I am now a Published Author!!

I recently wrote an article about dogmen and werewolves in Ohio and had it published in the official journal of the Centre for Fortean Zoology. I am extremely excited about being a published author.

You can find my article here. The article is titled "Ohio Dogman"

Please comment and let me know what you think.

My Journey Around America

Vacation time is always one of my favorite events of the year, three years ago I went to Maine and got to visit the International Cryptozoology Museum. I always try to incorporate my paranormal interests and my recent trip was no exception.
I had the privilege of visiting three of the most historically important cities in America; New Orleans, Gettysburg, and Washington DC (all three of which are considered to be "the most haunted city on Earth" according to all the postcards and tourist traps).

On my visit to New Orleans, I visited a vampire boutique (where I purchased a guide to the paranormal aspects of the city), a handful of voodoo shops, and a witchcraft store (where I got a copy of Psychic Self Defense by Dion Fortune). We also visited the Audubon Zoo which had an excellent exhibit on the Rougarou (a Cajun version of the werewolf. The term is derived from the French Loup-Garu) and Bigfoot's three-toed cousin, the Honey Island Swamp Monster. Needless to say, I got suckered into purchasing a Rougarou T-shirt.

My Gettysburg trip was fairly brief because it was a short stop on the way to visit some friends who live in Harrisburg, PA. We visited a Civil War museum, saw some of the statues and monuments, and went to numerous ghost shops. Gettysburg, interestingly, has no less than five different ghost stores as well as a handful of Wiccan, fortune teller, and other paranormal related venues (and an excellent comic book store). Needless to say, if you are looking for ghost-hunting equipment or a ghost-hunting team to join, you should probably move to Gettysburg.

When we visited Washington DC, we didn't do anything paranormal focused but we did visit a handful of monuments, the National Zoo, and the Smithsonian Natural History Museum (which, unfortunately, did not have any of their prehistoric animal exhibits available to the public due to revisions in the exhibits). The Museum did have a couple sections that were of interest to cryptozoologists, though. They had a neat display about the coelacanth and giant squid, a fascinating exhibit about the thylacine (aka. Tasmanian tiger/wolf), and a stuffed okapi.

Overall I had a wonderful time. Next year we might venture to Florida, so I might go looking for the infamous Skunk Ape!

My sister and I with the terrifying Rougarou at New Orleans' Audubon Zoo

Werewolf of Defiance

Defiance, Ohio, a sleepy little town, about 55 miles south of Toledo, had a series of unusual encounters in 1972 that will become whispered legend in the years after. Defiance is your average, small, Midwestern American town. Most of the people who live there make their living by working at one of the handful of factories around the area. Defiance is best known for its Fort Defiance, which has a colorful historical significance . So what happened in Defiance all those years ago? Possibly the oddest couple of Dogman encounters ever reported.

On July 25th, 1972, when two employees a local freight train company were working the graveyard shift, inspecting railcar braking systems. Ted Davis, one of the witnesses, during an interview with the Toledo Blade said, “I saw these two hairy feet. Then I looked up and he was standing there with a big stick over his shoulder. When I started to say something, he took off for the woods.” The creature was also described as having, “huge, hairy feet, fangs, and it ran side-to-side like a caveman in the movies.”

About a week after the first encounter, Davis claims to have seen the creature, at the same place as the first encounter, the rail yard. He said it looked at him from the edge of the woods, and the turned and left. That same night, a grocer reported an attack from a hairy, animal-headed creature wielding a two-by-four.

In a small town, nothing stays quiet for long. About a week after the initial events, the local newspaper caught wind of the unusual story. The headlines wrote “Horror Movie Now Playing on Fifth St.” and opened with the famous poem from The Wolf Man:

“Even a man who is pure of heart,

And says his prayers by night,

May become a wolf when the wolf bane blooms,

And the moon is clear and bright.”

The Crescent News, the local newspaper, and the Toledo Blade, ran a total of four articles about the incident. The longest of the articles focused on the local police force’s investigation into the incident. Headed by Donald Breckler, the police chief at the time, the police searched extensively for the “werewolf”. Although the general public thought that it to be a bored teenager’s prank, Chief Breckler considered the club-wielding, animal-faced assailant was a threat to the community. Eventually, after days of looking and no results, the search soon ended.

