The Meat Suit Man

Welcome back, MMers! It has been  LONG time coming, and before we dive into today's story, we feel we owe you guys a bit of an explanation. In August we were surprised by the Feds showing up at our office. No, not the men in black Feds (unfortunately) but just your regular federal officer. It seems that we popped up on the radar because of a story we had posted and they asked us to turn over all of our research on the matter. We, of course, agreed and assisted with their investigation however we could. Because of their ongoing case, we were asked to refrain from posting anything new to our site. We're happy to say everything has ben resolved and we're ready to keep bringing you the weird stories from all over the great state of Maine. We want to state clearly that at no time was Malevolent Maine under investigation or accused of any wrongdoing; we were simply abiding by the guidelines we were given.

We have their permission to continue, we promise!

So, we're back, and we're ready to jump into a rather strange story we think you'll find interesting as we enter our third year of strange and weird reports. We're calling this one The Meat Suit Man of Harrison.

Harrison, Maine is located just east of Bridgton, across the aptly named Long Lake. A loyal reader, Martha Atwood, contacted us about a story she heard from her husband, George, who passed away in 2018. George had lived his whole life in Harrison and first told the story to Martha sometime around 1985. According to George sometime around 1977 a man named Warren Gray went missing. He had been something of a local pariah, shunned by many of the townsfolk.

"George said he was a smallish man, about my size," Martha told us (Martha Atwood is 5'5", by the way). "He never did anything wrong, really. He was just sorta different."

Gray wasn't well liked in town, with hardly any friends. He was unmarried, lived on the outskirts of town, and never held a real job for very long. There are no reports of any criminal behavior for any Warren Grays in the area, and we haven't been able to find a reason for the public shunning. However, the fact remained that he was quite the outcast.

"George used to say that a lot of people in Maine went missing between the summer of '76 and the winter of '77," Martha said as she Zoomed with us from her kitchen table. "A lot fo them probably just up and ran away from their problems, but he said a bunch of them, mostly big men, just simply disappeared."

According to reports from the Maine State Police and a thorough search of the Portland Press Herald, there was a marked uptick of missing persons cases. Malevolent Maine was unable to determine the size of the missing people, however.

As the story goes, soon after Warren Gray disappeared, a large man, heavily clothed started to be seen in the area around Harrison. "George said he was walking home from the Depot Street Tavern one night. It would have been around '78, I guess. It was after midnight and George said he came across a big man stumbling down the road in the opposite direction. George said he'd had a few, but the guy looked like he'd had a few of his own too."

The man was big, George guessed about six-six or six-seven, and he stumbled around as if his boots were made of cement. His arms flapped around. "Looked like a kid trying to get out of his winter clothes, you know?" Martha told us.

As George passed the man, he offered a greeting, assuming he was another late night carouser heading home after a night of drinking. The big man grunted a greeting that George thought was muffled, sounding like it was coming from beneath a scarf, despite the fact that the man only wore a large hooded sweatshirt.

It was at just this moment that the moon came out from behind a cloud. George told his wife Martha, and numerous other people over the years that he had been scared plenty of times in his life, but seeing the face of the man who he passed by that night was about the scariest thing he had seen. We'll let Martha tell it:

Artist's rendition

"The face was all scarred up, thick black stitches sewn everywhere. George said it looked like a Frankenstein or something. He said the eyes didn't match up, like they were too small or like the face was pulled the wrong way."

George Atwood didn't linger but broke into a sprint, trying to put as much space between him and the thing he had encountered. He would later tell his wife he expected to hear the plodding, heavy footsteps of the thing chasing after him, but he got home with no further altercations.

Over the next several months there are several other sightings of the creature. All of the stories are the same: big, heavy man, heavily scarred or stitched together. One of the men who saw the thing was Brent Carter, a local farmer who saw the thing walking through his fields one night. We were able to track down Mr. Carter, and while he didn't want to sit down for an interview, he did agree to answer some of our questions.

"I knew Warren Gray fairly well. We weren't close or nothing, but he had worked several summers on the farm. He didn't say much and wasn't much of an agreeable guy, but I'd had a few cold ones with him after a long days work. When I saw that thing in my field, I had no clue what it was, but it had Warren's eyes. I was certain of that much. They were swimming in that great big wreck of a face. They looked like they didn't belong there, like they were sunk deep, but they were Warren's eyes, alright. That's when I began to suspect something was up."

A few weeks later a group of young men came across the shambling man along a dirt road where they were out partying. They called to the man, but got no response, so in their drunken state they attacked him. One of the men, Isaiah Rideout grabbed onto the sweatshirt the large man wore and tore it off his back. He told us last week over the phone:

"Of course I remember it. Like it was yesterday. It was the weirdest damn thing I'd ever seen. There was a seam going down the guy's back and a thick zipper. Like the kind you have on a winter coat. It had come down a little and I could see inside of him. There was something else in there, someone else. Like a little guy inside of a bigger guy. You know what I mean?"

Is this what George Atwood, Brent Carter, and Isaiah Rideout saw?

No one was ever able to prove what Rideout saw, though when asked both Martha Atwood and Brent Carter agreed that matched the descriptions of what they had seen and known. Whispers began to spread about the Meat Suit Man and the stories quickly caught on.

Supposedly all of the missing people from around the area had been killed and their bodies turned into a suit of some kind, much like the Marvel character Iron Man, played by Robert Downey Jr. in the 2008 movie. Except the heavy suit of wasn't made of metal but human flesh. Brent Carter believes it was somehow Warren Gray. That the strange local pariah somehow tried to reinvent himself by creating a new man for him to walk around in. The fact that Gray was known to be on the smaller side only supports this theory.

The Meat Suit Man was seen only a few more times and disappeared for good by 1980. Some stories go Gray died, suffocated by his own suit. Others claim he caught a bacteria infection from the cadaverous suit he had made. But that's not what George Atwood believed. As Martha told us, George always believed that Gray had moved away. 

"He was never much of a people person and once folks started figuring out who this Frankenstein guy was, he ran off. George always said that the Meat Suit Man had gone north. Every time he'd hear stories about hunters encountering something in the north woods, all of those Bigfoot sightings and whatnot, he always thought they were Warren Gray, living on his own."

