Why Do I Believe Bigfoot Exists if I've Never Seen One?

What's the Intrigue?

 It's interesting to think about the researcher who researches. What is their motivation? What makes a person intrigued by a topic like UFOs, or ghosts, or cryptids?

Sometimes it's because the researcher herself saw something. Something so unusual that she has to pursue it. Or the person has had a lifetime of odd experiences. (I fall into those categories concerning ghosts, UFOs, psychic experiences, but not Bigfoot. Well, even if with Bigfoot I did have one odd episode. More on that later.) And sometimes the person is a skeptic, a debunker even, who is out to disprove the existence of ghosts, Bigfoot, UFOs, aliens, etc.

So why do I, who has never seen a Bigfoot, believe that the being exists? I watch just about every Bigfoot show I can. I have dozens of books on my shelf about Bigfoot. I can't get enough. Why? Someone asked me that not long ago; why am I so intrigued? 

Part of it is the mystery. I love mysteries. Part of it is the fact I have personally met many people here in Oregon who have seen a Sasquatch. People of all ages, genders, occupations . . . including teachers, doctors and psychologists. I believe them. Why would they lie? And do I think they're stupid enough, or ignorant enough, about local wildlife that they  mistake an elk or bear for a Sasquatch? Of course not.

There's the added factor of paranormal type activity connected to many Bigfoot encounters. What is going on with that?! Orbs, strange lights, cloaking, "mind speak," or telepathic communications, UFOs, black helicopters, cover-ups. All seemingly part of Bigfoot's existence. Who can resist chasing after that mystery?

There's just enough evidence to strongly suggest -- very strongly suggest -- that Bigfoot exists. Footprint casts, heat images on camera, calls, tree knocks, rock throwing, structures, synchronicities, not to mention eye witness accounts. 

My Bigfoot Encounter: Sort Of

I've written before about my odd episode concerning Bigfoot. I was inside the local New Age bookstore in Eugene discussing with the owner Stan Johnson. Stan Johnson, (deceased) lived in Sutherlin, Oregon and self-published a couple of books on his interactions with a family of Sasquatch. (They did not like to called Bigfoot, they told him.) Johnson's experiences included many telepathic communications with several Sasquatch on his ranch, and journeys inside a spaceship. Johnson's experiences included UFOs, conversations with a family of Sasquatch, and a new age version of Christianity. (I met Johnson once; he was in his eighties, I believe, but extremely vivacious. Definitely had charisma. He shook my hand; he was so strong I thought he was going to break it.)

So, the bookstore owner and I were talking about Bigfoot and Stan Johnson, when suddenly, I saw/felt a cone of light come down through the ceiling and cover us. Things were a bit blurry through this cone of light, like looking through gauze. Sounds were muffled. Colored streaks of light. I'm standing there, thinking this is very very weird. When our conversation finished, the cone shot up through the ceiling, and everything returned to normal. I mentioned this to the owner of course, who simply smiled and said "That sort of thing happens all the time when we talk about Stan."

So there it is. 

Enough "there there" for me to continue my Bigfoot studies. It might seem odd to some that I hope that there will never be undeniable proof Sasquatch exists, i.e. a dead body. Or even a live one, as in captured. I doubt either will ever happen. I sure hope not. For those that have seen a Sasquatch, no proof is needed. That's enough for me.

So I'll enjoy the journey, the process itself. I hope I am fortunate enough to see a Bigfoot some day. Whether I do or not, I will continue to believe Bigfoot exists. 

Book: Where the Footprints End

My copy of Where the Footprints End; High Strangeness and the Bigfoot Phenomenon Volume 1 (Joshua Cutchin, Timothy Renner) arrived yesterday.

As you can see, I already very into it!

I am loving this book and am excited for Volume 2.

Among other things, the book is very well written, which I appreciate.

A bit of synchronicity: the introduction contains a report from 1973 about an orange orb and Bigfoot type encounter.  Interesting for many reasons one being, the orange orb is described as being very large and close to the witnesses, and, it occurred in 1973! It's unusual to find reports of large sized orange orbs from that time. My sighting in Oregon of a large orange orb was in the early 1980s.

Haven't finished the book yet but just had to give this book a plug. I really think that anyone serious about Bigfoot research -- honest research -- should read this book, as well as others, like Them Powell's books.

