Mysterious Michigan – Water Creatures, Lights and the Dogman

Featured Photo: Source.

Michigan is a US state found in the Midwestern and Great Lakes Regions of the United States. The state is split into two peninsulas with them separated by the Straits of Mackinac (between Lake Huron and Michigan) but connected by the Mackinac Bridge. The smaller peninsula (Upper Peninsula) is bordered with the US state of Wisconsin and is separated from the US state of Minnesota by Lake Superior and from Canada by a number of lakes including Lake Superior. The larger peninsula (Lower Peninsula) is bordered with the US states of Indiana and Ohio and separated from the US states of Minnesota and Illinois by Lake Michigan and from Canada by Lake Huron, St. Clair River and Lake and the Detroit River and finally from this larger peninsula Lake Erie gives access to the US states of Pennsylvania and New York and through the Niagara River to Lake Ontario giving more access to New York and Canada. Michigan also has a number of small islands in the Great Lakes. The state capital is Lansing and the largest city is Detroit.  

The Upper Peninsula is heavily forested with a number of streams that flow into the Great Lakes and has a lesser population than the Lower Peninsula and the West of the Upper Peninsula is also quite rugged and mountainous. The Lower Peninsula is flatter with some hills found here and about but not as concentrated as in the West of the Upper Peninsula, the North of the Lower Peninsula is more sparsely populated and more densely forested than the South which is largely urbanized and farmland.  

Michigan has a very diverse economy but many still know it for its automotive industry, with it being home to three large automobile companies. The Upper Peninsula is important for its ability to attract tourism to its natural landscape while the Lower Peninsula’s economy is driven by manufacturing, forestry, agriculture, services and the high-tech industry.

Now let’s us get on to the strange and the unexplained of Michigan. With all these large great lakes about the place I wonder if it has any sea serpents? I guess we shall have to wait and see as we get into the list…

Well in matter of fact you won’t be surprised to know that there are a number of water-based legends and cryptids in the state of Michigan, some of them coming from Native American legend and others just spawning from general accounts of what some person happened to witness on one particular time or other.

Nevertheless, I am going to look into two of these water-based legends, one is called Pressie which appears to be Michigan’s most well-known water serpent and the legend of merman in the state as well coming from Native American legend.

First up we’ll start with Pressie, a water serpent said to be found in Lake Superior. The water serpent is said to have a tail that looks like a whale fin and the head of a horse, described or estimated at 75ft in length, visible teeth and a long neck and possibly pectoral fins. The description sounds like that of a typical sea serpent, especially the fins and the long neck and the horse head descriptions also isn’t uncommon. Sightings go back as far as the late 1800s, including a man who fell overboard from a boat and claimed to have been attacked by it, claiming it attempted to constrict around the man, a move reminiscent of a snake, which some skeptics have claimed it could be.

There was also a photo in 1977 supposedly of the Lake Monster near to the mouth of the Presque Isle River, which is a river found in the Upper Peninsula that drains into Lake Superior, running through the Ottawa National Forest and the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park. Like many supposed photos of cryptids it isn’t clear, you can see something dark sticking out of the water with the light appearing to reflect off it, with the skin or object looking smooth and slick like a large fish or water mammal. Apart from that you can’t really tell much and it could easily be some kind of rock or litter, among other explainable things such as simply a large fish.

Others continue to claim sightings of the cryptid on an infrequent basis.

In Mississippi they had legends of mermaids but over in Michigan it is legends of the opposite sex, the mermen, said by the Ojibwe Native American’s to be found living in the cracks of banks and waterways along the shores of Lake Superior. The Ojibwe call them Maymaygwashi and since it is a legend from them it goes far back even before the 1800s and some settlers who even accompanied the Ojibwa had claimed to witness them as well.  

They were described as looking youthful like children with their faces also sometimes being covered with hair. One of the earliest accounts comes from a French-Canadian fisherman and traveler called Venant St. Germaine in May 1782 when he was camping on Pie Island along with three Ojibwe Indian companions. It was dusk when something most strange took place, when a creature bobbed up above the water of Lake Superior in the distance as they sat on the shore.  

Germaine’s later description of the creature is that it had the upper body formed exactly like a human, the size of a child about 7 or 8-years of age, with brilliant eyes and a dark complexion but the lower part like a fish. For whatever reason Germaine decided to attempt to shoot the creature dead but was tackled by one of his Ojibwe companions and during the struggle the creature disappeared under water.  

The Ojibwe believed the creatures to be gods and goddesses and to kill or harm one would bring terrible misfortune in the turning of the weather, bringing terrible storms. The legend goes on that for three days afterwards a massive storm with gale-force winds which caused huge waves led to them being stranded on the island for a time.  

Although this legend took place within Canada’s territory, it was still within Lake Superior which is shared by both sides and as such I am giving it an exception.  