Is the Meat Suit Man roaming through the woods of Aroostook? No one knows, but he intend to keep looking.

Stay safe out there, Maine!

Last Ride Road

 Good Morning MMers, we've got a bit of a road story for you this time around. It deals with a certain section of Route 220, just north of Waldoboro that's come to be known as Last Ride Road. Since 1953 there have been seventeen fatal car crashes on this stretch of road. Nearly all of those crashes have been single vehicle, and the vast majority have involved only one occupant.

Route 220 just outside Waldoboro

The legend begins in the summer of 1953 when eighteen year old Brenda Thompson was returning from a date with her boyfriend. They had gone to the local bowling alley and returning late around 11:00 PM. Brenda and her beau got into a quarrel and despite the fog that had drifted in sometime while they had been enjoying the evening, Brenda demanded that her boyfriend pull over. She got out of the car and started walking in the direction of home. Her boyfriend, Tom Allen drove beside her for a few minutes, trying to convince her to get back into the car, but when she wouldn't, he drove off. Eventually Tom decided it was best to go back and get Brenda instead of letting her walk all the way home, so he turned around and started back to where he had left her. 

His concern for his girlfriend, coupled with the thick fog made driving difficult. By the time he saw Brenda walking up the middle of the road, it was too late. He slammed on the brakes, but struck and killed Brenda Thompson.

Is the ghost of Brenda Thompson still searching
for a ride all these years later?

Since then many have claimed to see the ghost of Brenda Thompson walking that stretch of road, wearing the same pink skirt she wore on her final date. Many will tell the story of driving that part of Rt. 220 late at night and seeing the shadowy figure of a teenaged girl standing in the middle of the road, beckoning for a ride. 

One Colton Campbell claimed to see the ghost of Brenda Thompson in the fall of 1999. He was driving home from a Halloween party with two of his friends when they came upon Brenda standing in the middle of the road.

"I thought she was in a costume," Campbell told us. "You know, like one of those poodle skirts from like Grease or something. She looked like she needed a ride, so we pulled over. She climbed into the back seat with Mark."

Right away, Campbell said he noticed something was off with the girl. She didn't speak much, only muttering, "Where's Tom?" over and over again. Campbell said it grew cold in the car, so he turned the heat up. 

"No matter how hot I cranked it, the car never got warm. It was cold, like a winter night," he said.

The radio began to squawk with static, no matter what station Campbell put it on. His skin began to crawl and he noticed his friends were starting to get pretty nervous too. 

"It felt like someone was looking into my head," Campbell told us more than twenty years later. "I know it doesn't really make any sense, but it felt like someone had unscrewed the top of my head and was poking around in there."

Finally, it grew too much for Campbell and his friends. They pulled the car over and ran out, leaving the motor running. They ran five miles to the closest house, woke up the owners by knocking loudly, and used their phone to call their parents.

"I've never been more scared in my entire life," Campbell said. "Never."

Campbell's car was recovered exactly where he had left it. There was no trace of Brenda Thompson or any other girl wearing a pink poodle skirt. 

Is this the ghost of Brenda Thompson?

Others have not been as lucky. The sightings of Brenda Thompson looking for her lost love have lasted for over fifty years. There have been many late night crashes along the stretch of road where Brenda died. There have been few survivors. Each one of them recalls seeing a teenager in a pink skirt moments before their crash.

Colton Campbell and the few who have taken the Last Ride Road and survived warn against stopping. They say its best to avoid picking up strangers late at night, or better yet, take an alternate route.

"Just stay away," Campbell said. "I wish I had."

Stay safe out there, Maine.

The Stymwood Cemetery

 Well, we're halfway through summer, MMers. A lot of you are on vacation, traveling, checking out all the myriad sites Maine has to show off. Here's one more for you to go see! The Stymwood Cemetery in Elliot, almost all the way at the southern tip of the state.

The Stymwood Cemetery

Long time friend of the blog, Rachael Burgess (or RBSmoothe as she's known on the blog) turned us on to this little graveyard and its owner, Brenda Howard. Located just off the Brixham Road, Howard lives on a five acre piece of property that has been in her family for many generations, going all the way back to 1816. 

"My father was Bernie Lynch," Howard told us. "His father was William Lynch, and so on and so forth all the way back to Robert P. Lynch, who came here from Boston. This land has always been in our family, and all of the male Lynch's are buried here."

The plot of land was farm at one point, but a lot of it has grown over with woods now. The original house burned down in 1901. It lies on the far end of the property. The new house was built soon after, though it was demolished in the 1950s and a new home rebuilt on its site. This house, the house Brenda Howard grew up in and still currently resides has been remodeled a few times so though it's still clearly an older home, there's still a modern feel to it. 

The family cemetery, inexplicably called Stymwood is closer to the filled in stone foundation of the original house than the current one. There's a dirt road that leads almost directly to it, apart from where Brenda Howard lives. She has made a small parking area nearby where people can park for a bit and stroll through the graves, the earliest of which dates back to 1850. 

"People like to come by and look," Howard says. "It's a bit of local history. The Lynchs have always been here in Elliot and a lot of old timers still remember some of them. Plus, the legend doesn't hurt."

The legend Howard is referring to concerns now just who is buried in the Stymwood Cemetery but how they're buried.

Sometimes they come back

See, since Robert P. Lynch was buried in 1850, all of the Lynch men have been buried with the coffins upside down. This odd tradition dates back to the original Lynch's death. Brenda Howard's ancestor was fifty-four when he died. A horse kicked Lynch in the head. He lingered in a coma for three days before dying. He was buried on a Saturday.

They found Robert P. Lynch sitting on the porch of his house two days later, still in the clothes he had been buried in. At first his family thought they had made a mistake, but no, Lynch was still dead. They assumed someone was playing a nasty trick on them and reburied him. Again, two days later he was back. This time, quite by accident they buried the coffin upside down, so the lid was facing downward.

After that Lynch stayed buried. 

The strange incident was largely forgotten until Lynch's eldest son, Robert W. Lynch died of typhoid. He was buried in the family cemetery next to his father. Again, two days after his burial, the younger Lynch was back, this time in the barn. He was promptly buried with the coffin upside down.

