Fluorescent Freddie

 Fluorescent Freddie

By Cole Herrold

Some Sasquatch sightings are downright strange. Some are connected with UFOs like the Uniontown UFO-Bigfoot Incident or the Ohiopyle UFO-Bigfoot incident; some bigfoot seem to vanish or turn into balls of light; in between these more surreal encounters and classic sasquatch encounters, there are seemingly normal sasquatch encounters that are just one degree into the weird. One such encounter of a sasquatch of a different color was reported in French Lick, Indiana, and while it's not one of the most famous cases out there, this case is so rare it seems to only get mentioned in comparison to other cases even though there is more to the story.

At least a dozen teenagers and adults, while out driving and wandering around the woods along a road three miles South of French Lick near a municipal works, began to encounter something that they never would have expected. The creature was an astounding 10ft tall, but this was not the most bizarre feature of the creature as instead of the traditional brown, red, black, or even white fur that was so common in other accounts but instead a vivid green and its eyes glowed bright red. The first and only named witness from what can be gleaned from newspaper and book sources was a 16-year-old official named Steve Dixon, who was a Springs Valley High School Student at the time of the sighting, yet not much is known from this sighting. The creature was investigated by Police Chief Oral Carnes, who searched the area after the initial sightings and having heard that the high school youths were entering the darkened woods with shotguns and other weapons but came up empty-handed both in gun-toting teens and monsters and felt that the whole green-furred monstrosity was nothing more than a hoax. One high school teenager said in the March 17^th edition of the Indianapolis News, "You can't knock it if you don't go see Freddie yourself". The area where the creature was seen soon became known as "the Valley of the Jolly Green Giant". The road, over the course of several nights, turned into monster hunter central as cars lined the side of the road for the entire length of the "Valley of the Jolly Green Giant". Youths would enter the woods in pairs of two and three, calling out to the creature in an effort to coax the creature from hiding. One boy, a 16-year-old named David Noble, who had it would seem seen the creature during this time, had even called out to the creature saying, "We're your friends. Don't be afraid. We won't hurt you". Yet the creature never seemed to respond. After a quiet night with barely any interactions or sightings, most of the searchers left after 3 hrs. After this initial wave of sightings, the creature seemed to of dropped off the planet, and no one has since claimed to of seen the creature.

Now it is important to point out that French Lick, as well as Pope Lick and Big Bone Lick, makes up one of the corners of the Big Lick Triangle. This is an area of high strangeness similar to the Coudersport Triangle, Bridgewater Triangle, and, more famously, the Bermuda Triangle. So, it’s almost unsurprising that such a creature would be reported in this geographical Fortean hotspot.

While this case is exceptionally interesting, what are we to do with this creature in regard to an explanation. This creature could obviously be a hoax or a prank perpetrated by the unmotivated minds of high schoolers. The fact that there's only one officially named witness and very few details on this case adds a patina seen with other hoax cases or urban legends. Yet I must say that this case has a lot of other details seen in other Sasquatch cases that seem to indicate a wider range of phenomena.

One of the most comparable cases to this one is the Bishopville Lizardman case. Now the Bishopville Lizardman case is a mixture of two types of creatures reported the classic reptilian-type creature which attacked Chris Davies and the large primate-like creature seen around the same time. This primate-like creature also was reported to have grayish-green fur or skin, and some researchers feel even the reptile-type encounters might have simply been a Sasquatch-type creature covered in moss and with dried muddied fur which gave the impression of scales. Perhaps this is what we are seeing here as mud-covered sasquatch-type creatures have been reported before, and in these accounts, leaves and other debris often are reported clinging to the fur.

This case is one that I would love more information on. It's quick and brief, but it has all the earmarks of cases that are stone-cold classics like the Mill Race Monster, as it involves a strange non-traditional creature and a monster hunt. It's amazing that this case was not covered more intently, but perhaps at the time, the case was not treated as seriously or that the witnesses simply were not interviewed. Either way, this was a brief and obscure case that definitely needed to be brought to the attention of more researchers.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Primate/ Hominid, Mammal

Location: French Lick, Indiana

Sighted: March 15, 1965

Works Cited:

Bigfoot Exposed: An Anthropologist Examines America's Enduring Legend By David J. Daegling

Cryptozoology A-Z By Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark

Mothman and Other Curious Encounters By Loren Coleman

Sasquatch the Apes Among Us By John Green

Weird Indiana By Mark Marimen, ‎James A. Willis, and ‎Troy Taylor

The Indianapolis News, Indiana, March 15, 1965

The Indianapolis News, Indiana, March 17, 1965

 

