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Lakeview Cemetery and Bruce and Brandon Lee
Shortly before Weird Washington was released Al and I did recorded a short greeting to our readers.
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After my first firewalk, even though I had pictures, several people did not really believe that I had done it. A few of them were even interested in walking, or watching at least, so I held two more. So far only my friend Matt has walked the coals with me. In our last firewalk, in November 2007, we took a little video footage I produced a video I call Why Firewalking?, which is about four minutes long. It was interesting doing a firewalk on my own. It was more interesting when others asked to come to one. Most said they were going to walk the coals after me, but only one did.
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Shortly after Weird Washington was released I traveled to Seattle and did an interview with PBS station, KUOW on firewalking and other articles from the book. The interview lasts about 15 minutes, and is in highly compressed mp3 format below. Sorry the compression made it a bit scratchy.
In May 2008, my co-author Al and I did an interview with Seattle Television station KOMO 4's afternoon show. Below are excerpts from the show. KOMO-TV (video or see below)
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On July 3rd 2008, I was a guest on KATU's AM northwest morning show. It was interesting and fun, despite the fact that I showed up on the 2nd as well. I guess I had yet to embarrass the human race for the month of July. Anyway, I hope to get a copy of the interview posted soon. Until then, follow the link below:
OK, here (below) is a low resolution version of the interview, a bit smaller in size. Sorry.
“OH MY GOD!!!”
“You will never believe it, but we visited Gravity Hill, and it worked. We stopped the car, which was facing uphill, and put it in neutral, then let off on the brake. AND WE WENT UPHILL!!! Before we did this, we put some talcum powder on the bumper of the car, and when we stopped and got out, we found a bunch of fingerprints from the ghosts pushing us uphill!!!” I will not say exactly where this Gravity Hill it is located, except that it is within ten miles of downtown Prosser. Gravity Hill is not easy to find, the landscape around Prosser has lots of rolling hills, and the government put in many, many roads in a square grid work, with a new road every mile. However you know you have found the place, because someone spray painted a line across the road, along with the helpful suggestion of, “START.” I looked forward, the road seemed to rise steadily to a small hillcrest about eight hundred feet away. I left the car engine on, just in case, but put the transmission in neutral, and then let off on the brake. Slowly, the car began to move forward without any power. Uphill! I brought a GPS unit along with me, and compared the elevation and speed it recorded with my car speedometer. According to both gauges, the car accelerated to a top speed of eleven miles per hour in about three hundred feet. It kept steady at that speed for about two hundred more feet, and then the road grade increased dramatically, as we climbed the small hill. I turned the car around to try again. As we drove back over the hill, I stopped the car on the steepest slope, just over the crest of the little hill. We were definitely on a downward angle. I put the transmission in neutral, and let off the brake. We did not move.
Gravity Hill movie .wmv format Gravity Hill movie .mov format Another theory holds that it is all an optical illusion. Skeptics suggest that this kind of effect can happen when the surrounding landscape tilts in one direction, and the road tilts in another. Because of the multiple angles, the human eye is fooled, and a road can look like it is going uphill, even though it is really going downhill. That be true in a number of cases, but it seems unlikely in Prosser.
Experiment 1 at Gravity Hill in .wmv format
Experiment 2 at Gravity Hill in .wmv format The price for the directions to Gravity Hill was that I do not repeat them here. After all, this chapter is Roads Less Traveled, and I think we should keep it that way. If you find it, please be respectful of the local folk, after all, farmers carry guns to eliminate varmints.
At the height of World War I, Sam Hill, was vacationing in England, when he visited the real Stonehenge monument. Scientists told him that the Druids built the entire complex of standing stones at one time, around 2000 B.C. East of the open end of the stone horseshoe was a single large stone, they called the Hele Stone. Inside the circle was a large flat stone. Archaeologists told Hill that this was the altar stone, where the Druids performed human sacrifices. Hill remarked that in the 4000 years since Stonehenge was built, young men were still being sacrificed on the altar of war. When he returned to the United States, Hill decided to build a Stonehenge replica as a monument to the men from Klickitat County who died in World War I. Funding was hard to get, and it took Hill twelve years to complete his Stonehenge monument. It was dedicated on Memorial Day in 1930, the names of twelve Klickitat natives inscribed on the large stones. Washington's Stonehenge stands on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the Columbia River Gorge in the vicinity of mile marker 102 on Washington State Highway 14. Today there is a snack bar, and modern war memorial as well. Normally Stonehenge Park it is open during daylight hours. There are exceptions during the various equinoxes, solstices, and the occasional lunar eclipse. People usually gather before daylight to celebrate with the rising sun. Unfortunately, the hills east of the monument block out the rising sun, so that on the summer solstice, it appears south of the Hele Stone. Unless you believe that Hill and the astronomer purposely laid it out wrong, to stop pagans from worshipping there. If that was the case, it did not work. Today, thousands of people may gather to witness these events. If the weather is cold and windy, like in December, you can count on only a hearty handful of Druids worshiping nature in their thin white robes.
Stonehenge movie in .wma format
Stonehenge in Quicktime video format
Bruce and Brandon Lee
Seattle’s Lakeview Cemetery hosts many famous occupants. The early pioneers are all there, the Denny’s, and Doc Maynard. Princess Angeline, the daughter of Chief Seattle rests with the Yeslers. Most of Seattle’s mayors and many of Washington’s governors also found their final resting places in Lakeview Cemetery. However, they receive few visitors. Every year, thousands of people from all over the world come to visit two men buried there; Bruce Lee and his son, Brandon. Visitors are so common that when I went into the cemetery office to ask about another matter, the receptionist did not even look up from what she was doing. The woman pointed to a little box beside the entryway. In a tone that suggested she repeated the same things several times a day, she said, “there are maps to the Lee graves in the box beside you.” Bruce Lee created the discipline of Jeet Kune Do, or The Way of the Intercepting Fist. As a child actor, Lee starred in several movies made in Asia. In the 1960s, he was the crime fighter Kato, on television’s Green Hornet television show. He taught Kung Fu to many he-man type actors like Steve McQueen and James Coburn. He broke the racial barrier, and became famous as a leading man in Europe and United States as well as Asia. When he died in 1973, at the age of 32, there were rumors that he was killed for revealing Asian fighting secrets to Westerners. An autopsy surgeon told a skeptical public that Lee probably died of an allergic reaction to a prescription aspirin. Other people believed that Bruce Lee and his son, Brandon were like stars that shined too brightly, and burned out before their time. Brandon Lee died in 1993 at the age of 28, while filming the movie, The Crow. He was killed by an improperly loaded stunt gun. In the case of both father and son, their final movies were released after their death, to rave reviews.
Video and interview at Lee Grave in .wmv format Some people believe that the spirits of the departed sometimes come to their gravesite when friends and family gather there. Many people believe that they have somehow touched the spirits of Bruce and Brandon at their graves. At least one person may have evidence of that in a photograph. In the past, I traded several emails with TC O’Reilly. He had stayed in several haunted locales in the Seattle area. Most of the time nothing happened, but there were a few times. In 2004, he sent me the following photograph and email. Hello there, Mr. Davis. How are you
doing? It's been a long time
since we last talked. How is your latest book coming along?
Were you able to visit some of the places I asked you about? I
recently visited Bruce Lee's grave in Seattle and took some pictures and
found something very interesting in one of them. My girlfriend and I
were the only people there that day and she was standing in front of the
tombstone when it was taken, yet there’s still a reflection of what
looks like a small Asian man. Take a look and tell me what you think,
especially look in the reflection on the tombstone. Get back to me at
your convenience.
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