You Can Be Bigfoot's Love Slave for Only $49.95

 
Remember Weekly World News? All those great covers of President Clinton meeting with tall grays, Bigfoot news and Batboy? You can still be a part of WWN even though they've left the publishing world a few years ago. And it's only $49.95, if you act now! I Was Bigfoot's Love Slave! Custom Cover - Weekly World News

Monster of Boggy Creak Tarot/Oracle Card

My brother-in-law, now deceased, designed his own Tarot/oracle deck in 1979. He called it The White Goddess deck. He was an astrologer, and as you can see, incorporated astrology into his deck. He didn't do the drawings himself -- those were done by an artist he knew at that time, Ida Foreman.

White Goddess oracle deck, Michael Bear, creator, artist Ida Foreman

I hadn't looked at this deck for several years. I had forgotten that Michael used a number of cryptid, creature type images in his deck. I don't remember Michael Bear being particularly interested or knowledgeable about the topic, especially Bigfoot stories. Here's The Monster of Boggy Creak, and yes, he spelt it creak, not creek. I don't know if the misspelling was intentional, but he was a notoriously awful speller, so who knows.

I noticed in the booklet that came with the deck that there is a Bigfoot card listed, but it isn't in the deck. Maybe it got lost, or it could be it just never made it. I don't remember seeing the card, but again, I don't remember much about the deck overall. Here's how the card is described:

Conscious awareness of, not only, your own beliefs, but those of others.
Reversed: Having to be aware, consciously, of the universal subconscious.

The card is given the number 9, "relating to Neptune, the subconscious, daydreams and nightmares, drugs, alochol, habitations of all kinds." (The missing Bigfoot card is also given the number 9) and placed in the suite of spades. He has astrologically assigned "moon square retrograde Neptune" to the card.

 An interesting piece of family history. As to the aesthetics of the deck or its usefulness -- I've never used it and doubt very much I ever will. I'm too involved in family history, including some of what went on in creating the deck.

The Bigfoot Filmography

Very cool; something I thought of doing a few years back. I'm sure many of us have! I even started collecting DVDs of BF films -- the good, the bad, the ridiculous. But quickly realized I just didn't have the time, and, some of the movies were so bad ... I mean, bad, not "so bad it's good" but just ...bad. Enough about that; visit Dave Coleman's site which gives us a ton of links to Bigfoot blogs and sites, and ordering information on the book. The Bigfoot Filmography

Bigfoot Hunting Preserve Site

Someone went to a lot of work to present a polished looking website all for a "joke": Bigfoot Hunting Preserve Home.

It goes too far. Call me humorless but it isn't funny or smart or witty. It's really pretty sick, in a psychotic way. Taking their cue from canned hunt sites -- which are sadly all too real and not at all a joke -- this site is set up the same way. Here's some of their verbiage from the Select the Hunt That's Right for You page:

*We deemed it necessary to use pointed, jacketed, high-velocity rounds for all our open-range Sasquatch hunts because soft expanding rounds were bouncing off their thick skulls. Soft rounds would only leave them wounded running through the woods holding their heads screaming in agony. It became inconvenient for our guests and guides to chase a wounded animal for hours in the thick brush just to put them out of their misery.
Nightime Hunts
You and your guide start after midnight where you test your tracking skills to locate and target a group of Sasqatches. With the help of night vision goggles you drive them for hours until they reach our prepared shooting zone. Your guide will teach you about wind-direction as it relates to sounds and smell. You will also learn wood-knocking, yells and rock throwing techniques to push the animals into the shooting zone.

They couldn't stop there and had to add an item about a Sasquatch Rodeo. There's more but I don't care.

From "Denying Science" to "Anomalist Historian."

Lesley at The Debris Field linked to, and commented on, Melisa Hovey's post about my post: The Search For Bigfoot: Denying the necessity of Science.....

Melisa wrote on her blog The Search For Bigfoot:

What do witnesses want?

I have to say, I disagree with Regan Lee. When witnesses contact a person they know is a “Bigfoot Researcher” they may believe with all their heart and soul they have seen a Bigfoot, but they, as much as any researcher, want proof.

Why do I think that?

Because witnesses contact people within the “Bigfoot Research Community.” They send emails to Bigfoot Organizations. They call the 1-800 numbers, asking us to come and take a look at their property, or an area where they had a sighting. They write in their emails, “I know I’m not crazy”. Witnesses think, if anyone can prove they seen a Bigfoot – it is someone within this community. Witnesses know we collect any possible evidence of what they are reporting. Witnesses allow us to stay on their properties and hold “night ops”. If they didn’t want proof as much as your average researcher, they wouldn’t contact us, or allow us on their property.

