Teenagers observe animal hiding behind trees in yard near Cape Fair witnessed in Stone County, Missouri

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It was July, 1978. My family had just moved from Illinois to Cape Fair, Missouri a few weeks before. Our parents went back to Illinois for a funeral and my sisters (ages 16 & 14) and I (12 years old at the time) were there alone. It was late at night around 11 or midnight when we all were startled by our dogs barking and growling on the porch. Normally the dogs would go down to the driveway if they heard something. This time they stayed on the porch looking towards the front yard barking and growling like I have never heard them do before. What scared us was that the dogs were scared to go down off the porch. We turned all the lights off in the house and looked out the front windows and door to see if we could see headlights or something outside. There was a flood light at the corner of the driveway that cast a light on the front yard. The front yard was all uphill with a 5 ft barbed wire fence separating our yard from the pasture. The front yard had huge black walnut trees spaced abou...