Return of the 'Monk'

Some months ago, I posted about the wild animal which terrorized the Latrobe area in the late summer and autumn of 1945. Although it was usually said to be a monkey, it's tempting to think of it as possibly a juvenile Bigfoot, since, after all, this is on the Chestnut Ridge. It seems to have first appeared in the Crabtree area and the predominant theory was that the animal was an escapee from a circus, according to the Pittsburgh article cited below.

A young boy from Lloydsville, Jerry Nolan, ran into his home in late August, having been chased by a monkey from a field. The boy's mother looked out a window to see the animal swiping at their furiously barking dog. After it struck at the dog, it turned tail and jumped over a four-foot fence. Latrobe police, gamesman Robert Reed, and veteran hunter John Horne went to Lloydsville to search for the ape, but to no avail ("Monkey, If There Is One, Still Eludes Folks of Latrobe Region", Connellsville Daily Courier, August 27, 1945).

On September 13, James Poole of Greensburg was bitten on the neck and hands by a monkey which dropped from a tree onto his shoulders. He was treated at Westmoreland Hospital by Dr. C.C. Crouse ("Greensburg Man Bitten By Monkey", Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Sept. 13, 1945).

This and the previous post constitute the extent of my knowledge on this case - at this time, anyway.

The 'Monk' of Wildcat Hollow (1945)

This has to take the prize for most misleading name in the annals of Forteana. While it gives the impression of a clerical, cassock-wearing phantom, this beast was nothing of the sort, being a "large rhesus monkey or a chimpanzee" that roamed the area between Latrobe and Ligonier in 1945.

The first real mention of the so-called 'monk' came on September 7, when an article appearing in the Altoona Mirror mentioned that the Reed School had been closed the day before due to sightings of the weird creature. It leapt into the midst of a corn roast being held at the school on the night of September 5, making off with two ears and displaying no fear of humankind. I'm assuming this was the incident which led to the closing of the school - as a local game warden (coincidentally also named Reed) said, "The parents won't let their children out of the house so long as the thing is on the loose. And we can't blame them." Reed had also been investigating the animal for a month, so presumably there's some earlier sightings, though I haven't seen them.

One of the witnesses to the animal was Paul Claycomb of Marietta, who said the 100-pound beast broke into his chicken house and stole one of the birds. His dog "almost broke down the door trying to get in the house when that thing came along."

Another article, appearing in the Indiana Evening Gazette the next day, reported another sighting of the beast, made the previous night. Two boys near Norvel, Norman White and Joseph Seville, were out in Seville's backyard with their dogs when they began to growl - swiveling their flashlights around the yard revealed the animal hiding nearby. One of the ubiquitous hunting parties was formed, but like practically every posse hunting a weird creature ever formed, all was for naught and they came up empty-handed.

And there the story seems to materialize and end. A predominant theory mentioned was that the ape escaped from a circus about six weeks before - isn't that the theory on any animal found where they aren't supposed to be?

This is probably the earliest sighting of a simian nature from the Chestnut Ridge I'm aware of, the Chestnut Ridge area of Westmoreland and Fayette counties being, apparently, the domain of Pennsylvania's resident Bigfoot population.

As a fun 'name game' aside, Wildcat Hollow might, or might not, be named after another weird creature - an article following up on the 1922 shooting of a long-tailed wildcat shot near Tinicum, Bucks county, says that the cats also inhabited the Chestnut Ridge.

Henry W, Shoemaker, Part IV: Long-tailed bobcats

Shoemaker's pamphlet "Felis Catus in Pennsylvania" describes an incident on January 16, 1922 in which a wildcat was killed in Nockamixon (Bucks County) by 16 year old Tunis Brady. Frightful screams had been heard in the vicinity for three years. A detailed description of the dead animal quoted in the pamphlet describes a cat about 2 1/2 feet in length and a foot in height, with a broad head. It was a smoky gray color, with yellowish patches on its undersides. It had an 11 inch long tail which was bushy and rather like a raccoon's. It had a white spot on its throat and was marked with black stripes. At the time, it was believed that the animal may have been similar to a European wildcat (Felis sylvestris) and the original article describing Brady's kill is quite clear on its not being a bobcat (Lynx rufus) or lynx (Lynx lynx).

