an Indian, a chief’s grandson, who once came face to face with a hairy Sasquatch and barely escaped with his life, the witness is a highly respected resident of the Songhees Reserve, here is how he described the creature, “His eyes glowed like the noonday sun, and the hair on his body was like moss on the rocks. His voice sounded like the roar of a surf from a heavy sea.”
The old Indian related that in his youth he was searching for a young deer up a mountain slope. When he reached the summit there was no deer. He was about to retrace his steps when he heard a loud roar. “At first I was like a frozen man, even the rocks were trembling. I looked up and there, not far away from me was a hairy man maybe 18 feet tall. As tall as a mountain tree. He was holding the deer. I remember that my spirit animal guide was a wolf, that it made me fast, so I turned and ran like the wind, he was throwing trees at me. You can still see the trees up there on the mountain rotting.”
From the description of the mountain he gave, it is Mount Matheson, near Rocky Point. He said they have always lived on Vancouver Island, but now that it’s settled they have moved to the interior…
Excerpt from the Times Colonist, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, 26 Apr 1957,
. . . when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. Sherlock Holmes In case you haven’t noticed, it is Bigfoot season again. When the rainy season ends and the cold fronts begin to move in, the Bigfoots emerge from hiding. Already this fall, mass Bigfoot sightings have begun in Florida: a Lakeland man shot one in the Green Swamp (it got away), an Apopka security guard was scratched by one at a nursery, a hitchhiker near Belleview saw one and the smell (not the Bigfoot) knocked him down. The Suncoast is no exception: this month five were seen near Brooksville (where more Bigfoots are sighted than anywhere else in Florida). They have been sighted near S.R. 583 in Safety Harbor, on the shores of the Pithlacoo-chee River, strolling along lonely Pasco County roadways, at Little Salt Springs south of Sarasota, thrashing about in a Venice wilderness, and crossing S.R. 476 up in Citrus County. Just last Thursday, Port Richey high school student David Humphrey was chased across the Bay Boulevard bridge by one. These are real Bigfoots, now, not the ones who will be appearing at your door tonight grunting “Trick or Treat.” You hope. One never knows for sure. That’s why we have thoroughly researched the Bigfoot phenomena to prepare a sort of Bigfoot primer to aid in distinguishing the actual abominables from the hirsute heathens. How do you know a Bigfoot is nearby? One always senses the presence of a Bigfoot before it appears. A severe feeling of nausea and fright will take hold one minute before a Bigfoot appears. The fright is understandable. A scale devised by Dr. Grover Krantz (physical anthropologist at Washington State University) puts the average Bigfoot at between seven and nine feet tall. It weighs between 500 and 1,000 pounds (a 12-footer weighs 2,350 pounds) with a 5.8-inch heel breadth and four-to-six foot stride. The nausea is advance warning of the worst case of B.O. you’ll ever encounter. How do Bigfoots smell? ” Bad. Real bad. So bad, that those who have been near Bigfoots have trouble describing the odor, most settling for a combination of the following: rotten meat, skunk, rotten eggs, moldy cheese, goat dung, and burnt sul- phur. Much traveled Bigfoot author Ivan Sanderson says the smell is ciose to that emitted by the “pygmies of the Ituri Forest of the Congo Uele” (and that we smell like “boiled rabbit” to Bigfoots). Suncoast Bigfoot spotter John Sohl says it is “like being downwind from the Toytown dump.” Charles Stoekman, whose Florida Keys home is constantly plagued by Bigfoots, claims they smell “like a dog that hasn’t been bathed in a year and suddenly gets rained on.” What don’t Bigfoots like? Rain. They like rivers and swimming pools, but nix on rain. When a Bigfoot gets rained upon, it shakes its arms vigorously until they are dry. Bigfoots do not like shotguns. A New Port Richey woman saw one in her backyard and threw a bag of garbage and a cooler filled with trash at the monster. It didn’t budge. Bigfoots love garbage. But when her husband emerged with a shotgun, it was long gone. When is one safe from Bigfoots? If it is raining or you are with someone owns a shotgun. What do Bigfoots like? Tricycles. Experts don’t know why but there have been numerous reports of Bigfoots walking off with trikes. They like to eat rats (which they squash before eating), decapitated racoons and ducks (which they . . . well, you get the picture), flour pancakes and frogs of any size. Bigfoots pull the tongues out of everything they eat. Experts feel they do this because they resent not having the power of speech. Bigfoots also like fire. What is the greatest ambition of a Bigfoot’s life? To start a fire. In fact, one way of tracking a Bigfoot is looking for the piles of branches and twigs it leaves. Try as it might, a Bigfoot cannot start a fire. What is an average day in the life of a Bigfoot like? Eating, trying to start fires, running from rain, searching for tricycles. What are some other interesting facts about Bigfoots? When more than one Bigfoot are together, they walk in order of size, tallest to shortest. Bigfoots are nocturnal, omnivorous, bury their dead and hide in trenches covered by branches and leaves. They are said to be direct descen-dents of Esau, whom the Bible describes as smelling like a “field of rotten potatoes.” Is Bigfoot known by any other name? Sasquateh (NW U.S.), Skunk Ape (SE U.S.), Yeti (Himalayas), Big-Unn (Pasco County), Yequi (Tibet), Sisimito (Honduras), Shookpa (Nepal), Jacko (Rocky Mountains), Mi-Go (Bhutan), Shiru (Andes) and Gin-Sung (Central China). What do Bigfoots look like? Massive shoulders. Body covered with dark hair. V-shaped chest. The bulk is equal to a six-foot human weighing between 300 and 400 pounds. The hands are wide with long palms, short fingers and thumbs nearly the same length as fingers. Forearms are long, biceps thick, hands reach to the knees. Bigfoots have a knot on the back, no neck and a small lump of a head which resembles the peaked hump of a yak. The face is hairless but not Neanderthal, as most think. The forehead slopes only slightly, the nose is pugged with nostrils flowing into the upper lip and there is a tuft of thick hair running across the forehead. Eyes are glowing and cat-like and have been described as both hot pink and yellow. How does Bigfoot sound? The call of the Bigfoot is a high-pitched shrill bark, 10 times louder than a dog, like a coach’s whistle blown in a tunnel and amplified. It is said that baby Bigfoots are born with the sense of language but lose it by maturity since there is no one else to talk to. There are only two Bigfoot words on record “hu hu,” and “ook.” Why is it called Bigfoot? Because its feet are at least 17-inches long, calloused on the edges, have short metatarsels, an equal row of straight toes (slightly webbed), wide heels and double balls. Young Bigfoots have arched feet; older ones are flatfooted. The footprint is 3-6 times deeper than a man’s. Bigfoots often have deformed right feet, although experts cannot figure out why. What should you do if you see a Bigfoot tonight? Put a tricycle in its “hu-hu or ook” bag and Bigfoot will leave you alone.
𝑾𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒘𝒐𝒍𝒗𝒆𝒔… The idea of a being, half wolf, half man, and possessing also many demoniacal attributes, is a very curious piece of old-world superstition still to be found in very many European countries , and strengthened, no doubt, by the discovery, at times, of children who have been carried off and cared for by wolves who preferred the role of foster-mother to that of devourer —an occurrence of which there are frequent proofs on record. The wild and howling night winds, the Maruts that gave name to our too familiar nightmare, may have given the first notion of demon wolves to the trembling listener as they passed shrieking by his solitary tent or hut. As the transition of thought by which the spirit-wolf and the human form became amalgamated is easily imagined. There appears to be plenty of evidence that, at different times, a form of madness has broken out by which individuals have fancied themselves to be turned into wolves. Burton, in his ” Anatomy of Melancholy,” desoribes this disease, which he calls Lycanthropia, as ” when men run howling about graves and fields in the night, and will not be dissuaded ,that they are not wolves or some such beasts.” -Manchester Courier, October 20, 1883
Indonesian officials have posted a reward for anyone who captures a Tasmanian Tiger, a doglike striped animal that zoologists say has been extinct for at least 60 years. While there’s no scientific proof of their existence, news reports this week quoted villagers as saying that packs of Tasmanian Tigers have been killing farm animals in moonlit attacks to feed their pups. The official Antara news agency said officials in the remote mountainous interior of Irian Jaya, the Indonesian-controlled western half of the island of New Guinea, offered $670 for the first Tasmanian Tiger captured alive.
