The Beast of Barrington: the Bay State's First Bigfoot?

Recently, I've seen a few posts claiming that something called the "Beast of Barrington" was the first Bigfoot ever seen in Massachusetts. This idea has even started to find its way into a few books, like John O'Connor's The Secret History of Bigfoot: Field Notes on a North American Monster (2024). 

According to some online sources, the Beast was captured in the western Massachusetts town of Great Barrington in 1765, placed into a cage, and shown to an audience in Cambridge. Maybe the people who captured the creature wanted the professors at Harvard to see it? It's not clear.

What did the Beast look like? Well, according (again) to online sources, it was a bearlike humanoid with a head like a gorilla. That sounds pretty scary to me, and very memorable. You'd think a creature that like would be much better known! The description is also a little strange, because Europeans and Americans didn't really use the word gorilla until the 1840s... 

A 15th century engraving by Martin Shongauer

You can see why I found the story interesting, and also why I wanted to find the original source. My friend David Goudsward helped me find it: the July 4, 1765 edition of The Massachusetts Gazette and Boston News-Letter. 

The Beast in described in an article titled “A Description of an Uncommon Animal Found at or near Great-Barrington.” The author writes that the Beast was being displayed in a cage in Cambridge, where “all whose curiosity lead them, may have a sight of this uncommon creature.” It was supposedly captured by armed men in Great Barrington, where it had allegedly broken into houses in search of food. Strangely for an animal, the creature also had stolen silver, linens, and other “white or glittering” objects, which it seized with its “obscene paws.” I like the phrase "obscene paws." It's very creepy!

Stealing silverware and linens sounds like something a person would do, not an animal, and the article goes on to describe what sounds like a person wearing a costume. “This animal has a power of metamorphosing itself into various forms, such as blackness of face, much resembling that of an artificial mask, also upon a near view, it has been observed to be vested with a kind of robe, having the appearance of the hide of some huge bear. This vestment seemed to be the production of art, rather than nature.” 

I'm going to pull out some key words: "artificial mask," "robe," and "production of art, rather than nature." The article's author is using sarcasm and humor, but he's clearly describing someone wearing a costume. The Beast of Barrington wasn't a Bigfoot or a mysterious animal, it was just someone dressed as a monster or wild man, and exhibited to make money from spectators. 

 Painting of a wild man by Albrecht Durer

To make the point even clearer, the same article in The Massachusetts Gazette describes another fake wild man who appeared in Boston around the same time. This one came from Georgia and seemed to have had a criminal record, because after only “two public exhibitions, he was discovered by several that had seen the effects of his voracious appetite in other parts… Whereupon yesterday morning early he thought proper to remove to some place where he was less known, and set out for Providence, with his companion, a Black lady, who attended him from Georgia.” 

Again, although the author is being sarcastic, he's clearly writing about a human who's pretending to be a monster. It's someone performing for an audience - preferably an unwitting one. 

Although The Beast of Barrington isn't the Bay State's first Bigfoot sighting, it is an early account of a fake wild man, which is just as interesting, because there's a long history of fake wild men in Massachusetts. For example, on April 1, 1839, The Boston Times published an article claiming that a wild man captured in Mississippi was going to be exhibited in Boston. The hairy wild man supposedly was over eight-feet-tall with a powerfully-built frame, clawed doglike legs, and hair like a horse's mane.  

Thousands of people waited in line on April 1 to see this terrifying creature, but when they entered the room where he was held they saw only a mannequin with a sign reading "April Fool." Most audience members took the hoax in stride, but a small group of angry young men stormed the newspaper's offices and yelled at the editor. 

In the summer of 1861, concerned citizens reported a wild man roaming through the woods between North Adams, Massachusetts and Stamford, Vermont. He was heard shrieking at night, and people who saw him said he was terrifingly ugly. In fact, an armed posse of Vermont men tried to capture him, but the wild man “so frightened his pursuers by his hideous appearance that they could not shoot straight and he escaped harm” (Bangor, Maine, Daily Whig and Courier, August 19, 1861, quoted in Arment, The Historical Bigfoot). 

When the creature was finally captured, hundreds of curious people lined up to see the monster that had filled them with terror. They saw a strange, almost ape-like being with vacant, glassy eyes and an extremely long beard. Was it a man, or an animal?

In reality, it was just a Williams College student “who assumed the gorilla guise in a frolic which might have cost him his life” at the end of a hunting rifle. The whole thing had been a prank.

The Wild Men of Borneo (Syracuse University Library)

Wild men were also big attractions in sideshows and circuses. The famous showman P.T. Barnum showcased a variety of fake wild men in his circuses and museums, including the What-is-it (played by a series of performers wearing furry costumes) and the Wild Men of Borneo, who were two very short but very strong brothers from the Midwest. The Wild Men of Borneo lived in Somerville, Massachusetts for a while, and spent the final years of their lives in Waltham, with one passing away in 1905 and the other in 1912. 

Fake wild men continued to appear in Massachusetts during the 20th and 21st centuries, although now they're more likely to be called fake Bigfoots. For example, in 1976, an Agawam teenager created a sensation when he put on giant plywood feet and created mysterious tracks in the snow. And during the Snowmageddon winter of 2015, a Somerville man donned a Yeti costume and gained fame as the Boston Yeti. The Boston Yeti returned to the spotlight again this year in January, lured by the heavy snow. 

