Wisconsin, a paranormal paradise with lake

monsters, dogmen haunted hotels, famous ghosts, and

deadly killers. It's a lot more than just America's

dairyland. It's time for a deep dive into the weird,

wonderful and terrifying that's lying just below the surface of

reality. From American ghostwalks and Badgerland

Legends. This is the Wisconsin Legends

podcast.

Welcome back to the Wisconsin Legends Podcast. I'm Jeff FinUp

with Badgerland Legends. And with me, as always is Mike.

Huberty from American ghostwalks. Today, Mike, we're going

to hmm all. The way up north. Up in the

northwoods. Any idea what we might be talking about? Well,

considering that this is a podcast about legends of

Wisconsin and we are talking about Rhinelander legends, we talk

about things like ghosts and mysteries and

of course, cryptid, rhinelander has the

most maybe behind the beast of Bay Road, but the second

most famous at least cryptid in Wisconsin. So I bet

we're talking about the hodag today. We are talking about the hodag. What

is a hodag? Good question. According to the book fearsome creatures of the

Lumberwoods by William T. Cox, 1910, the

hodag has been variously described by woodsmen from Wisconsin and

Minnesota. Opinions differ greatly as to the appearance of the

beast, some claiming it to be covered with horns and spines and having a

maniacal disposition just like me, the size about

that of a rhinoceros, somewhat resembling that animal in general

makeup, the creature is slow in motion, deliberate, and

unlike the rhinoceros, very intelligent. Its

hairless body is modeled, striped and checked in a

striking manner. On the hodag's nose, instead of a horn, there

is a large spade shaped bony growth with peculiar

phalanges extending up in front of the eye so that it can only

see straight up. This probably accounts for the deliberate disposition of

the animal, which wanders through the spruce woods looking for suitable

food. This description in that passage varies wildly

from the beast that we know from Rhinelander today, which means it has

evolved over the years. Right, but when I think about that one, though, when I

envision the hodag, I always picture, you know, like the people

when they do the modern primitive thing and they get like the nose piercing and

they get the big bone through the nose. They look

like hodag is what you're trying to say. All of our friends with septum piercing,

glistening, you look like hodag? I'm not going to say it to their face, but

I'll say it on the podcast. So what exactly is a

hodag? Well, let's start first with what it's not. Now,

you mentioned at the top of the show that it was Wisconsin's maybe

famous, most famous cryptid. Well, the hodag is not a

cryptid. What? Jeff, you're blowing my mind. It is

actually a fearsome critter. Now, it lives in the same

fictional universe as Paul Bunyan babe, the big blue ox, the

Jackalope, the Squawk, and the Snelly gaster.

Wait, hold on. What universe does the Snelly

gaster live. In in this fictional universe of Paul bunyan and

lumberjacking lore. Okay, sounds good. Well, we have the gaster, we'll get a

different episode. Snally gaster. I think that's more of a Maryland

cryptid. I'm sorry. Fearsome critter. The

hodag likely originated in the bunk houses of lumber camps in

the northwoods of wisconsin and Minnesota, maybe stretching into maine. It was

likely a tall tale created by veteran lumberjacks in camp foreman to

pass time as well as fill the vital role of a cautionary

tale. The lumberjack profession, for obvious reasons, was a

perilous endeavor. Other than the standard occupational hazards like

tree falls, widowmakers log jams, and work around heavy

animals, there may have been other unseen hazards

like attacks from bears and the advantageous cougar. Being on the

lookout for one of these mythical beasts like the hodag, it may have

provided a heightened sense of danger to those walking alone through the big

woods. So, Mike, you may have a little article

about the origin of the hodag name. Right, the idea

of the word hodag, where it might come from. This is from

beachcombers bizarre history blog, and this is written by the guy that

runs the blog beachcomber as his username, and he's researching

into the history of the ho dag. He finds the history and directory of kent

county, Michigan, from 1870, and that's the first place we find the

word hodag. There is a portable, detached, steam saw

mill on the west side of section eleven on the little cedar. Erected in june

1869 by McClure and kidder, this mill cuts 10,000ft

of lumber, or 15,000 shingles per day. It will be better known as

the hodag mill. This name was given it from the fact that an

unknown and mysterious animal was heard, seen, and even

fired at in the woods near here some years ago. And as no other

name could be found for it, it was called hodag. And when the

mill was built, this was the name given to it by the people of Birchville.

And he goes on to say, this sounds a bit like the way

boggart was given to haunted buildings and spots in

northern england. This researcher, beachcomber also found a

hodag creek in montana. And so this idea

of people already in 1870 using the word

hodag to represent some kind of unknown,

mysterious kind of animal, and he compares it to

boggart, which is like a little goblin or demon in english

mythology, and then they just referred to that spot. That's a

boggart spot kind of thing. Yeah, the hodag spot or the hodag lair. And now

we have a hodag spot in 1870. And so it's just when

you were saying that lumberjacks might be using it for some term of,

hey, be careful out there, you never know the ho dag is going to get

you for safety and for watching out for animals. We already see an

example of this kind of thing. 25 years before it shows up in

Wisconsin. Where does the hodag come

from? Well, according to the lore, the hodag was said to be born from the

ashes of cremated oxen, a reincarnation of the

accumulation of the abuse these animals suffered at the hands of

their sadistic drivers. The reincarnated ox was a bit of lore

injected by author Luke Lakeshore Kearney in his

book The Hodag, which was published in 1929. Now,

Kearney, he was believed to be one of the originators of the hodag hoax,

along with Eugene Shepherd back in the late 18 hundreds. Now, from

the book Hodag, the customary burial ceremony for the

ox was cremation. So a huge pile of brush was usually

gathered and the remains of the ox placed carefully in the center.

The belief of those sturdy woodsmen was that seven years of continuous

fire was necessary to exterminate the profanity which

had accumulated in the body of the ox during its life.

So literally bullshit. A little

bit of bullshit and a lot of cussing.