The Northumberland County Mystery Beasts

 The Northumberland County Mystery Beasts

By Cole Herrold

In September of 1913, the cities of Bear Gap, Paxinos, Reed Station, Elysburg, Snydertown, and Shamokin were in the epicenter of a rash of strange sightings of a bizarre creature that made its presence known in the surrounding woodlands and desolate forests. The first sighting of this creature occurred near Bear Gap and was sighted by timber dealer Jacob Leisenring who was driving his car on Brush Valley Road towards Bear Gap when he noticed a strange figure along the side of the road ahead of him. The figure was on all fours and covered in dark fur and seemingly was not use to the car's bright headlights as it seemed to disorient the creature enough that it did not realize the potential danger it was in. The creature seeing the now incoming car, began to turn around and slink back into the woods. As Jacob watched the creature return back into the woods, he was able to tell that the creature was about 30 inches in height and about three feet long. Jacob reeling in what he had just seen, returned to Bear Gap and gathered several other people to return to the location with him. When the group got to the location, they found several prints in the soft dirt. The prints they were surprised to see were very similar to a human's hand, but the bizarre thing about these prints was that they were seemingly backward.

A week before the September 15^th publication Irvin Startzel and several others in his car would also encounter this bizarre creature also while out driving his car; this time, however, he was driving on a creek road near Reed Station towards his home in Shamokin when a large creature leaped out across the road and began to scamper and crawl up the nearby mountainside. Irvin, as well as everyone else in the vehicle, had a much better look at the creature and said that the creature had a striped furry body and that as it leaped across the road, the way it did so was like the movement of an ape or a monkey. Exiting their car to try to catch another glimpse of the creature, they noticed a series of footprints that were human-like and also like Leisenring's tracks were backward.

Sightings of the creature continued in Paxinos and Elysburg when farmers continually caught glimpses of a creature matching the description of what Startzel and Leisenring saw in their fields, and at night the area was filled with a cacophony of bizarre cries. While there is a vague appearance to this creature, whenever the farmers would attempt to approach the creature, it would run off, so they were unable to get a more defined appearance of the creature. The farmers and nearby towns and cities, however, even without a clear description, were on high alert as search parties in the area broke out looking for the creature. Farmers loaded countless rounds into their rifles and laid out several traps in the nearby woodlands waiting for any anomalous animal to come into their possession, yet nothing was ever found.

Sightings of this creature seemingly stopped for a time, but it would not be for long when the same or a similar kind of creature was reported in Snydertown in January of 1940. A family comprising of a husband, wife, and his sister was driving one afternoon when a creature began to walk out in front of their car. The man began to slow down, thinking that it was a deer about to come out into the road, but as he watched the creature cross, he realized it was not a deer. The creature appeared to be like a large monkey and had a long tail that it kept curved up over its head as it moved across the road. The creature had extremely bright eyes that were reflective like a deer's, and the creature was covered in dark brown hair and skin. One of the women who went on to report the sighting to the PA Bigfoot Society would recount that Snydertown has several bizarre events and phenomena said to occur there, such as a woman who went insane on a farm after saying, the devil kept coming to look in her window.

While there have been, at least to my knowledge, no other sightings of the Northumberland County Mystery Beast, the area around Paxinos and Snydertown are filled with accounts of Bigfoot. I’ve personally heard and collected several first and secondhand accounts of these encounters and am extremely surprised that there might be another cryptid in the area. The interesting thing about the Mystery Beast is that what witnesses were describing in both 1913 and 1940 seems to be kinds of Primates. While a full description of the creature was never described, the footprints left behind in 1913 appeared hand-like which is something that we see in other primates like chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, monkeys, and lemurs. The 1940 account, however, clearly seems to be a kind of extremely large monkey or lemur.

Now with that said, it's difficult to come to any true conclusion as to what species these creatures could be; their identities are not definitive; aside from that, they both appear to be primates. Skeptically speaking, there is the chance that these creatures could be escaped Chimpanzees or some other animal that escaped captivity. In the annals of cryptozoology, however, there are countless reports of large primates that are not Bigfoot-like, but more like baboons or chimps these species are referred to as Napes or North American Apes by Loren Coleman, have footprints very similar to what was reported in 1913. Another cryptid reported in North America that is of the same vein is creatures referred to as Devil Monkeys typically Devil Monkeys are described as Baboon like creatures; however, the term has been used to describe any monkey-like primate in North America such as the Danville Devil Monkey of New Hampshire which bore a resemblance to a Woolly Monkey.

