in Black - COMING IN DECEMBER ON AMAZON, iTUNES, BARNES & NOBLE, SMASHWORDS & MORE.

Bill Russo is also the author of Ghosts of Cape Cod, based on the life and 'afterlife' of some of Cape Cod's most unusual people.

His blog about meeting 'Littlefoot' has been read many thousands of times and the encounter was featured in his book "The Creature From the Bridgewater Triangle" as well as on television, in the Lore Podcast, and on film.

The award winning documentary "The Bridgewater Triangle" features an interview with Russo that has made him known to thousands as the 'ee wahn chew' guy.  That eerie call came from the mouth of a hairy being that some people say was a "Puckwudgie".

His tale has also been featured on Destination America (in Season Two of Monsters and Mysteries in America) as well as "America's Bermuda Triangle", which is a one hour film that airs regularly on the Discovery Network's channels.

Russo's encounter was the subject of episode seven of the award winning podcast "Lore".  Titled "Into the Woods" the segment has been critically acclaimed and helped to push the Lore podcast to 3.5 million listeners per month, as well as win the iTunes award for Best History Podcast of 2016.  All episodes of the Lore Podcast are available for free, on the website.

Discussions are being held with the producers of "Walking Dead" about a series based on the Lore Podcasts.

UK Viewer says Bridgewater Triangle Film 'Fueled by Drugs, Alcohol and Mental Illness'

By Bill Russo

"A cornucopia of oddballs, and a hilariously bad video from a guy wearing dark glasses and a facial expression that telegraphs his inability to sell the lie, he should absolutely avoid playing poker with that face." - portion of the comments  by 'Wingman S'

If you are an author, performer, or a witness in a film or TV interview, you will be subject to bad reviews.  It is part of the territory.  As a writer of more than a dozen books I have a trunk full of bad reviews.  Some of them were actually helpful.  They pointed out shortcomings that I addressed.

The Golden Rule for those of us who have been involved in books, film, radio or TV, is 'simply ignore the reiews and NEVER respond to them'.

I am about to break the rule.

As a witness, I have appeared in film and television interviews about a creature sighting I had before the turn of the century.  My blog about it (on Hubpages) has been read many thousands of times. There's a section in the blog that asks readers if they believe in ghosts, swamp creatures and such.  54 per cent of the readers have said they are 70 to 100 per cent believers.

Another 13 per cent say they are 51 to 69 per cent believers.  "I just don't know" say 19 per cent. One per cent say they are 30 to 49 per cent believers.  Ten per cent are 'total skeptics', and finally, two per cent of the readers say "Hey Russo, You're Nuts!"

I guess that 'Wingman S' from the UK fits the last category and that's ok.  Speaking only for me, I do not drink and I say "NO" to all drugs except coffee. As for being crazy, I've always been crazy, it keeps me from going insane (to steal a line from Waylon Jennings): but to call the whole cast and crew of the film 'mentally ill' and suggest that the production was fueled by "Alcohol and Drugs" is just too much.

Here's the review Wingman posted on IMDB - after you read it, I hope you'll go to IMDB and post a review of your own.   If you haven't seen the film, it's shown regularly on Destination America and can be streamed cheaply.  The DVD is available at the Bridgewater Triangle Documentary Website.

The ONE STAR REVIEW....

by Wingman S..as posted on the Internet Movie DataBase - IMDB

"This review is actually for the shortened version that was shown on TV, but even after they had distilled it down to the better material there is still zero substance here.

Generally when someone tells you an unbelievable story you automatically start trying to figure out a logical explanation, but for most of the people on this show that isn't relevant, most of them can be dismissed out of hand simply because they are clearly suffering from some sort of mental illness, the rest is likely drug or alcohol related.

In the first few minutes we're reliably informed that all of the phenomenon are connected, the bigfoot sightings, UFO's, hauntings and devil worshipping etc, because these things traditionally go hand in hand and trying to connect them isn't the work of a lunatic.

4 minutes in and we get a cryptozoologist who doesn't know that bears can stand upright as well as run on all fours, I realise that it's Pseudoscience and he is actually just a quack, but you'd think he'd know simple stuff like the capabilities of a common bear. This unfortunately sets the trend for the entire show.