It was at the end of the 7th year of the cremation of an

ox which had led an unusually hard life that an event

was to happen which would cast its shadow upon every man who

witnessed it. As the fire died down, there slowly

issued from that great pile of ashes a mystical

animal later to be known as the hodag. Oh, it's

almost like the phoenix. It's kind of a phoenix rising from. The ashes, except

the phoenix is like a beautiful creature feeling of

rebirth. The hodag is a vengeful bastard, right,

with a penchant for white bulldogs hungry for the

bulldog. Although a fun piece of lore as an origin story

for the creation of the beast, these stories may have served the lumber company's

interest because the improper treatment of these animals could result in

loss of production due to an exhausted or injured animal. These animals were

a primary piece of hauling equipment long before the use of

tractors, trucks and other forms of mechanized equipment.

So the ox was the workhorse, for lack of a better term. They

probably had Belgian horses and quarter horses. But the rugged

ox was probably your best bang for the

buck for getting an animal. Thousands of logs or

whatever from the camp to exactly. If you look through some of those old

lumbering pictures, you will see these snowsleds piled

high with fresh timber and you're like, how could anybody ever move

it? A team of ox and some determined lumberjacks.

Paul Bunyan babe, the blue ox. And now you've explained for me why

Babe was even around. So I was like, Paul Bunyan's not a farmer. Why does

he have an ox around there? Maybe just like steak or I didn't know what

he liked. The beast of burden turns into a hodag if you piss it off

and burn it.

Kearney may be where we draw the current resemblance of the

hodag from. He wrote in that book, the Hodag. The animal's

back resembled that of a dinosaur, and his tail, which

extended to an enormous length, had spear like ends, sharp spines.

One and a half feet apart, they lined the spinal column. The legs were short

and massive, and the claws were thick and curved, denoting great

strength. The broad, furrowed forehead was covered with coarse, shaggy

hair and bore two large horns. From the broad, muscular mouth,

sharp, glistening white teeth protruded. Kind of looks like a

dinosaur. Kind of looks like an ox, right. Because it's got the front

of the ox with the horns and stuff and obviously the septum piercing,

and then it's got the back of a stegosaurus kind of

thing. Yeah. And there's also other descriptions that talk about, like, an elephant

likes body and then a head of a frog or grinning frog. Each telling

of the tale, it gets more and more absurd. But we've finally

settled on the Rhinelander hodag that we see

today on display at the huge statue. Yet another

description from the time came from a newspaper. The news article

predated kearney's by about 40 years. In

1893, newspapers reported the discovery of a

Hodak near Rhinelander. Timber cruiser eugene

simeon shepherd was hiking near his home in Rhinelander.

Shepherd was well aware of the legend of the Hodak, but he had yet to

spot one. Shepherd stood face to face with a snarling

beast. It was 7ft long and weighed about 185

pounds. Its head was larger than its body, and it had two

horns growing out of its head. Short black hair covered its muscular

and stout frame. The beast emitted a terrible odor, and flame

and smoke rolled from its nostrils. Shepard would describe the odor

as a combination of buzzard meat and skunk

perfume. Shepard solo, of course,

retreated back to Rhinelander, which at the time was a bustling lumber

camp, according to that newspaper report in the publication The New North,

an article written by the snake editor. We might be able to guess

who was the snake editor by the end of this. A group

of Hunters aspired to capture one the best Hunters of Poverty

Hill. In Logtown districts well armed with heavy rifles and

large boar squirt guns loaded with poisonous water,

they came upon their game in a tamarack swamp. Their

guns commenced a regular fuselaged until their guns

got too hot to longer hold in their hands. And then they drew

their knives and sailed in, followed by a great crowd who were

all well armed. Then men stacked piles of birch bark around the

beast and threw a few sticks of dynamite. The beast

thrashed and began slashing timbers, the trees falling in every

direction. As the explosions, fire, and falling timbers

settled, the first black hodag was consumed. The

remains were transported to Rhinelander and displayed the Hunters, unable

to capture the beast alive right. They had to use dynamite

on him. Now, that was an actual news article that

ran next to regular news articles and legal

notices. We already know the snake editor dropped this little

nugget in there to either entertain readers

or to trick them, we're not sure which. The fact that the Rhinelander

newspaper or whatever at the time had a snake editor. Yeah,

it's like we have the copy editor, we got the guy that covers the sports

section, and then we got the gossip pages. And don't

forget, snakes get their own section in the rhyme snake editor front

page too. So the story gained so much tension in the northwoods in Central,

Wisconsin, it was even featured in an ad campaign by the

Centralia Lumber Company. Centralia, Wisconsin.

Mike, have you ever heard of Centralia? I have not been there myself.

You might have. It is actually Wisconsin Rapids. The town I grew up in was

once called Centralia. I did centralia in Grand Rapids and

then it merged to Wisconsin Rapids. I have been you bet I've been to

Centralia. Then there was once a coffee shop called Centralia. I'm not sure if it's

there anymore, but that was where I first learned of the origins of

my city's name. And that also that they were running ads for the

hodag. Yeah, it's really cool to go into newspaper archives and

find the old ads for Centralia. It has a cartoon in it,

it might be from Eugene Shepard who drew it. But the ad featured a

cartoon sketch of the spotted hodag, the bovine

spiritualis pretty much saying the cow spirit, and spoke about his prowess

and attributes. The ad was tagged if you desire the

complete history of this denizen of the pine forest of Wisconsin,

call on Centralia Lumber Company. So I'm not sure if you went there and they

gave you a flyer on it, if they regaled you with some lumberjacking tailors,

they've got a hodag, brochure. What I think is interesting here though, is that in

the creation of this know, I guess when I refer to it as a mean

verse is a fearsome critter. I did not realize that the

hodag was a supernatural creature in its

origin. Because if it's created out of the ashes of burning

oxen or whatever, it's born out of those things, then

created through a fire ritual. Yeah, I never really thought

about that. For those wondering why is it not cryptid? Well,

a cryptid is an undiscovered

animal, animal that people believe exists, but it hasn't been

documented by science. That's where cryptid would come in, where

this is more of a legendary creature or a

mythical creature or I believe in it a Fireborne hodag.