Named after their only known habitat in Tasmania, an island state off southeastern Australia, the animals have dark stripes on their backs. They raise their young in pouches like kangaroos and other Australian marsupials. Hunted mercilessly by European sheep ranchers last century, they were declared extinct when Tasmanian Tiger back on ths prowl Villagers of Irian Jaya, the Indonesian-controlled western half of the island of New Guinea, have reported packs of Tasmanian Tigers killing farm animals. The Tasmanian Tiger, also called the Tasmanian Woff, is a large marsupial native to Tasmania. Scientists believed it’s been extinct for at least 60 years. The Tasmanian is about 5 leet long with light brown fur with dark stripes across its lower back The jaws of a Tasmanian Tiger are believed to open wider than any other mammal. They raised their young in pouches like other marsupials which include the kangaroo, koala, possum, Tasmanian Devil, and wallaby. The last known Tasmanian Tiger died in a zoo in Hobart in 1936. Dozens of unsubstantiated sightings have been made in Tasmania ever since. Now New Guinean villagers claim packs of six or seven Tasmanian Tigers have been killing pigs, cats and other domestic animals during the past month. The Indonesian Observer newspaper said one Tasmanian Tiger was killed recently by villagers and sold to highway workers who ate it for dinner.
Wisconsin State Journal, August 1997
Art by Jon MacNair
Seeing the thylacines last images from that zoo in the 30s is heartbreaking. Knowing we hunted an animal to extinction is almost unbearable. But as much as I hope they are still alive and hiding from humanity, I am very troubled about the idea of bringing them back. Their habitat is not what it once was and there is no guarantee at all they won’t be hunted mercilessly all over again.
They are beautiful creatures, and we should remember them as they were…
“It was nearly midnight when he started on his return over stony hills and hollows. Though he was a bold youth, he became silent as he approached the lonely valley known as Rocky Ravine. When half way through the tortuous cliff between the hills a sound attracted his attention. On his right, near tho top of the hillside, a curious figure was seen creeping from rock to rock and keeping well in the shadows. It carried something which gleamed brightly now and then as the moon’s rays fell upon it. It came nearer aud nearer the farmer, who had crouched down behind a clump of blackberry bushes, with a strange feeling of dread within him. The mysterious being animal or man approached until it reached the roadway within ten feet of the boy, when with a bound it sprang to the top of a huge boulder, where it crouched for a moment in the full glare of the moon. Frank Rose gave one look back and then shut his eyes with a gap of horror. The thing upon tho rock was a man. But what a man ! When Frank got home that night he told his story of what he had seen upon the way of a creature which, though it walked on “all fours” and was covered with hair from head to foot, carried a gleaming axe and displayed other indications of being human. It was gaunt but muscular, and had burning eyes that shone through long, fancied locks of hair. He had seen this thing but for a moment as it crouched upon a rock. Then it leaped down on the other rock , and he made his way out of the deserted valley as quickly as possible. Young Rose’s story created little agitation among the neighbors. They practical pooh-poohed it, the superstitious added it to their list of ghost tales and inwardly resolved never again to be caught in the neighborhood of Rocky Ravine after nightfall….
But the adventure was not to end so lightly. On the very next night, Henry Simon and William Downey, stock buyers, living in another county, rode within a short distance of the dreary valley, when they were astonished to hear the reverberation of a succession of blows, evidently made by some instrument of steel or iron. They tied their horses and walked up the dark ravine until they arrived at a tremendous cavity which had evidently been excavated by human hands. Twenty feet below in tho darkness some one was striking blow alter blow upon tho rocky bottom of the pit. ” What are you doing down there?”‘ shouted Simon. For answer a stone came whizzing through the air, narrowly missing Downey’s head. A big, hairy creature sprang out of the hole with a frightful yell and disappeared with surprising rapidity over the side of the hill, still carrying its steel tool, though running apparently upon four legs. The traders were Stupefied with astonishment, aud lost no time in getting out of the neighborhood.”
