THE BEAST OF BOGGY CREEK: The True Story of the Fouke Monster by Lyle Blackburn Read Free Book Online Page A

notoriety, capturing the public’s attention with a steady stream of tales chock full of fright and intrigue. As more and more people read the accounts, and in some cases began to drop by the area to have a look, the creature was well on his way to becoming Fouke’s own contribution to Deep South lore, forever linked to the town in name and legend. The monster had seemingly been lurking in the Sulphur River Bottoms for most of a century, but for Fouke…this was only the beginning.
     
    Bounty on the Beast
    Shortly after the Ford incident hit the papers, KAAY radio in Little Rock, Arkansas, offered a $1090 reward for the monster’s capture. Station representatives, who felt they were doing a public service by helping Fouke rid itself of its “monster problem,” announced by way of the Texarkana Gazette that the reward would be paid to anyone who handed over a “legitimate and valid monster” to an authorized representative of the station. Further rules required that the monster be “alive and in good health at the time of delivery,” and that no property could be damaged in the process of capturing said creature. One final stipulation stated that: “All monsters turned in will become the property of the station.” This, however, was contrary to a statement made by Sheriff Leslie Greer, who said that “if the culprit is captured it would become property of Miller County and not that of the radio station.”
    To up the ante, a local man by the name of Raymond Scoggins offered up his own $200 bounty. Like the radio station, he stipulated that the creature must be brought in alive. Scoggins, who had lived in Fouke before moving to Texarkana, had heard reports about a mysterious monster for nearly a decade before the recent rash of sightings. He believed it to be “a member of the ape family.” To make it official, three Fouke residents were appointed to verify authenticity of any captured beast: Mayor James D. Larey, City Marshall Bob Bowen, and Constable Earnest Walraven.
    The posting of these bounties sparked an all-out hunt and signaled the beginning of what would be several years of Fouke Monster frenzy. Monster hunters began to descend on the little town, looking for a chance to bag some truly exotic game. The radio station was contacted by groups from nearby cities, including Benton, Pine Bluff, Conway, Texarkana, and Little Rock, as they announced plans to send search parties toward Fouke.
    This quickly became more of a concern for town officials than the actual monster, as trigger-happy hunters began to run amok in search of the beast. As well, calls began to jam up official phone lines and letters started showing up at the mayor’s office. Even reporter Jim Powell was getting calls and letters inquiring about the monster and the ensuing hunt.
    The Miller County Sheriff’s Office first tried to control the situation by stopping people to check for guns and liquor. Trespassing was a huge problem, so visitors were asked not to cut any fences, although they did anyway. A long time friend of mine, Larry Moses, remembers when his father headed up to Fouke to join in the hunt. “He grew up in east Texas and every liquor-crazed teen from around Texarkana went to try and track it down,” Moses told me. “I think it just ended up as an excuse to go out, get drunk, and try to shoot something.”
    At one time or another an estimated 500 hunters stomped through the woods around Fouke looking for the monster. Eventually, officials had to flat-out ban the use of firearms unless it was actual hunting season, in an attempt to avoid a fatal accident that seemed to grow more likely as the bounty hunters continued the hunt. Looking back now, it’s amazing that no one was hurt. “It was chaos,” Rick Roberts told me, as he recalled the craziness. “There were a lot of people out there looking who weren’t local.”
    During my research I also spoke to H.L. Phillips, who was a deputy in Miller County at the time. [4]