The Alton Piasa Theory

My Alton Piasa Bird Theory

Piasa is pronounced "pie-uh-saw"

The ancient Mississippi River Legend of the flying beast and his return

This is the First page of the Piasa Story

Click here to go to the Second Page of the Story

A 2017 visit to the Alton Piasa Bird Site

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The first time my dad took us kids to see the ancient Piasa Bird painting just north of Alton Illinois, was about my second or third grade in the mid to late 50s. We lived south of Alton in Rosewood Heights, and used to go and see this every few months. It was about 30 feet high and 50 feet long on a smooth limestone cliff by the Mississippi River. This is across the river from North St Louis, about where the Illinois River from Chicago, enters into the Mississippi. It impressed me then, to wonder of the lines on his face around the cheekbones and the thick lips that are not noticeable in this photo. We usually went there as a local park outing, and chatted with others on what was our concept of it's origin and the shape of it's face. It was impressive, but that face truly alarmed me then; and now the legend of the image seems to make more sense.

Can you imagine that the shape of the creature is like the United States? Who knows when it originated, but it was first announced by explorers in 1673. This is not the original, this was redone in 1934 and retouched every few years by a local college. That is why, when we viewed the image after every new article in the newspaper, it had a little bit different look each time. There are many old photos of this thing, and many are slightly different variations by changes through the years. There were associated post cards, news articles, business names, and basically the town uses the Piasa image like a modern tourist logo.

Then Politics took over; seeing the Limestone was valuable, and the parking on the river side of the highway-100 was commonly interrupting traffic. The quarries tried for years to get that land, so they finally found a Liberal Judge that determined that since it is being retouched, it is not the original, and therefore it cannot be an ancient landmark. So about 1970's it was removed to widen the highway, which never got widened till 40 years later, just quarried in that section of the cliff. The quarry traffic frequently blocked and slowed the highway so they could load the barges directly, and even detoured many miles around quite often, and that lasted several years. Thanks to the wisdom and judgment of our honorable judges and leaders that are always making decisions in our best interest; then again, we might recognize that their best interest may only be for their own pockets.

When Obama started making noises as a presidential candidate, his face immediately struck my memories as the one on the Piasa Bird. The image had a different look in the 50s and 60s of a thinner face with thick lips, and there was an unmistakable resemblance to the legend of the beast that searches and devours all men. So if the legend is true: The image in Illinois could very well represent the beast or Senator from Illinois that was intending to destroy the United States. It does all fit the legend and the actions that (Former) President B.O. has taken to trample the economy and Constitution that he was sworn to protect by his oath of office.

Many of you have never heard of Marquette and Joliet; but from the first grade to the fifth, Alton schools taught of them as the territorial explorers of our national history. After them came Lewis and Clark, then Daniel Boone, of whom is my relative ten generations before me.

The Discoveries and recordings of Pere Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet in 1673.

"While Skirting some rocks, which by Their height and length inspired awe, We saw upon one of them two painted monsters which at first made Us afraid, and upon Which the boldest savages dare not Long rest their eyes. They are as large As a calf; they have Horns on their heads Like those of a deer, a horrible look, red eyes, a beard Like a tiger's, a face somewhat like a man's, a body Covered with scales, and so Long A tail that it winds all around the Body, passing above the head and going back between the legs, ending in a Fish's tail. Green, red, and black are the three Colors composing the Picture. Moreover, these 2 monsters are so well painted that we cannot believe that any savage is their author; for good painters in France would find it difficult to reach that place Conveniently to paint them. Here is approximately The shape of these monsters, As we have faithfully Copied It."

Note that Marquette and Joliet and their escorts were in a flat bottom boat on the river when they saw these unusual rocks. Upstream of the cliff painting are two huge rocks in the river where tugboats dock and started the town of Grafton. These rocks are unmistakable, the exposed portion above the water is about the size of a house, and they are still there with no other such stones anywhere in that area. That is treacherous and swift water unless the river is low, so examining the rocks is not recommended, but this has often been my curiosity that may get further research. The original drawings of the artist Marquette are lost, and some published drawings that claim to be the lost ones, have no wings, and state that they may or may not have been added later. It is doubtful that those drawings were true, for Marquette describe the images as something that would equal the best artists of France, yet the wingless drawings that are published are closer to the talent of 3rd grade art, and the legends called it a bird. Marquette and Joliet were chosen for their skills in mapping and art, so it is my opinion that they would not have made such bold statements, and drawn such a pitiful resemblance, but their work would be more like the last two drawings on this page.

