File:Wild Man (of the Woods, Missouri, Moberly) - 1913-12-23 - The Madisonian (Richmond, KY), p. 3.jpg

Summary

"GOVERNOR FINDS WILD MAN, Fur Clothes and Wooden Leg of His Own Make and He Carries Bees With Him", The Madisonian (Richmond, KY), 1913-12-23 <https://archive.org/details/xt7d251fmm36/page/n5>

Text

GOVERNOR FINDS WILD MAN Fur Clothes and Wooden Leg of His Own Make and He Carries Bees With Him.

Moberly, Mo. — In the famous annual Missouri coon hunt here, attended by Gov. Elliott W. Major, National Com- mitteeman Edward Goltra of St. Louis and the majority of the state officials, a wild man was captured who had lived in the woods since 1890. He had a wooden leg which he had carved from a tree limb and in a hole in the leg he carried bees which he had cap- tured. He also had bees in a curious old fashioned stove pipe hat which he wore.

Goltra captured the coon, which is the prize of the hunt, its teeth having been filled with gold by a dentist. The hunter capturing the coon is conceded the best hunter.

Nearly seven-hundred persons par- ticipated in the events at the camp of the Randolph County Coon club. Five squads of hunters with more than one hundred hounds left camp at 10 o'clock at night and plunged into the sycamore forest on Elk Fork Creek.

Goltra had the distinction of bring- ing down the first coon. He, with Judge Charles Clark and Judge Thom- as J. Seehern, also had the unenviable distinction of remaining in the dense woods all night, losing their way and forcing the party to walk to Evans- ville.

A party headed by Mayor Rolla Rothwell of Moberly drove a wild man from the brush. He finally was sur- rounded and captured by the party and brought to camp. After he had been fed and given liquid refreshments he told the hunters his name was Thomas Siebler.

He had lived in the woods on the hunting preserves since 1890, following a disappointment in love. His clothes are of fur from rabbits, foxes, coons and possums,. He had made but one trip to a large city in his life, that be- ing in 1889, when he went to St. Louis to buy a wooden leg.

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