Wild Humans (and Journalists) Running Wild

[Trogluddite]

Many wild men and wild women stories are just as clearly human as stories about 8-feet tall, hair covered calf-killers are clearly Bigfoot or Sasquatch (or entirely made up, we'll never know).  I'm going to put some of the more dramatic or humorous or in some cases wholly disheartening stories here.  While it may seem counter-intuitive to include such stories in this thread, there are at least two cases where published books found only half of a story and reported an incident clearly involving a human as if Bigfoot was involved.  

Edited August 15, 2025 by Trogluddite
Stupid computers ... grumble, grumble, grumble ...

[Trogluddite]

New York 1912 - Soldier Deranged by Service in the Philippines Lives in Cave. 

Published in the Pine Grove (PA) Heranld on October 4, 1912. 

 

[Trogluddite]

Published in the Washington (DC) Post on November 1, 1878.  Unfortunately, this sounds like a person born with many birth defects; hopefully it is just an example of a journalist running wild with their imagination.  

 

[Trogluddite]

Another incident where the "wild man" is clearly just a man.  Hopefully making such cases available will let serious Bigfoot researchers smoke out fake internet stories trying to pass such things of as an actual Bigfoot.  These events took place near Tennallytown, Maryland and the stories were published in the Washington (D.C.) Post on July 22 and July 26, 1894 respectfully.

 

                        

 

 

[Trogluddite]

Millville, NJ - German immigrant captured after living as a "wild man" for two years.  Published in the York (PA) Dispatch on July 25, 1906.  

 

[Trogluddite]

A baseball playing Bigfoot?  Sign him up. 

 

UPDATE: I found the publication data.  This story was printed in the Franklin (PA) News-Herald on August 28, 1920 - during the height of the Doerr Terrace gorilla or large ape scare that was occurring just to the north of this location.  The idea of hoaxers taking advantage of recent sightings is not out of the ordinary, as we all know. 

 

 

Edited September 22, 2025 by Trogluddite
To add publication data

[Trogluddite]

Published in the Pittsburgh (PA) Post-Gazette on December 1, 1894.  It's a hard read at some points due to the condition of the old newspaper, but well worth it.  A giant (6' 4") hermit living in the Montana wilderness.

 

[Trogluddite]

Another story about the Doerr Terrace hoaxer who impersonated a gorilla and broke up a community baseball game and picnic; the story was published in The Pittsburgh (PA) Press on August 27, 1920.  Given that shots had been fired during the week-long gorilla scare, the government planned to use chlorine gas to smoke out the "gorilla," and that the ball players were armed with bats, this was probably a really stupid thing to do.

 

[Trogluddite]

Kansas 1896, as published in the Fort Scott (KS) Daily Tribune and Fort Scott Daily Monitor on July 10, 1896.  This appears to clearly be a human, but I wouldn't be surprised if a truncated form of this story shows up in a book or on a website and leaves out the part about "Bigfoot" wearing a straw hat and being tanned.  (I have a good example of a book leaving out the smoking gun, but can't find it right now!)

 

[Trogluddite]

Michigan 1902 as reported in The Yakima Herald on February 18, 1902.  Sadly, this sounds like a human with mental health issues who probably died in the woods.

 

[Trogluddite]

The Evening Mail of Halifax, Nova Scotia seems to have a corner on all the wild men stories; they published this one on July 31, 1896.  Who among us hasn't fallen in a pond, stripped naked, and then wandered about the woods for a bit while our clothes dried?

 

 

 

 

[Trogluddite]

This story in The Courier-Journal of Louisville (KY) on March 5, 1853 reprints a story from a Florence, Alabama newspaper.  The Alabama editors seem to suspect that the Arkansas editors writing about the giant wild man in that state are all "boss liars."   The follow up article, with a happy ending, was found in the Republican Banner of Nashville (TN) on April 13, 1853.  

 

                     

[Trogluddite]

Another article about a wild man that is clearly a human, but that didn't stop Paul and Robert Bartholomew from suggesting that it might be a Bigfoot in Bigfoot in New York and New England.  In addition, the Bartholomew brothers incorrectly state that this incident occurred "in western Long Island;" Mount Vernon and Bronxville are both in southern Westchester County.  This story from the Springville (NY) Journal on September 2, 1897, is the first article about the incident that is from a New York paper. 

 

Forgive me for harping on stories like these but whether such stories are put forth by "researchers" as Bigfoot encounters through lackadaisical fact-checking or through intentional misrepresentation, each one sets serious efforts to resolve the question back 10 yards for every inch gained. 

 

[Trogluddite]

The world's first -- and worst -- infomercial, published in the Public Ledger of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on January 30, 1847 and included in Bigfoot in Pennsylvania by Timothy Renner.  While it does demonstrate the degree to which wild men existed in public imagination, it clearly is just an advertising ploy.

 

[Trogluddite]

I can see why this story made the local news, but why a cross-dressing wild man with a mask and pet dog was included in Bigfoot in Pennsylvania by Timothy Renner, I cannot explain beyond the need to fill space or to stretch credulity.  From the The York (PA) Daily on  August 11 and 12, 1874.