Well, a lot of people still believe in the hodag.

Three years after the original capture of the Hodak article ran,

shepard shocked the world. In 1896, Shepard and a

group of lumber jacks surprised a hodag in its den and

asphyxiated the monster with a heavy dose of chloroform.

The thing is, if you're going to chloroform a hodag, you get like, chloroform, blanket.

What I've heard was they used a pipe and they

vaporized the chloroform and blew it into the

den to put it to sleep. And then they dragged it back to. Some kind

of like, sleeping gas. Yeah, exactly. Okay. Wow. Before

we go any further in legend of the Hodag, let's talk about

Gene Shepherd. He was kind of the godfather or the

progenitor of the Hodag mythos. Eugene

Simeon Shepherd was born in 1854 in Fort

Howard. Do you know where that is, Mike? No, never heard that even in here.

That was Green Bay before it was Green Bay. Okay. Fort Howard.

Fort Military Ridge started exactly old Fort Howard. So his

family ended up moving to New London, where his father operated farm. He

earned a 6th grade education from New London schools. Unfortunately, his father passed

when he was only twelve, and Gene had to work as a farm hand and

a tugboat pilot on the Wolf River. Now, at 16, Gene found his

true calling as a Timber cruiser or a landlooker when he was hired

to be an assistant of Albert A. Weber in 1870. Now,

this job took him all through the northwoods of Wisconsin, assessing standing

timber and estimating its yield and value. So there was a lot of

land prospectors from out east. They needed local

help to find the Timber that was ripe for the picking

and being able to buy it at a cheap rate and knowing that the

yield would be worth their purchase. So they hired this

Weber guy in Gene Shepard to go out and scout this

Timber and say, hey, this is the best parcel of land that you can

buy. And then they took a cut, of course. Sure. So he was like a

tree expert. He was a tree expert, he was a forest expert, and he

knew the Northwoods like the back of his hand. It was on one of these

Timber cruising trips where Weber and shepherd camped at the

confluence of the Pelican in Wisconsin rivers. The place at the time was called

Pelican Rapids and later became the city of Rhinelander. Now

the city was founded officially in 1882, and shepherd

was on hand to witness its first year of growth. Although Timber cruising did

take a lot of time away from Rhinelander, he became a permanent resident

in 1886, about four years after its founding. He was up

and down the Northwoods, and Rhinelander was kind of a place that

he wanted to settle and grow. And maybe

become a snake editor. Snake editor of the New North. During the time

leading up to his residence in Rhinelander, he took a wife, mildred

Molly Woodworth of New London. That is a very 19th

century name. Mildred. Mildred. Molly Woodworth. That

was in 1876. So the following year, the couple had their first son,

Claude. Claude's only sibling would come 15 years later, a boy

named Leighton. Apparently, Gene was too busy Timber cruising

to produce the lot of kids accustomed to families of the time,

right? But at least he had a 15 year old. So then you got a

babysitter right. Away thinking at this point

America was expanding. A flood of European immigrants were hitting the

shores of the US and moving westward to stake their claims. Now, the

1868 Homestead Act provided that any adult

citizen or intended citizen who had never borne arms

against the US government, so Confederates excluded, could

claim 160 acres of surveyed government land. It

was like a land rush. And Wisconsin, 160 acres.

All you had to do was not. Be part of the Confederacy and you didn't

even have to be a citizen, just an intended citizen. You settled the land,

you worked towards citizenship. You got 160 acres on the

new frontier, right? And you think about all those people who had come over from

Ellis Island at the time. That was the

Western Europeans, the German immigrants and everything like that. That's a

bonanza. Imagine that you grew up poor in some city like

Hamburg or something, and you're like, okay, we're going to take a shot in America.

You come over and they're like, here's 160 acres of

land. It's an embarrassment of riches. It really is. And that's how my

family made their way from Germany and Prussia and

made it to central Wisconsin, was through programs like this where they

could transform the land and turn it into productive land. My

grandfather's grandfather came over and he did just that. He ended up

cutting all of the oaks on the property, selling them to a stave

mill, and then farmed the land. If you go to Rudolph town of

Siegel, there is still a road with our surname on

it. You can go to FinUp Lane next time here at Rudolph cheese factory. That's

pretty nice. Huberty is still a little bit too embarrassing to be a road name,

so I'm hoping that one of these days. I'll change that Huberty Lane. Yeah, I'll

change that reputation. So because of

this land rush, timber demand was soaring and the rich pine forest of

Wisconsin were ripe for the harvesting. The prairie lands west of Wisconsin being

settled raised the demand for the natural resource. Now. The town of Stevens Point.

Mozani. Wasaw, Merrill and Rhinelander were all

founded and developed by the lumbering industry. In 1890,

according to the Wisconsin Historical Society, 23,000 men worked

in more than 450 logging camps. Seeing that the population

of the state was only about 1.6 million, that means

that lumberjacks were about 2%. So two out of every

100 people, every adult men were

lumberjacks at that time in Wisconsin. Now they just dress like lumberjacks. No,

they're just hipsters. Well, in 1887, oneida

county would officially be chartered as a county, taking

with it land from Lincoln County. Now, Ryan lander would be the county

seat. The new county board would be appointed and they would appoint

Shepard. The knowledgeable woodsman. Along with his map making

abilities. The county's surveyor, Shepard, got the job. He

mapped a lot of nineta county. He named most of the lakes, including there

is a lake in Rhinelander called Shepherd Lake. A little favoritism, I imagine, right

now, he continued the land prospecting business that he started after

he left Weber and it was called the Northwestern Land Agency.

