No-Head Nellie

Usually our stories tend to be a bit on the... dark side, MMers, but today we've got a a heartwarming story for you. For this one we're traveling all the way to Johnson Mountain Township just south of Jackman. The story comes to us by way of Brock Easton who claims his great-grandfather had a dog with no head. As unbelievable as this seems, there are plenty of records of No-Head Nellie that seem to corroborate Brock's story. We'll try to stick to just the facts. 

Weston "Butch" Easton and his wife, Margery, 1938

Brock's great-grandfather, Weston "Butch" Easton lived in Jackman in the 1930s and 40s. One of the family dogs gave birth to a litter of pups and one of them was born with no head. Butch figured the pup was stillborn because of its deformity, so he was completely surprised when the headless pup began to crawl around. Butch immediately brought the pup to a local vet, who after his initial skepticism, did pronounce the pup as alive. He recommended that Butch put the animal down as it would never lead a full life. Butch refused. Instead, for the next fifteen years he raised No-Head Nellie and loved her as dearly as any animal companion.

According to Brock, who heard all of this from his grandfather, Butch's son, Carter, Butch took No-head Nellie on the road, showing her at local fairs and carnivals. Butch would feed Nellie through an IV injection, twice a day. Nellie could walk, run, wag her tail, even shake hands and roll over. If all this sounds incredible, it really is. To this day scientists have no idea how Nellie lived for fifteen years! But here's the proof. Brock has a picture he found in his grandfather's stuff. The picture was labeled 1947.

No-Head Nellie circa 1947

On top of that we were able to uncover a flyer from the 1949 Fryeburg Fair, and sure enough it mentions Butch Easton and his amazing No-head Nellie. Brock is working on going through the rest of his late grandfather's possessions, hoping to find more pictures from his great-grandfather, but he does recall his Grampa Carter (who passed away in 2019 at 92 years old!) telling stories of No-Head Nellie. He recalls his grandfather had a photo album full of Butch and Nellie's adventures, but so far Brock has been unable to locate it. He even remembers his grandfather telling him that Ripley's Believe it or Not at one point wanted to purchase Nellie's remains after she passed, however he was unsure whether the sale actually happened.

Brock Easton is attempting to put together a museum for No-Head Nellie. He says that if you or anyone you know has any information or possible pictures of No-Head Nellie, please contact him at: no-headnellie@yahoo.com. We'll keep our eyes peeled and hope you will too!

Help out Brock! Find some old pics of No-Head Nellie.

Stay safe out there, Maine! 

Hero of the Iron Works

Good news this time, Malevolent Mainers! One of the most iconic employers in Maine is Bath Iron Works. Jerry has worked at Bath Iron Works for twenty years, “Usually as you are putting a ship together” Jerry says, “everything gets to be pretty routine, after a while you start not to think too much about the massive slabs and beams of steel that get moved around and put into their place.”  Jerry went on to tell us of one particular day when he and his crew were working on a destroyer. 

“I want to keep the other guys anonymous, because they might get unwanted attention when this gets out. But as we were putting this destroyer together I was up operating the crane to lower this massive cross beam into place so we could get it welded in. My crew was down below waiting for it to go into place.” Jerry paused here and took a deep breath. “Well everything was going fine but as I was lowering the bean into place I watched as the connection between the hook and the main hoist line started to stretch and then an instant later there was a massive pop as they separated and the beam started to free fall.”  A member of Jerry’s crew was startled by the pop and looked up to see the beam falling almost directly on top of him. 

Luckily for the man about to be crushed he was about to get some help from another member of Jerry’s crew. “Well I don’t want to use his real name, but Mike jumped up almost immediately to help. Now Mike was never considered the brightest bulb on the crew but he was a good guy and a great welder, I knew that he was just trying to help but I couldn’t help but think Mike was gonna get crushed too, and I couldn’t bear the thought of one death on my hands let alone two. Well Mike, that crazy bastard, as that beam fell towards him and the other guy, he jumps up in the air just about as this 2000 pound piece of steel is coming down on top of them and he just bats it out of the air.”  The beam ended up falling diagonally across the hull of the destroyer and the two men were safe. Jerry couldn’t believe his eyes, Mike had done a superhuman feat to save his friend and coworker. 

Jerry went on to say that Mike stayed with the crew for another few years but neither he nor the rest of his crew ever saw any other examples of superhuman abilities out of the man. With all the strange and otherworldly stories we report on, its nice to have one where the phenomenon seems to be looking out for humanity. Stay safe out there, Maine, and if you ever find “Mike” make sure you buy him a cold one!