Was a reverse-footed Nape or Devil Monkey seen in 1913?

Now with that said, there is the chance that the 13' and 40' sightings are of different species of this kind of creatures. While the creature seen in 1940 seems to be some huge monkey, the lack of features described in the creature seen in 1913 makes an exact identity impossible, but there are two key features that are described, the first being that the creature had some sort of stripes along its furry back which is odd because stripes are rarely seen on primates aside from lemurs and Owl Monkeys and secondly it had human hand-like feet that were backward now there is a chance that the witnesses may have misinterpreted the tracks and the footprints were forward-facing but interestingly enough in other countries there have been reports of primates with backward-facing feet the Kalanoro of Madagascar and some versions of stories revolving the Orang Pendek of Sumatra describe them as having backward-facing feet to make tracking impossible. Now there are very few references to this kind of feature in creatures in America, but it is interesting that there are alternative creatures in other parts of the world which could be possibly related.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Mammals most likely Primates

Location: Paxinos, Shamokin, Reed Station, Snydertown, Bear Gap, Elysburg, Northumberland County, Pennsylvania

Sighted: September 1-14, 1913, January 1940

Works Cited:

Bigfoot in Pennsylvania By Timothy Renner

Humanoid Encounters: 1930-1949 By Albert S. Rosales

Danville Morning News Danville, Pennsylvania September 15, 1913

 

The Cookie Monster

 

The Cookie Monster

By Cole Herrold

It was during October of 1972 when a family would have a nightmare experience with a large hairy creature on their property. The creature frequented their property, frequently peering from the nearby woodlands at their home. The family apparently felt the beast was nothing inherently dangerous as it seemed to simply be curious of the family and would always keep its distance. The children of the household felt that the creature bore a resemblance to a classic children's program character, and soon, everyone in the family came to call the creature the Cookie Monster. While the household felt that the beast was not a hazard to their health, they had ultimately let their guard down whenever the creature was around. This, however, would change when on one particular night, as they returned home late, they heard the sound of yelping from the back of their house.

The family drove up to their driveway and there sprinted out a large hairy creature. The Cookie Monster was coming right at them. The family stopped the car, and the beast began grabbing the car lifting it up and attempted to shake it from side to side. The family was absolutely terrified, trying to cower in their seats from the massive hulking man-beast. The creature continued this for some time before ultimately dropping the car and running off into the woods. The family waited in the car as the creature left from sight. The parents could hear the children cry in the back and attempted to calm them. This took some doing, but ultimately this was succeeded enough that the parents felt that they could keep them safe from attracting the creature's further wrath. The family waited in the car just a little bit longer as a way to guarantee that the creature had left the area.

The family slowly opened the door to their car and began to meander their way towards the safety of the house. As the family worked their way towards the door, they could hear a slight whine. The family huddled close together, expecting the worse, thinking perhaps the creature had gone and did a U-turn in the woods coming around on the other side of the property. The group looked cautiously at the forest but soon realized that the sound was coming down low to the ground. The family looked near the porch, and there was the family dog. The family called to the animal to try to get him to approach, but it would not. The father soon began to approach the animal but as soon as he saw the four-legged member of the family proceeded to tell the family to get into the house. The wife seeing the seriousness in her husband's face, escorted the children back inside. The father continued to be bent over the animal, slowly trying to pick it up.

He hollered to his wife that he had to run to the Veterinarians Office fast, and as she came out, she could tell why. The animal was severely mauled to the point that it was almost ripped in two. The father began to slowly lift the dog up, trying to keep the creature's intestines inside as best he could, and slowly worked his way back to the now dented vehicle. The man gingerly put the animal down in the back and, hopping into the front seat, began to drive out towards the closest veterinarian. The Vet stared in horror at the extensive damage done to the animal and instantly began trying to save the animal's life. This was unfortunately not to be the case, and the animal died on the operating table.

It is unknown after this terrifying ordeal whether the family continued to have experiences with the Cookie Monster, but clearly, none would have rivaled the violent assault of that October night in 1972. However, I am sure that while there may not have been a continuation of sightings, the family was much more cautious around their property, especially at night. The Cookie Monster, unlike other Bigfoot cases, is one version of the phenomenon that I certainly would not like to encounter, for it is perhaps the most aggressive PA bigfoot I've ever come across, and I shudder to think of what would have happened to a person as opposed to the family's dog.

