Transcript

Episode 721: MiniMORBID x 2: Cryptids of the Midwest

From Morbid | Podcast · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 1 h 16 min · 15,810 words · 434 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Episode 721: MiniMORBID x 2: Cryptids of the Midwest", an episode of Morbid | Podcast published October 29, 2025 (1 h 16 min, about 15,810 words). It mentions 51 people, works and ideas, including Bray Road, Twilight, Linda Godfrey, Wisconsin, Enfield Monster.

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 10:00: Bray Road, Wisconsin, Doris Gypson, Pat Lester
  2. – 20:00: Bray Road, Linda Godfrey, John Frederickson, Twilight
  3. – 30:00: Linda Godfrey, Bray Road, Werewolf, Chris Maxwell
  4. – 40:00: Beast of Bray Road, Bray Road, Mark Shackleman, Twilight
  5. – 50:00: Twilight, Enfield Monster, Henry McDaniel
  6. – 1:00:00: Edward Cullen, Henry McDaniel, James Masser, Twilight
  7. – 1:10:00: Enfield Monster, White County, Henry McDaniel, Rick Rainbow
  8. – 1:16:28: Enfield Monster, Beast of Bray Road, Bray Road, Bridgewater Triangle

Notable quotes from "Episode 721: MiniMORBID x 2: Cryptids of the Midwest"

  • I'll go first. I'm talking about the beast of Bray Road.
    about Bray Road · at
  • Driver named Pat Lester was just chatting with one of her passengers, Doris Gypson.
    about Doris Gypson · at
  • No. Yeah. She told local journalist Linda Godfrey, I just put my foot on the gas pedal and started going. She said she didn't get a good look at the thing because she was so terrified and it was dark. But she believed it had.
    about Linda Godfrey · at
  • It has a whole It has a crew like Jacob in Twilight. And when they see you, they're going to say, Where the hell you been, Loca? Bella, where the hell you been, Loca? I just watched that again. I'm going to say for the record.
    about Twilight · at
  • Strange humanoid wolf thing. So, she went over to town hall and tracked down the animal welfare officer, John Frederickson. It turned out that Frederickson, who had been working in the town since the mid1 1980s, so [ __ ] he's.
    about John Frederickson · at
  • Rounds to like go in there and make sure no one's [ __ ] around in there. One night in 1936, the editor's father, Mark Shackleman, was doing his rounds when he came to the…
    about Mark Shackleman · at
  • We're going to be talking about the Enfield Monster.
    about Enfield Monster · at
  • Everywhere. Ew. Ew. Ew. Gar. So, the arrest prompted White County, which is a crazy name for a county.
    about White County · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Linda Godfrey — Person · 9 mentions · first at
  • Henry McDaniel — Person · 5 mentions · first at
    In the Enfield place. So, on the evening of April 25th, 1973, 50-year-old Henry McDaniel and his wife Liil, they were just coming home from like a school function some for the kids. Henry and Lil, they got home a little past 9 and they.
  • John Frederickson — Person · 4 mentions · first at
  • Doris Gypson — Person · 3 mentions · first at
  • Mark Shackleman — Person · 3 mentions · first at
  • Pat Lester — Person · 2 mentions · first at
    It was in Elkhorn, Wisconsin, a bus driver named Pat Lester was just chatting with one of her passengers, Doris Gypson.
  • Edward Cullen — Person · 2 mentions · first at
    Woods completely. Holy [ __ ] It's literally like Edward Cullen when he runs really fast.
  • Rick Rainbow — Person · 2 mentions · first at
    Well, the second sighting obviously brought a new round of reporters to Enfield, including WWKI reporter Rick Rainbow.
  • Greg Garrett — Person · 2 mentions · first at
    Something that, shall we say, is strange. Including the McDaniel's next door neighbor, 10-year-old Greg Garrett, who said he saw the animal about half an hour before Henry had…
  • Jack the Ripper — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Like the Jack the Ripper time period.
  • Jay Bakin — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Were spotting in the area of Bray Road over the years. Local paranormal investigator Jay Bakin summarized the all these reports basically as containing a description of a quote…
  • Tom Bria — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Residents 15 kind of 15 or so miles from Elorn. The woman was calling to report something her son, 17-year-old Tom Bria, had experienced in the summer of 1992, not long after Lor's encounter on Bray Road.
  • Chris Maxwell — Person · 1 mention · first at
    I want to go to there. According to Tom, he and a friend, Chris Maxwell, were on their way home from a wedding reception one night in August and they passed through Elhorn. There was an incredibly like super dense layer of fog that.
  • James Masser — Person · 1 mention · first at
    But after listening again to the description, trooper James Masser said that while it seemed highly unlikely one could be roaming the woods of western Illinois, he said, It kind of sounds like you're describing a kangaroo.
  • Edward Phillips — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. so Rick Rainbow was accompanied by Edward Phillips, a pet store owner and a big game hunter.
  • Jim Clark — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Like side note, maybe come up with a different name. That's rude. But White County Deputy Sheriff Jim Clark made a public statement warning everybody else that they were about…
  • Roy Poshard — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Sheriff Roy Poshard told reporters he had already quote declared an end is going to be put to the monster kick before somebody gets hurt and he loses his mind answering queries from news.
  • Mario (Sherry Coleman's brother) — Person · 1 mention · first at
    So after speaking with Rick Rainbow about his reporting, I think it's Lauren Coleman, a graduate student at the University of Illinois, he decided to come to Enfield and study the animal himself if he could. He had spent years collecting.
  • Alan Yorkshire — Person · 1 mention · first at
    The letter writer Alan Yorkshire had read all the stories about the Enfield monster and like many he believed the description matched that of a kangaroo and he was wrong.
  • Adolf Ash — Person · 1 mention
  • Bella Swan — Person · 1 mention
  • Jacob Black — Person · 1 mention
  • Laura Andrizzi — Person · 1 mention
  • Lil McDaniel — Person · 1 mention
  • Lorie Lester — Person · 1 mention
  • Macy — Person · 1 mention
  • Michael Mloud (Mikey) — Person · 1 mention

Books & papers

Companies & orgs

  • St. Coletta School for Exceptional Children — Company · 2 mentions
  • University of Illinois — Company · 1 mention · first at
    About his reporting, I think it's Lauren Coleman, a graduate student at the University of Illinois, he decided to come to Enfield and study the animal himself if he could. He had spent years collecting data on similar sightings of.
  • Echo Cafe — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Come of the story, but most people were pretty eager to put it behind them. A waitress at Echo Cafe said, I think it's about all over now. I heard the sheriff told him he…
  • Carmi Times — Company · 1 mention
  • Creed — Company · 1 mention
  • WWKI — Company · 1 mention

Concepts & topics

  • Enfield Monster — Concept · 7 mentions · first at
  • Beast of Bray Road — Concept · 6 mentions · first at
    I'll go first. I'm talking about the beast of Bray Road.
  • Werewolf — Concept · 5 mentions · first at
    Oh god. So he's like the straight up werewolf. Yeah.
  • Satanic cults — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    But others predicted it was something evil in nature. Throughout the 1980s, there were rumors of satanic cults active in the area. And many like Lori and Drizzy, who we talked…
  • Thunderbird — Concept · 1 mention · first at
  • Social contagion — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Team of sociologists weighed in on the Enfield Monster and they called the story boo, a classic case of social contagion.
  • Anemoia — Concept · 1 mention
  • Pukwudgie — Concept · 1 mention
  • Roaring Twenties — Concept · 1 mention

Places & events

Full transcript with timestamps

Hey weirdos, I'm Ash. And I'm Elena. And this is Morbid in the morning. Mini mini mini mini morbid. Mini morbid. Mini morbid. Mini morbid

times two. A kind of double mini morbid in the morning. Oh yeah, [ __ ] We are bringing back. You guys love this song so much. I created a masterpiece back in 2018, 2017, whenever I did it,

which is hilarious cuz it started with a joke. It should have gone like triple platinum.

Yeah, I Where's my Where's my Grammy? Um, but yeah, so we're bringing back the morbid mini morbid theme song. We're going to start We kind of do this for spooky episodes already, like we each tell a spooky tale. Today we're going to talk about some cryptids, but we were also thinking in the future sometimes there are like shorter cases that we don't end up covering because

yeah, just interesting topics that are not super long but very fascinating. That's the thing. And like not always enough for a full episode, but we figure if we combine forces like we do for spooky episodes, we could do it for other topics too.

And we can bring back the mini morbid theme song because you guys love it so much. And [ __ ] old morbid is back in the house.

Oh yeah. So, here's your mini morbid, except it's kind of a full morbid. So, it's awesome.

It's a full It's a full morbid made out of two mini morbids, which is all the more morbid.

I said to Mikey, we should add a little clip. And I don't know if it should be like times two at the end or like times two.

I like that times two times two. Cuz it's like it really hits after like the I think we should add that in. So, I I mean, we did to this episode. So,

hey, you'll find out right now. Yeah. Or you already found out why we chose. You [ __ ] around and you found you pressed play and you found out.

You did. All right. Do you want to go first or do you want me to? Oh, yay. Cool. I like when you go first.

I'll go first. I'm talking about the beast of Bray Road. Oo, that's spooky. Yeah, he's scary, everybody. He's real scary.

