"I Saw Bigfoot: The Almond-Eyed Giant of the Woods"

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It's not human, it's not animal. The eyes were what I would describe

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as as almond shaped, set farther
apart than a human's eyes, very large,

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very deep, sunken into the head. The brow ridge was very pronounced,

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but the brow ridge was thicker in
the middle between the eyes and tapered.

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The forehead was actually covered in hair. It didn't have a bare forehead.

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The hair came all the way down
to the brow ridge and grew backwards

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up over the back of its head. Its jawline was very wide. The

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jaw sat wider than the temples did. The cheekbones were very high and pronounced.

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The nose wasn't like anything I've seen
either. You listening to the Big

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for Society podcast and I'm Jeremiah Byron. Every week I talk to individuals who

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have experienced sasquatch in some way or
another, so you won't want to miss

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an episode. Make sure you're subscribed
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channel number. Links to those are
in the show notes in Big fo Society,

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I've taken far too much of your
time so far, so let's get

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on with the show, all right, big Foot Society, we got the

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privilege of talking to Matt Knapp,
the host of Bigfoot Crossroads, tonight on

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Bigfoot Society. How's it going,
Matt? It's going, good man?

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How are you, dude? I'm
so excited to talk to you. Every

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once in a while I get comments
where it's like, oh, you gotta

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what if I could hear Jeremy am
I and Matt on the same podcast.

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Here you go, guys, is
happy tonight? It's party time. We

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talked a little bit on the phone
a few weeks ago. It was a

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good chat. You reached out and
we were chatting bigfoot and stuff, and

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we're like, hey, let's let's
make an interview happen. But Matt,

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how is how is the world bigfoot
down there in Oklahoma? For you?

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It? It's actually active right now. I'm not getting out in the field

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anymore. I haven't gotten out in
the field in years. But the group

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that I followed down here, which
is No Bro the native of Oklahoma Bigfoot

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Research Organization. That's a mouthful.
They are very active and they get reports

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all the time. They just got
a pretty interesting photograph, a troll camp

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photo. It's going to be inconclusive. It shows something that could or couldn't

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be who knows. But they're investigating
that and trying to get to the bottom

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of it. But those guys keep
me in the loop of what's going on.

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And then there's a group that you're
actually a part of as well on

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Facebook, the Oklahoma Indian Territory Bigfoot
Alien Everything Group. I love that group

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so much. Yeah, and man, they've got so many amazing stories that

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the Native American community, especially in
that part of Oklahoma, which is like

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the south central area. There's just
always amazing stories coming out there. Such

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a rich history whenever it comes to
bigfoot stuff. Oh, that group is

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so good. And yeah, you're
right the stories that are shared in there.

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Oh, man, I would love
to talk to those guys. I'm

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sure a lot of them. Probably
you've I don't know, have you had

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the privilege of meeting those guys that
are in there. Yeah, I know

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a few of them. And then
those guys know other guys and I'm familiar

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with some people that are in that
group. But yeah, it's just whenever

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I first got started in this,
I actually had friends that lived in that

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part of Oklahoma, and I was
going down there a lot and researching in

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their areas, and that's how I
got to know some of those people.

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And even back then, you're talking
twenty years ago, the stories were still

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just insane, just absolutely insane.
Absolutely, Matt, what was it that

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got you into Bigfoot? Oh?
Man, it's weird. I actually grew

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up in a house that was known
to be haunted, experienced some paranormal activity

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whenever I was real young, and
so I started seeking out information on that

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stuff, trying to understand what was
going on. Back then, this is

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pre home computer, So I would
go to the library or anytime I got

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a chance to check out reading material
on the subject. That's what I was

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doing. And back then Bigfoot was
plumped in with those topics. You'd find

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them in the same section at least, And so that was my introduction to

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Bigfoot. I remember I got a
book at a garage cell that had Bigfoot

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and the Lockness Monster stories in it, and that was the first time that

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I read like actual accounts of Bigfoot
activity and that just captured my attention at

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a very early age. But then
it wasn't something that I really thought too

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much about until years later, whenever
I did get a home computer and I

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was just exploring the world of the
Internet for the first time and typed in

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the word bigfoot one night and it
led me down the rabbit hole. Back

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then, there was a handful of
websites, the BFRO being one of them,

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and I got on there and started
reading signing reports and was just amazed

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that people actually went out and actively
looked for this thing. I had no

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idea. And then eventually I found
a group that was based out of Oklahoma

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and managed to hook up with those
people and started talking to them on the

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Internet, and they invited me to
go along, and the rest is kind

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of history from there. Wow,
So you were getting onto the computer and

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checking out the BFR Was that nineties
or yeah? That was like I got

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my first PC in nineteen ninety eight, and this would have probably been that

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following fall of ninety eight. Whenever
I started checking out bigfoot stuff specifically,

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I actually reached out to the BFRO. At the time, they had just

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like you could just go on their
website and apply for membership. I was

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actually staying the night over at a
friend's house and I was up late on

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his computer and just bored. So
I was like, I'm just going to

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apply. Why not? So I
put in an application, and I remember

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there were like there was a section
where they're like what kind of research equipment

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do you have? And I was
like, I've got a camcorder, I've

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got a polaroid camera, I've got
a tape recorder. Just nothing in other

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words. And the next day I
get back home and jeez, I sound

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so old telling this stuff. But
there's a message on my answering machine.