Since that time all of the Lynch men have been buried in the Stymwood cemetery, all with their coffins facing downward. Not the women, however. A few of the early Lynch women, notably Robert P. Lynch's wife, Eustis, and the daughter of Robert W. Lynch, Elizabeth, are buried in the Stymwood Cemetery. None of them ever returned.

"See, they thought the Lynch men came back on their own," Howard tells. "For whatever reason, they thought that the Lynches has some unfinished business and kept returning. So they buried them with the coffin facing down, so they couldn't get out. That seemed to work."

Since then, twenty-nine Lynch men have been buried lid side down in the Stymwood Cemetery, including Brenda Howard's father, Bernie who died in 2011.

"Yeah, we buried dad upside down," Howard told us. "We had to."

Twenty-Nine Lynch Men are buried in Stymwood.
All upside down.

And it doesn't end there. Brenda Howard's husband died in 2015, though he isn't buried on site. Their eldest son, Brian, however is. He was killed while serving oversees in the Middle East. He too, is buried lid side down.

"It's just become a tradition, you know?" Howard told us. "Do I really think they'll come back if we don't bury them the right way? No, of course not. It's just what we do. What we've always done."

Feel free to visit the Stymwood Cemetery. Take pictures with the large sign that explains its history. Howard tells us that no one in the cemetery is dangerous. At least not now that they're buried properly.

Stay safe out there, Maine!

Cranberry Bog Boys

 

Heads up, MMers! Rumors have it, there's a cranberry bog over in Turner with quite a malevolent history. Now, we couldn't quite find an exact street address for these bogs, but it shouldn't be too hard to find them if you're willing to risk a look. We're not sure we recommend that, and maybe after reading this you won't either.

First, cranberries grow in wetlands called marshes or bogs. A bog is layered gravel, peat, and sand that gathers and collects water. Cranberries grow a lot like strawberries except in a bog instead of soil. These aren't typically deep, maybe three feet. You've probably seen the juice commercials with the guys standing up to their hips in the bog. From a distance it can look like a field of red berries, and you might not even realize until it's too late that it's actually water.

Anatomy of a cranberry bog

Leo Guerin, a longtime resident of Turner actually contacted us about this story. Guerin is 77, a retired machine fabricator who worked forty-two years at Pratt & Whitney. An amateur gardener and somewhat of a local historian, Guerin heard about the cranberry bog boys when he was a teenager. We met him for a few beers at the local Elks Lodge in Auburn, where he shared with us the story.

Leo Guerin, local historian

"When I was eighteen I joined the Elks," he told us. "This was 1962. You could drink at eighteen back then.When I joined there were a lot of veterans, the guys who had fought in World War II, who came in here for drinks after work or on a Sunday afternoon after church. I was too young for the Big One and because I broke my hip in a skiing accident I wasn't eligible for Vietnam, but I loved hearing those stories. They're the ones that got me into history. Local history, see? Because no one ever knew those stories. Some of those guys, those vets, are the ones I heard about the Bog Boys from. Thats' what they called them. Bog Boys."

The creature they called a Bog Boy is a humanoid being, but it appears to be covered in layers of mud and ooze, as if it has just emerged from a muddy swamp or puddle. Bits of sticks and plants cling to them. Their faces are partially concealed by the ooze, but they appear to have eyes of some sort and their mouths continually yawn open as if searching for something. They are slow moving, but relentless. Guerin claims they are easy to outrun if you know where you're going, but its easy get turned around out in the woods around the cranberry bogs.

The cover of Goosebumps #15: You Can't Scare Me. Makes you wonder if
R. L. Stone or artist,Tim Jacobus had heard the legends of the Cranberry Bog Boys.

"The old GIs told me that the first Bog Boy started showing up around 1947 or 48. Around that time a kid went missing. As near as I could determine it was either Tyler or Thomas Martin. I've seen conflicting reports. Anyways, they searched the whole town but there wasn't much they could do. Martin was eighteen, so a lot of people figured he up and moved."

But that's not what the GIs believed and it's not what Leo Guerin believes either. Guerin believes that Martin fell into the wild cranberry bog. Maybe he had been out drinking, maybe he just got turned around and lost, but Guerin believes he somehow fell into the bog and drowned. 

"Think about it, if you were disoriented and fell, the layers of peat and muck that would get kicked up, plus the tangle of cranberry plants, it would be enough to snarl you all up. Maybe hold you under just long enough to drown."

Why the police never found Tyler/Thomas Martin's body in the bog is a mystery, but by 1948 enough people had begun to see this so-called Bog Boy, that there was a brief investigation. The police turned up nothing of course, but some of the locals began to suspect something nefarious had happened. There started to be whispers that the ghost of the Martin boy had returned, mingled with all the muck of the bog. The stories went that he had gotten lost in the bog and was trying to find his way back home, not realizing he'd been dead for over a year. Not much came of the whispers and over time, sightings of the Bog Boy stopped and the story, like many local rumors, dried up.

By 1962, when Leo Guerin was old enough to drink at the Elks Lodge with the WWII veterans, rumblings of the story of the Bog Boy had begun again. That's because that year Ellis Saucier, the seventeen year old son of the local barber, had gone missing. Guerin says he knew Saucier who had been a few years younger than him in school.

Ellis Saucier, left, in 1962, the year of his disappearance

"He wasn't what you'd call an angel or a teacher's pet. I think the polite term is ne'er-do-well. Always getting into some kind of trouble, always looking for trouble, you know?"

The area was searched, including the bogs, but Saucier was never found. There was a rumor he had run off to Boston to join a gang, but there wasn't much evidence of that. In 1962, Bog Boy sightings had started up again, only now the stories claimed there were two of them.

"Every fifteen years, like clockwork," Guerin told us. There were several empty beer glasses on the table between us. "Every fifteen years another kid goes missing from town. The last one was back in 07. You might remember that one? Zachary Clarke? There was all that news coverage? And you know what? Right around that time the stories of the Bog Boys kicked back up again. There were four of them by then. Tyler Martin in '47, Ellis Saucier in '62, then Michael Coulombe in 1977, and Joshua Landry in '92. All of them young, between sixteen and nineteen. All of them missing, no trace ever found."

In 2007 Leo Gurein was 63, preparing for retirement. A lot of the veterans who had told him the story of the Bog Boy back in 1962 and passed away or were living their last few years in assisted living centers, but Guerin said there were still whispers of the Bog Boys. 