It is worth noting that Defiance, Ohio is no stranger to unusual phenomena. Within the past fifty years Defiance has seen hundreds of Unidentified Flying Objects, a Dracula lookalike running amuck, and numerous other tales of the weird.
Later this year, Ken Gerhard will be running a symposium about the Dogman and it is located in the town of Defiance. You can find more info here.

Here is one of the articles about the Defiance Werewolf

Canada's Werewolf Hunter

On the night of April 14 and the morning of April 15, 2014 there was a full, blood moon, as well as a lunar eclipse. This created a very creepy atmosphere, which, naturally, lead to students at the University of Calgary to throw parties and generally be collage kids.

Unfortunately, the creepy atmosphere also lead another student to a different activity. Matthew de Grood murdered five students because he claimed they were werewolves.

The Canadian courts are currently ruling on the case now. You can find more details about the case here.

New Book by Cryptozoologist and Folklorist Ronald Murphy Jr.!

Ronald Murphy Jr. is a world class expert on fairies, writer, actor, and cryptozoologist extraordinaire.
He has written numerous books, both non-fiction and fictional, including On Dogman, On Mermaids, and The Unexplained World of the Chestnut Ridge.
Ron is a seasoned researcher with cryptozoological and folkloric subject. He has done extensive research for all of his books and all are extremely well written and detailed.
I am glad to call Ron my friend and associate, he has done much for the subject.

He has come out with a new book!
On Wildman: Tracking Bigfoot Through History
On Wildman is his third book in his 'On' series where he examines the cultural and mythological origins of well known figures in cryptozoology. His other two were about Mermaids and Dogman.

I ordered his new book last night and cannot wait until it comes. After I read through, I will do a review as well.

I highly recommend anything Ron has written. You can find his website here and his new book here.

The North America Dogman Project

Joedy Cook, well known and respected Bigfoot research from Ohio, has recently begun a new group focusing on research of the Dogman phenomenon.

The new group is called the North American Dogman Project and is looking for new members.
I recently joined the group and am looking forward to working with Joedy in the future.

You can find the NADP's website here.

Interview With Stan Gordon

Stan Gordon is a seasoned ufologist and cryptozoologist who has worked in the field since 1965. He has three books, The Silent Invasion: The Pennsylvania UFO-Bigfoot Casebook, Really Mysterious Pennsylvania, and Astonishing Encounters: Pennsylvania’s Unknown Creatures. He is widely considered to be the foremost authority on paranormal phenomena in Pennsylvania as well as the Kecksburg UFO crash. I met Stan over Labor Day weekend where he agreed to this interview, and again at the recent Mothman Festival, which I will be posting a summary and review of as my next post.

1. What originally inspired you to research the paranormal? How long have you been doing this?

>I was a curious youngster who had an interest in science and electronics at an early age.  By coincidence my birthday is around Halloween. In 1959, on my 10th birthday, my parents gave me an AM radio as a gift. That evening as I tuned across the radio dial, some radio shows were discussing strange events such as ghosts and flying saucers. I listened to the discussions, and while intrigued I was also skeptical of some of what I was hearing. I wanted to learn more and began many trips to the Greensburg library to read what books they had on these topics. I continued my interest and research making scrap books from news stories that appeared on these subjects.  I was 16 years old in December of 1965, when a major UFO incident occurred in a rural community called Kecksburg, about 12 miles away from where I lived.

That night as the news was breaking from around the Pittsburgh area of the UFO incident, I began to take down notes. The next day as the story appeared in local newspapers, I began to call people in the area where the incident occurred to try to obtain more details. This year will mark 50 years of my investigation into the case.

That UFO incident still remains unsolved. I have been out in the field conducting first hand investigations in the UFO phenomena and many other areas of what would be described as paranormal. In the nearly 56 years that I have been conducting this research, I have still never seen a UFO or crossed paths with Bigfoot. The thousands of witnesses I have interviewed and the physical evidence that I have seen has convinced me, however, that there remain many mysteries in this world for which we have no answers.

