Wesley Clepper and the Bobcats

Two clippings from a Waller County area newspaper that are kept in a picture frame by William Wesley Clepper’s granddaughter, Dana Clepper Spires.

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HANDY WEAPON - W. W. Clepper, Rt. 1 Hockley, was driving down the road just south of Three-Mile Creek last Wednesday night when his car struck what he thought was a dog. Worried about the animal, Mr. Clepper got out to see about it. As he stepped from his car, this 20-pound bobcat, not a dog, jumped up and lunged at him. Mr. Clepper reached into the car for the only weapon - a crescent wrench. He struck down the big cat in the head, knocking it back, then killed it with the wrench.
- Staff Photo by Mary Midkiff

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Neighbor’s Dog Turned Into 20-Pound Bobcat
By Zane Chastain
Press Outdoor Editor

If you ever have reason to doubt that old saying about lightning striking twice in the same place, W. W. Clepper of Hockley can prove to you that it does... in the form of bobcats!
Driving home from the work just south of Three-Mile Creek recently late one evening, Clepper’s car struck something which felt like a dog.
Fearing it was one of his neighbor’s dogs that had dashed unseen out of the woods, the Houston area pile-driver operator stopped his car and started to get out to give the animal aid.
“It wasn’t a dog,” Clepper told listeners later on. “It was a big bobcat and he came right in after me when I started opening my door. That’s when I had to do something. So I grabbed a crescent wrench lying on the car seat and hit it.”
The blow, a solid one, lowered the boom on the cat, knocking it unconscious. The Clepper finished the devastating cat off.
As if that wasn’t enough, two weeks later, he was driving along the same road - and thinking about his hair-raising experience - when he saw a cat-like figure dash out of the woods into his headlights.
Again Clepper’s car hit the quick-moving animal and the husky Texas stopped to see what it was.
“Only this time I didn’t get out to see what it was,” he recalled. “I just backed up my car until I saw what it was. It was another bob-cat. Dead, too. This one, weighed 17 1/2 pounds.
The one he killed earlier pushed the scales to 20 pounds, and was a male.
“This one was a female. Must have been his mate. They travel in pairs and I was dog-gone lucky both of them didn’t tear into me that first night.”

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More Details:
• Lucille Mehrkam, History and Genealogy of the Family of Jacob Klepper/Clepper Family and Malcolm McAlpine Family (The Gregath Company, 1996), Library of Congress under card number 86-62751 (Page 216)