The Dead Children's Playground - Alabama

 

This eerie playground adjacent to Maple Hill, Huntsville's oldest cemetery, doesn't just have an eerie nickname for fun. The playground was presumably designed to entertain kids while their parents visited the graves of loved ones. Legend has it, though, that the spirits of children, who've been buried in the cemetery since the first grave was dug there in 1822 come out to play at night. The living have observed orbs of light going down the slide, seen swings moving on their own, and even heard giggling. Creepier still, some say the spirits include victims of a rash of child murders that happened in the '60s, when bodies were rumored to have been found in the area that now houses the playground.

Furthermore, according to another legend, many children who died in Huntsville during the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic are buried in Maple Hill plots adjoining the playground. The spirits of those children, some say, come out after dark to run and play, as they might have in life. An online search turns up photos of unexplained shadows and orbs.  Dead Children's Playground receives several visitors each year including paranormal investigators. There have been several reports of strange events that have taken place at the playground, including swings moving on their own and the laughter of children. Although there is no official count of the number of children who died in Huntsville during the pandemic, or how many were buried in Maple Hill, the number must have been in the hundreds. 

Covering approximately 100 acres, and including more than 80,000 gravesites, Maple Hill Cemetery is also Huntsville's largest cemetery. Whether you believe it's haunted or not, Dead Children's Playground is most certainly Alabama's creepiest urban legend.