The Lambertville Record

MIGHTY KAN,
THE HURCULEAN HUNTER OF THE GREAT
AMERICAN PLAIN.

About three miles down the Illinois shore
from St. Louis, near the little town of Cahokia, lives a very queer Indian, who has a history as remarkable as it is romantic. He is a
full-blooded Cherokee and according to his
own assertion is 100 years old. His name is
John Meehoo, and he was born in the county
of Jefferson, Mississippi, where his tribe resided over a century ago, and from which region they were transported to the Indian Territory. John, or the "Big Indian," as he is
familiarly termed, is an extraordinary person
in appearance, being six feet four inches in
height, weighing about 190 pounds, and in
spite of his age is erect and comparatively
robust. His hair is now perfectly snow white;
he has but few teeth left, and within the last
two or three years he has grown somewhat
bald. He is a fisherman and frog-hunter by
profession and has a wife about sixty years of
age, a French woman who does not speak English. His wife was an Indian half-breed, by
whom he had two children, both living in the
vicinity of Cahokia, and hunters and sportsmen by vocation.

At the age of eighteen, Meehoo had
already become noted for his physical strength
and great powers of endurance. Unfortunately he became involved in a quarrel with the
chief of the Cherokees, Mananatal, and slew
him. Meehoo, while making an effort to flee
was apprehended by his tribe, and, after a
trial, according to the forms common to the
Cherokees, he was condemned to be burnt at
the stake, but during his short confinement
preparatory to his undergoing this terrible
penalty. he escaped. He went to the northern part of the Territory of Mississippi, where
he joined the Chickasaws. Here, too, his
belligerent disposition broke out again, and
he killed two of the Choctaw chiefs and made
captive a woman of the tribe, with whom he
fled. His life since has been a series of wandering from one State to another. From Mississippi he proceeded to Louisiana, from
thence to Texas, and from Texas to Missouri,
and for the last fifty years he has been living
in the vicinity of St. Louis, where he has
followed the precarious avocation of frog
hunting. He has always been famed for his
remarkable strength. During his earlier life
he was able to lift 1,000 pounds on a dead level. On one occasion he carried upon his broad
shoulders a barrel of pork weighing 300 lbs.,
from the landing at East St. Louis to his then
home below Cahokia, a distance of six miles.
Several years ago he lived in the old town of
Caskaskia, in Illinois, where he was employed in a flouring mill. Remarkable stories are
told of the wonderful feats of muscular
strength performed by him. It is said that
he was in the habit of placing upon his
shoulders two bags of wheat weighing 200
pounds each, and carrying them up a flight
of stairs. This labor he would perform for
two hours, never seeming to tire.

While roaming through the woods one day.
his dogs, which were following him, bayed a
huge stag in the bed of a dried creek. Mee-
hhoo was unarmed, and after several ineffectual efforts to club the deer with such bludgeons as he could pick up, he seized the infuriated beast by the antlers, and by main
strength hurled him over his head, breaking
the animal's neck.

Meehoo at one time was probably the
mightiest hunter that roamed the wilds of
the American bottom. Forty and fifty years
ago bears were plentiful in the thick forests
of the swampy regions skirting the eastern
shore of the Mississippi, and bear-hunting
was Meehoo's favorite sport.

He still carries upon him the marks of
more than one terrific contact with savage
bruin. To a reporter who interviewed him he
gave a recital of a remarkable struggle he had
with a bear in the winter of 1829, while hunting through the Dry Creek bottom, about
seven miles south of where Centreville station
is now situated. It was on the 24th day of
December, and a light snow covered the
ground. Meehoo had gone out for the purpose of hunting wild hogs, and had with him
one dog that was trained for that peculiar
sport. While traversing the bottom he was
suddenly confronted by a huge black bear.
The dog rushed at him, but the bear at one
blow of his powerful paw stretched the poor
brute dead, and at the distance of thirty feet
bruin poised himself on his hind legs as if
throwing down the gauntlet of battle. Mee-
hhoo immediately pulled down upon him with
his rifle, but to his dismay the powder refused to go off. The cap exploded with a loud
noise. It was immediately replaced by a
fresh one, but before Meehoo could fire a second time, the bear was upon him, and in such
close proximity that it was impossible for him
even to use the rifle as a club. The man and
beast closed in a terrific struggle, the bear in
his characteristic game of hugging, the desperate Indian struggling to draw his knife
from his belt.

"Meehoo laughingly said to the reporter.
"I tell you, my son, the hug that bear gave
me was the worst I ever had in my life. At
first I thought all my ribs were broken, and
I felt as if my entire body was mashed into
a complete jelly. My breath was entirely
taken away, and for a moment I was entirely
exhausted, but I made a struggle to free my
right arm, and succeeded in drawing my knife.
Before I could use it the bear hugged me again, but I managed to get a small cut into
his fore shoulder. The animal released me
and began to snap at me with his teeth,
and he struck me with his fore paw. One
blow felled me to the ground and almost
stunned me into insensibility. By the time
I rose the bear was upon me, but I had my
knife in time and gave him a thrust that
made him growl with anger and howl with
pain."

The old man then proceeded to relate to
the reporter the several details of the fight
and its result. The contest lasted ten minutes, the bear getting in blow upon blow,
knocking his antagonist down, but never succeeded in getting a hug on him. In the meantime Meehoo used his knife in savage desperation, though for a long time unable to touch
a vital part of the monster. Finally he managed to stab the bear in the heart and kill
him.

Meehoo now owns forty acres of land and
lives with his squaw in a very primitive cabin. He is an inoffensive old man now, and
continues his daily avocations, molesting no
one.