words: Emily Jones photos: Kaiko’o Victor
While the Sasquatch phenomenon continues to be hit hard by cynics around the world, bigfoot believers refuse to back down
Even ardent Sasquatch believers have their standards.
The man with the longish blond, wavy hair, bright suspenders and a button that says, “I know the truth,” learned that the hard way. The tall, not unBigfoot-like man believes that Bigfoot’s elusiveness can be explained by the fact that he’s a shapeshifter-alien. Receiving no love from the “mainstream” Bigfoot believers, he was forced to conduct his own workshops from his hotel room.
The rest of the experts were in the small desert town of Pocatello, Idaho, this summer, discussing the biology and whereabouts of this elusive beast. It’s the first annual Bigfoot Rendezvous, and Pocatello is ready. Still, months after Bigfoot Rendezvousers have gone home, a life-size black Bigfoot stands in front of the water tower, welcoming people from the Interstate into town.
It’s not the only Bigfoot Rendezvous in the country—for six years, Jefferson, Texas, has hosted Bigfoot believers. Salt Fork State Park in Ohio hosted their 18th annual conference this spring. Willow Creek, California, has not only hosted conferences, in 2000, they have honored Bigfoot with a statue in the center of town and a declaration that their city is the “Gateway to Bigfoot Country.”
It’s Pocatello’s first year hosting Bigfoot, however, and in all, there are only about 100 or so hardcore Bigfoot believers in town, attending serious presentations and lectures about the elusive Sasquatch. Most of the lecturers are Bigfoot experts, either with doctorates or just decades of experience searching. There are, however, a few different views, including a novelist and Benjamin Radford, editor of Skeptical Inquirer. In 2002, Radford wrote an article discussing 50 years of Bigfoot research, addressing inconsistencies in footprint shapes and a lack of Bigfoot bodies or bones as evidence. The crowd was obviously unimpressed when Radford told them the evidence was stacked against Bigfoot, but for the most part, they were polite.
It’s hard to find someone who has seen Bigfoot, but for most, it doesn’t really matter that much. Most of the fun is in the mystery. Utah Bigfooter Darrell Smith’s been looking for 25 years and he hasn’t seen one yet. “But I’m still having fun looking, though,” he says with a smile. This Bigfoot hunter, who sells life insurance in his free time, shared his searching method after getting his picture taken with the Pocatello Sasquatch, who made an appearance during the pre-conference street party and book-signing. He first learned that Bigfoot was in Utah in 1980 when he saw news reports of Sasquatch stealing fish at the Cold Springs trout farm. Once, Smith says, someone saw the beast stealing some chickens, and shot it. Since Sasquatch are between eight and nine feet tall and weigh about 900 pounds, the bullet didn’t do a whole lot. “It really made him really, really mad,” Smith says. After hearing the stories, Smith talked to his UFO group, many of whom already had studied Bigfoot. Soon, he was going on outings and looking himself. “Now all my friends look for Bigfoot,” he says.
How do you find a Bigfoot?
Though Smith hasn’t found one yet, he has a method. He and his friends go out camping in places where Bigfoot is likely to be, usually somewhere with footprints or Bigfoot hair. Since Bigfoot has been spotted in the mountains of Utah, they don’t have to go far. When they get there, they set up camp and cook some good food, hoping to lure Bigfoot in with the smell. They build a big fire, expecting the light and warmth to attract the animals. It turns out, you don’t need to be quiet to wait for Bigfoot. It usually likes the noise. “You just sit around the fire and make as much noise as you want to,” Smith says.
Once, a Bigfoot circled Smith’s camp for five hours, but it never stopped by the fire. “They don’t want to be seen,” he says. To get them to come closer, Smith sometimes hits a tree with a big stick, or makes a Bigfoot call (kind of a Whoop! Whoop! sound). Sometimes, they call back.
Smith doesn’t understand why anyone would think Bigfoot doesn’t exist. He’s heard them in the woods. He doesn’t mind that there aren’t any bodies of Bigfoot, because he’s heard stories, like the one about hunters in Texas who shot an entire Bigfoot family in 1976. The hunters, Smith said, shot a male Sasquatch, mistaking it for another animal. The next morning, they followed the blood trail to a thicket, where they found him dead, his mate by his side. The female Sasquatch charged the hunters, who shot her in the chest. Looking closer at the bloody mess, the hunters panicked, seeing Bigfoot’s human-like face. Thinking they had killed giant, hairy people, they buried the evidence and it was never found.
