* face was a dark copper colour, free of hair, and seemed somewhere between that of a man and an ape;

 

* eyes, which had a deep crease under each one, and lips were like a human and its nose that was big and sort of flat;

 

* hair like a "Phyllis Diller wig", dirty-grey in colour but clean, straight, and well kempt;

 

* short bullish neck;

 

* chest and shoulders twice the depth of Gray's (who was 5 foot 3 inches in height and of stocky-build);

 

* body hair which stood up along the upper chest and shoulders and fell like a shawl over the lower body;

 

* arms were short in length - no more than 18 inches (45cm) - but had "huge" upper arms;

 

* skin that was difficult to physically grasp - Gray's fingers would sink in and he could feel bones but no flesh;

 

* legs like a fit and "well-built little man";

 

* webbed feet with possibly only 4 toes with one claw-like toe being more prominent than the others;

 

* made no sounds, did not even seem to be breathing, and gave off no odour;

 

* was strong enough to shake Gray "like a dog";

 

* as it departed its shuffling gait seemed more animal than human.

So, what actually happened?

 

Perhaps Gray was simply engaging in the timeless practice of yarn-spinning or storytelling - a common practice in a nation of straight-faced larrikins and one which still accounts for many seemingly inexplicable encounters. Maybe he had experienced some sort of waking dream or night terror where person's dreams linger into waking consciousness temporarily distorting perceptions of reality. It is not known whether his two sons, Robert and Dennis who were in the next room, were ever interviewed about their thoughts on the matter. In any case, neither saw anything - by the time the Gray's youngest got out of bed whatever it was that had accosted his father had gone.

 

Yet Gray's account never wavered over the years and the terror he felt at the time and with subsequent retellings always appeared to be genuine. Perhaps only some of the details were accurate - after all, memory does not work like a video recording and eyewitness testimonies can become confabulated (i.e. where the uncertain mind fills in details) under the best of conditions and in this particular instance Gray had been woken from sleep and subjected to a traumatic experience in the dark of night. If, indeed, that was the case then how is it possible to know which details were accurate and which were not?

 

Perhaps  something did actually enter Gray's hut and had a physical altercation with him but what?

 

Many of those that Gray recounted his incredible story to later on were largely sceptical and suggested it was a practical joke or to lay off the booze yet Gray, restricted by his diabetes, was not a noted drinker and was never known to do so while on the job.

 

Eight years later Patricia Riggs, an editor for the local Macleay Argus, was the first to publish Gray's amazing encounter and the story was quickly picked up by the Sydney Sun Herald but it was Rex Gilroy, eccentric purveyor of all things mysterious, who brought the incident to national prominence by appearing with Gray on Mike Walsh's Mid Day Show a few weeks later. The word on Gilroy's lips to explain the unknown creature was "Yowie" - Australia's own little known mythical ape-man or Bigfoot had finally gone national.

 

Although the creature described had such an unusual combination of physical features never reported before or since, Gray's account has continued to puzzle proponents of crypto-zoology (i.e. the study of animals unknown or unrecognised by science) and folklore alike. Malcolm Smith, author of Bigfoots and Bunyips: In Search of Australia's Mystery Animals (1996), seemed sceptical particularly over the high degree of detail offered during a dark night scuffle. Gilroy, self-proclaimed "Father of Yowie Research", of course remained a staunch supporter of the Yowie hypothesis while Tony Healy and Paul Cropper, co-authors of The Yowie: In Search of Australia's Bigfoot (2006) went a step further by speculating Gray's creature to possibly be a junjudee - considered to be a 2nd pygmy-sized species of undiscovered hairy men - but, like Gilroy, ultimately settled on small or juvenile Yowie as the most likely explanation.

 

George Gray passed away several years ago and it seemed like the definitive answer to what really happened on that dark, moonlit night in 1968 passed with him. Not so. Information has recently surfaced which not only sheds new light on this classic unexplained report but actually unmasks the George Gray Yowie.