THE BEAST OF BOGGY CREEK: The True Story of the Fouke Monster (7 page)

Fortunately for the manimal, Smith was either drunk or the worst shot in Fouke.

The next incident hit the papers on June 16, 1971. In the early morning hours, two local residents witnessed a creature, which fit the monster’s general description, “slouch” across a gravel road in front of their car. The road ran two miles south of Fouke, only a quarter mile from Smith’s bean field. Al Williams and A. L. Tipton, both residents of the rural community, reported the sighting to Sheriff Greer, saying that they were close enough to see that the creature was either a “small ape or large monkey.” Tipton stated that “it appeared to be about three or four feet tall as it crouched over and walked across the road.” Although the height estimation seems at odds with the usual seven-foot range, it did reinforce the theory of it being ape-like. If it was a real animal, then it likely had offspring, which could explain this creature’s smaller stature. Theories of all kinds abounded.

Mayor Virgil Roberts holds an original 1971 track casting.
(Courtesy of Rick Roberts)

Another
Texarkana Gazette
report from late June told how two men from Kansas stopped into town to ask about what kind of wild animals were thought to inhabit the area. Several of the Fouke locals figured the two men were joking about “the monster” and immediately laughed it off. But when the locals began to speak of their would-be beast, the men were shocked. They claimed to have no knowledge of the recent incidents. They were only concerned because they had seen some kind of peculiar looking two-legged animal standing by the side of the road. They may or may not have been pulling a fast one, but they were indeed from Kansas. One of the locals saw their car’s license plate.

Willie Smith holding a trophy deer outside of
the Boggy Creek Café, circa 1975.
(Courtesy of the Miller County Historical Society)

Another alleged sighting by outsiders was not reported to the news at the time. Only later did Sheriff Greer reveal that a group of several women and children, who had traveled to the area to look at the tracks in the soybean field, reported seeing an ape-like creature nearby.

The monster also inspired some pranks, as such things tend to do. On June 28, three local Fouke men claimed that they were attacked by the creature, showing claw marks as evidence. But when Sheriff Greer noticed traces of blood under their fingernails, the truth came out that the men had simply been drunk and got into a fight amongst themselves. He threatened to arrest them but instead fined them $59 each for filing the bogus monster report.

In addition to the regional newspapers, some of the stories were also picked up by the associated news services, which allowed them to be reprinted in papers around the country. Outside reporters began to tie in other Arkansas strangeness as they covered the subject. One subject they brought up was the legendary White River Monster of the Ozark Mountains. Described as a 30-40 foot water serpent, this would be the equivalent of the Loch Ness Monster living in northern Arkansas. Though obviously more of a stretch on any believability scale, it did nonetheless serve to heighten the monster mania.

By this time, the Fouke Monster was basking in the limelight of 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]  He remembers the situation well. He told me that the official stance of local law enforcement was to take the “monster” reports seriously, but at the same time try to downplay the incidents in an attempt to minimize the madness. “A lot of the stuff that was reported to us never made it to the media,” he told me over the phone one afternoon. “We tried to downplay it because every time something would come out, the place would be loaded down with people with guns wanting to go in and try to find it.”

Along with the hunters and their guns, people showed up with tape recorders and cameras trying to capture the monster’s scream on tape or snap a photo to finally prove its existence. Perhaps not surprisingly, with all the fuss in the forest, the monster stayed out of sight, effectively avoiding the hunters but also casting doubts as to whether there was really anything to the stories.

During this first wave of monster mayhem, only a few enterprising locals attempted to make good from it. Willie Smith, who owned the Boggy Creek Café at the time, created casts of the three-toed prints found in his bean field and sold them to monster enthusiasts eager to purchase any kind of souvenir during their visit. To increase the appeal, the casts were autographed by both Smith and Smokey Crabtree. Since there were not many places to stop for a bite around Fouke, the Boggy Creek Café was a perfect outlet for Smith’s enterprise.

One particularly industrious young man, Perry Simmons, who was 15 at the time, made himself a tidy profit by giving tours in and around the house where the Ford incident took place. Just after the report hit the papers, people began to line up in cars along the street trying to get a look at the house, which was owned by his stepfather, Joe Simmons. As will happen when sightseers drop by unannounced, the property was being overrun, and in some cases people were entering the house without permission. To keep people out, a barbed wire fence had to be installed, but that only made it even more of a spectacle. At times, there were an estimated one hundred people gathered on the street to see the house for themselves.

Recognizing a perfect business opportunity, Perry posted a sign that announced “Guided Tours for $1” and in no time he was taking in money to give curious folks a peek in the house and a look around the field behind it. It became something of a residential carnival attraction. People offered as much as $5 in their excitement, as if they were going to actually get a glimpse of the monster itself. In fact, people were so overcome by monster fever that when passing through the vegetable garden in back of the house, they noticed trampled corn stalks and believed that the monster must have surely been the culprit. Perry simply smiled, knowing that in reality raccoons had done the damage. But it just didn’t seem right to spoil the fun. After all, people were paying good money for a close-up look at the mystery.

Of all the events, the Ford incident became the cornerstone of the monster craze. Not only had it been the first of the reports in the 1970s, but it had the most substance to it: prolonged monster scuffles, a hairy paw, gunfire, and a trip to the hospital. Despite alternative explanations proposed by news reporters, there was still no refuting the fact that something strange went down at the house. And as far as the public was concerned, a monster was the best explanation. The subsequent sightings only served to back up this conclusion.

1971: The creature is spotted by a law enforcement official as it ran in front of his patrol car.

Law officials were not prone to dismiss the whole affair either, and for good reason: one of their own had seen it with his own eyes! According to H.L. Phillips, a Deputy Sheriff by the name of Robinson nearly hit a creature fitting the description of the Fouke Monster as he was patrolling in his car one night. In the official report filed with the Miller County Sheriff’s Office, he claimed that he could see the thing very clearly as it took two or three big leaps across the road in front of him, jumped over a fence, and disappeared into the woods. In the opinion of Phillips, he was a good officer with solid judgment, not someone prone to wild stories.