Oh god. Um, hold on because I just Oh, it's Wisconsin. Okay. I forgot where Please leave that in.

Hold on. Wisconsin. Okay. Is that Wait, I'm sorry. Is that the Midwest? Yeah, m Wisconsin is Midwest.

Is Illinois also the Midwest? Yeah. Yeah. Right. Whoa. Your stomach said yes. Um, mine is from Illinois. So, this is creatures of the Midwest.

Oh my god, look at that theme. Let me double check if Wisconsin What if everyone is screaming at us right now, [ __ ] That's not the Midwest.

I was like, Wisconsin a lot of geography in first thing in the morning. Yes, Wisconsin is. I knew that.

I feel like Illinois definitely is. I feel like Illinois [snorts] is. No, it definitely is cuz Drew's dad is from Chicago and that's Midwest.

See, I got to stop second guessing my own [ __ ] knowledge. I knew about Illinois. I second guessed myself, too. All right. Spooky [ __ ] brought to you from the Midwest.

Hell yeah. Midwestern spooky [ __ ] [ __ ] All right. So, uh, so one afternoon in early 1992, which it's the n was the '9s. I wasn't even alive yet.

Oh, of 1992. I was seven. Wait, that's crazy. You're such a [ __ ] for experiencing more of the '9s than me.

Oh, the '9s. No, I know. The '9s. I'm nostalgic for it. There's got to be a different word for that. When you're nostalgic for a time that you didn't experience.

Oh yeah. I think it's just jealous. There is a word. Is there for that? Because I think

let's just pause this episode 80 times to look things up. People are nostalgic for times that they never lived in. Like like like I feel like I'm nostalgic for certain times that periods that I never existed in.

Like the Jack the Ripper time period. Yeah. Or like the Roaring 20s. Oh yeah. Wouldn't have wouldn't have been great for us either of those times. for like the aesthetic and the vibe of it.

What is it called when you're nostalgic for a time you experience? Everyone's like, can you just get to the [ __ ] case?

This is interesting. Anamoya. Anamoya. I like that. It's pretty. So, you experience anamoya in the '9s.

Yeah. For like the I mean I was I like experienced some of them, but I mean I wasn't cognizant.

I know. I was going to say it's cuz it's like me with the 80s. Yeah. Even like 99. I can remember like

flashes. I guess I can remember flashes of8s things when I was like five, you know, like like four or five. I can remember like certain music videos. Yeah.

Which like I feel like I can like remember like little blips from like mom and papa's house. I also have a very distinct memory. I can literally see it in my head and I like remember the moment we were shopping with you and I don't know who else but I fell out of my stroller like face first.

Wo. Yeah. Do you remember that? Why don't I remember that? I don't know. You were there though.

Damn. You were there and you were there. Holy [ __ ] And I fell out of my stroller.

I fell out of my stroller. Explains a lot. I don't remember. Face first. Damn. Yeah. I think it's I think you can remember bursts cuz I'm like I can remember little pieces.

Your oldest remembers so much of her early childhood and obviously she's still little so it's not as far away but it's interesting. Yeah, she reme I think it's also significant events. Yeah,

cuz when she was four, she was in the hospital. Mhm. But she even remembers things before that, too.

Yeah. But she really remembers that time. I mean, that makes a lot. She remembers every bit of that.

I mean, that's traumatic. That's why we love Boston Children's Hospital because they were amazing.

All her memories are pretty good for that. Yeah. Uh but yeah. All right. I don't know how to transition back to scary monsters, but

spooky scary skeletons and monsters from the Midwest. Uh, so one afternoon in early 1992, a time where we feel

anoya. Um, it was in Elkhorn, Wisconsin, a bus driver named Pat Lester was just chatting with one of her passengers, Doris Gypson.

Doris. Doris. Remember when I used to call myself Auntie Doris? Yeah, I love that name. you know, they were talking about strange things that she'd seen while she was out driving cuz she's a bus driver. She's probably in Wisconsin. She's probably

um including an incident her daughter Lorie had had a few years earlier on Bray Road.

According to Lester, her daughter had been out on the isolated road at night when she passed what looked like a large dog or a wolf that appeared to have quote human characteristics.

No, thank you. Which sends me into orbit already. I'm like, what do you mean a large dog or wolf

with human characteristics? What are the human characteristics? Cuz I'm picturing a full human face on like a furry dog and that's freaking me out. And or like human hands or

No, I was just human feet. I just pictured like a wolf with human arms doing my taxes cuz that's a very human characteristic. I just pictured this galumping wolf with human feet. Like big oversized human feet,

like giant feet. Yeah. Uh, rural Wisconsin does have its share of wildlife. They have wolves. They have coyotes. So Lori didn't think too much of it and kept driving. She was like, "Maybe I just like

saw, you know, like maybe I just saw something weird." I just want to say it's [ __ ] that we don't have wolves around here.

I think wolves are so cool. They are. They're so wolves. They are. They're so [ __ ]

And they're so pretty. And every once in a while I'll tell them that our dogs are related to wolves and they're like

they are like they're like these they're a lot more domesticated. But as they're like this [ __ ]

as Blanch runs up the stairs farting on every step I'm like she descended from wolves.

Dolores Dolores has started farting and it is ungodly. It is dog farts. Makes crazy noises. I'm like [ __ ]

Yeah. She just Blanch every time she runs up the stairs, she just farts her way all the way up.

How embarrassing. She's not She feels not a drop of shame. Good for her. But every time I'm like, she descended by from wolves.

I want to come back as Blanch in my next life. The dog. And my kids like I don't think she did. Somebody else did.

Doubt it. So to Pat Lester, the story seemed like one of those, you know, local urban legends or maybe just a misidentification of a pretty normal animal.

She's like, I don't know. you were tired. Yeah. So, she was like, I don't know. She shouldn't think anything shocking of it. But when she caught a glimpse of Doris Gypson's face, she was suddenly like, you know what? I think something happened here. Because Doris was genuinely terrified while she was talking about it.

Oh, no. Now, according to Doris, she had encountered a similarly strange animal to Lorie.

Yeah. The daughter. So, yeah. So, she and she encountered it on Bray Road the I think the year before. It was Halloween night. Halloween night. Halloween 1991.

Oh god, the aesthetic must have been going crazy. Oh, one thing I do remember very well in the '9s is '9s Halloween parties at school.

Remember that a lot. Those are great. I remember pictures of '90s Halloween parties.

Oh, so good. So, this was Halloween night 1991 and Darus, who was a senior in high school at the time, was driving home on Bray Road when she felt like she hit something on the street.

Oh, [ __ ] She said it was kind of smoggy out and my front tire got lifted off the ground. So, she was afraid that she hit an animal. She was like, "Fuck." So, she drove about 50 yards and then pulled over and she came to a spot that was kind of like out of the way.

Mhm. So, she checks the front of her car, sees if anything happened, you know, to be stuck under the car. She didn't see anything, but she walked around to the back of the car again, saw nothing, and she was about to get back into the car cuz she didn't see anything around either. But then she looks down the road a little ways and she saw the thing.

Later she talked about it and she said, "Here comes this thing. Here comes this thing."

Uhoh. And it's just running up at me. Oh [ __ ] You get in your car and you drive out of there, girl. So she couldn't she was kind of a distance away so she couldn't tell what kind of animal it was. She said it was large and hairy like a German Shepherd.

The [ __ ] But much larger. And it didn't move like a dog. She said it moved more like a man crouched down on all fours.

Ew. Not a man. And that's why I can't stop picturing human feet glumping down the street.

Yeah. But I also see him in a flannel. Yeah. Right. Oh wow. Okay. He's got a tattered flannel in my mind.

Oh god. So he's like the straight up werewolf. Yeah. Yeah. But she said, "I could hear its feet on the asphalt

as it's running at her." Now she's terrified, obviously, and she turns and runs back to her car. She gets inside, closes the door just as this thing reaches her and dragged what sounded like claws along the outside of her vehicle.

No. Yeah. She told local journalist Linda Godfrey, "I just put my foot on the gas pedal and started going." She said she didn't get a good look at the thing because she was so terrified and it was dark. But she believed it had been chasing after her on two legs.

No, no, no. Because she said as she like when she looked back, she could see its huge chest heaving as it ran.

What the [ __ ] Yeah, I would. It's like terrifying. That's [ __ ] terrifying. Scary. I would never recover from this. No, I'd be this would be the hot topic in therapy every time I went for the rest of my life.

I'd like to talk about the monster as well. I again I would love to talk about that humanoid monster that chased me down the street.

How do you ever go to sleep again? That's the thing. Knowing that that's like lurking in your in your whereabouts

cuz you you know it's lurking around and you know it's seeing you. I'd be like, I don't know how intelligent this thing is. Maybe it knows where I live and it's going to break into my house and a real monster is going to [ __ ] wake me up in the middle of the night. And if there's one of them, it perhaps has a family.

Yeah, it it has a whole crew. Not a squad. It has a whole It has a crew like Jacob in Twilight. And when they see you, they're going to say, "Where the hell you been, Loca?" Bella, where the hell you been, Loca? I just watched that again. I'm going to say for the record that he's really hot in that movie. Oh, you all of a sudden you're team Jacob.

I was team Edward as a gal and now as a woman I am team Jacob as a woman. Is that natural?

