Pig Lady

Looking at the title of this blog post—Pig Lady—if you're old enough to remember Seinfeld, you might hear in your mind Kramer shout: 

"It was a pigman, Jerry! Half man, half pig!"

The Pig Lady, from Cecil County, Maryland, however, is no joke. She is not a "fat little mental patient" as Kramer's pigman turned out to be. In my book Detours Into the Paranormal: Atlantic City Road Trip, I discussed the legend. The following is an excerpt:

...According to the tale of the Pig Lady, she was horribly disfigured in a house fire. She escaped the burning structure with her life but suffered awful burns in the process. A nearby person came to help, but when he laid eyes on her, he became so frightened by her burnt, disfigured face that he took off running. The poor woman who had just lost her home had now lost her face—she was a freak, an outcast; she fled into the woods and became the Pig Lady.

As with a lot of these urban legends, there are several variations of the tale. One version of the story places the Pig Lady in the forested areas around Elkton. Here, she hides in the woods and ambushes unsuspecting passersby—especially children—and kills and eats them.

In another version of the story, she resides under a bridge at the south end of the town of North East. Known as the “Pig Lady Bridge,” squeals and noises can be heard in the vicinity. Cars have been said to stall when crossing, at which point the Pig Lady attacks the motorists with an axe. Cars have been scratched and dented—hoof-shaped dents, no less—while crossing the bridge.

In a nod to the “Bloody Mary” urban legend, some say it is possible to summon the Pig Lady. Of course, if you do, she will kill you; I'm not sure what the upside is in trying to conjure to porcine murderer. But, if you are in the area, and if you would like to try to summon her, this is how you do it: Get out of your car and stomp on the bridge; blow your horn 3 times; call out her name. Oh, and please, let me know how this works out for you if you try it.

In other parts of the county, the Pig Lady has allegedly been known to scare away young lovers in parked cars by banging on their vehicle...

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