"I don't know how the story passed down from each generation. Parents telling their kids, I guess. Warning them about staying out of the woods at night, like a boogeyman, I suppose. But in '07, when the Clarke boy went missing, everyone started talking about Bog Boys again, and sure enough, the sightings increased. This time there was five of them."

The stories claim that if you encounter the Bog Boys to run as fast as you can. They're not terribly fast, but their open arms and yawning mouths are easy to get tangled in, especially now that there's a pack. The stories claim that if they catch you, they'll drag you back to the bog and pull you underneath the waters to lie with them until they rise again.

No one knows what exactly these Bog Boys are. The only pictures are blurry and can be written off as tricks of the light, strange angles, and active imagination. In recent years, and as technology has gotten more advanced, there is still no evidence of any bodies buried in the cranberry bogs. Still, the stories persist. Whether they are an elaborate prank or the actual ghosts of the missing boys, no one is sure. But Guerin is. 

"Oh, it's them, all right. The missing boys. The dead boys. They're angry they died or they don't want to be alone, or whatever, but it's them all right. I've got no doubts about that," he said, draining the last of his beer. We offered to pay for the drinks, but he waved us off. "I'm just happy to have someone to talk to. When my grandson told me about your website thing, I knew I had to reach out to you fellas. There aren't too many of us left that remember how this all started."

We left Leo Guerin soon after. He waved to us from the doorway of the Elks Lodge. As we pulled out of the parking lot, he went back inside and sat back down at the table where he had told us his story. We could see him order another beer.

A cranberry bog

We did some research into this story before writing this. Guerin's timelines does seem to check out. Tyler/Thomas Martin, Ellis Saucier, Michael Coulombe, Joshua Landry, and Zachary Clarke all went missing from the Turner area. No bodies were ever found, and no evidence of them turning up anywhere else has ever been presented. The youngest, Joshua Landry, was sixteen. Michael Coulombe was the oldest, just nineteen years old. To date their cases are unsolved, though every lead has since gone cold.

This does not take into consideration the many other missing peoples that have happened over the years. In the Turner area, just outside Auburn, there have been 46 missing persons since 1947. Their ages range from 6 to 81. Many of them are assumed to have moved for various reasons. The most infamous, was the Britney Redlon case from 1997. Britney was eight when she went missing under suspicious circumstances. Her father, Bradley Redlon was the prime suspect in her disappearance, though he refused to say anything. Many people believed Redlon killed and disposed of his daughter, though no case has ever been brought against him.

Still, the similarities in Guerin's stories are perhaps too much to discount. All five of the missing boy are around the same age. All of them were described as less than popular or well-liked. They were all, for lack of a better term, misfits with penchants for the kind of irritating trouble teenage boys find themselves in. Interestingly enough, they all came from broken homes.

We spoke with several people who have claimed to have encountered the Bog Boys at various times. Their stories are all different, different times of day, different years, different numbers of Bog Boys. The stories are consistent about several things - the appearance of the Bog Boys as moaning, mud-covered creatures with open arms and reaching arms, and the locations of all of these encounters. Everyone one of them has been around the cranberry bogs.

One last note, if the Bog Boys return every fifteen years to seek a new victim, 2022 would be fifteen years from Zachary Clarke's disappearance in 2007. If Leo Guerin is correct, that would mean that sightings of the Bog Boys should begin happening soon, and that any young man between sixteen and nineteen years old from Turner, should stay as far away from the cranberry bogs as possible.

Stay safe out there, Maine!

My Daughter the Telekinetic

Calling all MMers, we have a reader who needs our help! Everett from Saco has written to us that his daughter has been exhibiting some strange phenomenon.  Everett says that his daughter Clara is three years old and for the first couple years of her life everything was completely normal, but lately some strange things have been happening in their home. 

Who wouldn't want some Oreos?

We called Everett and he told us his concerns, “The first time I noticed it was with the cookies. We keep the sweets up high so she can’t sneak any, I mean this shelf is up there, my wife has to stand on a chair to reach it. And one day I just see Clara walking around non-chalantly with this huge family pack of Oreos. We know she didn’t climb on a chair because…”  Everetts wife Vicky who was listening on the line as well piped up at this moment. “We know she didn’t climb because not only would she not be able to reach the shelf by standing on the counter but to even get on the counter she would need to pull a chair into the kitchen all the way from the dining room. And when we moved we specifically bought heavy oak chairs so the kids couldn’t move them around too easily.” 

“But the cookies were just the first thing, I brushed if off, maybe the cat had knocked them down or something. But last week during our bedtimes after we had read a few books I kissed Clara goodnight and shut the light off and closed her door gently. As soon as the door was closed the light popped back on. There is no way she instantaneously got out of bed, ran over to the light and flicked them on. She had to have done it from her bed.” 

At this point Everett and Vicky got quiet, and I heard a sniff over the line as if someone was trying not to cry. “So you think she has some sort of ability that lets her move things with her mind?” “Yes,” Vicky said. “She seems to have some sort of telekinesis, we had to look it up, the word for it I mean. Its a rare thing but according to a few Facebook groups I found, it is possible.” 

What is the human mind capable of?

Everett took a deep breath and then said “We were just hoping you could put this on your blog, so maybe some other readers could see it and spread the word, or even if one of them knows how to deal with this sort of thing, you could put us in contact with them? We love Clara to death, but this kind of ability is terrifying, we just want to make sure she has a normal life, and to do that we have to figure out what to do with this thing.”

If you or anyone you know has any sort of experience or expertise with psychic abilities or telekinesis please write to us here at Malevolent Maine and we will pass on your contact information to this distraught family. We need you MMers, stay safe out there, Maine!

Reed Music

Eyes open, MMers!

It's that time of year, and we thought we'd pass on a curious story we had sent to us here, at Malevolent Maine. This one involves those swampy, marshy places that seem to pop up all over the place for the few months of mud season, sorry, Spring, but are gone by summer. Here's, Terry from Newfield:

"Those little swampy spots have always freaked me out, ever since I was a kid. My old man told me there were water moccasins in the water and quicksand. He told me about a kid he knew when he was a boy who got stuck in a quicksand pit and died. But that's not what freaks me out. That's just common sense. No, it's the reeds that gives me the willies."

