Luminous images accompanied by newspaper extracts dating back to the early 1800s and words by Ngiyampaa Elder Peter Williams explore the ongoing mystery of yahoo encounters.

SHORTLISTED: CBCA 2020 Eva Pownall Award for Information Books

‘He was surprised to observe a hairy human form, about seven feet in height, walking in the bush.’ Queanbeyan Age, 24 August 1886

Throughout the first century or so of Australian settlement by Europeans, the pages of colonial newspapers were haunted by reports of a bewildering phenomenon: the mysterious yahoo or hairy man …

But what was it?

Yahoo Creek breathes life into this little-known piece of Australian history – which, by many accounts, is a history still in the making.

‘These stories are not my stories or your stories, they’re our stories.’ Peter Williams, Ngiyampaa Elder