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Bigfoot
Nov 17, 2007 13:31:42 GMT -5
Post by Melissa Foxworthy on Nov 17, 2007 13:31:42 GMT -5
Bigfoot, also known as Sasquatch ("wild man of the woods"), is an unrecognized large primate species alleged to inhabit remote forests, mainly in the Pacific northwest region of the United States and the Canadian province of British Columbia. In northern Wisconsin, Lakota Indians know the creature by the name Chiye-tanka, a Lakota name for "Big Elder Brother"
Bigfoot is sometimes described as a large, hairy bipedal hominoid, similar to other legends of bipeds around the world under different regional names, such as the Yeti of Tibet and Nepal, the Yeren of mainland China, and the Yowie of Australia.
Bigfoot is one of the more famous creatures in cryptozoology. Cryptozoologist John Willison Green has postulated that Bigfoot is a worldwide phenomenon (Green 1978:16).
Indian Native tribes in the Northwest note the appearance of large creatures they call Sasquatch. Such creatures were said to exist on Vancouver Island and near Harrison Lake.
The earliest unambiguous reports of gigantic apelike creatures in the Pacific Northwest date from 1924, after a series of alleged encounters at a location in Washington later dubbed Ape Canyon, as related in The Oregonian.[3] Reports the pro-Bigfoot authors claim are similar appear in the mainstream press dating back at least to the 1860s. The phenomenon attained widespread notoriety in 1958 when enormous footprints were reported in Humboldt County, California by roadworkers; the tracks pictured in the media inspired the familiar name "Bigfoot".
Mainstream scientists generally dismiss the phenomena due to a lack of representative specimens. They attribute the numerous sightings to folklore, mythology, hoaxes, and the misidentification of common animals.
Ecologist Robert Michael Pyle argues that most cultures have humanlike giants in their folk history. "We have this need for some larger-than-life creature."
Bigfoot sightings or footprints are often demonstratively hoaxes. Author Jerome Clark argues that the "Jacko" affair, involving an 1884 newspaper report of an apelike creature captured in British Columbia (details below), was a hoax. Citing research by John Green, who found that several contemporary British Columbia newspapers regarded the alleged capture as very dubious, Clark notes that the New Westminster, British Columbia Mainland Guardian wrote, "Absurdity is written on the face of it" (Clark, 195).
In 1958 bulldozer operator Jerry Crew took to a newspaper office a cast of one of the enormous footprints he and other workers had been seeing at an isolated work site in Bluff Creek, California. The story and photo garnered international attention through being picked up by the Associated Press (Krantz, 5). Crew was overseen by Wilbur L. Wallace, brother of Raymond L. Wallace. Years after the track casts were made, Ray Wallace got involved in Bigfoot "research" and made various outlandish claims. He was poorly regarded by many who took the subject seriously. Napier wrote, "I do not feel impressed with Mr Wallace's story" regarding having over 15,000 feet of film showing Bigfoot (Napier, 89).
Shortly after Wallace's death, his children called him the "father of Bigfoot". They claimed Ray faked the tracks seen by Jerry Crew in 1958. There were some wooden track makers among Ray's inherited belongings which the family said were used to make the 1958 tracks. At the height of the publicity, the Wallace family sold the story rights to a Hollywood filmmaker. The film, set to star actor Judge Reinhold, was never produced.
Canadian newspaperman John Green argues that Ray never claimed to have made the Bluff Creek tracks and was not present in the Bluff Creek area when the Crew cast was obtained. Wallace had road-building contracts in various parts of the north-west and was usually not around in Bluff Creek.[citation needed] Years after the fact, Wallace attempted to capitalize on the interest in various ways. He tried to sell various items from a roadside shop, including Bigfoot footprint replicas, which he made behind his shop using a pair of wooden track stompers.
Alleged Bigfoot sightings 1840: Protestant missionary Reverend Elkanah Walker recorded myths of hairy giants that were persistent among Native Americans living in Spokane, Washington. The Indians claimed that these giants steal salmon and had a strong smell.
