Located in Newton Falls, Ohio, which is the town where Shawn is from and both Shawn and Marianne work, is a covered bridge that dates back to 1831. We have been by and over this bridge on many occasions, but this blog is focused on the folklore of it being a "Cry Baby Bridge."
The Newton Falls Covered Bridge, in Newton Falls, Ohio, was built around 1831. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974. It is also known as the Arlington Boulevard Covered Bridge. It spans the east branch of the Mahoning River. It is a three-span truss bridge and has vertical siding.
It is unusual for its pedestrian walkway, which was added in 1921 for children on their way to the school on Center Street. "The Newton Falls bridge is considered the second-oldest existing covered bridge in Ohio, the oldest covered bridge in use on its original site, the only covered bridge in the state with a covered crosswalk, and the last surviving covered bridge in Trumbull County.
Legend of a Cry Baby Bridge
An old story or legend that would travel from town to town in the days of traveling salesman is one that is called the "Cry Baby Bridge" story. When salesman would visit all of the small towns along their route, selling their goods, they would also spend their time telling stories in local pubs and bars that they would hear from other towns. People would surround them to hear the different tales, most of which were made up and elaborated stories. When you begin to piece these stories together and try to find the origin of them, you find a pattern that a lot of the same stories would appear in different towns. Maybe with slight changes from time to time, but the basic plot of the story is the same. In paranormal research, we call these stories, "town jumpers."
This is the case with the story of "Cry Baby" bridges. There are many of these bridges across the country, and the bridge in Newton Falls has the same rumor also tied to it's mystique. Like I mentioned, the basic plot of the stories are similar, but there are many different versions. As for the Newton Falls cry baby bridge legend, either there was an unwed mother that gave birth out of wedlock and she threw her newborn baby over into the water from the bridge, or she was walking over the bridge one day and slipped and fell in the water with her baby. Either way, there are those who report hearing the sounds of a baby crying from somewhere in the water under the bridge.
In our following video we tell you a little bit more about the Newton Falls Covered bridge and go over the folklore of "Cry Baby" bridges a little bit more.
Surprisingly, we do not have many pictures of this bridge. This is one of those locations that we drive by very often. We should probably stop there some day and take some photos so that we could have them archived. Please let us know down in the comments if you have heard about the story of "Cry Baby" bridges before and if you have one in a town near where you live.