Is that natural? Although, you know what? I'm actually team none of them because Jacob comes on way too strong and he kisses Bella with no uh

I know he does. No consent. Yeah. So, not team Jacob team, but he is really hot.

I was team Edward. I get team. You love a pale man. I do. I love a pale man. I love a vampire. But he just also like we can't get into this. Let's have a Can we do the bonus episode about Twilight in November? Would you guys kill us?

Guys, would you let us do that? Please let us do I want so badly to unpack the movie Twilight from an adult perspective.

Really love to unpack the movie Twilight from an adult perspective because I feel

Please so many feelings about it. Comment on this post and tell us if you are down for us to do that as the bonus episode for November because that would be really fun.

And just the bonus episode. This is not a regular episode of bonus episodes. And just know that if you say that you don't want that, you're breaking two hearts.

You're breaking our hearts. Okay. All right. So, that's your task. God, I so you guys say yes.

All right. So, when Doris gets home a little bit later, she's she's been through it. And like we were saying, now she's got to go home.

She looked at the side of the car and there were huge claw marks on the back side of the car near the trunk.

Oh. So, not only did she have a [ __ ] terrifying experience, now she has to go get work done on her car, which is also a terrifying experience. going to say, which sucks. Now, according to Linda Godfrey, the journalist, she saw the claw the marks firsthand, and she said it appeared as though something with huge claws had dragged both sets along the rear of the car.

This [ __ ] keyed her car. Yeah, with its claws. Linda Godfrey had been referred to Doris by a friend who occasionally did some freelance writing for the local Elorn newspaper. Linda had been looking for an interesting local story to publish in the paper. And when she heard Doris's story about the encounter on Bray Road, she was like, "Whoa, this is exactly what I want."

Um, and her instincts were right. Doris was just one of several locals who'd seen something strange out on Bray Road. And their stories would eventually put the little town of Elorn on the map when it came to supernatural encounters. Now, after interviewing Doris, Godfrey figured the young woman, you know, couldn't have been the only person in town who had seen this [ __ ] crazy, strange humanoid wolf thing. So, she went over to town hall and tracked down the animal welfare officer, John Frederickson. It turned out that Frederickson, who had been working in the town since the mid1 1980s, so [ __ ] he's

he's been around. I picture this in my head when I was reading this story cuz I this like this like hard-hitting journalist, Linda Godfrey, here's this crazy story from Darus and and then is just like I'm going to go down to the local animal rescue officer. This is in the '9s, so I'm just picturing it all '9s coded with like a '9s lens.

And then she finds John Frederickson who's like, "Well, I've been this town's animal rescue officer since the 1980s." And you're just like, "Yeah, you have you have stories." Authority.

You have stories. You have tales. Tell me that. What does he look like in your mind?

Oh, I see him. He's older. Yep. Mustache. Definitely not young. I Yep. He's got a mustache. He's chewing on a on a toothpick.

Okay. He's just always chewing on a toothpick. All right. Um he's got a hat. Yeah, definitely.

I'm trying to picture what kind of hat, though. I feel like it could be similar to like a news boy cap or like a cap.

All right. Yep. I love skelly cap. Yeah. I think he's he's one of those like he's got a vibe. You kind of just describe Dave, by the way.

Did I did you did So that's who I picture. Dave also has a skelly cap and a toothpick at most times.

It's true. I did just picture Dave. Dave just doesn't have a mustache. Right. I picture Yeah, I just picture an older Dave.

All right. I mean, I see it. Older Dave is that grizzled animal rescue officer who's going to tell you his story.

Let's go. Except Dave would be like, "You're That's not real. That's not real. That was a wolf. Leave me alone.

We love you, Dave." I love that I pictured Dave. So, so the good thing is, and this would be a Dave thing to do, he had been keeping a file on what he informally referred to as the Elhorn werewolf. Dave would keep the file and he would have all the receipts. Among other things, the file contained copies of reports of a large unidentified animal that people were spotting in the area of Bray Road over the years. Local paranormal investigator Jay Bakin summarized the all these reports basically as containing a description of a quote biped a walking humanoid dog with the muzzle the ears about 7 to 8 feet tall hands hairy I don't want to say like a human but humanoid hands with claws deep set fangs enormous eyes just ferocious looking no thank you like what the [ __ ] I don't I don't like that it can walk on two feet.

Humanoid hands with claws. No. So, he does have like human hands just with long nails.

Ew. Which is so much worse. I don't like how his legs are so big either. And he's got big eye. Like I don't like that at all.

I hate it all. I don't like it. And he walks. He's like bip he's a biped. That's fun to say. Biped

bipedal I think it is when you Yeah, I think you're right. While the reports themselves were pretty [ __ ] interesting, for Linda's purposes, more interesting were that some people had actually signed their names to the reports. Oh [ __ ] Weren't just anonymous.

That's kind of crazy. Yeah. Including a report from Laura and Drizzy, a local bar manager in Elorn. According to Lorie, she was driving home on Bray Road one night in December 1991 after closing the bar, and she spotted something strange in the ditch beside the road. That's always when you see the craziest [ __ ] on your way home from a [ __ ] restaurant or a bar that you work at.

When you see something strange in the ditch next to Bur Road, keep driving. Keep driving.

It's not for you. Now, Lorie slowed down as she neared whatever it was by the side of the road. Its back was to her, but she could tell that it was kneeling in the ditch, and she could see that it had pointy ears, like a large dog.

So, you keep driving her in the ditch. You get out of there. This would not have been unusual in and of itself, I guess, like just seeing like a dog in a ditch, you know, like hanging out on the road that I would stop for a dog in a ditch.

But Lorie said she was immediately put off by the fact that it was literally kneeling.

Like she was like immediately I'm like, "Oh, dog." And then I saw it kneeling. Like,

so Godfrey later recalled, "She said it was kneeling in a way she didn't think a canine could kneel, like a human."

Yeah. So, you see a dog in a ditch and your immediate thought is like, "Oh, a dog. I should stop and make sure it's okay." And then you look and it's kneeling like a human.

So, you hit the gas. [ __ ] that. So, when she pulled ahead of it, Lorie looked into the rearview mirror and was stunned by what she saw. The animal, she was at least sure that it was an animal at this point, was crouched down and appeared to be eating something.

No. She said its elbows were up and its claws were facing out. So, I knew it had claws. I remember the long claws.

What? From what she could see, it looked as though it was eating some sort of roadkill.

Ew. And when it finally noticed the car slowly pulling up beside it, it turned its head towards Lorie, and the lights from the car reflected in its eyes, but it didn't run away like most animals would. It just stared at her.

And she said it struck her as very unusual that like an animal would run away. Yeah. I'd be stunned

and like or be stunned. It literally looked at her and then continued eating. Dislike. Later in her interview with Linda Godfrey, Lorie described the beast as quote, "Dark brownish gray in color, somewhere around 5' 7 in in height and around 150 lb."

What a menace. And most unnerving at all, she said it looked almost human in shape, except for the head, which looked very much like that of a large dog or a wolf. She said, "To this day, I believe it was satanic. It was just my feeling. I don't really believe in werewolves per se, but I believe something could be well conjured up. That was not of God.

My favorite thing about that, what about that satanic is I don't believe in werewolves, but I do believe that's satanic. I feel like it's just like, girl, you believe that?

Don't believe in werewolves, but you do believe in a demon in the ground. Let's not write off men that can turn into wolves on a full moon and and say that this is satanic. That's the thing.

If you're believing this is satanic, we got we got to open up the door to werewolves bunch of other possibly being real. Like, let's not write them off so fast. Okay.

I was really rooting for you, girl. I was too. [gasps] A few days later, Lori went to the library and started combing some books on Wisconsin wildlife cuz this was bothering her.

I mean, yeah, it would bother me, too. She was hoping to find something that resembled what she'd seen on the side of the road so she could just like put it aside. She came up empty and she so she visited John Frederickson's office and reported the sighting hoping she'd be able to explain something that he could just look at her and be like, "Oh, that's this."

Right. And Frederickson said later, not too long into the conversation, some books that were on the shelf just came flying down. There wasn't really any cause for the books to go flying down. So, that was the end of that conversation.

What? Like, what? I'm like, "So, is the is the essence of the werewolf in the room with us just [ __ ] with you now? Like

the essence of Is he just is he everywhere? He's everywhere. He's everything. He's infinite.

Everywhere to me. He is. He's everywhere to me." Uh, so the deeper that Linda Godfrey dug into Frederickson's werewolf file, she continued to discover reports of this unusual and really scary creature out on Bray Road, all giving more or less the same description. Not long after she published her first article about it, Linda received a call from a woman in Palmira, a tiny village of about 1,500 residents 15 kind of 15 or so miles from Elorn. The woman was calling to report something her son, 17-year-old Tom Bria, had experienced in the summer of 1992, not long after Lor's encounter on Bray Road.

I want to go to there. According to Tom, he and a friend, Chris Maxwell, were on their way home from a wedding reception one night in August and they passed through Elhorn. There was an incredibly like super dense layer of fog that night. So Tom was driving slowly when they felt a thud, like they'd hit something that they didn't see in the road.

