Old King of ’Gators is Dead.
The king alligator of Georgia has been killed at Hutchinson’s pond at Adel by M. L. Crowley, after the beast had eluded hunters, for twenty-two years. The alligator measured ten feet four inches and had thirty-seven notches on its tail, which shows that it was thirty-seven years old.
Many have been the attempts to kill the sly old creature, but always, until now, it has escaped the bullets aimed at it and has scuttled safely back to its cave. It was the ’gator’s appetite for hogs that proved its undoing.
Mr. Crowley, who for twenty-two years has been hunting this beast, tied the leg of a porker to a tree near Hutchinson’s pond, and hid himself. The wary old ’gator slid out of the water, through a clump of bushes, and was just reaching for the bait when Mr. Crowley fired. The bullet took the beast in a vital spot and killed it instantly.