The Wolf of Schwaben Valley

Imagine you are an early settler of the great state of Pennsylvania. You are a very successful sheepherder who makes their living off of maintaining their flock. One day, you wake up and one of your sheep is dead; mauled to death by a predator. Soon, everyone in your neighborhood reports many of their sheep being killed or taken by wolves. You decide to put an end to this and go out hunting for these wolves. On your hunt, you see an old wolf crossing the road and shoot it. Injured, it limps off into the woods where it later succumbs to its injuries. You return the next day to locate the body of the wolf and instead you find an old man that has been shot and killed. 

According to a legend from the 1800s, out of Schwaben Valley located in Northumberland County, PA, there lived a community of sheepherders. In the community, there was a 12-year-old French girl named May Paul who looked after her family’s flock of sheep. One day she was visited by a strange old man who was known as an outsider, and had rumors swirling that he was a werewolf. This man appeared to be infatuated with May and when he was around her, the wolves that had been wreaking havoc on the community did not bother her or her family’s flock. One full moon night, one of the neighbors saw an old wolf crossing the road and shot it. The next morning, he followed the trail of blood and instead of finding a dead wolf, he found an old man who had been shot through the heart. The neighbor buried the body near the road and named it “die Woolf man’s grob” which translated to “Wolf Man’s Grave”. 

Read More