Douglas Herrick, 82, Gave the Jackalope Its Horns
By Douglas Martin
The New York Times/International Herald Tribune
January 20, 2003

Douglas Herrick, 82, who gets both the credit and the blame for perhaps the tackiest totem of, the American West; the jackalope - half bunny, half antelope and 100 percent tourist trap - died on Jan. 6 of bone and lung cancer in Casper, Wyoming.

He lived in Casper, but it was in his hometown, Douglas, Wyoming, that luck changed his life. In 1932 (other accounts say 1934,1939 and 1940, but Herrick's brother, Ralph, swears it was 1932), the brothers had returned from hunting.

"We just throwed the dead jack rabbit in the shop when we come in and it slid, on the floor right up against a pair of deer horns we had in there," Ralph said. "It looked like that rabbit had horns on it."

His brother's eyes brightened with inspiration.

"Let's mount that thing!" he said.

That was tens of thousands of jackalopes ago. A jackalope, of course, is a legendary animal with a jack rabbit's body and the antlers of a pronghorn antelope, which resembles a small deer. The last syllable of the name comes from antelope. (Jackadeer? Nah.)

Believers say that Buddha mentioned a horned rabbit, although they usually neglect to mention that the Enlightened One implied they do not exist. They also point toe picture of a horned rabbit painted in the 1500s, but scientists suspect its cerebral protuberances were tumors; from a rabbit virus. Cowboy's have said that while they were singing around the fire, their chorus was joined by a distant jackalope, often in harmony, usually in the tenor line. (Yep.)

Whether truth, fiction or metaphor, the mounted version of the jackalope, many made with deer horn tips, relentlessly proliferated. Many thousands were made by Ralph Herrick and his son Jim, Douglas Herrick was less interested in the family taxidermy shop:

"I don't think my brother ever made more than a thousand, if he done that," Ralph Herrick said.

Douglas became the jackalope capital. In 1965, the state of Wyoming trademarked the name, and in 1985 Governor Ed Herschler pronounced it the animal's official home.

Jackalope hunting licenses are sold; an applicant must supposedly pass a test to prove he has an I.Q. higher than 50: but not more than 72. Hunting is permitted, only on June 31, from midnight to 2 a.m. Jackalope milk is available at several stores, though its authenticity is questionable; everyone knows how dangerous it is to milk a jackalope.

(AP)