FIELD FILE · RAYSTOWN-RAYLAKE & SEA MONSTERLOCAL LEGEND

Raystown Ray

Also known as Ray, Raystown Lake Monster

Raystown Lake, Huntingdon County, PennsylvaniaFIRST REPORTED: 2006LAKE & SEA MONSTERS

A shy, supposedly plant-eating serpent of Pennsylvania’s Raystown Lake, unveiled in a 2006 tourism press release and a fisherman’s blurry photo.

Raystown Ray is the resident monster of Raystown Lake, a 28-mile-long reservoir that winds through the ridges of Huntingdon County in central Pennsylvania. The lake itself is young: the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built the present dam between 1968 and 1973, flooding the valley of the Raystown Branch of the Juniata River and the site of an older, smaller dam. At around 200 feet deep near the dam, it is the largest lake lying wholly inside the state – deep enough, fans say, to hide something big.

Ray stepped into the spotlight in April 2006, when the Huntingdon County Visitors Bureau issued a playful press release announcing photos of a shadowy shape just below the surface, said to have been taken by a local fisherman near the visitor center that February. The release quoted Raystown Lake’s managing director, Dwight Beall, saying the creature had been in the lake “a while,” and a lake wildlife biologist, Jeff Krause, assuring readers that it must be a vegetarian, since nothing suggested it was eating fish or ducks. Cryptozoologist Loren Coleman, writing at the time, filed it as a probable tourist-promotion hoax, noting that people on the ground knew of no earlier local tradition.

Whatever its origins, the legend caught on. Ray got his own website, merchandise and even a song; regional newspapers and TV stations covered him; and in July 2010 the Syfy series Fact or Faked: Paranormal Files sent divers into the lake to look for him. Lake rangers told WJAC in 2017 that Ray was the legend visitors ask about most, and the county visitors bureau now calls him the region’s most widespread legend – a friendly, Nessie-style mascot rather than a menace.

Type
Lake & sea monster
Status
Local legend
First reported
2006
Best-known location
Raystown Lake, Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania
Also called
Ray, Raystown Lake Monster
Reported in
Pennsylvania

What witnesses describe

Usually pictured as a long, dark, serpent- or plesiosaur-like animal, seen as a large shadow or a hump just below the surface, or as an odd wake and ripples on calm water. Promoters describe him as gentle and herbivorous.

Where and when it’s seen

The deep, cold water of Raystown Lake, especially around Seven Points and the main channel; most reports come in the warmer months when boaters and anglers are on the lake.

Notable sightings

  1. February 2006The fisherman’s photos Near Seven Points, Raystown Lake

    According to the visitors bureau, a local fisherman photographed a large dark shape below the surface from near the visitor center, taking a series of 25 to 30 pictures.

  2. April 2006Ray is announced Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania

    The Huntingdon County Visitors Bureau released the photo with tongue-in-cheek quotes from lake staff, including a biologist’s verdict that Ray must be a vegetarian. Cryptozoology blogs spread the story within weeks.

  3. July 29, 2010Divers on the case Raystown Lake

    An episode of Syfy’s Fact or Faked: Paranormal Files investigated the photo and local reports with sonar and divers, finding nothing conclusive.

What could explain it?

  • Raystown Ray appears to have begun as a tourism promotion: he was introduced by the county visitors bureau, and investigators at the time found no earlier local tradition.
  • Large fish such as the lake’s big striped bass and muskellunge, swimming otters or beavers, boat wakes and floating logs can all produce the shapes and ripples people report.
  • The lake was created only in the early 1970s, so any large animal would have to have been introduced in living memory.

Legend, culture and tourism

Ray is a much-loved lake mascot: there is a Raystown Ray website, logo, merchandise and song, and he appears in regional TV travel shows, newspaper “monsters of Pennsylvania” features and the visitors bureau’s spooky-season storytelling.

Places to visit

Raystown Lake Visitor Center at Seven PointsHesston, Pennsylvania

The visitor center and overlooks near where the 2006 photos were said to have been taken.

Where it’s reported

Pennsylvania

Raystown Ray in the news

No recent headlines about the Raystown Ray. Our news desk checks every day — see all cryptid news.

Sources

First published · Updated

More like the Raystown Ray

An illustration recreating Sandra Mansi’s 1977 photo of a long-necked shape rising from Lake Champlain LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1819

Champ

Lake Champlain, New York–Vermont border

A long-necked monster said to live in Lake Champlain, made famous by Sandra Mansi’s 1977 photo and protected by local and state resolutions in the 1980s.

REGIONAL LEGEND The turquoise waters of Bear Lake on the Utah–Idaho border, ringed by mountains LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1868

Bear Lake Monster

Bear Lake, on the Utah–Idaho border

A serpent-like monster said to swim Bear Lake on the Utah–Idaho line, born of an 1868 newspaper story its own author later called a lie.

REGIONAL LEGEND Emerald Bay on Lake Tahoe, California, at golden hour – one of the lake’s best-known viewpoints LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1865

Tahoe Tessie

Lake Tahoe, California–Nevada border

A humped, serpent-like monster said to glide through the deep, cold water of Lake Tahoe – the Sierra Nevada’s friendly answer to Nessie.

REGIONAL LEGEND Cover of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service coloring book “Chessie: A Chesapeake Bay Story,” showing a friendly cartoon sea serpent LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1943

Chessie

Chesapeake Bay and its tidal rivers, Maryland and Virginia

A long, dark, serpent-like animal reported in the Chesapeake Bay since the mid-20th century, famously caught on a blurry 1982 home video off Kent Island.

REGIONAL LEGEND The White River at sunset, seen from near the boat launch at Jacksonport State Park, Arkansas LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1915

White River Monster

White River near Newport, Arkansas

“Whitey,” a gray, elephant-skinned giant of the White River near Newport, Arkansas – so famous that the state legislature gave it a legal refuge in 1973.

REGIONAL LEGEND A lobster boat emerging from fog on Casco Bay, Maine – the kind of foggy water where Cassie sightings were reported (no image of the creature exists). LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1779

Cassie

Casco Bay, off Portland and Cape Elizabeth, Maine

Maine’s great sea serpent: a long, snakelike animal reported in and around Casco Bay since the 18th century, last famously seen off Cape Elizabeth in 1958.

REGIONAL LEGEND