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Oh yes, dude. Yeah.
So I checked the message and it's from

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Matt Moneymaker no way. Yeah.
He called me and he's like, yeah,

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well you received your application. That
tells you how long ago it was.

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And I heard the message, and
I swear to god, I was

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like, my name's Matt and his
Latin moneymaker? Really Like it's a scam,

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Like I should have known better.
So I just erased the message and

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went on with life. Wow.
And then my curiosity got the better of

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me and I started looking and I
found out like, oh wait, no,

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his name really is Matt Moneymaker.
It's actually a legit Bigfoot research organization.

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So I emailed them again, corresponded
with not a little bit and everything

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was good. But so technically I
was a member of the BFRO. I

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never went on any audiens. I
wasn't allowed on like the real message for

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him to talk to everybody or anything
like that. I don't really know what.

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I was the absolute worst, lowest
level of number you could possibly be.

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And I remember they used to like
how they have now where they're like

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upcoming outings when you can sign up
and pay to go on their outings and

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everything. Well back then they did
have something similar, but it was we're

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having an upcoming outing here. If
you want to be part of the research

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team, email us, and they
were coming to Oklahoma. So I was

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like, oh, here's my chance, and yeah, I got denied.

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Man, I got denied. They
wouldn't let me go. Matt Moneymaker told

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me that I was too inexperienced,
that people had very expensive equipment and they

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didn't want to be liable for that
or anything like that. So I had

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to set that one out. And
that's what actually propelled me to look to

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see if there's any other groups,
and I found that one in Oklahoma,

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so I just started hanging out with
them. Wow. So how old would

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you have been around? Like late
nineties, early two thousand and then early

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twenties. Man, Oh wow,
very early twenties, dude. That's that

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had been very interesting if you were
in the BFRO at that time period in

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Oklahoma, for because of certain events
that happened in alternate universe, you could

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have been involved with that. Yeah, that all of it would have been

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very crazy. If my path had
stuck with the BFRO as opposed to trailing

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off in the other direction, everything
would be different. You start getting involved

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in an other group, did you
go out on expeditions trying to find a

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big Foot for yourself? Yeah?
So at first there was a lot of

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getting to know the people. There
was like a voice chat service called a

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pal Talk I believe it was called, where everybody hang out and talk over

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the microphones on their computers. And
I got to know everybody there, and

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then one night they said, hey, some of us are meeting up in

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this town in Oklahoma if you want
to meet up with us and go out.

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So I did. I loaded up
my vehicle and drove forever like three

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and a half hours to meet up
with them, and went out with them.

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Got really freaked out the first night
ever, I'm out in the woods

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looking for bigfoot with people I didn't
know what to expect. I was a

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complete nube, and everybody was real
nice and everything like that. Nothing happened.

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Might have been some eye shine or
something, but at that point I

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didn't even know what I shine was. And then it was like the end

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of the night and everybody has their
plans and everything and they're just like,

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it was nice meeting you. It's
like okay. So I'm driving back home

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at one am out in the middle
of nowhere, and I get pulled over

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by a sheriff and I'm just like, oh man, this is not going

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to be good because my car,
like at that time, again being a

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nube going and meeting up with people
I don't know. I had a shotgun

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in my vehicle. I had spotlights, flashlights, knives, everything bad you

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can possibly think of to have.
And he gets me out of the vehicle

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and has me stand at the front
of his car and he's he goes back

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and he's searching my vehicle and I'm
like, yeah, there's a shotgun in

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the back. It's not load.
The shells are in the glove box,

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blah blah blah. And he's like
okay, and he shines a flash light

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in there. And then I think
I had like a ceebee radio or something,

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and he pulled that out. It
was just like a little handheld tebe

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radio and he sets that on top
of the car. And he sets like

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a couple of knives on top of
the car. They were just pocket knives,

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nothing crazy, and he's like,
what are you doing with all this

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stuff? I was like, I
was out with some people looking for bigfoot.

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I didn't know what to say.
And he was like, looking for

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bigfoot. We're at and I told
him what time we were in. He

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was like, they got bigfoot there, that's what they tell me. And

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he goes, huh, slow it
down, have a good night, and

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just let me go, no problem, And so I thought I was going

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to stay the night in the jail. I thought, hindsight, I would

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not suggest anybody tell the police that
you're out looking for bigfoot in the middle

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of the night with a bunch of
weapons. It's probably not the brightest move,

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but you let me go. And
yeah, that was my first ever

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trip out looking for Bigfoot. If
there's any state you're going to get away

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with that, probably it's going to
be Oklahoma, though, probably because you

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guys are rocking and rolling when it
comes to Bigfoot. From what I've heard

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now, I'm an outsider, never
been in the state before, but talked

