Dover Demon...

Dover Massachusetts, probably not the first place you would think of when you hear the word cryptozoology. You might think of Scotland, or Walnut Creek California, or even Loveland Ohio, but Massachusetts? One of the classic cryptozoology cases comes to us from 1977, in the town of Dover.

In the spring of 1977, three teenagers were taking a joyride when the headlights of their car illuminated something in the road. At first glance, the driver thought it was a dog or a cat. Once they were a little closer, they realized that it was not anything that they had ever seen before. The creature was not very large, around three feet tall, hairless, long spindly arms and legs, and a huge, almost watermelon shape to its head. It also had no visible mouth, nose or ears, only bright orange eyes. The creature scattered away from the road to not be seen again. By these three anyway.

Around an hour later on the same night, two other teenagers were walking down the same road. They described seeing the exact same type creature, this time it crossed in front of them, ran down into a gully, climbed up the other side and watched the two teenagers from a distance. These two had no previous knowledge of the earlier incident.

The next evening, two other teenagers driving in the same area spotted the same creature. The only difference in their description was that it had glowing green eyes instead of orange from the original description. Everything else was described as all of the other accounts.

So what could all of this mean? Was this an alien? An escaped hairless monkey? A hoax from area teenagers to liven up their town? Or was this something genuine, something so real that one of the teenagers drew out a sketch of what he had seen, and wrote "I swear on a stack of bibles this is what I saw."

If you go back into history, way back in to Native American times, you normally find some similarities. The tribes of Eastern Canada, specifically the Cree, had a creature they called the Mannegishi. They described the Mannegishi as short, hairless, lanky creature with no mouth, nose or ears, and an excessively large head. The exact same description as the ones from the 1970s. For the Cree Indians, these creatures were tricksters, known for flipping over their canoes, and sending their people into the rapids. Another tribe, the Iroquois, had a similar creature called the Gahonga.

Once again, Native American legends are explaining phenomenon that we see in today's world.