THE BEAST OF BOGGY CREEK: The True Story of the Fouke Monster (12 page)

As the story goes, Ms. Brown was deer hunting southwest of Fouke within an eighth of a mile from the Sulphur River. This would have placed her in the general vicinity of the other Jonesville sightings. McFerrin recalled: “She was in a deer stand and she heard the dogs running what she thought was a deer. She looked up a pipeline and there came what she thought was a black guy… running upright. He was far off at first, and then she got to realizing ‘no that’s not a black guy, that’s something that’s got hair on it that’s black… running like a man!’ The thing was moving in a northwesterly direction behind her, and when it passed by she got a good look at it. She said ‘it was not something she had ever seen before.’”

At the time of the sighting, she only told a few family members and trusted friends what had happened as she was reluctant to tell her story for fear of ridicule or damage to her reputation in the community. Even when
The Legend of Boggy Creek
was being shot in 1971-72, she declined to tell her story to director Charles Pierce. When I asked McFerrin about her credibility, he replied, thoughtfully: “I do know people that are credible that have seen something they could not explain. I don’t think she made this up. I think she literally saw something.”

A few years later, around 1967, Charlie Walraven was driving toward his home on County Road 9 late one evening. As his old ’52 Ford coughed its way down the lonely stretch of rural road, a man-like creature suddenly darted out in front of him. It was only visible a few seconds before it disappeared into the thick grove of trees on the opposite side of the road, but he had seen it long enough to tell it was something running on two legs. The beast was hairy and fit the profile of the Jonesville Monster.

A year later, sometime in 1968 or 1969, a similar beast was seen on two separate occasions just two miles south of Jonesville as it searched for food around the home of Louise Harvin. Ms. Harvin is now deceased, but I was able to speak with her son, Mackey Harvin, who recounted the events. The first encounter occurred at sunrise one morning as Ms. Harvin prepared for work at the D&W Packing Company where she was a meat cutter. Hearing a ruckus in her hog pen, she went outside to check on her animals. As she headed across the yard toward the pen, she was startled to see a large, hair-covered animal standing on two legs inside the fence eating from a pile of scraps that had been left out the night before. She said the animal had long reddish hair that covered its body while its face was a darker shade of brown with a large, flat nose. Food scraps hung from its mouth and clung to the fur of its chest and hands. When it saw the woman, the creature immediately stopped eating. Within seconds, it jumped the fence and disappeared into the woods. Startled, but not overly frightened by the strange beast, Ms. Harvin continued on to work, although at the time she told no one what she had seen.

The creature made a second visit not long after the first incident. On this occasion, Ms. Harvin was stepping out onto the porch early one morning when she surprised the animal as it was licking remnants of food from an old hub cap that was being used as a dog bowl. As before, the creature paused and looked at her. Ms. Harvin made note of the creature’s scraggly hair and its ability to stand on two legs. She could also see that it had rather long canine teeth, which resembled those of “a baboon, although the face was much more flat like that of a gorilla.” After a few seconds, the animal bounded off into the woods, never to be seen by Ms. Harvin again.

Her son Mackey, who was off serving in the war at the time, did not hear of his mother’s encounters until a few years later when he returned. He was already familiar with the sighting by his friend Lynn Crabtree and the incident at the Searcy house, so he was not completely surprised that his mother had also seen the creature. Given the creature’s flat, brown nose and overall hairy body, he feels quite certain that his mother had been surprised by the same creature, or one of its kind, that Lynn had seen. Mackey did not feel his mother would have any reason to make up such a wild tale. But like so many others, she was reluctant to tell most people that she had seen the Jonesville/Fouke Monster. The Harvins had seen first hand what had happened to Lynn when his story got out. He had suffered considerable ridicule at the hands of his classmates and other locals. Ms. Harvin was not eager to experience the same.

Yet another sighting of the mystery beast occurred in 1969, although the details of this case are somewhat thin. According to Sheriff H.L. Phillips, two coonhunters were hunting near Jonesville when they proceeded down into a draw. As they reached the bottom of the short incline, they turned and noticed something standing behind them. It was a large upright creature on two legs and covered with bushy hair. Just how the men reacted is not known, but presumably they either retreated up the draw or the creature slipped away into the woods before they could get a better look. The creature was often surprised by encroaching humanity, but it was easy enough to slip back into the shadowy woods of Jonesville. For the creature... it was a perfect haunt.

1968-1969: The creature prowls around the Harvin home, two miles south of Jonesville.

The Strange Runner

One of the most astounding reports that seems to corroborate the stories told by the Jonesville residents didn’t surface until long after Pierce’s movie had been made. One of the witnesses in this case was Carl Finch, guitarist and founder of the popular polka/rock band, Brave Combo, from Denton, Texas. Founded in 1979, the band has gone on to enjoy a wide following and legendary status with a slew of honors including two Grammy awards, an appearance on
The Simpsons
cartoon, and a cameo in the 1995 feature film,
Late Bloomers
, among other achievements. I had the good fortune of speaking with Finch, who still lives in the Denton area.

