Lou’s View – March 5, 2015
The Altamaha-Ha
by Lou Bernard
Of course you know I love Central Pennsylvania. Lock Haven is my home. I love writing about Sugar Valley and Wayne Township. Even Glen Union is okay. But sometimes, I just want to break free a little.
Because I hear it a lot: “Wow, there’s so much neat stuff in this area.” Which is true—And I’m certainly not complaining about the people who say that—But the truth is, there’s a lot of good history and legend in most areas. The difference between Lock Haven and any other area is that I’m here to dig up these cool stories.
This is why I’m declaring March my “Travel Month.” No, I’m not physically going anywhere, but my column is going to take a little run around the country. For each week in March, I’m going to write about legends and interesting stories from some other area. Don’t worry; I’ll be back to Clinton County in April, but for March, I’ve decided I want to feature some other neat locations.
I’m going to start with southern Georgia.
I’ll admit it never once crossed my mind to visit Wayne County, Georgia before. But I’ve been down a few times, because my wife is from there. Personally I could cheerfully go the rest of my life without ever visiting my in-laws, but she likes to go and see them. I can generally be talked into this trip about once every three years or so.
One of the things I have investigated down there is the Altamaha-ha.
You probably either just laughed, or squinted in confusion. I don’t blame you. But it turns out the Georgia has its own river monster story, because there’s no reason Loch Ness should have all the fun.
The river, which I investigated, is the Altamaha River. It’s about ten miles from where my in-laws live, and I investigated the monster because A) I am interested in monsters, and B) It got me out of the house.
This creature is named after the river, and called the Altamaha-ha. It’s been seen in the river since the Native American times: A snaky, scary monster that mostly stays underwater, occasionally surfacing and brushing up against swimmers. Imagine the Loch Ness Monster, but with a southern accent.
When I went down a few years ago, I looked into it, photographing the river and interviewing possible witnesses. I found an old couple on their porch swing, and asked them,”Have you been here long?”
“’Bout three months,” said the man. (I’m not sure if he meant they’d been in the house three months, or on the porch swing three months.)
“Have you ever seen the monster?” I asked.
“Monster? You mean like the Loch Ness Monster? Nope, no monsters….Got some gators, eat ya right up.”
Okay, so much for interviewing witnesses. But I did better when I visited the library and looked up the historic information.
Wayne County, Georgia, was the site of a lot of rivalry between the Native Americans and the settlers. It got so bad that the settlers had to build a fort to keep the Natives across the river—And I think the Native Americans spread a rumor about a monster to accomplish the same thing.
I noticed that a lot of the earliest sightings were reported by the Native American tribes, and they made the monster sound bigger and more vicious than later sightings. Plus, the Native Americans particularly loved a game they called “Mess with the White Man.” I suspect they made up the monster, and spread the stories. Ever since then, sturgeon have swum in from the ocean and enhanced the legend—A sturgeon is a huge, ugly fish, and I admit, if one of them brushed up against me in the water, I’d go leaping out screaming “Monster” too.
I suspect the Altamaha-ha is a combination of the Native American legend, plus sightings of large turtles or sturgeon. Of course, you never know. There might actually be monsters in that river. I’ve heard weirder, often from my sister-in-law.
