Atomic Robot News: Hunting For Monsters And Other Unexplained Mysteries In My Own Backyard

Hunting For Monsters And Other Unexplained Mysteries In My Own Backyard

Written By: Ken Hulsey

In various articles about strange phenomena and mysterious creatures I have mentioned how my family and I are huge fans of such television programs as "Ghost Hunters", "Monster Quest" and "Destination Truth". Now as luck would have it, I stumbled upon a very interesting book at my local Barnes and Noble called "Weird California" written by Greg Bishop, Joe Oesterle and many others. Come to find out, while Josh Gates of "Destination Truth" regularly jets off from Los Angeles to points across the globe to search for the Yeti, or ghosts in King Tut's tomb, there are about a zillion such mysteries here in his (our)(I also reside in CA) very own backyard.

Now, this is not going to be a shameless plug for the "Weird California" book, though I do recommend you pick up a copy, especially if you reside here in Wackyfornia, and I am providing a link from Amazon where you can purchase it.

I will, however, be featuring articles about subjects I pull from the book and other sources, over the next few months for my new "Hunting For Monsters And Other Unexplained Mysteries In My Own Backyard" series of articles here at Monster Island News.

I plan to do a lot of research, and go out and explore (with my reluctant son, and wife, in tow no doubt) some these fascinating anomalies for myself. It should be great fun!

Though I have just begun ready into some of these local California mysteries and legends, I have been really fascinated by how many of these reports seem very similar and in some way could be connected.

Case in point, the mysterious 'Lizard People' that turn up in the legends of several Native American tribes across the state. Could these "Reptoids" be connected to Charles Wetzel's report of a strange creature near Riverside in 1958? Would Indians describe 'Grey Aliens' as 'Lizard People'? and if so, does that tie-in with the numerous UFO and USO sightings in, and around, areas that these creatures are fabled to dwell?

Does their reported thirteen settlements across the state include one under Los Angeles, which G. Warren Shufelt spent his life looking for?

Is there a wrecked Spanish sailing ship full of pearls in the middle of the desert? Do the sand dunes sing? What is the mystery around Zzyzx, a town off the 15 freeway on the way to Las Vegas that I must have sped past a hundred times?

All good questions, well worth my spare time to get to the bottom of.

What makes me qualified for this task of getting to the bottom of California's legends? Well....I have seen Bigfoot, I saw a wax banana fly across a kitchen and I've seen a lot of things in the sky I can't explain.

Okay, that stuff made me sound like a complete nut-job. Honestly, I'm just a guy that has seen, and experienced, more strange things in his life than he has answers for, and this has sparked a flame of curiosity in my soul that I can't make go away.

I would, of course, love it if some television producer read this and decided that the idea would make for a great series starring yours truly and drove a U-haul full of money up to my door. (Okay, that sounds nuts too)

That is not likely to happen, so you will have to learn to deal with my crude and amateurish ways of getting to the bottom of things.

Come on! It will be fun!