The Fort Dodge Messenger: June 23, 1904

He Runs on Schedule Time

Residentes (sic) of Prospect Hill Terrorized by “Wild Man.”

Strange Individual Making His Appearance Every Afternoon and Leaves in Evening.

The residents of Prospect Hill are being terrorized every afternoon by the apeparance (sic) of a “wild man,” as he is termed. The wild man is evidently a person of very regular habits. He runs on schedule time. Each day for the past wek (sic) he has arrived in the same neighborhood on Prospect Hill at the same hour of the day, about 3:30 p.m., and departs at a given time later in the evening, after frightening the women and children of the neighborhood helf out of their wits by his freakish actions.

The man always appears from the direction of the woods near Oleson park, and and after his usual stay in the neighborhood he has haunted, departs for the unknown whence he came. All attempts on the part of the male residents of Prospect Hill to engage him in conversation and find out the reason for his strange behavior, and why he should haunt this particular neighborhood at a certain time each day, have thus far proven fruitless.

The women and children of the neighborhood have been worked up to a high state of nervous excitement by this man of regular habits, and it is understood some action is to be taken in the near future to capture him and find out the wherefore of his maneuvers.

(Editor’s note: There’s a follow-up article here.)

Tags: 1904