Mason Ramsey, an 11-year-old from Illinois, became an overnight Internet celebrity after a video of him yodelling in Walmart went viral in late March. As of this morning, Ramsey has gone missing, and while the Pope County Sheriff’s Department has ruled out foul play, his community and adorers search for an explanation.
“It’s a sad, sad day for yodelling fans,” said Peter Tarjay, a Canadian fan who runs the “Yodel Yobs” yodelling meme imageboard. “For a brief moment, this boy’s beautiful mountain songs warmed our hearts in these trying times. Now that light has been extinguished.” Various theories have arisen to explain Ramsey’s disappearance.Many suspect the boy has been kidnapped, but one of Ramsey’s neighbours, “Old Tom” McClatchey said that people looking for solutions on the ground are on the wrong track.
“He went up there!” McClatchey told The Contrarion, pointing a crooked finger at the ceiling. “I dare say he’s an angel, or an alien, or both! But I saws it with me own two eyes. The aircraft landed in me field and took him up — strange figures in white cloaks greetin’ him like an old friend,” said McClatchey, waggling his gnarled cane and sucking at his false teeth.
While some have dismissed McClatchey as “obviously a nutcase,” others have flocked to his theory, including some 60 individuals who have assembled to worship at the site of Ramsey’s supposed ascension. Calling themselves the First Lonesome Lovesick Church of the Divine Walmart Yodelling Kid (FLLCDWYK), these visitors from all over the world have set up a tent city in McClatchey’s field where they eat, sleep, and debate the meaning of Ramsey’s gospel, yodelling long into the night.
Photo by Alora Griffiths/The Ontarion