Shepherd continued his government role until 1891 when

he relinquished his duties and turned back to his land prospecting and

surveying agency full time. At this point, shepherd was heavily

invested monetarily through the land acquisitions as well as

psychologically in the success of Rhinelander, shepard

got involved in boosterism. This was an enthusiastic practice

by a person or organization to attract people or money to a

specific town, region, or area. The practice does several things. It's

an attempt to enhance public perception and attracts people to the area

for development of tourism. It was like an early form of visitors

bureaus or chambers of commerce. Right. So he's the head of the

Rhinelander, the Chamber of Commerce. He's the

carnival barker for Rhinelander, trying to bring

in industries, he's trying to bring in business, and then he's trying to bring in

tourists and he's trying to bring in permanent residents because that's really how you

get things done is by getting the people there to work the industries. You got

to get a railroad, you got to get lumber mills. Shepard, in his

travels, was an avid booster of his new little boomtown,

Rhinelander. Now, Shepard also had a long term outlook for

his new town. He understood that lumbering industry and the implications of a

cutover and what that would have on the economy. He'd already seen the

boomtown to ghost town cycle after all the resources were

harvested in order to protect his investments in Rhinelander, he looked to

attract businesses and entrepreneurs to the area to further develop both population

and infrastructure. His main aim was to bring railroads to expand the population of

Rhinelander and set up industry and infrastructure for citizens, bringing both

prosperity to the economy and attracting tourist dollars. So this

civic duty may have been where the hodag came in. What better

way to bring attention to your community than the emergence of a mythical

beast the world has never seen before? I think every

town should do that. It's really worked for Rhinelander. It's worked

for Point Pleasant. Right. I think everybody needs their own

mascot, whatever it is. The Galloping Ghosts of

Kakana. They could get on that, right? The Ridgeway phantoms. Yeah.

Hire the Hubertie FinUp Consulting Group and. We'Ll we will

bring tourism to your town. Exactly. So Shepard was well known

as a rock on tour. He often visited lumbercaps during his

travels and told tall tales. These tales would seemingly grow

exponentially during each retelling at successive camps.

Now. Gene Shepard, the P. T. Barnum of the bunkhouse may

be the reason we know of Paul Bunyan today. Although it's unclear the exact

origins or who first told the world's largest

woodsman tale. The bunyan tales were definitely within his

repertoire. Shepard was also known for a series of pranks at one

of his resort properties on Ballard Lake. He was known to douse a

patch of moss with cheap perfume and charge visitors

a quarter to smell. The exotic scented moss

only could be found on Ballard lake, only on the shepherd property. He

also promoted the area and Ballard lake as the greatest

musculunge fishing in the world. Now, when that fish of 10,000

cast was not biting, shepard treated downtrodden

fishermen to another display. Through a series of wires,

he managed to make a musky leap from the lake as a reminder of the

one that got away. The simple sleight of hand intrigued fishermen to

book yet another week at his resort.

About a week before the inaugural oneida county fair, an

article ran in the new North Rhinelander's local newspaper.

They announced black hodag for the fair. The beast

was captured by Shepard and crew. After it's

captured, Shepard transported that hodag to the

fairgrounds and confined it to a pit resembling its

den. There it stayed in the days leading up to the

Oneida county fair, 1896. He preps this

with the story that the hunters captured the hodag. They chloroformed,

and now they're bringing the dag to the fair. He

seeded the ground, and now he's got to pay it off. Right? Of course.

Shepard announced that he would proudly exhibit his captured

beast. Those who were brave enough could enter a darkened

tent, drop their dime, and encounter the beast. Separated by a

tarp fairgoers witnessed the beast move and growl, a

cunning trick played by his sons. Using their voices and

wires to animate the beast, very few left the fairgrounds, not

believing in the authenticity of Shepard's Hodak. From this

introduction, the Hodak and its boastful owner toured county fairs and

even the Wisconsin state fair in Milwaukee. Shepard also displayed

the beast at his home, enticing visitors to layover

and conducted the same charade to unwitting dupes. So

he let people know that he's got a real hodag taking around the fairs, and

then he keeps it in his home. Yeah, he keeps in his backyard and then

charges people turns the same trick his personal zoo. Yep. So

legend has it that P. T. Barnum even offered to buy the

rights. Shepard putting one over on the man that coined

the phrase, there's a sucker born every minute. Barnum

historians refute that claim, and it's speculated that this was yet another

tall tale woven by old shep. Now, in that same vein, it

was said that the Smithsonian sent men to view and validate

the existence of the beast. Although this seems plausible, it also falls

into the category of legend. There's no documentation from the

Smithsonian showing any interest in the beast. And if there was, they probably would

have destroyed it. Right, because it had been embarrassing, but. That'S the kind

of thing that goes on websites. They talk about the hodag and everything. They're like,

well, you know, even the Smithsonian came down to check it out. Yeah, it's definitely

been weaved into the general lore of the hodag, is that the

Smithsonian came calling right. That the hodag was so convincing

that Washington, DC. Had to try and get it. By the turn of the century,

it was revealed that the hodag, at least Gene Shepherd's, was indeed a

hoax. It's not known who revealed the hoax and

when, but by 1900, a Chicago evening post article

claimed that Shepard had since fessed up to the ploy. Despite

being revealed as a hoax, it didn't temper the interest in the beast.

People still flocked to Rhinelander to view the beast or to learn about

the creature of the Lumberwoods, much like shep spinning yarns in the bunkhouse

or around a roaring fire, the stories changing with each telling. So did

the legend of the hodag. The size, characteristics, and the method

of capture evolved with each telling. Where did Gene Shepard

get the inspiration for the mythical beast known as the hodag? Few people know

that Gene Shepard was actually fluent in the ojibwe language. Well,

that's interesting. Yeah. So he used it to communicate with the local

Indians in that area and establish routes and

converse with people for intel on the pine forest. So he's

familiar with the native culture. And in ojibwe lore, there was this mythical

beast called the mishapishu, or the underwater panther. Many

native cosmologies of the region, they break things into planes of

existence. They have the earth, the sky, and the underwater or

underground. Well, mishapishu, or the underwater panther

lurked in this lowest realm. Pictographs found near lake

superior show a depiction of mishapishu that looks

surprisingly like a hodag. Right. Got the horns and everything. Got the

horns and the spikes. And could this be where Shepard conceived the

description of the beast and brought it to life in lumberjacking lore? Well,

much like the piasaw bird in Alton, Illinois,

that's right next to the Mississippi, there if you see

the modern redoing of the pictograph, kind of looks

like a HOD egg with wings. Oh, really? Kind of thing? I haven't seen that.

