Spook Hill Burkittsville

The village of Burkittsville is a peaceful hamlet, nestled in southwestern Frederick County near the border with Washington County.  With a population somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 residents, it’s not the kind of place one would expect to draw much attention. 

That changed dramatically in 1999 following the release of a low-budget horror film, The Blair Witch Project, which was based in Burkittsville and featured scenes from Burkittsville cemetery which sits behind St. Paul’s Lutheran Church. The brilliant marketing of the film completely blurred the lines between fact and fiction and many were convinced that the story of three college kids who went missing while searching for the legendary Blair Witch witch was true.

The film was a smash hit, and brought in several hundred times its cost at the box office - to this day, it still holds the record for the generating that highest gross receipts versus budget costs of any film ever made.  Even though the vast majority of the movie was filmed a little over 30 miles south in Seneca Creek State Park, the iconic images of the cemetery and the lore of the mysterious Blair Witch that lured the film’s protagonists to Burkittsville inspired throngs of fans to invade the town looking for clues and remnants to unlock the movie’s grisly secrets.  A pair of sequels did not fare nearly as well, and while the townspeople worried that their serene burg would once again be overrun by curious fans, the crowds never materialized. 

Even though the Blair Witch story is apocryphal, there is another very real place in the town where things are not at all what they seem.  Dubbed “Spook Hill” by locals, it is a stretch of Gapland Road heading southeast from Gathland State Park toward the downtown area of Burkittsville, just past the intersection with Mountain Church Road. 

Intrepid thrill-seekers can experience the bizarre effect their car seemingly rolling up the hill toward the red barn that sits on the right side of the road at its peak.  Local legend holds that the mysterious forces acting upon vehicles on Spook Hill are the ghosts of Civil War soldiers who died nearby in the battle of Burkittsville. 

In fact, Spook Hill is one among hundreds of so-called gravity hills around the world where this strange phenomenon occurs. The true force behind gravity hills is gravity itself - a slight downward slope appears to be an upward slope due to an optical illusion created by the surrounding landscape.  That Burkittsville already has a reputation for being haunted definitely adds to the fun, though, and promotes a little suspension of disbelief.