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All the United States Wisconsin Monico Rhinelapus

Rhinelapus

Meet the "Green Monster" of Monico, Wisconsin.

Monico, Wisconsin

Added By
Eric Grundhauser
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The Rhinelapus   Lanyap/CC BY 2.0
The Rhinelapus   Lanyap/CC BY 2.0
The Rhinelapus   Lanyap/CC BY 2.0
The Rhinelapus is kept in a cage as a safety precaution, should it get hungry   Wormfood / Atlas Obscura User
Zoomed-in view of the Beast’s fierce glare   Wormfood / Atlas Obscura User
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There are statues and tributes to bizarre local cryptids all over the country that are all worth visiting. And then there’s the Rhinelapus, or Green Monster of Monico, Wisconsin, which looks far stranger than any other.

Part folk art, part cryptozoological mythmaking monument, the Rhinelapus is unlike any of its odd brethren, including the nearby Hodag. The Green Monster was born in the 1940s when a local man Guy Dailey found a huge, strangely shaped piece of wood. The three-pronged mega-log was once the top of a tree, but Dailey thought it looked like a monstrous cross between a rhino, an elephant, and an octopus, so he named his wooden monster the Rhinelapus.

Dailey dragged the natural tripod back home and put it on display in front of the Lake Venus Tavern, where it stood for more than 60 years. Eventually the Rhinelapus was painted green, both to preserve the wood and to finally transform the local icon into a real monster. In the early 2000s, the Rhinelapus, or Green Monster, as it came to be called, was moved to its own little pavilion, where it remains today.

While it stood in its original home in front of the Lake Venus Tavern, the people could walk right up and pet the Rhinelapus at their leisure. Today the local creature is surrounded by a chain link fence, which both seems too weak to hold the big green monster inside and too flimsy to keep all the esoteric cryptid fans out.

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Monsters Statues Roadside Attractions

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Added By

EricGrundhauser

Edited By

michaelnhartman, HoRed, Wormfood

  • michaelnhartman
  • HoRed
  • Wormfood

Published

July 16, 2018

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  • Guy Dailey is my great-grandfather
  • https://www.roadsideamerica.com/tip/11653
Rhinelapus
1668 US-8
Monico, Wisconsin, 54501
United States
45.576781, -89.158723
Get Directions

Nearby Places

Kovac Planetarium

Rhinelander, Wisconsin

miles away

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miles away

World's Largest Soup Kettle

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miles away

Explore the Destination Guide

Photo of Wisconsin

Wisconsin

United States

Places 182
Stories 29

Nearby Places

Kovac Planetarium

Rhinelander, Wisconsin

miles away

The Hodag

Rhinelander, Wisconsin

miles away

World's Largest Soup Kettle

Laona, Wisconsin

miles away

Explore the Destination Guide

Photo of Wisconsin

Wisconsin

United States

Places 182
Stories 29

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