Skunk Ape.
Some of this reportage is based on the journals of the enviably named Professor Ethan Lovejoy, the Gertrude Toynbee Chair of Cryptozoological Studies at Tulane University.
Professor Lovejoy's office is rarely visited. It is Dinwiddie Hall, across the corridor from the room where Tulane's mummies are stored. This suits the professor. He is getting up in years, so he enjoys the peace and quiet.
" I do not seek to understand that I may believe but believe that I might understand. For this too I believe since, unless I first believe, I shall not understand." -St. Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109).
St. Anselm is known as the Doctor Magnificus. This is a quotation that is framed on Professor Lovejoy's office wall.
Ethan Lovejoy knows all the guards who work in the mummy room. They are cowardly and dim-witted lot. The studious professor knows what the guards do with the mummies. He turns a blind eye. He gets a cut.
Prof. Lovejoy often works late into the night, often past the witching hour. His quiet contemplation of scholarly matters is often interrupted by giggling in the hall. They charge admission to see the mummies after hours.
The kind of people who want to visit the mummy room after dark fall into two categories. Most are occultists or paranormal investigators. Some are just perverts.
Because of the mummies' age, a guard has to be in the room at all times.
Professor Lovejoy came to New Orleans in 1964, intrigued by reports of the Honey Island Swamp Monster in nearby Pearl River. The monster was first sighted in 1963 in a remote corner of the Honey Island Swamp, one of the last pristine marshlands. The swamp where the monster was first seen is untouched by civilization. It is primeval.
Tulane University was just starting up its cryptozoology department at the time and Prof. Lovejoy was one of the first hires. He made a name for himself in New Orleans by tracing the origins of the Scout Island Skunk Ape in City Park back to the Honey Island Swamp.