1870: An account by a California hunter who claimed seeing a sasquatch scattering his campfire remains was printed in the Titusville, Pennsylvania Morning Herald on November 10, 1870. The incident reportedly occurred a year before, in the mountains near Grayson, CA.[dubious – discuss]
1893: An account by Theodore Roosevelt was published in The Wilderness Hunter. Roosevelt related a story which was told to him by "a beaten old mountain hunter, named Bauman" living in Idaho. Some have suggested similarities to Bigfoot reports.[11][dubious – discuss] (Note: Roosevelt's testimony is the only evidence this encounter ever occurred).
1924: Albert Ostman claimed to have been kidnapped and held captive for several days by a family of sasquatch. The incident occurred during the summer in Toba Inlet, British Columbia.[dubious – discuss]
1924: Fred Beck and four other miners claimed to have been attacked by several sasquatches in Ape Canyon in July, 1924. The creatures reportedly hurled large rocks at the miners’ cabin for several hours during the night. This case was publicized in newspaper reports printed in 1924.
1941: Jeannie Chapman and her children claimed to have escaped their home when a large sasquatch, allegedly 7½ feet tall, approached their residence in Ruby Creek, British Columbia.
1940s onward: People living in Fouke, Arkansas have reported that a Bigfoot-like creature, dubbed the “Fouke Monster”, inhabits the region. A high number of reports have occurred in the Boggy Creek area and are the basis for the 1973 film The Legend of Boggy Creek.
1955: William Roe claimed to have seen a close-up view of a female sasquatch from concealment near Mica Mountain, British Columbia.
1958: Two construction workers, Leslie Breazale and Ray Kerr, reported seeing a sasquatch about 45 miles northeast of Eureka, California. Sixteen-inch tracks had previously been spotted in the northern California woods.
1967: On October 20, 1967, Roger Patterson and Robert Gimlin captured a purported sasquatch on film in Bluff Creek, California in what would come to be known as the Patterson-Gimlin film.
1970: A family of bigfoot-like creatures called "zoobies" was observed on multiple occasions by a San Diego psychiatrist named Dr. Baddour and his family near their Alpine, California home, as reported in an interview with San Diego County Deputy Sheriff Sgt. Doug Huse, who investigated the sightings. 1995: On August 28, 1995, a TV film crew from Waterland Productions pulled off the road into Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park and filmed what they claimed to be a sasquatch in their RV's Headlights.
2005: On April 16, 2005, A creature resembling a bigfoot was reportedly seen on the bank of the Nelson River in Norway House, Manitoba. Two minutes and forty seconds of footage was taken by ferry operator Bobby Clarke from across the Nelson River.
2006: On December 14, 2006, Shaylane Beatty, a woman from the Dechambault Lake, Saskatchewan, Canada, was driving to Prince Albert, Saskatchewan when, she claimed, saw the creature near the side of the highway at Torch River. Several men from the village drove down to the area and found footprints, which they tracked through the snow. They found a tuft of brown hair and took photographs of the tracks.
2007: On September 16, 2007, hunter Rick Jacobs captured an image of a possible sasquatch using an automatically triggered camera attached to a tree. A spokesperson for the Pennsylania Game Commission challenged the Bigfoot explanation, saying that it looked like "a bear with a severe case of mange." The sighting happened near the town of Ridgway, Pennsylvania in the Allegheny National Forest, which is about 115 miles north of Pittsburgh.
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Bigfoot
Nov 17, 2007 13:37:00 GMT -5
Post by Melissa Foxworthy on Nov 17, 2007 13:37:00 GMT -5
There are hundreds of articles, sightings and accounts of "Big Foot/Sasquatch." The best account concerning identification is between 7 - 12 feet tall and a 6 1/2 to 8 inch foot print. Some photos exist but cannot be proven or disproven. Here are some statistics to ponder.
Big foot has been in existence for 6,000 years. They are descendants of a animal species. They exist throughout the northern continent, from Florida on into Canada and from the east coast to the west coast. There are 133 of them living (as of 27 May 97). There are 16 family groups, averaging 8 to a family. Usually, there are three males per family group. The average life span is 70 to 80 years. They are "vegetarians."
Their range requires each family group to move on to the next area when the vegetation gets low. They could cover 20 miles per day between areas. They live in caves, sleeping during the day and foraging for food at night. They are "nocturnal creatures," with "night vision characteristics, well-developed smell and hearing. There are 5 digits on their hands and 4 on their feet.
