Mephisto's Corner ep 4: The Antioch Gates of Hell

[Music] [Applause] hello everyone welcome back to Mathis toes corner a podcast where we discuss the unexplainable the paranormal and our morbid reality thank you for joining us as we add fuel to your nightmares I am your host ready to glare with my co-host Jacob in this week's episode we will be discussing the Antioch and gates of Hell and the Empire mine road yeah these supposed gates of Hell and the terrain behind this metal barricade it known as the Empire mine road is riddled with stories of myths death and blood is this place haunted well we hope to give you enough information to where you can answer that question for yourself so let's get spooky in the city of Antioch California exists the desolate Trail called Empire Mine Road Antioch is actually one of the oldest towns in California anyway alongside the road leading is a seemingly innocuous gate with concrete slabs a metal frame and graffiti locals call it the gates of hell as it is rumoured that if you pass through them bad things will happen to you beyond these gates might be hell on earth there are many accounts of paranormal phenomenon happening at this location and because of the myths surrounding this location the infamy of the Antioch gates of Hell has become something of an urban legend itself literally enter at your own peril just like this podcast huh anyway the gates of Hell are said to be the entrance to the realm of the Dead or the house of Hades according to Bible scholars moral character makes no difference we are all designated to enter this realm when we depart from this life and descend into darkness okay so totally not being dramatic at all sounds like tumblr poetry so bad poetry duh the Antioch gates of Hell and and mine Road are said to be slew to all sorts of paranormal activity ranging from floating orbs of light or as zak bagans says light anomalies to ghosts demons and their even supposed sightings of possible cryptids in this account written by a user called Cristian haunted places org says a group bus went over the gates which was a cement block at the time everyone got scared and ran back except me and my husband and we were walking on some sort of what used to be a road we were surrounded by dark and all of a sudden it felt like people ran up on us and rocks were being thrown at us clearly this person does not use punctuation so I apologized for how this is Fred we ran back to the car also on Marsh Creek Road one night we were parked on the side of the road and something what I thought was a mountain lion slammed down on the trunk of the car I quickly rolled up my window and locked the door my husband looked back and he yelled did you see that I didn't but he said whatever animal ended it on the trunk got up and walked like a human into the hills I've noticed that many people sharing these stories whether it be themselves or friends when they went beyond the gates of Hell they felt a sense of dread so perhaps this explains why the Friends of this couple could not go beyond a certain point before getting too scared it is common in these experiences for people to feel like they're quote unquote run up on or that they feel like many hateful eyes are upon them and this is not the first time I've heard this in sensation of rocks being thrown at people who visit the Empire main road though I think it should be said that a lot of teens go here to drink and do drugs and they never really experience these feelings a lot of locals call [ __ ] about the hauntings and the worst part about it is that it used to be used for drug use and other criminal activity though there are many who truly believe this specific trail and region is hot spot yeah the idea of haunting seems to come from the strange history of empire mine road legend said there is a haunted slaughterhouse and abandoned insane asylum and a gravity hill beyond the gates of hell apparently the gates of Hell and Empire Mine Road were actually the gates to what was supposed to be a gated community in the 1950s yeah I actually read the same thing and also saw that the plans or abandoned because the death of a group of children which will actually talk about later also it should be noted that the road has since been closed for quite some time so vehicles can no longer drive here but of course when will that ever stop people from coming to explore this road without vehicles so you could say it used to be a highway to hell okay let's cover the insane asylum first because I know this one seems to be the most contested okay so supposedly there's an old and abandoned insane asylum or at least the remains of one at the very end of Empire Mine Road the asylum has a history of abuse lobotomy and brutal murder basically your average haunted insane asylum you've seen in many if not every different horror movie it is said that the spirits haunting this road are there because of this asylum as mentioned things are said to be thrown at people people are being pushed and even blood-curdling screams have been heard these screams are assumed to be of those who suffered at the insane asylum some people believe that the asylum itself is a portal to Hell basically basically like a gate within a gate gate exception as I like to call it this place is not filled with nice spirits these spirits are said to be evil in nature and one could possibly say that these could be demonic in nature and perhaps the violence that occurred in the insane asylum or caused by possession I feel like mental tuitions are always associated the [ __ ] like this granted many of them do have a horrific history but I think they appeal to the idea of evil spirits because of the negative connotation associated with mental health back in the day hence the term insane back then there wasn't great treatment