← Club 49 Prospecting, the free gold & adventure map of the American West

The Hermits of the Wissahickon

Documented folklore from the Club 49 map, told straight and sourced.

The story

In 1694 a German mystic named Johannes Kelpius led forty scholars into the Wissahickon woods to await the end of the world, living as the Society of the Woman in the Wilderness: they watched the sky through a telescope, practiced alchemy and healing, and waited for a sign that never came. Kelpius, the Hermit of the Ridge, is said to have thrown a casket of secret arcana into the creek before he died. A stone grotto called Kelpius’s Cave still sits above Hermit Lane in Fairmount Park.

The ground it haunts

Wissahickon Valley, Fairmount Park, Philadelphia (PA). Source: TRUE: a documented 1694 mystic commune; the cave still stands. The Club 49 map pins this legend at its documented country, beside the real mines, active claims, land status and modeled honey holes of the same ground. Open the free map and go stand in the story.

See every spot on the free map →
Club 49 Prospecting is a free members map: 764 ranked honey holes, 20,000+ documented gold sites, stocked fishing waters, foraging sightings, gems, springs and the lore, across the American West. Free forever. club49.app