Hoaxes aren't as exciting as a real wild man or Bigfoot, but they're still interesting. They illustrate what people think - or hope - is lurking out there in the dark woods. Clearly, people think a large, hairy humanoid might be hiding somewhere in Massachusetts. The Beast of Barrington wasn't real, and neither was the Boston Yeti, but maybe someday a real Bigfoot will be captured and fulfill our wild-man dreams.  

Brookline's Haunted Schoolhouse: Stalked by an Angry Ghost

A few weeks ago, Tony and I paid a visit to Larz Anderson Park in Brookline, Massachusetts. Although it's a popular place for dog walkers, and well-known for its Auto Museum, we went there for a different reason. We wanted to see a schoolhouse that was once haunted by a vengeful ghost.

Built in 1768, the schoolhouse in question is a charming, one-room building known as the Putterham School, and originally stood at the intersection of Grove Street and Newton Street. In addition to being a school, the building may also have served as a synagogue and a Catholic church after World War II. It was moved to Larz Anderson Park in 1966, where it now serves as a museum. 

I love a historic building, but I love a historic building with a ghost story even more. According to Ken Liss, president of the Brookline Historical Society, the Putterham School was allegedly haunted for seven years by an angry ghost. Well, at least according to a local legend, that is.  

Here's how the school supposedly became haunted. Sometime after the Revolutionary War, a young man named Samuel Frothingham fell in love with the Putterham School's teacher. Unfortunately for him, she loved another man, and rejected Samuel's advances. 

Samuel did not accept rejection lightly. He became so distraught that he stopped eating, growing ever more emaciated. He eventually starved to death, but not before he wrote a message on the chalkboard, "berating the teacher for her betrayal and saying the note would appear every year until she died"(Brookline Tab, October 25, 2018, "Spooky Brookline: ghost stories").

True to his word, the angry message appeared on the blackboard every year for seven years, until the teacher eventually died. I don't think her death was connected to being haunted, but I'm sure the ghostly messages didn't help her mental health. As far as I know, Samuel Frothingham's ghost never haunted the schoolhouse after her death. 

To use a modern term, Samuel Frothingham seems a little bit like a stalker, doesn't he? The schoolteacher wanted another man, but rather than move on, Samuel starved himself to death and then sent her nasty messages from beyond the grave. This doesn't seem like a very mature reaction. Even though she was haunted for seven years, I think the teacher made the right choice. If Samuel was that creepy while dead, think how bad he would have been while alive?

Rutland's Abandoned Prison Camp: Ruins, Graffiti, and Maybe A Ghost or Two?

Back in March, Tony and I took a road trip to Rutland, Massachusetts to visit an abandoned prison camp located in Rutland State Park. Rutland is located west of Worcester, and we had never been there before. It's a very beautiful part of the state and I recommend visiting. 

One small caveat, though. I don't recommend visiting when there's been a huge ice storm, like we did! A big nor'easter had hit the state the day before our trip, and while it brought only rain to Boston, Rutland had been hit with ice, which we didn't realize until after we were beyond Worcester. All the trees in Rutland were covered with glittering ice, making them very sparkly and captivating, but the two mile walk from the Rutland State Park parking lot to the prison camp was treacherously slippery. It took us a lot longer than we anticipated to walk to the camp. I have learned my lesson to check the local weather forecast before heading on a road trip! 

Solitary confinement cells. 

According to the signs in the park, the prison was conceived in 1898 as a "temporary industrial camp for prisoners... to rehabilitate them for their return to society while reclaiming wasteland and abandoned property..." Four years later, a Rutland farm from the 1700s was repurposed and used as a kitchen, dining area, and housing for the camp. The inmates also built additional structures, and an abandoned schoolhouse was incorporated into the prison as well. 

In 1905, a tuberculosis outbreak necessitated the construction of a hospital, which remained in use throughout the prison's history. The park's signage notes the following: "While most of the prisoners of the camp were minor offenders, some patient prisoners in later years were 'lifers' and murderers, so the hospital was a secure facility." The camp also had 150 acres of farmland which were used to raise livestock (including prize winning horses) and grow enough fruits and vegetables to feed the inmates. They even produced excess to sell locally. The fruits and vegetables were stored in an enormous underground root cellar, which still exists. 

The entrance to the root cellar.

Inside the root cellar.

Sometimes in old movies, prisoners are shown breaking big rocks into little rocks. There is some truth to that, at least at the Rutland prison, which had a rock crushing plant that made concrete, gravel, and sand for road repairs. It sounds a little grim. The solitary confinement cells, the ruins of which are still standing, are also very small and grim. They're covered with colorful graffiti and don't have any bars on them now, but it was easy to imagine how dark and confining they would have been in the prison's heyday. We didn't visit the nearby cemetery of unmarked prisoner graves, but I think that sounds grim as well. 

The prison camp was closed in 1934 because the land it stood on was part of the watershed of the newly created Quabbin Reservoir. There certainly is a lot of fresh water in Rutland State Park, including a giant beaver pond that we walked past on the way to the prison's ruins. We didn't see a beaver, but we did see some of their lodges. 

Beaver pond with a beaver lodge. 

Just in case you don't know where you're going...

I couldn't easily find any spooky legends associated with the prison camp. The blog Haunted New England mentions a legend that the ghost of the warden's wife still haunts the prison, but they couldn't find many other details. And in the comments on Abandoned Wonders, I found the following comment from 2019:

This place is incredibly haunted. Within the last 10 years, a group opened something in the tunnel area and called a non-human entity into the camp. Be advised! It followed me home and stuck around for about 3 months. Not fun.

