StanCourtney

Saturday, 12 May 1973

Wabash “monster” being sought

Robinson Daily News

Enfield, Ill. (UPI) –

An anthropology student who has made a study of sightings of ape-like creatures plans to hunt the , “Enfield monster” with a camera and a tape recorder today.

Loren Coleman, 25, who is studying at the University of Illinois at Urbana after putting in three years at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, said he and two friends will attempt to locate a creature reported sighted during the last week around this White County community.

Coleman, who said he has been collecting data on such sightings for 10 years, said he believes the creature may be a type of anthropoid ape. “These are not the first such monster reports and they won’t be the last,” he said Friday.

Coleman said he decided to look for the creature today after talking with Rick Rainbow, news director at radio station WWKI, Kokomo, Ind., who with three companions said he saw an ape-like creature near Enfield last Sunday. Rainbow tape recorded sounds he said were made by the creature.

The sound on Rainbow’s tape is similar to an elephant call, Coleman siad. He added he has hear the Saimang ape give such a call.

Rainbow said he and his group saw a 5 to t 1/2 foot tall creature, grey-black [sp] in color, in the open end of an abandoned barn about half a mile north of Enfield. The creature let out a shriek and fled, he said.

First reports of the “Enfield monster” came from Henry McDaniel, a disable war veteran, who said a hair creature scratched on his door about 9:30 p.m. April 25. He said he saw it again on a railroad track near his home last Sunday.

Coleman said reports of an ape-like creature came from Canton, Ala., in 1960 and casts were made of tracks found in the area.

There was a report of a creature near Bridgeport in Lawrence County in 1962 and another report from Jackson County in 1942 of an ape-like creature that leaped 20 to 40 feet across highways, Coleman said.

Then in 1971 there was some flack about a “skunk ape” in Florida because the creature gave off some sort of odor,” he said.

In 1941, Coleman said, a Reverend Harpole was hunting in the woods near Bonnie, south of Mount Vernon when a creature jumped out of the trees, knocked off the minister’s hat and dislodged a pipe in his mouth.   The startled clergyman whacked the creature on the head with his shot gun barrel and it fled, Coleman said.

Monday, May 07, 1973

‘It’s Something That’s There” – Monster Lurks Along Wabash

The Coshocton (Ohio) Tribune

Enfield, Ill. (UPI) – Henry McDaniel said he’s seen it twice: a gray, hairy, three-legged monster standing tall like a human being with pink-reflecting eyes bulging from a huge head.

The second time was Sunday morning, after his original report on the monster had brought newsmen, police, anthropologists, experts on unidentified flying objects and the just plain curious to the Wabash River Valley to investigate.

McDaniel, a disabled war veteran, said they found footprints covering the woodland areas around his home. The tracks were three to five inches across with six toes and little hoof marks, he said.

Ed Phillips, a pet shop owner from Kokomo, Ind., came out to look around and verified McDaniel’s description of the tracks.

“It couldn’t be a hoax.” Phillips said. The tracks were hidden under dense bush as well as in the open, he said. Plaster casts were made.

McDaniel said the first time he saw the monster was about 9:30 p.m. on the night of April 25. His family heard a scratching noise at the back door and he went to investigate.

“When I first saw it, I thought it was an animal. I went back (inside the house) and got a gun and a flashlight.” he said. “It was right about three feet from me, I wasn’t scared.

“Then I saw those pink eyes shine at me like a reflector on a car. It had pink eyes, a large head and was a kind of dirtyish gray color …hairy…about four or five feet tall. Standing righ in front of the door on three legs just like a human being.”

McDaniel said he shot at the monster four times.

“I knew I hit it once,” he said. The monster, he waid, hissed, leaped 75 feet in three jumps and disappeared down the the railroad tracks near his home.

Sunday morning, about 3 a.m. CDT, the barking of his dogs awakened McDaniel and he opened his door and looked out. He said he saw the same three-legged monster on the railroad tracks 75 feet away.

