The Legend of Juan Erramouspe: Wild Basque of the Rockies

On the high barren plains of Idaho in the summer of 1847, a wagon train of immigrant families bound for Oregon is attacked and massacred by a Blackfoot war party. The sole survivor is a ten-year-old Spanish Basque boy named Juan Erramouspe. Horribly burned and disfigured during the fierce and bloody attack, Juan is found and adopted by a band of Shoshone Indians. Growing into manhood among the Shoshones, he becomes known as "Strange One", due to his grotesque and threatening appearance, gigantic size, and tremendous physical strength and agility. Ultimately cast out by the tribe, he is forced to wander in the wilderness forever as a deserted, lonely and feared recluse. As he moves silently through the mountains and forests, his periodic encounters with Indians and settlers, and his balefully mourning scream in the night, create fear and panic in the local communities. Branded unjustly as a threat to all, Juan perseveres and his legend is told and retold around campfires in the West, even today.