Elk Mound Bigfoot Research Center
History
We wanted to give you a little of the history of Bigfoot. Go ahead and read through it and see what you learn.
Bigfoot (also known as Sasquatch) is the name given to a cryptid simian-ape-, or hominid-like creature that is said to inhabit forests, mainly in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. Bigfoot is usually described as a large, hairy, bipedal humanoid. The term sasquatch is an Anglicized derivative of the Halkomelem word sásq'ets.
Scientists discount the existence of Bigfoot and consider it to be a combination of folklore, misidentification, and hoax, rather than a living animal, because of the lack of physical evidence and the large numbers of creatures that would be necessary to maintain a breeding population. Conversely, scientists Grover Krantz and Jeffrey Meldrum have focused research on the alleged creature for the greater parts of their careers.
Before 1950
Wild men stories are found among the indigenous population of the Pacific Northwest. The legends existed before a single name for the creature. They differed in their details both regionally and between families in the same community. Similar stories of wild men are found on every continent except Antarctica. Ecologist Robert Michael Pyle argues that most cultures have human-like giants in their folk history: "We have this need for some larger-than-life creature."
Members of the Lummi tell tales about Ts'emekwes, the local version of Bigfoot. The stories are similar to each other in the general descriptions of Ts'emekwes, but details about the creature's diet and activities differed between family stories.
Some regional versions contained more nefarious creatures. The stiyaha or kwi-kwiyai were a nocturnal race that children were told not to say the names of lest the monsters hear and come to carry off a person—sometimes to be killed. In 1847, Paul Kane reported stories by the native people about skoocooms: a race of cannibalistic wildmen living on the peak of Mount St. Helens. The skoocooms have been regarded as supernatural, rather than natural.
Less menacing versions such as the one recorded by Reverend Elkanah Walker exist. In 1840, Walker, a Protestant missionary, recorded stories of giants among the Native Americans living in Spokane, Washington. The Indians said that these giants lived on and around the peaks of nearby mountains and stole salmon from the fishermen's nets.
Local stories were compiled by Indian Agent J. W. Burns in a series of Canadian newspaper articles in the 1920s recounting stories told to him by the Sts'Ailes people of Chehalis and others. The Sts'Ailes maintain, as do other indigenous peoples of the region, that the Sasquatch are very real, not legendary, and take great umbrage when it is suggested that they are. According to Sts'Ailes eyewitness accounts, the Sasquatch prefer to avoid white men, and speak the "Douglas language", i.e. Ucwalmicwts, the language of the people at Port Douglas, British Columbia at the head of Harrison Lake. It was Burns who first borrowed the term Sasquatch from the Halkomelem sásq'ets (IPA: [ˈsæsqʼəts]) and used it in his articles to describe a hypothetical single type of creature reflected in the stories. Burns's articles popularized the animal and its new name, making it well known in western Canada before it gained popularity in the United States.
A story told to Charles Hill-Tout by Chief Mischelle of the Nlaka'pamux at Lytton, British Columbia in 1898 gives another Salishan variant of the name, meaning "the benign-faced-one".
Each language had its own name for the local version. Many names meant something along the lines of "wild man" or "hairy man" although other names described common actions it was said to perform, e.g., eating clams.
After 1950
In 1951, Eric Shipton photographed what he described as a Yeti footprint, which generated considerable attention and led to the story of the Yeti entering popular consciousness. The notoriety of ape-men grew over the decade, culminating in 1958 when large footprints were found in Del Norte County, California by bulldozer operator Gerald Crew. Sets of large tracks appeared multiple times around a road-construction site in Bluff Creek. After not being taken seriously about what he was seeing, Crew brought in his friend, Bob Titmus, to cast the prints in plaster. The story was published in the Humboldt Times along with a photo of Crew holding one of the casts.
Locals had been calling the unseen track-maker "Big Foot" since the late summer, which Humboldt Times columnist Andrew Genzoli shortened to "Bigfoot" in his article. Bigfoot gained international attention when the story was picked up by the Associated Press. Following the death of Ray Wallace – a local logger – his family attributed the creation of the footprints to him. The wife of L. W. "Scoop" Beal, the editor of the Humboldt Standard, which later combined with the Humboldt Times, in which Genzoli's story had appeared, has stated that her husband was in on the hoax with Wallace.
1958 was a watershed year, not just for the Bigfoot story itself, but also for the culture that surrounds it. The first Bigfoot hunters appeared following the discovery of footprints at Bluff Creek, California. Within a year, Tom Slick, who had funded searches for Yeti in the Himalayas earlier in the decade, organized searches for Bigfoot in the area around Bluff Creek.
As Bigfoot has become better known and a phenomenon in popular culture, sightings have spread throughout North America. In addition to the Pacific Northwest, the Great Lakes region and the Southeastern United States have had many reports of Bigfoot sightings. The debate over the legitimacy of Bigfoot sightings reached a peak in the 1970s, and Bigfoot has been regarded as the first widely popularized example of pseudoscience in American culture.
