Editor’s Note: This series is part of the monthly contributions to the Fort Morgan Times by the Community History Writers, a group of area individuals committed to documenting and writing about local history and the people, places and happenings that created the various communities within Morgan County.
On Aug. 13, 1975 – the same day that the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association issued its checklist for cattle ranchers in the Fort Morgan Times – the Brush Banner reported that a meeting had been held in order to discuss theories of what was happening to cattle in Morgan County.
In attendance were Morgan County Sheriff Howard Mann, Morgan County Sheriff’s Office special property crimes investigator Charles Bass, Fort Morgan Police Chief Gale Davey and Walter Chen from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
The article said that results coming back from the School of Veterinary Medicine at Colorado State University (CSU) indicated that the animals sent in to them had died from a blow from a hammer or a knife and that the animals had been mutilated after they died. Chemical tests showed that the animals had not been tranquilized or poisoned.
The group debated the theory that satanic cults were using helicopters to kill and mutilate cattle and they decided that it didn’t make sense. The cultists would have to be able to fly a helicopter, have surgical skills, and have enough money to pay for the helicopter. They concluded that the chances of one person doing all of this was far-fetched.
Someone speculated that it might be some kind of a research project, but if so, why wouldn’t they just get carcasses from a rendering plant?
All in attendance were concerned about how the rash of mutilations had brought the local ranchers to the point of hysteria. Many were armed and ready to shoot, yet there had never been a mutilator spotted at a scene.
Debate continues
Not all ranchers were convinced that the cattle deaths were due to mutilations though.
Art Thompson, a Nebraskan brand inspector, said that a whole bunch of ranchers were laughing at this hoopla because “they’ve had cattle dying with these same marks on them for a hundred years. It is the work of coyotes and raccoons.”
He said that cattle get hit by lightning and then predators move in and go for the softest parts of the carcass.
“Their teeth are sharp, they leave incisions starkly resembling knife marks,” Thompson continued.
Dane Edwards, the publisher/editor of the Brush Banner newspaper, disagreed with this assessment.
He said that ranchers are experts on this. They’ve seen range deaths their entire lives and what they are seeing now was different.
Edwards said that coyotes usually go for the heart, and this was not the case with the mutilations. He pointed out that coyotes don’t just go for the left side of body parts, like the mutilators do, and they don’t generally eat the tail of a cow. Plus coyotes leave tracks.
Finally, Edwards asked how those who thought the deaths were being caused by predators could explain the helicopters. He commented,
“Unless, of course, there is yet another expert somewhere willing to show us a coyote with a pilot’s license.”
Helicopter activity
Leon Irey of Hoyt called in the next mutilation on Aug. 16, 1975.
He said that the night before they found the calf, they heard the sound of a helicopter over the field near their house. They searched that night for dead cattle but didn’t find anything. Then they found the calf the next morning. This was the second livestock that Irey had reported killed that month.
Meanwhile, the Brush Banner was flooded with calls: a Brush woman said she saw a helicopter making low passes over a pasture on the west side of Julesburg, several people reported seeing flashing “strobe lights” traveling east-west at high speeds, and a rancher told the newspaper that only half of the mutilations occurring were being reported to law officials.
On Aug. 19, 1975, the Times reported that three more mutilated cows had been found. Two cattle had been lost by Jack and Allen Weisbart, who were pasturing their cattle northwest of Weldona.
Bass from the sheriff’s office investigated and said it was apparent to him that the cows had put up quite a struggle. They had freed themselves from ropes. Their legs had been tied together and they had deep burns on their legs and ankles. There was evidence of rotor wash near the dead animals; it seemed that an aircraft had dumped the cows in this remote location.
The third cow, owned by Calhoun Fasus of Byers, was found 2 miles southwest of Weldona. It had been eaten by coyotes, yet the carcass showed surgical marks where both ears, an eye and the mouth had been removed.
One wild day
The next morning, a call came in from Alvin Dinnson who found a heifer mutilated on his ranch, 27 miles south of Fort Morgan.
That night, local deputies were summoned to the Brush area by a network of citizen band radio operators. This group of 15 members of I-80 Control observed and pursued a helicopter for 1.5 hours; keeping the police informed of the helicopter’s location.
Gary Hanson and Bill Rasmussen spotted a chopper at 10:15 p.m. on Aug. 20, 1975. They chased it 50 miles between Snyder and Goodrich, until one of the men’s tires blew out. The other man stopped to help him, and as they changed the tire the helicopter remained stationery in the sky about 2-3 miles away. When they jumped back in their cars and resumed the chase, the helicopter led them further west, always remaining in view of the two pursuers.
That same night the Logan County sheriff’s department spent a busy night chasing suspected helicopters.
The first report that came in was of low flying copters around Merino. The sheriff’s deputies tracked it and another helicopter with an airplane and ground vehicles.
They also received reports of another copter between Stoneham and New Raymer and another unconfirmed report of a helicopter landing several miles northwest of Sterling.
Numerous calls of helicopter sightings were reported in southwestern Nebraska that night, as well. Law enforcement officials there tracked helicopters for five hours, because they believed that the helicopters were connected to the cattle mutilations in Colorado.
Next in the series: Looking for answers about the helicopters and the cattle mutilations.
