Let’s take a look at all the major Bigfoot/Sasquatch footprint casts and tracings that have been made since 1941, in chronological order. These will appear in my upcoming book on Bigfoot.
I must make a note here before beginning: Despite decades of interest in the reality of Sasquatch, there has never been any systematic analysis (or even compilation) of footprints. This has allowed “Bigfoot,” a California hoax, to masquerade as “Sasquatch” for decades. Because of this the real Sasquatch has been dangerously obscured. To read most “enthusiast” driven articles on Bigfoot/Sasquatch is to be ingrained with a perspective that is dangerously one-sided and skewed toward accepting almost every report and claim made, no matter how contradictory. Scientific response to the assertions made in such publications is therefore also of little merit since it is disputing claims that had no foundation to begin with, and whose only tangibility is hearsay. It is time to start weeding out truth from falsehood so that discussions on this subject can finally advance.
There is no better way than a chronological analysis of the data and the case sightings to see what picture they paint, and then see what simply does not fit in the picture anymore. This Recasting Bigfoot does. But for here, lets stick to a look at the only tangible evidence there has ever truly been: footprints.
It is amazing that for a subject nicknamed or outright titled “Bigfoot” that a chronological compilation of footprint casts has never been done. The following constitutes “Exhibit A.”
1941, Ruby Creek, BC, Canada. “Ruby Creek Print” survives in a tracing done by deputy sheriff Joe Dunn. The first ever recorded of a “Sasquatch” foot. It was 16 inches long. Noted for a thin heel. This characteristic was associated with the hairy “Wild man of the woods” as early as 1818 in New York State, when the Exeter Watchman filed a report on September 22 of a sighting, in which the witness described a hairy, manlike creature with “heel of the foot narrow, spreading at the toes.” In 1924, miners in Washington State reported that giant hairy manlike creatures attacked them, having a long foot with 4 stub toes. In 1955, William Roe described a hairy manlike female creature up Mica Mountain in British Columbia: “Its feet were broader proportionately than a man’s, about 5 inches wide in front and tapering to much thinner heels.” Such a print as shown here is historically the most consistently reported footprint across the entire North American continent. In 1822, Senator Thomas Hart Benton reported in the American Journal that fossilized “human-like” tracks have been found. In May, 1939 Dr. Roland T. Bird wrote in Natural History how he found the first brontosaurus track at Glen Rose, Texas, where all the fossilized dinosaur tracks were being found in the alluvial sand. He then reported something often overlooked: that giant man-like tracks were also found. One was “about 15 inches long with a curious elongated heel.”
Historically, aside from the foot above, only one other foot has been described: The Shipton Print, taken from a photo by Eric Shipton on the Menlung La, Nepal, in 1951. 12 inches by 6 inches. It is considered to be the “Yeti” footprint, a hairy manlike creature said to inhabit areas of Tibet and Nepal. The print at left, however, was the first time that the world had ever seen anything that looked like proof of the notorious “abominable snowman.” Eric Shipton and Dr. Michael Ward traced a track of two creatures and finally photographed this where the snow was only an inch thick above the glacial ice. It set off the 1950s sensation of “yeti” or the “Abominable Snowman.” So popular was this that several books were written, and several motion pictures were made. This was the most famous foot in the world. In 1958, the most famous movie came out, Abominable Snowman of the Himalayas, released by the late great Hammer Films of London, starring Peter Cushing and Forest Tucker. That very year something fascinating happened for the first time in California -- Bigfoot.
It is with the advent of “Bigfoot” in California that an entirely new footprint came about, never before reported: it is at left, the Crew Print, merely an enlarged human flat foot 16 inches long just like in Abominable Snowman of the Himalayas. No one knew what to make of it until a Canadian newsman, John Green, interested in Sasquatch came to California and identified it with “Sasquatch,” though the footprints are not alike.
Another footprint found at the same time is left, the famous “Hourglass Print.” 15 inches long. It became so dominant at Bluff Creek, California, that it became the foot of “Bigfoot” on local advertisements, banners, signs, a lumber company’s logo, and on the painted car doors of Bigfoot research organizations. This print is what inspired John Green to pursue Bigfoot as a reality and to regard it as a Sasquatch. Pacific Northwest Expedition* was formed, sponsored by millionaire Tom Slick. This print usually appeared in August. In 1962 there was a flap of them in August and in 1967, all identical-- an hourglass with a groove in the ball of the foot like the Shipton Print, only the groove was connected to no joint whatsoever. This flap was crucial in drawing worldwide attention back to Bluff Creek. In October of that year Roger Patterson would film his famous Bigfoot footage there. Bigfoot would become a household name.
In 2002, however, the family of the hoaxer, Ray Wallace, confessed that their father had a friend make two pairs of these feet. His nephew, Dale Lee Wallace, showed them to the world. Thus ended Bigfoot at Bluff Creek.
*It was really Pacific Northwestern or Northwestern Pacific. It was called both interchangeably until Ivan Sanderson and then Green merely called it Pacific Northwest. It is difficult to say what the actual name was.
