A report that was originally sent to the Pittsburgh Gazette describes encounters with what the residents of Mahaffey, PA called a 'wild man.' Could it have been a Bigfoot?
The Wild Man of Mahaffey
"A dispatch from Mahaffey to the Pittsburgh Gazette says: "The people of this village are trying to solve a mystery. On Saturday, May 26, a gentleman driving along the road leading from Curwensville to this place [Mahaffey], noticed smoke issuing from a pine thicket on the south side of the river a mile below Mahffy. In the center of the thicket is an old tumble-down log stable, used years ago by lumbermen for their horses. The ground adjacent to the thicket is an open pasture for cattle.
On Sunday last, while Mr. Johnston was looking for his cow, he noticed a man suddenly bound out of the stable and make for the woods as if afraid to meet a fellow creature. On other occasions, this same man has been seen but always fled like a wild animal when observed.
Yesterday squire W.W. Mcquown and Emery Mahaffey made an investigation of the place and found in the old stable a rude bed made of hemlock boughs and a fireplace a few feet from the couch, where the strange individual cooked his meals. No person was to be seen, however.
The hermit had evidently noticed the approach of the party and escaped to the mountain a short distance back from his lonely habitation. A den of rattlesnakes, only a few hundred feet from his camp, which is the terror of the neighborhood, must certainly furnish weird music for the lone citizen.
The hermit is a man about 40 years of age, with a tall and commanding figure. His hair and beard are unkempt, and he looks as though he has been roughing it for months. Who is he? That is the question the people of Mahaffey are anxious to have answered."
Source: The Indiana Progress (Indiana, PA - 6/13/1888)
NOTE: The present-day area (in Clearfield County) is well-known for Bigfoot sightings. Lon
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