I actually agree with Melisa in many ways. Read her post for my comments.

I also commented at Lesley's blog. One thing I wrote at Lesley's blog that just came out and inspired me for more on this is what I said about the need for having a Fortean, or "anomalist junkie" etc. along on BF teams. That'll tick off some, I'm sure, but if we can have scientists, and nuts and bolts (to borrow a term from UFO research) kind of researchers, why not those kinds of investigators, researchers, and writers who come from a different perspective altogether? An "anomalist historian" along for the journey?

MonsterTracker.com

UFO Digest publisher Dirk Vander Ploeg has a new site dedicated to cryptos, cryptids, monsters and beasties at MonsterTracker.com. 

New Bigfoot Thread on JREF: "Mormon Bigfoot Genesis Theory"

The JREF (James Randi Educational Forum) has a new thread on Bigfoot; this one is titled "Mormon Bigfoot Genesis Theory." I stopped counting long ago how many Bigfoot threads there are on the JREF but at last estimation, it was around sixty. Sixty seperate threads on a "skeptic" site about a creature the majority of posters don't believe exists.

Interesting thread, on the Mormon folklore about Sasquatch. And, about UFOs. Not connected, according to the OP, and I'm not that familiar with Mormon doctrine. But it is an interesting juxtaposition.

Naturally, the skeptoids scoff at this; because it's Bigfoot, because it's religion. (The only valid point made by the OP is the potential racism inherent in this folklore -- kind of like David Icke's and other Illuminati loving theorists, who disguise their anti-Semitism with code phrases like reptilians, world bankers, etc.)

But in reading about Mormon founder Joseph Smith's experiences, it's clear he had contact with something that is very close to alien/UFO encounters. And in reading the book of Mormon, with different tribes stealing chests full of DNA, -- it reads like a sci fi novel. Parallels are clear, as Biblical/religious text UFO researchers know.

Blue Dog Intensity

Maybe it was because of my cheeky beginning in my response to T.G. Powell's, of the CryptoFlorida blog, comment on my previous post about so-called blue dogs: "Stop Killing the Blue Dogs" -- the murder of quasi chupie. I did start off my response to his comment with:

My but aren't we testy today?

I continued, in reply to his comment below:

"These animals are NOT anything but disease ridden common animals."

And I agreed that they are not chupacabras:

As was my point, they are not chupacabras.

My other point: that some people insist on calling these poor creatures "chupacabras" and kill them, not for "humane reasons" as you say you do, but because of fear. They don't know what they are, and they kill them because of that fear. That is not a reason to kill.

It's sad all around, and one question that hasn't been addressed, as far as I can tell, is why are there so many of these creatures, in the UK and elsewhere -- if they are mange ridden animals, why so many? Is it an indicator, like so many other animal signals of late, that the planet is in crisis?

I think you've misunderstood motivations here as well as being defensive.

As I've posted many times about these animals, if they are victims of mange or some other disease, why now, why so many, and isn't their conspicuous appearance an indicator of something we should be paying attention to?


Maybe it's because CryptoFlorida continues to misunderstood my purpose in posting items concerning blue dogs/chupie news. Or maybe it's because some people are just that way; obnoxious in tone and intractable. Whatever, Powell has posted about my abilities as a  "mental midget" and my "moronic thinking" in his post More Blue Dog Stupidity.

My main intent in posting items about canine type creatures who appear to have mange or other diseases -- or, who may be another variety of animal altogether -- is to point out the meme that any hairless looking dog like animal is a chupacabra for many people, and of course, these canines are not.  That is my point. As I wrote in that post:

 I've written before, as have others, that these so-called "chupacabras" seen in the Southwest  are not the crypto-creature from Fortean or paranormal realms. These hairless 'blue dogs' are simply mundane animals. Either mange or some other disease, or, as Lon Strickland of Phantoms and Monsters writes:

a hybrid species of Mexican wolf and another canine species. Ken Gerhard and Jon Downes have done extensive study and have written about this cryptid canine. I just wish people would stop killing the 'blue dog' just because it's been given the 'chupacabras' moniker. Below are previous posts on this cryptid...Lon

The key point here, as I've made many times, as I made in the post that has Powell distressed over,  as Lon makes in the above quote, is the fear trigger response to something perceived as a chupacabras -- there fore a "monster." 

I don't pretend to be a field investigator of blue dogs, and I don't say I know anything about them other than what I've read on-line from a variety of   researchers. Those researchers offer interesting views and, as such, I pass them along. It's up to readers to make up their own minds. I find it all interesting.