2. Of all the cases you have investigated, what is, in your opinion, the most significant and why?

>This is a tough question to answer as there are multitudes of UFO and Cryptid cases that I have investigated that are significant.  The case that stands out was an incident that occurred during the major UFO-Bigfoot wave of 1973. It is very involved and well documented, so I am just giving you a brief summary.  On the evening of October 25, 1973, I received a call from a state trooper from the Uniontown barracks in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. He had returned from investigating a strange incident on a farm and felt that I should send a research team to that area immediately.

About 9 PM that evening, a number of local residents observed a barn sized red sphere hovering about 100 feet in sky and dropping towards the ground. Three people went up to the pasture to investigate. They were shocked to see about 250 feet away that the object was on the ground or hovering just above it. The object now looked to be a bright white dome shape about 100 feet or more in diameter. It illuminated the area and made a loud whining sound. About 75 feet away from the observers was a barbed wire fence. Along that fence were two huge hair covered creatures with very long arms walking in their direction.

As one man fired ammunition at the beasts with a 30.06 rifle, the object suddenly just vanished, and the creatures being hit with ammo just kept walking back towards the direction from which they came with no apparent effect. The state trooper who arrived within the hour to investigate, said the area where the object had been was glowing and the farm animals would not go near it. When my team arrived during the early morning hours to investigate, some strange events took place in that area. I explain the entire case in detail in my “Silent Invasion” book. It was the case that clearly indicated that the Bigfoot and UFO phenomena is much more complex than any of us were aware of.

3. Are your files and research  concentrated simply to Pennsylvania, or have they branched out further?

>While I am interested in similar cases from surrounding states and what takes place elsewhere, my focus has been to document what has been taking place in Pennsylvania. The Keystone state has a long history of mysterious happenings, and these strange encounters continue to take place each year. This year has been very active with UFO, cryptid and other anomalistic incidents.

4. Your second book, The Silent Invasion: The Pennsylvania UFO-Bigfoot Casebook, focuses on a wave of sightings during the seventies where Bigfoot and UFO sightings seemed to be connected, do you have any theories as to what the connection might be based on the various encounters? Do you feel that all Bigfoot sightings are connected to UFOs?

>The “Silent Invasion” book details the many mysterious events that took place from 1973 into 1974 across Pennsylvania. I began investigating Bigfoot encounters in the late 1960s. I had always felt that the initial information we had indicated that these creatures seemed to be some type of unknown animal. During the wave of the early 1970s, residents were calling the police and my research team reporting many very strange events. Some patterns of the phenomena began to emerge from widespread locations.

Observers would report a UFO sighting in a certain area and within a short time, a Bigfoot encounter would take place there as well. Sometimes it would be the reverse, with a Bigfoot sighting taking place, then a UFO encounter would occur. Then there were cases where a UFO and Bigfoot were seen together at the same time and location.

Most UFO sightings historically reported have no association with a Bigfoot encounter. And most Bigfoot incidents aren’t associated with UFO activity. Such cases of Bigfoot with UFOs  have been reported not just from Pennsylvania, but from throughout the country and other parts of the world. As I have mentioned many times in my writings, I don’t have the answers if there is a direct connection between the two phenomena. The more you look into the UFO and cryptid fields, the more it is apparent that we are dealing with a very strange, and complex phenomena.

I am not suggesting that Bigfoot is an Alien life form and that it is an occupant of a spacecraft from another world. We don’t know for sure what UFOs really are. While many sightings are explainable, some remain unexplained. There are many theories for these objects including extraterrestrial spacecraft, time and interdimensional travelers, even unknown natural phenomena. I don’t have the answers, but I keep an open mind to all possibilities.

5. You seem to, in your books, focus on cryptozoology and ufology, what are your thoughts, if you have any, on some other paranormal subjects, such as ghosts, poltergeists, psychic abilities, fairies, or werewolves?