The average male is 8 feet tall and the average female is 7 feet. The male's weight is around 350 to 400 pounds and the female's is 250 to 300 pounds. They leave their "dead" in a cave, where other animals eat them. Animals also eat the "waste," so nothing is left for humans to find. They do not travel over the same trails year-after-year.
The males may have one or two females and they remain together throughout their lives. They "do not" mate with their off-springs, the off-springs are left with other families, when they cross paths during their travelling from one area to another, or during "rare gatherings."
As mentioned earlier, bigfoot families also live in Florida on up to Canada. They are relatives of the northern families. However, there is a difference between the southern families and their northern families. The southern families forage for food during the daylight hours and sleep at night. They average 6 members to a family. They are "meat eaters."
Bigfoot seems to exist throughout a wide range of the Northern Americas. Some of what we were interested in were... their habits, their migratory routes, how they mingle with thier own kind and any peculiarities that separate them from other animal/mammal species.
They seem to be social but not truly social... meaning, Because of their size... the male isolates himself from the female and off-spring. Our findings have also noted that the females do not tend to stay together (in a group). When a young one is able to forage for food, they are weaned and then left to fend for themselves. Where Bigfoots were noted, their separation from each other was less than five miles apart.
They are territorial and tend to remain in a particular area for some time. High elevations are not preferred. A medium sized hill/mountain with a mild slope, abundant folage (for concealment), and food source. They are continuously on the move for ten days and then remain in one area (but not longer than a week).
Their sense of smell, as well as, their sense of approaching danger... is their greatest asset. They are able to detect approaching intruders up to 300 yards. This affords them the time they need to either remove themselves from the area or to conceal and observe their intruders.
In July, 2002, Otherplane was invited to an area where two females seemed to frequent. Our hosts were well aware of the presence of Bigfoot near where they lived. In one particular location, near a well-travelled highway, our hosts observed (on several occasions), a human-like creature watching them as they passed by. Stopping to get a good look at the creature... would always prove futile as the creature disappeared each time. Since one of them worked as a tracker, they decided to go look for the creature... that they surmised was a Bigfoot.
They investigated the area where they oberserved the human-like creature but could not find the creature. However, they did find some very large footprints. The footprints looked as though they had been there for some time. It was noted that grass did not grow back in the footprints depression. Our hosts would take us to the same area.
Suddenly, a piercing whirling-like scream filled the air. Instantly, everyone hunched down and looked at each other. The scream came from a nearby ravine... the chase was ON. We were equipped with handheld radios. Since there were three of us, one would take the right side of the ravine, half-way up and another would take the left side, half-way up. Otherplane would take the bottom center of the ravine and coordinate the pace of travel... based on density of ground cover, shrubs and trees. Visibility would be less than 15 feet at times. Noise would have to be kept at a minimum.
Using the device, the location of the female would be noted and relayed to the others. Move a few feet and scan the area, move a few feet and scan the area... each time relaying the information to the others. After a while, it was noted that when we moved... she moved away and always kept at least a 40 to 70 yard distance from us. It was also noted that she positioned herself down wind of us and kept this up for almost six hours. We never caught even a whiff of her scent/smell, nor did any of us catch a glimpse of her. At one point, we thought that we had her cornered but she somehow managed to get away... the only thing we saw was... birds flying up and away from her location (as if being spooked by something).
After six hours, we called off the chase and regrouped. Retracing our route back to where we first started, we looked around as we moved, and we could not find any footprints. It was noted however, that the ground was densely packed and even we did not leave any footprints.
We had hoped to get photos of her but she would not let us get close. However, all was not lost... we took photos of the footprints, came back with soil samples (of the footprints), and what resembled a "waste by-product".
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Bigfoot
Nov 17, 2007 13:40:39 GMT -5
Post by Melissa Foxworthy on Nov 17, 2007 13:40:39 GMT -5
(From : Traditional Attitudes Toward Bigfoot in Many North American Cultures, By Gayle Highpine) Originally printed in the Western Bigfoot Society Newsletter "The Track Record". Excerpted from "Legends Beyond Psychology", by Henry James Franzoni III. Reprinted with permission from all parties.
