Rhinelander, Wisconsin - Home of the Hodag

Rhinelander, Wisconsin - Home of the Hodag

A lumber town makes hay with a beloved local monster. Roadsideamerica.com Report...

Rhinelander, Wisconsin - Home of the Hodag

Next time you're in the North Woods of Wisconsin, check out the Hodags up in Rhinelander. We stopped by there this sommer, and it was a semi-entertaining couple hours trip. The Hodag is a strange local attraction, there are a couple of them up there. It's a wooden fake beast. The other interesting attraction in Rhinelander is a semi-large logging and train museum, along with a couple small museums on the property. [Brian Wolf, 12/05/1999]

[RA: The Hodag, scourge of the northern woods, is FAKE? Says who? The Hodag is seven feet long, 30 inches tall, first seen in 1896 when local Gene Shepard snapped a photo. Tusks, razorsharp claws, pointy horned spine . . . lumberjacks cornered it in a cave and knocked it out with a chloroform sponge on a pole. Today, Hodag banners flutter from street poles downtown, and a Hodag statue stands in town. Not sure if it's still around, but a stuffed "replica" could be seen at the Chamber of Commerce and the Logging Museum.]