Giants From the Dreamtime the Yowie In Myth And Reality

West of Dubbo1924

2.6 m high Manbeast

One day in 1924, a Mr David Squires was kangaroo shooting in an area of open to thickly timbered country west of Dubbo. Having shot one big 'roo' on this particular afternoon, he was in the process of skinning it when, suddenly he became aware that he was not alone. Glancing up he was shocked to see, standing 10 metres away beside a tree, and with one huge hand resting upon it, a two legged male creature a good 2.6 m in height. At first he thought it must be someone who had "gone wild when he was younger", but the hominid's height soon dispelled that notion.

The manbeast appeared to be in splendid physical condition, and was covered with a thick coating of bluish-grey, coarse-looking curly hair about 8cm long. The body, arms, legs, hands and feet were in proportion to its height, as were the neck and head. Recovering his senses, Mr Squires slowly reached for his rifle, checked that it was loaded and the magazine full, and placing it beside him resumed skinning the 'roo'.

"I finished that job with one eye while the other was watching the Big Bloke", he said later. The creature had so far made no move nor sound, and continued watching Mr Squires for the next 10 minutes, staring inquisitively at him with large, grey-blue eyes, which he noticed, were set in facial features half-human, half-apelike. Then reaching up the tree trunk as far as it could, it scratched it in several places, before turning and walking slowly off into the scrub.

"I was tempted to drop it with the rifle just to see it I, or someone else could tell what it actually was; but I refrained from doing so, when I recalled how easily it could have killed me without a chance to defend myself", he told friends later. The next day, together with police, black trackers and other bushmen, he returned to the scene to try and track it.

Yet although the men searched an area of a couple of kilometres of the surrounding bushland, they found nothing, mainly because heavy rain the previous night had completely erased any signs of the mystery manbeast. When measured with a carpenter's tape, the distance from ground level to the top of the highest scratches made in the tree trunk by the creature, was a full 4.3 metres!