Old bear tracker Ivan Marx dropped into a sagging chair and stared at the mountains through a streaked window “I really do believe there’s something out there” he said pensively “Something of a superior intelligence” Meanwhile a dozen cats bumpied against the front door begging for supper. Out back American wilderness dogs — domesticated wolves actually — restlessly awaited their feedings. So too did the various hounds chickens and geese that live on Marx’s Bear Ranch near this little logging town But Marx wasn’t anxious to tend to his stock He was pondering another creature one he’s certain is every bit as real. He swears he’s seen it And photographed it And once even lost a fight to it. It is Bigfoot sometimes called Sasquatch Skunkman and Stickman “It’s a thing that looks darned near like a man” Marx explained his forehead wrinkling “only it has a lot of hair and a high pointed head” Sightings have been reported overseas in China, Russia and Australia. And In the United States in Alaska, Florida, Louisiana, Arizona,Vermont, Washington and frequently in Northern California. A Redding beautician told the local sheriff 10 years ago that a Bigfoot kidnapped and raped her. The lawman doubted the story because the woman returned to town smelling nice (Bigfoot reportedly reeks) and wearing clean clothes A few years later a Eureka woman claimed a Bigfoot raped her too. Neither incident was ever proven. Campers have told of their tents being destroyed by Bigfoot and hikers have said they’ve spotted the creature in the Sierra high country. During the summer of 1986 a construction crew working in the Inyo National Forest in the southern Sierra Nevada reported glimpsing the shadowy outline of something 8 feet tall “I’m just about pretty sure I saw Bigfoot” said one crewman.
Not everyone of course believes in Bigfoot Most people don’t But this story is about some folks who do — and its existence is about all they agree on. Marx, who mostly wears plaid flannel shirts and denims has tracked animals since his Depression-era childhood when he sold racoons for a whopping $14 apiece. He’s since made a living hunting bear and cougar and selling the photographs and films he’s taken of wildlife Although only slightly more profitable than killing raccoons in the ’30s Marx also claims to be the one and only Bigfoot tracker “There are a lot of Bigfoot experts” he said “because you can be one instantly Nobody really knows about Bigfoot To be a Bigfoot tracker though that’s gonna take you a lifetime” Marx is acquainted with the self-proclaimed Bigfoot experts he says because they’ve hunted the creature with him A couple of those “experts” are involved in this minor Bigfoot feud. Warren Cook an East Coast anthropologist believes Marx has seen photographed and battled Bigfoot However Grover Krantz a West Coast anthropologist argues that every woolly creature picture Marx has taken actually was Marx’s wife in a monkey suit.
Marx’s part of this story began in the late 1940s when he heard Shasta County locals whispering about a huge hairy animal that walked like a man In fact they called it “Wild Man of Little Valley”. Marx disregarded the stories until 1951 when he spotted 18-inch footprints near Mount Shasta “Whatever it was I didn’t know” he said “But I knew it was something that was alive “Before that” Marx continued “I would no more have believed it than the man in the moon. People would try to get me to chase it, I never would. But that (seeing tracks) made a believer of me” Although he says he’s seen 15 of the Bigfoot his first sighting was in 1959 in the White Mountains near Bishop in east-central California He shot film of that Bigfoot but misplaced it “It just didn’t seem important at the time” Marx carries cameras on tracking trips and says he’s sold wildlife films to Disney Studios and Warner Brothers for movies and television His footage was the basis of World Picture’s The Legend of Bigfoot which played in movie theaters 11 years ago.