Elsewhere in Shoemaker's article it is described how just such an animal was kept in the Philadelphia zoo, and labelled an "Indian Devil". Similar animals were to be found in the Blue Ridge Mountains and also in the Chestnut Ridge area in the western part of the state. In around 1920, Daniel Trouts killed two similar wildcats in the same area as Brady's kill. Robert Lyman's Forbidden Land describes these wildcats as being recorded from Potter County.

Karl Shuker has noted that long-tailed specimens of the normally short-tailed bobcat and lynx have been recorded. In fact, despite the early denials, the size of the animal and coloration meshes perfectly with commonly-accepted traits of the bobcat. The striped markings of the animal may not line up perfectly, but as some lynx subspecies such as the Iberian lynx have coats with a striped appearance, this is not out of the ordinary either.

Furthermore, bobcats can be melanistic (black). I have been wondering whether a melanistic long-tailed bobcat could account for some of the sightings of "black panthers" often recorded. Also, a wildcat with similar markings to the Nockamixon one could account for sightings of "tigers".

Caterpillars

Researcher Stan Gordon wrote a piece for the Paranormal News detailing a sighting which took place on June 27, 2009. A number of motorists travelling near Mt. Pleasant, in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, reported to Gordon the sighting of a creature which "looked like a giant caterpillar". It was about 7 inches in length, tapered at the ends and thicker in the middle, and appeared to be segmented. It was a blue-white color but the witness noted that it was not luminescent.

Within a few moments, the four witnesses encountered a second worm... and another... and another. In all, six or seven individuals were seen both in the road and beside it.

In September the same year, Brian Seech of the Center for Unexplained Events forwarded a second report to Stan Gordon, this one originating from Youngwood, again in Westmoreland County. This one was of what the witnesses first took to be a snake, about four feet long which before their eyes "broke" into eight smaller creatures anywhere between six and eight inches in length. The witnesses reported that each of these creatures seemed to have four legs, and was of a dark color, with a "shiny wet" texture.

Then, they claimed, the smaller animals assumed a ring-like position and then reformed into a large snake and slithered away.

Chad Arment has noted that the so-called hickory horned devil, the caterpillar of the regal moth, is the largest variety of caterpillar in Pennsylvania and can grow 6-7 inches long. The larvae have a greenish coloration and segmented appearance much like those in the first sighting. The witnesses did not to my knowledge report any sort of horn-like appendages that these larvae sport. Many people on websites note sightings of hickory horned devils from roadways and also note that they are highly visible from a distance.

As for the second sighting, Arment notes that there are a number of species of caterpillars which migrate in what is called a processional pattern; processionally-migrating caterpillars can at times be difficult to distinguish from one another, possibly giving the appearance of a snake. None of these processional caterpillars are known to exist in Pennsylvania. He does believe it possible, however, that there could be some present. The most famous is the pine processionary caterpillar. It is interesting that another detail of the second sighting claimed that after the snake broke apart, its components formed a ring-like pattern before it reformed; just such a pattern is shown in the photos on this page.

I had at first been thinking that the second sighting, at least, may have had some sort of mammalian explanation, rather than an entomological one; the wet-shiny appearance, four legs and dark color practically screamed otter or weasel (the barely 7-inch least weasel is native to the western half of the state). But these revelations (to me) of caterpillars of a similar size and appearance and that there are similarly-behaving caterpillars to the second sighting leads me to wonder whether there may be some as yet unidentified moth native to the state.

And obviously, such a thing would not be outside the realm of possibility at all!

I am in contact with Stan Gordon and will let you know if anything more develops.

Apologies to E.F. Benson for the title of this post, which is shamelessly ripped from the title of one of his stories.