We live in an era where pretty much everyone carries a phone with photo and video capability, and this is supposed to be an area where loads of weird things happen, logic would dictate that people would be going out of their way to get pictures or video evidence, yet where is it? That's right not a single shred of credible evidence, just anecdotal evidence from a cornucopia of oddballs, and a hilariously bad video from a guy wearing dark glasses and a facial expression that telegraphs his inability to sell the lie, he should absolutely avoid playing poker with that face.

I think there is a greater mystery here and questions need to be answered, but that would only be solved by looking at the rate of mental illness in the triangle compared with elsewhere, as there does seem to be clear evidence to suggest there may indeed be something in the water there."

Remembering Those who Fought "Over Here"

A young boy in 1944 using his Mom's Ration Card to buy a Can of V-8

There are only about 600,000 U.S. World War II veterans still living as of Veterans Day, 2016 But there are many millions of others still living, who fought and survived the war - those who battled on the home-front. 

Though I was a toddler, I still remember my Mom shepherding my brother and me into a tiny room where we had to stay in total darkness during the nightly air raid drills in a Massachusetts seaside city. Mom would give us milk and cookies that she somehow was able to manage even though all food and even gasoline was rationed. We sat in that room for what seemed like hours until "Nick", the Air Raid Warden knocked on the door of our tiny third floor apartment next to the railroad tracks and said, "Hey Russo family - It's all clear. Turn on your lights"

The volunteer air raid people, the people who willingly accepted less food and gasoline so their would be more for the soldiers: these people were heroes too. On this solemn Veterans Day, I thank all those who fought "over there" as well as those who fought "over here".

Cape Cod says "No" to Pot, but the Provincetown Area says Yes!

Eleven of the 15 Towns of Cape Cod, vote against legalizing weed

by Bill Russo

By a spread of eight percent in the November 8, 2016 election, voters chose to make Massachusetts the first Eastern state to legalize marijuana for recreational use.  The large margin of victory, 54 to 46 per cent, indicates widespread approval of the measure.

But the island/peninsua of Cape Cod voted against the ballot question - with the exception of the outermost Cape, where all four towns said 'yes' to pot.  The total vote of the dissenting towns was 5981 yes votes and 3629 no votes. The tiny city of Provincetown led the way with 1717 people in favor and only 537 against.

Across Barnstable County which includes all 15 towns of the Cape; Question Number Four was beaten back 64,541 to 59,758.  Cape Cod is commonly divided into four sections - Upper, Middle, Lower, and Outer.  The upper section includes the towns of Bourne, Falmouth, Mashpee and Sandwich.  The section wide vote was 24,504 in favor and 27,166 against.

In the Mid Cape towns of Dennis, Yarmouth and Barnstable; the vote was 22,731 for and 26,116 not in favor of legalization.  The City of Barnstable is the Cape's largest community and is comprised of a number of villages including Hyannis, the unofficial capital of Cape Cod.

The four Outer Cape towns, Brewster, Chatham, Harwich and Orleans said no to pot by about 1500 votes, with 11,325 in favor and 12,812 against.

Under the newly passed legislation pot becomes legal almost immediately.  Residents will be allowed to have up to ten ounces in their home and one ounce on their person. Citizens will be permitted to grow their own marijuana.  Pot stores however, will not be begin to appear for about two more years - and even then local communities will have a large measure of control over the venues. This could mean that the Outer Cape will have a proliferation of such establishments but the other parts of the peninsula may be unreceptive to allowing pot stores.

By Region, here are the vote totals, with the 'yes' votes listed first, followed by the 'no' votes.

Upper Cape:

Bourne: 5178-5516
Falmouth: 9373-10,071
Mashpee: 4126-4749
Sandwich: 5807-6830

Mid Cape:

Barnstable: 12,314-13,391
Dennis: 4237-5028
Yarnouth: 6180-7697

Lower Cape:

Brewster: 3220-3467
Chatham: 1924-2611
Harwich-3982-4449
Orleans-2199-2285

Outer Cape:

Eastham: 1875-1783
Provincetown: 1717-537
Truro: 963-546
Wellfleet: 1426-763

Among the tiny islands off the coast of Cape Cod, most notably Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, the playgrounds of presidents, celebrities, and billionaires, voters were in favor of legal pot by a margin of two to one.  The final tally was 11,671 in favor with only 6268 opposed.