It’s basically the story of Ivan Marx and Bigfoot “I wanted people to see the god darn thing” he said “I didn’t realize there would be such a big controversy”. Amazing Horizons a production company in Sunnyvale a few months ago released a videotape documentary titled, “In the Shadow of Bigfoot”, which is mostly Marx’s footage. Marx claims never to have made money on either project Maybe he got $800 for The Legend of Bigfoot, he says but the producers of Shadow haven’t even given him a copy He says he doesn’t care about the money, “Who the hell else could live to be 65 years old don’t owe one cent in this world don’t have any money in the bank and don’t want any?” Just as easily Marx discards both the public ridicule — not unlike that endured by people who believe in flying saucers — and Grover Krantz’s criticisms? Krantz is an associate professor of anthropology at Washington State University, had he not been so outspoken during his 18-year tenure about the existence of Bigfoot Krantz says he’d probably be a full professor now. ‘‘I’m curious about anything weird and out-of-the-ordinary” Krantz said recently “I don’t put much stock in them but I’m always curious Bigfoot — I like the name Sasquatch — is pertinent to my work in human evolution. To ignore something like that even if the odds for it to exist are slim, would be the height of folly”. However he doesn’t think Marx has even photographed Bigfoot “In the two (films) I’ve seen I not only know they’re faked, I know who was in the monkey suit: He was in one and his wife was in the other” Krantz said “He’s an extraordinary outdoors man and expert photographer . He thought he would be the one to get this (Bigfoot images) But after trying so many years I think he gave up and said ’If I can’t get the real thing I’ll fake it’ ”. Marx knows of Krantz’s complaints and grins when he remembers his old friend. They used to hunt Bigfoot together “Some of the pictures we’ve taken are funny-looking as hell” Marx conceded “but the damn thing looks phony He’s not well-groomed and the more spooked he gets the higher that dome on his head gets” The Bigfoot’s normally pointed skull also becomes more pronounced or undergoes what Marx calls a “cranial erection” when it’s courting another Bigfoot For all the squabbling though Krantz considers himself one of perhaps only two — the other being Warren Cook — academicians in this country who admits there’s a Bigfoot Neither however has ever seen one. Krantz’s belief is based on talks with 40 people who told him they’d seen Bigfoot “I can’t find a flaw in the stories of a little over half of them’’ he said “If those creatures don’t exist every one of those people was mistaken. And if just one was right then Bigfoot does exist” Cook an ethno-historian and professor of history and anthropology at Castleton State College in Vermont is as adamant as Krantz about the creature’s existence He also has queried witnesses and considers their stories credible “I may not be right about some of my impressions” Cook recently said by phone “but I know the phenomenon I’m studying exists It’s not a figment of people’s imaginations” Neither does he believe Ivan Marx concocted any Bigfoot photos In fact Cook has traveled across the country with Marx talking with him about Bigfoot on television and radio shows and promoting the, In the Shadow of Bigfoot movie for which Cook was the scientific consultant Cook and Marx are aligned in their estimates that a few hundred Bigfoot creatures exist in this country and Cook is convinced the Bigfoot is dying out On the other hand Grover Krantz suggests that some 2000 live in the Pacific Northwest and adjacent Canada Krantz hopes someone will kill a Bigfoot and allow scientists to autopsy it Cook and Marx disagree Leave it alone they say Meanwhile Cook is trying to muster funds to send a Castleton State anthropology student into a Bigfoot “hot spot” in Columbia County NY to observe the creatures much as the late Dian Fossey did mountain gorillas of Africa Said Krantz “The only way to establish that Bigfoot exists is to have a body or a significant piece of one” Retorted Cook “The death of any creature might endanger the ability of that breeding pool (to reproduce) it might push Bigfoot beyond the level of survival” Then Krantz countered “While I don’t think these things are endangered if we’re to do something to help them — maybe alter logging procedures or avoid making roads in a few places — nobody will unless we prove they exist It becomes all the more important to shoot one as soon as possible”.
Although Krantz isn’t planning to kill Bigfoot himself he says a few Bigfoot hunters are trying to get one for him In the meantime he’s looking for a Bigfoot that’s already dead He’s building a lightweight helicopter and plans to fly with an infrared heat detector over known Bigfoot country in the spring “If I could locate an area where they die during winter” he explained “in the spring when they thaw they would rot So the entire year’s supply of dud Sasquatches would be rotting and a rotting body generates heat I could pick up an Image of the rotting body on the detector’s screen” Until they’re able to actually study a Bigfoot corpse. Krantz and the other believers can only guess at what the creature is Krantz thinks it’s a descendant of Giantopithecus an apelike creature that lived a million years ago in what is now China “It’s more ape than human” Krantz said of Bigfoot “and intellectually it’s like an ape. But the locomotion the walking on the hind legs is more human There’s no indication it can reason but I think it’s a closer relative to us than to the apes”. Cook suggests that Bigfoot is a cold weather-adapted swamp-adapted genus that preceded Homo Erectus (the scientific name for Peking Man). Cook also believes Bigfoot is more intelligent than an ape but less so than Peking Man. He also contends that Bigfoot’s intelligence keeps it safe from man. That and the fact that Bigfoot is nocturnal, Marx is not a scientist but a bear tracker And he shrugs his shoulders about Bigfoot’s identity “I guess it’s just whatever it is” He tried two years ago to capture a baby Bigfoot Marx told that story as he headed up a bumpy abandoned logging road to two alpine lakes high above Burney. PlayThere he will circle the watering holes looking for Bigfoot tracks The altimeter on the dash showed Marx was nearing 7000 feet prime elevation for Bigfoot “You know” he said directing tobacco juice into a can and squeezing the jerking steering wheel “they get so darned used to us being around us that they’ve come to tolerate Peggy and me That’s the reason when that one tossed me around I didn’t feel like it was going to try to break an arm or anything I really felt for the thing because of the look in his gol-darned eyes ” Marx and his wife had been camped he said when they heard pitiful whimpers of a – sick female Bigfoot carrying a white-furred baby “First she came into our camp and we heard her crying like a baby. We spent one hell of a night there, so we moved camp and she followed us.
