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Did you know that Virginia isn't only for lovers, but also for gassers, ghouls and very strange animals? This Halloween, you can frighten your friends and family members with weird, scary stories like these about our great state of Virginia:

n The Gasser of Botetourt

In the 1930s, a mysterious, tall and darkly-clothed "gasser" was terrifying the residents of Botetourt. This so-called "Gasser of Botetourt" would cut a hole in innocent people's windows and feed in gas tubes that would shoot out an unidentified sweet-smelling gas.

This particular type of gas caused headaches, nausea and face puffiness. The gassings that had started in the 1930s came to a sudden stop in the '40s.

Police found only one puzzling clue: The track of a woman's heel under the window that the gas tube had been fed into.

n Botetourt Bunny Man

In the 1930s, a legend emerged about a man who escaped from Lorton Prison in Fairfax County and lived in a tunnel under a railroad bridge in Clifton. This particular man would scare and kill children on Halloween night.

In one story, four friends went out on Halloween night to the Clifton bridge, now infamously known as "Bunny Man's Bridge." One of the children was dared to walk under the bridge.

As he got to the middle of the bridge, the friends saw a flash of white light above the bridge. The boy under the bridge became paralyzed and couldn't leave. There was a sound like a train going by above the bridge and when the kids looked back to where their friend had been, they saw that he had been hanged from the bridge's entrance.

Also, one of the kids who had witnessed the slaying was marked with a white streak on his head, which is still there to this day.

n Hitchhiker of Walney Road

The famous Walney Road in Chantilly is known for its strange and lonely figure, the "Hitchhiker of Walney Road."

According to legend, this phantom appears to drivers three different times at three different locations on the road.

Rumor has it that if you don't pick up this wandering ghost for the third and last time, he will reappear in the passenger seat of your car and force you off the road.

If you're hanging out with your friends on Halloween night, you can just whip out these stories and scare them to death.

Have a great and safe Halloween.

Source: "Weird Virginia" by Jeff Bahr, Troy Taylor and Loren Coleman.