Loveland Frog
The upright frog-man of the Little Miami River.
- Region
- The Little Miami River at Loveland, Ohio, northeast of Cincinnati
- Documented sightings
- 4 reports →
Overview
The Loveland Frog — also the Loveland Frogman or Loveland Lizard — is a small bipedal amphibian reported from the banks of the Little Miami River in Loveland, Ohio. The record rests on three episodes: a 1955 roadside encounter publicized by UFO researcher Leonard Stringfield, two sightings by Loveland police officers in March 1972, and a 2016 report from Pokémon Go players at Lake Isabella. From that thin record it has grown into one of the Midwest's best-loved cryptids, and in April 2026 a bill was introduced in the Ohio House to make it the state's official cryptid.
Identification
Reported as three to four feet tall and upright, with leathery, hairless, greenish-gray skin, a wide frog-like face, and webbed hands and feet. Officer Ray Shockey estimated his at 50 to 75 pounds and said it crouched like a frog before standing to look at him; his colleague Mark Matthews added a tail. The 1955 witness described a group of three — four in some retellings — one of which raised a wand-like rod that threw sparks. The 2016 figure was described as a huge frog that stood up and walked on its hind legs.
Lore & Origin
Stringfield's CRIFO newsletter carried the 1955 report, keeping the witness anonymous; later retellings name him as Robert Hunnicutt, a name the early sources do not confirm. In 1972 Shockey watched a creature climb a guardrail toward the river on an icy night, and about two weeks later Matthews shot one on Kemper Road — though in 2016 he told WCPO it was a tailless pet iguana and called the frogman story "a big hoax." Skeptoid could find no contemporary newspaper or police record. None of that has slowed the legend: it inspired the bluegrass musical "Hot Damn! It's the Loveland Frog!" (2014) and the film "Frogman" (2023), and the city held its first "Return of the Frogman" festival in October 2024.