Then we saw a big young male. Then we saw her laying down with the baby and the baby was trying to get up We could hear the male talking Finally she got up and went into the brush” So Marx set out after the female thinking he’d snatch the infant, call Cook to fly out and see it then put it back the next day. The 400-pound male intercepted him however “He made a couple of runs at me” Marx said “but I wouldn’t get away. Finally he just come in and bowled me over three times He didn’t hurt me But he’d have had a helluva time getting that baby away from me if I could have gotten a hold of it” Marx never saw the white baby Bigfoot again and thinks it died soon after What he wants to do his legacy to the Bigfoot legend would be to find the remains of that infant to prove once and for all that the creatures exist Otherwise he wants the Bigfoot left alone. “There’s a lot of animals in this country that people don’t even know is there” Marx said “We caught one animal and called the game warden and told him we had a mountain boomer (a nocturnal rodent) He said ‘You couldn’t that’s a myth’ But then we showed him We’re out in the woods all the time We see a lot of things we don’t even -know can’t explain” Marx says most people won’t admit to things they don’t understand things that are odd And that’s why many Bigfoot sightings go unreported. But if folks want to talk they’re likely to seek out the Bigfoot Man of Burney He’s heard firsthand about kidnappings and rapes He’s met a hairy-faced woman in Alaska who says she’s one-quarter Bigfoot her grandmother allegedly was carried off by a Bigfoot and returned to the village pregnant “Then there’s this ol’ boy from over bn the coast a hippie type” Marx said chuckling “He was camping one time and this female Bigfoot wouldn’t leave him alone She kept coming around and coming around He told me he was going back to that same place this last summer and I haven’t heard from him yet Maybe they got married”
Article FROM the News Tribune Tacoma Washington, Dec, 30th, 1986
Fouke Monster Film Does Good BY DEBRA HALE Associated press Writer FOUKE, Ark (AP) —
He’s as tall as Wilt Chamberlain, almost as fast as a cheetah and as heavy as a gorilla. He has bushy hair, red eyes, a three-toed foot and a voice like a peacock’s. He is the legendary Fouke Monster, the main character in the movie “The Legend of Boggy Creek” starring Keith Crabree, Willie Smith and other residents of this southwest Arkansas community. Crabtree, who portrayed the monster, no longer lives in Fouke. Although the first recorded sight of the monster dates back to 1954, Smith, who plays himself in the movie and who provided the description of the monster, said his 75-year-old sister saw the creature when she was 10. it was not until last summer, though, that the Film Productions of Texarkana turned the legend into a moneymaking movie filmed in Fouke and nearby Texarkana. Producer-director Charles Pierce originally had planned to call the documentary film “Tracking the Fouke Monster.’’
The movie is called a documentary because, as its actual title suggests, the monster subject is treated as a legend. One year after the movie premiered residents of this small community, population .506. are beginning to realize that the movie could have bolstered the town’s economy if they only had acted sooner. “The people here in Fouke have missed the boat by not taking advantage of the publicity we have received and expanded on the monster theme.” said Mayor J.D. Larey of Fouke. “A novelty shop might have been the thing to bring in more money from tourists. But the people here just didn’t realize what they had when the iron was hot.”