Species/Potential Species: Hominid/Primate

Location: Champion, Somerset County/Fayette County, Pennsylvania

Sighted: October 1972

Works Cited:

Encyclopedia of Cryptozoology By Michael Newton

Humanoid Encounters: 1970-1974- the Others Amongst Us By Albert S. Rosales

Strange Pennsylvania Monsters By Michael Newton

Hoboken Monkey Man

 Hoboken Monkey Man

By Cole Herrold

There are tons of cases out there that are extremely bizarre and seem to be either straight out lies or cases of mass hysteria. The case of the Hoboken Monkey Man is one such case. It's a case that appeared several times online and only in a few book and magazine sources and has been said by many to be a case that has absolutely no merit in the annals of actual cryptozoological study. However, upon closer inspection of this case, there are some particularly bizarre encounters that did make their way into some sources that seem to indicate that there were some kernels of truth to an outright hoax.

Hoboken was in a state of panic in October of 1982. School children were terrified by the whispers of their classmates. Those whispers were not only of the malevolent mirror spirit Bloody Mary or the deranged lunatics Cropsy and Hookman but a new boogeyman-like entity that seemed to of popped out of nowhere to terrorize the schools and streets of Hoboken. They would describe the horrendous actions of this figure known as Monkey Man, whose appearance was that of a mixture of the two in varying gruesome details. The creature was said to of lurked in the school hallways during the day and night and would leave the confines of the school grounds only to attack children on their way home from class. Rumors would go even further and into a more violent path as the creature was reported to of been seen throwing students out of the school’s windows and that the creature even allegedly killed a teacher.

The hysteria and panic swept through the halls and homes of Hoboken for two weeks before finally, word reached the Hoboken Police Department and the Public Safety Council. The officers and Council proceeded in going from home to home and to the schools attempting to find anyone who had claimed to of seen the creature or to see if there were any missing persons who could have perished at the paw of the Monkey Man. They scoured the streets at night, searching for anyone who bore the description of the person or creature said to be terrorizing the city. As the weeks and nights crept on, their inquires eventually came to a dead end. No members of any of the schools' faculties were missing, and no children in the area were reported missing either. As they talked to most of the students, they discovered that none had officially claimed to of seen the creature, and most said that they heard it from a friend who knew someone who claimed to of encountered the beast. The police and Public Safety Department irritated for they realized that this was some sort of urban legend gone out of hand, eventually came out with the following statement "There is no Monkey Man. No students or children missing. We went looking for him, he wasn't even in the streets. How do you stop a rumor that's growing like wildfire?”.

While this statement seems to be true for most of the rumors surrounding the creature, especially those in an urban surrounding like the schools. However, over the years, some potentially real sightings did take place; some cases seem to be in the same vein as Bigfoot sightings, and some are bizarre Fortean cases that seem to be similar to other nontypical animal phenomena. The earliest account comes from an individual named Jack D. Jack would describe an encounter he and his girlfriend would encounter one year before the mass hysteria outbreak in 82'. Jack and his girlfriend were out driving their car on Sinatra Drive; during that time, it was River Road. Jack, while staring out at the darkened road, noticed something moving in through the trees. The dark form soon stopped in one particularly large one, and as he looked through the windshield, he noticed it was something eerily bizarre. Jack pulled off to the side of the road, surprising his girlfriend as she did not yet see the arboreal abomination. Jack, still looking through the window, pointed up to the tree and there, dangling from a hefty branch, was the creature staring right back at them. The creature was monkey-like and proceeded to grunt and make all sorts of awful noises at the parked pedestrians. Jack, not following better judgement, proceeded to leave his car and girlfriend to get a closer look at this bizarre beast. As he got closer, he noticed that while it was monkey-like, it had eerily more human qualities as its hair was long and matted with what appeared to be more of a neanderthal like face. The creatures' arms were long and seemed to sway as it hung from the branch. The creature's body was covered in hair, but this was obscured by what appeared to be animal skins that were fashioned as a kind of clothing. Jack was shocked at this entity but not too shocked to be quiet, for Jack then proceeded to threateningly yell at the creature. The creature seemed to take offense and grunted right back at Jack. Jack backed away slowly and watched as the creature brachiated through the trees until it got to the deeper sections of the woods, ultimately disappearing into the darkness.