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to a few people and I picked
up that certain counties you could probably get

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away with stuff like that. Probably. Yeah, all right, so you

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had a pretty wild first night meeting
the gang. Did you meet up with

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those guys again or yeah? So
that group, it was part of the

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network of people that I was getting
to know that I would eventually get in

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good with, and a lot of
them I consider extended family. At this

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point, that trip was just testing
the waters. And then after that,

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my next trip was several months later
and it was down to Texas and that

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was whenever I met the real main
group that I had been talking to,

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met them all for the first time
and started getting to know them, and

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again that trip introduced me to a
lot of interesting people. It was definitely

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a crazy trip, but didn't see
anything. Maybe heard some calls or something

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like that. But again, this
is my second trip out into the woods

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looking for Bigfoot. So I was
probably not noticing most of the stuff that

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was happening. But at that point
I had the bug, and this group

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was pretty active. We were going
out. We were all from different states,

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so that caused a problem. But
we were still going out at least

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once every three months or so,
just meeting up somewhere for like anywhere from

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three days to a week and just
hitting it hard the whole time. And

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at that time there wasn't really a
lot of groups doing that. It was

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pretty interesting. Is it East Texas
or yeah? Yeah, it was the

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Angelina National Forest exactly outside of Lufkin. I believe Zavala kind of got put

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on the map for a little while. And I've talked about that place a

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lot. We call it the dead
End Road. There's a old sawmill in

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this forest Boaken Springs Park if anybody
wants to look it up. And yeah,

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that place became famous. It became
a historic Bigfoot location for Texas because

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of the group I was with and
the things that we experienced there. Are

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you able to mention names of anyone
that was in that group or do you

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have to keep that No. We
affectionately started calling ourselves the Bigfoot Outlaws.

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Oh sure. So the most famous
people are obviously Baron Coombo of that group,

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and then Dan Ricky, Lori I
think Lori Dyerhood. She goes by

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at this point. Whenever I knew
her, it was a different name.

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Kelly Maddenly Vicky just a whole group. We were just the Outlaws. That

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was the same group that we eventually
started doing podcasts together and everything else.

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And as far as I know,
some of them are still actively going out

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into the woods twenty five years later. There might be some listeners that don't

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know what happened in that forest.
Are you able to share what happened in

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that forest that made it a location? The reason I was there, I

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didn't actually go on the first trip
there. Like I said, we're all

206
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from different states and we would meet
up. So wherever we were meeting up,

207
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there would be a person that kind
of hosted that get together and would

208
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scout locations for us to go to. And I don't even know how this

209
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location was picked. I don't know
if it had a history of stuff or

210
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what. But they went there and
I'm trying to remember. I think it

211
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was like February or something. I
think it was around Valentine's Day. Whenever

212
00:17:25.240 --> 00:17:30.759
they went there, and this was
about a month before I went, and

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whenever they went there was a large
group of people. There's probably ten to

214
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fifteen people on that outing, which
that's another thing we didn't really like to

215
00:17:41.160 --> 00:17:45.480
have big groups like that. We
called them circus outings because usually the more

216
00:17:45.519 --> 00:17:49.640
people you have, the lesser chances
of experiencing anything. But this particular time,

217
00:17:49.680 --> 00:17:55.920
they were in a caravan of vehicles. They're driving down this forest road

218
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at night, and a group of
bigfoot crossed the road in front of them,

219
00:18:00.680 --> 00:18:07.759
and they all had spotlights. They
hit the bigfoot with spotlights. They

220
00:18:07.880 --> 00:18:12.799
basically paralleled them down the road.
They kept the spotlights on the group of

221
00:18:12.839 --> 00:18:18.640
bigfoot, and I would say probably
four or five people out of the group

222
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all saw multiple bigfoot at the same
time. So that was like a really

223
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big deal, still would be by
anybody's standards, I would think, oh

224
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absolutely. So after that outing,
it's like, hey, we're going back.

225
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We got to go back down there. So that's why I got in

226
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on that trip and I went down
there with them, and some of the

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things that I saw just that first
trip down there were like the limb structures

228
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that you hear about. Those were
the first times I ever actually saw limb

229
00:18:52.200 --> 00:18:57.759
formations that people attribute to bigfoot,
tree bows, exes, things like that.

230
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But the rangest thing we saw.
They had talked about these tracks in

231
00:19:03.799 --> 00:19:07.640
the road. Now I know this
isn't going to make sense to a lot

232
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of people, but these guys weren't
interested in casting footprints. They would sometimes,

233
00:19:12.599 --> 00:19:17.240
but they wanted to see bigfoot.
They don't they're not in it for

234
00:19:17.839 --> 00:19:22.119
scientific purposes. They're in it because
they enjoy it. They are trying to

235
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learn about the behavior and things like
that. So they had talked about these

236
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footprints that they saw where they crossed
the road at and everything. So whenever

237
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we went back down there, they
took me to the spot. And this

238
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is like the first time we're driving
in and they take me to the spot.

239
00:19:37.559 --> 00:19:40.480
They're like, yeah, the footprints
are going to be right up here.

