Casper Star-Tribune from Casper, Wyoming • 69

I I F.I i A iff I ft' KRISTY GRAY Star-Tribune staff writer arl Higdon wishes he had stayed in McCarty 1 Canyon after all. Not because he didn't find elk he spotted five of them, in fact, one that looked pretty nice in his 1 rifle's crosshairs. Not because he can't explain what happened afterward, but because he can explain and because it sounds kinda crazy when he does. It was Oct. 24, 1974.

Higdon, 41 at the time, an oil field worker and a father of four, was headed south of Rawlins to hunt in the Medicine Bow National Forest. But hunters he encountered in the canyon told him the hunting was better deep in the forest. That's where he went. And that is where he would be found, several hours lat -er, disoriented, incomprehensible complaining about the lights that burned his eyes. He remembers seeing the elk.

He remembers pulling the trigger, waiting for the kick-back, wondering why there wasn't one. He remembers seeing the bullet come out of his brand new Magnum rifle, watching it glide forward, as if in slow motion, and drop to the ground 50 feet in front of him. Higdon's is arguably one of Wyoming's most famous cases of alien encounters. You can find details of it all over the Internet. He invites you to, in fact.

Now 75 and living in Marble Falls, Texas, he's told the story so many times in 36 years he figures it's probably faster if you read about it for yourself. But it's not the only case. Dr. R. Leo Sprinkle of Laramie has investigated thousands of cases from all over the country, many in the Cowboy State.

He's hypnotized hundreds of people who claim to have been visited by E.T.s extraterrestrials. He's spotted at least two UFOs himself and believes he was abducted by a benevolent alien when he was 10. "Many people feel like they are on a training program. They are given a mission, a task or a chore to help the E.T. Sprinkle said in a telephone interview from his home in Laramie.

"It's an initiation, like joining a college sorority or the military." You don't have to believe him, he's not asking you to. You're free to fold up this paper, shake your head and set it aside. But, if you are curious, read on. Halloween is when we consider other possibilities, when we turn down the lights and wonder. We know there are no masked murderers waiting in our coat closets, but we still jump when they attack in our favorite scary movies.

This is the season when we can look up into the Milky Way and ask ourselves: Is anybody out there? Are we alone As Paul Marquard, instructor of engineering and physics at Casper College, says: "It would be arrogant to think that life does not exist on other planets." Please see ALIENS, F2 v-r 1 -V My rV 1 1 J- il i 4 It' if; i. t. 1 41 Tales from the Tribune On Halloween, we renew our fascination with the unknown. We talk of ghosts, goblins, creatures lurking in the dark nd just around the corner. The vastness of the Wyoming wilderness lets our minds wander.

This season, we will take a look at a few Wyoming mysteries: alien abductions, the existence of Bigfoot and the legend of the Little People. Consider the evidence and anecdotes and then decide for yourself: fact, fiction, or a little of both? Oct. 24: For centuries, people hav reported sightings of a large ape roaming the of North America. Some scientists say evidence pointing toward the V(i 7 existence of Sasquatch cannot be ignored. II Oct 31: Both American Indians and European settlers believed in the 'Little.

People, human-like creature? who stood no taller than our knees living I i mountains of Weste'rn Wyoming Jiny mummies found deep in caves iCCllfCU VJ JIUVC IUCU CAOICIIIC. A Illustration by Wesley Watson, Star-Tribune.