Arlington, TX

If you’ve lived in Arlington very long, chances are you’ve heard the story of Screaming Bridge.  Many a high schooler has ventured out to North Arlington at midnight to try to hear the screams of the girls who lost their lives in a tragic accident at the bridge.  There are many different versions of the story. Over the last 46 years the details of the accident and even the location of the bridge have changed (most accounts wrongly put it in River Legacy Park). It has evolved into the tall tales we hear today. But this urban legend is born out of a real tragedy. The real story goes something like this:

On February 4, 1961, six girls, all students at Arlington High, piled into one of their parents’ cars and went to a drive-in movie. Afterwards, they drove out on the old Arlington-Bedford Road, which was a little used dirt road at the time.

There were wooden bridges on the north and south sides of the railroad tracks.  A few days prior, on January 27, some pranksters had set fire to the bridge on the south side of the tracks.  It was blocked off with a permanent barricade.  It has been assumed that someone thought it would be funny to remove the barricades that had been placed in front of the burned-out bridge.

Around 9:30pm, 16 year old Bill Young and his girlfriend approached the bridge and, seeing a train, began to slow down.  As he slowed, he noticed the burned out bridge and stopped. He was backing away as the girls passed him.  He began honking his horn frantically to try and warn them , but as he tried to get their attention the driver apparently got spooked and drove off at high rate of speed, careening straight off the burned out bridge across the 40 foot ravine and landing upside-down in the creek bed.  Two of the girls, Mary Lou Goldner and Claudia Jean Reeves were killed instantly. Kathy Fleming was dead on arrival at Baylor Hospital.  The other three, Donna Post, Dorothy Ibsen and Jo Ann Anderson, were critically injured and taken to Baylor for treatment.  They had to wait for one of the girls to regain consciousness to determine the identities of the girls since they had no identification.

After the accident, an investigation was launched and the 4 boys who burned the bridge, also students at Arlington High, came forward. Clinton Veres, Tracy Stanley, Ronald Max Moore, and Richard Truett Rivers were brought before a grand jury, but were not indicted. No one was ever charged with removing the barricades.

Adding to the myth, another accident took the life of 2 women when they were struck by a train while crossing the tracks in the same location in 1994. 

Arlington-Bedford Road is now known as Greenbelt Road.  It links up Green Oaks with Trinity Boulevard.  The old wooden bridge is long since gone and the landscape has changed, but they say the screams still echo…

Happy Friday the 13th. 

Special Thanks to Carl Hullett for the photos.

Sources:  DFW Paranormal Research,  DFW Ghost Hunters, Carl’s Screaming Bridge Page, and this long thread at the Dallas Historical Society Forums.

Arlington, Arlington TX, Screaming Bridge, River Legacy Park, Arlington High, Car Accident