Those were the only legends I could find about the camp. Overall, I found the prison camp interesting but not really spooky. We were the only people there for most of our visit, which was great, but also be aware that the area is isolated. As always, travel with a friend if you're wandering out in the woods, particularly to the ruins of an abandoned prison. 

A view inside the root cellar.

Walnut Cemetery: A Ghost, A Crossroads, and A Poetic Tragedy

I was chatting with someone a while ago, and they asked if I had ever visited Walnut Cemetery in Haverhill, Massachusetts. I was born and raised in Haverhill, but had surprisingly never been to this particular cemetery. After they told me it was haunted, I decided it was finally time to pay a visit. It's an interesting place, and I have lots of thoughts. 

Walnut Cemetery is located in one of the more rural areas of Haverhill. I couldn't find what year the cemetery was started, but it's quite old, with a few gravestones dating back to the 1700s. It's still active today, with newer burials and monuments being added. The newer section is well-maintained, but the older section is a little rough looking. It looks, in fact, like a haunted cemetery. There are a lot of tall weeds. Tree branches have fallen on the graves. Some of the oldest monuments are covered in lichen. We went in the winter, so it may just have been between scheduled maintenance. The older section of the cemetery is also on a rocky hill, so perhaps it is harder to cut the grass there. But whatever the reason, the old part of Walnut Cemetery looks a little spooky. I can understand why someone might think it's haunted. 

The cemetery is said to be haunted by a ghost known as the Woman in White, who roams through it at night. You don't even need to go inside the cemetery to see her - the Woman in White has also been seen by motorists just driving by. Some people say she's terrifying, but others say she is simply eerie and mysterious. As with so many things, I think your mindset might influence what you see. If you go expecting something scary, that's what you'll probably encounter. 

When we visited, I noticed that Walnut Cemetery is located within a triangular crossroads. There's a lot of interesting folklore associated with crossroads, so perhaps it's not surprising there are legends associated with this particular cemetery. The ancient Greeks and Romans believed that crossroads were sacred to Hecate, the goddess of witches, and to Hermes, the divine messenger who guided the dead to the underworld. In England, Scotland and Ireland, people who died by suicide were buried at crossroads, often with stake in their heart. Something similar happened more locally in 1680 in Hampton, New Hampshire, when the citizens of that town buried accused witch Eunice Cole at a crossroads with a stake in her heart. For good measure, they placed a horseshoe on her chest to keep her in her unhallowed grave. And in the American south, legends say that if you want to sell your soul to the Devil, you can find him at a crossroads at midnight. 

Speaking of triangular shapes, paranormal investigator Fiona Broome thinks Walnut Cemetery could be linked to a ley line triangle connecting several weird, legendary places in New England. Ley lines are straight lines that connect important locations on a map, and some people believe these lines conduct mystical energy across the landscape. I can't say if that's true or not, but it's another interesting idea to consider when thinking about Walnut Cemetery. Ghosts plus a  crossroads plus ley lines must all add up to something, right? Well, it may not, but it's still fun to think about. 

Broome and several other ghost hunters investigated Walnut Cemetery back in 2009. They perceived several spirits, including a woman in black, an undefined male spirit, and possibly the restless spirit of a small child. They did not encounter the Woman in White, however. 

Who exactly is the Woman in White? Some people think she is the ghost of Lydia Ayer, the most famous person buried in the cemetery. Ayer was immortalized by the Haverhill poet John Greenleaf Whittier in his 1868 poem "In School-days." In this autobiographical poem, Whittier recalls an incident from his childhood, when he lost a spelling bee to a girl in his class. The girl was Lydia Ayer. Rather than revel in her victory, Ayer instead felt sorry for Whittier.

'I'm sorry that I spelt the word: 


I hate to go above you, 


Because,’ - the brown eyes lower fell, - 


'Because, you see, I love you! ' 



Still memory to a gray-haired man 


That sweet child-face is showing. 


Dear girl! the grasses on her grave 


Have forty years been growing!

He lives to learn, in life's hard school,

How few who pass above him

Lament their triumph and his loss,

Like her, - because they love him.

It's a melancholy poem, and justifiably so, because Ayer died in 1827 when she was just fourteen years old. It's clear that her death made a big impact on Whittier. The poem itself also made a big impact. "In School-days" was one of Whittier's most popular poems, and is often still taught to students today. 

Death is the great equalizer, but Lydia Ayer is the star attraction for living visitors to Walnut Cemetery. A wooden sign points towards her grave, which is marked with a large, handsome memorial that was put up in 1937 by a local civic organization. But is her spirit the Woman in White? 

I'm not sure. Ayer died when she was just a young teenager, and the Woman in White is usually described as a woman, not a young girl. Maybe people only see that the ghost is female, and can't really discern her age, and think she is a full-grown woman. Or maybe Ayer's ghost actually looks older than fourteen. After all, she's over two-hundred years old. Or maybe it's not her ghost at all. And of course, this could all just be a legend. There may not be a ghost at all. 

Women in white are a classic form that ghosts appear in, and stories about them can be found all over the world. In a sense, a Woman in White transcends the story of an individual and partakes in a greater, archetypal identity. In his book Daimonic Reality (2003), Patrick Harpur says the following about "white ladies":

"A ghost? Possibly. But it is a distinguishing characteristic of white lady apparitions they are not individually identifiable. They have deeper resonances than the shade of a historical personage. The time and location are suggestive... an hour and place of transition, of in-between. "

He goes on to say: 

"... white ladies do not speak. But their silence is eloquent. Their appearance itself is the message: enigmatic, often sinister, pointing towards the unknown."