Part of the legend delivered in the 50s and 60s newspapers and the local stories added to the legend to scare the kids. A teacher touring kids on the site told us that this is the devil that will come to destroy the nation. The people that turn to him will wreak havoc in the land even killing those that oppose. If the nation does not defeat him, they will cease to be a country of freedom and rights as we know it. You must recognize him, and watch for him, and show the people his true nature. What a ridiculous thing to say to a bunch of kids! Who could possibly see that thing and not know it was a devil. But now we can see the meaning much better, and not even those folks telling the stories new how true the legend really was.

Before the cliff site was wiped out, there was a promise that the painting would be restored. It took them nearly twenty years to do it, but they mounted a Bill-Board about 8 feet high and 15 feet long with this picture on the end of a truck parking space about 1992. That was a ridiculous joke to our expectations, and a severe disappointment to preserving history. Then a larger image was made on what is told to be a steel plate, and that hung on the sandstone cliff for years. That one now resides at a high school football field north of Godfrey on old highway 67. The original highway 67 was the way from Springfield to St Louis traveled by Lincoln the lawyer, and part of that original road is now my parents driveway in Woodson Illinois.

Then about 1998, they cleared the cliff touching sandstone, and the college painted this one to proper size, on a somewhat rough surface. That is where it now resides, and still it is amazing to view. My personal choice is not to honor images, but to recognize that this may be a prophetic symbol of historical significance. The legend warns of this nation being taken or attacked by the beast, depicted in the 1600s or earlier. The original image was placed long before the nation or states were formed or even discovered by the explorers that documented the Mississippi River many years before the Lewis and Clark expedition.

This is a photo of me and my daughter in 2002. Click on the image-1, for a high resolution cut-out of the beast from this photo, and image-2 is a another photo that has my sister and my daughter in the foreground, at a distance and angle that makes the beast look smaller.

The painting is just outside of the cave where the legend says that it lived. It is told that the cave was full of bones, which is pretty ominous, because you could probably fit a shopping mall inside that cavern, or a hundred large trucks. Some of the cave was excavated by the limestone company, but you can tell that it has original features and serious dangers from the collapsing overhead sandstone sheets that are scattered on the floor from the 50 feet ceiling. My own explorations went only about 200 yards to the end of the natural light.

The Piasa painting is also about 30 miles upstream from the largest ancient city north of Mexico, the Cahokia Indian burial mounds in Collinsville Illinois. The 120 documented mounds are man made, most about 20 feet high 50 feet wide and 100 feet long, resembling a section of a modern flood levy. But some were set side by side and others scattered throughout an area of 4 to 6 square miles. One that we toured was opened and found packed with remains of people buried with their possessions of pots, copper and shell ornaments, weapons and clothing, arranged as a progressive tribal cemetery. The largest Mound is like a dirt pyramid, at 100 feet high, 950 feet long, and 836 feet wide composed entirely of burial plots covered with soil.

The proximity of the Piasa painting to such a large and organized civilization suggests that the painting may have been a territory marker or symbol upstream for the Mississippi and Illinois River traffic and travelers. But it still amazes me of the resemblance to the shape of our nation, and the face of (Former) President B.O. The facts that this nation has changed so radically from a Republic to a Socialism in a short time, and implemented by the policies of (Former) President B.O. to ignore the warnings of national debt and irrational spending. We cannot stand as a nation if the softening of our controls continue. We will be forced to sell off assets of land, or break apart the states, as we have recently done with our industries. The policies of (Former) President B.O. were driving the nation to ruin, and many believe rightly that this is entirely his and the Democratic Parties' intention to weaken our resolve so that the nations of Islam can embrace us and imbed their culture, and conquer from within as they are doing in Europe. This is becoming more evident since the Democratic Platform officially has removed God and Israel from their Parties' documents of policies, and voted in the changes during the September 2012 Convention.

We also have many versions of the image that artists have rendered for newspapers and books that were drawn and painted before my time. Many were probably the embellished works of the college artists that structured the reworking of the cliff painting. There is not much that my searching has found on these drawings, but we can assume that anyone can make one and it eventually becomes historical. Then again, these may be similar to the two lost originals done by Marquette and Joliet.

Consider this part of my theory, where the legend and drawings said that the tail wrapped around the body three times, then over the head and between the legs. What if this creature had a torso with bands similar to an armadillo. The thing was wounded and dove into the river, but was not recovered, so these images were from brief observations of frightened people. There are other legends of pterodactyl type birds with scales, and these were of tremendous size and length of tail that could carry men or livestock. A lot of legends are fabricated, but some have a truth that lived beyond what we have seen.

http://www.piasabirds.com/piasalegend.html This is a link to the High School version of the Piasa Legend, where the steel-plate painting was adopted as a school logo. There are several websites that cover different versions and different folk tales of the history of this image.