A Plain Account of the Ohio Marsh Man Part 6

Of all the largely sensational (and most likely fictional) reports that came out of that next spring the most interesting is that of Colleen Dupree. Dupree was a 48 year old bank teller who would often frequent the Erie waterfront on her lunch breaks. In May of 2017 she was out walking the same shoreline (at roughly the same place on Magee Marsh as the initial report) at about 11:30am. As she walked the length of the berm she noticed a man walking towards her from the far end of the dike. This was not altogether interesting in any conventional way. The stretch of trail was heavily used by hiker, bikers, and birders. The man looked “very trim,” was not wearing a shirt, and sported a full black beard. At the onset Colleen took him to be a runner out on his lunch. There were often those who ran any number of routes through the area and besides, she had no objection to trim shirtless men.

As the man approached, Colleen offered a brief greeting. She could not remember if she had said “how are you doing?” or if the man had simply answered as if she had. The stranger hesitantly said, “I’m doing fine,” then added, “What brings you out today?” The words seemed to slide off his tongue like syrup escaping slowly a bottle. Colleen took note of that even then. The two were not standing beside each other. Colleen explained that she often liked to walk along the shore on her breaks. It allowed her a chance to get away from the concerns of the day. She had a bit of an anxiety problem, she explained, [in our interview she admitted that she rambled a bit both out of her own character flaw and also because the man was remarkably attractive] and here she could focus on her breathing and calm herself.

Reluctantly, the man looked out at the vast great lake with its sweeping aquamarine surface stretching out toward the horizon and said, “It can, it can. It can be an escape for the mind. It allows us to get away from the busyness of it all. We’ve trapped ourselves you know. We’ve trapped ourselves in the busy-ness and we’re starving to death.” With that the man trailed off, seemingly embarrassed that he had spoken so much. The pair exchanged pleasantries and each proceeded on their way. After a moment, Colleen, who has no recollection why she did so, turned to look at the attractive man. However, he was gone. Surely he could not have reached the far end of the berm even at a run. Either he had climbed down the embankment toward the marsh or towards the lake. Surely that must have been it, she conjectured. Colleen gave little thought the encounter and likely would not have reported it at all had it not been for the aforementioned article in the Toledo Blade. In hindsight, she too called in her story, though for certain, it did not bear very much in common with the initial bigfoot-like story that had been the impetus for the whole affair. Still, to this day, Colleen Dupree claims with absolute certainty that the shirtless man she had spoken to was indeed the Ohio Marsh Man.