Cryptid US Page 8

  The creature was hunched over with its forelimbs bent and was reaching forward. The three people in the car took off at this point, totally forgetting the cameras they had brought with them. “We got the feeling we were not safe,” The witness said. “I felt that it was aggressive and would not hesitate to defend itself.”

  In recent years, there have been a few sightings of the Beast at the end of Bray Road near County Road NN. In 2006, a woman saw a dog-like head in a cornfield with sixfoot cornstalks. As her headlights hit the creature, it ducked out of sight.

  Pet cats in a mobile home park near Elkhorn began to go missing in 2007. That’s not weird, it’s was probably just coyotes, right? Nope. One evening, while a man was leaving a friends house, he saw a tall, dark, bipedal creature run across Geneva Street towards Bray Road. He also said the legs were “bent backwards.”

  He decided to follow the creature in his truck, but lost sight of it before he got to Bray Road. His curiosity got the best of him at this point, and he drove up and down Bray Road until he spotted the creature again, walking towards a wooded area in thigh-high grass.

  The man estimated the creature’s height at 7 to 8 feet tall, and had gotten close enough to see that it was covered in fur, and not dark clothes. He said it walked in a “hunched over” posture.

  A couple from Elkhorn had a run-in with a strange creature on October 15, 2008. There was a full moon out that night, and they both saw a “dark, upright figure with ‘flowing’ fur run across the road. The figure came from the Bray farm and jumped over a guardrail when it got to the other side. They said it ran “hunched over” (like other witnesses have said) and was about 5 feet tall.

  “We saw the back of it,” the woman said. “It didn’t jump over the guardrail like a deer, it used its hand or paw to lift itself over it. We both saw the same thing at the same time.” They went back the next day, but found no other evidence.

  Dogmen in Michigan Wisconsin has a lot of Dogman sightings, and so does one of its neighboring states, Michigan. Joedy Cook sent me a report of a sighting from May 6, 2006 that occurred near Lansing, Michigan. On that night, the witness was driving to his girlfriend’s house (which happened to be in a very isolated area.) He was driving on an old dirt road surrounded by fields (Dogmen seem to like to hang out in them.) As he was driving, he saw something on a hill on the right side of the road. He stopped because he thought it was a deer and didn’t want to spook it. When he stopped, a giant, human-like hand reached towards him and he saw a large silhouette. He said it was much larger than any man and had a wolf head. Its eyes reflected in his headlights. It just sat there, looking across the road. The creature then turned and looked at the witness. The witness was frozen in fear, and he and the creature sat staring at each other for about 20 seconds.

  The creature then got up and started moving down the hill. The witness slammed on the gas and sped past it. He stopped when he got to a stop sign. He looked back and saw the thing sitting in the middle of the road, just staring at his car. He became even more frightened and took off again. He looked back one last time and saw the creature go into the adjacent field and move out of sight. (Source: Joedy Cook. HC addendum source: Linda Godfrey.)

  On June 7, 2006, John Lyons and three friends went to check out an old school because they had heard rumors of a Dogman around there. Shawn, one of his friends, had been to the area before and had seen the creature. The three parked the car in front of the old building and waited.

  “There were crickets all around,” John Lyons said, “and all of a sudden they all stopped. I kept seeing the silhouette of something moving in the woods. I thought it was a deer until we shined the light on it. It was huge, must have been six-foot-nine! It was a humanoid, I think it was bipedal. I could see down to the knees. The hair was a dark brown or black, about an inch long, and covered most of the body. We saw one arm; one of my friends saw it. It was longer than a human arm.”

  He said they were about 50 feet away from the creature, which was partially hidden behind a tree. The trio became frightened and left. They drove away, but decided to go back a few minutes later. When they got back, they saw the building’s motion detecting light come on and heard something run through the brush.

