The Tale of the Ground Creature

The story of the Ground Creature was perfect for Camp Aharah. It combines the unique history of the place, a fear of abandonment, and physical “evidence”. As a child, I had more than one counselor find a soft spot of earth, probably over some rodent’s burrow, and declare it a Ground Creature tunnel (Hopefully, he’s not around!). Also, with one exception, the cabins at the camp were raised on cinder blocks. The story was that years ago, the creature had burst through the floor of Seminole cabin and knocked over a gas lamp, starting a fire. The camp rebuilt the structure on a solid concrete slab as a preventive measure. 

Here is the story as I remember it:

A few years before Camp Aharah transitioned from a logging camp to a camp for children, the camp owner built a summer home for his wife and family to escape the city. The place overlooked a pond some distance from the main camp, an ideal place to relax. However, the family held a closely-guarded secret. One of their children was mentally unstable, even dangerous. The child never learned to speak and perhaps could not learn. His attempt at playing with his siblings always ended with an injury. When one of these injuries led to an emergency hospital trip, the father had had enough. He insisted that the wild boy be committed to a facility. Yet, his mother would not let him go. There was still a primal connection when they met each other’s gaze. 

As the child grew, he became more dangerous and violent. The family kept him in a separate section of the basement, locked away from the rest of the world. He was a prisoner in solitary confinement, his days broken only by the sound of his mother sliding food through a slot in the bottom of the door. There was no light in his cell. He amused himself by listening for and chasing the mice, rats, and roaches that found their way into the room. 

      He knew nothing of his mother's death, only that the food stopped coming. He heard noises above, the sounds of possessions dragged on the floor to be carted away as his father and siblings moved back to the city. For some time, he satisfied himself with the rodents that always find an abandoned house.

Then one day, he was filled with rage, yearning for escape, digging into the dirt walls, digging with strong hands and long nails. He dug his way from the basement and into the daylight, but the sun was painfully blinding; its heat felt like needles on his skin. So the creature, no longer a boy, but simply a creature, an “it”, began to dig its way around the woods, searching for the nourishment to continue its journey. A deer walks on the forest floor and, with an eruption of dirt, a hand stretches and pulls it below to be torn to pieces and consumed.

I am sure it hears us walking around, playing our games. It waits for the sound of someone walking alone, far from the safety of a cabin group. Do you know why Seminole cabin is the only one built on a foundation? Do you know why its logs are up and down rather than side to side like the rest? Years ago, the Ground Creature burst through the wood floor. In the fear and confusion that followed, a kerosene lamp fell over, starting a fire that burnt the cabin to the ground. You could hear the creature howling in pain and confusion at the intense heat and light. When they rebuilt it, they placed the cabin on concrete to block the creature's return.

Since that time, the creature has never attacked inside the camp area again, though I have heard stories of people tripping over nothing, sure that something touched their feet. I have seen holes in the woods that could be the site of an attack. Just to be safe, you should always take a buddy. If you feel the ground shake or the grip of its hand: Run! Run! Run!