“Animal Without A Name” Caught
Posted by: Loren Coleman on September 21st, 2011
Catch Strange Animal
Hopping Along Highway
Washington, Pa., Aug. 22 (AP) – An “animal without a name,” which goes for vegetables and nuts in a big way, had the townsfolk puzzled today. No one could identify it.
The “watcha-call-it” has been viewed by hundreds since Saturday, when, hopping along the road like a kangaroo, it was corralled by a group of men and boys.
Its rear legs are like a kangaroo’s, its head and ears resemble those of a squirrel, and the eyes and nose bring to mind a rabbit. Its hair varies from brown to green.
Game Protector Carl Stainbrook is investigating whether the animal escaped from a carnival sideshow.
“I never saw anythink (sic) like it,” he said. “I searched through a book on the mammals of America and can’t find anything like it.”
Source: Reading, Pennsylvania
Reading Eagle
August 22, 1939
Reports of cryptid kangaroos or at least cryptids that look like kangaroos are nothing new, as I write about in Mysterious America.
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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.
Pademelon. It’s fairly squirrel-like.
Oh darn! I thought this was something new! Feels like a let down!! Seriously, though, the first thing I thought of when I read this was the Jersey Devil. There was also a prehistoric Kangaroo, Propleopus, which had a similarity in the head to that of a squirrel (i.e. a shorter, rounder face. It was 3 feet long and either a carnivore or Omnivore). I would think it would be unlikely that this was a Propleopus (it was an Australian), as much as it would be unlikely that there was weapons of Mass destruction in Iraq.
Was there not a follow up with this account? If not, then it makes me think of those News Stories of giant human bones discovered in the 1800s that likewise vanish into history without a further word, or the numerous articles discussing multiple type specimen findings of the dwarf Grizzly (aka Lava Bears) without any further information as to the body’s locations.
Any chance of an image of it from somewhere? Then I could look through my “Australian Mammals” book.
David – No photos or drawings have shown up since 1939, so I don’t expect any to appear now to assist your search of Australian mammal images.
It has a name. It’s a CusCus. A marsupial from Australia and New Guinea. Nocturnal and very cute. See here.
That Pademelon looks pretty close to the stated description. Best guess would be a stowaway on a boat, or maybe someone brought home a ‘pet’ from their journey that managed to escape.
It was a Springhaas I reckon. Google the name springhaas and I think that you will agree that the characteristics of the cryptic animal in question fits most of those of the springhaas. I have seen cuscus and they are nothing like that described above.
I agree the Springhaas or Springhare to be the animal in question.