It's giving I know what you did last summer. It is. So Bria's mother said he thought he hit a mailbox. So he backed up. That's when he realized it was no mailbox. So Tom opened the driver's side window and immediately noticed, quote, "A real skunky smelling odor." So Tom stuck his head out the window, expecting to see a dead or injured skunk on the road, but instead he saw something he still can't really explain. His mother told Linda Godfrey he described it to me as big and hairy and that it was walking and quote reaching out in his direction.

What? Now I'm just picturing him like with arms out to me with arms wide open. That's what I picture now. And now I'm like maybe maybe he's not satanic. Maybe he's Creed.

Spot the difference. I mean, spot the difference. Maybe it's entirely possible.

That he's creed. The entire band right here. That's why he's so big. That's why he's so big.

He's so open. That's what he was doing. I'm screaming. So, according to Tom's mother, being creeped. So, according to Tom's mother, the family had a cabin in the woods. According to Tom's mother, he was not creed.

He was not creed. Uh, the family had a cabin in the woods and spent a lot of time hunting and camping. So Tom definitely would have recognized any of the usual wildlife like bears, wolves, coyotes, anything like that.

In his videotaped interview or creed, if you wouldn't recognize them, so he you never know.

In his videotaped rep uh interview with a reporter, Tom described it. He said, "I saw a faint shadow of actually how big it was. It was large. Its lower chest or belly was at the top of my car."

Oh, [ __ ] It was whitish gray with black streaks in it and it was hairy. I didn't get any facial details, but the lower part of the body I can describe to a tea. It had large legs. The feet were a little fuzzy. I can't describe them as well as I can the arm that was reaching for my car with arms wide open. The fingers were either pointed or had quite the nails on them. The arm I love quite the nails.

Quite the nails on them. I really need somebody to describe my nails as quite the nails. Your fingers have quite the nails on them.

Ellie, give me quite the nails. I like that he wasn't like that's a good way to describe it that he's like it. They weren't claws. They just had quite the nails on them.

The arm was long and kind of oddshaped. H. Now, this the sight of this thing in the road obviously terrified Tom and he stomped on the gas trying to get as far away as possible. Yeah.

A few miles down the road near Highway 106, the boys spotted a state trooper and pulled over to report what they had just seen. So, they reported it right away. Uh, when he got home that night, Tom got out and inspected his car, and he noticed that the animal had scratched a small piece of the pin striping from the exterior.

Rude. After going inside and telling his mom what happened, they called the sheriff's office to report the incident a second time. Now, later, as she was working on another article, Linda Godfrey confirmed the report with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department, who verified that Tom did report that sighting that night. She also found other reports of an unusual animal sighting that same night.

Oh, [ __ ] Including one report that came in about a half hour after Tom's report.

Wow. Yeah. Which is strange. This is This feels legit. Yeah. Like the sheriff's deputy told Linda Godfrey someone called in and said they saw a large object in the ditch at 106 and north and thought it looked like a bear.

Oh. A squad was dispatched and saw nothing. The two incidents were seven miles apart.

Wow. Now, like Doris Gypson and Lori and Drizzy, Tom couldn't help but notice how humanlike this thing looked. That's what really stood out to him. It stood on two legs. It walked towards him like a person. Its head and upper shoulder um shoulders were level with the cornstcks growing in the field beside the road.

That description is the scariest thing I've ever heard in my life. Do not ever be level with a cornstck in my presence.

No, don't do it. Keep that away from me. Don't do that. Also, just if you're next to a cornstck, just assume that you're you're dangerous.

You're nefarious. Like, I as soon as corn stalks come into play. Yeah. I'm terrified.

It's very he who walks with the he who walks behind the rose, you [snorts] know, like that's

I don't need it. Being level with a cornstck is that's satanic. Being in the vicinity of a cornstck is

satanic is pretty creed like behavior. Yeah. So, so which is also synonymous with fill out over there.

So, um, so Tom said it hadn't noticed us. Then it looked at the car and looked at me and gave Are you ready?

Two thumbs up. Are you ready? Just kidding. You honestly not far off. It gave this little snicker like it was challenging us.

Oh, so he's like a frap, bro. And it says, "We were scared. It was huge." What? So he literally was

snickering. He was just standing next to the corn, level with the corn. And then

like that. He looked over and did the Let's see. Let's hear yours. Little the little like I see. I picture him as being a little more dingusy. Like he's like,

"Oh, wow. Wow." I picture it more. I don't like that one. That's almost scarier.

It kind of is cuz you don't want a dingus chasing you. You know, a dingus monster.

Funny. I've had a dingus chasing me a couple of times. A dingus monster. In fact, Honey of Hannah had a dingus.

Honey the land. Honey the land. Honey the dinguses. Honey the land. I brought a couple home. You met him.

Oh yeah, it's true. Dinguses forever. Not forever. But yeah, he said uh he said and then he he was like challenging them, but he was scared. He didn't like it.

To like a duel. Uh maybe maybe to a singoff. Oh to a he said you guys know Creed.

Yeah. You guys like that band? Because I am that band. I'll win this circle. Now, after publishing the two-page spread about what was she was by then calling the beast of Bray Road, which is a great name.

It is. In the fall of 1992, Linda Godfrey had become a kind of like, you know, representative of this creature at this point.

I mean, yeah, she's done the work. She's doing a lot of PR for him. Um, she's his agent now.

She is. Yeah. She signed this man to talent agency. No. For a a period of several weeks, she received countless new reports about the beast. Some relatively recent from like, you know, the previous few years, while others were much older. When she started out in her investigation, she assumed the beast sightings were a new phenomenon because a lot of times these things will come up and you're like, "Yeah, it's only been in the last few years people just made this up,

right?" But as the stories poured in, she started to wonder whether Wisconsin had been home to some strange species that had somehow managed to avoid detection until now.

I mean, I could see why she was seen too much of it. The article brought more accounts and countless sightseers and crypted hunters to the area in search of this beast of Bray Road,

which that's not great. But by far the most interesting among them was the editor of a paper from a nearby town who'd grown up in the area and after reading Linda's article remembered a story his father had told him when he was young. According to Linda, the man's father had worked as a night watchman for St. Kleta School for exceptional children.

Okay. Um this was in nearby Jefferson. Uh on the school grounds there were several quote ancient burial grounds.

What? Yeah. They were trying to preserve and the watchmen had taken to include them in their rounds. So they were trying to keep them like at bay.

No one at bay. They were trying to they were trying to preserve them. So they were trying to keep them from like vandals, anything happening to them like anybody at bay. They were keeping the vandals at bay and keeping the ancient burial grounds safe

and at bay apparently. And at bay apparently. Um, so the night watchmen are using their rounds to like go in there and make sure no one's [ __ ] around in there. One night in 1936, the editor's father, Mark Shackleman, was doing his rounds when he came to the burial grounds and saw a large animal frantically digging into the mound like it was trying to unear something.

No, thank you. Unsure of what he was looking at and not wanting to endanger himself, he quickly and quietly backed away. Uh the next night Mark was again on his rounds when he came upon the beast a second time at the same spot. And this time though he shine the beam of his flashlight at the animal. And to his horror instead of running away the creature rose onto its hind legs and stood up tall and he estimated it to be more than six feet tall.

Level with the corn. Level with the corn. With the corn. Level with the corn. Honey the corn. So years later,

how am I gonna follow this? Years later, when he recounted the story to his son, Mark Shackleman described the animal as being covered with dark or black hair and having a terrible odor like long dead meat.

A stank ass. A stank ass. And remember Tom when he hit something in the road, he smelled like a skunk-like order odor. So like a bad smell, like a an odor, you know? I like the smell of skunk.

That's so weird to me. I won't even get into that because I don't understand it.

It's a thing. No, other people like it. I'm sure it We're going to have a whole No, don't use the comments. Wait a second.

The comments are for tell us if we can do Twilight for November's bonus episode. Do not support Ash's. I know I'm going to hear a million people,

don't support Ash. Ash, I'm on your side. I know everyone's on Ash's side here. It's okay. I don't like the smell of skunks, but you have to tell us in the comment section about the Twilight bonus episode. Do not,

guys. That was Elena saying it. Here's me. It's Ash. I'm not reading from a script. She didn't write this for me. The comments are indeed for Twilight.

Yeah, we need I know that I have supporters out there who also like the smell of skunk. So, don't even feel the need to reassure me

because I know you're out there. You can PM me. Yeah, there you go. PM you. Oh, private message.

I think I aged myself there. Thank you for pointing it out. I think that's like what old people on Facebook say.

As you can evening you. I don't understand that. I probably aged myself. You cannot evening me. I don't know what that means, but don't talk to me.

Don't evening me. Anyway, Twilight Twilight Twilight. Stanky. So, this thing stinks is what we we know now.

Um, more surprising than its side was side. Nope. Size. Uh, more surprising than how big it was was that the what the beast did next. Standing before him, it looked him right in the eyes.

Confident and made a sound the watchman later described as quote sounding like a protohuman language.

What? It was though the creature was speaking to him, but it wasn't speaking like English like we know it today. What? From where he stood, the only word Mark could make out was what sounded like gdara.

What does that mean? That's not a word. So we will So there is something to that.

Gdara. Yes. So he maybe he really wants some Gdiva. Gdiva. No, they think it's something else. So as they stood facing each other, Mark began to pray, assuming that this thing was going to attack him.

