I'm Laura Norton, and Florida's skunk ape,

because of course Florida would have a skunk ape,

the southeastern U.S. doesn't get too much coverage in the cryptid area.

It might be because we're just dumb, well, entertaining enough on our own merits down here to add another facet of the bazaar,

but strangers don't discount us totally. We do have a few good monster tales, tall or otherwise,

you be the judge, down south.

And today we bring you a story close to the heart of yours truly, the lizard man of Bishopville,

South Carolina.

When your narrator was but a tiny lover of the paranormal, way back in the summer of 1988. This Lee County phenomenon struck and took the whole state by storm.

There were Lizard Man t-shirts and barbecue sauces and witness interviews all over the evening news,

usually accompanied by an approximation sketch

that was drawn by a teenager named Chris Davis, who'd experienced the most famous lizard man

encounter of all time. Seeing as Chris Davis was a 17-year-old high school student, it was not

a professional forensic artistic

rendering. Imagine, if you will, a sleeping bag with arms and legs and a suggestion of a face.

Not very lizard-like or lizardly, even, and yet it would be the only circulated visual of the Lizard Man for many years.

Which really is a shame, as Chris Davis would repeatedly describe the creature he saw at Orescape

Swamp as absolutely terrifying, seven feet tall, with glowing red eyes, three long clawed fingers

on each hand and three clawed toes on each foot, and shining scales, just like a snake.

Oh, and the ability to run very, very fast. But we'll get to that in a moment.

It shouldn't be a surprise, really, that South Carolina's most famous beast sprang up from the depths of Bishopville.

Tucked into Lee County in the northeastern region of the state, Bishopville has had in the past 50 years

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