The Indian Lake Project and the Spooky Adirondacks

My aunt had just told us that she found an old Ouijia board in a cabinet in her room of the lake house. Being nine years old, my cousins and I were extremely excited by the prospect of calling back the dead. But then nighttime hit and along with it: fear. All the parents decided to head over to the lodge for drinks leaving us alone in the big unfamiliar house with the Ouijia board. My older brother, ever the drama king, grabbed the fire poker exclaiming that he wasn’t taking any chances. I could tell my little brother was on the verge of being terrified so I demanded that we stop talking about scary stories. After some board games and lots of laughter, we began to forget about ghosts completely. Then suddenly a lamp switched off and the room went dark. We all started screaming and running up the stairs into one of our bedrooms. The windows were locked, curtains shut, and a bed was moved to block the door. The next morning, I woke squished in with my brothers and cousins in the other bed. The daylight gave us the courage to walk downstairs and recount the story to our parents. After they all laughed at us, they pointed that the lamp had a timer and was set to turn off at night. Maybe it was the mysterious woods surrounding us or hearing the calls of the loons on the lake but there is something spooky about the Adirondacks.

I know I’m not the only one who feels this way about the Adirondacks. The blog, “The Indian Lake Project” acquired a large following from those who also associate the Adirondacks with mystery. The author of the blog just calls himself John and claims that his Uncle was hiking by Indian Lake when he found an old metal box filled with photos, film, and documents. Throughout the blog, pictures and other relics are revealed and begins unfolding the mystery of a possible “crime involving children… it seemed that these children were all part of some United States Government experimentation.” The blog was started in 2005 and continued until 2013 but with very few posts in the last few years. While the story seems plausible, there are many people who became fans of the myth.

So what is it about the Adirondacks that leads people to create these scary fantasies? It’s one thing to fear bears or getting lost in the woods. The wild can often be out of human control and that scares us. Yet, I don’t think that’s the fear that drives these fantasies but instead, the association between the wild and the separation from the rest of civilization. When you’re camping in the woods, there’s no cell service or Internet or even a nearby road. You’re on your own. It’s the idea that Indian Lake is a remote enough spot that a crime could take place without anyone knowing that drove the blog’s success. As a kid, I felt that if I saw a ghost, no one would hear me scream and there would be nowhere to run. While that blue line protects the environment of the Adirondacks, in our wildest fantasies, it separates us from the feeling of protection from the rest of the world.

Sources:

"John" "The Indian Lake Project." The Indian Lake Project. N.p., Oct. 2005. Web. 04 Apr. 2016.

Meier, Eric. "A Look at an Adirondack Urban Legend - Indian Lake Project."LITE 987. N.p., 5 Mar. 2015. Web. 04 Apr. 2016.