PART VI

  GIANTS IN AMERICA

  The Firelands Pioneer, Vermillion Township, Erie County, Ohio, (1858):

  “The bones and skeletons found are very large, and some of the inhabitants think they must have belonged to a race of beings much larger in size than the Indians found here by the first settlers.”

  CHAPTER 36

  GIANTS IN AMERICA

  “As the Vikings made repeated journeys into the North American continent, they pressed further inland. Our own country’s history is rich with discoveries that suggest giants once lived across this great landscape. Did you know that even President Teddy Roosevelt wrote about an encounter with what he believed to be a giant? He wrote, “Walking through a breach of burnt forest, I came across huge half-human footprints. It gave me a rather eerie feeling.” He later described another experience that same night: “We were roused by a ruder noise—a kind of grunting or roaring whine. Two or three times, a harsh cry arose from the depths of the woods. It was a sharp, sudden noise, perfectly distinct from the natural creaking of branches; just such a sound as would be made by some heavy creature.”

  Roosevelt later wrote about these experiences in a newspaper article. Beyond that, Native American history is rich with stories describing encounters with giants in these lands. Histories of many Native American tribes detail battles and interactions with races of giants throughout North America. In a Minnesota news article, a Native American was quoted as saying, “In our way of believing, they make appearances at troubled times, to help us get more in tune with Mother Earth. Giants bring messages that announce that there is a need to change, a need to cleanse.”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  There are also thousands of accounts from settlers, pioneers, and amateur archaeologists who reported discovering physical evidence that giants once lived here. In newspaper after newspaper from the early 1800s, farmers and settlers described findings within Indian burial mounds they had uncovered. Time and again, they reported skeletons of a race of people much larger than either the Native Americans of the region or the settlers themselves.

  One such account appeared in the Firelands Pioneer, describing a burial mound in which “the bones and skeletons found are very large, and some of the inhabitants think they must have belonged to a race of beings much larger in size than the Indians found here by the first settlers.” Many reports also described artifacts and skeletal remains believed to be of European origin.

  When compiling a history of giants, the bridge between eras becomes easier to see. The theory that giants traveled from Europe aboard Viking ships correlates with the discovery of large skeletal remains in North America that did not match those of local tribes. If these remains did not originate from the indigenous populations, then they must have come from elsewhere. These giants could have arrived either by sea or by a land bridge of ice. It is widely believed that the earliest human tribes crossed from Asia into North America using such an ice bridge. No matter how they got here, they were here.

  I asked Grandpa, “Do you think there are still giants around here?”

  “I know so,” Grandpa Jack said.

  Darby scoffed. “Are you serious? You think there are giants here today?”

  “Well, of course,” Grandpa Jack replied.

  I had to ask, “Have you seen one?”

  He paused. He wasn’t sure we were ready for that part of the story. “Let’s not get too ahead of ourselves…”

  “Of ourselves?” Darby interrupted. “Why is it that whenever we ask you something like that, you say let’s not get ahead of ourselves? What is it you don’t want to tell us—the truth? Or are you making this all up as you go along?”

  “Darby!” I yelled. I was worried she was going to ruin our chance to keep reading.

  “What?” she shot back. “I think we have a right to know.”

  “I don’t know if it’s right or wrong, but it’s rude,” I told her.

  Grandpa Jack finally spoke. “These journals and this history should be proof enough that I am not making this up as I go along. You’ve read parts of my journals yourselves. It’s all here. Sometimes you need to wait and be patient for certain things. Everything in its own due time.”

  He was speaking from experience. He knew our frustration; he remembered feeling it himself. But after Darby’s outburst and whatever private discussion he and Grandma had the day before, he wasn’t sure we were ready to continue.

  Instead of pushing forward, Grandpa Jack sent us into the house to help Grandma with something.