That's right: the reeds. Terry recounts how as a boy he was out playing near one of those swampy patches that formed along the river behind his grandparents' house. He was staying well back from the actual water, remembering the lessons his dad taught him, when he sense something watching him. He looked to the reeds, thinking that would be a great place for someone, or something, to hide, but he couldn't see anything.

That's when he heard it. High-pitched, thin flute-like sounds floated faintly towards him. His first thought was that it was the sounds of the reeds blowing in the wind. But there was no wind; it was a totally calm day. Terry went back to whatever he was doing. Soon he heard it again, coming from another cluster of reeds. Again, he felt like he was being watched.

"It was like being stalked."

"It was like a song," Terry told us. "But not. It was like a madman's idea of what a song should be. It was like one of those backwards played song."

The song kept fading and coming back, always from a different cluster of reeds. It lasted for maybe twenty minutes, and the entire time Terry continued to feel like he was being watched. Finally, he ran back to the house.

He thought nothing of it until ten years later when he was out fishing along a marshy stretch of river. "I heard it again. Same weirdo music, same feeling of being watched." Terry heard it a third time when he was out hunting when he was forty-five. He never saw anything, but the overwhelming sense of danger always made him leave the area quickly. 

"It was like being stalked," Terry said. "Like one of those lion shows on tv. Except I wasn't the lion, I was the deer or whatever. And that music... I've never heard anything like it. It's... it's hard to even explain, but it didn't sound like it came from this world. Like it was something from another world or whatever."

And here's the part that really freaked us out, MMers. 

"It doesn't make any sense, but that weird flute music... it sounded like a growl."

What was hiding in the reeds?

Stay safe out there Maine!

Beware the Portly Man

As we near the summer months and the tourists begin to arrive, I feel the need to remind you all of the strange encounters many people have had over the years with the Portly Man. Each summer at least one or two people, native Mainers and tourists alike, report long unwilling roadtrips with a rather rotund, older gentleman. Whatever this being is, they don't seem to be malevolent, everyone even though they don't agree to go on the trip reports having a grand ol' time. However they are gone for days or even weeks at a time and at the complete mercy of the Portly Man. They say he takes them to wine tastings, art exhibits, small arthouse plays, and antique shops. Once he has had his fill of their company the Portly man often drops them off somewhere in the Old Port, and they soon regain their faculties and find their way home. Most people are uninjured and genuinely feel a strong connection to the old man, but they never see him again.

So if you are are spending your summer vacation in Maine this year please be aware of the strange danger/opportunity the Portly Man represents. He will not harm you but you will be away from friends, and family for an undetermined amount of time, while he takes you on his little adventure. If you would like to avoid the Portly Man, these are the types of locations he typically appears at:

1. Amateur Plays (Schools, Small Productions)
2. Yard Sales
3. Breweries and Wine Tastings
4. Portland Museum of Art (and other similar locations)
5. Antique Stores and Pawn Shops

An artists rendition of the Portly Man

The vehicle the Portly Man drives

Stay safe out there, Maine, avoid the Portly Man, unless you feel like having the trip of a lifetime!

Ticks, Black Flies, and Witches, OH MY!

It's getting to be that season MMers, ticks and black flies are out in full force. But are the pests accosting you just part of the natural season cycle or are you being targeted by disgruntled neighbors, coworkers, or ex’s? Reports have reached us here at Malevolent Maine that there is a coven of witches operating somewhere in Southern Maine. This coven in order to make enough money to pay for exotic supplies is taking orders for hex totems that draw pests such as ticks and black flies to unsuspecting homes. 

What a totem could look like

We interviewed someone who was a new potential member of this coven who ultimately decided against joining. She told us her name was Talia, but also said that wasn’t her real name. “Well I’ve always been super into the occult and alternative lifestyles, but once I was actually in with these people I realized how weird they were.” Talia told us about strange initiation rituals where they had to kill small animals such as squirrels and rabbits, and make trinkets and totems out of their bones. “It was pretty icky” she said, “I was really uncomfortable the whole time, but some of the other people were really into it.” Some of these totems would then be used to hold the hexes that bring pests down on unsuspecting people.  

What a totem could look like

The leader of this coven was known simply as the Betrothed. “When I asked why she was called that, I was told it was the highest title of the coven. It meant she was like literally engaged to marry the devil, like satan you know? And that sketched me out.” Talia said that after a few weeks she started trying to figure out how to get out of the group. “Eventually I told them that I couldn’t participate anymore because my dad was sick. He wasn’t, but it was the only way I could figure out how to get out of all that. They offered to heal him but it would take more than a few little animals, but I declined.” 

Talia says that if you are experiencing any sort of curse or hex be sure to look around your home/property for small totems made of sticks or bones, tied with hair or strips of leather. This is most likely the source of the misfortune befalling you. She also warns against joining any sort of occult group “It seems fun at first, and sometimes you feel powerful, but eventually they will ask you to do something you aren’t comfortable with. It isn’t worth it.”  

Check your house for these totems, avoid occult groups, and stay safe out there, Maine!

First Crinkle Face Sighting in Maine

Sorry to start the week with such bad news, but we at Malevolent Maine have been informed that the nationwide phenomenon known as Crinkle Face has made its first appearance in Maine. A University of Maine student returning from Spring Break has been taken to a mental health facility in Augusta after experiencing symptoms of the Crinkle Face Phenomenon. For those of you who are unaware, Crinkle Face is a phenomenon of unknown origin, it easily spreads from person to person, and eventually causes a psychotic break down which can lead to violent behavior. The person infected begins to see their reflection in a distorted way (we will include an artists interpretation below), then they begin to see others the same way, until eventually they snap and commit heinous crimes. It is unknown if the student at the university spread Crinkle Face to anyone else, but we will continue to monitor the situation.

Signs to be aware of if you think someone you know might be developing Crinkle Face:
1. Complaining about seeing odd things out of the corner of their eye
2. Avoiding mirrors or other reflective surfaces
3. Increased agitation or paranoia
4. Violent outbursts
5. Mutilation of their own face.

If anyone you know develops or displays any of the above symptoms please do not go near them and immediately report them to the authoritiies. Stay safe out there, Maine, don't get Crinkled!

Artist interpretation of what a person experiencing the Crinkle Face Phenomenon sees.

