An Alligator Smile?

Two-Toed Tom supposedly

mocked residents of Florida

and Alabama for years, killing

both people and livestock.



Battling a Monster Alligator

This painting by the French

artist LeMoyne shows Florida

Indians battling massive

alligators.



ExploreSouthernHistory.com - Two-Toed Tom, Alabama & Florida



ExploreSouthernHistory.com - Two-Toed Tom, Alabama & Florida



Two-Toed Tom - Alligator Monster of Florida and Alabama



A Descendant of Two-Toed Tom?

If the legends are to be believed, Two-Toed Tom is a

monstrous demon-possessed "bull gator."



A Deep South Monster Legend



The following is excerpted from the book

Two Egg, Florida: A Collection of Ghost

Stories, Legends and Unusual Facts . More

information on the book can be found at

www.exploresouthernhistory.com/dalecox .



The story was old even before writer and

University of Alabama professor Carl Carmer

heard it during the 1930s.



Deep in the swamps along the Alabama-

Florida border, residents told tales of

legendary battles with a monster they called

“Two-Toed Tom.” Carmer was fascinated

with the story and included it in his critically-

acclaimed but controversial book, Stars Fell

on Alabama .



When Carmer first learned of Two-Toed Tom,

at some point during the 1920s, the beast

was described as a “red-eyed hell-demon” in

alligator form, about fourteen feet long and

greatly feared by the rural residents along the

Florida line near Florala. The reptile had

been well-known in the area for more than

twenty years and was accused of eating

cows and mules and even blamed for

assaulting several local women. According to

Carmer, the monster received its name from

the unusual footprints it left behind.

Supposedly he had lost all but two of the toes

on his left front foot to a steel trap. Two-Toed

Tom also had survived numerous shootings

and at least one dynamite attack, none of

which seemed to have bothered him.



The well-known dynamite attack was

launched after the alligator emerged from the

swamps near Florala and killed a mule on

the farm of a local resident named Pap

Haines. The farmer had been waging a

twenty year war with Two-Toed Tom and was

so irate over the loss of his mule that he

decided to go after the beast with as much

firepower as possible.



According to Carmer’s account, Haines and

his son packed fifteen syrup buckets with

sticks of dynamite, lit the fuses, and threw the

buckets into the pond where the alligator was

believed to be hiding. The explosions

shredded every living thing in the pond,

uprooted trees and sent geysers of water

high up into the air.



No sooner had they ended their attack,

however, than the men – now joined by eight

of their neighbors – suddenly heard a

monstrous splashing sound from another

nearby pond. The splashes were punctuated

by the sounds of screams. By the time all the

men could reach the scene, all they could

see were the red eyes of Two-Toed Tom

sinking into the pond. The half-eaten

remains of Haines’ twelve year old

granddaughter were found on the shore.



A wave of sightings of a giant beast soon

spread through the Choctawhatchee River

and Holmes Creek swamps of Holmes,

Walton and Washington Counties, Florida.

Cattle and livestock disappeared from farms

and the countryside was generally terrorized

by this new threat that had crossed the line

from Alabama.



A monstrous alligator was spotted in Sand

Hammock Lake, a large body of water near

Esto in northern Holmes County. It could be

heard bellowing every morning and it was not

long before people began finding tell-tale two-

toed tracks in the sand.



A group of local teenagers who saw him

reported that he was much larger than

previously estimated - from eighteen to

twenty-four feet. Efforts to kill him with rifles

and shotguns failed.



In the 1980s, however, people who

remembered the tales were stunned by

news that Two-Toed Tom apparently was still

alive. An alligator “slide” or path of enormous

size was discovered on Boynton Island on

the Choctawahtchee. A monstrous gator had

walked across a sandbar and climbed the

muddy bank to the island. Close inspection

of the tracks revealed that one of its feet had

only two toes.



The discovery prompted a new frenzy of

monster reports and a reward for proof of his

existence sparked hunts for Two-Toed Tom

that even received national attention from

NBC news. Tom, however, was never found.



The legend of the demon-possessed

monster still lingers on and many believe

that it still hides somewhere in the swamps

of Northwest Florida and Southeast Alabama.



The story of Two-Toed Tom is a major part of

the folklore of the Esto area of Northwest

Florida, as well as of parts of South Alabama.

Similar stories have been told elsewhere

across the South, but Tom's tale is thought to

be the best documented.



An Alligator in the Florida Sun

Alligators once almost

vanished from the South, but

have rebounded in recent

decades.



A Large Alligator in Florida

This large alligator measured

over 10 feet, less than half of

the last reported estimate of

Two-Toed Tom's length.



Copyright 2011 & 2012 by Dale Cox

All rights reserved.



Last Update: November 14, 2012



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