When something that looked curiously like a meteorite landed in Bill Hicks’s driveway and left a sizable indentation, he wondered out loud if maybe it was meant for his neighbour.
“We live near Camp Phillip. Maybe God was trying to speak to them and he missed.” - Bill Hicks.
“We’ve got some neighbours who wish we weren’t here. Maybe he’s one of them. We sing and make noise and praise God. Some of the neighbours want peace and quiet.” - Pastor Tom Klusmeyer. Camp Phillip is a ministry of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod Church that caters year-round to children and families. Hicks lives about a mile from the camp on Buttercup Avenue west of Wautoma.
“I don’t even hear them,” - Bill Hicks.
But he definitely heard the rock that landed in his driveway about three weeks ago. It sounded like a big thunderclap so he didn’t think much of it at the time.
“I got up in the morning and saw the hole and said: What the hell is that?” - Bill Hicks. He filled the hole, which he estimated at about 2 feet deep, with cat litter, gravel and rocks so that his SUV wouldn’t get snarled up when he tried to back out. Hicks and his roommate Larry Linde haven’t shown the rock to any experts but they’ve asked someone from the astronomy department at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh to take a look at it.
“It definitely looks like pictures I’ve seen of meteorites.” - Larry Linde. It measures about 4 inches by 6 inches and is reddish-brown in colour. Neither Hicks nor Linde would be surprised if the rock turned out to be a meteorite, they said. Other rare occurrences have happened on their property. “We’ve been struck by lightning twice since I’ve been living here.” - Bill Hicks. The same thing happened at the camp, Klusmeyer said. But, a meteorite is rarer than that. “You’re four times more likely to get hit by lightning than a meteorite.” - Larry Linde.
