Feathered Monster
Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 25th, 2010
Harrisonburg Daily News
Harrisonburg, Virginia]
February 16, 1909
PAGE COUNTY MYSTERY.
Covered with Feathers, Head Like
Horse, Barked Like Dog.
A county correspondent of the Page Courier says: Mr. R. L. Williams, near Cave Hill, one night recently, while on his way home from Luray, encountered some strange creature. According to Mr. Williams’ description, its body was covered with feathers, had a head like a horse, and barked like a dog! This strange creature (it is said) had previously been seen in Roanoke, then in Baltimore – no doubt on the hunt of Bob then! Bob says he was in close proximity to the creature. He turned pugilist then, putting in a right hand upper cut, but coming wide of the mark, the[n] took to his heels and fled!
Thanks to Jerome Clark for this item.
What is intriguing is that during this same year, newspapers across the Northeast and in NY-NJ spread the tales of the sightings of the winged “New Jersey Devil.” Those, it turns out, were based on a real estate hoax.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
There is only one animal that I feel fits this description. An animal covered in feathers, having a face the approximate shape of a horses &, possibly, letting out growls with each breath that could sound like a medium/ large-sized dog barking.
A Deinonychus, though what one was doing in Virginia in 1909 is beyond me.