Published in:
The Democratic Northwest: August 23, 1883 “A Big Man Or A Big Lie” (left)
The Sun: September 26, 1883 “Must Have Been Goliath” (center)
Fort Worth Daily Gazette: August 15, 1883 “A Giant’s Skeleton” (right)
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“Hon. J. H. Hainly, a well known and reliable citizen of Barnard, Missouri, writes to the Gazette the particulars of the discovery of a giant skeleton four miles south-west of that place. A farmer named John W. Hannon found the bones protruding from the bank of a ravine that has been cut by the action of the rains during the past years. Mr. Hannon worked several days in unearthing the skeleton, which proved to be that of a human being whose height was twelve feet.
The head through the temples was twelve inches. From the lower part of the skull at the back to the top was fifteen inches and the circumference forty inches. The ribs were nearly four feet long and three and a fourth Inches wide. The thigh bones were thirty inches long, and the entire foot eighteen inches in length. The skeleton lay on its face twenty feet below the surface of the ground, and the toes were imbedded in the earth, indicating that the body either fell or was placed there when the ground was soft.
The left arm was passed around the back, the hand resting on the spinal column, while the right arm was stretched out to front and right. Some of the bones crumbled on exposure to the air, but many good specimens were preserved and are now exhibition at Barnard. Medical men are much interested. The skeleton is generally pronounced a valuable relic of the prehistoric race.“
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