Long before cheerful little men in red hats began appearing beside garden ponds and flower beds, European folklore imagined something considerably stranger living beneath the ground. They were small, secretive beings connected to the earth and the riches hidden inside it. They knew places human beings could not reach. They moved through stone, guarded underground... Continue Reading →
The Onza: The Mysterious Cat of Mexico’s Sierra Madre
For generations, people living among the rugged mountains and remote ranches of northwestern Mexico told stories about a cat that didn't quite fit with the animals they already knew. They knew the jaguar. They knew the puma. And they knew the onza. The creature was said to roam the mountains of Sinaloa and the surrounding... Continue Reading →
The Badalisc: The Creature That Knows the Secrets of an Italian Village
Deep in the mountains of northern Italy, where old stone villages cling to the slopes and thick forests stretch into the Italian Alps, there is said to live a creature that spends most of the year hidden among the trees. Its name is the Badalisc. The legend belongs particularly to Andrista, a small village in... Continue Reading →
The Castle His Dead Daughter Helped Build: The Ghost of Iulia Hașdeu
In the Romanian town of Câmpina stands a strange little castle built from grief. It has towers, hidden symbolism, rooms designed for séances and spaces that seem intended to blur the boundary between the physical and spiritual worlds. But perhaps the strangest thing about Iulia Hașdeu Castle is the reason it exists at all. Its... Continue Reading →
The Drumming After Dark: The Haunting of Tedworth
In the spring of 1662, in the quiet Wiltshire countryside of England, John Mompesson could hardly have imagined that confiscating a wandering man's drum would lead to one of the most famous haunting stories of the seventeenth century. Mompesson was a landowner, magistrate and local official living with his family at Zouch Manor in Tedworth,... Continue Reading →
The Scream Beyond the Tree Line: The Mystery of the Wampus Cat
The Wampus Cat is one of those Appalachian creatures whose story seems to change depending on which mountain, hollow, or small town you happen to be standing in. Sometimes it is described as an enormous black panther with glowing yellow or green eyes. Other accounts give it an almost human posture, capable of rising onto... Continue Reading →
The Footprints in the Snow: The 1951 Yeti Mystery
High in the Himalayas in 1951, a group of experienced mountaineers stumbled upon something that would become one of the most famous mysteries in the history of cryptozoology. They weren't searching for the Yeti. They were looking for a way up Mount Everest. British explorer Eric Shipton was leading a reconnaissance expedition into the remote... Continue Reading →
Borley Rectory: The House They Called the Most Haunted in England
Borley Rectory stood in the quiet village of Borley in Essex, England, an imposing Victorian home that would eventually earn a chilling nickname: “the most haunted house in England.” Long before paranormal investigators arrived with notebooks and cameras, however, the people who lived within its walls were already telling strange stories. The rectory was built... Continue Reading →
The Baldoon Mystery: Something Terrorized a Family in Upper Canada
In the early years of the 19th century, along the waterways near what is now Wallaceburg, Ontario, stood the farm of John T. McDonald and his family. It was an isolated place surrounded by woods, marshes and farmland, the sort of landscape where darkness could feel especially deep once the sun disappeared. Toward the end... Continue Reading →
Something Crossed the Trail: The 1995 Carmacks Sasquatch Encounter
In the summer of 1995, two teenage girls headed into the woods near Carmacks, Yukon, looking for a little privacy. They crossed a gravel road and followed a trail leading toward a small lake, eventually finding a place to sit among the trees. It was broad daylight, reportedly sometime around two in the afternoon, and... Continue Reading →