Behind the Frogman — that is, a person disguised as the elusive creature of Loveland lore, the real reason we gathered together in a Cincinnati suburb’s conference center — was Jeff Craig: the founder and organizer of the Frogman Festival, which officially started in 2023.
Craig, a cartographer and supporter of many cryptid and paranormal events, is, in some ways, my own personal Frogman.
Two days before the festival, I was forwarded an email from someone mononymously known as Brandi. Brandi and I have similar email handles, and she ostensibly receives some mail meant for me. Though, the magnitude of that truth remains vague, as I’ve only seen the one forwarded email so far.
Craig had seemingly reached out, through Brandi, thanking me for previewing this year’s Frogman Festival, and to offer me a media pass for the weekend. But since I’d already planned on attending the cryptid celebration, perhaps because my experience at last year’s Mothman Festival wasn’t enough, I bought tickets a month prior.
Still, I thought I might try to track down Craig, just as attendees do the Loveland Frog (i.e. seek merchandise inspired by the cryptid and adjacent creatures), and to maybe get an interview.
Once again I traveled with my Sasquatch-obsessed friend, John Dubuc, as well as Ward Lawson, a newcomer to this type of festival. The three of us perused the aisles of artisans, vendors, authors and detached salespeople capitalizing on the mysterious, the unknown and the weird.
As we checked in, I briefly mentioned to the staff that there might be a media pass for me, even dropping Jeff’s name for good measure. But there was no such pass to be found. When I asked where Jeff might be, a staffer said: “he’s around here somewhere.”
And so, with that nebulous bit of information, much like the foggy details of the Loveland cryptid since its initial 1950s sightings, my search for Frogman began.
The entry hallway, sparsely adorned with setups, gave us a good taste of things to come. In a side conference room, called the Lily Pad, I got a quick glimpse of the Wump Mucket Puppets playing to a packed house, but only enough of a glimpse to know that it wasn’t quite worth standing for. So we headed into the main vendor area, called the Terrarium for one festival weekend a year, making mental notes of what odd souvenirs we deemed worth spending money on.
Paranormal podcasters and media personalities filled in the gaps between handcrafted and mass-produced products inspired by Ohio legends and beyond: the Mothman, the Flatwoods Monster and the Grassman were all represented on shirts, patches, stickers, prints and more.
Some keynote speakers gave away free tchotchkes and pushed their set times, while others speakers, not on the official agenda, wore headset mics and orated from behind their booths to anyone who would listen.
At a corner table, a sign read: “Do you believe in the Loveland Frog?” Two plastic boxes held pennies to tally the vote. The “No” box held significantly more. But regardless of whether we believe, we were all there on account of the Frogman.
Given I have a decent market share of graphic tees to my name already — I wore an “I know what I saw” T-shirt to the festival, as if to prove this point — I consciously avoided booths that I’d normally gravitate toward. Instead I focused on the more artisanal (i.e. pricey and unique) end of things.
At one booth, I found a miniature needle felt Frogman, and a custom print of Mothman as “the girl” in a take-off on Vermeer’s “Girl with a Pearl Earring.” At another, a whimsical painting of the Fresno Nightcrawlers affixed in a potentially haunted frame purportedly found in Edinburgh — subsequently smudged with palo santo upon entering my apartment.
After John and Ward found some goods — oracle decks, more needle felt Frogmen — all three of us eventually bought cryptid-themed patches for jackets we’re not going to sew them onto.
Through all of the searching, and the inevitable money spent browsing such conventions, Jeff Craig was nowhere to be found. If only because I had no clue what he looked like.
However, the Frogman — a short, big-headed, slimy, potentially extraterrestrial creature with a sparking magic wand — is unmistakable.
Sure, maybe the descriptors have gone through a years-long game of telephone, and the initial sightings had no such evidence of any frog-like characteristics. And maybe it was just an abnormally large tailless iguana deceased on the side of the road in Loveland, Ohio, in the ‘50s. But for some reason, the legend of Ohio’s most milquetoast cryptid — right behind the Kirtland Melonheads — brought a bunch of random people with similar strange interests together for a weekend.
And Jeff Craig, the man I now know was the guy walking behind the costumed Frogman in the noon parade, played a big part in that by founding yet another annual cryptid celebration.
On our way out, stocked up on gifts and odd wall art, we stopped at one more booth. As a cartographer, and as a fan of the paranormal, Craig creates scenic maps that play into both of his interests. John, Ward and I all buy the 2022 edition of “Map in Black: A Mysterious Map of North America,” which Craig authored, logging ancient sites, extreme and haunted locations and unexplained mysteries throughout the US.
It didn’t even cross my mind that Jeff Craig was the guy we all handed $20. And his name was on the banner.
He’s around here somewhere. Sometimes that means he’s right in front of you.
Brandon Berry writes about the Dayton and Southwest Ohio music and art scene. Have a story idea for him? Email branberry100@gmail.com.
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