Small family cemetery with a debunked Route 66 ghost legend
30356 S 4130 Road, Catoosa, OK
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Family cemetery; respect private burials and visit during daylight
Access
Limited Access
Rural gravel road, grass
Equipment
Photos OK
Timber Ridge Cemetery is a small family cemetery at 30356 S. 4130 Road, located approximately six miles east of Catoosa, Oklahoma, off Highway 412. The cemetery is documented on Find a Grave and listed by Oklahoma haunted-places aggregators as 'Haunted Hollow' in some sources.
The site is family-owned. Local community discussions describe ongoing burials and visiting family members. No National Register listing or major historical archive entry was located during research. The cemetery itself is a routine rural family burying ground; its public reputation rests almost entirely on a single piece of folklore added in a published Route 66 haunted-places guide.
The Oklahoma GenWeb Rogers County project and the Cemetery Census project for Oklahoma (cem007) preserve transcriptions of Timber Ridge's earliest burials, which were compiled by Clarence Page of Inola. Family records indicate the burial ground has been continuously maintained since the early 1900s. BillionGraves and Find a Grave records collectively document more than 500 memorials. The cemetery is presently kept locked at all times because of repeated trespassing and vandalism; access requires advance permission from the family caretakers.
Sources
The popular legend attached to Timber Ridge Cemetery describes the ghost of a young Indigenous boy hit by a car while riding a bicycle in the late 1980s, said to be buried at the cemetery and seen as a spectral figure on the roadside. Drivers have reportedly felt unexplained impacts, heard the sound of striking something, and described abandoned bicycles at the scene that vanish on inspection.
The original author of a Route 66 haunted-places book has subsequently described the story as invented to drive book sales. According to Oklahoma sources discussing the legend, an actual fatal accident did occur involving an Indigenous teenager, but he was riding a motorcycle, not a bicycle, and the accident took place approximately eight miles from Timber Ridge Cemetery, not at the cemetery's gate.
The legend is preserved here because it is widely circulated and frequently searched, but should be presented to readers as folklore invented for commercial purposes rather than as community oral tradition or documented incident. The cemetery itself is a family burial site that deserves visitor respect.
Media Appearances
Timber Ridge Cemetery is a small family burial ground at 30356 S 4130 Road, off Highway 412 east of Catoosa. The 'ghost boy on bike' legend popularized by Route 66 haunted-places guides has been described by its own author as invented to drive book sales. Drive past the gate during daylight; do not trespass on what is private property.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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