“A message from Mars” ― an outer space stone engraved with strange hieroglyphics

In the summer of 1908, a strange event took place in the vicinity of Cowichan Valley on Vancouver Island, in British Columbia, Canada. When Willie McKinnon, the 14-year-old son of Mr. Angus McKinnon was working in his father’s garden around 11:30 o’clock, a meteor about 10 inches in diameter was hurled through space and buried itself in the ground about eight feet from where he was standing.

Fortunately, Willie was not injured by the meteorite impact. He immediately called his father to see what happened and when Mr. McKinnon came to the spot, he was shocked to find that the meteor was almost as round as a marble; and the hot surface was deeply scored with what resembled some kinds of strange hieroglyphics.

This startling story was published as a front-page newspaper article of Sept. 5, 1908, entitled, “A Message From Mars”.

Since this weird incident took place, Mr. McKinnon had spent most of his life trying to decipher the strange markings on the mysterious stone. However, the strange outer space stone appears to have never been examined in a proper way, because any of its research papers has not been found yet.

In the present day, its exact location is unknown, and the ‘miracle stone of Cowichan’ remains an unexplained mystery that is untouched to this day.

This fascinating story was recently published in the Cowichan Valley Citizen in January 2015, by TW Patterson who has been writing about British Columbia’s history for more than 50 years.

So, what could it be? Was the meteorite really inscribed with hieroglyphics, or is it all nothing but Mr. MacKinnon’s fabricated story? What do you think?