Smith has dozens of other tales. Bigfoot has been spotted on every continent, and nearly every state in the US, he says.
Sasquatch aren’t much different from people in their looks. Smith says they are large, but have human eyes, a flat human-like nose, human teeth and genitalia. But Smith doesn’t believe Sasquatch and humans evolved from the same ancestors. Like humans, Smith says, “Sasquatch were brought here by God from another planet. Chances are, there are Sasquatches and humans on other planets as well.”
Anthropologist and Bigfoot guru Dr. Jeff Meldrum has a vastly different theory. The Idaho State University professor has appeared on dozens of Bigfoot documentaries, from independent films to the Discovery Channel. Most of his academic work concerns Bigfoot, an animal he believes is a giant ape. Meldrum focuses his research on the several hundred casts he’s created of Bigfoot footprints.
He first became interested in Bigfoot in 1979, after he was shown some spectacular footprints near Walla Walla, Washington. “They were amazing. I was impressed,” he says. Since then, he’s seen and collected hundreds of footprints from across the Northwest. At the conference, believers can buy footprint casts for $15.
Meldrum doesn’t subscribe to the idea that Bigfoot was brought here from another planet and he definitely doesn’t buy the shapeshifter theory. Bigfoot, he says, is likely a descendent of Gigantopithicus, a giant ape that lived in China 250,000 years ago. It’s what he calls a “working hypothesis.” “Nothing in its behavior shows us it’s anything but an ape,” he says. Just like people, they are ominivores, meaning they enjoy both meat and vegetables. They also like greens and carbohydrates. “They probably like mostly deer and elk,” he explains.
Meldrum’s good friend, M.K. Davis, is focused less on the biology and more on the behavior of Bigfoot. He’s an amateur astronomer who uses the latest in technology to photograph the skies through a telescope. Nine years ago, he came across the Patterson-Gimlin film, the most famous footage of Bigfoot walking through the woods (it doesn’t matter to Davis or anyone else at the conference that members of the Patterson and Gimlin families have said the film was fake). Since the film is violently shaky, Davis decided to use his film editing equipment to reduce the shaking and see if he could learn more. Davis claims to be, “less of a Bigfoot believer, more of a Bigfoot observer. I’ve flip-flopped and changed my mind more than Oprah has lost weight.”
At the pre-conference party, people pose for pictures in front of Davis’ life-size poster of Bigfoot—created by a fellow Bigfooter merging two pieces of the Patterson-Gimlin film. It’s signed by dozens of people he’s met at Bigfoot get-togethers over the years.
The next day at the conference, however, he’s all business.
Isolating pieces of film, Davis shows the legs of the animal as it walks through the woods. “You can see the calf muscles bulging,” he points out. Moving down to the feet, he finds more evidence. The left foot seems to bend when Bigfoot walks, something Davis says doesn’t happen with a man in a suit. “What does that tell me? That it’s probably a real foot,” he says.
In front of a small crowd, Davis shows dozens of enhanced clips, including one where Bigfoot appears to be mooning the camera. Shapeshifter-man stands up and asks if the rear could actually be the beast morphing into something else. A few people make some mocking comments and someone shouts, “let the speaker finish.” (Later, he’s mocked further on Bigfoot message boards, although never mentioned by name). Davis shows how, in some cuts, you can see the sun shining through Bigfoot’s thin hair. In others, you can see the skin. He’s not 100 percent sure what kind of animal is on the film, but he’s sure it’s not a man in a monkey suit.
“It’s been eight or nine years, and I still find things on this film. As long as I find them, I’m going to keep on looking,” Davis says. “Whatever Gimlin and Patterson saw, it was real. It was authentic. I just don’t know what it is.” And the other Bigfoot believers will keep on looking as well. Because, for most of them, it doesn’t matter all that much if they ever find a Sasquatch. Most of the reward is in looking and believing.