 

Tales of A Tentacled Lake Monster: Fact or Fiction?

Does a tentacled, horned, snake-like monster haunt Nagog Pond in Littleton, Massachusetts? There aren't a lot of legends about lake monsters here in the Bay State, so I was excited when I first stumbled upon the possible Littleton lake monster a few years ago. It has been lurking in the back of my mind since then, and I finally decided to do a little more research. 

Nagog Pond is on the border of Littleton and Acton, and was formerly called Nagog Lake. It's a kettle hole pond, meaning it was formed thousands of years ago when the glaciers melted at the end of the last ice ice. Kettle hole ponds are so-called because they hold water just like a tea kettle. 

I've seen a few explanations for the name "Nagog," which is apparently derived from a word in one of the local Algonquin dialects. Some people say nagog means "corner," since the lake is in one corner of Littleton, and other say it is derived from "magog," which means water. As an FYI, Nagog is pronounced NAY-gog. Nagog Pond was used for fishing and recreational sailing in the past, and it now supplies drinking water to the nearby town of Concord. 

Illustration from Uriah Jewett and the Sea Serpent of Lake Mephemgagog (1917)

To understand the monster, you first need to know a little local history. Littleton was originally established in 1645 as Nashoba Plantation, a village for local Nipmuc and Pennacook Indians who had converted to Christianity. It was one of six so-called Praying Indian Villages that were created in Massachusetts by the Puritan minister John Eliot. The term "plantation" here does not refer to a large farm based on slave labor like you would find in the old American south, but instead to a farming settlement. The Praying Indians from Nashoba and the other villages were forcibly moved to Deer Island in Boston Harbor during King Philip's war by their English neighbors who thought they would join Philip (Metacomet) in his rebellion. Many of the Indians died from starvation and exposure on Deer Island, and the rest intermarried with English settlers or gradually joined other Indian groups after the war ended. All the Praying Indian villages eventually became English towns. 

The last Indian to live in Nashoba was Wunnuhhew, also known as Sarah Doublet, who returned to the village after King Phillip's War. Doublet sold the remaining 500 acres of Nashoba in 1734 to cover the cost of her care when she was elderly. She died two years later. 

Sarah Doublet is one of the topics in John Hanson Mitchell's 1998 non-fiction book Trespassing: An Inquiry into the Private Ownership of Land. This is where the monster comes in. Mitchell's book is the only place I've found reference to the Nagog Pond monster. According to Mitchell, Sarah Doublet and the other Indians at Nashoba believed the pond was home to a large monster named Ap'cinic. Ap'cinic was a horned water-serpent, and also had tentacles that it used to probe the shoreline for prey. The creature seemed to have a particular appetite for human intestines. 

"She knew the terror that flies by night, the fiery worm, the gnashing devils, and the legends of the tentacled, horned monster who would reach up out of the dark waters of Nagog at certain times and draw the entrails of passing villagers down into the depths." (Mitchell, Trespassing, p. 23)

Mitchell talks about Ap'cinic's tentacles a few other times. An earthquake struck the area in the 1600s, and he describes the monster reacting to it: "... the waters of Nagog churned and roiled and swelled, and the horned water beast who lived most of his time unseen beneath the surface rose up and spirited his vicious hunting tentacles through the drying air." (Mitchell, Trespassing, p. 65) 

At one point in the book, Mitchell encounters some teenagers illegally swimming in Nagog Pond. He tries to warn them away by telling them about Ap'cinic:

"It had these long tentacles, they say, and a huge gnashing beak and horns on its head. At night it would reach up and feel along the shore for people, fishermen, swimmers, things like that. If it caught you, it would either drag you down into the waters, or worse, slice you open and suck out your intestines."

The teenagers were quiet for a minute.

"You mean it would like eat you alive?" Tracy asked. 

"Yeah, suck out your inner body parts while you clung to a tree."

"Cool," she said. (Mitchell, Trespassing, p. 154)

The teenagers are intrigued, but not too worried. After all, is the story about Ap'cinic even true? Was there ever a monster lurking in the pond? You may wonder the same thing yourself. 

To be clear, Trespassing is marketed as a non-fiction book. It is about the history of Littleton, Massachusetts, about people who actually lived, and even about the dry business of town governance. Town hearings about zoning are a key part of the book. Ap'cininc is only a very small part of Trespassing. 

From Native People of Southern New England, 1500 - 1650.

Sarah Doublet (Wunnuhhew) really lived in Nashoba, but we don't know much about her life, and sadly Mitchell doesn't cite any sources for the legend of Ap'cinic. It's possible he made the story up. On the other hand, it's entirely possible that the Indians at Nashoba did believe a horned serpent lived in the pond. Horned serpents were part of the Alonquin cosmology. The anthropologist Kathleen Brandon writes:

"Among the manitou known to the Ninnimissinuok (i.e. New England Indians) was the giant horned or antlered, under (water) world serpent, a being familiar to other Algonquian-speaking people as well. Images of this fearsome underwater dweller sometimes decorated amulets, bowls, and other objects." (Kathleen Bragdon, Native People of Southern New England, 1500 - 1650, 1996, p.187)

So perhaps the Indians at Nashoba did believe a horned serpent lived in this particular pond, but John Hanson Mitchell doesn't present any concrete evidence they did. He doesn't explain where he found the name Ap'cinic, or why he thinks Ap'cinic had tentacles. 

