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Friday 15 March 2024

Phantom ghost towns


 

While there are many abandoned ghost towns known as tourists attractions, there's also actual phantom towns that are impossible to visit because they come and go. I plan to discuss just a few individual towns that are simply ghosts. I shall mention 3 of them here.

1. Ong's Hat = This is a weird place. It's located in Pemberton Township, Burlington County, on Magnolia Road, off from New Jersey's motorway, Route 72, that crosses with Route 70, with only shadows of what was a busy town. The town itself was where a farmer, Jacob Ong, used to journey there while travelling from Little Egg Harbour to Burlington. Ong's Hat was a town where he stopped while transporting goods. He spent his time in a hut that he made there so he could spend the night there. The town Ong's Hat appears on maps even one dating back to 1778. It consisted of a dancehall, houses and shops, but there's no trace of the population. What remains are some signposts and a few empty rotten old buildings. A married couple moved into Ong's Hat a long time ago but vanished without trace. An unidentified human skeleton was discovered in the bushes there. 

2. Urkhammer = There are many creepy stories about this town that behaves like an apparition. Described by many who claimed to remember it, Urkhammer was a bustling lively town that thrived but now it simply isn't there. Located in Iowa, along Route 41, the town of Urkhammer appeared on a census carried out on it in 1920 with a population of 300 people. In 1929, newspaper Clarion-Sun Telegraph, mentioned Urkhammer as a site of two strange events. The first being that a plane flew over Urkhammer and took aerial photos of it, showing the place empty and overgrown. The second was about a motorist who stopped at an Esso petrol station in Urkhammer, to find after leaving the town a couple of miles he ran out of fuel. He wanted to walk back into Urkhammer to get a refund from the petrol station, but he could never reach the town, even though he saw it. Another motorist helped him but the experience was unsettling. A mysterious woman named Miss Fatima Morgana wrote to the same newspaper weeks later, claiming to be a resident of Urkhammer and said it wasn't a ghost town. In 1932 a group of families camped near Urkhammer, while a couple of the men decided to enter the town to purchase food and drink. They reached the convenient store but found their feet passed through the steps. Frightened, they returned to their campsite and insisted that they leave. Iowa State Police wanted to clear the rumour up of Urkhammer, but once they reached the town's sheriff office, they found it was not really there. A farmer from the 1930's remembered the town of Urkhammer from his childhood,  who wanted to visit the place again, only to find nothing except fields, rotting wooden fences and a rusty bath tub. 

3. Langville = A town named Langville in Montana was a place that turned out to be a complete mystery. Many believe Langville was a true town, that lots of people claimed it was an actual place where visited or even lived. Google Maps had an entry for the town with Google Street View images revealing streets and houses of Langville. Then during the 2000's the town disappeared without trace. Some claim this was simply an urban legend and never existed at all. The pictures of the Langville streets on Google show a place that can't even be identified! Many sceptics argue it's all a marketing ploy and just an urban legend. Others bring up the Mandela Effect and it's explanation for the town disappearing. 

Links and sources:

Ranker's Vanishing Towns

She Wolf Night

Sunday 10 March 2024

Irish werewolves


 

This is March and almost St Patrick's Day, so I want to bring up the subject of the Irish werewolf legends that I briefly mentioned a couple of times in the past on She Wolf Night. Werewolves of Ossory, a folklore stemming from Medieval times, believes that these are descendants of a mythical king, who became shapeshifting warriors. They thrived until one day Saint Patrick arrived to spread Christianity, and the Ossory werewolves refused. Their punishment was to roam the woods as starving wolves, and fail to return in human form, after some time had lapsed. They hunted on human prey. There are different versions told about the Ossory werewolves HERE at Wikipedia.  

Faoladh and Conroicht are Irish words that basically mean werewolf. It's believed that these werewolves are benign guardian spirits who protect children, the wounded, and the lost.  

Tipperary werewolves, attached to this location in Ireland is the story from Coir Anmann, about a man called Laignach Faelad who could turn into a wolf. His descendants also were wolf shapeshifters who enjoyed the taste of human flesh. They were warriors who behaved like berserkers or Ulfhednar. They were prominent during the reign of Tigernmas, an era found in the mists of legend. More about this HERE at Medium.

It must be mentioned that in 1999 there was a reported sighting of a mysterious wolf seen at the road between Newpoint and Rearcross in Tipperary. The eyewitnesses said this creature had glowing red eyes and appeared to be where a man once stood. Also in 1913 in a quiet lane in Ballymacward, two boys heard growling coming from behind a wall, and they found a strange man with an animal's head. Wolves became extinct in Ireland during the 18th century.

She Wolf Night      

Monday 4 March 2024

Cryptid news March


 

This subject has enabled me to post anything new that I come across about cryptids, so each month I will begin discussing as many stories as I can find that have been happening. 

It's believed that a mysterious large animal was filmed in Kerriemuir, Angus, in Scotland. The video clip was made by a woman who filmed an unknown beast prowling through the grass near her home. She described it later on as resembling a huge cat, "I felt it was bigger than any cat I have seen" she told the Daily Mirror. To watch the clip from the original article at The Daily Mirror site: HERE

Now another clip from Massachusetts, where the region is nicknamed "Monsterland". This is a very old nickname that stems from a legend of Bigfoot creatures living there and reportedly seen since the 19th century. A certain place called Leominster State Forest is featured in a video clip about Bigfoot investigating. To look at it, go to Mail Online article HERE.

In Oklahoma are strange stories of a "Thundercow" mysterious creature, often seen but never captured or tracked down. The sightings sparked the legend as many claimed to have seen a cow wandering around Lake Thunderbird, while many didn't believe it. This video clip shows a cow near the lake, while many believe it's just an ordinary cow, some like to think this is more mysterious as the cow is only active at night, and disappears. Here is a report made on Yahoo! Finance showing a short clip of the subject HERE.  

She Wolf Night

Wednesday 28 February 2024

Mutant wolves


 

It's believed that there are mutant wolves at Chernobyl with special powers, meaning, they've developed an immunity towards cancer. This is going to help scientists find new ways to help fight against the disease.

Chernobyl is the site where a nuclear power plant accident happened in 1986, causing in thousands of people leaving the area after they were evacuated to avoid radiation. That region has become abandoned ever since, and is called CEZ, or Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, which is a 1,000 square-mile area around the site that poses a radioactive danger. While this zone is no longer lived in by humans, wildlife certainly thrives there. Animals such as elk, horses, boards, dogs and wolves. Human houses including towns like Pripyat, are now spooky and overgrown, silent and with no sound other than nature itself that has claimed the region. 

It's believed that mutated species are at CEZ, especially among canines. When people evacuated in 1986, they also left behind everything including their dogs. Decades later, a population of wild dogs living in the exclusion zone have been studied to learn about the dogs. Generations of dogs have been exposed to high levels of radiation and they're not as healthy as other dogs outside of the zone. Wolves there have been exposed to high levels of radiation for generations, but they've adapted to it. Their immune system has a certain immunity to cancer risk. It's something that Dr Cara Love hopes to research more about these wolves. Further studies on this have been paused due to the conflict upon the Ukraine by Russia. These mutant wolves might be the answer to help survive cancer. 

She Wolf Night