My purpose in posting about these items is to share my fascination with the fact that the name "Chupacabras" has morphed from the label of a truly unknown, possibly paranormal creature, to labeling obviously mundane creatures such as "blue dogs"  as Chupacabras. That's it. That's all. I quoted Jon Downes in that post:

It is a very weird and very interesting member of the dog family; it has nothing to do with this weird folklore," said Jonathan Downes, a former zoological journalist and self-taught amateur "cryptozoologist" from West Devon, England.

I'm not the expert, so can't speak to the reality of Downes statement, again, interesting and others will decide for themselves. Either way, what Downes says about this dog like creature not being Chupacabras holds.


However, within that context, I have said that it is sad people are running around shooting anything that moves just because they can. Fears based on some vague "chupacabras" creature and an unknown (those who aren't familiar with mange ridden canines, or are afraid of a new animal, if it's a new animal) kill what they don't understand. The way of humanity for eons.

In my previous post, Powell says he kills them to put them out of their misery; as well as to protect livestock and children, and he says the same thing again his current post. That hasn't ended things for CryptoFlorida however. A recent post on his blog reveals his thoughts concerning Frame 352:

It would seem as though there are those out there that refuse to give in to proof, DNA testing, and first hand experience. Frame352 is the latest in this line of moronic thinking. Basing theory on what those with arm chair experience and NOT looking at the over all picture. It would seem that letting these animals suffer by freezing to death in the frigid winters, or letting them raid chicken farms which the humans depend on for food, or maybe letting one that has gone hungry for a period of time, attack and maybe even kill someones small child while he or she is playing in the yard is OK with these mental midgets.

You can visit Frame352 to get the low down, if you really care too.

Well, if these "blue dogs" are a threat, and if they are also in misery, I don't know what to say, since I am not there, and have not seen or lived in that situation. Again, my points are this:

• The chupacabras label has moved from paranormal/unknown/cryptid creature to mundane, possibly new species of mundane, animal
• Too many trigger happy people in some cases reacting to what they don't know or fear by killing.

MQ's Fear of Getting Real and Alfred Lehmberg: 'Sandbagged by Monster Quest'

Alfred Lehmberg writes about last week's Monster Quest episode about the Flatwoods Monster on our blog UFO Proletariat. It's reposted below.

It seems Monster Quest has always been timid around real cryptostuff; I don't mean Bigfoot -- of which Monster Quest has done many episodes of -- but the high strangeness and certainly esoteric angle in the cryptid realm. As I posted before, the Mothman episode wasn't all that much; and any conspiracy or so-called anti-government/infrastrucure perspective decidedly unwelcome (as made clear by a producer of the show I spoke with.) For more on that, see My Mothman Monster Quest Moment, on my blog Mothman Flutterings. Even the Bigfoot stories stays away from the weirder side of Bigfoot lore; high strangeness, UFOs, so much more.

As to the Flatwoods episode, what a shame MQ didn't use the opportunity to do an authentic story about one of both UFOlogy and cryptozoology's classic and fascinating cases. The Flatwoods story could take up several episodes on its own without doing something ridiculous like bringing in the 'Starchild' skull.

And why they need to trot out skekptics like Joe Nickell all the time -- well, at least he didn't say the Flatwoods creature was an owl. Or did he?  He did say several other ridiculous things however. Not unexpected, but terribly annoying and insulting nonetheless.

As to Alfred's piece below, I want to comment on the following by Al:

Feschino, who deserves better than this, was fit to be tied. See, he's telling the culture changing real story. Nickell and company shill for the guys insulting the reader's intelligence and obscuring real history. Case in point "Mass Hysteria" as touted by Dr. Nickell... is a clueless dodge.

Feschino is Frank Feschino of course, author of the well researched and excellent book Shoot Them Down! - The Flying Saucer Air Wars Of 1952
As Alfred points out, there is a real story that goes beyond a "monster" in the Flatwoods case, but sincerely exploring that story would indeed be "culture changing" as Al puts it, and we can't have that.

Flatwoods, Sandbagged By MonsterQuest (by Alfred Lehmberg)

Folks, regarding the recent History Channel MonsterQuest episode of March 10th featuring Fred May, Frank Feschino, Stanton Friedman, and other witnesses from the town of Flatwoods, West Virginia: I was the bearded fellow, the only one, I think, associated with the Flatwoods segment exclusively. I wore the UFO Magazine hat. I was working with the Helium Balloon and assisting Feschino vis a vis the sighting at the hunter's camp in deep forest beside the spring fed stream. My one spoken line, used apart from where I actually said it was, "Frank, there's a hot spot up there...," or some such... all that said:

Folks? You can quote me!