Laney . a retired Air Force officer, noted, however, that such profits would not have had a lasting effect. One man who was involved in financial arrangements for the movie shared Larey’s opinion. “None of us dreamed that the darned thing would make the money that it did,” he said. “The man who made the movie had never made a movie in his life They guy who backed the movie had never backed a movie in his life. The people who acted in the movie had never acted before in their lives. I don’t think you could have foreseen anything like this. Laney said he receives several long-distance telephone calls and from three to 12 letters a day about the monster. Much of the mail is addressed directly to the mayor or to other city officials, but some of its is addressed to the Fouke Monster. Larey said the Post Office had decided to forward him all such mail. One such letter addressed to the “Boggy Creek Monster, Fouke. Ark.” was from a child saying she thought his movie was neat. One was to a City Official. And was from a member of the volunteer fire department in Martinsburg, W. Va The man inquired about the monster’s habitat, size and identity. The fireman said he also would “like to have some picutres of the monster. He promised to keep the information “confidential.”
Fouke residents say it is not unusual for a tourist to stop in their town to hunt for the creature in the swamp along Roggy Creek. One customer in the Boggy Creek Cafe, for example, recently said he had seen a man wandering through the swamps the previous day with a knife. The customer said the man told him he was hunting for the monster and that he had just spotted the creature’s claw print on the side of a tree trunk. “I just laughed at him.” the customer said as he drank a cup of coffee “He got mad.” Larey said, three Green Berets from Virginia recently telephoned him to ask if they could look for the monster during their leaves. Larey said he advised the men to wait until after deer hunting season. “I was afraid the game warden would pick them up.” he laughed.
The Miller County sheriff’s office does, in fact, forbid hunters to take guns into the woods to look for the monster except during deer season. They say this limits the possibility of a hunter’s shooting a human mistakenly thought to be the Fouke Monster. On Fouke’s main street, but still not far from Boggy Creek, is the Boggy Creek Cafe, owned and operated by Mr. and Mrs. Bill Williams. The cafe is one of two Businesses in Fouke that have capitalized on the monster. In addition to the regular menu items, a hungry customer can choose such items as the “Boggy Creek Breakfast,” a “Three-toed Sandwich” and a waffle and ice cream dessert called the “Boggy Creek Delight.” Money clips, cards, key chains, bumper stickers and ash trays with “Home of the Fouke Monster” written on them are sold behind the counter. The jukebox offers a Bobby Picket rendition of “Monster Mash.” The cafe also stock a reproduced souvenir print of what some persons say is the monster’s foot. The souvenir, autographed by Smith and Crabtree, is considerably smaller than the monster’s foot—which Smith said is 5 inches wide and 14 inches long. Mrs. Williams said 20 to 25 tourists stop by the small restaurant daily She said she never had seen the monster, but wanted to see it. “I believe there’s something out there. From the way the people I have talked to described it. Smith walked into the cafe. He saw a reporter, his eyes brightened and he started talking. Insisting that the monster was a vegetarian. Smith said he had seen it several times near his house along Boggy Creek. “First time I saw him was back in 1955. I though he was a man. I shot at him 15 times with an Army rifle, but missed him,” Smith said. “Next time he came up behind the house throwing rocks at my dog,” Smith added. “So. I shot through the brush and missed him again. ‘’The third time my wife and I were watching TV when I heard him. He slapped my dog across the porch into the screen door.” Again. Smith’s aim wasn’t too good; he said his shots missed the monster , which is said to run about 45 miles per hour . Smith said some other Fouke residents had heard the monster about two weeks ago, but that the creature didn’t sound like a peacock this time. “He was roaring and cutting up and sounded like a crazy man,”
Vernon, B. C, Oct. 24. With a human footprint nineteen inches long, the big toe alone measuring five inches, it is left to the imagination to fill in the superstructure of this huge monster that has frightened the inhabitants of this smiling valley. Men, women and children have turned out to look with awe and wonder at the mysterious and .enormous “hoof.” It is a naked human foot in all the essentials, and its partner is at the other side of a six-foot creek, giving some idea of the pre-historic stride of the creature.
