I talk about the weird and unexplained of Minnesota including the Minnesota iceman, the strange dogmen and a lake monster called Pepie and more.

1. May 7,
2020
Mysterious Minnesota – An Iceman, Dogmen and Pepie
the Lake Monster
theweeklyrambler.com/mysterious-minnesota-an-iceman-dogmen-and-pepie-the-lake-monster/
The US State of Minnesota is located in the Upper Midwest of the United States and is
bordered with the Nation of Canada as well as the US states of North Dakota, South
Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and a water border (via Lake Superior of the Great Lakes) with
Michigan. The state capital is Saint Paul while the largest city is Minneapolis.
Minnesota is made up of prairies, grasslands and mixed/deciduous forests and a small
part of the state also stretches into a part of the Great Lakes region, vast freshwater
lakes between the US states of Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Kentucky, Ohio,
Pennsylvania, New York and the nation of Canada.
Minnesota once heavily relied on agriculture and resource extraction (it once mined a
significant portion of the world’s iron ore) but has since majorly diversified into sectors
such as services and finance. The state is the largest producer of sugar beets, sweetcorn
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2. and peas and also farm-raised turkeys. The largest privately owned company in the
United States, Cargill, is based in the state. The state has the most food cooperatives per
capita in the United States. Logging, pulpwood processing, paper production and forest
products remain a large sector.
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3. Public Domain. Minnesota Iceman.
But now on to the unusual, strange, unexplained and paranormal side of the US state of
Minnesota. Apparently Wendigo is one Native American legend that originated from this
area, as well as from areas of Eastern Canada and Nova Scotia and other areas of the
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4. Great Lakes region, but of course since it is a widespread creature and not specifically
confined to Minnesota, I won’t be going over, but I did go over it in my Paranormal
Alphabet series which you can see the one on the Wendigo here.
One of the state’s big mysteries is that of the famous Minnesota Iceman, an apparent
ape-like wildman that was incased in ice and was from Siberia (or a number of other
places depending on what version you go with) and was displayed around the United
States as an attraction at fairs in the 1960s-70s for people to look upon with awe and
fascination of what it could be, whether it was real or just a hoax (which it was widely
believed it have been) being used to generate monetary value at the time.
A number of scientists and other experienced people in biology and animals interestingly
expressed belief in it being real, at least according to A Menagerie of Mysterious Beasts
by Ken Gerhard. But ultimately it was ruled as a hoax by the Smithsonian Institute.
Frank Hansen was apparently a caretaker of the Iceman for an anonymous California
millionaire who apparently, eventually ordered Hansen to remove it from public
inspection, Hansen later “replaced” it with another which was said to be a latex fake,
although some say that the original iceman and the latex one are one in the same.
Some people still choose to believe the original was actually real and it had been
speculated that it could even have been a murder victim due to bullets seemingly in the
back of the figures head, which even at one point had the FBI concerned. But at the
same time if someone had killed a Neanderthal-like Wildman, you would have perhaps
thought more would have come from it.
It’s all a rather strange foray and this is an extremely brief bit of information on the affair,
but the more you look into it, the more interesting it can get, which makes it harder to
simply brush of as a hoax… or not. This is likely more of a thing that deserves an entire
blogpost on it, so perhaps I will come back to it one day.
So, you may be wondering at this point, it came from Siberia (well maybe, or from Hong
Kong or Vietnam or… yeah), it has toured the US… so what does it have to do with
Minnesota? Well, beats me, but I added it anyway due to name connection. I’m sure
there is a reason, there is one origin of the creature being shot in a region of Minnesota
instead of being from Siberia (the owner seemed to change the story of its origin several
times) so that could be one reason.
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5. Lake Pepin, apparent home of Pepie the Lake Monster. Photo by Jonathunder from Wikimedia.
CC BY-SA 3.0. Source.
Lake monsters anyone? You better believe it. Yeah, if there are any frequent readers of
these series of posts some of you may be starting to get a bit tired of all these apparent
lake monsters and sea serpents that so many of these states seem to have as a mystery
cryptid, but then if you think about it, how is it really much different to various land
cryptids? Not all water cryptid is exactly one in the same, similar to how not all land
cryptids are one in the same.
Although I guess I can understand why land cryptids might seem more exciting, I guess
they are something that are just in the same realm we are, as in a sense they walk on the
land we walk… or at least they MIGHT walk on the land we walk and so it’s just more
interesting I think to wonder of them, rather than something possibly in a body of water,
which can seem more unrealistic as you’d think we would have easily found some
unfound large creature by now in a body of water as there are only so many places they
can hide. There also does seem to be a disproportionate amount of water cryptids
compared to land cryptids.
Nevertheless, Minnesota does have one and it is called Pepie, named after Lake Pepin
which it is said to inhabit. Lake Pepin is located between the border of Minnesota and
Wisconsin so I can guess it also counts as a water cryptid for that state as well… or not,
maybe it only likes the Minnesota side. Anyway, the lake is a naturally occurring one on
the Mississippi River, it is 45.7 square miles in surface with an average depth of 21ft and
a max depth of 60ft. The lake is used for water travel and also recreational activities such
as jet skiing.