I have no idea what that program was about! Why, apart from Joe Nickell who was decidedly true to form, I didn't even recognize who was involved in it!

This is _real_ irony, reader, given I was at Flatwoods for a week during the shooting —and I do mean shooting— of the MQ program. Moreover, I have an appropriate intimacy with all the principals shown on the Flatwoods segment and have better than a layman's understanding of just what occurred in and around Flatwoods that Indian summer night in 1952.


Ladies and Gentleman, let me digress to say that, entirely apart from what the Reader saw on a "flawed" MonsterQuest, THIS is what occurred on that one night in Flatwoods in Flatwoods: http://paratopiary.blogspot.com/


I remind the HONEST reader that this referenced map data is supported by Project Bluebook, named Newspaper reportage, and first person witnesses in that order of numeracy.


The History Channel, one finds, had the time, opportunity, and all the requisite data to produce a stunning program about the infamous Flatwoods affair. What the History channel did instead, reader, was to contrive to manufacture a senseless "mash-up" of two entirely unrelated cases from what could be most easily be "faux-discredited" in either of them. Suggesting this bogus relationship, one not even remotely tenuous, is the program's kiss of less-than-mediocre death.


Sincerely, none but those entirely honest with themselves dare call this very poor, contrived, and inauspicious telling of the Flatwoods story a blithering incompetence, a fatuous cluelessness, or a distorted propaganda! More irony is revealed given Feschino, Friedman, and I had to sign sworn statements indicating our contribution to the program was true as we knew it to be true. The History Channel reportage of same, paradoxically, was not.


See? Flatwoods was the tail end of the biggest UFO Flap in US History: The 1952 "Summer Of Saucers" chronicled by Frank Feschino, Wendy Connors, various other authors, and an un-sifted Project Bluebook. Reader! It was _not_ about "Lizard Monsters" allegedly lurking the woods for 60 plus years, and to this day. This is the distortion prosecuted by the History Channel.

And this! The intrepid MonsterQuest documentarians wrongly called the more honest Stanton Friedman a "doctor" and made the dissembling (to be kind) Dr. (degree immaterial) Nickell look "reasonable" in contrived comparison! Glowing eyes? Not before or since. Ground miasma? Not before or since! Mass hysteria? Not before or since! Noxious weeds? Not before or since! Roc sized barn owls? Not before or since! How could they have got things so canted and wrong!

I'm sick at heart and really ticked off... Feschino, who deserves better than this, was fit to be tied. See, he's telling the culture changing real story. Nickell and company shill for the guys insulting the reader's intelligence and obscuring real history. Case in point "Mass Hysteria" as touted by Dr. Nickell... is a clueless dodge.


Why? The witnesses at Flatwoods, a gang of playing children and a couple of young adults, presupposed a meteor, predominantly, on the Fisher farm in the hills above the school that evening. They'd heard about them recently in school. Nickell _dissembled_ when he reported they expected "monsters"... They did not run up a hill armed with only with a flashlight to look for "monsters," Reader! That only happens in the movies and Joe Nickell's facile imagination! They went up the hill to pick up pieces of a meteorite!


No, the Flatwoods story was not remotely told. The historical facts regarding the "Flatwoods Monster" incident are distorted, once again, by a soap-selling TV show.


Tune in to the actual story, cited above, to tune _up_, sincerely. See, it's not a story about a giant lizard in a "hover round" "attacking" a group of Flatwoods residents with a harmful gas. The gas, remember, was actually an exhaust emitted from pipes surrounding the lower torso of the body. The lower torso was part of the propulsion system of this giant "metallic" structure propelling it and causing it to hover. Moreover, apart from the gas, the "Flatwoods Monster" never made any aggressive or threatening maneuvers towards the witnesses during the encounter!


More crass inaccuracies?


The nearly 60-years of "sightings" reported by the MQ show were not all "monster" sightings, as the over-edited Feschino and Friedman footage seemed to intimate, but were UFO sightings! This is what the two researchers reported on. _UFOs_, reader! Not _monsters_!


The "Flatwoods Monster" incident, the Snitowsky "Frametown Monster" incident and the Frametown Hunter incident are the documented entity sightings, reader. These, and other "monster" sightings... never occurred again! It's UFO sightings that are ongoing! This was the actual report and testimony of Friedman and Feschino!