A resident was calmly sawing timber when a gentleman of the neighborhood came up to him and sprung the yarn on him so suddenly that he thought he had somebody from the New Westminster institution to deal with. But the informant was perfectly sane, and produced a stick with the pedal particulars carefully marked. The footprint was down the hill there for anybody to see. No one certainly ever heard of the fertile Okanagan producing stray giants but an old Indian gives color to the theory by averring that forty years ago there were what he terms giants who stole children and things. Perhaps this may be the last of the Canadian mound dwellers.
The reservation folks have certainly had a genuine scare and have called up all the whites round about to help them out. Rifles are all loaded and lanterns lit about in the darkness, so that it is unsafe for a stranger to loom up into view to suddenly when the least crash in the bush is sufficient to excite their tense nervous system.
Some have gone on the trail on horseback with magazine guns, but a few men even with a Maxim under each arm might not stand the ordeal of confronting a hairy monster some thirteen feet high, judging by the feet. Besides, the possession of the creature alive would be as good a financial “spec” as a valuable quarter section of Okanagan land. As there are no people around here to hoax and the Indians are too grave and occupied to manufacture footprints for sport the story and the evidence are just as stated, the Indians themselves being the most concerned and serious over it.”
One evening, about 100 people saw a huge craft, “seven stories high,” emerging from the waters of the Ohio River. “It drifted slowly high above the river, then from the craft sped a dozen smaller vessels. They hovered motionless for half an hour, then moved away and disappeared. We called it the mother-ship and its scouts. “At least one person had a Polaroid camera and used it. But every picture turned out completely black.” The strange craft, with lights blazing, were seen patrolling the skies for months. Staring eyes “The lives of everyone who saw it were changed in some way,” said Linda. “I was divorced. The Malletes who first saw it with us refuse to even discuss it and live strictly on their own. A leading businessman turned to drink. A woman had a miscarriage. People who had never been ill in their lives began to pick up every ailment going.”
It was when the UFO eyewitnesses began to get together to talk about it that the strange things began to happen. I got the stories of people, who now refuse to give their names or to be interviewed, who were stalked by the men in black and white, and red and white, checkered shirts. These strangers, singly or in pairs, would be seen emerging from a garage just as the owners returned home.
Chidren who knew nothing about the UFOs or Mothman, reported walking during the night and finding the strangers in the room, just staring at them. i All our lives changed in some way Lonnie McDaniel told of his own experience. “I was in a friend’s house, both of us watching TV. Suddenly the set went black and a voice said, “We’re not finished with you yet.”
Then the film came back on again.” On December 15,1967, a year after the first arrival of Mothman, tragedy and horror struck Point Pleasant. The 700-foot long Silver Bridge spanning the Ohio River collapsed without warning, taking 31 vehicles and carrying 46 people to death in the icy waters. Author Keel is of the opinion that the tragedy was somehow connected to the UFO presence, and so are many of the townspeople.
It was when Mrs. McDaniel tried to contact a woman who had seen Mothman that I experienced for myself the eerie phenomenom of the telephone interference. Clicking The dialing tone had gone for several rings. Then there was silence, then a loud clicking began. Mrs. McDaniel, from the other end of the room, held up the phone. I could distinctly hear the sounds — loud pings and clicks. They continued for five minutes, then the phone went dead. It was not until the next day that I was able to get in touch with the woman, Mrs. Marcella Bennet, 34. Mrs. Bennet was visiting her sister when she met Mothman. “I walked to the back of the car and suddenly it was in front of me. It was about six feet tall, and in the little light there was, I could see its body covered in gray feathers. It was hunched over, looking at me, but I saw no red eyes.” But somehow she got inside the house, and Mothman went after her. Her nephew Ricky slammed the glass door shut and pushed a table against it while the creature battered against the door. Then he grabbed a flashlight and shone it on the thing. Mothman turned and vanished.
Mrs. Bennet had a miscarriage. One woman who kept on delving into the mysterious UFOs was Mary Hyre, a local journalist. One day she told friends of a phone call and a strange male voice telling her: “Soon you’ll be in some other place.” A few weeks later, on February 15,1970, she died suddenly, aged 54. WHATEVER the truth about the Mothman, it has the whole area worried. A few hours after our investigation started Reporter Scott and Photographer Ranns were stopped by police and told to leave the State.
Sasysquatchgirl 