Clinton Road, West Milford: The Truth Behind New Jersey's Most Haunted Road

Clinton Road runs north from Route 23 near Newfoundland to Upper Greenwood Lake, in the township of West Milford in Passaic County. For almost all of its roughly ten miles it passes through undeveloped land, much of it the City of Newark’s watershed and state forest, with only a handful of houses. It is narrow and twisting, and parts of it were dirt until fairly recently. After dark it is very dark indeed.

Weird NJ magazine made it famous, printing so many reader stories that it once gave the road an entire issue. Since then it has been ranked again and again as one of the most haunted roads in the country, and in 2024 a car rental company’s survey put it at the top of the US list. A 2019 horror film is named after it. But behind the legends are some real places and one real crime, and knowing which is which makes the drive far more interesting.

The real history of Clinton Road

The road takes its name from Clinton, a small settlement that stood roughly where the road crosses Clinton Brook. In 1826 William Jackson, son of Stephen Jackson of Rockaway, began building an iron furnace here, and Clinton Furnace was in blast from 1833 until 1837. Its tall stone stack still stands beside the brook, listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1976. The Newark water department fences it off. In 1892 the Clinton Reservoir was built on the site, and the old village disappeared.

Writing in 1905, local author J. Percy Crayon described the “Five Mile Woods” beyond Clinton Furnace as dangerous after dark, haunted by robbers, counterfeiters, witches and ghosts. So the road’s reputation is older than the automobile.

That same year Richard James Cross, an English-born railroad official and banker, began building a three-story stone summer house on high ground near the reservoir for his wife and three children. The family called it Bearfort; everyone else called it Cross Castle. The estate covered 365 acres plus the 77-acre Hank’s Pond. Cross died in 1917 and the family sold the land to the City of Newark in 1919. A fire later gutted the house, and its stone walls became a graffiti-covered hangout for hikers and teenagers until the Newark watershed authority razed them in 1988 as an attractive nuisance. Trails still lead to the foundations.

Nearby, the Jungle Habitat safari park ran in West Milford until it closed in 1976, which is the root of the stories about strange animals in the woods. And on May 18, 1983, a cyclist on Clinton Road found the body of Daniel Deppner, wrapped in a green garbage bag, with a vulture feeding on it. The mob hitman Richard Kuklinski, known as the Iceman, was convicted of his murder. It is the one recorded case behind all the rumors of bodies dumped along the road.

The legends of Clinton Road

The ghost boy at Dead Man's Curve

The best-known story is set on the bridge over Clinton Brook at a sharp bend near the reservoir known as Dead Man’s Curve. A boy is said to have drowned there, or in some versions to have been hit by a car while playing on the bridge. If you toss a coin into the water at midnight, the story goes, he will throw it back, and some say you will find it on the road. In darker versions he pushes anyone who leans over the side into the water.

When the Weird NJ team visited, they found dozens of coins on the creek bed, and local reporters still see them there. There is a second bridge further south, near the old furnace and a waterfall, and nobody agrees which bridge the legend belongs to. No record of a drowned boy has ever been found.

Phantom headlights and the ghost Camaro

Drivers describe a pickup truck, or just a pair of headlights, that comes up fast behind them at night, tailgates them to the end of the road and then vanishes. A Travel Channel special in 2009 featured the story. A West Milford resident told the local paper in 2024 that headlights had followed her twice before disappearing.

Another reader story is about a ghost Camaro driven by a girl who supposedly died in a crash on the road in 1988. Telling the story while driving the road at night is said to make the car appear.

The castle, the furnace and the rangers

Cross Castle collected the wildest tales: Satanic symbols in rooms with no entrance, hooded figures, visions and unexplained bruises, and a castle that rebuilt itself every October 30. The stone Clinton Furnace was said to be a Druid temple. One group of campers near Terrace Pond told Weird NJ they were given summonses by two park rangers, and later heard that no rangers patrolled there and that two had died on duty in 1939.

Strange animals

Readers report a grey-white wolf with reddish eyes they called a hellhound, monkeys, a floating dog and creatures they could not name. The usual explanation is that animals escaped from Jungle Habitat after it closed in 1976 and bred in the woods; Weird NJ is the source of much of this lore, and there is no evidence for it.

Where to look

• The bridge at Dead Man's Curve: the bend by the Clinton Reservoir where the coin legend is set; look for coins on the creek bed in daylight.
• Clinton Furnace: the 1826 stone stack by the brook, fenced off by the watershed but visible from nearby.
• The Cross Castle site: the foundations of Bearfort on watershed land near the reservoir, reached by trails.
• The empty middle miles: the long unlit stretch where the phantom headlight stories are set.

Driving Clinton Road

Clinton Road is a public road and you can drive it at any time for free. It leaves Route 23 near Newfoundland, at an intersection known for one of the longest traffic light waits in the country, and runs north to Upper Greenwood Lake.

The real dangers are ordinary ones. The road is narrow, poorly lit and twisting, cyclists use it, and local drivers go fast. West Milford’s mayor told the local paper in 2024 that she has never met anything paranormal there and asked visitors to drive slowly and safely. Lost drivers often end up knocking on the doors of the few residents, which does not make the road’s fans popular.

Much of the land along the road belongs to the Newark watershed, and Clinton Furnace is fenced off. Stay on the road and on marked trails, and do not climb fences or park on the bends. If you want to see the furnace and the castle site properly, go in daylight; Terrace Pond and Wawayanda State Park are good hikes from the north end.

• Visiting A public road through Newark watershed land and state forest; Clinton Furnace is fenced off and the castle site is on watershed property
• Hours and season Public road, always open
• Tickets Free
• Ghost hunting No organized investigations; do not trespass on fenced watershed land

Tips for your visit

• Drive it first in daylight, then again just after dusk, so you know where the bends are.
• Keep your phone charged and your tank full: there are no services on the road.
• If you toss a coin at the bridge, do it from the shoulder in daylight and never stand in the road.
• Read Weird NJ’s Clinton Road issue before you go; half the fun is matching the stories to the places.
• Pair it with Ringwood Manor, a short drive east, for a haunted day out in the Highlands.

More haunted places nearby

• Ringwood Manor and the rest of haunted New Jersey: Ringwood’s haunted ironmaster’s mansion is a short drive east
• Shades of Death Road: New Jersey’s other famous haunted road, in Warren County to the west
• Mid Orange Correctional ghost hunt: our ghost hunts in an old prison in Warwick, New York, just over the state line
• Haunted places in New Jersey

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the official website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as staff, visitors and investigators tell them, and we say where records contradict a story.

• Wikipedia: Clinton Road
• Wikipedia: Clinton Furnace
• Weird NJ: Clinton Road, a dark ride
• Advertiser News: Tales from the most haunted road (2024)
• NorthJersey.com via AOL: Three of the country's spookiest roads are in North Jersey (2024)
• The Outlook (Monmouth University): The scares in your state (2011)