In the Potato Fields

This story comes to us from a new MMer named Andrea who lives up in Aroostook County. She lives in a small town nestled in a bend of the St. John River. Her family has always been potato farmers, and they plant fields upon fields of them every year. However she was always warned by her grandmother never to go out into the fields during the nights leading up to harvest. Andrea told us that she listened to her grandmother for most of her life and avoided the fields, until her teenage years when she and her friends stayed out just a little too late one night.

As they covered what was left of their bonfire for the night, Andrea parted ways with her friends and began to walk home through the potato rows. The moon was just bright enough for her to avoid tripping if she walked slowly. On her way home she was met with a whistling shriek, she stopped in her tracks as small shadows skittered in and around her legs. She panicked and began to run, more shrieks errupted as she ran. She stumbled and landed face first in a large mound of potatoes that had been freshly dug up. As she scrambled to pick herself up her hand found what felt like a potato but it had a strange leathery outer shell, and was warm to the touch. Upon picking up the object there was a symphony of shrieks and strange chittering sounds. She clutched the odd potato like object to her chest and ran back towards her house.

As she neared her house she turned back and saw several small creatures with large eyes following her. She quickly entered the house and closed the door. The next morning the only evidence of the creatures was the scratches on her front door no higher than her knee and the now cold object she had picked up. It wasn't a potato, nor was it a rock, she has no idea what it is but suspects its an egg of some sort. This was nearly twenty five years ago, but she still keeps the object as a reminder of her strange encounter in the potato fields.

Andrea sent us these photos of the object

If you are ever in norhthern Maine during the potato harvest, make sure you stay out of the fields at night, you never know if these little creatures will be around! Stay safe out there, Maine!

Rapid Fire - April 2021

It’s time for some more Rapid Fire, MMers!

• Speaking of Rapid Fire, there was a report out of Lebanon of a small lizard engulfed in flames. It was reported by local Bobby Newark that the old house on Mill Road was burned down by this “tiny fire dragon.” While this theory was quickly dismissed by the Lebanon Fire Department, Bobby swears up and down that it’s the truth. After all, he saw it with his own eyes.

• You know the paper mill up in Old Town? Well, when the wind is blowing just right, you can smell it from the University of Maine campus. Joseph Lundgren, a freshman residing in Cumberland Hall, reached out to us. “Yesterday the smell from the paper mill was so strong. Normally, it just smells like rotten eggs or sour milk. But today, it smelled like something else rotting. Like a corpse decomposing or something…” What is rotting at the paper mill, MMers? Is it just the paper, or is it something more...grotesque?

What's that smell?

• “Crinkle crinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are.” Today we had another report of a potential Crinkle Face in Maine. James Rideout, a Newfield resident, wrote this to us: “The other night I was looking through my telescope at some constellations. When I was looking at Orion’s Belt, I could have sworn that I saw the stars aligned in the shape of Crinkle Face. I only know about it from your blog, and I really hope that it’s just in my head.” We here at Malevolent Maine take Crinkle Face very seriously, and we want to warn you again of the dangers of Crinkle Face. While we hope that it was just James’ imagination at work, we can’t be 100% sure. God, we hope.

• Last, but certainly not least, MMers, we had a report lost in the mail way up from Presque Isle. The letter was supposed to be delivered in March, but we just received it this week. Harry Bordeau reported an interesting phenomenon he experienced while tapping his maple trees, as he does every year around this time. Here is part of Harry’s letter, “I tapped the tree as I always do, but that wasn’t sap. It was a gooey substance, kind of like that Nickelodeon slime, but it wasn’t green. It was an orange-yellow color, and it smelled like hand sanitizer or some cleaning solution.” While we don’t know what infiltrated Harry’s tree, we do know that there was a reported UFO sighting up in Presque Isle back in January. And while we don’t know what this unidentified “slime” is, we would be willing to bet it’s not from this world…

Is there sap in that tree?

Well, that's it for today, MMers. As always, feel free to send us any strange happenings from around the state. Stay safe out there, Maine!

The Witch of Woodland Valley

Good afternoon, MMers! With summer rapidly approaching and the weather improving, we wanted to take some time to warn you about potential harm found in a seemingly safe hobby. As you may know, there is a disc golf course in Limerick called Woodland Valley Disc Golf. You may have even played a round there yourself at some point in time. However, what you didn't know is that there is an evil spirit that haunts the grounds. If you've ever played there, you may have experienced a chill crawling up your spine around the sixth hole on the Grizzly Bear course. The hollowed out tree that marks the hole? Well, that's not there by accident. 

Back in the early 1690s, long before Maine was granted statehood, a woman named Isabelle Houser was arrested, and later convicted, for practicing witchcraft. It was said that she used her powers to lure young boys and girls out into the woods, pierce their ankles with rusty nails, hang them from a tree, and slowly drain the blood and life force out of them until they expired. Many believed that this was Isabelle's way of staying young, as she was 102 years old according to local records, but she didn't appear to be a day over 70. Once she was convicted and found guilty of witchcraft, murder, and other unmentionables, it was decided that she herself should hang from the same tree she had drained so many children from. So, the noose was readied, and Houser was hanged until death. The locals decided to not bother taking her body down afterwards, as she "deserved to rot" for what she had done. Six days after Houser's hanging, the middle of the tree seemingly imploded on itself, leaving only the hollowed out trunk that exists now. Interestingly enough, the tree hasn't changed shape since those days. Some say that it has an impenetrable hex that can never be removed. 

After her death, there were numerous reports of strange activity in those woods. Some reported hearing cackling in the distance, others heard the cries of desperate children. If you got close enough, you might even be able to smell, even see, the fresh blood of innocent children dripping down the tree's bark. 

Britney Bernard in the Hollowed Tree

In recent years since the disc golf course's opening on those "hollowed" grounds, a trend has started in which players pose in the hollowed tree for a photo opportunity. In 2017 a local, Britney Bernard posted a picture to her Instagram of her posing in the infamous tree. Britney was found dead six days later, cause unknown. We tell you this today, MMers, to warn you while you are out in those woods. If you hear a strange noise, smell the scent of freshly spilled blood, or even feel something brush against your shoulder, you should pick up your disc and leave the grounds before it is too late. Stay safe out there, Maine! 