While Jack would never see the creature ever again, it would not be the last time this kind of primate Monkey Man would be seen. Two park rangers who worked for the Atlantic County Park in Route 50 while driving down the road noticed a strange figure moving across the road. The figure was an "anthropoid, ape-like" creature and seemed to be walking upright. Neither ranger reported their sighting at the time because it was "so strange and bizarre". This creature would reportedly have other sightings in the area, and much like the rumors of the creature in Hoboken was said to live in a building most of the time. The building was an old tin cow barn that was on the Belcoville Munitions Plant. During this flap of sightings, it was claimed that "no animals would go near the old barn and that the floor of the cow barn and the cowbarn itself were always clean".  This adds a new patina to a case already bizarre for this, if not just some homeless individual who was mistaken for the entity, implies that the monkey man is a clean freak and not a creature that wallows in filth. However, sightings in the area today are no longer reported.

While the animal skin wearing monkey man and the nude version are bizarre enough, encounters with an even more sophisticated Monkey Man would arise and this time leaving the woods and returning back to the city. These are some of the even weirder Monkey Man cases, and the first shows he might have an occupation. A woman named Evelyn would recall her encounter with the Monkey Man when she was 10 in the book Weird NJ. Evelyn was in her bedroom reading; it was late, and she was trying to get the last couple pages of her book in before finally conking out for the night. As she was flipping and scanning the pages of her book, she suddenly had a bizarre feeling that she couldn't shake as she continued to focus in on the page. That feeling resonated to the point that eventually, she felt that she had to put down her book and investigate. She looked up and felt inclined to look out the window that faced another apartment. She peered into the apartment, and there appeared to be a man sweeping in a janitor's outfit. She continued to stare at the figure she felt uneased by him, but she couldn't place it, that is, until he turned around. There as she watched, what she assumed was just heavy sideburns, and a beard was actually a monkey-faced man. This proved too much for Evelyn, and she ran out of the room and jumped on her father's bed to wake him up. Her father, exhausted and irritated, followed Evelyn to her room, and the two peered out the window into the next apartment complex, but to her surprise and her father's further irritation, there was nothing there.

While this creature seemed to be hard at work, this does not seem to always be the case as sometimes it is reported to be either off for the day or on vacation. The next clothed creature account came from Mary A., whose children would report to encounter the creature as well as know where the creature lives. Mary and her children, when they first moved to 9^th St in Bayonne, noticed how bizarre their street was; the street at the end of the block drops off into Newark Bay; this goes into a dead-end that was covered in No Trespassing Signs and fenced in areas. There in this drop off was the Old PT Boat Factory, and that is where the neighbors and ultimately her children would go on to tell her the Monkey Man lives. The rumors around town were that the Monkey Man was abandoned by his parents as a kid and now lives in the Old Boat Factory to this day; he is said to run around the wooded paths and trails along Newark Bay. She laughed at the accounts and dismissed them as pure urban legends, that is until her kids would claim to see him not once but twice. The first time her kids would encounter the Monkey Man, he was walking an old trail not too far off from their home. Her kid would describe him as having long brown hair on his arms and a monkey-like face, but he bizarrely wore a ragged green shirt and pants. The kids ran away from the figure to tell their mom, who saw the seriousness in their faces, realized that they had seen something. Then not too later, her younger son would also see the Monkey Man on the same trail that his siblings had. This time the Monkey Man was wearing the same ragged shirt that the siblings had seen him wear, and he was not alone, for he had a dog walking alongside him.

While detailed sightings of the Monkey Man seem to of faded away, there are rumors still to this day that the Monkey Man can be seen in Hoboken's Washington Street. These accounts are very different and are reminiscent of another phenomenon that occurred in 2001. This phenomenon was the Monkey Man of Delhi, India; it was an extremely famous case when it occurred and has many parallels to the Hoboken case. Both cases are believed to of been caused by mass hysteria as well as the sightings started out as being urban encounters of essentially bigfoot like creatures that then turned into encounters of bizarre suited humanoid cases. The accounts also both had alleged violence and death associated with them.

When breaking down this case, the 1982 Hoboken sightings seem to definitely be a case of mass hysteria. However, the sighting of a creature in 1981 definitely seems to be of some actual encounter. The creature is definitely a hominid of some variety. There is a possibility it could be some Tarzan enthusiast who had incredible gymnastic abilities, but this does seem to be unlikely. The creature appears to be some kind of hairy hominid, possibly a tree swinging sasquatch. While bigfoot are not exactly known for a tree lifestyle, there have been a few cases of young bigfoot swinging in the trees or an adult standing on some heftier branches. The animal pelts seen in this case is not exactly unheard of either in the history of bigfoot. Accounts of clothing or pelt wearing bigfoot are rare and appear more often in tales of native tribes, but they do occur, so it's possible that is what was reported.

