Hello, We used to live in Baileyville, Maine, but just moved to Millinocket. We thought you would like to know this story. We had dinner over Thanksgiving (2006) with a group of 60 or more friends and relatives who lived over by Meddybemps, ME. This happened in Washington County, ME.

There was this couple down the long Thanksgiving table from us from Woodland Junction, ME who had driven down with their elderly mother and their aunt (her sister), both widows with some standing in their respective communities over there on the Indian Township Reservation, that is about all I know of them.

I don't know what started the conversation as I got in on it after it started. Everyone was eating, the table was growing quiet then I heard this word used that got my attention, "Meddybemps howler."

The two older ladies, (we never got their names, too many people) were telling about when they were little girls they went with their parents over there to Meddybemps Lake to fish for small mouth bass, evidently the family went often. They said they were poor, didn’t have fancy camp gear, slept under the stars, unafraid with their parents and an uncle.

They went on recalling how "those were the days" and said as young girls had a favorite rocky island in the lake where they thought the fishing was best and sometimes they would sleep at this little place in order to get first light fishing in real early, except when this "howler" thing started calling across the lake, then as it happened either the uncle or their father would canoe out to collect them from the rocky outcrop. They explained the howling was more like a monotonous singing from someone with a husky voice, but it was called a howler.

They said that for a long time they didn't know what the howler was, and that as children they just went where they were told until one day they were left alone on that rock island and the adults went out quite a distance onto the lake to fish another area.

The one lady remembered they had two biscuits left from breakfast, some worms and crickets to fish with until mid to late afternoon. The older of the two ladies interupted and told about once when their parents didn't get back before sunset, the howler started singing again. Anxious for their parents to return, she said the two tied up three small mouth bass on market string; place them in a bucket of water then waited and worried.

The howling grew louder and then she said it got quiet suddenly. The two girls looked around behind them and there stood two giant Indians dripping wet. She said the giants stared down at the two of them and then reached over and took their catch, the bigger one walked over to the smaller giant and handed the fish to that one. The lady telling the story was gesturing with her hands.

Then the black giants went into the water and swam away with the fish. This man sitting across the table from them (the 2 Indian ladies) asked how big the giants were, and they said, "two-fathers high."

The one lady said the two-fathers-high-giants were covered in black shiny hair and both giants were dripping wet and had huge hairy black hands with fingers as big as the fish they caught. They had big feet and had on no clothing. At that recollection, the two ladies covered their mouth and snickered.

When the parents finally came in the canoe to pick up the girls they were not very surprised at their story and told them the “Meddybemps howler,” who was known to steal fish and sometimes little girls, had visited them. After that the girls were left at campground area and never fished alone again, in fact the one lady said they never went back to their favorite rocky island to fish again.

The description seemed close enough to bigfoot to write to you about this. If there were other reports from this area that you know about, please let me know. I don't know what year or years the Meddybemps howler was around but the two Indian ladies had gray hair and looked to be close to 80 in age. For some reason, 1942 comes to mind, maybe the lady said that was the year, not sure at this point.

Then after that, while we were eating dessert, another fellow said he had heard there was a family of those hairy giants seen crossing Stud Mill Road, north of Lower Sabao Lake in far northern Maine a few years ago. That sighting was made memorable because the hairy giant was carrying a horseshoe hare by the ears that was alive, -it was still kicking and squealing. We think there are more bigfoot stories like these.

Jackson Porter and Tulane Porter (Millinocket)
Meddybemps, Maine 04657
December, 2006
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Additional followup to this story... http://www.bigfootencounters.com/sbs/meddybemps.htm



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