Something strange was said to be roaming the wooded hills near Pleasant Run, Pennsylvania, and nobody seemed able to get a good enough look at it to say exactly what it was.
The animal was large, gray, and remarkably fast. Witnesses described it as having a head shaped like a sheep and a body of unusual size. Whenever anyone came near, it vanished through the countryside at tremendous speed.
Before long, the mystery had become a neighborhood sensation. Some believed the creature might be a kangaroo, though that was only a theory based on scattered sightings and the way it reportedly fought off dogs that attacked it.
Whatever it was, the animal had frightened local residents enough to keep them indoors after nightfall and put a temporary stop to the usual evening visits, tavern gatherings, and rural courtships.
Big Kangaroo at Large
PENNSBURG, Pennsylvania. — Tales of a kangaroo that is said to be roaming the wooded hills in the vicinity of Pleasant Run, a few miles west of here, have occasioned intense excitement.
Several persons, among them Erwin Styer and Martin Stengel, have seen the strange animal within the past week, and while it is so fleet that no one has been able to obtain a good view of it, the descriptions substantiate the theory that it is a kangaroo.
It is described as being of gray color, with a head shaped like that of a sheep and a body of large proportions.
Upon the approach of a human being it darts away at tremendous speed.
Dogs have attacked it, but were always worsted. They were not bitten, but apparently the animal flung them off with terrific force, in the manner that a kangaroo defends itself with its hind legs and tail.
People living in the neighborhood are afraid to venture away from home after nightfall, and there is little disposition to linger at the village store or tavern in the evening. Young men and women feel that the customary outdoor rural amusement are no longer safe.
“It ain’t that I’m afraid of any wile beast that ever roams the jungles of Montgomery County,” said one young swain, “but I certainly do object to the disgrace of being knocked out by the hind legs or the tail of a kangaroo. So I guess we fellows won’t do much sitting up with the girls for some time to come.”
Source: The Chickasha Daily Express. Chickasha, Indian Territory, Okla. September 25, 1907.
