In the summer of 1903, the town of Van Meter, Iowa was not a place where unusual things were expected to happen.

Van Meter sat west of Des Moines along the Raccoon River, a railroad town shaped by agriculture and coal.

At the turn of the 20th century, it was home to a few hundred residents.

Most people worked with their hands, and their days were measured by train schedules and

the steady rhythms of Midwestern life.

When the sun went down, the town went quiet.

That is why, in early June of that year, when residents began

waking one another in the middle of the night, it did not take long for panic to spread.

According to reports published at the time, something was moving through the town after dark.

It was not moving quickly, but deliberately. It appeared on rooftops, near buildings, sometimes along the edge of the river.

Men who believed they had seen every animal that the state of Iowa had to offer said they did not recognize it.

People reached first for lanterns, then for guns.

Within days, what began as a late-night disturbance

would escalate into armed watches, shots fired in the street, and a decision by townspeople

to seal off an abandoned coal mine on the edge of town. Newspapers as far away as New York

would carry stories out of Van Meter describing a creature that no one could

identify and that no one could capture. The sightings lasted less than a week. They ended as

abruptly as they began, and they left behind no body, no tracks, and no clear explanation.

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