THE WOOD BOOGER
THE WOOD BOOGER
CULPEPER COUNTY, VA 1995
The Wood Booger is a Bigfoot-like creature said to roam the forests of South West Virginia. The name "Wood Booger" was given to the creature because it was often rumored to carry off young children like the boogy man. This cryptid was featured in the Animal Planet TV show Finding Bigfoot episode Virginia is for Bigfoot Lovers. There have been a particularly large amount of sightings outside the town of Saltville, Virginia.
Since this visit, the city of Norton, VA has many attractions named after the Wood Booger. This city has also been named as a sanctuary for the Wood Booger. Since 2014, an annual WoodBooger festival is held where visitors can go on guided tours to search for the creature. A statue of the Wood Booger is located at the Flag Rock Overlook. The Wood Booger Bar and Grill is named after the creature and many local business sell merchandise of the Wood Booger. In September, a geocaching event named the WoodBooger Geo Trail is held in the Flag Rock Recreation Area.
William Dranginis heads the Virginia Bigfoot Research Organization. Based in Aldi, Va., he takes reports of sightings, does interviews and even goes onsite looking for the elusive “hairy man.”Dranginis works full time for defense contractor Northrop Grumman and had little or no interest in Bigfoot until 1995. In March of that year, Dranginis and two friends were trying out a new metal detector in Culpeper County, Va. The three were looking for treasure in and around old gold mine shafts in the area. The mines were active during the Civil War. After a long morning of searching with no luck, they were returning to their vehicle on a country back road. “The two guys with me were FBI agents, one of them did three tours in Vietnam. Suddenly he threw up his arm and stated that there was a man behind a tree up ahead,” said Dranginis. Both agents drew their guns and pushed Dranginis to the rear.“I was looking in the area where a man’s head would be and then about three feet above that a black hairy face came out from behind the tree,” Dranginis added.
The creature then moved across the road from left to right and made its way into the forest.“It moved with a fluid motion, it was covered in black hair. The shoulders were huge and you could see an area of gray on the upper back.”That event led him down a new path and into his current role as VBRO director. A search of his website found several reports of sightings in and around Southwest Virginia.Currently Dranginis is working an active case in Washington County near Saltville. A couple from North Carolina bought remote property in the area and were using it for camping. “The area is remote and can only be accessed by ATV. Their first night camping, they began to hear screams close by and got scared. They jumped on their ATV and left everything at the campsite,” said Dranginis. “As they drove off the husband turned around and saw something dark and close to 8 feet tall running behind them.”The couple waited over a week before returning for their equipment.They gave the VBRO permission to investigate the site. “We got some interesting audio the first night. Something screamed at us with an intensity that vibrated the tent. I took out my thermal image camera but did not see anything,” Dranginis added.He positioned cameras that take pictures every five seconds from sunup until sundown and can be active for six to eight weeks. He plans on returning in the next couple of months to retrieve the data.While he gets three to four reports of Bigfoot a month, they are mostly concerning sounds rather than an actual sighting.“I have had reports from law enforcement, doctors and lawyers that claim to have seen Bigfoot, a lot along the I-81 corridor. Sightings in the area of High Knob have been reported for the past several years.