Frankly, I might do the same. Honestly, he was like, I think I'm going to die right now. If there's ever a time to pray, it's when a werewolf yells gdiva.

Literally. No, for when when creed in the form of a beast in front of you yells Gdiva,

pray by the cornstck. By the he's on an ancient burial ground at this point. He's on an even more [ __ ] up.

So, fortunately, after uttering those strange words at him, it just turned and walked off into the woods.

Oh, I would feel cursed in that moment. But here's another thing. So, remember how Tom said this thing like kind of snickered at him, like made like made a fool of him.

Shackleman said, and this was way before this that account. He said, "It looked like it sneered at me. I never saw that thing again or anything like it."

What's the difference between a sneer and a snicker? Kind of like a And a sneer is kind of like

like a dirty like a stank ass face. Like just gives you like a h like I'm like in you like Yeah. like that little like like he did that like it's like an to me a sneer has that like feel about it

but not necessarily the motion he doesn't do that like come at me bro but it's like that feeling at me I think they they're like

want some Yeah they're like come get some. Yeah, don't start none. Exactly. Wow.

Yeah. What the [ __ ] Or like if we're bringing it into today's world, [ __ ] ain't [ __ ]

and they ain't saying nothing. That's what this guy was saying to him. What if he was saying [ __ ] ain't [ __ ]

What if they just did that and then and then he just turned around and walked into the woods and never

and he kept saying [clears throat] 100 [ __ ] can't tell me nothing. He does be He does bees in the trap.

He does. So whatever the beast had said, if it had said anything at all, it made no sense to Mark Shackleman. Obviously, he was like, I don't know what he was saying to me, but the most horrifying part.

It was only years later after he told the story to his son that it was pointed out to him that the word that the beast spoke sounded very similar to Gdara, the town in the Bible where Jesus casts out a legion of demons from a possessed man.

So I do think this is Creed. I think it is. I think it's Creed. So I mean that's the only song I know of them is the arms wide open song, but

yeah. I mean Creed, let us know if you're if you're also a beast of Bray Road. [snorts]

Uh so the stories of the beast of Bray Road that Linda had collected not only established a timeline dating back further than anyone had expected, uh but it also created a pretty unique legendary crypted that brought a lot of legend trippers and paranormal enthusiasts from all over the country to this area. Um much to the displeasure of some local residents. Yeah. Uh, but one thing Linda's collection of stories couldn't do was provide any indication as to where the animal had come from in the first place.

Maybe it's just of the land. Honey the land. Honey the land. So to some, like Linda, it had probably always been there. That's what I'm saying.

On the land, hiding among, you know, the Wisconsin forests are dense. Um, but others predicted it was something evil in nature. Throughout the 1980s, there were rumors of satanic cults active in in the area. And many like Lori and Drizzy, who we talked about earlier, couldn't help but think one of those cults may have brought the Beast of Bray Road into being,

like conjured it, like conjured this demon. If you have the ability to do that, you need to you need to get to work on some other things as well.

And also, I'm sorry if you believe that that can happen, you cannot discount werewolves being a thing. You just can't. I will stand on business with that.

10 toes down. John Frederickson, who you know was the town animal rescue officer for some time,

is willing to entertain such such theories. He'll he'll entertain any theories really when it comes to this. Okay.

He said, "I wouldn't discount some type of occult activity." Yeah. Which I mean, he did. He was the one who said like the the books came off the shelves when they were talking about it.

Um but he said if by chance somebody evoked some kind of occult entities, like maybe that's a thing. So he believes that like maybe the occult is involved here and he was brought into being

or maybe there's just ancient [ __ ] in the world that we think there's just ancient [ __ ] that we that have realized that we all kind of suck and that it should stay away from us

probably and they do and then every once in a while they don't cuz they're like cuz I think he truly has the the mentality of [ __ ] ain't [ __ ] and they ain't saying nothing. Well, and he also like

[ __ ] can't tell me nothing. Like that's that's why he's like, "I'm not worried about you anymore."

Well, he's not really seeking anybody out. They're stumbling across him. Exactly. He's like, "I'm just trying to eat roadkill."

He's just out late night, you know? He is. He's just out late night eating roadkill.

It's just like that sometimes, you know? He's just having his version of a faux fo.

It's also nice that he's eating roadkill and he's not Nobody saw him actively kill anything. I I have this one story thing about him, like this this one set of research about him, and nowhere in it do I see him tearing apart animals that are alive.

So, he's a pacifist. Is he trying to maybe kill humans? I Yeah, I think he's just trying to [ __ ] with them

or he's trying to be like, "Get the [ __ ] back in your car." Maybe he's trying to teach us all some survival skills and he's like, "Listen, none of you have a survival instinct. You're all getting out of your car. looking at me, a strange ass [ __ ] who's who's on par with the corn,

who's bamping through the night land. And it's like, you're all getting out of here bamping through the night. And it's like, I'm trying to chase your ass back into your car so you know never to get out of your car again.

What's up? That if you are driving late night, do not get out of your car. And maybe that's why he actually talked to the one guy who was the night watchman because he was like, I know you don't have a car, so Gdiva. Okay. And I think he also was like, "Last night you did the right thing and you just ignored me while I was

I was on the mound. Now you're shining a light upon me. Now you're shining a light on me." That doesn't feel very survival instinctish. So I'm going to teach you.

Go on. Get I'm going to teach you Gava. And then he just sneer. And then he walked back into the woods saying, "Bitches ain't shit." And they ain't saying nothing.

So that I think that is the beast of Ray Road is just out here trying to teach us all some survival instincts. I'm kind of obsessed with him.

Yeah, I think he's pretty great. I think he's real. I think there's I kind of love his attitude.

I do too. I think the snicker. I also feel like there's not just one of him. I feel like like he's got a squad.

Oh, yeah. I think they're all There was a couple different color descriptions. Yeah, there was some darker ones, some lighter ones. So, I think

Yeah, I think we have a whole crew here and I think they all have [ __ ] attitudes. Also, maybe it is a Twilight thing and they're just like people in the day and then they shapeshift like Oz even from

Oh, yeah. From, you know, and then they have sick ass tattoos like Jacob and his squad.

Hell yeah. So that they don't imprint on children. Don't do that. That's why we need to talk about Twilight. Okay. Cuz we will talk about the future ones if you let us. If you let us

if you let this could be a beautiful gift. It could be a beautiful thing. But we we want to make you guys happy with these bonus episodes. So

I really It's in your hands. Give us the opportunity to provide you Twilight happiness because I can provide.

We can provide. Okay, we can provide. No, honestly, if you guys don't let us do Twilight, I might cry. So, sorry. I took a bite of a donut.

This [ __ ] just has a chipmunk cheek full of a Boston cream. I really do. That's so Boston of you. All right, I'm back. Sorry. I took a bite right as we hit record and I was like, whoop, donut break. Donut break. Um, yeah. We got to do Twilight. Please.

Please. It's gonna be great. Please. [screaming] You want more of this? More of this commentary?

Let's go. Let's go. Open it up. All right, honey. Well, it's my turn. And we're still in the Midwest. Have no fear. We haven't traveled out of there.

Good. We're going to be talking about the Enfield Monster. Not to be confused with the Enfield poltergeist.

I was confusing them, so thank you for telling me. I'm glad that I could be of assistance in the Enfield place. So, on the evening of April 25th, 1973, 50-year-old Henry McDaniel and his wife Liil, they were just coming home from like a school function some for the kids. Henry and Lil,

they got home a little past 9 and they found their two kids in a state of absolute panic.

That's not where you want to find your kids. No, they were freaking out. And according to them, they obviously stayed home alone after their parents went out. Not long before their parents got back, they started hearing loud scratching noises at the door.

Yeah. I don't want any of this when I come home. And when whatever was at the door wasn't able to get through, they said it moved on to the windows and that they also heard claws scraping across the metal of the air conditioner outside or like the condenser.

It's time to burn the house down. Get rid of the entire Well, no. Where else are you going to seek refuge?

I mean, I don't know. This doesn't feel like a refuge, though. I know, but don't be don't be burning down your house when the cryptids are outside. I mean, that's never really a good solution to anything burning down your house, but here we are.

You heard it here first. Don't burn down your house. So, neither of the kids managed to really get a good look at the animal. The best they could say was that it was just like a weird creature. So, obviously the parents were like, "Okay, we won't leave you home again."

The amount of times my kids have been like, "Did you see that weird creature in the woods?" And I'm just like, "It's probably a deer."

You know, it's actually wild that literally happened this morning. I believe it. One of the kids first of all saw like something crazy in the forest and then told me that there was a pelican on my head this morning.

Sure did. Fun fact, no no pel on my head. Yeah. Can confirm there was not a pelican on her head. U she looked in the tree though and she was like I saw something big and brown and furry in the tree. That's why it's moving so much. And I was like that's a squirrel.

Squirrel. That's just a squirrel babe. Yeah. Yeah. It's brown squirrel. So I'm sure these parents were like that's just a squirrel babe. And that's the thing. And Enfield is like it's a rural place, but it's not so remote that they would have to contend with aggressive or confrontational wildlife. So they were like,

"Okay, I don't know about that." Yeah. Like it's probably bad. But then not long after the kids like went through the whole story, the entire family started to hear the sounds again. So the parents were like, "Fuck. Should have believed you."

