Kenneth Roberts
Oklahoma, 1961
In 1961 I was 5 years old and at the time we live Ada, Oklahoma where my father got job on a cattle ranch. My father was a real Cowboy which was very cool. My mom, baby brother and I were at home all day long when pop was working (which seemed like all the time), so I was always in the woods watching everything I could. I’ve seen cougar’s, some black bears, hawks, owls and a lot of snakes!
About 30 yards behind our house was a stream and there were lots of trees, it was amazing. Next to us were a farmer and his wife. Great friendly people! I would go down to the stream and take off my shoes and socks and tie shoes around my neck. Then I’d roll up my jeans to my knees so they wouldn’t get wet, saving me a butt whopping by my father, lol.
On this day when I got down there to the stream I was almost knee deep in the water and it felt so good. It was nice! I saw some small fish, about an inch long, turtles, crawfish and some snakes. I would always look for tracks to see what animals came down. It was at this moment I noticed no birds were singing and I remembered my grandfather told me when birds and squirrels are not making talk that there was a predator nearby. Then I heard a sound like something stepped into the stream and I look to my left and standing behind a tree I seen it.
At first I saw a big leg with the foot in the stream I looked up saw a huge hand with four fingers wrapped on a limb and thumb. I looked at the center were the limb met the tree and through a fork I saw two eyes and they were watching me! They were reddish to yellowish. I could also see its forehead, a wide face and its nose that was broad, but looked more human than ape. It had small ears and wide mouth and I didn’t see any teeth, but look as if it was smiling. Its head was covered with short hair and at the top it had a crest in the center that was small and its jaws were strong looking. Too young to know its height in feet, I think it might been 8-9 feet in height. His hair was about four inches long and dark brown to light brown in color and it stunk badly. Its build was very strong looking. I don’t think it wanted to hurt me; it just wanted to watch me.
We just look at one another with me breathing hard my heart picking up! I sprinted the 30 yards to the back door afraid to look behind me and ran into the kitchen were mom was making dinner. I locked the screen door and sat there watching where I just came from hoping not to see it, but I did! It stood there looking at me or it seemed to. My mom laughed and said that was the first time she didn’t have yell for to come home. Then she bent to better look at me and said “Kenny wants wrong”? All I could say was I saw a huge hog in the stream.
That evening when dad got home he grabbed my little brother and kissed him on his head and then him and mom talked after they kissed. Halfway through dinner dad ask me what I seen down in the stream. I look up at him and said a huge black hog. He smiled and said “How big”? At that time there was a knock at the door. Dad got up and I followed. The old farmer was asking dad if he had seen anything funny at night. Then my uncle Jim showed up and I heard the farmer say that two of his hogs were gone. So we went over to look.
The hog pen was closed to the stream and we saw huge footprints in the mud, they looked like people feet but bigger. I seen dad say something to Uncle Jim and he left. Then dad told me “Go home and watch over your brother and your mom”. Uncle Jim showed up with two shot guns and shells I ran home and told mom that dad would be back soon. Two hours later dad came in and put the shotgun down and then rubbed my head. Later I heard him say “We found the hogs or what was left of them and there are all sizes of footprints, small to very big”.
They all came home and talked about what they just found. There 10 men in that group. I was sleeping in the living room on the couch dad and mom slept in the bathroom with my little brother. I laid there and could hear the footsteps outside and a growl or something like it. I got off the couch and crawled to mom and dad’s bedroom and slept on the floor next to their bed.
The next morning I was back on the couch and heard mom and dad feeding my brother. I sat up and they asked me why I slept on the floor in there room? I said it was walking around outside last night and dad got up and we went out to look for sign. Dad was good at tracking. We found huge footprints that went around our house a few times and they looked human. Then dad tracked it back the stream. The farmer later said that on the other side of the tree line they found what was left of a cow.