The largest island community, the town of Nantucket voted 4,083 for the question, with 2320 against.

Massachusetts had voted in a prior election to legalize marijuana for medicinal use.  A few dispensaries have been opened, but the state seems to have put up a number of road blocks to implementation of the law.

Supporters of the legalization of pot, hope that their elected and appointed leaders will be more prompt this time around.

The $50,000 Ghost in a Jar

How much would you pay for a real "Ghost" trapped inside an old Mason jar?  When it was offered on Ebay some years ago thousands of people queued up for a chance to be haunted by the eerie occupant of the jar, which was found in the cemetery pictured below:

The auction was posted by "Teajay101" who related the following account of how he became the unhappy owner of the 'evil spirit'.

“Back in the early 1980s while out metal detecting, I came across an old abandoned cemetery with the foundation of a home-site or a church, or something, nearby.  My detector indicated there was something in the ground close by: the southwest corner of the foundation.

After digging down about two feet, my shovel struck a wooden box that was nearly rotted out.  The metal hinges and hasp were about all that was left of it. I thought I had discovered a fortune! Boy did that ever turn out to be wrong!!

There were two jars and an old journal in the box.  The jars had some strange writing and symbols on them.  While getting the jars out of the ground, I dropped one and it broke.  A black mist or something seeped out of it.

I should have known something was wrong right then and covered the thing back up – but being young and foolish, I didn’t.

I left the broken jar with what looked like a candle in it, there where it fell and took the other one and the old journal home.

What I was able to read in the journal before the pages crumbled made the hair on the back of my neck stand up!

That night I had my first visit from what I can only describe as “The Black Thing”. This thing fell on me while I was lying in bed and it felt like I was being pushed down through the bed and the floor into a pit!!! I struggled with it and managed to somehow escape its clutches.  Since that time, I have been attacked twice more and both times the unopened jar was in the close vicinity.

I and others have caught fleeting glimpses of a black, shadowy thing out of the corners of our eyes, as it would pass from one room to another."

Fifty thousand dollars! That was the high bid for the 'Ghost'.  It was made by a man from the Netherlands.  What of that man today?  What of the "Ghost"?  The answers to these and other questions are in the new Kindle book, Weird Tales of Ebay Sales.  Pictures and stories of the most bizarre  auctions in the Ebay Bazaar make this quick read a must for anyone looking for a a few laughs or a peek into a sideshow of curiosities! 

www.amazon.com/Weird-Tales-Ebay-Sales-Bizarre-ebook/dp/B01LW2MFBK/ref

Ghosts Take Top Spot in New England!

For the first time since its publication one year ago, The 'Ghosts of Cape Cod' has reached the top spot in its niche in the Amazon Kindle Sales Charts.  Bill Russo's book that takes readers on a virtual 'spectral' tour of the 64 mile long island/peninsula had previously reached as high as the fourth position before finally attaining Number One on its one year anniversary.

Click the link to view the book on its Kindle page...  www.amazon.com/Ghosts-Cape-Cod-Bill-Russo-ebook/…/B01BL1TP7U
#1 in Books > Travel > United States > Massachusetts > Cape Cod
#16 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Reference > Trivia & Fun Facts > Curiosities & Wonders
#47 in Books > Humor & Entertainment >

A message from the author, "YIPPIE!!!! The Ghosts of Cape Cod finally hit number one in its genre!!!!! Thanks eveybody."

Dallas Changes the Course of Mankind Forever

Make no mistake about it. Dallas really did alter the lives of everyone on the big blue marble - forever! The monumental action is detailed in my short story D B U L- which has received a fair
 amount of attention. Three reviews are listed below.

 You can read about Dallas' seminal action for free by clicking the link -www.smashwords.com/books/view/649363

1-"Review by: Mike White on Sep. 06, 2016 :
Given the way this brief story unites two disparate time periods through its pop culture and news references, it's enough to make one wonder about how people will connect with what happened in Dallas when they read about it in the future."

2-"Review by: James Jenkins
At the time of reading I did not associate this work with any real life events.

It works well as a stand alone story. Credit is given where credit is due."

3-"Review by: Malcolm Torres
That is an interesting spin on what happened in Dallas. When I heard the news about this event, the robot, I thought it was weird and didn't think of it again until I just read your story. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this."