TRUE Terrifying Tales From South Dakota I Rain And Haunting Ambience
Tags: episodes // South Dakota // lore & legends // requested
Related:
Zack’s Script: Google Doc
To Do:
- Urban legends
- specific legends
South Dakota Stories
Urban Legends
- Walking Sam
- Walking Sam Reddit thread
- “Walking Sam is a legendary creature that is said to inhabit the Black Hills region of South Dakota. According to legend, Walking Sam is a tall, thin figure that wears a hat and a long coat. It is said to wander the hills at night, and those who see it are said to be cursed with bad luck or even death.” — Reddit comment
- 10 scary South Dakota Urban Legends (YouTube compilation)
- Orpheum Theatre: Looking Back: The Orpheum's 'ghost' has a long history, and a name
- Spirits roaming the badlands? (<2 min YouTube video)
- 8 HAUNTED PLACES IN SOUTH DAKOTA'S OUTDOORS
- Sisseton (RE: wailing woman location) & Badlands National Park mentioned
- A Reddit mini thread on urban legends
Original thread
[Serious] People of South Dakota, what strange creatures have you seen or heard about in South Dakota? Is there a local legend in your community?
Doesn't have to be a personal experience, although I'd love to hear that too. I'm also interested in local legends.
Thanks
*** I have been asking this question in other states subreddit because I find the subject interesting. I enjoyed reading the responses from other reddit users. If you don't want to post feel free to PM me. Thanks South Dakota!
Follow-up comment
Theres an area that we always refer to as the “Bermuda Triangle of South Dakota.” Loosely spanning from Sisseton to the Milbank exit on 29 to Waubay. I can’t tell you how many times it’s been a beautiful day and then you enter this area and the weather is awful and immediately turns nice again several miles down the road. Area feels off when you’re in it half the time too.
At one point, I was working with a guy who was ex-law enforcement, but was still working with law enforcement using/training cadaver dogs, who stated that this area of South Dakota is where they find the bodies of 2/3rds of people that are missing in the state (and several that are out of state). He told me about a rumor/legend of a “wailing woman” that people saw and that he believed he saw too on one occasion. If I remember correctly, the “wailing woman” is a young (late teens/early 20s) Native American woman stumbling around near sloughs in tattered clothes/various stages of (forced) undress and scream crying. He had told me that the time he believes he and and a couple of officers saw her, they had found the body of a young missing Native American girl in the slough next to where they saw the “wailing woman.”
He could have been one of the most incredible bull shitters I’ve ever met, but his demeanor and 1,000 yard look in his eyes have stuck with me for years. It is worth noting that this area is on the Lake Traverse Reservation and some reservations have a history of missing women, which I’m sure this legend stems from.
I asked my wife if she was aware of any legends/creatures and she offered up the (Lake) Kampeska Monster, but didn’t really have much information to offer.
Notes:
- Legend of the Lake Kampeska Monster: more info here
Fucked up history
- Hiawatha Insane Asylum for Indians
- “It’s not even an ancient Indian burial ground. They built a golf course over the Hiawatha Indian insane asylum in canton. Hundreds of natives were murdered there and it didn’t even close 100 years ago. Just a small plaque asking you not to play off the cemetery grounds that are surrounded by a worthless wood fence. Shit is no where close to ancient.” — Reddit comment
Personal Stories
- creepy gas station attempted kidnapping story
- South Dakota cryptid hunting story
- Creepy encounter in Mitchell hotel
- “Is Cassie home??” - Airbnb encounter
- the bathtub
- the cat & the park
- good puppy!
Long time reader but I have never posted. This story was told to me by my father many times. It’s 100 percent my family story but I used chatGPT to organize it into story form. I’d be interested to hear from anyone who has had a similar experience.
Hope you all enjoy this one:
I want to share something my father experienced years ago in rural South Dakota. He was driving alone on a rural road late at night. It was quiet, empty, and the only real light came from his headlights cutting through the darkness.
According to what he told me, three figures walked out onto the road directly in front of his vehicle. All three were upright and walking on two legs. Two were about the size of adults, and one was smaller, about the size of a child. Their bodies were thin and human sized, but their heads looked cat-like. Their eyes reflected brightly in the headlights, the way animal eyes sometimes do.
As they moved, each one lifted its upper limbs and made a smooth, circular pedaling motion with them. It wasn’t frantic or fast. It was controlled, steady, and all of them moved the same way. They came close enough that they stood directly in front of his bumper. All three paused there, facing the vehicle, looking directly toward him in the full light of the headlights.
After a moment, they turned together and walked into the ditch beside the road. Once they stepped out of the beam of the headlights, he could no longer see them. When the area was checked later, there were no tracks, no disturbed ground, and nothing left behind.
Years later, almost in the same area… my father and my brother were out collecting sage for a sweat lodge ceremony. Both of them saw what appeared to be a deer head lying in the ditch. It looked unmistakable. When they looked again to locate it, the head was gone. There was no deer body, no blood, no hair, no tracks, and no sign that anything had ever been there. Both said they saw it at the same time.
There are reports from other places in the Midwest that match some of what my father described. These include sightings of upright, cat-faced figures crossing rural roads at night, often in small groups, and often seen only within the beam of headlights before vanishing without physical evidence. A few older case records describe the same slow, circular motion of the arms, and a handful of multi witness rural incidents mention animal remains that appeared briefly and then were gone when approached.
I’m not saying what he saw fits any known category. Only that the specific combination of details he gave has been recorded elsewhere in scattered reports over the years, usually in quiet rural areas, usually at night, and usually with no trace left afterward.
He’s told the cat people story over and over and our family members and friends have joked over the years that he must’ve been under the influence. He always swears he was stone cold sober.
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