The Strange Story of the Tombstone Pterodactyl
Cryptozoology
Friday 18th, March 2022
There are tails going back to the days of cowboys and Indians, with witnesses describing seeing dinosaur like flying creatures, one area that has had more than it's fair share of these sightings in the American southwest.
In the southwest of America there are stories of people seeing these dinosaur like creatures, large airborne creatures, said to resemble a pterodactyl. Among the natives in these areas the creatures are known as "Thunderbirds" and have been reported throughout the 1800s.
One of the cases is set in Tombstone, Arizona, a town that is famous for the historic Gunfight Behind the O.K. Corral in 1881.
Set in a typical dusty, western town that you would expect to see in a western movie, a strange case of a winged reptile has stayed in the minds of people to this day.
On the 26th of April 1890 the Tombstone Epitaph had an odd case of a winged creature that was found by two ranchers in a desert region between Whetstone and the Huachuca mountains.
The two ranchers followed the creature on their horses as it was reported to only be able to complete short bursts of flight, which was assumed to be due to exhaustion. Every now and then the ranchers would get close enough to shoot their rifles at the creature, injuring it, and at some point the creature turned and became aggressive with the two ranchers and came close enough for the two ranchers to shoot the creature dead.
After the creature was deceased the two men were able to measure and look at the creature in more detail. It's claimed that the creature measured 92 feet in length, with two feet under it's body were the wings met the body, the wings were said to be approximately 160 feet from wing tip to wing tip and that the creature had a head that was eight feet in length with jaws full of strong sharp teeth and eyes the size of "dinner plates". The wings were also reported to have been covered with a thin membrane and the whole body was said to be covered with an almost translucent skin with no hair or feathers.
The story would go on to have additional weight put behind it in 1963 when an article appeared in Fate Magazine by cryptozoologist Ivan Sanderson where he claimed that he had owned a copy of the photo of the creature but has since lost it.
Then in 1966 after a writer by the name of Jack Pearl claimed there was a photo of the creature and that the photo was published in another article in the Tombstone Epitaph in 1886.
After these two people came out in support with no evidence to back up their claims many more people came forward stating that the had seen the picture in newspapers and books etc. but no one was able to find the photo after looking for it.
Photos have surfaced over the years but none have matched well enough to what was described in the encounter by the two ranchers.
It has been said by some that the whole encounter was made up to encourage tourists to visit to help with the diving economy in Tombstone.
To this day people are still divided on whether it was purely a story or that there might have been a pterodactyl in the deserts near Tombstone.
In the southwest of America there are stories of people seeing these dinosaur like creatures, large airborne creatures, said to resemble a pterodactyl. Among the natives in these areas the creatures are known as "Thunderbirds" and have been reported throughout the 1800s.
One of the cases is set in Tombstone, Arizona, a town that is famous for the historic Gunfight Behind the O.K. Corral in 1881.
Set in a typical dusty, western town that you would expect to see in a western movie, a strange case of a winged reptile has stayed in the minds of people to this day.
On the 26th of April 1890 the Tombstone Epitaph had an odd case of a winged creature that was found by two ranchers in a desert region between Whetstone and the Huachuca mountains.
The two ranchers followed the creature on their horses as it was reported to only be able to complete short bursts of flight, which was assumed to be due to exhaustion. Every now and then the ranchers would get close enough to shoot their rifles at the creature, injuring it, and at some point the creature turned and became aggressive with the two ranchers and came close enough for the two ranchers to shoot the creature dead.
After the creature was deceased the two men were able to measure and look at the creature in more detail. It's claimed that the creature measured 92 feet in length, with two feet under it's body were the wings met the body, the wings were said to be approximately 160 feet from wing tip to wing tip and that the creature had a head that was eight feet in length with jaws full of strong sharp teeth and eyes the size of "dinner plates". The wings were also reported to have been covered with a thin membrane and the whole body was said to be covered with an almost translucent skin with no hair or feathers.
The story would go on to have additional weight put behind it in 1963 when an article appeared in Fate Magazine by cryptozoologist Ivan Sanderson where he claimed that he had owned a copy of the photo of the creature but has since lost it.
Then in 1966 after a writer by the name of Jack Pearl claimed there was a photo of the creature and that the photo was published in another article in the Tombstone Epitaph in 1886.
After these two people came out in support with no evidence to back up their claims many more people came forward stating that the had seen the picture in newspapers and books etc. but no one was able to find the photo after looking for it.
Photos have surfaced over the years but none have matched well enough to what was described in the encounter by the two ranchers.
It has been said by some that the whole encounter was made up to encourage tourists to visit to help with the diving economy in Tombstone.
To this day people are still divided on whether it was purely a story or that there might have been a pterodactyl in the deserts near Tombstone.