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6. Pepie appears to be relatively obscure although according to some sources there may
have been a lake monster in the lake for some time, such as accounts from Native
American mound builders according to a book called Pepie: The Lake Monster of the
Mississippi River, so of course I can’t really confirm if it is 100% true, the Indians also
apparently used thicker canoes on this lake due to the apparent danger from large sea
serpents puncturing their canoes. There was another apparent witness in the 1600s by a
Frenchman called Father Louis Hennepin who claimed to see an unknown serpent seven
to eight feet and of which was apparently reported in a newspaper at the time.
Despite its seemingly long history it doesn’t really appear to have a clear description or
much of a description at all and it also doesn’t seem to be as large as a typical lake
monster or serpent (although some sources allude to it being larger), compared to those
we have gone over previously in this series so far.
There is apparently a $50,000 reward for anyone who can capture the lake monster,
either on film, via a net or hook or however you’d want to do it, which has been up for
grabs since 2008 and I assume it likely will remain up for grabs forevermore. It is widely
speculated that this also was a ploy to attract more tourism to the area.
The best and seemingly only source of significant compiled information on this creature
appears to be the previously mentioned book by Chad Lewis and Noah Voss.
Ever heard of a dogman? It is seemingly a type of cryptid, similar or perhaps the same as
a werewolf. A number of US states have their own version with perhaps the Michigan
dogman being the most well-known and since its inception (wherever that occurred) it
appears to have spread across to numerous places and so although it isn’t entirely
isolated to one place, I see it being individual enough in a number of places to warrant a
section here.
These dogmen are apparent humanoid canids that are capable of walking bipedally
(using just two legs) but can switch between using both just two and four legs. It can be
sometimes described as having the body of a man but the head of a dog. They can also
be described as having claws on their arms/legs. Some seem to be more werewolf-like
while others appear to be more ape-like looking similar-ish to bigfoot although with
differing features such as a more doggish-head and visible claws instead of nails.
All in all, they are a very bizarre cryptid if we can even call them cryptids, as naturally
some of the encounters with these beings also appear to be paranormal in nature at
times. These dogman can also be heard apparently making howling noises, which can
often be described as quite deep and guttural, not like any usual howl such as from a
wolf, dogman sound large in their vocalizations as they are apparently very large
creatures.
It would be quite a terrifying thing to come across and also hear. There are a number of
apparent vocalizations caught on audio and also many apparent sightings captured on
camera and photos, but so far nothing has been definitively proven.
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7. There is an encounter in early 2009 near Fergus Falls in Otter Tail County in the state.
The witness was staying at his mother-in-law’s property about 3-4 miles out in the
country from Fergus Falls, while his mother-in-law and wife were out shopping. They
called him and asked if he wanted to go to see a movie which he agreed to and left at
the time allocated to meet them.
The man on his way there was driving down a country road known as Wendel Road,
along the Mistinka River when he spotted three white tail deer and decided to pull over
and observe them. The deer were following a small creek bed a part of the river where
there were hardly any trees, except for one. Eventually he noticied something crouching
behind the tree on his side of the road and also looking at the deer which the man
believed the creature to be hunting and said although the man was clearly visible at his
truck it took no notice of him.
The man said the creature had one “hand” on the tree to brace itself, but that what
shocked the man was that the creature appeared to be 2-legged instead of 4-legged. He
also described it as appearing to have opposable thumbs and long slender fingers. The
man said that if it had stood up its estimated height could have been over 7ft tall. He also
described it having a protruding muzzle, broad shoulders, a slender waist and thick
muscular thighs and that the creature had a deep dark brown colour throughout it s
body.
The man said after several seconds of looking at the strange creature the deer ran off
and then at the man’s amazement the strange creature looked directly at him, as if it
were judging him for the loss of
its meal. With the creature just
staring at the man he became
scared and drove off out of there.
Quite a scary encounter if true,
there are also a number of other
encounters, but this is plenty
enough for this section. Dogmen
are probably another thing that
deserve its whole own blogpost.
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8. Image by Viergacht from Pixabay
St. James Hotel, Red Wing. Photo in Public Domain.
As usual we will round this off with a haunting and I thought St. James Hotel in Red Wing
would be a great way to finish a large part of the haunting is said to be connected with a
tragedy on Lake Pepin.
St. James Hotel was invested in by 11 businessmen in early 1870s as a place for other
businessmen and also tourists to stay due to Red Wing’s wealth and status as a
commercial center and steamboat stop at the time. The hotel had its grand opening via
a Grand Ball on Thanksgiving in 1875. The hotel remains historical and popular today but
is also said to be haunted.
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9. The reason some believe it to be haunted is due to a maritime disaster that took place on
Lake Pepin in 1890 that killed 98 people after the Sea Wing ferry capsized, known as the
Sea Wing disaster and was caused by a squall line. Due to the amount of bodies the St.
James Hotel ended up becoming a temporary morgue for the dead, which has led to the
belief of the hotel being haunted from those who died brought to the hotel.
Room 310, where a former owner off the hotel Clara Lillyblad used to live until she died
is said to be haunted by her ghost as well, sometimes also experienced in other areas of
the hotel, but by far most prominently in that room.
So, there you have it, some of the strange and unexplained things of Minnesota. Next up
will be Iowa.
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