I'll put that in the show notes. Right. There's a theory that maybe originally it

was supposed to be a mishapishu pictograph kind of thing,

and then later on, they added the wings. Somebody added wings. But anyway,

the pyasau, it's now on the edge, and you can go there in Alton and

see this big, giant pictograph on the side of a cliff.

You see it and you're like, oh, kind of looks like the hodag. So I

can definitely see how gene Shepard took that. He might be like,

hey, this is a cool creature in Indian lore,

and how do I take this a little bit and then use it to

my advantage and add it. To kind of the mythos of the

Lumberwoods. And lumberjacks were already doing that with the Indian

character Wisakachek Whiskey Jack. That was

a tradition. The lore that surrounded them, the lore that discovered the

people that were living there they would adapt that to their lumberjack

universe. Yeah. What do they say? Good artists borrow, great artists steal. It's no

different when it comes to lumberjacks. So although the Hodag may have been

native to Rhinelander his influence have been felt throughout pop

culture. Mike, where else in pop culture can we find a Hodag?

I gotta say, that probably the most famous place people can see the Hodag be

in harry Potter. Never heard of it. Right. Who's that guy in

Fantastic Beasts and where to find them? The Hodag is named a

couple of times. Here's one in the 1620s. There's an Irish

witch, Isolt sayer, and a puckwoodgie William.

I don't know what a Puckwoodgie is. But they took trips together to observe the

Hodag's hunting in nature during its search for moon

calves. I don't know what moon calves are, but I assume it's another fantastic beast.

The Hodag was attracted to Muggle farms at night. That's non

magical people are the Muggles. So the wizards are the wizards and

jokers like us are Muggles. The Hodag would go to the Muggle farms

much like the Snallygaster, just like they have Hogwarts over in

England. In the US. They had this magical association of

the USA. There's the Department of no Magic Misinformation

and they worked hard to convince the people of America that the

sightings of Hodag were hoaxes. So maybe

Gene Shepard was right. Maybe Gene Shepard worked for this

magical association in the United States of America. And so there's this Department of

Misinformation so that the Muggles wouldn't know who the wizards were. And then the

Hodag was confined to a protected area around Wisconsin. And so this is

from, like, the Harry Potter website and the fantastic beats that J. K.

Rowling before the movie came out. She designed this website about this

beastiery of all of the magical creatures inside the Harry

Potter universe. And she placed them in Wisconsin. She placed them in

Wisconsin. I think this is from a video game associated with Harry Potter. Like the

Harry Potter video game during the 1988 and 89 school year.

Rubius Hagrid. Remember Hagrid, the big, huge guy? That giant

guy? Yeah. Robbie Coltrane played was gifted a Ho dag from a friend

as it was terrorizing his friend's herd of moon calves. The

Hodag preferred to bite Hagrid's fingers then eat a special

feed Hagrid obtained from Wisconsin. Was it cheese? Right.

That's what it should have been. The hodag. JK. Rowling knows what it

is. And it also appeared in Scooby Doo, right? Yes. In

2012. This is from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Cole Levy wrote

this straight from the northwoods of Wisconsin to the television screen. The

Hodag, Rhinelander's mystical beast of Yore is making a

scooby Doo debut next month. An episode of Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated

will feature the Hodag and its discoverer August 3 on Cartoon

Network. It's a great avenue of free PR, said Laura Reed, the

executive director of the Rhinelander Area Chamber of Commerce. She's the

heir of Jean Shepard? Probably. Apparently, we're excited about the attention it

brings to Rhinelander. Reed hopes the show will inspire viewers to visit the real

Hodag the fanged, reptilian creature that Eugene Shepard discovered in

1893. Shepard makes an appearance on the TV show as an entertainer

traveling with a curio wagon and a seemingly stuffed hodag. So why

did Scooby Doo's producers choose to showcase the Wisconsin monster and its

chief proponent, Mitch Watson and Tony Cervone? The writers wanted a

folkloric monster, the Northwoods River News reported. It didn't hurt that

legend says the Hodag prefers eating dogs, particularly white

bulldogs although the cartoon beast finds Scooby just

as appetizing. Watson and Cervoni, who were unavailable for comment had

also considered a storyline involving an ancient wheel of cheese with a

clue to a larger mystery. The connection to Wisconsin was obvious.

Regardless of whether you believe the state is the Hodag's natural

habitat you'll agree it's definitely the land of

cheese. Nice. The Hodag, he was actually

linked to at least one presidential campaign and may

have been a totem for an iconic candidate. Well, that's

right. Even though it may have ended, it in bad luck. So this is from

the Rhinelander Daily News, July 16, 1960.

Kennedy prizes, his hodag gift. A Hodag symbol of

Rhinelander is one of the prized possessions of Senator John F. Kennedy

who this week was nominated by the Democratic Party to be its candidate for

president of the United States. The miniature Hodag was given to

Senator and Mrs. Kennedy when they came here last fall during the course

of the campaign for delegates to the national convention. The presentation was made

