American werecat sightings are truly rare, except in places such as traditional ethnic communities. Yet a few werecat sightings. or things that sound much like the werecat folklore of a hundred years ago, get reported by normal, modern Americans. These cases almost always involve the elusive semi-mythical "black panthers" of the eastern United States. One such occurrence happened about 1970, a mile south of Olive Branch, Illinois, on a road bordering Shawnee National Forest. A man named Mike Busby had his car stall along this road. As he was opening the hood, he heard a noise and looked around. He saw two slanted, green eyes glowing in the darkness. In a moment the creature possessing these eyes came into view: a black panther walking on its hind legs.
It jumped on Mike and cut his shirt to bits, scratching him badly on the left arm, chest, and belly. Mike held the mouth away from his neck by sheer force. The thing felt like it had short, wiry fur, and Mike could feel whiskers around the mouth. The creature smelled strongly of wet fur, even though it wasn't wet. It made growling sounds that were unlike the sounds a real cougar would make. In the headlights of passing vehicles, Mike saw the creature a bit more clearly. Its fur was a slick, shiny black like watered silk, and it had a strange tail. The animal seemed frightened by the lights and ran away. Mike Busby was certainly attacked by something. He was treated for minor injuries and got a tetanus shot in St. Mary's Hospital in Cairo. A truck driver named John Hartsworth claimed he saw the struggle on Ihe side of the road; he described the creature as a "big cat."
A Kansas resident named Ray Jones reported another sighting of one of these bipedal black panthers in 1998. He went out late one night to find out why his cows were disturbed, his geese were honking, and his dog was terrified. As it was a full moon, he had a good view of everything he saw. He decided that the animal causing these problems was probably in the henhouse, where the chickens were creating a horrible racket.
When he opened the door, expecting to find a stray housecat, he glimpsed a dark, growling shape nearly his own size. Then the creature jumped out of the door, pushing Ray over with the same motion and pinning him to the ground. As it came out into the bright moonlight, Ray got his first good look at it. It was definitely a black panther (a creature not supposed to exist in Kansas, especially since there has never been a confirmed sighting of a black-phase cougar). Once the big cat had pinned Ray, it seemed uncertain about what it was going to do next. Just then, Ray's dog came out and began furiously barking at the panther. Suddenly, the creature seemed to come to a decision. It let Ray go, eerily stood on its back legs in a very human way, and then dropped to all fours to exit the area.
In a report from 1964, campers in California notified authorities that two "cat people" were bothering them. These creatures were bipedal but rather short for humans, had no tails, spoke to each other with strange sounds that were unlike what either a cat or a human would make, and had heads that seemed to be attached to their bodies in an odd way. They were sighted three times before disappearing forever.