History & local legend
Columcille Megalith Park below Blue Mountain grew from a dream Bill Cohea experienced on the Scottish island of Iona in 1967. Exhausted during a walk, he spread his raincoat on a hillside and fell asleep. In the dream, circles of standing stones closed around him, with scraps of cloth fluttering where faces might have been.
Cohea expected terror as the nearest stones leaned toward him. Instead, he recalled an overwhelming feeling of love and awe. He returned to Iona repeatedly and continued trying to understand the experience after making a home in eastern Pennsylvania.
In 1978, Cohea and Fred Lindkvist founded Columcille as a spiritual sanctuary. Their six-sided stone chapel was dedicated in 1980. Volunteers began raising an inner circle of standing stones in 1983, followed by an outer circle in 1989.
