On this day... official start of the Salem Witch Trials. Mass hysteria has pulled some pretty remarkable tricks in its day. According to people who ought to know, group delusions are more common in societies which foster repression. Puritain villages definitely fit this bill, as does Victorian England in the days of Spring-Heeled Jack. Jack was a supernatural figure in a helmet, skintight costume and tall black boots who was fond of breathing blue fire at unsuspecting pedestrians and molesting women - only to escape by superhuman leaps onto rooftops or over high walls. While he sounds remarkably like a DC comics character, Jack was taken quite seriously. At least one victim of a Jack attack was beaten unconscious, and several witnesses claimed to have seen him drown a young woman in a sewer. In 1838, Jack was declared "A Public Menace." The No less authoritative a man than the Duke of Wellington came out of retirement to hunt him down.
Not that there aren't such figures of legend today. But somehow, I don't find Bigfoot as interesting.
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