Giants
From the Dreamtime the Yowie In Myth And Reality
Tweed
Valley 1935
Monster
men of Lamington Plateau
Around 1935,
residents of an isolated farm were startled by the frantic bellowing
of their house cow one dark night. Their cattle dog, immediately let
out of the house, attacked something but suddenly let out an agonizing
yelp-then all went quiet. The farmer and one of his farmhands went out
armed with lanterns and guns.
They found
the corner fences down, the cow dead with a broken neck, its head almost
torn off, and the dog crushed against a tree where it had been thrown.
In the distance they could hear something crashing through the bush
up the mountainside. A search the next day failed to explain what had
killed the animals. However, many neighbouring farmers believed it was
the work of the "Monster Men of the Lamington Plateau".
Aborigines
refuse to enter these valleys for fear of the horrible man-beasts they
believe still lurk there. Over the years, people have disappeared without
trace in these wilds. Eerie cries are often heard at night, terrifying
campers.
South
Lismore 1935
Monster
men of Lamington Plateau
After reading
of the experience of the two Woodenbong ladies, a 52 year old man told
the Lismore Northern Star that he sighted a Yowie in 1935, on his late
grandfather's dairy farm on Three Chain Road, South Lismore.
He was, he said,
standing on his grandparents' verandah at 9pm on a moonlit winter's
eve and saw a 'man' walking in from the hills. His grandfather's horse
near the house started raising a fuss.
The 10 year old witness went inside and told his grandfather who, when
he saw what it was, blew out the lamp, grabbed his rifle and watched
from a small kitchen window. The Yowie was visible in moonlight 25 years
away.
The man recalled
that the creature's head had no neck, the head being sunk into its shoulders,
and it seemed to have a hunched back but was standing upright, and was
much thicker than a man in the chest and shoulders.
The grandfather
said later that it was the same creature he had seen a few years earlier
when he'd ridden up a gully to pick some guavas. The Yowie came down
sone side of the gully, crossed creek, then climbed the other side of
the hill, making the horse play up badly.
At that time, in 1935, the
area behind South Lismore was a lot wilder than now and the mountains
and hills were covered in thick trees.
It was about
the time of the above story that settlers of the wild country around
the base of the rugged Lamington Plateau known as the Tweed Valley,
just inside the Qld border, were reporting many similar encounters with
the 'hairy man'.
Dove
Lake 1935
Larger
than man-sized Footprints
The distance
from Dove Lake to Cradle Mountain is 85 km, covered by a long winding
track that takes the traveller on a five day journey across terrain
that has killed some people
It was constructed
during the 1930's and emerges at Lake St. Clair. The Cradle Mountain-Lake
St. Clair National Park presents a vast area in which the 'Bugaloo'
[another local Aboriginal name for these hominids],is claimed to linger
on to the present day. Indeed, the area has been the scene of some recent
giant footprint finds.
Back in 1935,
about a dozen larger-than-man-sized footprints were discovered on the
Dove Lake shore by campers, while another party of campers that same
year claimed they had observed through binoculars, a pair of strange
hominid creatures - a hairy looking male and female - moving among rocks
on a nearby slope.
The hominids
soon disappeared before the people could get a closer look, and although
they searched the spot where they had seen the mystery pair, due to
the rocky terrain, the people failed to find any tracks. Very little
was heard of the 'Bugaloos' thereabouts until, in 1952, a lone bushman
reported sighting a group of several man-sized hairy creatures in the
Dove Lake area while on a camping trip.