The Hodag: And Other Tales of the Logging Camps
Wasau & Madison, WI: R.W. Hickey, 1928.
First edition. 158 pp. Original dark green cloth stamped in gilt. Presentation bookplate from former owners to college on paste down and gift inscription from a different former owner "from one former lumberjack to another" on front free endpaper, else Fine. In a rare example of the dust jacket, Very Good with tears along folds at head and tail, small piece of archival mending tissue on verso over removed tape, rubbing along edges. The jacket is interesting bibliographically in that it lists the publisher as R.W. Hickey on the spine panel and front flap; the book itself, as all other copies we're aware of, lists no publisher. Apparently the assumption was that it was self-published.
Contemporary artist Jill Kuczmarski writes of the "The Hodag Legend is most notable as lumberjack lore from the near turn of the century in Northern Wisconsin. The Hodag was made 'famous' by a lumber scout in the late 1800s named Gene Shepard who was first 'attacked by one' and then successfully 'caught one'." Eventually it was revealed as a hoax but the creature lives on in Wisconsin lore. Kearney's book is the first about the subject and one of the best examples of the American folklore of "fearsome critters"-- strange beasts from tall tales, usually told with tongue firmly planted in cheek. Nevertheless some of these stories have interested cryptozoologists hunting for accounts of potential cryptids.
Price: $600.00