240
00:19:40.480 --> 00:19:44.519
We're gonna turn right and they'll be
right there after we turn right about

241
00:19:44.519 --> 00:19:48.599
thirty yards. So we do all
that and there's this is so weird.

242
00:19:48.960 --> 00:19:56.200
So it looks like a trackway crossing
the road, but the tracks are filled

243
00:19:56.200 --> 00:20:02.680
in with dirt, but it's like
fresh dirt. That's been brought in from

244
00:20:02.759 --> 00:20:07.720
someplace else, but they're in the
shape of like footprints, basically large footprints,

245
00:20:07.759 --> 00:20:14.519
and they're the same pattern as the
footprints would be, except they have

246
00:20:14.720 --> 00:20:21.000
just these packed in dirt. Somebody
had come in there and filled in the

247
00:20:21.000 --> 00:20:23.160
footprints, trying to cover them up
for some reason. And I thought that

248
00:20:23.319 --> 00:20:29.480
was just really bizarre, because like, how would those people if they were

249
00:20:29.559 --> 00:20:33.200
lying to me, why was that
right there like where they said the tracks

250
00:20:33.200 --> 00:20:37.440
would be. It just didn't make
sense. And that was whenever that was

251
00:20:37.480 --> 00:20:47.440
my first experience with maybe someone on
an authority level is actively trying to cover

252
00:20:47.519 --> 00:20:52.720
this up and keep Bigfoot a secret
or something, because I just I couldn't

253
00:20:52.720 --> 00:20:55.880
come up with any other explanation for
it. It just didn't make sense to

254
00:20:55.920 --> 00:21:00.400
me. And no footprints around,
no, like smaller footprints around, bigger

255
00:21:00.400 --> 00:21:04.079
footprints. Just no, it's so
weird, man. Yeah, yeah,

256
00:21:04.480 --> 00:21:10.160
it reminded me. In Oklahoma,
we have a lot of blacktop roads and

257
00:21:10.200 --> 00:21:14.000
whenever you get like holes in the
blacktop, sometimes they'll come along with a

258
00:21:14.000 --> 00:21:17.480
truck and like shovel more blacktop into
the holes and just pack it down with

259
00:21:17.480 --> 00:21:21.160
a shovel, And that's what it
reminded me of somebody drove through with a

260
00:21:21.200 --> 00:21:23.039
truck that had dirt in the back
of it and they just shoveled it into

261
00:21:23.119 --> 00:21:27.720
the tracks and packed it down and
kept driving. Wow. So no video,

262
00:21:29.200 --> 00:21:34.200
no, nothing like that of the
night when there was the multiple bigfoot

263
00:21:34.680 --> 00:21:41.039
in the road. Christ I think
somebody may have been taking video at the

264
00:21:41.079 --> 00:21:45.039
time. I'm not sure. Like
I said, I wasn't there. I'm

265
00:21:45.079 --> 00:21:51.640
trying to remember back. It seems
like maybe somebody did have a video camera

266
00:21:51.680 --> 00:21:55.599
at the time. I don't know
if they got anything or not. Probably

267
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not. I would assume I never
saw a video or anything like that.

268
00:21:59.279 --> 00:22:03.400
It was more or less just the
people I talk to all the time,

269
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you know, because we had talked
just about every night on the computer.

270
00:22:07.359 --> 00:22:10.759
They all come from back from that
trip and they're just they're going crazy.

271
00:22:10.799 --> 00:22:11.680
They're like, oh my god,
you got to hear what we saw,

272
00:22:11.720 --> 00:22:17.319
and like all these different people are
like telling me the same story. And

273
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I didn't really know what to think
of it. But then the more I

274
00:22:22.119 --> 00:22:26.200
talk to the people and get to
know them and everything, like these people

275
00:22:26.240 --> 00:22:30.640
aren't liars, like they're not making
this stuff up. And I don't know,

276
00:22:30.680 --> 00:22:33.799
man, it's one of the craziest
thing. I wish I had been

277
00:22:33.839 --> 00:22:41.000
there, obviously, but it's one
of the crazier stories for sure, because

278
00:22:41.119 --> 00:22:45.519
just so many people seeing them at
once. You had the experience with seeing

279
00:22:45.839 --> 00:22:49.680
the filled in tracks. Was there
ever a point after that, Matt,

280
00:22:49.680 --> 00:22:57.480
that you were able to have any
experience where you saw an actual creature or

281
00:22:57.640 --> 00:23:03.359
was that the kind of pinnacle of
seeing some sort of evidence when you're out

282
00:23:03.359 --> 00:23:07.480
in the field. Oh god,
no, man, that's my second trip

283
00:23:07.519 --> 00:23:10.359
out into the woods. Well,
you know, some people, that's all

284
00:23:10.400 --> 00:23:14.279
they get, right, I know. And that was part of the problem.