But within the years between 1967 and 2002 Bigfoot at Bluff Creek was the pervading notion. And these footprints of Ray Wallace were very influential in inspiring other prints that would turn up. The first and most famous are those in October 1967 supposedly left by Roger Patterson’s Bigfoot in his famous 39 second film, LEFT. The left foot is always smaller, and it’s toe line a complete copy from Ray Wallace’s foot, as found in dozens of casts of the Hourglass Print that had already existed. Nine days after Patterson shot his film and cast these prints, Bob Titmus cast 10 others left by the “Bigfoot” on Patterson’s film. BELOW, three examples of them;
Due to the popularity of Patterson’s film, Bigfoot became the craze of the 1970s. The film has become crypto-zoology’s mascot. Hundreds of footprints were being found all over the United States and Canada. Aside from the hourglass at Bluff Creek, the earliest was in 1969 at Bossburg, Washington State. The print became famous for showing a “crippled” Sasquatch right foot. This is now dubbed the “Cripplefoot Print.” The uncrippled left foot, however, reveals it to be those of a 16-17 inch flat enlarged human foot, totally different than Bluff Creek but still of the general enlarged human foot variety.
“Cripple foot” and its months-long pursuit was a fiasco and a black eye for Bigfootery, ending up damaging the reputation of Bigfooters throughout Canada and America.
A slough of footprints turned up over the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s:
Hyampom, near Bluff Creek; 17 inches.
Tollgate, Oregon, 1986
Various prints found throughout the Pacific Northwest.
The Terrace Print, British Columbia, 1976. John Green considered this the clearest print ever taken in British Columbia. It looks like a bathtub sticker was used for the model.
The charming “Wrinkle Foot” prints of the 1980s.
Above, Blue Creek Mountain Prints found in the early to mid 1980s by Paul Freeman. They are sometimes called Dermal Prints because of the large amount of dermal ridges on them. Paul Freeman even seemed to have anticipated Grover Krantz when he named one of the “Bigfeet” making these tracks “Dermals.” It seems Krantz might have told Freeman beforehand that dermal ridges indicated a real foot. Freeman found over 30 prints, more than anybody else. These made most Bigfooters suspect these prints and Freeman. Hair found at the same sites was proven to be synthetic.
LEFT, the Indiana Print. Grover Krantz regarded this as best evidence for a Sasquatch east of the Rockies. It was merely made and shipped to Krantz in Washington State. The hoaxer, JW Parker, confessed just before Krantz’s first book hit the stands: BIG Foot-Prints, 1992. Parker made it with his own skin detail, used a walnut for the big toe and put in scars and toenails. All of this Krantz considered to be beyond hoaxers. It was this kind of detail that Krantz used to judge a print to be real or fake. His research was largely just limited to looking at plaster casts gratuitously sent or given to him.
The Neanderthal Foot.
During all this hooplah, a couple of prints turned up which did not get wide publicity. The first and most surprising was the one left, The Manitoba 1973 or The Pas Print. Found by conservational officer Utchmann. The toe line was eroded from the weather by the time he found it, but it clearly showed 4 toes. The heel is identical to the Ruby Creek Print. It is 21 inches long. The toes are almost even across, and the heel narrows. Utchmann called it giant “human-like” and notified the Museum of Man. Two scientists investigated it.
The Manitoba 1988 prints found by no less than the Royal Canadian Mountain Police in the boondocks 200 miles north of Winnipeg. They cut them out of the soft earth of a dirt road. The one, LEFT, of the left foot is the most distorted. But it nevertheless shows only 4 toes. The one furthest left, of the right foot, is best preserved at the heel, showing a narrow heel.
This fits the historical descriptions of a long foot, narrow in the heel, of immense size. In 1902 at Bannick County, Idaho, a giant “human monster” terrorized ice skaters. When the local men went to hunt it they found where it had stood overlooking the frozen lake. The footprints were 22 inches in length and 4-toed. This incident was reported in newspapers as far as Wilkesboro, North Carolina’s Chronicle, on February 5, 1902.
Attempts to link any such “Bigfoot” or Sasquatch” to a primitive human troglodyte are ill informed at best. At left is the Neanderthal Foot, and BELOW is the Gool Foot of Eurasia. None of them bear any resemblance to Sasquatch or event the myriad of “Bigfoot” prints which began after the popularity of Cine du Yeti in 1958 Bluff Creek.
The Ruby Creek Print does indicate that the Sasquatch does exist. The 4-toed Skoocoom Print also indicates that the Skoocoom also exists. Both are almost completely unknown because their real attributes and appearance have been hidden behind the froth of grandstanders and publicity seekers.
What is terribly bizarre is that amongst those who consider themselves the scientific investigators, Bigfoot, Sasquatch and Yeti are lumped together as the same thing. Has any ever examined the actual data? Crypto-zoology must start anew, with a new dossier, in order to find the real and not the fabulous.
FOOT PRINT COMPARISONS
One other Eurasian print bears mention. It is the McNeely 1972 Print. There is said to live a manlike creature in parts of Russia, Mongolia, and the Pamirs that is below the average human height, has a very thick jaw and human-like teeth. It is called the Almas by the Mongolians and the Almista by the Russians. Russian zoologist Vasili Khakhlov investigated them in the early 20th century. He put together a description that included a wide paw-like foot with the large toe shorter and offset from the others. This seems a fairly apt description of the McNeely Print of 1972. The Almas is the only creature that is portrayed in ancient Tibetan medical books.