for mental illnesses as they weren't really understood so yeah this is convenient yeah they were also called lunatic asylums mad houses lots of controversial treatments I mean many of these patients were abandoned by their own families they were forgotten that said I did not find any records of a mental institution in Antioch California nor did I find any records of treatments in Antioch but maybe I didn't research well enough who knows well locals say the mental institution thing is just a myth the supposed remnants of the mental institutions seem to just have been the foundations of the abandoned housing development we mentioned before so safe to say I think the mental institution is a quash because we can't find any records and even locals are saying there's nothing there yeah and pulse one nothing's there what can you put up creepy a mental asylum where people got [ __ ] lobotomies yeah commune well still makes for a good ghost story lease but seems like that is all it is so let's move on one of the other creepy locations near Empire Mine Road is the slaughterhouse sounds creepy right an insane asylum and a slaughterhouse definitely seem to be hitting all the classic horror landmarks in this episode but yes slaughterhouses are quite creepy well turns out it's actually a granary silo as in where you store grains so probably a little less creepy anyway slaughterhouse sounds more dramatic so we can pretend that's accurate the story is that there is the ghost of a prior groundskeeper the most common things said to but at this location our clanking noises and the feeling of being watched there are also rumors that KKK meetings happen there now as well as satanic rituals I actually read on a post from someone who runs a paranormal page that he spoke with the owner of the slaughterhouse quote-unquote slaughterhouse and the owner confirmed it was in fact a granary silo so we don't even need to pretend it's a slaughterhouse at this point but I've never seen anything about that KKK in my research so it's like wait the KKK aren't they supposed to be dressed like ghosts of Confederate soldiers so is this is this what people are seeing just a bunch of white races [ __ ] dressed up in sheets you know I don't who knows but I have heard about the satanic rituals that have taken place but there really is no hard evidence that I can find I'd assume that the legend of the road and the gates of Hell probably entices individuals to go there to do the rituals as opposed to the rituals causing the slew of activity said to be going on there I agree yeah I think it's safe to say that people have had I mean it's it's possible people would do satanic rituals there yeah like what I would surmise is that people go there hoping to conjure [ __ ] whether it's via Ouija board or actual ritual so going back to the ghost of the old groundskeeper real quick apparently it is an old man that walks the grounds and does his duties of when he was alive so he's not evil some say you can hear footsteps behind you but that's about it what I read was that there are some eyewitness accounts that have seen a man covered in blood some blame down the road moaning for help until he reaches the gates in which he cannot cross in a story published by a woman called Sarah Krupp of the contre times an article I have yet to find I might add that apparently there was a murder that occurred in 1995 the story goes that he was murdered by a stabbing from a pissed-off ex-girlfriend his throat had been slit his jaw had been broken and he was stabbed in the back of course once again I could not find any record of the murder or the article so the events and reasons of this murder are unknown though there are also accounts of people seeing a woman with a bloody knife who screams in rage stalks around and even hovers above the ground hmm so how did she die then heartbreak maybe she sounds like a stereotype a convenient one doubt she ever lived doubt that murder ever happened yeah well either way some people say maybe that was the old groundskeeper perhaps or maybe just some murder that happened in the area close to the slaughterhouse or none of them ever existed or not only ever existed so another strange happening in the desolate stretch of land is the existence of a supposed a gravity hill for those who do not know what a gravity hill is a gravity hill is a seemingly mysterious place where cars drift uphill there are like 15 of them in just California if you drive your car at the bottom of the hill and put it in neutral it will proceed to roll up the slope and not down as logic would dictate there are apparently many of these bizarre gravity Hills around the world so it's obviously not exclusive to the Empire Mine Road right yeah these gravity Hills are not exclusive to just the Empire Mine Road though for Empire Mine Road the association with the gravity Hill is much more tragic than the others yeah and it has to do with the children that died in the bus accident in the night fifties but first I want to share an article from paranoia magazine.com written by Olaf Phillips telling a story about the gravity hill of empire mine Road I just need to note paranoia magazine that's an interesting title alright very believable it was a quiet evening as we approached this mysterious spot armed only with our senses in a bag of flour we placed our car into position at the base of a small incline in near Antioch and we gently dusted the back of our car with a thin layer of flour which we were told would reveal the source of our haunting just be patient it will happen our guide alerted us and just a few minutes later the car began to roll the car didn't move fast but it moved with a slow silent movement slowly up the hill as we crested the hill our cars slowed and stopped just as we'd been told eagerly we