  John said the beast had yellow eyes, a long, narrow snout, and it may have had a mane. It was very slender in stature, and he guessed that it weighed about 210 to 220 pounds. The head was that of a canine. “I’ve seen pictures of Bigfoot,” he said. “And I don’t think this was a Bigfoot.” After a minute they left for the second time. One of John’s friends looked back and saw the thing go down on all fours. It chased them for a short time, and then it was gone.

  John went back to the area following week. They once again saw a creature in the brush. “This thing was gray and big.” John said. “When I saw it, it was kind of squatting, almost like an ape sits.” They left after a few minutes, but, still curious, they once again returned for a second look. John got out of the car to get a flashlight out of the trunk, but by the time he got back his friends had lost sight of the creature. They then heard a high-pitched sound coming from behind the old school. They listened to the sound for thirty seconds before it ended. About 30 seconds later, Aubrey, one of John’s friends, heard something and the motion light on the building turned on. John sped out of the area and did not return again.

  In 2007, Linda Godfrey (author of many books on cryptozoological topics) received a report from a man who had seen a Dogman creature in the Reed City area (which is where John’s sightings occurred as well). One cold January night, the man had snuck out behind an old barn to smoke. As he approached the barn, he saw what he thought was farm equipment. As he looked at it, the “farm equipment” moved! He said it looked like it had eyes and pointy ears. “I thought my imagination was running wild.” He said, “Because the barn was quite a ways from where I was and it was dark outside.”

  He heard a noise in the woods, and the “farm equipment” turned and looked towards that area. The man then realized that he was looking at a living creature, and estimated that it was about 6 feet tall. He said it had “a doglike appearance; a pointy nose and really big pointy ears.” “I started backing away, because I didn’t want to take my eyes off this thing.”

  Once he got inside, he grabbed a flashlight and told his mother what he had seen. She did not believe him, so he went back out himself. He shined the light where the creature was, but it was gone. He did notice that there was a three-foot-high drift where the creature was standing, so it would have had to have been four or five feet taller than that, putting the actual height at 10 or 11 feet! One of the man’s friends saw the creature when she was over after he had his sightings. “It’s as big as a buffalo and looks like a dog and I don’t want to talk about it anymore!” Was all she said.

  In November 2007, a hunter saw a strange creature at about 4:30 P.M. one day, as he was getting ready to leave. He saw two does walk into a clearing, and then saw a totally different creature following them. It was on its hind legs, and the witness was sure that it was not a bear. The creature was following the two deer, and dropped down to all fours and it went back into the woods. It was six feet tall when it was on its hind legs, had pointy ears, and had a face like a Husky’s.

  There are lots of Dogman sightings in Michigan

  The hunter stayed where he was until his friends came to pick him up. They laughed at his story until he showed them tracks the creature left in the snow (also see pages 95 and 96 for tracks of a Dogman.) The prints the hunter found resembled a dog’s but were broader. There were four toes, with two-inch claws. The claw marks did not touch the actual track. The front paws (from when it dropped on all fours) were 5 inches long, and the back prints were 7 inches.

  The sightings did not stop there, however. The next day, the hunter waited to go hunting until about 2 in the afternoon. At about 5 pm, he heard three shots from about 100 yards away, and heard screaming coming from his walkie-talkie. He climbed out of his tree stand and saw o
ne of his friends running towards him. His friend had seen the creature and said it was a dark color, had yellow eyes, and left the same tracks.

  The next day, the hunter and his friend saw nothing unusual. Their third friend, who went off by himself while the other two stayed together, also saw nothing strange.

  They split up the same way on the 4th day, and the hunter and his friend saw it again. The creature ran into a clearing (standing upright), and looked directly at them. “It was almost grinning.” The hunter said. The two said it had arms as long as a humans and made a “growling/hissing noise” when it ran off. About an hour later, their other friend called them on the walkie-talkie and said “Um, are you guys over here in a werewolf suit? Because its not funny.” They heard five shots after that.

