The story
The Jersey Devil belongs to the Pine Barrens, the vast pine wilderness of southern New Jersey, and its birthplace in legend is Leeds Point on the marshy Atlantic edge: there, the story runs, in 1735 Mother Leeds cursed her thirteenth child, which was born a winged, hoofed thing that shrieked and flew up the chimney into the pines. Folklorists trace the tale to colonial-era feuds around the real Leeds family and their almanac's devilish imagery, but the creature long ago outgrew its origins: the great panic of January 1909 saw reported sightings, strange hoofprints in snow and school closures across the Delaware Valley, and sightings, sounds and track-finds have been claimed ever since, making the Devil the state's official demon and the namesake of its hockey team. Leeds Point today is a quiet shore hamlet beside the Edwin B. Forsythe wildlife refuge; there is nothing to tour, only pines, marsh and story. The record should present the Devil wholly as folklore — one of America's richest legends — with the 1909 panic its documented historical high-water mark.