Delaware

1Selbyville Swamp Monster Proven hoax

Ape-like · Great Cypress Swamp, near Selbyville, Sussex County · first reported 1930s legend; 1964 sightings · also called Great Cypress Swamp Monster

The Great Cypress Swamp, on the Delaware-Maryland line, has long been a place of ghost stories, including one tied to a moonshine still explosion and a peat fire that burned for months around 1930. In the 1960s, the swamp gained a hairy, upright monster that carried a club. Hunters and trappers swapped stories, and some reportedly left dead chickens out to keep it calm. In 1987 the truth came out: a local newspaper editor had cooked up the monster, and a performer had played it in a costume made from a Halloween mask and his aunt's raccoon coat. He said he grew scared for his own safety as armed locals got jumpy. Sightings have been told ever since anyway.

• 1964Proven hoax Bigfoot-style sightings of a club-wielding hairy figure began in the swamp. Source: preston-posits.com
• 1987Proven hoax Editor Ralph Grapperhaus and performer Fred Stevens were revealed as the minds behind the monster costume. Source: preston-posits.com

2Fence Rail Dog Told story

Beast · Route 12 (Midstate Road) between Frederica and Felton, Kent County · first reported Uncertain (local legend) · also called Fence Raildog

Drivers on a rural stretch of Route 12 between Frederica and Felton tell of a huge black dog, about four feet tall at the shoulder and nearly ten feet long, with a wolf- or hyena-like build and glowing red eyes. It is said to appear in storms and around bad crashes. Explanations for the ghost vary: an outlaw, an enslaved child, or a murdered landlord's pet. Folklorist Charles J. Adams III recorded the legend and its link to accidents. Like the black dogs of England, it is less an animal than an omen. Folk Bestiary also ties it to drivers and rural residents along the old Midstate Road, where it is said to appear during storms.

• UndatedTold story Motorists report a giant black dog with red eyes on the road, often in storms or near fatal accidents. Source: preston-posits.com

3Zwaanendael Merman Proven hoax

Water monster · Zwaanendael Museum, Lewes · first reported 1800s (object) · also called Zwaanendael Mermaid

Lewes has a sea monster you can see in person, though it is not what it claims to be. The Zwaanendael Museum owns a small dried mermaid figure, the top half of a monkey joined to the body of a fish. This kind of fake, in the tradition of the famous Feejee Mermaid, was a popular sideshow item in the 1800s. Tradition says a sea captain brought it home, and it passed through a local family before the museum acquired it in 1985. Local tales now give it glowing green eyes and claim sightings of a live mermaid along the beach over the centuries.

• 1985Proven hoax The museum acquired the mermaid from a local family; it is understood to be a nineteenth-century sideshow fake. Source: preston-posits.com

Visiting: Zwaanendael Museum in Lewes.

4Prime Hook Swamp Creature Told story

Beast · Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge, near Milton · first reported July 2007

In July 2007, a woman named as Helen J. and several family members and friends reported a strange animal at Prime Hook refuge on the Delaware Bay. They described it as two and a half to three feet tall, with long legs, a tan body, a flat, pug-like face, small ears and a long tail, weighing perhaps thirty pounds. Staff at the refuge visitor center could not identify it from the description. Writers have suggested a misidentified coyote, a dog with a rare short-spine condition, or a non-native animal. It remains a one-time report, but a fun reminder that strange sightings happen even in well-watched nature reserves.

• July 2007Told story A group of visitors reported a tan, long-legged, flat-faced animal; refuge staff could not name it. Source: preston-posits.com

Visiting: Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge has trails and a visitor center.

5Sussex County Bigfoot Told story

Ape-like · Sussex County: Route 24 near Lewes, Cape Henlopen, Redden State Forest, Milton · first reported 1998 · also called Delaware Bigfoot

Flat, small Delaware is not obvious Bigfoot country, but its southern county has a short list of reports. Accounts collected by researchers include two teenagers who saw a tall figure with red eyes on Route 24 between Angola and Lewes in the late 1990s, a father and son from Annapolis near Cape Henlopen State Park in 2003, a college student on Old Furnace Road in 2004, a driver near Milton in 2010 who noted a heavy brow ridge, and a couple near Redden State Forest in 2012. Descriptions are of a black-haired, upright figure six to eight feet tall. Skeptics point to the short, scattered record and to ordinary animals seen briefly from cars.

• February 1998 or 1999Told story Two teenagers reported a tall black-haired figure with glowing red eyes on Route 24. Source: preston-posits.com
• June 7, 2003Told story A father and son reported a sighting near Cape Henlopen State Park. Source: preston-posits.com
• August 16, 2010Told story A driver near Milton on Route 1 described a figure with a prominent brow ridge. Source: preston-posits.com

Visiting: Redden State Forest and Cape Henlopen State Park are public.

6Deer Man of Hockessin Told story

Humanoid · Hockessin, New Castle County · first reported About 1993 · also called Deer Man

A single eerie story from Hockessin, in Delaware's hilly northern corner. Around 1993, an eight-year-old said a figure with an antlered deer's head and a muscular human body appeared at the bedroom window, then seemed to change into a young man. There are no other witnesses or follow-ups in the sources. Deer-headed figures turn up in modern online folklore across the country, and writers sometimes connect them to older European and North American stories about shapeshifters. Taken on its own, it is a childhood night-time memory that has become a small local legend, retold in modern cryptid roundups of the First State.

• About 1993Told story A child reported an antlered figure at the window that turned into a man. Source: preston-posits.com