The Hunter of Muck Creek
A rancher near Spanaway Lake achieves local fame after a brutal showdown with a family of cougars.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
John Northover, a half-breed rancher living seven miles from Spanaway Lake, on Muck Creek, brought three large cougars into town today. Their bodies were stretched on Pacific Avenue, near Twelfth Street, and attracted a crowd all afternoon. They were nearly of a size, the largest being between seven and one-half and eight feet long. Mr. Northover killed four cougars at one time. They are all believed to be of the same family. Northover started out with his dogs to go deer hunting. The dogs took after something in the brush and finally treed one of the cougars. After he had been shot, they found another 100 yards away and later still another. There was a lively fight between the wounded cougars and the dogs. One cougar caught a dog up in his fore legs and gnawed at his neck, while disemboweling him with his hind claws. The cougar would have fatally injured the dog if Northover had not stepped up quickly and, placing the muzzle of his rifle to the cougar's ear, blew out his brains. Still later, while returning from a short trip up the creek, the dogs treed another cougar and Northover shot him.
“The cougar would have fatally injured the dog in a minute or two if Northover had not stepped up quickly and, placing the muzzle of his rifle to the cougar's ear, blew out his brains.”
While cougar encounters remain a reality in the rural edges of Pierce County, the image of a hunter displaying a 'family' of predators on downtown streets reflects a vanished era of frontier bravado. Today, public engagement with local wildlife typically centers on conservation and living alongside predators rather than their public display in the city center.
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