Disclaimer: This article is based on actual news from the real world – honestly! However, it has been sprinkled with a healthy dose of satire.
COLUMBUS — In a rare moment of bipartisan accord, a Democrat from Lakewood and a Republican from Loveland have introduced House Bill 821, which would formally designate the Loveland Frogman as Ohio’s official state cryptid. The legislation describes the creature as “a frog-like, bipedal creature standing approximately four feet tall,” language that places it somewhere between a zoning code and a Dungeons & Dragons monster manual. Hopefully, this is the first step toward eventually merging their two districts into one called “Lovewood”.
Just a regular 4-foot walking frog. (Tim Bertelink/wikimedia)
Reps. Tristan Rader (D-13th) and Jean Schmidt (R-62nd) issued a joint statement framing the bill as a celebration of community identity rather than an endorsement of the creature’s existence. This is the legislative equivalent of saying “I’m not saying my uncle is Bigfoot, I’m just saying we should put him on the license plate in silhouette form and let people draw their own conclusions.” Schmidt represents Loveland itself, making the Frogman a constituent in the same way that her actual constituents are constituents, except with fewer property tax obligations and more reported encounters near the boot factory.
“This bill is about showcasing our communities,” Rader said. “The Loveland Frog is uniquely Ohio. It reflects the stories we tell, the places we’re proud of, and the creativity that makes our state worth celebrating.” This was framed as a tribute to folklore, but it can also be read as a damning admission.
The legend dates to 1972, when two Loveland police officers reported separate sightings of a large bipedal amphibian along the Little Miami River. One of those officers, Mark Mathews, has spent the intervening five decades trying to walk it back. His version, told repeatedly to local press and given again to WCPO this month, is that his partner Ray Shockey saw something near the Totes boot factory; that Mathews himself later saw something run across Kemper Road; that the something in question crawled under the guardrail rather than over it; and that — in his own words — “I know no one would believe me, so I shot it.” He then put it in his trunk.
The thing in the trunk turned out to be a 3-to-3.5-foot iguana missing its tail, which Mathews theorized had been someone’s pet before going feral and taking up residence near the warm wastewater pipes of the boot factory, which is also the most Ohio sentence ever assembled.
The bill cites the Frogman’s contribution to “books, documentaries, local festivals, artwork, merchandise, local tourism, and cryptid enthusiasts and researchers,” a list that does not include “an iguana that was shot in 1972 and is, presumably, still somewhere.” Loveland’s coffee shop, Mile 42, uses the Frogman as its logo. A 2023 found-footage horror film called Frogman exists. A 2016 couple playing Pokémon Go reported seeing the creature, marking the first recorded instance of a cryptozoological sighting aided by a Nintendo IP. Or they were tripping balls. One of those.
If passed, the Frogman would join Ohio’s growing cabinet of officially recognized fictional Ohioans, including a pending designation of Superman as state superhero and the buckeye as state candy. The buckeye is, technically, mildly poisonous when raw, the non-candy version that is. Superman is from either Krypton or Kansas, but either could also qualify him as a cryptid. The Frogman is an iguana. At this rate the state bird will be retroactively designated as the WKRP “as God as my witness” Flightless Turkey.
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