As for the clothing wearing accounts, part of me automatically wants to say this is kids misidentifying some overly hairy individual while out working or some person with a birth defect of some kind. However, what if what they were reporting was actually something else? What could it be? Could it be some escaped mutant like the infamous Melonheads or the cabaret of cryptids said to of escaped from circuses or government labs? It seems very unlikely, but there are countless sightings of such entities. Could it be that these individuals might have Hypertrichosis, a disorder that causes extreme hair growth? This is more possible but also unlikely as this disorder as only 50 official cases have ever been reported.

While this case seems to be a mixture of mass hysteria and some possibly legitimate accounts. It is so uninvestigated, even with the police involvement, that getting more specifics are frustrating. There are plenty of bizarre flaps out there and plenty of cases that seem way too impossible to have anything real to them, but as with most legends, myths, and mass hysteria, there is some kernel of truth to it; the question with this case is how much is fact, how much is fiction, and how much went unaccounted for or reported? We perhaps will never truly know.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Hominid or Hoax

Location: Hoboken, New Jersey

Sighted: 1981-1982/ unspecified latter accounts

Works Cited:

Monsters of New Jersey: Mysterious Creatures in the Garden State By Loren Coleman and Bruce G. Hallenbeck

Weird N.J. By Mark Scuerman and Mark Moran

Lois, Mary “Is the Monkey Man Real?”. Finding Myself in Hoboken. August 30, 2008. http://myselfinhoboken.blogspot.com/2008/08/is-monkey-man-real.html. Accessed July 11, 2021.

Alana Biggers, M.D., MPH “Hypertrichosis (Werewolf Syndrome)” Healthline. August 28, 2018 https://www.healthline.com/health/hypertrichosis#causes. Accessed July 16, 2021. 

Napa Rebobs

by Cole Herrold

California is one of the most famous areas when it comes to Fortean phenomenon. The state is home to Bluff Creek, where the infamous Patterson-Gimlin film was shot. The state is home to the Winchester Mansion, one of the most haunted and unique buildings in the United States. A sea serpent was allegedly beached and photographed in Santa Cruz, and a bipedal reptilian monster attacked a man in his car near a Riverside, California Bridge. It is surprising that a state we often associate with high population density would also seem to be a major mystery hotspot. While the state is home to classic phenomena like Bigfoot, ghosts, and sea serpents, it is also home to one of the most bizarre and downright ridiculous creatures in the books.

I first came across the creatures known as the Napa Rebobs while watching an episode of Monsters and Mysteries in America. These creatures were described as mirror images to the flying monkeys from the classic children book and fantasy film the Wizard of Oz. These creatures allegedly reside in a particular section of the Napa Valley known as Partrick Road. However, some sources, when researching the phenomena, do misname the road Patrick Road. The creatures allegedly have been in the Napa Valley area since at least the '50s, or 60's yet upon digging in newspaper archives, paranormal books that mention or focus on the region, and deep-dive Google searches, I have found no mention of these creatures at least officially prior to 2008.

The Prime Hook Swamp Monster

by Cole Herrold

Swamp monsters have always been an enduring part of fantasy, comic books, and science fiction. From Meg Mucklebones, the semiaquatic hag from Ridley Scott’s Legend to my second favorite comic book character Swamp Thing and his Marvel equivalent Man-Thing these creatures exist in a muddied mixture of the earth and water coexisting and proving to be either interconnected with all forms of nature or the ultimate predators. In the world of cryptozoology, there are several famous swamp monsters like the Lizard Man of Scape Ore Swamp that plagued Bishopville in South Carolina or the Crocodile footed Honey Island Swamp Monster of Louisiana, who is probably the best of the murky marauders. Swamp monsters are extremely predominant in the south, constantly slithering in and out of the marshy mire, yet the south is not the only area of this country to own swamps and strange creatures.

I first across the creature known as the Prime Hook Swamp Creature or Prime Hook Swamp Monster was on the now-defunct About.com site. It was one of the first online cases I came across in a time when every case and info I knew about cryptids came from books and magazine sources. I thankfully was able to procure the only information that was ever posted on the creature. This creature has since teetered on the point of unknown since then.