and worst of all, no explanation of its origins that doesn't require belief in the supernatural." Outdoorsman and author Tom Brown Jr. spent several seasons living in the wilderness of the Pine Barrens. He recounts occasions when terrified hikers mistook him for the Jersey Devil, after he covered his whole body with mud to repel mosquitoes. Medical sociologist Robert E. Bartholomew and author Peter Hassall cite the 1909 series of sightings (and the subsequent public panic) as a classic example of mass hysteria begun by a regional urban legend. One New Jersey group called the "Devil Hunters" refer to themselves as "official researchers of the Jersey Devil", and devote time to collecting reports, visiting historic sites, and going on nocturnal hunts in the Pine Barrens in order to "find proof that the Jersey Devil does in fact exist." Due in part to their isolated and undeveloped nature, the Pine Barrens have themselves fostered various folk legends. Apart from the Jersey Devil, many other legends are associated with the Pine Barrens; supernatural creatures and ghosts said to haunt the pine forests include the ghost of the pirate Captain Kidd, who supposedly buried treasure in the Pine Barrens and is sometimes allegedly seen in the company of the Jersey Devil; the ghost of the Black Doctor, the benevolent spirit of an African-American doctor who, after being forbidden from practicing medicine due to his race, entered the Pine Barrens to practice medicine in the isolated communities of the Barrens and is said to still come to the aid of lost or injured travelers; the ghost of the Black Dog, which, unlike many black dog legends, is usually portrayed as harmless; the ghost of the Golden-Haired Girl, the spirit of a girl who is said to be staring out into the sea, dressed in white, mourning the loss of her lover at sea; and the White Stag, a ghostly white deer said to rescue travelers in the Barrens from danger. There are also folk tales concerning the Blue Hole, an unusually clear blue and rounded body of water located in the Pine Barrens between Monroe Township, Gloucester County and Winslow Township, Camden County and often associated with the Jersey Devil. Writing in Jan Harold Brunvand's American Folklore: An Encyclopedia, Rutgers Professor Angus Kress Gillespie called the Jersey Devil "an obscure regional legend" for most of its existence, and said that "after more than 250