“I wasn’t scared,’ he said. “I’d like to have it as a pet and charge admission. It’s something that’s there and we’ve got to accept it.”

Saturday, December 07, 1985

Reliving the tale of the Big Muddy Monster

By Ann Schottman Knol

The huge creature was the stuff of nightmares.

Monster sightings

– note – the entire article is located here:

Reliving the tale of the Big Muddy Monster – Jackson County, Illinois

Because of the reference to Union County I placed that excerpt here in Union County, Illinois

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July 16, 1972: A jogger reported seeing something like the Big Muddy Monstrer near the Ohio River levee at Cairo. (Alexander County)

June 26 – July 1973: Nine people reported seeing it in four separate incidents in Murphysboro. (Jackson County)

Sept. 2, 1974: Three Anna youths reported seeing it in the Beach Grove area near Wolf Lake. (Union County)

Jan. 26 1975: Four truckers, traveling separately, radioed in reports of seeing a “bear-like” creature along Illinois 3, near the Illinois 149 junction west of Murphysboro. (Jackson County)

July 7, 1975: Two Murphysboro men reported something they thought my have been the Big Muddy Monster near a pond in the Harrison community, north of Murphysboro. (Jackson County)

June 19, 1976: Three youths said they saw “something” near the Westwood Hills Subdivision – the area of two previous sightings. (Jackson County)

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At least 21 people reported seeing what was called the Big Muddy Monster in 12 separate incidents between Jul 26, 1972 and June 19, 1976. Seven reports came from in or near Murphysboro, one from Cairo and one from near Wolf Lake.

There have been no reported sightings in the past nine years. But the people who saw it still swear by their sightings.

Another man, Eddie Pitts, who reported seeing the thing near Wolf Lake (Jackson County), also declined to be iinterviewed.

“It was there, but nobody believed us then and nobody will believe us now. We were made out at the time to be fools,” he said.

Monday November 06, 2006

Did a hairy monster stalk Tazewell County, Illinois?

By Nick Vogel

Pekin Daily Times

Pekin, Illinois – Thirty-four years ago in Tazewell County, 100 armed men walked the woods around East Peoria’s Cole Hollow Road in search of a monster.

The search was called off about 7:45 p.m. when one of the men accidentally shot himself in the foot. The creature was never found.

The monster hunters were looking for was dubbed the Cohomo Monster, a beast thought to be lurking in Tazewell County in the summer of 1972.

James Donahue, Tazewell County Sheriff in 1972, still remembers the infectious hysteria of that summer.

“At the time it was a very big deal,” Donahue recently told the Pekin Daily Times. “Several people indicated they’d seen a monster up in that area. It was described as something like Bigfoot. All the neighbors showed up. We spent a lot of time up there. We never found anything to substantiate the claims. We were up there for a week or two weeks. A lot of volunteer people came out looking for this monster.”

On Tuesday, July 25, 1972, Creve Coeur authorities reported that a witness saw something big swimming in the Illinois River. The following evening, the Tazewell County Sheriffs Department received a call from a Eureka man who said he and his family were having a birthday party in Fondulac Park in East Peoria. The witness said he and his party saw strange lights come in a vertical position and go down behind some trees. The light allegedly left a vapor or smoke trail.

That same night, more than 200 phone calls about monster sightings jammed the switchboard at the East Peoria Police Department.

On July 28, a rural Pekin woman reported that she saw Cohomo while picking berries by an old coal mine. The woman told the Tazewell County Sheriff’s office she was so scared she ran off, leaving her purse behind.

That same night, East Peoria Police said two reliable citizens claimed they saw Cohomo. It was described as 10 feet tall. The creature’s face had long, gray U-shaped ears and a red mouth with sharp teeth. The reliable citizens said the creature possessed thumbs with long second joints and looked like a cross between an ape and a cave man.

Newspaper articles of the time suggest that Cohomo had a horrible smell, sometimes compared to that of a wet dog, rotten eggs, or as sulphur-like. The Cohomo craze swept over Tazewell County.