285
00:23:14.440 --> 00:23:17.880
That was part of the problem,
I should say that. So these

286
00:23:18.160 --> 00:23:23.960
people, we weren't called anything at
that point, so they were part of

287
00:23:25.039 --> 00:23:30.440
a different group. And there was
a fallout in the group. And there

288
00:23:30.559 --> 00:23:36.079
is this guy in Oklahoma who said, Hey, I'll give you guys a

289
00:23:36.119 --> 00:23:38.559
group if you want to come join
it. And that group was called the

290
00:23:38.559 --> 00:23:45.599
Monkey Chasers. This guy was not
serious about Bigfoot at all. He believed

291
00:23:45.599 --> 00:23:49.559
in Bigfoot, but he he just
wanted people to hang out with basically,

292
00:23:51.160 --> 00:23:55.599
And so the group was called the
monkey Chasers. So I don't really like

293
00:23:55.759 --> 00:24:00.160
publicizing that because it's not a great
name. That's what they were called.

294
00:24:00.799 --> 00:24:04.519
And that's the group I hooked up
with. And these people, it was

295
00:24:04.559 --> 00:24:11.000
an amazing group of people. You've
got Baron Coombo, that's just their nicknames.

296
00:24:11.400 --> 00:24:14.319
That's what they went by on the
Internet. So I'm going to respect

297
00:24:14.359 --> 00:24:22.720
that those guys had independently grown up
in areas where Bigfoot was on their family's

298
00:24:22.759 --> 00:24:29.759
property. These are both country guys
from the South who their first encounters were

299
00:24:29.839 --> 00:24:33.640
with Bigfoot were whenever they were children, and like their grandparents, knew about

300
00:24:33.640 --> 00:24:40.799
Bigfoot, and these guys knew how
to find them and knew how to call

301
00:24:40.839 --> 00:24:48.480
them in using vocalizations that they had
learned over the years based on what they

302
00:24:48.559 --> 00:24:55.880
had heard Bigfoot make. Then you
had Dan Rickey, who, like I

303
00:24:55.960 --> 00:25:00.200
said, was basically from south central
Oklahoma at that point, and he had

304
00:25:00.240 --> 00:25:04.880
been researching Bigfoot since the nineteen seventies. I was in with a group of

305
00:25:04.920 --> 00:25:11.799
people that were all much older than
I was, and they were all seasoned

306
00:25:11.920 --> 00:25:15.400
veterans in Bigfoot. They didn't care
about making names for themselves, they didn't

307
00:25:15.440 --> 00:25:21.400
care about being scientific. All of
them were from the South basically and just

308
00:25:22.400 --> 00:25:29.359
grew up in rural areas and just
didn't care about fame or what you're supposed

309
00:25:29.400 --> 00:25:33.960
to do or how you're supposed to
go about doing it. And they just

310
00:25:33.039 --> 00:25:37.640
applied a lot of outdoorsman knowledge and
a lot of common sense. And that

311
00:25:37.799 --> 00:25:41.759
was the same way that I was
brought up. I was brought up in

312
00:25:41.799 --> 00:25:45.160
a surrounding that was very similar to
that, so I was comfortable with that.

313
00:25:45.640 --> 00:25:49.160
I was raised by my great grandparents. They were both country folks,

314
00:25:49.920 --> 00:25:53.599
raised learning how to hunt and fish
at a very early age, so I

315
00:25:53.640 --> 00:26:00.960
didn't have a problem being with those
type people. They understood that, and

316
00:26:02.519 --> 00:26:07.079
they taught me a lot of stuff. Now I am a very skeptically minded

317
00:26:07.079 --> 00:26:12.000
person, so the stuff that they
taught me I didn't just accept. But

318
00:26:12.240 --> 00:26:17.519
I would take the things that they
taught me and I would apply them myself

319
00:26:18.200 --> 00:26:22.359
and I got the same results.
So I just started trusting them and started

320
00:26:22.359 --> 00:26:29.119
listening to them. This eventually led
to me going out with them. It

321
00:26:29.200 --> 00:26:33.720
wasn't a real outing, it was
more of a social get together. In

322
00:26:33.720 --> 00:26:37.960
two thousand and two. It was
in soul for Oklahoma. We were all

323
00:26:38.000 --> 00:26:44.400
meeting up and having a big barbecue
and camp out. But this park that

324
00:26:44.440 --> 00:26:48.559
we were in was historically known for
having bigfoot activity. Tourists would report seeing

325
00:26:48.559 --> 00:26:53.359
bigfoot there. It's a very tourist
active area. Locals knew about it,

326
00:26:53.759 --> 00:27:02.119
and some of the locals that we
were networked with were in attendance and friends

327
00:27:02.119 --> 00:27:08.240
of ours, and they took us
to a location that had active bigfoot sightings

328
00:27:08.279 --> 00:27:15.319
taking place. I got lucky.
This area was at a nature center,

329
00:27:15.759 --> 00:27:19.720
which is basically a small building set
up by the park rangers where you can

330
00:27:19.759 --> 00:27:22.880
go in. There's like restrooms you
can use, and you can go in

331
00:27:22.920 --> 00:27:26.960
and get like pamphlets and brochures and
stuff, and they got a few displays.

