Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 16th, 2012
In our journey through “name game” links to how various past Bigfoot, Mystery Cat or other cryptid sightings and folklore are often left as an artifact in geography, via the naming of the land, we must consider “Booger.”
Like most words that seem tied to past close encounters of the monstrous kind, the obvious is often taken for granted.
Devil Monkey © Loren Coleman and Patrick Huyghe 1999, 2006; © Harry Trumbore 1999, 2006, from The Field Guide to Bigfoot and Other Mystery Primates.
Booger is related to the same origins as boogey man and is a generalized place name now for areas where any kind of strange beasts have been seen. Remember the “Belt Road Booger“? Tom Finley has investigated “boogers.”
Henry Franzoni doing research on the name once found sixteen Booger locations in the USA and Canada.
There is a Booger Pond in South Carolina, Booger Den Hollow, Booger Hill, Booger Hollow and Boogertown Gap, all in Tennessee, Booger Canyon in New Mexico, Booger Branch and Boogertown in North Carolina, Booger Hole Slough in Mississippi, Booger Hollow in Kentucky and one in Arkansas, Booger Canyon and Booger Spring in Arizona, The Booger Hole and Boogerhill cemetery in Alabama, and Booger Lake in Ontario.
There are more out there, as lots of Booger spots, a creek here, a pond there, in the South just are not on any of the newer, bigger maps.
Do you have one in your area?
For more on another closely related name game, see the “Fayette Factor.”
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.