Tag Archives: Wisconsin

St. Nick’s Day

Nationality: American
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, from Wisconsin
Performance Date: April 29, 2014
Primary Language: English

Informant is a theatre student at USC who was raised in Wisconsin and comes from 65% German heritage. 

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St Nick’s Day is kind of a tradition that it isn’t anywhere else. Just because we’re so so German in roots. Everyone does it a little differently, but I know a few people who do it just like we do.

What is St. Nick’s Day?

It’s initially a German tradition. St. Nicholas, or Santa, whatever would – ‘cause Christmas is actually the birth of Christ. So St Nick would actually come around the 6th of December. And he would leave presents in the kids’ stockings. That’s kinda how all that really started. But how we do it, my family, is you leave your stocking – you leave your note for Christmas in your stocking, and Santa – or St. Nick – will come by and he’ll take the note out of your stocking and he’ll leave presents in your stockings. On the 6th of December. And then he has your list, for the rest of Christmas. Most other people around the US will mail their notes to Santa, which – I did not know that was a thing for the longest time. I was so shocked when I found out that people actually mailed their lists to Santa. I was just like “How does he actually sift through all of that? How does he know where it’s all coming from? At least with us he picked it up straight from the house and he knew where it was.” Childhood logic. And then I had a German teacher who would also celebrate it with us, and we would leave our little dance shoes on our desks at school, and she would put a clementine, which is kind of like a tradition – like a fruit, fruit in stockings is a tradition. And then she’d leave a couple little chocolates or something. Cute, fun little things. That one I know is initially a German tradition – ‘cause they also have Krampus, who’s hilarious. But yeah.

With St. Nick’s Day, it’s not just your family – it’s people in the area.

Its not just us. I’m not sure if it’s the whole area, but anyone with enough German roots knows what it is. Or at least has an idea about it. They may not actually practice it, but they know it.

[The people who learned about it through school were] anybody who wasn’t German enough. There were a few people who were like “What is happening?” But for the most part they all accepted it and moved on or already knew about it. I know there were at least two other kids who were super German, like one whose father was actually in Germany and the other whose father had immigrated from Germany and they definitely knew what it was.

It’s not just our family that does it. Everybody practices it a little bit differently.

What are some other versions?

Some people he just puts things in their stockings and moves on, I think my mom came up with the list part. I think that was all her. Everything else – like the leaving the little bit of toys in the stocking, that is the German tradition. Because the story of St. Nick, is like – he basically threw money in this guy’s window so his daughters would get married. That was essentially the story of St. Nick. And then somehow he became a saint. And now he goes around giving gifts to kids on the 6th of December. And apparently Christmas. I don’t know how that one came around.
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Informant described this pleasantly and excitedly. It is a holiday and tradition I was completely unaware of. I had heard of St. Nick, but didn’t know that he had a day to himself many days before Christmas.

Madison Sword Murder

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Performance Date: 4/10/12
Primary Language: English

My informant related to me a story from her hometown in Madison, Wisconsin about a man in a gang of some sort who was bothering his neighbor. The neighbor killed the gang member with an ornamental sword and left his body on a playground near the informant’s house. The informant never saw any kind of official report on it, but remembers everyone at school talking about this “sword guy.”

This story speaks to a fascination with murder, crime, and dark happenings in settings once thought innocent. I feel like I hear a lot of stories of someone utilizing a katana that was meant to be ornamental in a more practical fashion, but the notion of a skewered corpse left on a playground is a macabre little twist on the idea.

The Hodag

Nationality: American
Age: Eighteen
Occupation: Student
Performance Date: 4/10/12
Primary Language: English

In western Wisconsin lives the Hodag, a creature of folk legend native to Stephen’s Point that the informant described as their version of Bigfoot, but more evocative of a mongoose-like creature. It lives in the woods, and people frequently report sightings.

The informant claims most people don’t truly believe in the Hodag, treating it more as a tongue-in-cheek part of the culture. I suspect folk proliferation of the creature thrives largely due to the way the informant told me it bolsters the local tourism industry, with the Hodag plastered all over merchandise and used to entice outsiders to give the town a closer look and, by proxy, help out their business. Informant seemed dismissive of the local superstition, but still amused by it, as most Wisconsin natives probably are.

A bit of independent research revealed the Hodag is actually most closely associated with Rhinelander, Wisconsin, where it was “discovered.” That the informant didn’t know exactly where the creature is most popular despite living in Wisconsin indicates that general awareness of the creature greatly diminishes the farther out of Rhinelander one travels. I suspect it started out as some sort of hoax and proliferated from there, with locals becoming attached to the first accounts of the creature’s existence.

The Beast of Bray Road

Nationality: American
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Performance Date: 4/10/12
Primary Language: English

Interview with informant:

“Okay: Beast of Bray Road. It’s like, I think it’s more in the UP of Wisconsin, I don’t think it’s as far south as me, but like, it’s basically like a werewolf story in which like if you go down Bray Road at midnight or whatever and certain conditions are met, like I think it has to be in like October, November, like on a misty night or whatever and if you go down Bray Road, and if you flash your headlights three times then there’s like a wolf thing that stands on the side of the road. Like sort of one of those ghost stories. Like combine ghost stories with a regular werewolf myth and, you know, that like many people have seen it and taken sketches or whatever, like it stands like a man but it has the body of a wolf. So there’s Bray Road. I don’t know if it’s ever attacked people or if you just see it as you go by and go ‘Oh my God, there’s a wolf. We’re going to die.'”

Any number of ways this folk creature could have come to be. Perhaps there was a wolf once, or a frightening-looking man, or just someone thinking they’d seen either of those things or some combination of the two. Story gets spread around, people start daring each other to look for it, the rule of three gets thrown in there and presto: Bray Road has its very own Beast. Most people probably don’t take it very seriously, but some do, and the rest have no problem sharing their knowledge of it with each other.

Annotation: Airing on Animal Planet, the faux-documentary horror series Lost Tapes features found footage-style accounts of people encountering cryptozoological creatures. The penultimate episode of the show that aired in November of 2010, a militia group encounters with the Beast of Bray Road.