Case file · Folklore / legend
Uncle Monday, the alligator conjurer
In a 1934 essay Zora Neale Hurston recorded the Eatonville, Florida, legend of Uncle Monday, an African-born conjure doctor who escaped slavery and became an alligator in a lake near Maitland.
1934 CE · 28.63, -81.36 · status: legend
The account
People told Hurston he could not be harmed and could cure any illness. The story mixes African shape-shifting traditions with Florida's swamps.