332
00:27:27.799 --> 00:27:32.359
But it's set in the middle of
the woods. And we were actually

333
00:27:32.400 --> 00:27:36.759
in a parking lot for this nature
center, and the group had split up

334
00:27:36.759 --> 00:27:41.880
in everything gone in different directions,
and I hung towards the back with this

335
00:27:41.920 --> 00:27:48.039
other guy. He had a Gen
three night vision scope that he was looking

336
00:27:48.079 --> 00:27:52.519
through and he just said, Hey, Matt, come look at this and

337
00:27:52.960 --> 00:27:56.680
tell me what tell me if you
see what I see. He didn't tell

338
00:27:56.680 --> 00:28:00.440
me what he was looking at.
So I walked up over there, got

339
00:28:00.519 --> 00:28:04.200
the scope. I'm looking through it. He's guiding me with his hand,

340
00:28:04.279 --> 00:28:10.359
showing me where to look and everything, and I see eye shine just inside

341
00:28:10.400 --> 00:28:15.599
the tree line distance not real sure, it couldn't have been more than thirty

342
00:28:15.680 --> 00:28:18.799
yards. The night vision scope that
I was looking through was a monocular.

343
00:28:18.960 --> 00:28:22.279
It had a slight zoom on it. I'm not sure how much of a

344
00:28:22.359 --> 00:28:26.839
zoom, so that kind of throws
off the distance, but I could see

345
00:28:26.960 --> 00:28:33.240
clearly eyeshine looking right back at me. I tried to figure out what I

346
00:28:33.359 --> 00:28:37.319
was looking at. It didn't really
make a lot of sense. I started

347
00:28:37.359 --> 00:28:41.559
looking at the eyes and then could
see that the eyes were surrounded by a

348
00:28:41.640 --> 00:28:45.559
face. It was staring right back
at me, or at least it seemed

349
00:28:45.599 --> 00:28:49.359
like it was. The eyes were
glowing very brightly. There was a branch

350
00:28:49.400 --> 00:28:53.200
going across the bottom of its chin, and then another branch going across its

351
00:28:53.240 --> 00:28:59.079
forehead, so I could see basically
from the middle of the forehead down to

352
00:28:59.240 --> 00:29:02.880
just below the bottom lip. I'm
not sure how long I stared at it,

353
00:29:02.880 --> 00:29:07.640
it seemed like forever. I took
the night vision scope down in shock,

354
00:29:07.799 --> 00:29:08.759
and I'm like looking at him,
and I was like, oh my

355
00:29:08.799 --> 00:29:12.079
god, is that a face?
And I pull it back up to my

356
00:29:12.160 --> 00:29:17.759
face and it's gone. The thing's
just gone, and where it had been,

357
00:29:18.640 --> 00:29:22.400
the branch that was going across the
bottom of its chin was now higher

358
00:29:22.480 --> 00:29:26.160
up, so I think it was
holding the branch down and like looking at

359
00:29:26.200 --> 00:29:32.000
us through the branches. What I
saw, Yeah, it's crazy, man,

360
00:29:32.240 --> 00:29:37.359
it's crazy. That reminded me.
Yeah, So this thing I had

361
00:29:37.359 --> 00:29:41.359
a hard time. I still have
a hard time with it because it's not

362
00:29:41.519 --> 00:29:48.160
something that makes sense. It's not
human, it's not animal. I wasn't

363
00:29:48.160 --> 00:29:52.559
looking at a deer. I wasn't
looking at a bear. I was nothing

364
00:29:52.640 --> 00:29:56.359
like that. It was the size
of it of a large person. I

365
00:29:56.400 --> 00:30:00.039
would guess, about six feet off
the ground. The eyes what I would

366
00:30:00.039 --> 00:30:07.160
describe as almond shaped, set farther
apart than a human's eyes, very large,

367
00:30:07.880 --> 00:30:11.079
very deep, sunken into the head. The brow ridge was very pronounced,

368
00:30:11.680 --> 00:30:18.759
but the brow ridge was thicker in
the middle between the eyes and tapered

369
00:30:19.400 --> 00:30:25.319
in as it went around towards the
edge of the head. The hair was

370
00:30:25.359 --> 00:30:30.519
growing straight back slightly. I called
it an Afro style hair at the time.

371
00:30:32.279 --> 00:30:36.519
It reminded me of if you're familiar
with the old Wolfman movies, like

372
00:30:36.559 --> 00:30:40.839
the old black and white Wolfman movies. Yep, absolutely, I couldn't see

373
00:30:40.839 --> 00:30:41.799
the top of the head, so
I don't know if it had a sagul

374
00:30:41.880 --> 00:30:48.359
crest. It's just what I could
see. The forehead was actually covered in

375
00:30:48.400 --> 00:30:51.400
hair. It didn't have a bare
forehead. The hair came all the way

376
00:30:51.400 --> 00:30:56.480
down to the brow ridge and grew
backwards up over the back of its head.

