The Witch's Trail
Where have all the children's wild playgrounds gone ... the one's steeped in kid lore?
To a suburban kid in the 1950s, any "wild" space stoked ancestral memory about "the olden days." In my community, we were steeped long and hard in our pioneer heritage. I doubt if that's true now. Whenever I visit Salt Lake City, I see fewer traces of its beginnings except for official statuary that is polished for the tourists. Wild spaces inspired childhood imaginations, but those places have been buried under stack-and-pack condos and offices.
One wild space that became folkloric bordered the eastern edge of Fairmont Park in Sugarhouse. This wide strip of undeveloped land between the street parking and Fairmont's swimming pool and other amenities inspired legends of The Witch's Trail. Lurking in the thick bushes was an old woman who loved to snatch children exploring her domain. Older boys regaled us little kids with grisly tales that sent shivers through us at each telling. Much like the old crone in Hansel and Gretel, she cooked children in stews, simmering them to culinary perfection with an array of wild herbs.
Huge elms sprouted from the banks of Parlay's Creek that emptied into an evil pond filled with algae that stifled any desire for a swim. Thus, the stream itself must have emerged from some murky hell, adding flavor to the witch's brews as well as our discomfort.
The banks were steep and slippery with loose sand, making passage along the trail much more treacherous. Boulders and willows provided hiding places where the old hag could lie in wait for her victims. No child ever ventured alone in this mysterious place. We only went there during the summer when the Church's Primary classes gathered for a picnic.
After the sandwiches and lemonade were consumed, we swarmed the Witch's Trail. Little kids. Big kids. All tromped through the thicket with titillating delight, ambushing each other and chanting taunts to awaken the accursed crone.
Of course, she never appeared. No one ever saw the Witch, although the older boys described her in hideous detail. She must've hidden her lair well because there was no sign of it anywhere. No one ever saw evidence of her crimes either; such as drag marks in the dirt, fragments of torn clothing, or wisps of hair clinging to broken branches. There wasn't even the miasma of evil. Certainly an old witch would have imbued everything with a lingering stench.
It did feel creepy, though. Even with bright sunshine filtering through the leaves, and dozens of children wildly stomping around its many twisted paths, there was an aura of potential doom. I always wondered why that particular space held the stories so completely. Some places do become eerie as people bring their folklore-tainted energy into the space over time.
Then again, it took very little to scare the bejesus out of a little kid. Whatever haunted energies had soaked into the earth on the Witch's Trail are now long gone. It has been cleared of trees and flattened for other development. It would be impossible to even find that same street after sixty years of reconfiguring the asphalt, cement, and glass that Sugarhouse has become.
Over the decades, bits of wilderness disappeared from Salt Lake's shopping districts. Lots of trees met their demise, but recent trends replaced residential lawns with xeriscaping. The city grew more crowded and children were tamed, no longer playing in the avenues and lanes. Even the gullies our mother's warned us about filled with multilevel architecture. With urbanization, computerized distractions and adult themes encroached upon childhood fantasies. Kids have become more sophisticated and jaded. Their imaginations are replaced by actual horrors they read about on the Internet.
Innocent tales of the Witch's Trail soon died away. The only places those old stories still creep in is on social media pages where old people, much like the crone who supposedly haunted the Witch's Trail, reminisce about how much fun it was back then to be a kid.
If you enjoyed this story, feel free to check out the Ring Around the Basin Archive.
Oh, children are so constrained these days! No more free wandering.
When we lived in a developing suburb of Minneapolis in the 1960s, I rode my bike everywhere. Down unfinished streets with platted lots, no houses yet. Past the weathered old barns on Penn Avenue. To the library. No kids my age lived near, so I rode by myself. Later, in Sioux Falls, there were old wooded lots where my bike and I could be alone. Nothing ever happened, except for peace.