North Carolina: Bigfoot & The Beast

This stop on the Backwoods Cryptid Road Trip brings the journey home to North Carolina.

Brian and Dani have spent the last six years living on forty wooded acres in the foothills, and this episode begins on their own porch before traveling across the state and back to the winter of 1953–1954, when the small town of Bladenborowas gripped by fear.

Something was killing dogs.Using newspaper coverage from Wilmington, Raleigh, Charlotte, and Lumberton, Brian follows the story night by night: dogs found dead with almost no blood left in their bodies, terrified hounds refusing to follow the trail, eyewitness reports of a strange catlike creature, and the massive armed hunt that sent hundreds of people into the surrounding bay swamps searching for what the press had already dubbed the Beast of Bladenboro.


The episode also explores the theories that followed—from wolves and catamounts to bobcats and a mysterious dog called Big Boy—along with three chilling encounter accounts from the height of the panic.Then the story shifts from the Beast of Bladenboro to something even larger moving through the North Carolina woods.

Brian shares experiences from his own property before diving into Bigfoot encounters from Bladen Lakes, Badin Lake and the Uwharries, the South Mountains, Big Laurel, the Croatan National Forest, Wilkes County, Roan Mountain, and McDowell County.

From hounds hiding beneath a truck to towering figures seen beside roads, creeks, pastures, and mountain balds, this episode explores two of North Carolina’s most enduring mysteries: the creature that terrorized Bladenboro and the upright figures still reported across the state today.

Bladenboro still celebrates its strange history with Beast Fest every fall, but more than seventy years later, nobody can say for certain what was really stalking those streets.



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Have you experienced a Bigfoot sighting, Sasquatch encounter, Dogman experience, UFO sighting, or any unexplained cryptid or paranormal event deep in the woods? We want to hear your story.

Email your encounter to brian@paranormalworldproductions.com for a chance to be featured on a future episode of Backwoods Bigfoot Stories.

Backwoods Bigfoot Stories is a paranormal storytelling podcast featuring real Bigfoot encounters, Sasquatch sightings, Dogman reports, cryptid experiences, and true scary stories from the backwoods.

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