Mythical Creatures of San Antonio (Re: Mythical Creatures of Britain)

[Kelley]

Steve wrote:
> The subject of Hags ahs come up again in the main group, and that 
> lead me on another internet Google search which in turn lead to a 
> very interesting website...
> 
> "Mysterious Britian - a guide to mysterious places, legends and
> folklore within the British Isles."

Cool site, thanks, Steve.  This has led me to some googling, too...

> Dragons are the oldest monster and are found in nearly every culture
> on earth. Dragon cave paintings have been found dating back 25,000
> years. BUT, and this is a big BUT, there are still modern sighting 
> of dragons.
> 
> Texas - Modern sightings include a huge, winged reptile that
> terrorized the San Antonio valley, Texas for several months in 1976.

!!!

Okay, now why have I never heard of this?  (I live in SA.)  Amanda, 
ring any bells?  What geographical area is actually considered 
the "San Antonio valley"? (I've never heard this term, either.)  
Maybe Jan knows?  Granted, I was only 7 - 8 yrs old at that time, but 
this is the stuff local legends are made of.

Here are the "legends" I knew of growing up in SA:

The "Donkey Lady":
http://lonestar.texas.net/~tstevens/CS/donkey.htm

Never went to her bridge, so all I know of this is from the various 
tales; sometimes a variation of this has elements of the "La Llorona" 
story, too.  And yep, there used to be a working phone number, though 
was just a computer-generated squeal, but worth loads of great 
shivers for kids, anyway.

"La Llorona," not an SA thing, but a southwest/Mexico thing:
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/HC-WeepingWoman1.html

"Bloody Mary," also not something that originated in SA, but freaked 
us out when we were 10 - 11:
http://www.mythology.com/bloodymary.html

The "Ghost Tracks":
http://paranormal.about.com/library/weekly/aa031201a.htm
http://invisiblelibrary.blogspot.com/2004/08/ghost-tracks-of-mission-
row.html

Did this once in junior high and it worked, didn't do the baby powder 
thing, though. Apparently it's an optical illusion -- though it 
appears you're moving up a slight incline, you're actually going 
downhill...

"Midget Mansion":
http://www.geocities.com/midgetmansion/

Never saw this place, either.  Here's one that's vaguely similar, 
though -- the night we went to the ghost tracks we also went down 
another road (somewhere on the south/southeast side of SA), nothing 
much out there really, but set back from the street was a white 
building lit by a sodium street light.  It didn't look like a house, 
but more along the lines of a 'meeting hall' type of building, the 
place where lots of country wedding receptions are held. 

However, this building had no windows that I could recall, and the 
thing that was so weird about it was that the door into the building 
was several feet off the ground (rather than being at ground level) 
and there were no steps or other means of reaching it.  The place 
didn't look dilapidated at all, though we were only seeing it from a 
distance and at night.  Nothing else weird about it, and I'm sure 
there must be some explanation for the odd placement of the 
door...was wonderfully creepy seeing it that night, though. ;-)

No real reason for relating that story, other than hopes that perhaps 
Amanda or one of the few other SA / south central TX folks can 
enlighten me on what that place might have been...

Heh, probably should have saved all this for a couple weeks, eh?

--Kelley