  The two hunters raced to their truck and went to pick up their companion. Shaking, he got into the truck and showed them his gun. It had claw marks on it. He said the creature had charged him, and he fired off the first round almost accidentally to block the attack. That scared the creature into the woods, and he fired again to

  make sure it left. When the trio got back to

  their cabin, they found claw marks by the door

  and footprints. They packed up their

  belongings and left immediately, even though

  they were originally planning on staying three

  more days. They felt something ram into the

  back of their truck as they were leaving, but

  did not get to see what it was because it was

  already dark out.

  In July of 2004, two 12 year olds riding

  around in a golf cart saw what they thought

  was a dog on all fours. They said the “dog”

  stood up on its hind legs and ran off.

  Jerry Falkner saw a Dogman in the summer of 1982 near Rochester. His sighting occurred on Sheldon Road, which is located by the Ball Mountain Recreation Area and the Stony Creek Metropolitan Park. His sighting occurred around 11 pm when he saw an upright, doglike creature (like the one pictured on the right) “checking him out”. He estimated its height at about 7 feet, because he was 6 foot and was standing on a pile of debris which made him eye level with the creature. He said its tongue lolled over one side of its jaw, it had thick shoulders, and it had a tapered waist. “It had a huge head and its fur was shaggy and dark brown.” He said. “The teeth were canine.”

  Jerry dashed to the car where his friends were waiting to leave. The creature followed him, sometimes running on two feet and sometimes on all four.

  Another sighting occurred in the Flint, Michigan area in the summer of 1973. A high school student was delivering fruit with his uncle around 11:30 PM. As they were driving up a hilly road to park the truck, they saw a large, dog-like creature on the side of the road. It paid no attention to them as they drove towards it.

  As the headlights hit it, the creature stood up. It had a human body covered in dark fur, topped off with a wolf head, just your typical Dogman. The creature stared at them with eyes that reflected yellow. The student’s uncle stopped the truck where the creature had stood where they first saw it and grabbed a gun from under his seat. To the student’s horror, he got out of the truck. He went over to where the thing had crouched down and found a half eaten deer carcass. The student watched for the Dogman the rest of the summer, but never saw it again.

  On April Fools Day, 1987, Traverse City disk jockey Steve Cook released his recording “The Legend.” The song is about Michigan Dogman sightings, although some reports in the song are fictional. Cook has updated the song several times over the years. If you are ever camping in Michigan, play that song one night. It’ll creep you out!

  Cook later teamed up with amateur filmmaker Mike Agrusa and created two films purportedly showing a Dogman. The film became known as the “Gable Film” and was thought to be real until the two men admitted that it was a hoax on an episode of MonsterQuest.

  A frame from the Gable Film created by Steve Cook and

  Mike Agrusa.

  The sightings in this section are only a fraction of all the sightings in Michigan. Many states surrounding it have a lot of sightings as well, but Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin are not the only states where werewolves are seen.

  More Sightings From Across the U.S. The rest of this chapter will cover reports from all the other US states. It will not cover all the sightings, because there are too many to fit into one chapter of a book.

  MORE WISCONSIN REPORTS Bray Road is not the only place in Wisconsin where people have seen werewolves. Another well-known Dogman in that state is “The Holly Hill Bearwolf.” On November 9, 2006, Steve Krueger was patrolling the roads, looking for road kill (he is a contractor for the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.) He found a freshly-hit deer that was not on his list at about 1:30 a.m. and threw it in the back of his truck. He climbed back in his truck and began filling out the paperwork. As he was writing, he felt the truck rock. Thinking it was the wind, he continued to write. Then the truck rocked again. Krueger glanced in the side mirror and saw a creature reaching for the deer in his truck. He said it had a wolf’s head with a long muzzle and pointy ears. It stood six to seven feet tall and was very thick in its neck and upper body, reminding Krueger of a bear. He hit the gas and sped off. He heard two things hit hit pavement as he left, one being the deer and the other being an ATV ramp he kept in the back of his truck. He drove for several miles, but then decided to go back and retrieve his ATV ramp. When he returned to the spot, the creature, deer, and ramp were gone. Krueger told the local sheriff because he thought the public should know about a large, possibly dangerous animal in the area.