"Here in the Northwest, and west of the Rockies generally, Indian people regard Bigfoot with great respect. He is seen as a special kind of being, because of his obvious close relationship with humans. Some elders regard him as standing on the "border" between animal-style consciousness and human-style consciousness, which gives him a special kind of power. (It is not that Bigfoot's relationship to make him "superior" to other animals; in Indian culture, unlike western culture, animals are not regarded as "inferior" to humans but rather as "elder brothers" and "teachers" of humans. But tribal cultures everywhere are based on relationship and kinship; the closer the kinship, the stronger the bond. Man Indian elders in the Northwest refuse to eat bear meat because of the bear's similarity to humans, and Bigfoot is obviously much more similar to humans than is the bear. As beings who blend the "natural knowledge" of animals with something of the distinctive type of consciousness called "intelligence" that humans have, Bigfoot is regarded as a special type of being."
"But, special being as he is, I have never heard anyone from a Northwestern tribe suggest that Bigfoot is anything other than a physical being, living in the same physical dimensions as humans and other animals. He eats, he sleeps, he poops, he cares for his family members. However, among many Indians elsewhere in North America... as widely separated at the Hopi, the Sioux, the Iroquois, and the Northern Athabascan -- Bigfoot is seen more as a sort of supernatural or spirit being, whose appearance to humans is always meant to convey some kind of message."
"The Lakota, or western Sioux, call Bigfoot Chiye-tanka (Chiha-tanka in Dakota or eastern Sioux); "chiye" means "elder brother" and "tanka" means "great" or "big". In English, though, the Sioux usually call him "the big man". In his book "In the Spirit of Crazy Horse," (Viking, 1980), a non-fiction account of the events dramatized by the excellent recent movie "Thunderheart", author Peter Mathiessen recorded some comments about Bigfoot made by traditional Sioux people and some members of other Indian nations. Joe Flying By, a Hunkpapa Lakota, told Mathiessen, "I think the Big Man is a kind of husband of Unk-ksa, the earth, who is wise in the way of anything with its own natural wisdom. Sometimes we say that this One is a kind of reptile from the ancient times who can take a big hairy form; I also think he can change into a coyote. Some of the people who saw him did not respect what they were seeing, and they are already gone."
"There is your Big man standing there, ever waiting, ever present, like the coming of a new day," Oglala Lakota Medicine Man Pete Catches km told Mathiessen. "He is both spirit and real being, but he can also glide through the forest, like a moose with big antlers, as though the trees weren't there... I know him as my brother... I want him to touch me, just a touch, a blessing, something I could bring home to my sons and grandchildren, that I was there, that I approached him, and he touched me."
Ray Owen, son of a Dakota spiritual leader from Prairie Island Reservation in Minnesota, told a reporter from (the) Red Wing (Minnesota) Republican Eagle, "They exist in another dimension from us, but can appear in this dimension whenever they have a reason to. See, it's like there are many levels, many dimensions. When our time in this one is finished, we move on to the next, but the Big Man can go between. The Big Man comes from God. He's our big brother, kind of looks out for us. Two years ago, we were going downhill, really self-destructive. We needed a sign to put us back on track, and that's why the Big Man appeared".
Ralph Gray Wolf, a visiting Athapaskan Indian from Alaska, told the reporter, "In our way of beliefs, they make appearances at troubled times", to help troubled Indian communities "get more in tune with Mother Earth". Bigfoot brings "signs or messages that there is a need to change, a need to cleanse," (Minn. news article, "Giant Footprint Signals a Time to Seek Change," July 23,1988).
