Dover — the Dover Demon, 21–22 April 1977

OVERVIEW

The Dover Demon is a creature reported in Dover, Massachusetts, on 21 and 22 April 1977. The three witnesses each drew what they saw; plotted on a map, their sightings fell along a straight line more than two miles long.

HISTORY

On 21 April 1977, driving along Farm Street, seventeen-year-old Bill Bartlett said he saw a being about four feet tall with glowing orange eyes, no visible nose or mouth and a watermelon-shaped head, perched on a broken stone wall. That evening fifteen-year-old John Baxter reported something similar on Miller Hill Road; the next night fifteen-year-old Abby Brabham reported it on Springdale Avenue. Bartlett signed his drawing: 'I, Bill Bartlett, swear on a stack of Bibles that I saw this creature.'

REPORTED ACTIVITY

LEGEND. Police told the Associated Press it was 'probably nothing more than a school vacation hoax'. Joe Nickell proposed a snowy owl; Brian Dunning doubted an illusion that fooled several people in 24 hours and never again, but held that a prosaic explanation exists. Ben Radford pointed to 1977's science-fiction films; Dunning noted Close Encounters came out eight months later.

VISITING

Public roads in a residential town; private property along them.