From Wikipedia
Proposed explanations for sightings
Various types of creatures have been suggested to explain both the sightings and what type of creature Bigfoot would be. The scientific community typically attributes sightings to either hoaxes or misidentification of known animals and their tracks. While cryptozoologists generally explain Bigfoot as an unknown ape, some attribute the phenomenon to UFOs or other paranormal causes.
Misidentification
In 2007, the Pennsylvania Game Commission said that photos the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization said showed a juvenile Bigfoot were of a bear with mange. Jeffrey Meldrum, on the other hand, said the limb proportions of the suspected juvenile in question were not bear-like, and stated that he felt they were "more like a chimpanzee."
Hoaxes
Both Bigfoot believers and non-believers agree that many of the sightings are hoaxes or misidentified animals.
Bigfoot sightings or footprints have, in some cases, been shown to be hoaxes. Author Jerome Clark argues that the Jacko Affair, involving an 1884 newspaper report of an apelike creature captured in British Columbia, 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 Mainland Guardian of New Westminster, British Columbia, wrote, "Absurdity is written on the face of it."
Legends of Bigfoot
We hope you enjoy learning about these legends as much as we have while putting this together for you.
Of all legendary Native American beings, none has captured the imagination of non-Native people as much as Sasquatch and other "bigfoot" creatures. This page is here to look at some of the different legends in various Native American tribes as well as the legends from more modern times. You will find links to different Native American legends as well as the more modern stories. We hope you enjoy this part of our site and we also hope you learn as much as we have.
Stories of a giant, hairy creature that appears half man and half ape have existed in various parts of the world for many centuries. In fact, the only continent not to have stories of “wild men” is Antarctica. In the Himalayas, it’s the Yeti. In Canada, it’s the Sasquatch. And in the northwest United States, it’s Bigfoot. Stories of a “wild man” existed among the Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest long before white colonists moved in. Versions of Bigfoot ranged from harmless giants who stole fish from fishermen’s nets, to cannibalistic monsters living on mountain peaks. These stories varied from tribe to tribe, and even from family to family, which meant that Bigfoot had a lot of different names.
The Bigfoot figure is common to the folklore of most Northwest Native American tribes. Native American Bigfoot legends usually describe the creatures as around 6-9 feet tall, very strong, hairy, uncivilized, and often foul-smelling, usually living in the woods and often foraging at night. Native American Bigfoot creatures are almost always said to be unable to speak human languages, using whistles, grunts, and gestures to communicate with each other. In some stories, male Bigfeet are said to be able to mate with human women. In some Native stories, Bigfoot may have minor supernatural powers-- the ability to turn invisible, for example-- but they are always considered physical creatures of the forest, not spirits or ghosts.
That is where the intertribal Bigfoot similarities end, however. In the Bigfoot myths of some tribes, Sasquatch and his relatives are generally shy and benign figures-- they may take things that do not belong to them or even kidnap a human wife, but do not harm people and may even come to their aid. Sometimes Bigfoot is considered a guardian of nature in these tribes. These more benevolent Bigfeet usually appear alone or in a small family unit, and may exchange gifts or use sign language to communicate with Native American communities.
But Bigfoot legends from other tribes describe them as malevolent creatures who attack humans, play dangerous tricks on them, or steal children; they may even eat people. These more dangerous Bigfoot monsters, known as Stick Indians or Bush Indians, are sometimes found in large groups or even villages, which engage in warfare with neighboring Indian tribes. Clearly there are many different legends that run a wide range of discriptions in the Native American communities.
Food for thought
What are the undisputed facts about the bigfoot / sasquatch mystery?
It's a fact that for more than 400 years people have reported seeing large, hair-covered, man-like animals in the wilderness areas of North America.
It is a fact that sightings of these animals continue today. Real or not, these reports are often made by people of unimpeachable character.
It is a fact that, for over seventy years, people have been finding, photographing, and casting sets of very large human-shaped tracks.
Most are discovered by chance in remote areas. These tracks continue to be found to this day.
It is a fact that the cultural histories of many Native American and First Nation peoples include stories and beliefs about non-human "peoples" of the wild.
Many of these descriptions bear a striking resemblance to the hairy man-like creatures reported today.
These are some of the facts. There is, however, much disagreement as to what these facts mean.
To many, these facts, taken together, suggest the presence of an animal, probably a primate, that exists today in very low population densities.
If true, this species, having likely evolved alongside humans, became astonishingly adept at avoiding human contact through a process of natural selection.
To others, these same facts point to a cultural phenomenon kept alive today through a combination of the misidentification of known animals, wishful thinking, and the deliberate fabrication of evidence.
From The BFRO