Other "real" entities documented on record in the Flatwoods area are as follows:


Dec. 30, 1960. Hickory Flats, WV, Located in Webster County and just across the southern Braxton County border - Witness Charles Slover, 35 years-old, was driving a delivery truck and sighted a 6-foot tall hairy biped, man-like creature near the road. This was _unreported_ by the History Channel.


Dec. 7, 2005. Braxton County, 7-8 miles from Flatwoods. A wildlife trap camera took a photograph of an unknown entity that has been called the "Braxton Beast." This was _unreported_ by the History Channel. Meager and unrepeated stuff!


UFO sightings _abound_, reader, on the other hand... not "monster" sightings! A UFO sighting that occurred in Holly, Braxton County on Nov. 8, 1957 was documented by Jacques Vallee in his book "Passport To Magonia."


Holly is located near Flatwoods. In Case #437, Vallee reports that Hank Mollohan and eight other local witnesses saw an elongated object that was 12-metres long.


More UFOs! Frametown Area, 1990: A Frametown couple saw several UFOs over the area of the Middle Ridge area southeast of Frametown. When one of the witnesses walked outside of the house to get a closer look, one of the UFOs flew into the back-yard and shot a bright beam of light down towards the witness. This Frametown incident was documented and broadcast in 1990 by a national TV show of the time, Current Affair With Maury Povich.


In 1991, Feschino documented crop circle rings in Frametown, WV., which were recorded by Colin Andrews. Throughout the early 1990s, Feschino also photographed and videotaped UFOs in the same area of Middle Ridge southeast of James Knob.


OTHER MONSTERQUEST DEGLECTED POINTS


The Sept. 12, 1952 "Master Map" of UFO locations was not shown. The flight-path trajectory of the "Flatwoods Monster" UFO was not shown or mentioned. This was the Washington DC. to Flatwoods, WV UFO flight-path. Check the included link for same.


The Colonel Leavitt Interview was not shown or mentioned, nor was there any mention of the sizable West Virginia National Guard involvement in and around Flatwoods.


There was no reference that the USAF had heavily documented the Flatwoods incident.


The First person witness-journalist John Barker interview was not mentioned.


Well respected reporter and first person responder A. Lee Stewart, Jr., who broke the national story, was not mentioned. The drawings of the metal piece that he found on the farm were not shown.


There was no mention or reference that there were strange metal and black plastic-like pieces found on the Fisher Farm by the locals, shortly after the incident.


The five known drawings made by five of the boy witnesses who saw the "Flatwoods Monster" were not shown." Despite being separated by Stewart the drawings are astonishingly similar!


The "Flatwoods Monster" color illustrations painted by Feschino from eyewitness descriptions were not shown.


The 1996 Fred May pencil drawing of the "Monster" was not shown. It depicted the figure as "mechanical." This was a point errantly avoided by MonsterQuest!


The Flatwoods reenactment segment did not show the actual "mechanical" figure as described by Mrs. May and Fred May. The incorrect 1952 "We The People" mock-up, which depicted the arms and claws was shown instead... and then senselessly compared to the "Frametown Monster."


Finally, the Star child skull and the entities in Flatwoods/Frametown were errantly compared. These cases have no relationship to each other, what so ever, all respect to Lloyd Pye! I'm sure he would agree.


I'd hoped for the best regarding the History Channel. What happened?


"Hollywood" happened, reader... corporate manipulations apart from, and not interested in, telling the real story... These contrive a mash-up between two unrelated cases and, "highlighting" what was "explainable," work to "faux-discredit" both... actually. We were sand-bagged, imo.


The only good thing... the Flatwoods story was broached, at all, in a no-nonsense manner by Frank Feschino, Freddy May, John Barker, and Stanton Friedman! People are eventually going to wonder where the "lizard monster" (sheesh!) came from and how it came to be in Flatwoods at all. That story? Again, right here: http://paratopiary.blogspot.com/


I personally apologize to the people of Braxton County, Frametown, and the town of Flatwoods specifically, that the story was not portrayed as it was related to the production company. We regret their time was wasted. It's not Frank Feschino's fault that the creative control was well out of his capable hands... as it will be on _all_ these programs. You pays yer money and takes yer chances. We all got burned. All the credible stuff went to the cutting room floor.