ran from the car to inspect our trunk and what we saw was swirls and scuffs as though ghostly hands had rested themselves on the thin layer of flour their voices gently carried on the all-too-common breeze of the area and their message was just lost whispers gravity Hill is a strange place nestled in the middle of a largely uninhabited part of Antioch only a small distance from the legendary black diamond mines whose haunting is the stuff of legend but in this case we found ourselves in the darkness surrounded by fields and the wreckage of a former slaughterhouse looming in the distance so why does the car get pushed well the theory goes like this in the 1950s on a rainy day a group of children were on a field trip and we're driving along the Empire Mine Road the bus lost control and ran off the road crashing in a quote-unquote wash leading to the deaths of all the children of drowning the children of the accident are now eternally tethered the location where they met their tragic fate the gravity Hill are the ghosts of the children pushing cars up the hill prevent other motorists from what happened to them or is this something else at work it's pretty interesting after looking up videos of gravity hills and doing outside research I found an article on science alert calm that explains that gravity hills are actually optical illusions and are very elaborate illusions the article says it's such a good illusion that you need proper equipment to really see the truth here's a bit of what the article states quote if you got some surveying equipment or GPS markers to actually measure the difference between the top of the slope and the bottom you'll realize that everything is actually in Reverse the embankment is sloped in a way that gives you the effect that you are going uphill materials physicist Brock Weiss from Pennsylvania State University told discoveries and breakthroughs in science back in 2006 you are indeed going downhill even though your brain gives you the impression that you're going uphill but if a hill is physically sloping one way so much so that cars actually gain quite a bit of momentum when they start drifting up how can our eyes trick us so bad every time according to psychologists it's all about the horizon either it's obscured in areas with gravity hills so we don't have a proper point of reference or the horizon is there but it obscures how the hill slopes in relation to the rest of the landscape it's really strange but very interesting so it seems like it's just basic physics at work so I guess maybe that's all the gravity Hill is I can see how people will consider this paranormal because it sounds kind of creepy if you experience it firsthand okay but there's also actually another supposedly haunted location I want to talk about it is not really related to the gates of Hell or the Empire Mine Road but it is said to be close by and it actually might have some historic documentation to make the claims legit at least there's a grave this involves the black diamond and the infamous Rosehill symmetry so the black diamond mines in the Rose Hill Cemetery sitting north of Mount Diablo yeah you heard that correct Mount Diablo the black diamond region was once a coal mining committee in the late 1800s to the early 1900s with this type of community they're of course going to be urban legends and ghost stories considering all the negative aspects mining brings such as black lung disease and mining accidents that ended the lives of many miners so there is a legend that is the most prevalent and that is the white witch's of the black diamond mines we're really really going on originality for this one why is it always white witches ladies in white what what's with the white where the witches in black I'm missing the gothic vibe here yeah I feel like you know even my hometown has a lady lady in white urban legend so I guess during this time period of hauntings that I guess white clothing was in vogue it's like you knew you were gonna die so you're like hey let me wear white so when I reappear I'm gonna be the lady in white right there just like I just want to be pure anyway the spirits of Sarah Norton and another woman called Mary haunt the area Norton was a midwife who died when her carriage fell over order or according to some legends she was thrown from one while she was on the way to deliver her baby she was crushed to death the day of her funeral a fierce storm prevented the service they tried again only to have the same thing happen and because of this she was buried without a ceremony in Rose Hill Cemetery it is said that her spirit is still seen there hovering over the graves since her death in 1879 Mary was another infamous resident of the area and live there also during the 1870s she was a young woman accused of witchcraft because she was a nanny at the time and all the children she cared for died of illness the townspeople found evidence of her sorcerers leading to her execution by hanging she is seen guarding the mines oh and white so there's a clear discrepancy I need to point out that I'm sure some listeners are gonna notice so I have two versions of the story some say that Sarah Norton is not the white witch there's only one and that title belongs to Mary while some say they are the same spirit that roams the mines and the cemetery still the legend is clear there is at least one woman in white seen hovering above the graves at Rose Hill Cemetery guarding the mines and wandering along the Summersville Road at night so is there any aspect of this that stands out to you that you can possibly believe or for you is this kind of just turban legend than that set the thing that strikes me the most about this is the lack of nuance like all of this [ __ ] there is nothing of specific that we can confirm that is we can confirm the