by Henry J. Berquist, a Democratic county chairman and master of

ceremonies for the labor temple at which the Massachusetts senator spoke. We

find The Hodag to be a very provocative conversation piece. Senator

Kennedy has written Burquest and we are delighted to have so

interesting a souvenir of our visit to Rhinelander. Nice. So that was my

very poor Massachusetts Kennedy accent, but yes, and he

accepted the nomination at the Biltmore Hotel, which we

discussed the Biltmore really quick in the episode about Frank Lloyd

Wright when we talk about the Black Dahlia. And that was the last place she

was seen alive. That was also where JFK

accepted the Democratic nomination for president in 1960

because of the Hodag. So his entire success

we can attribute. To you wonder whatever happened to that Hodag figurine

that they sent him. Do you think he just tossed it on the campaign

trail, or do you think it was actually, I think what. Probably happened was

the CIA had to take it back after they killed him. That's why they

assassinated him to get the Hodag figurine to get it back. So we

also think of the Hodag as strictly a

lumberjack lore, but you've been able to find a couple

articles from Ohio and even America's

Southwest that mention the Hodag. Well, that's right. It seems

like we talked about earlier that the Hodag name, the

word itself, it said, oh, it's a combination. Some people said it's a combination

of the word horse and dog, but that doesn't kind of

go along with the. Description the cow,

the oxen, oxen, the bulls. But the idea that the Hodag might

have been a mysterious creature in general, or a word for a mysterious creature

in general that the lumberjacks might have used, or

people who were exploring the territories when we get to the mid 19th

century that maybe it comes from. So, Ohio, we've got this

place called St. Mary's Lake, and this is from the Lake

Improvement Association website for this. Grand Lake st. Mary's

Lake near Lima, Ohio. And it's spelled Ho dag with an

E-H-O-E-D-A-G-H-O-E-D-A-G. Grand

Lake St. Mary's was once the world's largest artificial body of water

dug by 1700 German and Irish immigrants. From

1837 to 1845, Grand Lake St. Mary's was home to the world's

first offshore oil well, with waterbound Dereks positioned

on the lake to pump oil from beneath its water. So

it's built to connect a couple of rivers in Ohio, and

then after they're not using steamboats and things

anymore, they're going to fill it up. They decide not to fill it up and

instead make it kind of a place that people might want to visit. The other

thing they had was a lake monster. The Hodag, a monster that reportedly lives in

Grand Lake St. Mary's, was first reported in 1912. So that's

a mishapishu? Maybe. What does it look like? The beast was said to be the

target of many fruitless hunting expeditions and is three quarters the

size of an elephant. Going back to your hodag. Elephant possesses a

serpentine body with a back hump, chicken like feet, a green

eye on the forehead and a red eye and a long tail, and is

covered in hair and feathers for a lick.

Monster. Yeah, that's a very interesting monster. Now, what does it eat? The Hodag's

diet supposedly consists of the farm dogs that once ventured into her native

cattail habitat, frightened humans. They linked her to several human

disappearances and her favorite food pumpkin pie. Not

white bulldogs. Not white bulldogs. She loves the pumpkin pie. What does it sound

like? The terrible Hodag makes a moaning sound, like a mix between the

call of a Yahoo bird and the Winnie of a horse, and has also been

heard cackling and screaming when amused. It is believed that the Hodag

is lonely and starved for affection. This is from the Lima

News. Lima, Ohio. October 30, 1930.

Mardi Gras at St. Mary's to be held Friday. A community

Halloween celebration will be held in St. Mary's Friday night, October 31, under

the auspices of the local merchants. The main street of town will be roped off

for the celebration and Masqueraders will stage a big parade. The hodag

is to appear in the parade the hunters, Traders and Trappers Organization has

promised. The hodag is a strange creature which was blamed for years by

the Htnt's, the hunters, Traders and Trappers Organization

for the disappearance of pies, cakes and other delicacies at their clubhouse,

Lake St. Mary's. It has eluded them until recently when they succeeded in

staging its capture. The animal has feet that are circles resembling

plates. He is capable of moving backward or forward at an equal rate of

speed, and it's exceptionally hard to trace because of the circular

footprints which leave the pursuer in doubt as to which the direction

the animal has gone. Other strange characteristics of the

hodag is its long neck, bristling with porcupine like

quills, its body, which resembles that of a calf. There's your

cow, its long front legs and short rear legs. Its tail,

which stands erect and is about 3ft long. So they had

their own hodag captured. Party nice

at the Halloween celebration in Lima, Ohio, October 30.

And this is 1930. So this is 30, 33 years or whatever,

or longer than that. Then it made its debut at the

fair. So that's going on in Ohio.

And this grand Lake St. Mary's has its own hodag, which

is more like the Mississippi shoe, the Water panther and then going back in

time. 1913 arizona the Arizona Republic phoenix,

Arizona a hodag hunt is suggested. Information leaked

into Phoenix yesterday of the discovery up in Bloody Basin of a

curious animal which is said to have the ability to run around the side of

a mountain with peculiar ease. The story was brought to town by a

prominent apple grower from up the Verde Valley, which proposed the

parties be organized immediately to go up and hunt the thing. He said that

as far as his information went, the peculiar animal, which

seems to be a relative of the New Mexico side hill

hodag, has a wolf's head, a coyote's body and a

fox's tail. And the legs on the left side are shorter than the right side,

which assists the critter to run around the side of a hill with the rapidity

of a lobo wolf. It was said that there are a number of these things

and that the steeper the mountain, the shorter the legs are on the left side.

He said they also always run in one direction so as to give the short

legs on the left side the greatest play on the upside of the hill.

Okay, Arizona, this is in January of

1913. Now a New Mexico paper also

talks about the hodag horrible hodag in New Mexico. The

Phoenix Republican is somewhat agitated over the fact that a genuine

hodag has been reported in new Mexico of a variety different to the

side hill hodag indigenous to the state of arizona. The Arizona

paper also doubts the authenticity of the reported New mexico

find and insists that while the original variety of hodag was

first seen in new Mexico it had extended its environments well into

Arizona. And but the one species is known to exist. The

republican says that's the Phoenix Republic they call it republican under the

title of quote the hodag or sidewalloper unquote. An

exchange prints a very captivating account of the discovery of one of the

strange animals in the salt marshes of new Mexico. So far as

discovering a hodag on several bowdags in new Mexico is concerned the

exchange is all right, but when it takes the word of a half witted old

trapper for the plans and specifications of the animal, it

oversteps the bounds of veracity. The hodag was originally discovered in new

Mexico and later found in large numbers in Arizona. It is yet alluded

capture until the old trapper in question caught one. But he neglects to

produce a hide or teeth to prove his assertions. The old

trapper, who claims to be a partner of Kit Carson

is experienced in the use of every weapon from the latest automatic rifle

to the primitive bow and arrows of the indians. He says so himself. He's also

quite likely to be skilled in the use of the long bow. The description

of the hodag is entirely too fanciful to ring true. He has too many

frills. It will be remembered that the Arizona species was just

awful and nothing more. No one was ever venturesome enough to stop

to verify certain suspicions about the Hodak's general appearance. So those who

have caught glimpses of the animal have contended themselves with either saying it was

simply awful or stretching out a flock of imaginary facts

supplied by a mind scared blank of any real data.