God damn. Henry later told a reporter, "This thing was trying to get into the house."

Oh, I hate that. So now concerned that whatever it was, you know, might succeed this time, cuz obviously it's it's trying and trying again,

Henry ran to his bedroom and he grabbed a flashlight and a 22 caliber pistol that he kept on his bedside table.

By the time he came back, the beast moved from the front of the house, moved on. So he slowly opened the door, aimed the flashlight out there,

and after a quick sweep of the yard, the flashlight's beam landed on the thing that had been clawing at the door. And now it was standing between two flower bushes at the edge of the yard. Later, Henry said it had three legs on it, a short body, two little short arms, and two pink eyes as big as flashlights.

That sounds horrifying and hilarious all at the same time. Kind of adorable. Has three legs and two little stubby arms. Like a stubby arms. Literally T-Rex arms.

And it's just standing between two flower. You know what it sounds like? It sounds like a child's drawing. Uh, it comes to life because it also has pink eyes.

Yeah, it sounds like a kid's drawing. Mikey just asked me if I farted in its eye and the answer is no. Because this was 50 years ago. Mikey, did you FART IN ITS EYE?

OH, FIRED. BOOM. ROSE. BOOM. FIRED. I'm just kidding. Don't kill me. You guys all love Mikey.

I get it, Elena. So from where Henry was standing, the shape of the body he said like similar to yours almost looked human. He said it was around

I thought you were saying similar to my body. Similar to your body almost looked human. I was like wow your shots are just ringing out in this podcast studio. Similar to I thought you were like similar to yours that looks almost human. I was like whoa wow. I realize I had some kids BUT I realize but damn I realize THAT I would never say that to you. What if I actually said something that diabolical to you? So I was like, "Wow, damn."

Similar to your crypted, my dear. Similar to the beast of Ray Road. Yeah. Similar. Let's

not to the beast of this podcast. [gasps] Arguably, I'm the beast of the podcast. You are.

Actually, arguably, you are. I can't breathe. I'll take it. I can't breathe. I'll own it.

No. similar to your crypt. It looked human. It was a little shorter than yours. Your crypted from you.

Actually, it was around your height. It was about 5 and 1/2 ft tall. Maybe I am this.

Well, it was a grayish color. I mean, I've been there. Well, after you give birth, actually, after you had those kids, you were pretty gray.

So, from checking off all the pops, I don't think I'll ever recover from you thinking that I said you were almost human. I think we might need to pause so I can breathe. Hold on. It's just the way it was. It was after you were like, "Mikey, you're 100." Then you were like similar to you. It looked almost human. I was like, "No, no."

She's just like, "Pow." And you know what, Debbie? Hey Deb. Oh my god. Oh no. Take cover.

All right. All right. All right. All right. All right. Get it together. Get it together. So, from where Henry was standing, the shape of the body almost looked human, similar to your crypted.

Thank you for that. It was around 5 and 1/2 ft tall, except it was a grayish color.

Okay. From the doorway, he aimed the pistol and he fired in the direction of the beast at least four times. He was not [ __ ] around.

No, he was like, "Die." He was like, "Die." When he said, "When I fired that first shot, I know I hit it." The creature gave out a hiss much like a wild cat's. Then after it cried out, it just turned around and got the [ __ ] out of there. And he said it covered 50 feet in just three or four bounds before disappearing into the woods completely. Holy [ __ ] It's literally like

Edward Cullen when he runs really fast. Yeah, hold on tight, Spider Monkey. Look at me pointing back to Twilight to get it on your mind again.

There's so many things I want to say even about that just that one will scene alone. And you better let us. Yeah, you got it. So, he was shocked by whatever the [ __ ] he just saw in the backyard. So, he ran inside and he said, "911. I'd like to report a crypted." And two state troopers arrived a short time later cuz they didn't have a lot to do, I guess.

Yeah. They were like, "Let's see what this is about." So they arrived obviously way too late to see what this was, but with Henry's help, they were able to find the tracks that the animal had left behind or the crypted. And they were nothing like anybody had really seen before. The tracks in the dirt looked somewhat similar to what a dog might leave behind or an animal with like a similar foot pad, but it had six toe pads on each foot instead of five.

It's a six-toed, three-legged, stumpy armed [ __ ] Gray thing. Yeah. Or [ __ ] or [ __ ] if you're nasty. So, the three men searched the perimeter around the house and a short distance into the woods, too. But they didn't really find anything aside from the prince. Back at the house, they listened as Henry described what this was. And at first, they were I was like, "What?" They said, "Maybe it's just a large dog that you never have seen before."

A large six-toed dog. Maybe it's a large six-toed uh dog with three legs, 5 and 1/2 ft tall,

and has tiny arms as well. Makes sense. They were like, "I don't know. Maybe." Honestly, valid. Why not just throw that out there?

Yeah, just in case. It might stick to the wall. Yeah. Henry was like, "No, nope, not a dog. Pretty sure it wasn't."

But after listening again to the description, trooper James Masser said that while it seemed highly unlikely one could be roaming the woods of western Illinois, he said, "It kind of sounds like you're describing a kangaroo." Uh, has he seen a kangaroo before?

Okay, so obviously has this man seen one? Here's the thing. Kangaroos don't have three legs. I was I was going like as we know but

what does he think a kangaroo is well I kind of I sort of see what he's getting at. So they don't have three legs but in the dark a tail could have given the appearance of you know an animal standing on three legs especially cuz they also use their tails for balance. So it might have looked like he was standing like that.

But it could have accounted for some of the other features too. Especially cuz he was like in the dark.

Yeah. Cuz they have those little arms. Yeah, they're grayish. Some of them, right? That's the thing. He was like, "It sounds crazy cuz I don't think there would be a kangaroo in Illinois."

Roman. Like, I don't I've never seen a rogue kangaroo. I haven't either, much to my sugarin.

Yeah, I mean, I would love to, but I would really love to see a random kangaroo.

Do kangaroos have six toes? That I don't know. Let's find out. Do they have toes at all? At first, it said 18 and I said, "What?" Five toes on each front paw and four toes on each hind foot. So nay.

So no less. Damn. All right. Well, there goes that. So there's that. Well, he said in the dark it could appear to have a human shape. Gray is a color for kangaroos. And he said it could have easily explained the growling hiss that it let out after it had been shot and how the animal managed to cover so much distance in a short time, but like you just said, they don't have six toes on each foot.

That's your That would have been my first question. Yeah. Well, Master suggested it could have been a kangaroo, but Henry flatly rejected that explanation. He said he once had a pet kangaroo while serving in the army in Australia, so he would recognize one if he saw it.

I'm literally obsessed with the fact that he was able to shut that down with that.

He said, "Bitch, I had a kangaroo once." He said, "Not a kangaroo. Oh, you think you know about kangaroos?"

He said, "I'm going to one up you here. This is my kangaroo. This is not and it honestly that would make me be like did you release your kangaroo? Like wait a second.

I don't really know what happened to connection to a kangaroo. Yeah. Yeah. Well, aside from taking down the information, there really wasn't a lot that they could do. The troopers at that point. So, they conducted their brief search and then they left the house. Assuming that that was probably the last they'd hear about it. They were like, "This guy's kind of crazy.

Kind of crazy. He's kind of crazy." In a town like Enfield, the population is less than a thousand residents, so there's not a lot that goes on there. especially back then without somebody else in town knowing about it and then everybody else in town knowing about it.

So not long after the state troopers had shown up at the McDaniels house almost 50 to 75 onlookers had lingered in and around the family's yard while they conducted this search just trying to figure out what was going on.

Yeah. And as a result of course over the next few days everybody in town including a lot of reporters had heard about the unusual encounter and they just wanted to hear directly from Henry himself.

I would want to hear. Now, Henry was like, "Yeah, hell yeah. I'll tell you everything." And over the few days after the encounter, he gave a ton of interviews where he described the animal. And he just, you know, kept giving increasingly dramatic retellings of the story, which if honestly if I saw what he saw in his backyard, I'd do the same thing. And when asked how he was able to recall the event so clearly and describe the beats, like all the details, he said, "I have a photoatic memory."

Obviously. Yeah. Uh he also told reporters that he was sure he wasn't mistaken in what he saw because the next day some school children told him that they had seen a similar looking animal while they were playing on the school's baseball field.

Oh, so now we got more eyewitness. He said he was sure it wasn't quote a prankster. And he said because no man can run that fast and leap such distances.

I don't know. Ask Edward Cullen. I don't know. Just saying. Hold on tight, Spider Monkey. Now, when it came to exactly what the thing was, he he didn't really know exactly, but he said he did have a theory. He said, "If they do find it, they will find more than one, and they won't be from this planet. I can tell you that."

I like where he went there. He said, I like that he went full stop. He said, "Martian." He said, "10 toes down. This is an alien.

It's an alien. They should study it." Okay, I'm into it. So, when the articles were uh published in the papers about the sighting, Henry's phone started ringing off the hook. He said he got around 250 phone calls, mostly from people telling him that he thought they thought he was describing a kangaroo. So, everybody was really tento down on that.

Everyone's so willing to accept the fact that a kangaroo is just rogue in the Midwest right now.