It’s hard to pin down exactly when and where all the excitement over the Cohomo monster started. Old articles found in the Daily Times archives blame a monster called Momo who was first spotted in rural northeastern Missouri a year before the Tazewell County sightings.

One of the first Illinois reports came from Randy Emert, then 18, of Peoria, who claimed he spotted some type of hairy creature in the woods near Cole Hollow Road in Tazewell County. Emert said he didn’t report seeing the monster at first because he feared people would think him crazy.

In 1991, the Peoria Journal Star received a phone call from Emert, who said that he made the whole thing up. Emert told the newspaper that he and his friends made the story up to scare another friend who worked late nights at a gas station.

But one remains. If Cohomo was the product of mass hallucination, caused by the sightings of a Missouri monster called Momo, why did only the citizens of Tazewell County invent the elusive beast?

And although he has no idea what it may have been,  Donahue says he thinks somebody may have seen something.

July 26, 1972

Man Reports Seeing ‘Hairy Creature’ In Woods Near Cole Hollow Road

The Pekin Daily Times

A Peoria youth reports he has seen a large, hairy creature in the East Peoria area near Cole Hollow Road.

Randy Emert, 18 of 3527 Twelve Oaks, Peoria says he and many friends have seen some type of “hairy” creature in the woods near Cole Hollow Road in East Peoria. Randy says he first saw the “creature about two months ago but that he didn’t report it at that time because ” people would think we’re crazy.”

When he heard about the story of a “monster” sighted in Louisiana, Mo., he decided to come forward with his own story. Randy said he first heard about a “creature” in the Cole Hollow Road area about a year ago from a friend. He reports he has seen it twice in the last two months. He claims there are footprints “all around up there,” and that they show three big toes.

Randy describes the “creature” as being between 8 and 12 feet tall, “kinda white and it moves quick.” The teenager also claims he has heard the “creature” several times and says it “lets out a long screech kinda like an old steam engine whistle, only more human.”

He says a friend in Wisconsin has photographs of the footprints. Randy says many of his friends have seen the footprints or the “creature” but don’t want their names mentioned. He says he is not ” doing this for publicity, “adding he “believes this is for real.”

Saturday, September 08, 1883

A Roaming Madman – Startling Experiences of An Illinois Lady with a Wild Man – As Naked as the Day He was Born

The Saturday Herald – Decatur, Illinois

Centreville, Ill., Sept . 4 – A wildman, naked as Adam, has been roaming around the country in this vicinity for several days, causing intense excitement and consternation among the farmers’ families.

His long tangled beard and matted hair, his tall athletic form and the fierce look out of his eyes make him an exceedingly unpleasant person to meet in a lonely spot. He is begrimed with dirt from head to foot, for he never gets a bath except when it rains or when necessity compels him to wade a creek in search of prey.

He was seen by the wife of Dr. John Saltenberger, who lives about three miles west of this place. Mrs. Saltenberger was returning home shortly after nightfall, and was near the Stelzelriede farm. The wild man crept stealthily out of the orchard, and when near the buggy, made a rush to stop the horse.

The lady gave the animal a frantic cut with the whip, and he bounded along the road at a furious pace, but almost before she had recovered her breath, the wild man had overtaken her and leaped into the vehicle from behind. He uttered not a word, and seemed immediately to become as badly frightened as the lady herself.

He spring down and ran rapidly towards the woods. A telephone message was sent to Belleville, yesterday, asking the sheriff to come and capture the creature. Young men of the settlement are searching the woods in every direction today, but some of them are not over anxious to encounter the monster.

Superstitious persons declare it to be the ghost of one of the Stelzelriede family, five of whom were murdered and robbed about eight years ago. Others are puzzled to decide whether it is the Missing Link or an escaped lunatic.

Thursday, June 12, 1890

Stackmer’s Bend Wild Man

Davenport (Iowa) Morning Tribune

STACKMER’S BEND, near Jacksonville, Ill., is much alarmed over the presence of a wild man in a section of wood near town.