ZPi Logo "Serving the Paranoid
since 1997"
Lyle Zapato

Pacific NorthWEIRD: Mima Mounds

Lyle Zapato | 2014-08-28.8310 LMT | Field Trips | Cascadia | Nature

There's a new webseries called Pacific NorthWEIRD "chronicling the strange, supernatural, and eccentric happenings of the Pacific Northwest". Their premier episode is about the mysterious Mima Mounds near Olympia, WA (map):

I've been to the Mounds. I don't recall there being as much gunfire, but that was eight years ago and the war against paraterrestrial invaders may have heated up since then. While the Mima Mounds Natural Area Preserve is left as a natural prairie with simple trails winding between the mounds, the state did build an elevated viewing platform with informative displays underneath explaining the different, government-approved theories of the Mounds' origin. Looking at recent photos, it appears they've updated the graphics, but here's one that was on display during my visit (click for original photo):

Paul Bunyan

BUNYAN'S BARROWS

a legend...

A story is told of Paul Bunyan, a legendary giant who lived in this area a long time ago. Paul had heard about the Great Wall of China and decided that this country needed one for protection. So, Paul hired some Irish, renowned for their hard work and set out to make a huge wall of earth. Moving wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow full of dirt, they soon had created a good-sized wall and a large hole. Paul wanted it bigger. About this time the Irish started complaining about their meals, but Paul paid no attention so they quit. They dumped their barrows where they stood and went back to Ireland.

The wooden barrows rotted over the years and left no remains. The hole they left flooded one year, almost to overflowing, and created the Pacific Ocean. The wall is the Cascade mountains. And the heaps of dirt from the wheelbarrows lie all over this prairie.

I'm not sure if this tale is more offensive to Irish workers or giant management.

End of post.