Boggy Creek Monster photo op.

Monster Mart: Boggy Creek Monster

Fouke, Arkansas

The Fouke (formerly Peavy's) Monster Mart is where you have to go if you want to find out about the Boggy Creek Monster, which has terrorized these parts since the 1940s. Or, if you don't feel like going outside ever again, you can just watch The Legend of Boggy Creek (1972), Return to Boggy Creek (1977), and Boggy Creek II: And The Legend Continues (1985).

The Mart sells monster t-shirts and post cards, and it has on display a plaster footprint cast from a Pacific Northwest Bigfoot (An original cast of a Boggy Creek Monster footprint was lost in a fire decades ago). There are yellowed newspaper clippings on the wall, and showcases that display photos, drawings, and recent plaster footprint casts -- proof that the Monster is still stomping around. Owner Denny Roberts hopes some day to build visitor cabins -- "Scare BnBs" -- out in the swamp.

Bigfoot footprint plaster cast.

Perhaps the best reason to stop here is the Boggy Creek Monster photo-op, which stands between the Monster Mart and the post office. Birds have given the monster a poop beard and hair, which we mention because the face hole is not very big. If, however, you can position your loved ones gingerly, you will have fine photos of their faces wreathed in painted-on monster fur.

As long as you're in the South and are interested in monsters, you might also want to head east to Florida and its Skunk Ape Research Headquarters.

For those who question the viability of an attraction based on a monster, consider the case of Boxcar Willie, who grew up in relatively nearby Ovilla, Texas, became a millionaire celebrity, and had attractions in both Nashville, Tennessee, and Branson, Missouri. Willie's fame peaked many years after the Boggy Creek Monster first gained nationwide notoriety. But when Boxcar Willie died, his attractions shuttered, and the only memorial to him now is a highway overpass back in Ovilla. The Boggy Creek Monster, however, lives on.