If you believe the legends and breathless witnesses, somewhere deep in New Jersey, there's a devil so scary even Satan himself would be terrified. And now, there may be an image to prove its existence. Or maybe we finally found Jimmy Hoffa's toupee.
NJ.com reports that security guard Dave Black was startled last week when he saw what he thought was a llama running through the trees on the side of the road as he was driving past a golf course in Galloway, New Jersey. If the prospect of an escaped llama terrorizing New Jersey isn't baffling enough, what Black says he saw next could prove mind boggling.
Black claims the thing suddenly spread its wings and flew over the golf course. He grabbed his camera and began snapping photos, but only managed to capture a single image, which he submitted to NJ.com.
Stories of this mishmash of a monster go back nearly 280 years. It has "the body of a kangaroo, the head of a dog, the face of a horse, large leathery wings, antlers similar to those of a deer, a forked reptilian tail and intimidating claws," according to Weird N.J.
This hellish cryptid is infamous for its piercing scream. It's also the namesake for the Garden State's hockey team.
Could Black's photo be a bona fide image of the famed beast? Seems like that's about as likely as finding Bigfoot on his honeymoon with the Loch Ness Monster.
Still, when NJ.com reporter Kelly Roncace asked Black whether he was sincere about the photo, he defended the image and claimed it wasn't a hoax:
"Yes, I swear it's not Photoshopped or a staged thing," Black responded when I asked if he was willing to let me use his name and state that the photo he sent was not manipulated in any way. "People have said it's fake, but it's not. I'm honestly just looking for an explanation for what I saw."
The Jersey Devil legend began in 1735, when a resident of Pines, named Mother Leeds, found herself pregnant for the 13th time and wished her child to be born a devil, according to Weird N.J.
Within months of the child's birth, it sprouted horns, hair, feathers and wings and morphed into a monster, killing its mother before turning on a crowd of witnesses. It then emerged again in New Jersey culture in 1909, when eyewitnesses spotted the beast but were unable to take it down.
But if it's not actually the famed Jersey Devil, then what is it? Could it be a premature Halloween stunt? A viral promotion for tomorrow's Devils game against the Nashville Predators? A photo of a dog that mysteriously grew wings after falling into a vat of New Jersey nuclear waste a la "The Toxic Avenger"?
We may never know.
However, even if Black spotted a llama, it would be pretty amazing. These domesticated relatives of the camel are native to South America, a mere hemisphere away from the mean streets of New Jersey, where spitting is considered an art.
