Ol' Rip the Horned Toad

Ol' Rip in his coffin in Eastland County Courthouse

Ol' Rip the Horned Toad (died January 19, 1929) was a Texas horned lizard⁠ (Phrynosoma cornutum), commonly referred to as a "horned toad" or "horny toad", ⁠which supposedly survived a 31-year hibernation as an entombed animal following its exhumation from a cornerstone in Eastland, Texas, on February 18, 1928. The lizard became a national celebrity and appeared in 1920s motion pictures.Template:Sfn Template:Sfnm Its name was a reference to American writer Washington Irving's fictional character Rip Van Winkle.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The same year, a Texas political delegation led by Senator Earle Mayfield presented the docile lizard to President Calvin Coolidge at the White House for his inspection.Template:Sfnm

Following the creature's fame, horned toads were sold by the thousands as souvenirs at public events, including the 1928 Democratic National Convention.Template:Sfn The ensuing mass capture and export of the horned toads resulted in the genus's abrupt decline in West Central Texas and prompted an intervention by the Texas Department of Agriculture.Template:Sfn

Decades later, the saga of Ol' Rip inspired Looney Tunes scribe Michael Maltese to write a 1955 animated theatrical short entitled One Froggy Evening.Template:Sfnm In the cartoon, a construction worker demolishing an old building finds an 1892 time capsule inside a cornerstone.Template:Sfnm The capsule contains a living frog which is able to sing Tin Pan Alley songs such as "Hello! Ma Baby" and "I'm Just Wild About Harry".Template:Sfnm

HistoryEdit

Alleged entombmentEdit

File:Eastland County Courthouse Wiki (1 of 1).jpg

Eastland County Courthouse in 2021

On July 29, 1897, a four-year-old boy named Will Wood caught a horned toad in Eastland County, Texas.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn His father, Eastland County clerk Ernest E. Wood, decided to test the West Texas tradition that the creatures could survive for many years in hibernation.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The horned lizard was placed in a time capsule in a cornerstone of the Eastland courthouse along with memorabilia, including a Bible and a bottle of alcohol.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

Thirty years later, during the Jazz Age, construction workers began to tear down the old courthouse, and town officials scheduled a public event to open the time capsule in mid-February 1928.Template:Sfnm An ambitious young newspaperman named Boyce House reported on the forthcoming ceremony in his articles for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.Template:Sfn House particularly emphasized the mystery of the horned toad which supposedly had been entombed in the capsule since 1897.Template:Sfn

As a result of House's sensationalist newspaper articles, a crowd of 1,500 spectators gathered in Eastland, Texas, to witness the opening of the time capsule and to learn the fate of the horned toad.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Many spectators had traveled more than 25 miles to be present, and hundreds thronged around the makeshift fence that encircled the old courthouse.Template:Sfn At exactly four o'clock on Saturday, February 18, 1928, a live horned lizard was allegedly produced from within the time capsule in front of the excited audience.Template:Sfnm Template:Sfnm Newspaperman Boyce House recalled the chaotic scene:

Template:Quote Template:Multiple image Within days, national newspaper chains reported the discovery of the entombed lizard on their front pages.Template:Sfn The New York Times reported the event on its front page with the declarative headline: "Toad Alive After 31 Years Sealed in Texas Cornerstone".Template:Sfn The Times article credulously reported:

After the cornerstone was removed, the toad appeared lifeless for some time, but in a little while, it opened its eyes. In about twenty minutes, it began to breathe. The mouth, however, appeared to have grown together. Efforts will be made to induce the toad to take food, and, if necessary, the mouth will be opened by an operation. The toad is now on exhibition.Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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Following these newspaper reports, zoologists and other scientists began a public debate over whether a Texas horned toad could survive such an extended period without water, sunlight, or oxygen.Template:Sfnm Dr. Raymond L. Ditmars, curator of mammals and reptiles at the Bronx Zoo, declared the alleged survival of the entombed lizard in Eastland, Texas, to be "utterly impossible".Template:Sfn In contrast, preeminent naturalist William T. Hornaday, the curator of the New York Zoological Gardens, asserted that "the incident was possible⁠—and gave an instance from his own experience in Ceylon".Template:Sfn Indifferent to this scientific debate, Eastland locals instead ascribed the horned toad's "miraculous" survival for thirty-one years to the presence of the Bible in the time capsule.<ref>Template:Harvnb: "In the cornerstone with Old Rip had been a copy of the Bible and Arthur Brisbane, in his column read by scores of millions, said that Will Wood believed the frog had derived strength from the presence of the Scriptures. Sermons were preached on the subject."</ref>