377
00:30:56.799 --> 00:31:02.240
I couldn't see any visible ears.
This jawline was very wide. The

378
00:31:02.359 --> 00:31:10.160
jaw sat wider than the temples did. The cheekbones were very high and pronounced.

379
00:31:10.960 --> 00:31:15.359
The nose wasn't like anything I've seen. I have a really hard time

380
00:31:15.400 --> 00:31:22.559
describing the nose because the bridge of
the nose was thin and scooped out,

381
00:31:22.119 --> 00:31:29.039
almost ape, but also almost human
at the same time. It didn't have

382
00:31:29.200 --> 00:31:33.440
a bulb on the tip of its
nose like we do. And its nostrils

383
00:31:33.480 --> 00:31:37.599
weren't like turned all the way up
like a gorilla, but they were slightly

384
00:31:37.680 --> 00:31:44.400
upturned, but they sat really wide, really wide. And then the lips.

385
00:31:44.680 --> 00:31:48.240
The top lip was thinner than the
bottom lip, and it looked like

386
00:31:48.240 --> 00:31:52.279
it had an underbite. The bottom
of the jaw was sticking out farther than

387
00:31:52.279 --> 00:31:56.480
the top of the jaw. The
facial hair was just like basically a man's

388
00:31:56.799 --> 00:32:01.119
pattern facial hair if you just grew
up your beard and never shaved like on

389
00:32:01.240 --> 00:32:07.400
the cheeks, not around the eyes
or anything thinner on the face and growing

390
00:32:07.440 --> 00:32:10.559
out longer into a beard. From
what I could tell, Yeah, and

391
00:32:12.240 --> 00:32:15.039
that's what I saw. And then
it was gone. Didn't hear anything,

392
00:32:15.160 --> 00:32:23.000
leave, nothing like that. I
think I believe we had smelled something skunky

393
00:32:23.039 --> 00:32:28.839
smell before I saw it, but
that was I I had such a hard

394
00:32:28.880 --> 00:32:31.839
time processing. I guess I still
do because I it's all these years later,

395
00:32:31.880 --> 00:32:35.720
I can still see it clear as
day in my head. It was

396
00:32:36.000 --> 00:32:38.200
very That was in two thousand and
two, September of two thousand and two,

397
00:32:38.799 --> 00:32:44.920
so it was very early in my
quote unquote bigfoot career, which was

398
00:32:44.960 --> 00:32:50.880
also hard to process because I had
talked to a lot of people and you

399
00:32:50.960 --> 00:32:54.720
had grates out there, John Bendernagel, who had spent their entire lives out

400
00:32:54.720 --> 00:33:00.279
there and never seen one. And
here I am just some basically just going

401
00:33:00.319 --> 00:33:05.079
out there, and I'm in a
parking lot of all places, and I

402
00:33:05.119 --> 00:33:08.319
see one, and I'm just like, what is going on. I'm trying

403
00:33:08.359 --> 00:33:13.039
to figure out if somebody hoaxing me
could that have been somebody in a mask.

404
00:33:13.200 --> 00:33:16.880
They would have had hiked in multiple
miles through the dark to find us

405
00:33:17.000 --> 00:33:21.480
and new We didn't even know we
were going to be there. We like

406
00:33:21.599 --> 00:33:24.559
eventually went there, but there was
multiple locations and we were just going around

407
00:33:24.559 --> 00:33:30.079
from locational location and there was just
no way that it could have possibly been

408
00:33:30.839 --> 00:33:35.559
anything. And it didn't look like
anything I had ever seen. And yeah,

409
00:33:35.599 --> 00:33:39.319
that was it. That was it. That that locked me in for

410
00:33:39.359 --> 00:33:44.359
the life. Oh. Absolutely,
there'd be no getting out of it after

411
00:33:44.799 --> 00:33:47.880
seeing something like that. Matt,
that's wild. I'm sure you've replayed that

412
00:33:49.720 --> 00:33:55.680
over and over. Have you had
the internal discussion where it's did I see

413
00:33:55.880 --> 00:34:00.359
something that's human or did I see
something that's a or is it something that

414
00:34:00.559 --> 00:34:06.400
is I don't even know? Excuse
me. Yeah, I still go back

415
00:34:06.480 --> 00:34:10.679
and forth on that. That's the
thing. Obviously, these things can't just

416
00:34:10.719 --> 00:34:15.000
be an animal. What I was
looking at was not an animal, but

417
00:34:15.079 --> 00:34:19.960
at the same time, it wasn't
a human and one of the most difficult

418
00:34:20.039 --> 00:34:23.480
things that I had with it,
and I guess maybe it helped me.

419
00:34:23.679 --> 00:34:30.039
I don't know, but having that
sighting and nobody will ever be able to

420
00:34:30.079 --> 00:34:37.000
take that away from me. So
it now became a discussion of these things

421
00:34:37.039 --> 00:34:43.239
do exist. So I'm skipping over
all of the part of we're trying to

422
00:34:43.280 --> 00:34:45.880
figure out if they exist, you
know what I mean. And that's where

423
00:34:45.880 --> 00:34:51.719
most researchers stay, trying to determine
if they exist or not. And now

424
00:34:51.760 --> 00:34:55.320
I go to a point of,
oh, I know they're there. So

425
00:34:55.400 --> 00:35:00.639
if they're there, is this sign
of them? Are these limbsructure right?

