The From Time to Thyme Virtual Circus

This week I’m introducing yet another column spinoff — the “From Time to Thyme Virtual Circus.”

Grab some peanuts and popcorn, and follow me into the virtual big top to see the Carnivorous Mouse, Killer Turtle, Daredevil Dog and Fiddling Bear!

Cue the circus music! (You know the tune I mean.)

Our first act appeared in a November 22, 1929 Noblesville Daily Ledger article that begins “Carnivorous mice are prevalent in Sheridan . . .” (and you thought I was kidding about the “carnivorous” part!)

The Ledger reported that Mr. and Mrs. Vern Gray of Sheridan had just entered their car, intending to take a female visitor home, when the women began screaming that the vehicle had been invaded by a mouse.

As they scrambled to escape, Mr. Gray scoffed,  “It isn’t a mouse. How could it get in here?”

Shortly thereafter, “blood was gushing from Mr. Gray’s nose.”

The mouse (it was indeed a mouse) had darted up Gray’s leg and either bit or scratched him.

The incident left Gray with an inch-long scar. The mouse, caught by some bystanders as he attempted to escape, didn’t survive.

And now, presenting the Killer Turtle, straight from its habitat on a White River Township farm!

According to the May 3, 1933 Ledger, this ferocious beast had been running (I use the term loosely) around the same general area for at least 38 years.

Farmer Ora Newton, who’d discovered the box turtle a few days earlier, immediately recognized it. In 1895, when he was a boy, he’d carved his initials into the turtle’s shell. Over time, the names of Newton’s brother and sons had also been added to the shell.

And just how did the turtle gain its lethal reputation? A few years earlier, one of Newton’s young sons had flung it at a rabbit.

The bunny died, but the turtle was “none the worse for this experience.”

Our next act is Noblesville’s “Canine Champion Roof Climber,” reported in the April 18, 1933 Ledger.

“Bare footed and without the use of any brakes,” Captain Jenks Cryderman thrilled witnesses with a death-defying leap over the “very steep, 35% grade, smooth-surfaced” roof of the local traction company’s freight house. (The traction company operated the interurban.)

After a running start, the two year-old Boston terrier hurtled over the peak of the roof and down the opposite side. He then went back up and over, ending his performance with a safe landing in the arms of his mistress, Mrs. George Cryderman, wife of the traction company’s local agent.

And now, the grand finale — the Fiddling Bear!

According to the May 2, 1890, Hamilton County Ledger, in the years before the Indians left this area, three Ohio men came here to hunt and explore along Cicero Creek.

One of them brought along an old fiddle to while away “the tedious hours of frontier monotony.” This fiddle and its bow were kept together on some pegs, high on a wall of the hunters’ log cabin.

During one of their excursions around the area, the men discovered a bee tree. Collecting a considerable amount of honey from the tree, they carried the sweet treat back to the cabin and placed it on a log that protruded over the fiddle.

The next day as they returned from hunting, they were startled to hear fiddle music coming from their cabin.

A cautious investigation revealed the musician was not an Indian, as they’d feared, but a bear who’d taken advantage of their open door. In attempting to get at the honey, “his bearship” had caught his paw in the fiddle’s bow, producing the music.

The impromptu concert ended when the men closed the door and shot the bear through a window.

(These were all front page stories!)

Paula Dunn’s From Time to Thyme column appears on Wednesdays in The Times. Contact her at younggardenerfriend@gmail.com