Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.comThis account of your basic friendly neighborhood monster appeared in the “Mexico Weekly Ledger,” December 13, 1883:MEXICO, Mo., December 8.--The neighborhood of Hopewell Church, near this city, is much excited over the appearance in the locality of a strange creature, which is thought by the credulous to be a ghost, and which is a puzzle at least to the most skeptical. The apparition is simply that of a lean monster man, between eight and ten feet in height, wearing a long cloak, and going about with head bowed in an abstracted way, but occasionally glaring at those it meets with small ,glittering eyes, said to resemble those of a cat or some wild beast. The negroes believe the apparition to be ghost, the white people do not know what to say.There appears little doubt, whatever the creature may be, that it has actually been seen a number of times. The school at Hopewell Church is about abandoned because of fear of the monster, and even sturdy farmers go about armed,…