[This is a post by TCC Team Member Dorraine Fisher]
The Legend of Piasa
Thunderbirds
In Illinois
By
Dorraine Fisher
There
is always some truth to legend. And legends of giant birds with up to a 25 foot
wingspan flying and hunting over the rivers of central Illinois has long
survived in Illinois native folklore.
Central
Illinois is a vast stretch of rolling plains, once home to the ancient mound
building natives that first traveled the waterways via the Illinois River all
the way south to the Mississippi River and Cahokia Mounds near St. Louis,
Missouri.
Native
Americans told stories of times when the people watched carefully over their
children to make sure they weren’t snatched by the giant birds that seemed to
swoop down out of nowhere. And they claimed the birds flew in on the spring
storm winds, and were large and strong enough to lift a baby buffalo and carry
it away. And skeletons of large birds of
up to 600 pounds have been found in other places like Argentina. So we know for
a fact that very large birds have existed in history.
In
1868 a teacher reported a young boy in Missouri who had been snatched from
schoolyard by “an eagle.” Apparently the other children caused such a loud
raucous over the incident that the bird dropped the boy, unfortunately to his
death. According to local reports, “eagles” in the area had been a problem in
that period, snatching up small livestock and pets. But anyone who knows
anything about eagles knows they aren’t anywhere large and strong enough to
pick up such large animals (or people) and carry them any distance.
Giant
birds have also been reported in Illinois in modern times. In 1977, boy in
Lawndale, Illinois was reported to have been picked by a large bird while
playing hide and seek in his back yard. The bird lifted him possibly a foot off
the ground, but dropped him as it realized the 60-pound boy was too heavy to
carry off. The boy’s mother filed a
report. But not satisfied by the explanation she was given by local authorities
of an attack by a turkey vulture, she
decided to do some leg work on here own and later described the bird as looking
more like pictures she’d found of a California condor. And this remains one of the most frightening
accounts of giant bird attacks in Illinois to this day.
So is there some truth to the legend? Some
insight can be found in native stories from years past.
In
Alton, Illinois, near St. Louis, a cliff face on the Illinois River tells the
horrific tale of a bird to be revered. A bird known as Piasa, (pronounced
PIE-a-saw), meaning “a bird that devours men” is painted on the wide cliff
wall. And according to Father Jacques Marquette’s diary, it “was as large as a
calf, with horns like a deer, red eyes, a beard like a tiger, a face like a
man, the body covered with red, green, and black scales, and a tail so long it
passed around the body, over the head, and between the legs.”
No one knows the artist of the huge painting,
but it’s believed to be a product of the ancient Cahokian Indians who built a
large earthen mound near there that rivals any Mayan pyramid. The painting is
believed to have been a warning to river travelers that they were entering
Cahokian territory.
And in the years
since, there have been numerous claims by hunters and other outdoorsmen of
unusually large birds patrolling the skies over the Illinois and Mississippi
Rivers. And there have been claims in other states like Alaska and Texas as
well. Some claim the birds to be larger
than an airplane. And often when reports are filed, turkey vultures are again
sited as the likely suspect. But witnesses maintain they’re not turkey
vultures, which are roughly the same size as the bald eagles that hunt and fish
along the rivers. They claim these birds are much bigger than that; large
enough to block the sun.
So when the sky
suddenly turns dark over your head as you walk along the Illinois and
Mississippi rivers, beware. ************
DF
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