I think the word "manitou" is key to understanding what's happening with Ap'cinic. Manitou means spiritual power, or anything that has a lot of spiritual power. My hunch is that Mitchell is responding to the spiritual power he feels around Nagog Pond, and he's trying to tell the reader what it feels like for him, and what he thought it felt like for the Indians who lived there hundreds of years ago. Mitchell has written several books about the history of Littleton, and has a deep awareness of its history and geology. Ap'cinic is the sensation Mitchell feels when he is near the pond. Ap'cinic is how Mitchell experiences the spirit of the place:

"Back at the car I stood on the road for a while looking up at the hill, simply feeling the sensation. Nothing happened, nothing seized me by the throat and dragged me back into the swamps to draw me, struggling, into the murky depths. And below me at the pond, I could not see the slimy gleam of the blind, searching tentacles of the Ap'cinic, feeling along the shores for victims." (Mitchell, Trespassing, p. 109)

If you were to probe the depths of Nagog Pond with a camera, I don't think you would find any trace of a giant monster. But perhaps, if you were sitting in the woods by the lake on a still autumn night, with your phone silenced and your mind cleared from worries, you might catch a glimpse of Ap'cinic. Maybe it would look differently to you, and instead of a horned serpent you'd see a hairy humanoid wading along the shore, or a giant black bird flying overhead, or a strange glowing orb hovering above the water. Or maybe you'd just get the feeling of a sentient presence surrounding you. 

The ancient Romans had a term for the spirit of a place: genius loci, or local spirit. Your belief in spirits as actual autonomous beings, or as a psychological metaphor, will depend on your intellectual temperament. But Ap'cinic may still hold a strange power, even if you think of him simply as a psychological experience:

"...a lake provides a ready-made metaphor for the Soul of the World, a symbol of the collective unconscious, an imaginative nexus where individual perception (or "misperception") and collective myth meet. Regardless of the actual characteristics of the lake, it is transformed by the Imagination into a reflection of the unconscious itself, becoming a dark, impenetrable, bottomless kingdom which does not yield up its dead. (Patrick Harpur, Daimonic Reality. A Field Guide to the Otherworld. 2003, p. 129)

That sounds intimidating, doesn't it? But perhaps less intimidating than a tentacled monster that wants to eat your intestines. 

Haunted by the Nantucket Mermaid

This post is about a mermaid who has fascinated, and possibly haunted, people for centuries. But I want to start by talking about a human man: Ichabod Paddock. 

Ichabod Paddock was born around 1661 in Yarmouth, Massachusetts, and died around 1750. He's buried in Middleborough, Massachusetts. Paddock is remembered today for two things: his pioneering role in the Nantucket whaling industry, and his alleged extramarital affair with a mermaid. As a whaling pioneer, Ichabod came with his two brothers to Nantucket in 1690 and taught the islanders how to hunt whales. Their actions were instrumental in making Nantucket into the whaling capital of the world. 

Oddly, we have more details about his alleged (and probably legendary) affair with the mermaid than we do about his actual life as a whaler. The legend goes something like this. Once while on a whaling voyage, Ichabod was swallowed alive by a large, seemingly invulnerable whale nicknamed Crookjaw. The local whalers thought Crookjaw was somehow magical, and this was confirmed by what Ichabod found inside the creature's stomach. Rather than digestive fluids and half-eaten fish, Paddock found a cozy ship's cabin with lit lanterns, a luxurious featherbed, and a table. Two people - a beautiful, golden-haired mermaid and the Devil himself - were playing cards at the table when Ichabod arrived. 

Engraving from 1817 by John Paas

The mermaid won the game, and the Devil angrily disappeared in a flash of sulfurous smoke. "What were you playing for?" Ichabod asked. "We were playing for you," the mermaid said, "and I'm glad I won." She took Ichabod by the hand and led him to the bed, where they made passionate love for hours. 

Ichabod eventually emerged from Crookjaw's mouth and swam back to his ship, but the next day he again commanded the crew to sail to the magical whale so he could enjoy more of the mermaid's loving embraces. After several hours he emerged from the whale and returned to his ship, only to sail back to Crookjaw and the mermaid the next day, and the next after that. Ichabod's passion for the beautiful mermaid was insatiable. 

Eventually, news of Ichabod's strange extramarital affair reached his wife, Joanna. Ichabod was a formidable whaler, but Joanna was equally formidable in her own way. Since both Crookjaw and the mermaid were magical creatures, Joanna asked a local silversmith to craft a silver-tipped harpoon. At the time, silver was believed to have the power to harm magical creatures like witches, mermaids, and even invulnerable whales like Crookjaw. Vestiges of this belief still remain today, with the idea that werewolves and vampires can be killed with silver bullets. 

Joanna presented the silver-tipped harpoon to Ichabod as a gift. He accepted it, and although he was a formidable whale-killer and mermaid-lover, he apparently wasn't bright enough to realize that silver  could kill enchanted whales and the lustful mermaids who live in them. At the urging of his crew, Ichabod hurled the silver-tipped harpoon at Crookjaw, expecting it to bounce off the whale's impenetrable hide. Instead, it sunk deep into the body of Crookjaw, who died with a groan and a geyser of blood. 

Ichabod screamed in horror, incredulous at what he had done. What had happened to his beloved mermaid? When the crew butchered the whale's body, nothing was found inside its stomach except some long yellow seaweed that reminded them of a woman's hair. The beautiful mermaid was gone. 

In 1710 Ichabod and his wife left Nantucket and returned to mainland Massachusetts, eventually having nine children. According to author Nathaniel Philbrick, little else is really known about the life of Ichabod Paddock. His legendary encounter with the mermaid has lived on, though, and is still surprisingly resonant with some people today. 

