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Wild Man Of Arizona

Wild Man Of Arizona image
Parent Issue
Day
3
Month
July
Year
1903
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

Wild Man Of Arizona

Strange Being Encountered by a Hunter In the Grand Canyon.

Many strange stories have been told of the wild man of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, and, while some persons have believed these weird tales, they have for the most part been regarded as the ingenious inventions of imaginative travelers and have passed into tradition as such. But, according to I. W. Stevens of Cedar, Colo., the wild man is not a myth, and he gives a thrilling account of an encounter he had with the creature.

"Two years ago," says Mr. Stevens, "I had business in the northwestern part of Arizona that took me in the neighborhood of the extreme lower end of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado river in Mohave county, Ariz. Having some time on my hands, I made a trip up the canyon. A few miles above the entrance I landed from my boat.

"The third day of my stay I saw the head of a man on a bench of rocks on the north side of the river. Evidently he was seated on the edge of a cliff some distance above my camp. I rowed up stream a little above the point where I saw the man's head and part of his shoulders above the grease wood brush. Climbing up to the bench, I had some difficulty in finding a place that I could get over the ledge and be on a level with my strange neighbor.

"I finally succeeded in approaching closer to the point. I saw sitting on a large bowlder a man with long white hair and a matted beard that reached to his knees. The creature was unaware of my approach, and I gazed up on him for some moments unobserved. He was about fifty yards away in full view. He wore no clothing, and upon his talon-like fingers were claws at least two inches long. A coat of gray hair nearly covered his body, with here and there a spot of dirty skin showing. I had found the 'wild man' of the rocks!

"At that moment a rock loosened by some animal came rolling down. The creature turned his face toward me. Horrors! What a face. It was seared and burned brown by the sun, with fiery green eyes. With a wild whoop and a leap he was off up over the rocks and cliffs like a mountain sheep for about seventy-five yards. Then he stopped. He was armed with a queer shaped club, large enough to fell an ox. Brandishing this bludgeon he shrieked and chattered for a moment, then started toward me, roaring and still flourishing his weapon. Faster and faster he came, and my hair began to stiffen.

"I am a poor runner, so I stood my ground. When the creature was within about fifteen yards of me I raised my rifle to fire, thinking to cripple him. As I glanced along the barrel I heard a deep growl just above the wild man. Looking up I saw a she cougar and two half grown cubs. The mother cougar crouched, with tail lashing, ready to spring on the wild man. He also had heard the growl and he braced himself for the shock.

"I drew a hasty bead on the cougar and pressed the trigger. When the smoke had cleared away the mother cougar lay dead where the wild man had stood. The man himself had disappeared. The two young cougars were still on the rock, apparently greatly frightened by the report and echoes of my old Sharp's rifle.

"Reaching hastily for a cartridge, I found I had neglected to buckle on my belt when leaving camp, so I hastily retreated to the boat, where I found everything I had left it. I shoved the boat off and drifted toward camp, which was near the cougars. There lay the old cougar where she had fallen. The wild man was standing over the two cubs, which were also dead, he having beaten the life out of them with his club. He stood for a moment gazing on the carcasses, then got down on his hand and knees and drank the warm blood, as it flowed from the death wounds. The sight sickened me.

"I stood up in the boat and yelled. The man sprang to his feet, took a long look at me, then fled up from ledge to ledge until he reached the top and disappeared."