New mexico is obviously taking Arizona's bait and coming back.

So all throughout 1913 you have these articles in

the Arizona Republic public and then there's new Mexico

newspapers and they're going back and forth until now we get to september. Wisconsin

hodag is exposed as a hoax. The hodag is exposed that is one

kind has been dug from its cave of obscurity and presented to the astonished public

as a hoax while the real one, the Arizona hodag,

remains as much of a mystery as ever. Joseph p. Dylan, who has always been

more or less keenly interested in hodag and arizona camels.

Arizona camels. It's the desert. Yep. Yesterday sent a

copy of a popular magazine containing the great hodag expose to the

republican writer who has chronicled the deeds of the animal on the borders of the

state. The article has been inspected and so far as it regards the Wisconsin

hodag produced authoritative but the despoiler of many

ranches in the bloody basin. The beast that was brought to Arizona from New Mexico

six years ago, along with two of its mates, has not yet been actually

described nor disproven in the public prints. So they

have this it's almost like. A pissing match, right. And they're almost doing

this hodag just the same way Gene Shepard is to

get attention. But they're not treating it like a parody or anything. They're

just sticking these stories in the newspaper next to

whatever announcements going on. So they have their own snake editor?

Yeah, they're playing it straight at these. You know, watching

the way they say this and how straightforward it is, it breaks my heart a

little bit because it makes me think that some of the reports of sea serpents

that we've had and all these different lakes over. Time charles E.

Brown said great folklorist archaeologist, historian.

He said a resort town without a sea serpent

was behind the times. You kind of let the cat out of the bag with

that one saying. A lot of these resort guys would say, oh yeah, there's a

sea serpent here. So then people would come out, rent a boat,

picnic on the lake shores, stop at the local restaurant watering

hole. 130 years later, right. I'm still like, looking for the

Lake Minona monster. He's out there. There's one in each lake in Madison,

right? Exactly. So when I read these stories, I'm like, oh,

yeah, now I think of like, well, maybe the newspapers weren't

100% accurate back then. I don't think they had a lot of fact checkers.

Clearly not. Especially if somebody by the name of Snake Editor.

Right. So now I feel I have to question every

sea serpent article I get or whatever, which hurts. And

speaking of arcane newspaper articles, I found this one in my

research. It was from October 1896. So this would have been a

couple of months after the United County Fair revealing the hodag. And this

was from the gazette in Stevens Point. John

N. Pickert spent a day in the vicinity of Nolton this week and

succeeded in bagging a sand hill gouger. Now, that

sounded a lot like the side hill gouger. Right. A species of

game never before captured in these parts. Later on further

investigation, the animal has been shown to be one of those

ferocious beasts known as the hodag. There we go. So they found

him down in Olton too. It's funny, it's just these newspaper

guys. I don't know if there was not enough going on, you figure with all

the people that disappeared, the lumber camps, there would have been

plenty. Just wonder if that news ever got out. Right. They were

too busy making up creatures to entertain themselves. Yeah. Newspapers

of that time, if you go back and read them, it's like john

Smith visited Sally Jane for lunch on

Sunday afternoon and Jim Brennan was in town from

Ohio visiting his in laws. So it was like very matter of fact

happenings of the community and then. To read sneak this stuff in there. To sneak

this stuff in there. You just have to wonder, even if you look back at

some of the early UFO flaps from like the 19 hundreds,

what did they call them? The airships. The airships in Chicago, Madison

and Milwaukee. Oh, yeah, 1897, there was airships all

over the Midwest and you kind of. See that and you're like, is there veracity

to these? Are these legitimate airports or is somebody putting them in there as

lark to sell newspapers or to just entertain themselves?

Allah. Jean Shepard. Right. So now you would think we read

the newspaper and you're like, OK, well, this has to go mean. There's

journalism school, there's fact checkers and

legal involved, editorial boards,

clearance to be able to use these quotes from people

and everything. When you read the newspaper, you want to believe it. And so we

have this standard today that was not the standard of the new

north with the snake editor or the Arizona

republican back 110 years ago. We got to take the sea

serpent reports with a grain of salt. And I did not realize that until this

very moment, this very moment, I was like, hold on, are you saying this

stuff might not be real? Our friend Chad Lewis has a great book called

hidden Headlines of Wisconsin, where he features a lot of this stuff,

pre 1925, that appeared. It's a fun read. If you want to read more

audacious claims made in newspapers from Wisconsin from that

era. Right. Don't believe everything you read. And then they say, don't believe

anything you hear and half of what you see. Yeah, exactly.

The people of Rhinelander, they're so enthusiastic about their

hometown critter that they even dedicated a music festival to it. The

Hodag Country festival. It's the longest running country

music festival in the world. Wow. It started in

1978 to a crowd of about 500. It's since attracted

acts like Garth Brooks, Tim McGraw, Brooks and Dunn jake Owen, toby

Keith this past year, I think the headliner was hardy. The estimated

attendance annually has now swelled to 30 to 50,000.

People descending on Rhinelander for a weekend of music.

Eugene Shepard would be proud. Yeah. So outside of the northwoods, somebody

referring to Hodag is probably referring to the country

music festival where we're talking about this mythical beast.