For example, the book The Ghosts of Nantucket: 23 True Accounts (1984) contains the following story which a Nantucket woman told author Blue Balliett. The woman came from an old Nantucket family, and went to visit the Nantucket Whaling Museum with her sister who was visiting the island. While touring the museum, the woman became entranced by a painting of a young man. She had the strange feeling that she somehow knew him, and had been in an intimate relationship with him, similar to a marriage. She said:

"I was held by a magnetism of some kind that was so strong I couldn't move. It wasn't that I was objectively interested in him, or thought I saw a family resemblance of some kind. It was rather that he had an iron grip on me." (Blue Balliett, The Ghosts of Nantucket: 23 True Accounts, (1984), p.62)

The woman remained staring at the painting, immobilized, until her sister came and shook her arm, asking if something was wrong. This ended the trance.

 A mermaid illustration from 1687

The woman later went to visit her minister, and told him about her strange encounter with the painting. The minister explained that it was a portrait of Ichabod Paddock, who had fallen in love with a mermaid who was killed by a silver harpoon. The woman felt dizzy as she heard the story, because ever since she was a young child she'd had a weird "recurrent memory" that popped into her head like a daydream:

"It goes like this: I remember being in pitch darkness and having an excruciating pain in my side as I swim back and forth, back and forth, in black water. I also remember phosphorescence around me, the kind you see in the ocean on a dark night. I always thought it was peculiar, and I used to tell myself that maybe it was a memory of being inside the womb or something." (Blue Balliett, The Ghosts of Nantucket: 23 True Accounts, (1984), p.62)

Her encounter with Ichabod's portrait seemed eerily meaningful to her as she listened to the minister talk. Were these daydreams memories of a past life? Was she somehow the mermaid, reincarnated in 20th century Nantucket? She wasn't sure, but for months afterward she had a craving (which she resisted) to revisit the museum to see the portrait, and would wake up in the middle of the night seeing Ichabod Paddock's face floating above her bed. 

Perhaps it was just coincidence that this woman's unusual, recurring dream fit so well with the mermaid legend. That's what I thought, until I received an email from a young woman who is a member of the Paddock family, which still exists today. Like the woman in The Ghosts of Nantucket, she also feels a strange connection to the legendary mermaid, writing that "In my mythos, I am the mermaid who was given the opportunity to reincarnate because of winning half of Ichabod's soul." 

About two years later, I received an email from a man who was also a Paddock, telling me that his daughter felt a powerful connection to the mermaid legend, that she had a large mermaid tattoo on her back, and that she often dreamt of being a mermaid. I arranged to talk with him and his daughter, who it turned out was the young woman who had already emailed me. We had a nice conversation over Zoom, and I learned a lot about their family history and connection to the mermaid story. I didn't get the impression that either the young woman or her father literally believed she was the reincarnated mermaid, but rather that the mermaid was a source of family pride and artistic inspiration. 

Unlike the woman quoted in Ghosts of Nantucket, this young woman didn't feel upset or scared by the legend. Neither did her father. They thought the the legend was an interesting part of their family's genealogy. I don't blame them. Many people descended from old New England families have witches in their family tree, but only a few have a mermaid.

Mermaids aren't just cute cartoons, like Ariel in The Little Mermaid, or sexy fantasy figures, like you might see online. Mermaids are the modern iteration of ancient ocean spirits. They are elemental beings personifying the vast and unknowable waters that cover most of our planet. The ancient Greeks knew them as nereids and oceanids, the nymphs who lived in the seas and ocean. Nymphs were powerful godlike beings who were feared and petitioned for their blessings. Mermaids may also partly have their origin in stories about the Sirens, seductive female monsters that lured sailors to their doom. The seductive and possible devilish Nantucket mermaid certainly seems to share some traits with the Sirens. 

You may not believe in mermaids, just like you may not believe in invulnerable magic whales like Crookjaw. But you can't deny the hold mermaids still have on our imagination. They may not be seen in the ocean as often as they once were, but they still haunt our dreams and subconscious. 

The Haunted Charlesgate: Ghosts, College Students, and Weird Engimas

Living someplace old and historic, like the Boston area, brings both perils and joys. Among its current perils is the decaying subway system, which has been well-documented elsewhere. To avoid the most hellish parts of the MBTA, lately my commute home from work has involved more walking. Which brings me to one of the joys of living in the Boston area: beautiful old architecture. 

Most nights, I walk through parts of Back Bay on my way home. Among all the beautiful old brownstones and apartment buildings, one in particular stands out: the former Charlesgate Hotel, located at the corner of Beacon Street and Charlesgate East. The hotel was designed by John Pickering Putnam, a prominent local architect, and completed in the 1890s. Putnam apparently loved the building he created, and took up residence there with his own family. 

He died there on February 23, 1917 at the age of sixty. A legend claims it was suicide, but he really died of natural causes. Still, esotericists of a certain bent will notice he died on the 23rd, making his death an example of the 23 enigma, the idea that the number 23 is considered strange, somewhat sinister, and connected to unusual phenomena. So maybe Putnam's death date was a precursor of the weirdness that was to come...

The Charlesgate operated as a hotel until 1947, when it was sold to Boston University as a dorm. In 1981, it was sold to Emerson College, which also used it as a dorm until 1995. It was during those 14 years that the Charlesgate acquired its reputation as one of the most haunted buildings in Boston. Here are a few of the ghostly legends from that time..