Rest assured, though, MonsterQuest at least showed enough to get interest kindled in _other_ quarters. There's a lot of life left to tell the story, still! You can bet Frank Feschino will be banging the Flatwoods drum, verily!


I remain firmly in his corner! There are many rounds left in this fight. Frank is strong and as focused as he ever was!


Closing, Flatwoods and Frametown residents write to tell me that the James Knob site east of Frametown is still ufologically active. Right _now_ reader.


Well, I suspect that if ET had swooped in and landed on the pasture that night while Friedman, Feschino, and myself were all up there on James Knob - and the Monster Quest people had shot miles of film of it? THAT footage would have languished on the cutting room floor with all the other pertinent material, too.


Tha MonsterQuest program regarding Flatwoods was a dissembling hypocrisy... and a shame!

One last point, in the dodgy MonsterQuest "cooked" portrayal, Fred May, Stanton Friedman, and Frank Feschino seem to indicate that Big Lizards in "hover-rounds," plus other monsters, still lurk dangerously in the West Virginia mountains around Flatwoods. No reader. They are not. Nothing these men actually reported to the film crew made that indication.


Sincerely, be disabused of the notion that dangerous monsters haunt your hills and forests! Fred, Frank, and Stan made _no_ such intimation. I was _there_. I _know_.

Ian Punnett is host tonight at C2C, and the show is: Bigfoot and Folklore. I am so wanting to listen to this! I'll do my best, but unfortunately, the day job is still a reality, and I have to get up at 6:00 a.m. (For some reason, my attempts at getting in sync with C2C's "Streamlink" have been negative.) Tonight's guests include Kathy Strain, who will discuss Bigfoot in terms of Native American mythology.

Something About the Blood; A Dream About Chupacabra

I had a great dream the other night, where all kinds of UFO, esoteric and cryptid researchers were gathered at a massive, world wide round table mega media event. Mainstream media had picked this up; CNN, etc. The marathon interview was organized by Nancy and Bill Birnes of UFO Magazine, and Amy from Paranormal Women's League. It took a long time to get this thing organized, but finally, the moment arrived. People like Greg Bishop, Nick Redfern Lesley Gunter (The Debris Field) , Alfred Lehmberg and dozens of others. In the dream I am so happy to finally meet these people in person; we had a great time being together.

So we get down to the interview/discussion. All ears in America, lol, and beyond, have tuned in. Prime time. Coast to Coast has nothing on us! This is huge. The interviewer is someone not particularly knowledgeable about this stuff, which is both good and bad; but it works out all right.

The interviewer asks me about my thoughts on the two versions of chupacabra, as I commented recently in this post. As I'm talking, in the dream, it turns out I've been to Puerto Rico and did some research. (I wish that were true! However, in real life, strictly an "arm chair" commentator at this point.)

Then, as I'm describing the deep puncture wounds the creature has been known to leave behind, and the complete lack of blood within, and around, the victim, I have the distinct and powerful awareness that the clue to this mystery is in the blood. Something about the way the blood is drained, and the blood itself; the need for the blood, and what is done with the blood, -- the reasons why the creature needs the blood -- the answer is there. And I'm given the answer, or at least solid clues leading to the solution.

This revelation is so important in the dream that I have a lucid moment: I tell myself I have to remember this when I wake up and make sure I write it down.

Then of course, I wake up, and forget what the answer was!

Miami UFO Center: What Is The Chupacabras? - Ten Year Study Results

What Is The Chupacabras? - Ten Year Study Results


An overview of a  ten year study of the Chupacabras by Virgilio Sanchez-Ocejo, of the Miami UFO Center has just come out. Notice in this article there is no mention of dog like creatures with mange. (See my previous post: A Contrast in Chupies)

The distinctive puncture wounds are mentioned:

These attacks have left a toll of thousands of dead domestic animals such as chickens, ducks, doves, dogs, cats, goats pigs, and even cows were attacked by the Chupacabras, living them all without blood...all removed through a small puncture, usually around the neck of its victims.

It's hard to imagine foxes, raccoons, or coyotes with mange doing the above.
The report is not afraid to aknowledge the high strangeness aura surrouding much of chupacabras activity:

Moreover, we received UFO sightings reports before, during and after the attacks. Also, we registered paranormal phenomena in most of the attack area.

The "second wave" of what's being called Chupacabras (hairless dog type creatures, particularly in the United States) don't include reports of UFOs or other oddness; not to my knowledge.