According to Finch, the incident occurred late one night on a lonely stretch of Highway 71. It was the spring of 1967. Earlier that evening he and his group at the time had performed at a “Battle-of-the-Bands” in Shreveport, Louisiana. After the show, he and his cousin made the late night drive from Shreveport back to Texarkana—where he was living at the time—in her Volkswagen Beetle. This trip took them right through the Jonesville/Fouke area. As they traveled along 71, which would have been extremely desolate and dark back in the late 1960s, they noted an upright figure in the headlights as the thing moved alongside the road in front of them. It was traveling in the same direction as their car, and as they got closer they could see that it was running at a fairly rapid clip. Finch’s first impression was that it must be “a guy in a brown coat.” That seemed rather odd, however, as this was a very dangerous and unlikely place for a man to be out jogging late at night. Besides, the weather at the time did not warrant a heavy coat, especially if one intended to work up a sweat.

As they closed the gap, it became increasingly apparent that there was something more bizarre about the late-night runner. “We noticed that it had really long arms and fur… not a coat,” Finch stressed. “It was well-defined and running very fast with a gait that didn’t seem human.” The creature did not react to the car’s presence but kept on moving quickly down the road as they sped by in the car.

Once they had passed the figure, the headlights no longer provided illumination, so it was impossible to get a better look at the face. “We were too scared to stop,” Finch remarked. “We just kept driving.” Once they passed the creature—or whatever it was—it simply faded into blackness. And eventually into a distant memory.

It wasn’t until the mid-1970s, when Finch caught a showing of
The Legend of Boggy Creek,
did he recall their sighting. Seeing the story of the Fouke Monster on the big screen and learning about its connection to the lonely stretch of Highway 71 gave him pause. Was it the Fouke Monster he had seen that night years ago? Finch believes it’s a definite possibility. How else could you explain a jogger running down a dark, desolate highway in a fur coat well beyond the witching hour?

This event is significant to the Jonesville-era monster since Finch and his cousin were third-party witnesses. They did not live in Jonesville or Fouke, and at the time had no knowledge of what had been going on there. “I didn’t know about Bigfoot or the Fouke Monster at the time,” he told me. So if the residents of Jonesville had all been caught up in some mass hallucination or hoax, Finch was certainly not a part. Yet the creature he describes seeing that night matches very closely with what locals have described, making it hard to dismiss the whole affair out of hand.

It is a widespread belief that the monster had only been seen a few times prior to the Ford incident, but as these reports show, there is a long history of sightings of the creature before 1971. It’s just that the folks down in Jonesville didn’t see this as big news, so they only shared their experiences with the people they knew and trusted. The presumption that a strange creature was living in their midst was just another part of daily life. They had, on occasion, organized hunts in an attempt to solve the mystery, but beyond that there was not much they could do. After all, it had never actually hurt anyone, so if it wanted to share their lonely little bayou, then so be it.

Brave Combo founder and frontman, Carl Finch. (Photo by Jane Finch)

4. From Swamp To Big Screen

Enter: Charles B. Pierce

Whenever someone brings up the classic 1972 horrordrama
The Legend of Boggy Creek
, it never fails to produce at least one response along the lines of “that scared the hell out of me when I was a kid!” And deservedly so. For anyone old enough to have seen the film during its heyday at a vintage drive-in, or later on television or video, it spawned a host of reactions, including nightmares, fear of the woods, fascination with ape-like creatures, anxiety when sitting on toilets in old houses at night, and/or a foolhardy desire to chase “real monsters” in the swamp… just to name a few. I was fortunate to catch
The Legend of Boggy Creek
at an old Texas drive-in as a child, so I can attest to the validity of these reactions. For me and countless others at the time, the tale of Boggy Creek was more than just a legend… it was real! And it was the movie, ironically, that helped establish in our minds a more permanent reality for the Fouke Monster.

The Legend of Boggy Creek
was the directorial debut of Charles B. Pierce, [11]  who ultimately put aside a career in advertising to pursue filmmaking. Though
The Legend of Boggy Creek
would end up being one of his most memorable achievements due to its monetary success, classic scares, and influence on future filmmakers, he did direct other films such as
Bootleggers
,
Winterhawk
,
The Winds of Autumn
,
The Town That Dreaded Sundown
,
Grayeagle
,
The Norseman
,
The Evictors
,
Sacred Ground
,
Hawken’s Breed
,
Chasing the Wind
, and eventually the less-than-classic sequel,
Boggy Creek II
. In addition, Pierce’s credits include being an actor, producer, and writer for his own films and others. One of his writing credits includes the screenplay for the 1983 Dirty Harry film,
Sudden Impact
, starring Clint Eastwood. Remember the line “Go ahead, make my day,” which was imitated by virtually every jokester back in the 1980s? Well, that was conceived by Pierce!