The building was said to be haunted by the ghost of Elsa Putnam, John Pickering Putnam's daughter, who died as a little girl when she was playing with a ball on an upper floor. The ball rolled into an open elevator shaft, and Elsa ran after it and fell to her doom. This story is not true - Elsa Putnam lived until the 1970s and had several children of her own - but many Emerson students still reported seeing her ghost. 

Another legend claims that mobsters owned the building in the 1930s and murdered three people in the elevator. The ghosts of these gangland slaying victims were often seen wandering in the dormitory. Emerson students also claimed they saw the restless spirits of young women who had committed suicide in the building back when it housed female Boston University students. 

A phantom "Man in Black" was also seen lurking around the elevator. No one was quite sure who he was, but students were afraid to encounter this black-clad ghost, particularly late at night. 

Even when ghosts were not seen, Emerson students living in the Charlesgate experienced a variety of strange phenomena including unexplained cold spots, toilets flushing by themselves, and doors slamming shut. Some students also claimed the hotel had once been the headquarters for a demonic cult. According to an article in a 1990 issue of Fate magazine:

"Also at one point, a good part of Charlesgate Hall's residents allegedly belonged to a demonic cult. 

When Emerson College bought Charlesgate Hall as a dormitory in 1980, it was not completely filled by students. It was claimed that some members of the cult still lived there, and it was not unusual for students to walk by the open door of a room belonging to a cult member and find a group of them chanting."

Well, college is supposed to expose you to new experiences, isn't it? The same Fate article also claims that Emerson forbid students from using Ouija boards in the Charlesgate - and then goes on to describe a group of them using one to contact spirits in the dorm. I guess college is also about defying authority.

The Charlesgate's ghosts have been written about in many places: The Berkeley Beacon (Emerson's student paper), The Boston Phoenix, Emerson's official newsite, and various books about haunted locations in Boston. The building also appears in Scott Von Doviak's 2018 novel, Charlesgate Confidential, as do some of the ghost stories. The combination of a creepy old hotel, ghosts, and college students makes the Charlesgate an appealing subject for writers.

The Charlesgate is no longer a dormitory, but instead is filled with condos and apartments. I haven't heard of any ghosts appearing in the building since it became condos. Are any ghosts even there now? Maybe the ghosts were chased away during the renovations, or maybe they were conjured up by the Emerson students who lived there. College students tend to like ghost stories, and many local New England colleges are said to have haunted dormitories. 

I mentioned the 23 enigma at the start of this post. Although the concept first appeared in works by William S. Burroughs, it was popularized by the author Robert Anton Wilson. Wilson didn't necessarily believe the 23 enigma was real, but rather that it showed how people have the ability to find patterns in random occurrences. Some people starting seeing the number 23 in all kinds of unexpected places once they learn about the enigma. The number is only meaningful, though, because they think it is significant. They are creating a pattern out of random data.

Perhaps the ghost stories at the Charlesgate are something similar. Students heard rumors the dorm is haunted, and then noticed lights flickering, strange cold spots, and weird noises at night. These all could have perfectly rational explanations - old buildings often have bad fuses, drafty windows, and frisky rodents - but students interpreted them as ghostly phenomena because they had heard the rumors. 

This is, of course, all speculation on my part. The only way for me to know for certain would be to rent an apartment at the Charlesgate and see what happens. A one bedroom starts at $2,400/month, which is more than I have budgeted for ghost-hunting. Or then again, maybe I'm just scared that the legends are true? I don't want to encounter the Man in Black late at night, no matter what he is. 

A Nantucket Ghost Story: The Man with the Long Chin

Nantucket is a playground for the very wealthy these days, but that has not always been the case. In the past, the island has been home to Native Americans, Puritans, Quakers, whalers, and an assortment of artists and eccentrics. Nantucket has a very long history, and a long history usually means ghost stories. 

After the whaling industry collapsed in the mid-19th century, Nantucket became sparsely populated. There wasn't a lot of economic development on the island, which meant that very few of the old historic houses were torn down to make room for new ones. Those old houses are now mostly vacation homes for the wealthy, but there may be some unexpected guests stopping by to visit, as the following story indicates. 

The oldest house in Nantucket. 

It comes from Blue Balliett's 1984 book, The Ghosts of Nantucket: 23 True Accounts. I bought this at a used bookstore a few years ago, and really enjoy it. It's full of old-fashioned ghost stories, and also has some charming line drawings of old Nantucket houses. 

Back in July of 1981, a seven-year old girl named Jesse and her parents were invited to a dinner party at an old house on India Street in Nantucket. The adults were having a great time at the party, but Jesse was the only child there and quickly became bored. To keep her entertained, one of the hosts suggested she take a tally of interesting items in the house: candlesticks, mirrors, brass doorknobs, etc. 

The adults could hear her counting in a nearby room counting as they talked and ate dinner. But their dinner conversation was suddenly interrupted when Jesse ran into the dining room, terrified and exclaiming that she had seen a strange man in the house. Her parents and the hosts followed the frightened child into the room where she said she had seen the man, but there was no one there. 

Jesse said the man had a very large chin and was wearing a strange, dark blue suit. He had tipped his hat to her and then vanished into thin air. Although she had been scared, Jesse said he seemed friendly. She emphasized repeatedly that he had a long face and very large chin. Since Jesse was safe and unhurt, the adults at the party didn't take her story very seriously. After all, children do have active imaginations. 

Vintage photo from Ebay

A few weeks went by, and Jesse and her parents had mostly forgotten about her strange experience. One afternoon they were invited back to the old house on India Street, and the owners showed them something they had found in the attic. It was a line drawing that showed people attending a garden party at the house, probably from the 1940s or 1950s. 

