In sad news, the NY Times reports Douglas Herrick, 82, Father of the Jackalope, Is Dead:
Douglas Herrick, 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 in Casper, Wyo. He was 82.One can't help but wonder whether consumption of spirituous liquors was involved.
...
Douglas Herrick lived in Casper, but it was in his hometown, Douglas, Wyo., that luck changed his life.
In 1932 (other accounts say 1934, 1939 and 1940, but Ralph Herrick swears it was 1932), the Herrick 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.