>During many years of research I had an interest in all types of anomalistic events including most of the topics you have mentioned.  In the late 1960s and early 1970s, I was involved with cases of alleged haunted houses and ghosts. I interviewed many people who claimed to have ESP experiences. I have looked into many types of strange creature and mysterious being encounters including claims of fairies and werewolves, and discussed in my new book, “Astonishing Encounters: Pennsylvania’s Unknown Creatures.”

6. Do you have any advice for anyone who may be starting within the subject of the unusual and unexplained?

>Don’t believe everything that you read and see on the internet. Keep an open mind when researching such cases, but be objective and look for sources that might explain what took place. Associate with trained research professionals such as scientists and engineers, and utilize their expertise when evaluating mysterious claims.

All three of Stan’s books are highly recommended. He can be found here. 

Werewolves

Werewolves, the man-wolf creatures of the night, said to terrorize townspeople and consume children and sheep. Werewolves are considered to be a strictly European notion, but most cultures around the world have some concept of people transforming into animals, in the Southern United States it’s the skinwalkers, in Japan, the kitsune, and in Mesoamerica, the nagual. Stories of these shapeshifting creatures are abundant, and many continue today.

The official term for shapeshifting into a wolf is lycanthropy. Many attribute legend of werewolves to people who had the mental disorder known as Clinical Lycanthropy, a form of psychosis in which one believes themselves to be a wolf or half-wolf.

Probably the best known tale of a werewolf are the stories of the Beast of Gevaudan. Gevaudan was the name for a mountainous region in the southern part of 18th century France. The Beast showed up in June of 1764 and terrorized the small town for three years. It killed women, children, livestock--anything it could. Eventually, nearly all of France had heard of the beast, and the king sent soldiers down to kill the creature. The soldiers succeeded in killing the beast and tried to bring it back to the king but because of decay and stench they buried it in an unknown location. Many speculate that the creature was just a hyena or an oversized wolf, but there are some who still call it a werewolf.
There is an abundance of modern werewolf sightings, not just in Europe, but in America as well. Researcher Linda S. Godfrey is the recognized expert on modern werewolf sightings and has a nearly complete list of modern American encounters. She has noticed, like many cryptids, there seems to be a correlation between sighting locations and the locations of both sacred sites and military bases. Godfrey speculated that this could be because the man-wolves are protection spirits from Native American mythology. Godfrey prefers to call these creatures Dogmen or Upright-Candids, because some encounters seem to attribute a more dog-like appearance to the creatures than wolf-like. Many researchers also feel that the dogmen are most supernatural than natural, due to the nature of many encounters. Nearly everyone agrees, though, that werewolves aren’t truly men transforming into wolves.

Sources

Real Wolfmen by Linda S. Godfrey

Encyclopedia of Cryptozoology by Michael Newton

Encyclopedia of Occultism by Lewis Spence

American Monsters by Linda S. Godfrey

New Rash of Werewolf Sightings in Britain

The cryptozoological community has seems to have become obsessed with sightings of werewolves, renamed 'Dogman' for a more broad moniker. Books, documentaries, and even a symposium have emerged from the recent excitement. 

New sightings of such creatures have started to emerge with more frequency, and they are being taken more seriously. 

The most recent set of sightings of bipedal wolf-like creatures have come out of Hull, East Yorkshire in England.

This 'flap' of sightings began in the late fall of last year when a witness claimed to have encountered a tall, dark dog-like creature that was walking on its hind legs. 

Many of the sightings, including the one above, have happened around the Barmston Drain, a channel dating back to 1798, and the industrial areas around the Drain. 

One of the witnesses also claimed that she saw one of the creatures walking with its hind-legs and all fours; “It was stood upright one moment. The next it was down on all fours running like a dog. I was terrified. It bounded along on all fours, then stopped and reared up on to its back legs, before running down the embankment towards the water. It vaulted 30ft over to the other side and vanished up the embankment and over a wall into some allotments.”

There seems to be an old history of bipedal wolves in East Yorkshire. There is an old legend of a wolf creature which had very bad breath, known as 'Old Stinker'. 

You can read the rest of the story here.