More on the Tiger of Uniontown

The Pittsburgh Daily Courier ran an article on September 3, 2009 that went more in-depth about the sightings of a 'tiger' in Uniontown, Fayette County:

Call it a case of mistaken identity. Fayette County 911 received calls Tuesday evening of a tiger on the loose in the area of Carr and Rankin Air Shaft roads in North Union.

The "tiger" had not escaped from the Wild Animal Orphanage nor from Camelot Veterinary Clinic, both run by Dr. William Sheperd. All their big cats were accounted for. The cat was considerably smaller -- a domestic tabby.

No tiger was ever on the loose. No cougar was spotted, said authorities. Both the state Game Commission and Camelot Veterinary were swamped with calls about the animal.

A couple spotted the feline at 6:15 p.m. Tuesday and called 911 after 9 p.m.

Karen Osler, big-cat handler and wild-animal caretaker for the Wild Animal Orphanage, said she went to the house where a man and a woman had seen the animal, which they described to her as "bright orange."

"The woman told me at first it was a fox because it was so orange," Osler said. "She said it was maybe 2 feet long, 3 feet with its long tail. She said they'd seen it since June."

Osler did not identify the man or the woman.

Sheperd was on call to tranquilize the "tiger" and give it a home or release it, with permission of the Game Commission. Osler did not spot the cat Tuesday night, although a line of people armed with spotlights, rifles and pitch forks were gathering near the residence as she was leaving.

Osler received a second call from the pair Wednesday evening ,saying they had seen the same tiger again.

"I'm looking for this tiger," Osler said. "Dr. Sheperd is ready to come and tranq it. I look and about 100 yards away, it's an orange tabby cat walking in the field -- a short-haired, domestic tabby. I got 10 feet away from the cat, to show them a size comparison. The cat bolted about 20 feet away and stopped. It was 12 to 15 pounds -- an average tom cat."

Osler said cougars have been spotted in the area. She said she saw one near Camelot Veterinary five years ago, but they have tawny coats and avoid being spotted.

"I would rather be wrong than for it to be a displaced or misplaced exotic feline," she said, referring to the orange tabby.

Osler said she might return today with a humane trap and some food to remove the tom cat from the area.

"It's just amazing to me how the rumor has spread," she said. "People were locking up their pets and livestock, and a farmer in Lemont Furnace said three of his cows were attacked -- I would like to see those cows."

Osler said bear hunters sometimes misjudge distance and shoot what they think is a large black bear and end up shooting a cub that is closer than they thought. She also said she has encountered people who generalize and identify all feline species as "tigers."

"I don't doubt they believed what they saw was a tiger," she said.

"I'm hoping the community can calm down. It was a tabby cat. All our exotic cats are accounted for," Osler said.

A black-eyed hairy monster in Uniontown

The Paranormal News reports that on July 10, 2009 a hominid encounter was reported from Uniontown, Pennsylvania. The report was investigated by the Pennsylvania Bigfoot Society, who found that at around 6:00 PM, the witness' car swerved to avoid hitting a figure which approached the road. After a few moments, she saw the creature again running down the roadway. She described a dark humanoid shape, 6 feet or taller, She reported that the entire face wss hairy, and that the creature had round, black eyes with no apparent irises. The long-armed creature had a flat black nose, no visible mouth, and a head that was oddly elongated. Upon investigation, a series of scratches on the car's trunk were found.

Eric Altman of the Pennsylvania Bigfoot Society also reported that the witness described the being as more of a canine hominid than a Bigfoot.

'Tiger' in western Pennsylvania

ThePittsburghChannel.com reported on September 2, 2009 that a 'tiger' had been seen in Uniontown, Pennsylvania and elsewhere.

Some residents in Fayette County swear they've seen a tiger on the loose.

State police said they're keeping an eye out for the beast after sightings came in from all across the city.

Dispatchers said people calling in about the alleged tiger swamped their switchboard on Tuesday night.

However, on Thursday, the Pennsylvania State Police said a large cat expert from the wildlife sanctuary in Grindestone viewed the reported tiger and determined it was a tabby house cat of normal size.