American Folklore Stories retold by S.E. Schlosser

The Cussing Quilt
A man ignores a promise he made to his dying wife, with dire consequences.
The Thunderers
Three men set out on a hunting expedition, but when one breaks his leg, the others abandon him in a pit rather than risk their lives carrying him home. The wounded hunter is rescued instead by a mysterious hermit who is not what he seems…
The Catskill Witch
At the peak of this mountain lived the Catskill witch who managed the weather for the whole of the Hudson Valley.
Origin of the Wind
Napioa, the Old Man who made the earth, is determined to have the bags that hold the summer and winter, so he asks prairie chicken to take them from the lodge where they are kept by man and woman.

Ghost Stories

The Cussing Quilt
A man ignores a promise he made to his dying wife, with dire consequences.
The Salt Witch
A pillar of snowy salt once stood on the Nebraska plain, about forty miles above the point where the Saline flows into the Platte, and people used to call it the Salt Witch.
Prison Break
Callahan was huddled in a cavern near the Pacific Ocean when the Feds closed in. There were still shreds of human flesh under his fingernails when the serial killer surrendered to the inevitable capture. They could put him behind bars, he vowed as they dragged him down the narrow path toward the waiting cars, but he would escape. And then they’d be sorry
The Bloody Mary Ritual
We were having a sleepover at my house that Saturday night. Me and my four best friends; Alex, Bianca, Sabrina, and Lacey. We made cookies and watched movies and did our hair and makeup. By midnight, we’d run out of planned activities. It was time to improvise. “Let’s try that Bloody Mary thing,” Lacey suggested.
Yancey’s Ghost
Yancey was a quirky old-time pioneer, gold prospector and Civil War veteran —perhaps the last of that breed—who came to Yellowstone in the 1870s and built a hotel in “Yancey’s Hole”; current day Pleasant Valley near Roosevelt Lodge.

The Cussing Quilt
A man ignores a promise he made to his dying wife, with dire consequences.
The Catskill Witch
At the peak of this mountain lived the Catskill witch who managed the weather for the whole of the Hudson Valley.
The Trickster Tricked
In which Terrapin the Turtle outwits the Trickster Rabbit

Jean Sot Goes Fishing
Jean Sot was sitting gloomily on the dock of the marina casting a fishing line into the Bayou when his friend Boudreaux (Boo-dro) walked by. “Why are you so gloomy, mon ami?” Boudreaux asked his friend. “Oh Boudreaux, I had a terrible dream,” Jean Sot said, waving the tip of his fishing pole for emphasis…
One Short
There is a tale once told of a Mississippi riverboat captain who called all of the passengers to the top deck in the middle of the night. When the announcement was made, everyone hurried topside, wondering fearfully what had occasioned the disruption in their sleep.
First Things First
Well, the spring floods here in Vermont are mighty fierce, doncha know. One young farmer named Tom got trapped one year when the river started rising near his place. He watched the water creep up to his front porch, and then through the front door, and then on up the steps until he and his wife were trapped in their upstairs bedroom.

Snippity-snip, snap and store,
Of American Folklore there’s plenty more!