They really are. Like everyone was just like, "Yeah, because probably a kangaroo." Like, if somebody was like, "I saw something strange last night. Like, we're in Massachusetts. I saw something strange last night in my backyard. It looked like this." The furthest thing from my mind would be that's probably a kangaroo. And if somebody was like, I think it was a kangaroo, I'd be like, I can tell you a hundred reasons why it wasn't.

Yeah, I can tell you 150 reasons why that's a crypted and not a kangaroo. Pretty sure our our climate is not super similar to Australia.

Definitely not. I don't really think they're hanging out here. That's the thing. I don't even know if they really could survive for a long time.

I don't see them roaming around either. I've yet to see one. Well, according to Henry, one call that he got was from a government representative who told him it was the fifth sighting of such a phenomenon. And the first uh being was in 1967 near Denver when UFOs were were reported seen in the west.

Like that a government representative was like, "Hello, Henry. Hello, Henry. I'd just like to call you and tell you that you are one of five people who have seen that." Like, okay. All right, Henry.

He's like, "Here, you know what? I'm going to validate you because everybody's calling you and saying this is not a kangaroo

or this is a kangaroo that a government representative loves to do more than to validate civilians.

Yeah, it happens all the time. Yeah, it happens every single day. I see it so much.

Me too in the streets. They're always validation getting on the horn and being like, I would love to validate you.

Getting on the horn. I love it. So Henry maintained he was like, yeah, that government official is right. I didn't see a kangaroo and other people saw this [ __ ] too.

I mean, I trust Henry here. So he maintained that what he saw wasn't a kangaroo and he cited plaster molds that had been sent to the lab for evaluation of the tracks that they got and they didn't look anything like a kangaroo print.

Of course not. It's not a kangaroo. Yeah. I actually we talked about it like quickly earlier, but they're unique and easily recognizable because of the shape of the foot and the fact that they have large claws.

Yeah. According to Henry, an anthropologist who had seen the prince casually identified them as resembling those of a bear. So he's like, "That's like the furthest thing from a kangaroo." No, cuz you look at a kangaroo's claws, they're like their claws are long and like I think when they're running they go up a little on them, but still those are long ass claws and they're like very

spindly. Yeah. And remember they said it looked like a dog print with another an extra toe. So it's like what?

Um so who knows about the tracks. But while the mystery of the species remained unsolved, what was clear to most law enforcement and local fish and game agents was that Henry wasn't making this entire thing up. Not only had the state troopers actually seen the tracks outside of the McDaniel house, but they also followed them down the railroad tracks and into a corn field a few miles away.

Oh, they're always up in the corn. Cryptids love corn. Cryptids plus corn equals love.

Honey, it's the land. Honey, it's the corn. They're just always up in there. They are. This guy is not as tall as the corn. That's where I was.

I forgive him. But he was But honestly, that probably made it easier cuz he could trapes through the corn.

He was he who walks behind the rose. Walks in the rose. In them. Also, I looked in a kangaroo track.

No. Have you ever Have you seen them? I haven't even seen a kangaroo track. Oh, it looks like

There's only two toes in a kangaroo track. Yeah. No, that doesn't look like a kangaroo track at all. Not a kangaroo.

They need to look up their [ __ ] before they start citing that an Australian creature is in our midst.

Probably. Yeah, probably. But, you know, the government agreed that it's not the government.

Government. So, the mystery deepened a few days later when investigators pulled quote something resembling hair off of one of the tree limbs in that field. Gross where they were looking around. According to Henry McDaniel, they all agreed quote the material looked nothing like animal or human hair.

Ew. Yeah. I don't like it. Now, when he was asked whether there was any blood or other evidence found that would indicate that Henry had hit the animal when he fired that night, he told reporters the anthropologist saw drippings of a clear substance that they collected for samples, but he wasn't sure what it was.

Damn. So, something came out of this crypted or animal and it was a clear liquid.

Something. Yeah. He just just went oozing away. Yeah. But they didn't they didn't know what it was. Like they got samples. Well, and it's like that's the thing cuz it got shot.

Yeah. At least once. And it's like, is that its blood? Maybe. Does it bleed clear liquid? It's kind of like a buffy zombie or like a not zombie, like a demon.

Yeah. Or it's very alienesque. It is. You know, that's why Henry thought that. I'm on Henry said.

Unfortunately, by the end of April, the story kind of petered out when most of the press and public moved on. But it was revived in early May when Henry called reporters to say he had seen the beast a second time on May 6th.

Henry's always seen this beast. I know it. One time, two times, he's seen them.

He's seen him. He said he got he was awoken in the night by his dogs barking around 3:00 a.m. the witching hour. And when he went outside to see what had gotten them so agitated, he saw the same three-legged monster standing on the railroad tracks about 75 ft away. He said, "I seen something moving down the railroad track and there it stood. I didn't shoot at it or anything. It wasn't in a hurry or nothing." And when asked whether he was unnerved by seeing something paranormal for a second time, he said, "I wasn't scared. I'd like to have it as a pet and charge admission. It's something that's there and we got to accept it." I'm literally obsessed with Henry.

Henry's the best. I like his vibe. Yeah. I like his whole thing here. He's like, "This thing is there. Let's just accept it." He's also saying like I think we have a connection because he keeps coming back to me.

Yeah. And I'm not scared about it. I think maybe we're kindred spirits. So, you know, I see him, he sees me, and I could have him. He said with arms wide open, I accept this creature.

Whole [ __ ] circle. And he would have named him Creed. He would have. So, there you have it.

There we go. Well, the second sighting obviously brought a new round of reporters to Enfield, including WWKI reporter Rick Rainbow.

Rick Rainbow. It's also It's always so fun to say like newspaper names like that or like radio names like WWKI

because you have to say it like that. Yeah. Uh so Rick Rainbow was accompanied by Edward Phillips, a pet store owner and a big game hunter.

Rainbow interviewed Henry and Phillips went out to the area where the animal had last been seen and he started making plaster casts out of the tracks in the dirt dirt again. Matt. Later in his reporting, Rainbow described the tracks as about 4 in in diameter and having five distinct toe pads, possibly a sixth.

Not a kangaroo. No, definitely not. According to Rainbow, there were at least three other people in the area who had quote seen something that, shall we say, is strange. Including the McDaniel's next door neighbor, 10-year-old Greg Garrett, who said he saw the animal about half an hour before Henry had the first time. He said he was in the backyard when the thing confronted him and quote stepped on his feet and tore his tennis shoes to shreds.

That's the most 10-year-old thing to say in the world. He said, "That's what happened to my tennis shoes."

Stepped on my goddamn shoes and that's the reason they're all [ __ ] up. Ma, that's the reason

it's Do you feel stupid now, Ma? Ma, it was a crypted not kangaroo. That's why I need new shoes. Ma,

that was exactly what I thought when I read this, too. The kangaroo krypted stepped on my It confronted me. I need new sho. It stepped to me.

It stepped. It What was it? It sneered at me. It did. It sneered. It said, "Come at me, bro."

It did all the thing. Yeah. And now I need new shoes, man. I believe it. So that's I know. That's the thing. It's like I believe Henry saw this thing. I really wish another adult had.

I also wish that not and not 10-year-old Greg. But here's the thing. The second sighting of the monster didn't just bring reporters. It also brought a small group of hunters uh from as far away as Indiana all looking to capture whatever this was and like capitalize on it.

Oh, don't capture him in Rome. Well, when in Rome, the police felt that way, too. On the afternoon of May 8th, local police arrested five teenagers from Lwood, Indiana on charges of violating hunting hunting regulations after they were discovered to be hunting without a license and had literally no proper safety precautions.

They were just like wy shooting off into the distance, literally. Just before they got arrested, they said that they they saw a quote gray hairy creature in some underbrush and that it ran faster than a man.

So let it be, man. It's better than us. Yeah. Don't shoot it. If it's better than us, it it deserves to be here.

That's what I think. It ran faster than you. That's it. If it could outrun survival of the fittest, baby, it it fit.

It's the whole thing about there's another Twilight thing where it's like outrun you.

What does he say? As if YOU COULD OUTRUN ME. A I love it. Oh man. Please, please, you guys.

You got to let I beg of you. You got to let us. [snorts] Back to this. So, they all took aim at the what the beast they called it and they fired with rifles and shotguns and two thought they hit the animal, but it still managed to get away. So, this man is like out here or this creature is out here like Swiss cheese still getting away.

He does. He's just leaking fluid everywhere. Ew. Ew. Ew. Gar. So, the arrest prompted White County, which is a crazy name for a county.

Deputy Sheriff Jim Clark. Like, side note, like side note, maybe come up with a different name. That's rude. But White County Deputy Sheriff Jim Clark made a public statement warning everybody else that they were about to be arrested if they kept shooting this thing. He said, "Nothing I know of is in season now, especially monsters. Anybody we know of out hunting monsters, especially with guns, will be put in jail. We're We are afraid they will kill somebody. He said, "Y'all, monsters are not in season right now."

That's literally what he said. He was like, "I'll let you know. We'll come up with a new law here in Watt County."

You think you got a monster hunting license? I don't know why they're they're suddenly southern, but they are.

Literally Illinois if you're talking about monster season. Wait, there's like a Chicago accent, but it's really hard to do.