The study sent a tooth for analysis; inconclusive. While that's frusrating, it's typical of cryptid findings; not human, not any known creature, but as to what it is. . . no answers:

As a result of a DNA process,  it was determined that the tooth does not belong to any human being, making it compatible with an animal that could not be genetically defined.  

The Chupacabras is an "unknown animal" -- what it isn't, is a dog, coyote, raccoon, fox, etc.

Hopefully studies like this will bring the chupacabras mystery back around to its original Fortean/esosteric nature, and away from the mange afflicted, known (mundane) animals currenlty being referred to as chupacabras.






Regan Lee Oregon

White Bigfoot Captured on Film?

(I don't think so, looks like a costume to me, that, and the voice of the cameraman sounds like he's acting.) Blogsquatcher has video clip and asks for comments.

Concerning white Bigfoot in general, there's something eerie and intriguing about them; on a mythic level they evoke something other, supernatural, or just enough on the fringe to give an added element of mystery. Just last night I was thinking of white Bigfoot stories -- including the Conser Lake creature -- this little bit of synchronicity adds to the overall white Bigfoot weirdness.

Ray Wallace, Mark Chorvinsky: A Look Back

More than ten years ago or so, when I was in the folklore graduate program at the University of Oregon, I made copies of any references to Bigfoot that I came across in the archives. I just found in my files notes about a field work project done by a student in the 1970s where Ray Wallace (April 21, 1918 − November 26, 2002) is mentioned. I have the original paper somewhere, but can't seem to find it; when I do, I'll post more about this.

Wallace of course was the man who "killed Bigfoot" -- upon Wallace's death,it was revealed he faked giant BF footprints and family members ran around in BF costumes. This, according to much of media and the uber-skeptic, "proved" that there was no such thing as Bigfoot; it was all just Ray Wallace, having a huge joke on the rest of us. But according to some accounts, Wallace had researched Bigfoot quite a bit in his day. He collected tales of Bigfoot from many sources, including many Native American Bigfoot tales. There is a reference in a student folklore field research paper to an informant named Kenny Spencer of Toledo, Oregon, who:

read in his forestry book at Pacific Lutheran University that Tom Slick (oil millionaire and Bigfoot researcher) and Ray Wallace were classed as authorities on Bigfoot as they have done more research on Bigfoot than anyone in the world. (Layton)

According to this report, Wallace:

bought a diary from an old miner’s grandson in Eureka, California (Joe Ellison) that tells about three, giant-sized, hairy people that used to attack Indians and the miners in 1849. (Layton)

Wallace was clearly aware of Bigfoot tales, and was interested enough to collect them. It seems that at that time and in that area, at least, Wallace had a reputation for knowing about Bigfoot, enough to get him mentioned as someone who has done “more research on Bigfoot than anyone in the world.”

Linda Layton’s student report contains several short tales told by Wallace about Bigfoot sightings, encounters and captures.

Wallace's contributions to Bigfoot research were ignored by almost all in the field, according to the late Fortean writer and Strange magazine publisher Mark Chorvinsky, who passed away in 2005. In a 1994 article for Strange, Chorvinsky wonders why this was, and asks if the photo (shown here) was of a real Bigfoot, or a "guy in a suit." Wallace had sent the photo to Strange editor Mark Opsasnick; Wallace would not reveal the name of the person who took the photograph:

Here is a picture of a female Big Foot... I bought it, the negative, from a photographer who was up near Mt. St. Helens in March taking pictures when he saw this giant sized female sitting on a log asleep as she was so heavy with a baby inside of her that she could not move very fast, he said she would have [been] easy to capture while sleeping on this log on an old abandon[ed] loading site where they loaded out logs several years ago. He said she was just sitting out in the warm sun and went to sleep."

As to Wallace's contributions to Bigfoot research, Chorvinsky cites Opsasnick:

Bigfoot expert Mark Opsasnick, author of The Bigfoot Digest, opines that, "If one does objective research into the origin of Bigfoot, it is obvious that the role Wallace played in the creation and development of Bigfoot cannot be ignored. He was there when the term 'Bigfoot' originated in 1958 as an important player in the case surrounding Jerry Crew, and Roger Patterson consulted with him repeatedly. This is a fact ignored by the contemporary Bigfoot investigators." Opsasnick concludes that, "It is quite conceivable that if there had been no Ray Wallace, there would be no Bigfoot as we know it today.

Sources: Layton, Linda: July 18, 1971, Randall Mills Folklore Archives, University of Oregon

Mark Chorvinsky,New Bigfoot Photo Investigation, Strange Magazine, 1994