Cinema Nocturna

Okay, MMers, this one is weird even by our standards. It comes to us from a reader named Chen from Biddeford. He told us about a secret movie theatre somewhere in Biddeford or Saco that shows rather, odd arthouse films. 

Downtown Biddeford, ME

The way Chen tells it,  he had a buddy, Abraham were out drinking in Biddeford. They had gone to a few bars and sometime between 11 pm and midnight, the two found themselves walking to their next destination. 

"To be honest, I'm not really sure where we were. We were somewhere around the bridge, but we'd had a few and everything got a little blurry after that. We stumbled around for a bit, down some side streets. There's all these old brick buildings that have been turned into cafes and shops and stuff."

Chen and Abraham found themselves outside of a brick building with no windows and a dark purple awning. There were steps that led down to a thick metal door with a wire mesh window in the door.

"I remember it because that cover over the door. It was purple - like a real dark purple - and I don't think I'd ever seen something like that before."

Thinking it was another bar, maybe one of the speakeasies that have opened in a lot of southern Maine cities, the friends went down to the stairs and knocked on the door. They saw a pair of eyes peer out at them from the window for a second, and then the door opened.

According to Chen a tall, thin man dressed in a tuxedo stood in the doorway, holding a lit candle. "It was an old style tux. He looked like something out of a Tim Burton movie." The man's face was pale and thin, with deep shadows beneath his eyes. "He told us he had been waiting for us and was glad we had arrived."

Artist's rendition

The man ushered Chen and Abraham into a hallway and then into a room. At first, they couldn't see anything because it was so dark. "But as our eyes adjusted we saw that it was like a movie theatre. It was small, maybe not much bigger than like a classroom or something. There were old wooden seats set up in rows and we could there were people scattered around the room, sitting in small groups of twos and threes."

The patrons all seemed to be wearing black or dark clothes and we staring up at a blank, dark screen. The tall man ushered Chen and Abraham to some empty seats and told them to get ready for the show. He was back a moment later, offering the men glasses of what appeared to be wine.

"We were looking to hit up one last bar, but we found this little artsy movie theatre. We were just drunk enough to think this whole thing was pretty funny, and besides, we got some free wine. It was pretty bitter and didn't taste like any wine I'd ever had, but we thought whatever, right?"

All of a sudden the light on the projector came on and the room was filled with a pale light. The tall, thin man was standing in front of the screen.

"Welcome to the cinema nocturna!" the man said. "We are ever so glad you could make it. What you are about to see is an original creation. I hope it will grab you as it grabbed me."

Then he clapped his hands twice. The theatre went dark for a second and then the movie began.

Chen described the film to us.

"There were all of these creepy images."

"It was black and white. It was a bunch of random shots. Like, there was a a shot of a fox slinking through the woods. There was another one, like one of those time-lapse shots of a mountain like crumbling or eroding or whatever. There were lots of real random stuff. I remember there was a skull. There was a fire that died down, and then I think they reversed the video and it sprang back to life. I can't remember a lot of it. But there was this awful music playing. Like screeching violins kind of. Maybe some sort of weird flutes. And, here's the crazy thing, that music sounded like it was coming from inside the room. There wasn't a band or anything, but it sounded like it was right next to me."

Chen began to feel dizzy. Maybe it was the alcohol or the film or some combination of the two, but he started to feel sick. "My head was swimming. I felt like I was outside of my body, but also deeper inside than I had ever been. It was like... like being high, but not in a good way. Not going to lie, I started to get pretty freaked out."

Chen looked around, but everyone else seemed entranced with the film. He tried to get Abraham's attention, but his friend stayed focused on the movie. "I remember looking down at the wine glass and it looked like... it looked like blood. I pout it down on the chair beside me and stood up."

Chen told Abraham he was going to be sick and he needed some fresh air. His friend made some noncommittal response, and then Chen lurched away. He thinks he remembers seeing the tall man staring at him questioningly, but he admits that could have been a false memory. He staggered his way out of the cinema as the images continued to flash on the screen and the music kept blaring.

"The images were getting more and more disturbing. And that music just drilled down into my brain."

Finally after what felt like a long time, Chen crashed through the door and up the steps. He leaned against the cold brick building and breathed in the fresh night air.

"I don't know how long I was out there. I must have passed out or fallen asleep, because the next thing I knew it was morning."

But here's the real kicker, MMers, the brick building with the purple awning was gone. Chen was in an alley behind a coffee shop and a law firm. 

"I figured maybe I just wandered off. Like I said I was pretty drunk. But I've gone all over Biddeford and Saco looking for that building. It's a purple awning, right? How hard should that be to find? I can't find it anywhere. It's like it never existed. I've asked everyone I can about that place and no one has ever heard of the theatre or the cinema nocturna."

As for Abraham, no one has seen him since the night they wandered into the movie theatre. There's security footage of Chen and Abraham walking out of a bar at 11:17. Street cameras have them walking up Main Street. They turn off onto a side street, and that's the last anyone has seen of Abraham. At the time of this writing Chen has been cleared as a suspect, but the whereabouts of his friend is unknown. If you have any information about Abraham Baldwin, please contact the Maine State Police.

Abraham Baldwin, missing since May 16, 2020

We asked around and we have heard some rumors of an underground theatre, the cinema nocturna, popping up in other towns. Westbrook, Auburn, and Bangor have all had unconfirmed sightings of the underground arthouse. Several witnesses remember the tall, thin man, and one person, who wished to remain anonymous, experienced similar symptoms as Chen. Who or what this obscure theatre is and what its true purpose is, remains unknown at this time.

Stay safe out there, Maine. 

Poverty Pond Poltergeist

This story comes to us from MMer Mike who lives on Poverty Pond in Shapleigh. After a long day of ice fishing Mike retired to his kitchen for a hot cup of cocoa and as he was looking out on the lake he saw a figure moving around carrying what looked to be a manual ice auger. It was strange to Mike because just a few minutes earlier he had been completely alone on the lake, but he quickly got over the unnerving feeling.