Mathiessen reported similar views among the Turtle Mountain Ojibway in North Dakota, that Bigfoot --- whom they call Rugaru -- "appears in symptoms of danger or psychic disruption to the community." When I read this, I wondered if it contradicted my hypothesis that the Ojibways had identified Bigfoot with Windago, the sinister cannibal-giant of their legends (see Track Record #14); I had surmised that because I had never heard of any other names for, or references to Bigfoot in Ojibway culture, even though there must have been sightings in woodlands around the Great lakes, and indeed sightings in that region have been reported by non-Indians. But the Turtle Mountain band is one of the few Ojibway bands to have moved much farther west than most of their nation; and Rugaru is not a native Ojibway word. Nor does it come from the languages of neighboring Indian peoples. However, it has a striking sound similarity to the French word for werewolf, loup-garou, and there is quite a bit of French influence among the Turtle Mountain Ojibway. (French-Canadian trappers and missionaries were the first whites that they dealt with extensively, and many tribal members today bear French surnames), so it doesn't seem far-fetched that the Turtle Mountain Ojibway picked up the French name for hairy human-like being, while at the same time taking on their neighbors positive, reverent, attitude toward Bigfoot. After all, the Plains Cree -- even though they retain a memory of their eastern cousins tradition of the Wetiko (as the Windigo is called in Cree) -- have seemed similarly to take on the western tribes view of Bigfoot as they moved west.
The Hopi elders say that the increasing appearances of Bigfoot are not only a message or warning to the individuals or communities to whom he appears, but to humankind at large. As Mathiessen puts it, they see Bigfoot as "a messenger who appears in evil times as a warning from the Creator that man's disrespect for His sacred instructions has upset the harmony and balance of existence." To the Hopi, the "big hairy man" is just one form that the messenger can take.
The Iroquois (Six Nations Confederacy) of the Northeast -- although they live in close proximity to the eastern Algonkian tribes with their Windigo legends -- view Bigfoot much in the same way the Hopi do, as a messenger from the Creator trying to warn humans to change their ways or face disaster. However, mentioned among Iroquois much more often than Bigfoot are the "little people" who are said to inhabit the Adirondacks mountains. I never heard any first-hand stories among the Iroqouis about encounters with these "little people" -- for that matter, I never heard and first-hand stories in that region about Bigfoot, either -- but the Iroquois pass down stories about hunters who occasionally saw small human-like beings in the Adirondacks (which are not all that far from the Catskills, where Rip Van Winkle was alleged to have met some little bowlers) (and slept for 100 years -HF). Some present-day Iroquois assert that the "little people" are still there, just not seen as often because the Iroquois don't spend as much time hunting up in the mountains as they used to. many Iroquois seem to regard both Bigfoot and the "little people" as spiritual or interdimensional beings who can enter or leave our physical dimension as they please, and choose to whom they present themselves, always for a reason.
Stories about small, humanoids who inhabit wild places are found in many areas of the world, especially Europe. (The Kiowa tell a story about several young men who decide to go exploring south from their Texas home for many days, seeing many new things, until they came to a strange forest [obviously the jungles of southern Mexico] whose trees were home to small, furred humanoids with tails! This they found to be too weird, so they immediately headed back for home). I never thought to connect the stories about the "little people" with the Sasquatch until Ray Crowe brought up the possible connection. After all, if there may be large relatives of humans living in remote areas, would it be so impossible for there to be small ones? Details that stretch credibility, such as pots of gold, pointed and belled caps, games of ninepins, etc., could conceivably be embellishments added over generations to some genuine accounts of sightings.
Throughout Native North America, Bigfoot is seen as a kind of "brother" to humans. Even among those eastern Algonkian tribes to whom Bigfoot represents the incarnation of the Windigo -- the human who is transformed into a cannibalistic monster by tasting human flesh in time of starvation -- his fearsomeness comes from his very closeness to humans. The Windigo is the embodiment of the hidden, terrifying temptation within them to turn to eating other humans when no other food is to be had. he was still their "elder brother", but a brother who represented a human potential they feared. As such, the Windigo's appearance was sort of a constant warning to them, a reminder that a community whose members turn to eating each other is doomed much more surely than a community that simply has no food. So the figure of the Windigo is not so far removed from the figure of the "messenger" coming to warn humankind of impending disaster if it doesn't cease its destruction of nature.
The existence of Bigfoot is taken for granted throughout Native North America, and so are his powerful psychic abilities. I can't count the number of times that I have heard elder Indian people say that Bigfoot knows when humans are searching for him and that he chooses when and to whom to make an appearance, and that his psychic powers account for his ability to elude the white man's efforts to capture him or hunt him down. In Indian culture, the entire natural world -- the animals, the plants, the rivers, the stars -- is seen as a family. And Bigfoot is seen as one of our close relatives, the "great elder brother"
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