THE OREGON TRAIL has been called the world’s longest graveyard. It’s a 2,000-mile road that averages one buried body every 80 yards. Out of the 350,000 emigrants that traveled along it, one out of every 10 died along the way.

There were lots of ways to kick the bucket on the Trail. Blood poisoning was a popular way to go — in those pre-antibiotic days, a minor scratch from a wagon fastener or prick from a thornbush could quickly go septic. And accidents — people getting run over by a wagon wheel, stepped on by an ox, or falling off the wagon and landing badly — were also common.

So it’s actually pretty ironic that the worst part of the whole trail was, in terms of body count, relatively benign compared with the rest.

That hasn’t prevented some great ghost stories from developing around it, though.

I’m talking about the dreaded half mile of 60-degree slope on southwest side of Mount Hood known as Laurel Hill. (Near Rhododendron, Clackamas County; 1850s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/24-05.barlow-road-laurel-hill-647.html)