As Mike began moving around his kitchen, whipping up a quick ‘suppah’ he paused every now and then to look out his front window. In the moonlight he could see the figure pausing for a few minutes to drill a hole, then it would get down on its hands and knees and it looked like it shoved his whole arm into the whole he just finished. Mike thought this was a bit odd, but maybe the man just had a few eccentric fishing habits. However everytime he paused in making his dinner Mike saw the man further down the lake, making a long string of holes, and every time he would stop and push his arm deep inside. “He must be freezing by now” Mike thought to himself, so he put on the tea kettle to make the man a bit of hot cocoa. By the time Mike had the cocoa ready and flipped his floodlights on so he could avoid the holes the man had drilled, the figure was gone.

Photo sent in by Mike, we have circled all the holes drilled by the figure

Was this just a man who had a strange way of trying to catch fish? Someone trying to fish something out of the pond? A ghost looking fruitlessly for something it had lost? Or something more Sinister. In our humble opinion at Malevolent Maine this sounds like a poltergeist of some sort, no other phantom could interact with the real world like that.

In any case avoid Poverty Pond at night unless you have a nice shack to stay in to avoid interacting with whatever is out there, stay safe out there, Maine!

Needle Ghost Mayhem

We hear a lot about ghosts here at Malevolent Maine, but this one is crazy! At a mental health institute up in Augusta we have reports of a terrifying and powerful apparition haunting the halls. Jeff Patrick, former night janitor and caretaker of the facility, has reported that he had an encounter with the ghost, and it changed his life in the worst possible way. 

Jeff reported that the institute gave him the creeps since the very first night, “I came in for my shift on the very first day, and there was this super weird sound coming from the second floor. I went to see what was up, and there wasn’t anything at all. Second night same thing but there was a weird floating orb. I’m not gonna lie, I didn’t stay there long after I saw that I ran back, put my headphones in, listened to some Floyd, and went about my night.” 

Jeff said he avoided whatever made the noise for a few months after those first encounters, but one fateful night two months ago had a different outcome. “It was time for me to mop the second floor hallway, so I got my bucket ready, headed up there, put on my tunes real loud so I couldn’t hear much then I went at it. Halfway through I look up and I see this half see through guy just drifting past me, heading down the hall towards the pharmacy. I yell at it but it just keeps on drifting. I watched it disappear into the pharmacy and I tried following it. Usually the pharmacy is locked up but today for some reason it was open. I go in and see this thing just hucking stuff every which way, I go to reach out and stop it and I feel this sharp pain in my arm. I pull my arm out of the ghost and sticking out of it is a syringe. It must have been some kind of pain killer or sleep medicine, because I woke up in the morning with the security guard standing over me with a big frown on his face.” 

The institute fired Jeff for stealing, and doing drugs on the job, there is even a pending criminal case. Jeff claims that he had nothing to do with the theft and that the “damn ghost” did everything. 

We believe Jeff and truly feel sorry that he lost his job and might end up going to jail over these supernatural shenanigans. If you are ever in Augusta avoid the mental health institute, the ghost there might just get you like it got Jeff. Stay safe out there, Maine!

Mirror, Mirror

Happy Valentine's Day, MMers! We've got a great story for you out of Garland, up in Penobscot County. Curtis Walker claims he's from a parallel reality, one very close to this one, but with several key differences. Walker tells us one morning, two years ago, he was out in his front yard trying to start his weed-whacker. It didn't start on the first pull, but that was nothing new. It was on his third tug of the pull cord, when he claims he passed through some sort of membrane into this one.

"It was like being encased in Jell-o," he said. "Except I didn't move. I wasn't the one in the Jell-o - the whole world was. It was like a thick, jiggling wall that I was being pushed through. It was only a second and then the feeling was gone."

The membrane between worlds or tasty dessert?

Walker's weed-whacker started right up and he went to town edging his lawn. When he was done, he put the wee-whacker away in the shed and came inside to cool down. That's when he realized something was wrong.

"There's a woman standing there in my kitchen. I lived alone, you see."

After a moment, Walker recognized the woman as Alice Kramer, a girl he dated in high school, twenty-five years before. She didn't think anything of it, but he was shocked to find her standing there. As Walker explained it, in this world - our world - Curtis Walker and Alice Kramer married young, right out of high school, but in Walker's original world, Alice Kramer died in a horrible car accident right before graduation. 

But that's not the only difference. In his world, Russia landed on the moon first, Jeb Bush won the presidential election in 2016, and Tom Selleck was Indiana Jones. Walker went on to note a bunch of other differences, but he said none of them seemed all that important. The world was pretty much the same, just some of the details were different. 

This makes us wonder who played Han Solo?

After the car crash in his world, Walker's heart was broken. He never quite got over losing Alice at such a young age. Now, suddenly here in our world, it was like waking up from a bad dream. 

"It's my second chance," he told us. "And I'm not going to waste it."

For her part, Alice says she believes her husband. "He just knows too much about this other world to be making it up. No offense, but Curt was never that smart."

According to public records, Curtis Walker and Alice Kramer married in 1995. He has worked for the post office mechanic pool for twenty years. He's been to birthday parties, holidays, sporting events, you name it. No one noticed a difference on that day in the summer where Walker crossed over.

It does beg the question, however, if this Curtis Walker crossed over to our world and was reunited with the love of his life, what happened to the other Curtis Walker, the one that was from this reality? Still, one can only help but feel happy for Walker, who wakes up everyday next to a woman he thought he'd lost forever.

Stay safe out there, Maine.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Unanswered Questions - December 2020

 

Welcome back to some more unanswered questions, MMers!

• Who is at the bottom of the old well on the abandoned farm in Chesterville? More importantly, why have they kept screaming "Tenon?" for the past twenty years?

If you hear, "Tenon!" coming from the bottom of a well... run!

• Why will Cobbie, the sea monster living in Cobbosseecontee Lake, only show itself at dusk?

• When is it okay to call the feds about aliens invaders? After the first visit? The second? The third? The Herrins out of Patten are on visit #4!

Fifth time's the charm?

• What lived under the bed in Caleb Clover's room? And why did it move to Lucas Cruz's? Has anyone seen Caleb lately?

• Where exactly is that fountain of youth in the Bethel area? Asking for a friend.

• How do you drive a vampire off your property after you accidentally let him in? Lots of garlic, crosses, holy water, and a blessing or two from the local priest doesn't hurt, according to Norman Reed of Brighton.

No visitors or vampires!

Stay safe out there, Maine!