1832 (pre): B. H. Hodgson's Yeti Report

The Legend: 

In 1832, B. H. Hodgson (often mistakenly called 'Hodson'), the Court of Nepal's first British Resident, reported that his native hunters had been frightened by a 'wild man' that "moved erectly, was covered in long, dark hair, and had no tail."

The Actual Report

        The "report" is actually a minor footnote within a long article about the mammals of Nepal that Hodgson submitted to the Asiatic Society of Calcutta, India, which was printed in an 1832 edition of their journal. No date is given for the event, as it is being mentioned more as an amusing anecdote about the superstitious natives of the country. The footnote is referenced from the short section of the article in which Hodgson discusses the native monkies of Nepal:

"Religion has introduced the Bandar [a native monkey] into the central region, where it seems to flourish, half domesticated, in the neighbourhood of temples, in the populous valley of Nepal proper. My shooters were once alarmed in the Kachár by the apparition of a 'wild man,' possibly an ourang, but I doubt their accuracy. They mistook the creature for a càcodemon or rakshas [demons], and fled from it instead of shooting it. It moved, they said, erectly: was covered with long dark hair, and had no tail."

And thus runs the earliest known mention by a foreigner of the native belief of Nepal regarding the hairy wild man.

The Mis-Spelled Name

        In 1976, Reader's Digest mis-spelled Hodgson's last name as 'Hodson' in their book, Strange Stories, Amazing Facts... so anyone printing his name as 'Hodson' ultimately got their story from this 1976 book.