National fameEdit

File:Calvin Coolidge cph.3g10777 (cropped).jpg

Calvin Coolidge inspected Ol' Rip at the White House. He declined to touch Ol' Rip, but he stroked the lizard with his spectacles.Template:Sfn

Due to the extensive media coverage, Ol' Rip became a national celebrity.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn The docile lizard was transported to Dallas, Texas, for public exhibition by Will Wood, the same individual who purportedly found the specimen as a boy in 1897. After a public outcry by Eastland inhabitants and profit-hungry business people over removing the famous creature from their otherwise nondescript and insignificant town, Wood returned Ol' Rip to Eastland. Dallas exhibitors promptly sued Wood for Template:US$Template:Inflation/fn for alleged breach of contract.Template:Sfn

After this incident, Ol' Rip went on a national tour, and forty thousand spectators viewed him at the Zoological Gardens in St. Louis, Missouri. Later that same year in New York City, motion pictures were produced with Will Wood introducing Ol' Rip, and "a bug-catcher was paid Template:US$Template:Inflation/fn each for insects that the frog devoured to please the cameraman".Template:Sfn

The peak of Rip's fame occurred in May 1928 when, during his national tour, the lizard was transported to Washington, D.C., where Texas senator Earle Bradford Mayfield presented the specimen to President Calvin Coolidge.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn A bemused Coolidge purportedly declined to touch the horned toad and merely nudged it with his spectacles.Template:Sfn A newspaper article reported the incident:

Template:Quote

As a consequence of the creature's immense fame, horned toads were sold as souvenirs at the 1928 Democratic National Convention in Houston, Texas, for Template:US$.Template:Inflation/fn Template:Sfn The mass capture and export of horned toads for such sales resulted in the genus' precipitous decline in West Texas.Template:Sfnm According to Texas journalist Boyce House: "So many [horned toads] were shipped out of West Texas that a Department of Agriculture bulletin foretold damage amounting to thousands of dollars if the [export] shipments did not stop inasmuch as horned frogs preyed on insects that would devour [local] crops."Template:Sfn

Death and controversyEdit

Soon after his national tour, Ol' Rip died of pneumonia on January 19, 1929.Template:Sfn After Ol' Rip's death, the specimen was kept in a tiny satin-lined casket, provided by the National Casket Company,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and displayed in the lobby of the new Eastland courthouse.Template:Sfn

Decades later, in September 1961, Ol' Rip briefly disappeared from the museum exhibit, and a ransom note demanded Template:US$Template:Inflation/fn for his return.Template:Sfn After a city-wide search, the specimen was recovered.Template:Sfn A year later, in 1962, John Connally visited the courthouse while running for governor of Texas for a publicity event.Template:Sfn An impetuous Connally lifted the embalmed creature by its hind leg which abruptly detached.Template:Sfn

In 1972, Rip's body was again stolen.Template:Sfnm Soon after, the City of Eastland claimed they had somehow "found" the stolen specimen and returned the object to exhibition.Template:Sfn However, museum visitors noted the "recovered" toad now inexplicably had four feet, while the original specimen only had three feet,Template:Sfn presumably due to the earlier 1962 incident with John Connally.Template:Sfn

In 1976, an anonymous letter was sent to newspapers claiming the original, three-footed specimen was still in the thief's possession, and the City of Eastland had replaced the original specimen with a fake.Template:Sfn Angry that "the city of Eastland was building its future around a dried-up horned frog",Template:Sfn the letter-writer offered to pay Template:US$Template:Inflation/fn to anyone who could prove the toad in the courthouse was truly Ol' Rip.Template:Sfn

Legacy and influenceEdit

In 1955, Looney Tunes writer Michael Maltese was inspired by the story of Ol' Rip to write an animated theatrical short entitled One Froggy Evening.Template:Sfnm In the cartoon, a construction worker demolishing a building finds an 1892 time capsule inside a cornerstone.Template:Sfnm The capsule contains a living frog, retroactively named Michigan J. Frog years later, which is able to sing Tin Pan Alley songs such as "Hello! Ma Baby" and "I'm Just Wild About Harry".Template:Sfnm

Ol' Rip's story was told in the 2004 documentary short ToadSpotting: The Legend of Old Rip.<ref>[https://www.imdb.com/{{#if: tt1018796

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ReferencesEdit

CitationsEdit

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Works citedEdit

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External linksEdit

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Template:Handbook of Texas
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"ToadSpotting: The Legend of Old Rip". (January 31, 2004). Esteem Education