Another fun event conceived from the minds of Kerry Bladern of the

Pioneer Park Historical Complex and Ben Burnell of the Hodag

store is Hodag Heritage Festival. It's an event held annually

at Pioneer Park to celebrate the Hodag, the actual beast, with the

assistance of the Rhinelander Chamber of Commerce. The one day event features

speakers, vendors, food, beer, of course, green beer, live music,

and even several reenactments of Gene Shepard's

sideshow hodag. Oh, man, I would like to see that. That'd be fun.

I got to attend this past year and I was able to take in

the show the gentleman they had there. I can't remember his last name for the

life of me. His name's Jerry. He was a two time mayor of

Rhinelander and he embodied Gene Shepard as he

showed off his Hodag along with his assistant,

Luke Kearney. Luke and Gene have come back for one final

performance of The Hodag. And it's a lot of fun. There's probably videos

out there. I'll put a couple photographs that I took in the show notes

so you can kind of take it in and get the sense of it. But

it's a fun day of just celebrating the beast. Plenty of

vendors, food, live music. The hodag king himself.

Carrie Exotic was there playing. I saw Hodag, one of my

kids'favorite songs. That's great. It was a great time. We talked about

our friend Ben Brunel and his Hodag store. Well, an

interesting suspect was linked to a shoplifting

incident at the Hodag store last year. Can you tell us more about that? That's

right. So this is in April of 2022. This is written by T

Kulos. And this is from Americanghostwalks.com.

T is our good friend from the Milwaukee Paracon,

the director director of the Milwaukee Paracon. And he also runs tours

for American ghostwalks in Milwaukee. And so this is the hodag store

robbed by Carmen San Diego. Security cameras at the store

caught something odd. A loudly dressed woman shoplifting at the

Hodag store stuffing her purse with a bottle of Hodag vodka we

could use that tonight. And other items. Retail theft is an unfortunate

reality for mom and pop stores. But when a steal from the security camera footage

was posted online, people pointed out that the shoplifter was dressed

similarly to a legendary globetrotting thief, carmen San

Diego. Where in the world? Where in the world is Carmen San Diego

debuted as an edutainment video game in 1985.

Presented on floppy disk format for the Apple II computer, it's had

many incarnations since, notably as a PBS game show from

1991 to 1995 and recently as an animated

Netflix show. San Diego is depicted as having a red wide

brimmed hat that obscures the upper half of her face and a long

red jacket. She is, as the theme to the PBS show states,

a sticky fingered thief filter from Berlin down to

Belize and that she'll stick them up down under and go

pickpocket Perth. This Carmen San Diego wannabe

was not as slippery as the fictional character. Local law enforcement

quickly picked her up, possibly due to her garish attire, and were

able to return the stolen merch to the Hodag store. That's

some good work. Gum shoes, as they say in the Carmen San Diego show.

Right? So that went viral a little bit last year when the image came out

and it really was this red wide brimmed hat. He's really stuffing a bottle of

vodka. I remember the first time I scrolled past it, I thought it was a

joke. And then I realized it was an actual incident store the

security camera. Would ben set that up a little promotion? I

doubt it, because you don't want to encourage people to take stuff

from the store. But it did let us know that hodag vodka exists. It does.

And hodag beer and hodag root beer. Rhinelander, they've

embraced the hodag. The high school mascot is of course, the hodag,

which recently won best high school mascot in

America. A scorebooklive.com voting

poll, and it won in a landslide. So everybody loves the

hodag. Municipal buildings, the water tower, even police cruisers are

emblazoned with the beast. The rhinelander area chamber of commerce

has even sponsored a self led hodag scavenger hunt

featuring 27 hodag depictions, most of them statues.

You can find the map online, or you can stop in at the chamber of

commerce and grab a copy for yourself and go on your own hodag

hunt fun. Rhinelander got its name from friedrich

rhinelander of New York. He was a railroad baron who

operated the milwaukee lakeshore and western

railroads at the time. The naming rights were part of a bid by two early

developers to get a spur of that railroad line to service the

northwoodstown. And they named it ah, a little.

Flattery there like town after you. Exactly. And it got the

railroad there, so it accomplished its goal, and it was something that

gene shepard actually advocated for. But a name like

shepherdstown would have been a fitting name for the area due to his early

involvement in Rhinelander's history. Now, regardless of the town name, shepherd's

name can still be found on the streets and parks throughout the city and even

shepherd lake, as I mentioned earlier. And the hodag store, it's

actually on the corner of lincoln street and shepherd street fittingly. And the

hodag BNB the airbnb that ben operates right behind the store is

on shepherd street. Eugene simeon shepherd died in

1923 at the age of 69. He was laid to rest in the

city's cemetery, but his spirit lives on through the hodag.

And if there's one place the hodag is real, it's

rhinelander. Long live the hodag. Long live the

hodag. I love it. And that concludes another episode of the

Wisconsin legends podcast. I want to say a special

shout out to carrie bladern for helping me do some research here. Ben at the

hodag store can always regale me and a legend of the hodag. I've never

shepard before. And I pulled a lot of the resource material

for this episode from a book called long live the

hodag the life and legacy of Eugene shepard by

Kurt Kornhoff. Thanks for joining us once again for

another episode. This is jeff finnap with Badgerland legends.

Along with mike huberty from american ghostwalks. And you

can find us online. You can find

jeff@badgerlandlegends.com or insta at.

Badgerland legends nice and easy. And you can find

me@americanghostwalks.com or

instagram. American ghostwalks.

The Wisconsin Legends Podcast is presented by American

ghostwalks, hosted by Mike Huberty and Jeff Finna, recorded

at Sunspot Studios in Madison, Wisconsin, edited by Jeff

Finna, audio engineer Mike Cuberty, music by

Sunspot and various artists. Find out more about the show, including show

notes@wisconsinlegendspodcast.com. Follow the guys

at American ghostwalks and Badgerland Legends on Instagram and

Facebook. We'll see you next time.