It is. It's hard. I don't even piss you all off. I don't want to do that. I have family from Chicago. Okay.

Yeah. We're not out here trying to piss off Chicago. But we love Chicago. Sometimes Drew has a weird Chicago accent.

I love that for him. Yeah. But anyway, by midMay, most people in and around Enfield were pretty tired of the Enfield monster.

How could you be? It's ridiculous in my opinion. It's ridiculous. They just wanted things to return to normal, which I've never wanted. I can't relate. Can't relate.

The editor of the Carmy Times wrote, "The case of Enfield's alleged monster has, for all intents and purposes, reached a climax and apparently is going downhill."

I mean, let's take alleged out of there. It's a [ __ ] monster. Okay. Even the sheriff thinks so.

Yeah. At the sheriff's office, deputies were writing out citations left and right to wouldbe monster hunters for trespassing, violating local hunting laws, and other city officials were frantically trying to answer questions from reporters who were like, "Hey, what's up here in White County?

What's up with this monster?" Sheriff Roy Poshard told reporters he had already quote declared an end is going to be put to the monster kick before somebody gets hurt and he loses his mind answering queries from news media. He was like, "I'm going to go crazy on your bus. I don't want to talk to y'all anymore.

He's like, "Go and get it. Go and get it." So whether local law enforcement and residents wanted to be done with the monster was kind of irrelevant. As long as there was still some interest in the beast, it and it turned out there was,

of course. So after speaking with Rick Rainbow about his reporting, uh I think it's Lauren Coleman,

a graduate student at the University of Illinois, he decided to come to Enfield and study the animal himself if he could. He had spent years collecting data on similar sightings of unidentified animals all around. And he thought that the Enfield monster could actually be a legitimate case of a previously unseen species.

Yeah, because that's the other thing. It's like it doesn't have to be a monster, everybody. I'm We don't know everything that's on this planet.

That's that we discover new [ __ ] all the time. So like called science. Look it up.

Be a new strange looking animal. That's what Lauren said. He had a degree in [ __ ]

Yeah. So unfortunately though, after just a few days of, you know, looking out for the beast, he gave up on his search when he came away or when all he came away with was just a few nice pictures of the White County countryside.

Pretty. Yeah. Name it something else. He insisted he wasn't giving up, but he told a reporter he wouldn't resume his search until there was more definite information,

which is like kind of a bummer. Lame. So, the final word on the monster came in midmay when a letter from a man in Ohio uh arrived at the office of the car times addressed to the publisher. The letter writer Alan Yorkshire had read all the stories about the Enfield monster and like many he believed the description matched that of a kangaroo and he was wrong.

Guys, it's not a [ __ ] kangaroo. If this is a kangaroo, I'll eat my hat. I It's not. But this is crazy. Uh, the difference between his suggestion and like the suggestion of countless other people was that he actually owned a kangaroo.

Okay, maybe you're an expert, but I don't know. It's not a kangaroo. I'm going to eat my hat.

According to him, his pet kangaroo, Macy, had gone missing a year earlier, and he believed that she was stolen by somebody who was relatively local. Macy did kind of fit the description of the monster and was described as her by her owner as a well as well-trained and gentle. And in his letter, Allan indicated that he would be traveling to Enfield soon and would offer a reward to anybody who could lead him to Macy, but as far as anybody knows, he just never showed up in town.

Are we sure he had a kangaroo named Macy? I don't know. Is this information? I mean, he wrote to the people

or did he just say like, "So, I had this kangaroo named Macy." I mean, I don't know.

She turned up missing. I have no idea, but I think he had a kangaroo named Macy. That's so specific. I know. Almost too specific.

You never know. Unfortunately, he didn't come out. Yeah. Well, it turned out that the letter from Ohio was the last piece of in of, you know, significant information on the origins of the Enfield monster. A year later of a reporter from Dalb traveled down to the town to see if anything had come of the story, but most people were pretty eager to put it behind them. A waitress at Echo Cafe said, "I think it's about all over now. I heard the sheriff told him he better not be seeing any more monsters or he'd be off to the funny farm." She's talking about talking about Henry.

Damn. Poor Henry. So whether or not law enforcement actually told Henry to keep his mouth shut is unknown. They might have, but what is clear is that once they put the story behind them, the sheriff's department fully intended to keep it there. In 1974, Sheriff Poshard said, "No, there ain't no damn thing to it. I let all that stuff go on until he got people with guns out there."

I mean, I can understand that he doesn't want people with guns trying to hunt this thing.

Yeah, that's kind of the sheriff's worst nightmare. That I totally get. That's very dangerous.

Yeah, that's the thing. It could it could have all been fun. None of you needed to shoot this thing. You could have just been like, "Oo, we have a fun local monster. Like, just let it be."

Things just got too risky once everybody was shooting willy-nilly. We have plenty of local monsters floating around the Bridgewater Triangle.

Yeah. None of us are out here trying to kill them. No, just let them be. Let them live.

They were probably here before on any of us. They definitely were. So, I don't give a [ __ ] Puckwajis. All right.

You out there? I think they're out there. Whenever I take Dolores out at night, I'm like, "Fuck Puckwajies." I think about it frequently.

Thunderbirds. Giant giant Thunderbirds. It's It is what it is. Puajis are my biggest worry.

Yeah. Puckwajis will [ __ ] you up. I don't I don't want to [ __ ] with them. But that's the thing. I don't want to [ __ ] with them. And I'm They don't [ __ ] with me.

I'm not trying to kill you. Don't try to kill me. It's It's what I always say. Pug wois live and let live.

Exactly. Puckies. I live. I let you live. Yep. Well, a few years later in 1978, a team of sociologists weighed in on the Enfield Monster and they called the story boo, a classic case of social contagion.

Whatever, man. I [clears throat] know. Based on their analysis, the number of actual sightings were a lot smaller than most people thought they were. And one of the supposed sightings, you know, the one that Greg Garrett had seen,

was a practical joke, unfortunately. I mean, I'm not shocked. I think he just [ __ ] up his tennis shoes.

Yeah, he did. Absolutely. Yeah, in their final report, the team concluded of the several monster reports discussed uh in Enfield on the McDaniels firsthand reports and the May 6th report of the WWKI party were made by people who were or were made by people who in all likelihood thought they saw something. But Henry McDaniel maintained that he did indeed see an unidentifiable creature in his guard that night. And the state troopers did find evidence of a strange [ __ ] animal having been there.

He saw something. So, something happened in Enfield that night, even if we don't know for sure what it is. And that is why the Enfield monster has remained a local Illinois legend ever since.

Illinois, you have a monster. You do. It's okay. And it's not a kangaroo. No, it's not a kangaroo. And it's okay.

It's fine. It's all right. Also, if White County is still named that, you really have to change it. It's crazy.

That goes crazy. It goes really crazy. I I believe Henry. I believe Henry and I'm prepared to defend him. Yeah, I think our crypted should team up and just take over the Midwest.

I think so. I think they have. I think so. You know. Yeah. The beast of Bray Road, I think, could really do do some damage.

I think he did. Seems like the the Enfield was just hopping along. He was just hanging out.

Yeah. May Did he want to get in a house? Maybe. But maybe he was cold. Exactly. It's a Midwest.

It's like, are you afraid of the dark? I'm cold. Maybe that's what it is. Yeah. And maybe he was knocking, but it just sounded like he was scratching because he's got acrylics.

He's got acrylics. So it's like she can't make a fist. How are you gonna knock if you can't make a fist? You just got to tap with your nails.

She taps on that phone. There you go. Sheen, I am watching old Vanderpump rules episodes, so that's very relevant.

All right. Well, I love these cryptids. That was Cryptids. Let us know if we can cover Twilight cuz we're gonna on the bonus episode,

please. On the bonus episode. a bonus episode. Bonus and not the actual episodes.

Bonus. Bonus. We hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird, but not so weird that you No, actually do keep it so weird that you spot a crypted in the wild and then please tell us all about it.

And let us do Twilight. I mean, yeah, we're doing it. I've decided. Executive decision.

Executive decision stamped.

Questions about this episode

What is discussed in "Episode 721: MiniMORBID x 2: Cryptids of the Midwest"?

In order: 0:00 Bray Road, Wisconsin, Doris Gypson, Pat Lester; 10:00 Bray Road, Linda Godfrey, John Frederickson, Twilight; 20:00 Linda Godfrey, Bray Road, Werewolf, Chris Maxwell; 30:00 Beast of Bray Road, Bray Road, Mark Shackleman, Twilight; 40:00 Twilight, Enfield Monster, Henry McDaniel; 50:00 Edward Cullen, Henry McDaniel, James Masser, Twilight; 1:00:00 Enfield Monster, White County, Henry McDaniel, Rick Rainbow; 1:10:00 Enfield Monster, Beast of Bray Road, Bray Road, Bridgewater Triangle.

What is mentioned in this Morbid | Podcast episode?

51 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Bray Road, Twilight, Linda Godfrey, Wisconsin, Enfield Monster, Beast of Bray Road. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Episode 721: MiniMORBID x 2: Cryptids of the Midwest"?

The episode runs 1 h 16 min; the transcript is about 15,810 words in 434 timestamped sections.

More from Morbid | Podcast

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated January 24, 2026.