Hello again good people, today I have two stories from what is now the United
States, but the first story is dated December 4th 1740, in The American Weekly Mercury, a report from Louisiana to be precise. In 1740 Louisiana was still
partly influenced by French rule and was still in the process of being defined
as a state.In 1740 it would have remained only partly explored. The
following is the brief account of some sort of elephant-like animal. It isn`t
the only account of a N.American
elephant I have come across but the other
reports came from the central Plains or the North-West.
This is the
account from 1740: " Tis also advised from Louisiana ,that the Natives advancing
into some uninhabited Countries found some Elephants that had perish`d in a
marshy place; which had given rise to a question whether this country does not
border upon Asia the rather because the Natives say,they never saw nor heard
that there were any Animal of that kind in that Country."
I have read
about the discovery of elephant bones in Ohio.
·
The second story is
from 1864, reprinted in 1964:
"The editor of the Reese River Reveille a
hundred years ago appeared to have had an open mind and to have been interested
in scientific matters, even if inclined to put his own interpretation on
them. He continued "The Territorial Enterprise says it has received from Silver
City a most singular animal, brought in by Indians. "When standing upright it
is about three-and-a-half feet high and greatly resembles a baboon or a gorilla;
though its head is more like that of a rabbit than any other animal. Its
tail is like that of the coyote. It looks more like a species of kangaroo than
anything else.Indians say it inhabits the highest peaks of the mountains".Henderson Home News Nevada Feb 20 1964.Silver City is a city in
New Mexico and the mountains are presumably high ground in New Mexico or further
west. The Daily Reese River Reveille was a newspaper in Austin, Nevada.I
have no idea what this animal was, the best I can think of is that it was a
juvenile giant sloth. The Territorial Enterprise was a newspaper published
in Virginia City,Nevada.
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