When Jesse saw the drawing she said, "That's him! The man with the long chin." One of the people in the drawing was indeed a man with an unusually long chin. Some text on the back of the drawing identified everyone in it. The long-chinned man was William Hunt, a previous owner of the old house. 

After doing a little research, the current owners of the house learned that William Hunt had committed suicide in 1961, twenty years before he tipped his hat to Jesse. 

*****

This is a very satisfying ghost story to me. It has an old house, someone encountering the supernatural, and proof at the end that the encounter was real. That proof is often a major aspect of classic ghost stories. For example, think of phantom hitchhiker stories. Someone always has to independently verify and identify the hitch-hiking ghost. "That girl hitchhiking was my daughter, and she died on this night twenty years ago on the way to her prom. You saw her ghost!" Or this story, from Cape Cod: "That seaweed you found only grows on the bodies of people who drowned. You saw the sailor's ghost!" 

In these older, classic ghost stories, someone who did not witness the paranormal encounter has to confirm it was authentic, or someone finds a piece of outside evidence (a piece of seaweed, a drawing, etc.) that confirms the encounter. It's what makes these stories satisfying. If this story just ended with Jesse telling everyone she had seen a long-chinned man it wouldn't quite feel the same. 

A Pukwudgie Sighting in Massachusetts

Sometimes people write to me about strange experiences they've had. Just a few weeks ago, a woman I'll call Mary sent me an email about a weird encounter she had while walking a dog. 

Mary lives in Norwell, and was taking care of a friend's large Labrador retriever while the friend was traveling. The dog would wake Mary up every morning between 4 and 5 am to take it for a walk. Mary would usually bring the dog to a small nearby watershed - a patch of woods and swamp - for its morning perambulation. 

Mary and the dog went on these early morning walks for a few weeks without anything strange happening, but that changed on March 1. It was pitch black, and as they walked on a road near the watershed the dog stopped in its tracks and let out a low growl. Had it seen a raccoon, or maybe a coyote? Feeling nervous about being alone in the dark with a wild animal nearby, Mary looked around to see what startled the dog. It was not a raccoon, or a coyote. It was something much stranger. 

Crouched near the woods was a small humanoid creature. It was covered in what looked like matted, black fur. Mary thought the creature stared at her with glowing green eyes, but isn't sure if she just imagined this detail. Whatever the creature was, it was something she had never seen before. She and the dog ran home. 

A few days later the dog went home to its owner, and Mary thought that was the end of her strange experience. But on the night of March 13, Mary heard some unusual sounds coming from outside her house. It sounded as though something were quietly but insistently tapping on the side of her house, or possibly on the window. At first Mary thought maybe her daughter had locked herself out of the house, but that was not the case - she was safely inside. Nervously, Mary's thoughts then turned to the small humanoid she had seen near the woods. Was it outside her house, tapping on the walls and windows?

The next day she talked with some people at work about what had been happening, and one of them suggested she had encountered a pukwudgie. Pukwudgie is a one name for the small, hairy, magical humanoids that are said to live in the woods in New England. Basically, they are a type of fairy. Not a pretty, tutu-wearing fairy like Tinkerbell, but a scragglier, rough-around-the-edges fairy. They're the type of fairy you'd expect to see in the woods around here, which are rough, rocky, and filled with poison ivy. 

Pukwudgie is something of a modern term, at least in New England. The Native Americans in New England had other names for these beings, like makiawisug, mekumwasuck, or mikumweswack. Pukwudgie was originally a word used by the Ojibwa Indians of the Midwest to describe the small magical beings they encountered, but it has since became a popular word in New England, and particularly in Massachusetts. (You can read more about the history of the term pukwudgie here.)

Pukwudgies are believed to be mischievous at best, and malevolent at worst. Traditionally, the local Native Americans believed that the little people would help humans if treated with respect. That is not the case with pukwudgies, who supposedly like to shoot people with darts, lure them off cliffs, and in general lurk around and frighten anyone who encounters them. If I can speculate, perhaps this change in behavior is because most New Englanders don't know how to treat them with the respect they deserve? 

Mary's encounter is similar to several other well-known pukwudgie encounters. For example, in 1990 a Raynham, Massachusetts man named Bill Russo was walking his dog late at night near some woods when he saw a small hairy humanoid creature, which tried to lure him into the woods. He declined the offer. And Christopher Balzano describes a very similar situation in his 2007 book Dark Woods: Cults, Crime and the Paranormal in the Freetown State Forest. A woman named Joan was walking her dog in the Freetown State Forest when she noticed someone watching her. It was a small, grey-skinned humanoid with hairy arms and a hairy head, and it stared at her with deep green eyes. After encountering the pukwudgie in the woods, Joan noticed the pukwudgie lurking around her house several times. Apparently it had followed her home. Creepy!

After I got the email from Mary, I asked Balzano if he had any advice for people who encounter pukwudgies, particularly if the pukwudgie seems to be lurking around their house. He said the best thing to do is just ignore them. Eventually, they'll go away and the strange phenomena will stop. That sounds like good advice to me. I think that the more attention you give to weird phenomena, the more of it you'll notice. You can just get sucked down the rabbit hole!

In a subsequent email, Mary told he that she had some lucky things happen to her on the day she encountered the creature in the woods. So maybe seeing it had been a fortuitous event, even if it was spooky? In the end, the situation was oddly ambiguous, much like the pukwudgies themselves.