Documented folklore from the Club 49 map, told straight and sourced.
In 1893 a timber cruiser and prankster named Eugene Shepard announced he had captured a horned, spiny, seven-foot beast in the woods near Rhinelander, and produced photographs of it. Crowds paid to see the thing in a dim tent, where it twitched convincingly on wires. It was carved wood and ox hide, and Shepard admitted as much when the Smithsonian took an interest. The town liked it so much it kept it: the Hodag is on the water tower, the high-school jerseys and the welcome signs to this day. A hoax that became a hometown.
Rhinelander (Oneida County). Source: A documented and confessed 1893 hoax, now the town mascot. The Club 49 map pins this legend at its documented country, beside the real mines, active claims, land status and modeled honey holes of the same ground. Open the free map and go stand in the story.
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