Billie Walter

It was February 13, 1969.  A few months earlier, I had moved into my very first apartment.  It was on Skyline Drive in Whitehall, a suburb of Pittsburgh.  I was rooming with Ellen (E.J.), another girl from the Children’s Home.  Being two eighteen year old girls who had their own apartment, it wasn’t long before we met a lot of friends who wanted to come over and hang out.

I loved music and fixed the place up with all kinds of psychedelic pictures and posters.  My best friend was Peggy, who I worked with at the Colonial Supply Company.  She spent a lot of time hanging out with us at our apartment.

It was the evening of February 13th and Peggy was visiting.  We were setting our hair (with big round wire rollers that we left in all night and actually slept on) and starting to get ready for bed when Mike called.  He said that he and Tom wanted to stop over and tell us something that they had heard.  When they got there, they told us about a graveyard that they heard about and said that anytime anyone went there, that something bad happened to them.  I think they were trying to get us to go with them because they were afraid to go alone.  Well, I didn’t believe those kind of things back then and I still don’t today.  I am not superstitious by nature.   So we decided to go with them and see what would happen.

Nothing happened at the graveyard but on the way home we had a horrible car accident on the main highway.  I’m not sure exactly what happened to cause it.  All I remember is that we had loud music playing on the radio and then we began to swerve until we crossed the divider into oncoming traffic.  I was sitting in the back seat between E.J. and Peggy.  I can remember looking out the window to my right and seeing headlights coming at us at an incredibly fast speed.  That is when everything went into slow motion. Our car was heralded into the air and we flipped over three times before landing on the roof of the car. Once they got one of the doors pried open, they were able to get us out of the car.  I was soaking wet and thought that I had been sitting in gasoline but when I got to the hospital they told me that I was soaked with blood.  It wasn’t my blood.  It was probably Peggy’s and Tom’s.  They were both sitting on the passenger side of the car and were both seriously hurt.  They both spent a long time in the hospital.  Fortunately, they both recovered.  Mike, E.J. and I, survived the accident with minor cuts and bruises, but I still suffer from whiplash in my back.  I think one of the things that saved me was the fact that I had those curlers in our hair.  After the accident they found my curlers in the car, still bobbie pinned together and completely flattened.  It must have protected my head from being seriously hurt.   The couple in the car that hit us head on, were both seriously hurt also, but survived.

The case went to court but I don’t think anything was ever resolved.  It was determined that we were hit on the side which caused us to swerve into oncoming traffic.  I know it certainly wasn’t the fault of the people who hit us head on.

Well, something bad did happen after visiting the graveyard.  I’m sure that some people who have heard the story and then heard about our car accident, will be convinced that the accident happened because of going there. I believe that it was a coincidence.

After the accident I realized that I could have died.  This event not only changed my way of thinking but it changed my life.   I had always wanted to be a good girl and live by the rules.  Now I wanted to live life to the fullest and I wanted to experience everything.  I became fearless.  I figured that if I was going to walk on thin ice, I may as well dance.   And boy, did I dance!