existence of Sarah Norton okay fine and she's supposedly a lady in white right or the white which one if not she was just a woman who had a tragic death I guess okay so what I'm saying is we have one or two white women in white or white witches we have a creepy asylum that potentially wasn't even [ __ ] there we have a slaughterhouse that just people put their [ __ ] grains in you know like all of this stuff it seems so generic that it almost makes me feel like these are such easy things to make up I think about where my grandpa has this country and then there's this forest and there's this creepy little house in the forest and I could easily attribute so much meaning to that generic meanings like she's The Witch of the forest and I feel like all of this reads so similarly to a kid wanting to attribute meaning to something where there really is none and I'm not contesting that nothing of tragic happened I'm just saying all of these things put together like you said and like we both said are very stereotypical horror movie type tropes they all sound trophy to me there's nothing that sounds like an actual person you know who isn't like the stereotype like the nanny who had all the kids who just died so it's hard for me to believe genuinely any of this even pushing to my maximum like the least cynical part of me all of this to me sounds like crap really just I don't believe any of this none of this to me reads this true I think that behind the gravity hill gravity Hill they're like 15 of those in California I believe those but I do think that it's science I don't think it's children right guys so you do believe in the gravity hill phone yeah I've seen the videos on YouTube okay so you do believe in physics science but okay I believe in science I don't think there's like a bunch of children coming back to help push a car I think being one of the oldest cities of California I think that's what you said yeah then I can see why all these generic urban legends sprouted from it being that it's an old mining community and you know it's closed down and a desolate so I think it creates a lot of imagination for people to kind of like create these to tell children and I will say I think it's quite strange that there's many different things surrounding Antioch that I feel like it's like so many things it makes it not believable because there's just so much stuff but if you pick apart all this urban legend I'd be curious to see what underlying fact may be relates these paranormal stories in these urban legends because they say urban legends are set to be built on something that actually happened so yeah and the thing is also to determine whether the thing that actually happened isn't a tiny thing because you know how towns work right a person will say hey I like the color pink next thing you know next week someone will say hey she only likes the color pink and every other color can go get [ __ ] and that's kind of what happens with these little things like someone will trip and cut their knee and someone's gonna be like did you hear bill pushed Sarah and she broke her [ __ ] kneecap so like it's it's the kind of thing where even if there is a base story is that base story big enough and important enough to support an urban legend because you know an urban legend like some real [ __ ] needs to happen for it to be considered an urban legend right personally I think it was closed down by authorities because of all the criminal activity that was going on there there was a bunch of arson and they're like this is not worth it we're gonna close it down and I think with closing it down that probably added to the hysteria did you know the hysteria people are wondering why is it really the criminal activity you know I would be curious to investigate this place to see if I get at least a sense of you know some paranormal activities you know going on like someone's gonna throw a rock at me you know or like yeah I mean as much as I don't I don't believe any of this as I think has been established at this point I also don't think I'd want to go there the same way that I feel about Ouija boards it's like I don't know what they can do I don't necessarily believe they can do something but I don't like [ __ ] with energies that don't want me there and I feel like overall that's how I feel about this place whether the [ __ ] is real or not I don't feel like I'd want to be in that area because it seems so repulsed by everyone if anything of this is true you know I'm getting here rocks thrown at you screams the [ __ ] with the night the bloody knife you know like [ __ ] floating over the graveyard that to me just says like you're not invited don't come here it all respects the non invitation I don't want to come yeah okay that's fair that's fair yeah plus I don't really like hiking so that'd be a problem for you okay well I think that's a good place to close up shop here at Mephisto scorner if you have any recommendations for future episodes you want to hear us about that we can well if that ready to glare can totally debunk for you hit us up at Mephisto's corner at gmail.com and or you can go to our Instagram at Mephisto's corner and also if you are watching slash listening to us on YouTube feel free to leave your comments down below especially if you've had an experience at Antioch or somewhere that you think is comparable we'd love to hear about it and read it in the comments down below so feel free to let us know about that thank you guys so much for listening she is [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: READY TO GLARE

Views: 47,111

Rating: 4.9304061 out of 5

Keywords: antioch gates of hell, antioch california, antioch, paranormal, supernatural, urban legend, urban myth

Id: UN4G9q4zQA8

Length: 30min 1sec (1801 seconds)

Published: Sat May 18 2019