Beast of Bray Road

I had the map out looking for things to do during my 2022 two-week stay in Wisconsin. So far, I had been to Rock Lake but failed to spot the fabled monster in its waters. I visited the amazing ancient mounds and earthworks at Aztalan State Park, Koshkonong Lake, and other places. And I had made an excursion into the fabled Kettle Moraine State Forest—allegedly home to strange creatures and unexplained phenomena. But there was still a place within a reasonable drive to the campground that I hadn’t been—Bray Road, home of the “Beast of Bray Road.”

Wisconsin's Werewolf

I don’t remember exactly when I became aware of the Beast of Bray Road. But I had done a lot of reading about the beast over the years. So, I was excited to get to see its stomping grounds. The lair of the beast lies just outside the town of Elkhorn, Wisconsin along Bray Road. Bray Road is a rural stretch of road connecting State Highway 11 and County Road NN. Though the road cuts through a rural area, it is not “in the middle of nowhere” like many envision when they think of cryptid sightings. There are houses all along the road on both sides.

Most believe the first sighting of the Beast of Bray Road goes back to 1936. It was then that a local man spotted and enormous dog or wolf hunched over in a field. Only this was no ordinary dog—this thing stood up on two legs and stood at over six feet in height!

The Beast of Bray Road gained its notoriety during the 1980s and 1990s. A rash of sightings occurred in the area of a doglike humanoid. In fact, there had been so many eyewitness reports that The Week, a local newspaper, sent the late Linda Godfrey to investigate the matter. Godfrey penned the book The Beast of Bray Road: Tailing Wisconsin’s Werewolf in 2003. Since then, she has written scores of books on the werewolf/dogman phenomenon. Though I do not believe in “experts” when it comes to things that may or may not exist, I saw Godfrey as the leading authority on the subject of dogmen and werewolves.

These Stories are Real

My trip to Bray Road was a lot of fun. I certainly didn’t see any six-foot-tall canines walking on two legs in any of the fields along the road, but that sort of thing is hit or miss, I suppose. It was great to see that some of the locals along the road were playing along with the legend. A couple of folks had werewolf displays in their yards.

And that is the great thing about these local legends. To me, it doesn’t really matter if the stories are true or false, embellished, or just cases of mistaken identity. The stories are real to those who saw something strange and to the communities affected by the sightings.

For more on the Beast of Bray Road, check out Linda Godfrey's books. I discuss dogmen and werewolves in Virginia in my book Strange Tales from Virginia's Mountains. For more on my travels, read the books in my Detours Into the Paranormal series.  

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