I will also give an honourable mention to another Native American legendary creature/evil spirit called the Mishipeshu, which is described as a water creature with the head and paws of a wild cat, the antlers of a deer, a body of reptilian scales and spikes protruding out along its spine as well as having a like snake-like tail.  

It is said the creature is angered when copper deposits along Lake Superior are disturbed and there are legends of boats being sunk by the creature and boatmen/sailors killed in relation to this. It would appear that Lake Superior is a very active lake indeed.  

Now let’s move away from the water and on to the land. We shall begin here with a strange light that has been witnessed by many people but has remained not fully explained. It is a totally real phenomenon that can be observed by anyone and so there is clearly something causing it but what it is remains up for debate and that means paranormal enthusiasts believe it to be a ghostly light, while others less commonly claim that it’s aliens observing Earth, although why they would constantly be in the same area seems absurd, unless there is something of great interest there, but I am doubting it. Photos and video footage of the light can be easily found on the internet and Youtube.  

The light is found in a valley near to the small community of Paulding in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula close to the border with Wisconsin. The light, which is quite bright, is best seen during the night and an old local legend claims that it is the ghost of a railroad brakeman killed on train tracks while holding his lantern. The legend claims there was once railroad tracks, although there has been no historic proof of their ever being train tracks in the area.  

Other legends to explain the light include that it is the ghost of a Native American dancing on the powerlines, the ghost of a mail courier killed in the area or the ghost of a grandparent looking for a lost grandchild.  

The first known sighting of the light was by a group of teenagers in 1966 who reported it to the Sheriff, bringing the mystery to wider attention when whatever it was could not be figured out. The light comes and goes but is said to appear almost every night. In 2010 a group of Michigan Tech students investigated the phenomena and concluded that it was merely car headlights and taillights off in the distance coming from US Highway 45.  

Although investigators from the Fact & Faked: Paranormal Files attempted themselves to prove that the phenomena were just car lights, but were unable to themselves. This could either be due to the Michigan Tech students having more scientific experience or that they were plain wrong.  

Other suggested natural theories including something to do with geological activity (there are the well-known, disputed and not fully understood Earthquake lights, which could possibly be related) or that it is swamp gas.  

Will o’ the Wisp folklore is another comparison or perhaps even what it is?! Probably not though, but it is another thing that is interesting to read into. Swamp gas can sometimes cause chemical reactions that may cause light, which some have put to explaining the Will o’ the Wisp folklore, as well as an explanation for some UFOs. 

To round this off we shall look at the Michigan Dogman, perhaps one of the most known cryptids or paranormal beasts said to roam the state. It has been seen in numerous different places across the state with no particular specific location, apart from it almost always being seen out in the wilderness and sightings being more common in the north of the Lower Peninsula, perhaps due to it being more forested than the south.  

It is described as a large black canine with wolf-like features and is able to stand on two legs, often reaching 6-7ft in height when doing this. The dogman is often described in a way that shows it having an above average and perhaps sometimes even human-like intelligence for a canine-type creature and can be harder to scare off. Sightings of the creature go back as far as the late 1800s.  

The first known documented sighting took place in 1887 within Wexford County where two lumberjacks described seeing a creature with the body of a man and the head of a dog. There is an alleged sighting in 1937 (appears to be conflicting years in some publications, although since the legend is associated with the number 7, I am going with 1937) that sounds quite terrifying, taking place near Paris in Michigan, a man called Robert Fortney claimed to be attacked by five wild dogs and upon shooting his weapon four of the five ran off, except for a larger one which stood up on its hind legs, seemingly unafraid of his gun, it took several more warning shots before the beast decided to casually turn away and leave him alone.  

The Michigan Dogman itself didn’t become popular until Steve Cook, a disc jockey for WTCM-FM released a song about the Dogman in 1987, which sung about the various sightings and was meant to be an April Fool’s dig, but the song became very popular and also had numerous people coming forward about their own sightings, leading to the Michigan Dogman entering into the states popular culture.  

Part of the legend also includes that sightings only happen on years ending with 7 before the Dogman vanishes to return 10-years later on the next year ending with 7, although there have been a number of sightings that have not followed this rule of the legend.  

The dogman itself isn’t entirely localized in Michigan, with reports of creatures dubbed dogman having been seen across the United States, making it into its own specific type of phenomenon, similar to how Bigfoot is, although clearly not as popular.  

Skeptics have often dubbed dogman sightings as merely misidentified animals such as Black Bears (of which can sometimes stand up on to their hind legs for a short time, although cannot walk in that state, like the Dogman apparently can) or wild cats such as a Cougar, Lynx or Bobcat which live in the state.   

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So, there you have it, the strange and paranormal of the State of Michigan but nowhere near all of it, the state certainly has a lot more but we shall come to that another time as otherwise this post would become too long.

Next up we shall be doing the strange and the unexplained of the US state of Ohio.

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