  Krueger may have seen the same creature again in 2007. He was once again picking up a dead deer when he saw the creature, walking on four legs. “It didn’t seem to notice me.” He said. “It back was about four feet high, it was the biggest wolf I’ve ever seen.”

  Did Krueger see the same creature both times? Maybe. Some witnesses say the Dogman they saw walked on all fours and on two legs. Is it possible he saw a giant wolf the second time? He contacted DNR officials and they said that wolves travel down from the Great Lakes, and some people keep wolf hybrids as pets. Either way, it would still have to be a pretty big wolf to have a back that was four feet in the air!

  The day after Steve Krueger’s sighting in 2006, Mike Lane went to the area to look for footprints. He was expecting to find large, human-like tracks like those reported with a Bigfoot, but instead found canine tracks. The tracks had been made by something bipedal. Lane also heard about a second hand sighting on October 25, 2007. A man told Lane that his brother had seen something big running along railroad tracks near Highway 175. It was running on four legs and he thought it was a bear. The creature then stood up on two legs and ran off very quickly.

  Rick Selcherk saw a large, bipedal creature running across the road in 2004. He could not identify it as anything he had ever seen. He said it looked like a combination between two animals and had a short tail.

  In 1996, two people driving on Scenic Road (not far from Holly Hill Road) at 2 a.m. saw two of the creatures. Both witnesses described the creatures as “tall, hairy, and quick.”

  Enough on the Bearwolf, though. Let’s move on to some other reports from Wisconsin. Another, particularly creepy creature called “The Wausau Whatzit” was encountered in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. A boy (he was 13 at the time of the first encounter) and his friends were out in one of his parent’s fields, sitting around a campfire, eating pizza, and throwing snowballs at each other. Suddenly, a strange beam of light appeared in the field and started moving towards the boys. The group got spooked because they could not identify the source of the light, but calmed down when it disappeared.

  Three years later, the boy and another one of his friends saw three of the strange lights above a creek. He and his friend saw those lights several times over a span of a few nights. The boy also saw a large, glowing, oval shaped object (a UFO?) floa
ting towards Lake DuBay one night at 1:56 a.m. Six minutes later, the object came back and shot off towards the creek, leaving a streak trail behind it.

  He would still camp out with his friends on his parents property, and a strange light would illuminate the campsite from time to time. They also saw an odd, triangular head looking at them from a nearby cornfield (again, Dogmen seem to like hiding in cornfields.)

  Not long after that, one of the boy’s friends said something rammed into the side of his pickup truck. He said the creature followed him home and tore gardening tools off of a shed, but he never saw what it was. Another one of his friends saw the creature cross the road, running on two legs. He said it was six feet tall and grayish in color. After it crossed the road, it dropped onto all fours and ran towards the river.

  A week later, the boy and his friend Jason saw the creature standing in the middle of the road. It stared at them with yellow eyes and had pointy ears. The boy said the thing had a human like body, canine legs, and tan, oily skin. It was very thin (they could see its ribs) and it had no

  tail. The boy said, that after seeing the creature, he thinks the UFO he saw could have been picking it up(or maybe dropping it off?) Strange lights and UFOs have been associated with Bigfoot and Dogman sightings before, so maybe it’s possible the boy and his friends saw an alien werewolf.

  Another well known Wisconsin Dogman encounter occurred in the summer of 2003. Katie Zahn from Janesville, Wisconsin, and three friends were out in the 168-acre nature preserve called Avon Bottoms. They went out there that day to look for a bridge that was supposed to be haunted. There was also an urban legend saying that a scientist was killed by some breeding experiment in that same area. Perhaps that is what the four saw that day.