426
00:35:00.719 --> 00:35:02.840
Is that something that they're making?
Is that noise I just heard one of

427
00:35:02.880 --> 00:35:07.440
them? It almost gets to the
point of paranoia a bit. There's a

428
00:35:07.480 --> 00:35:14.000
lot of after that point. It
was trying to learn as much as I

429
00:35:14.000 --> 00:35:19.800
could about them, trying to understand
what they are, what I had experienced,

430
00:35:20.920 --> 00:35:24.199
taking in multiple experiences after that,
but then you have to go home

431
00:35:24.239 --> 00:35:28.480
and settle down and be like give
it a few days. You're like,

432
00:35:28.559 --> 00:35:32.119
Okay, so what really happened?
What did I really experience and kind of

433
00:35:32.119 --> 00:35:37.679
filter it through. And then it's
also a matter of it's a hangout that

434
00:35:37.679 --> 00:35:42.599
I've had for a long time because
I was a researcher. Now I'm a

435
00:35:42.599 --> 00:35:46.840
podcaster. Now it's my job to
let people share their stories. But it's

436
00:35:46.840 --> 00:35:52.159
hard to make that separation. Sometimes. Do you find that the line is

437
00:35:52.400 --> 00:35:55.800
very thin sometimes between those two things? Matt, Yeah, it for sure?

438
00:35:55.920 --> 00:36:00.480
Is it? For sure? Is
it's very So sometimes I feel like

439
00:36:00.760 --> 00:36:07.679
I am. You see those old
movies where it's like someone is in a

440
00:36:07.760 --> 00:36:14.280
cultural environment and they're researching it and
they have to make the conscious decision.

441
00:36:14.440 --> 00:36:17.719
I'm not going to cross the line
between observation because if I do, then

442
00:36:17.760 --> 00:36:22.000
I change the thing that I'm observing, right, And I don't know how

443
00:36:22.039 --> 00:36:25.400
I feel about that yet. Yeah, for sure, that's the thing.

444
00:36:25.519 --> 00:36:30.800
It's so there's the side of you
go out into the woods, you hear

445
00:36:30.840 --> 00:36:36.079
a call. These things exist at
this point in your own mind. It

446
00:36:36.159 --> 00:36:39.719
doesn't matter what anybody else says.
So was that a big foot call?

447
00:36:40.239 --> 00:36:45.960
You didn't see a bigfoot make the
call, so you can't say that it

448
00:36:45.159 --> 00:36:50.280
was. They exist, So what
do you do with it? All you

449
00:36:50.320 --> 00:36:54.599
can do is document. And we
weren't documenting. We weren't documenting properly.

450
00:36:54.639 --> 00:36:59.639
I don't think most people document properly, and I think that's a huge issue.

451
00:37:00.079 --> 00:37:06.559
I talked to Mary Fabian a while
back from the Pennsylvania Bigfoot Project.

452
00:37:07.079 --> 00:37:13.360
I believe is the title and She
had mentioned going down to Oklahoma and spending

453
00:37:13.440 --> 00:37:19.480
some time with a group down there
that involves Kombo. Did you ever were

454
00:37:19.480 --> 00:37:24.760
you ever involved with a research area
called Purgatory or is that a sure you

455
00:37:24.840 --> 00:37:29.039
were? Okay? Yeah? Is
that anything you can comment on? Or

456
00:37:29.119 --> 00:37:34.400
is it that place is just scary
as hell? It's called I didn't experience

457
00:37:34.440 --> 00:37:38.159
anything personal while I was there.
It's a really weird place. People are

458
00:37:38.159 --> 00:37:45.280
pretty familiar with the term red dirt, especially pertaining to Oklahoma. We have

459
00:37:45.840 --> 00:37:50.320
a lot of iron in the soil
and clay, and it's this red color

460
00:37:50.360 --> 00:37:54.000
in some areas, and Purgatory is
one of those places where the dirt is

461
00:37:54.119 --> 00:38:00.920
red. And you turn off the
main road into this area and the road

462
00:38:01.840 --> 00:38:07.039
it's weird. The road goes it
doesn't go down, but the rest of

463
00:38:07.079 --> 00:38:15.119
the world goes up around it,
and you're basically driving through a ravine like

464
00:38:15.119 --> 00:38:17.800
a small canyon, but all the
roads are like that. You turn off

465
00:38:17.840 --> 00:38:23.079
one road onto another and you're still
like in this enclosed area where there's it's

466
00:38:23.119 --> 00:38:27.480
not two lanes, it's like maybe
a lane and a half. Like if

467
00:38:27.519 --> 00:38:30.199
a car comes towards you, you
have to pull all the way over to

468
00:38:30.239 --> 00:38:32.760
the side to let them buy,
but you can't, Like if you're looking

469
00:38:32.800 --> 00:38:37.599
out your side windows, you can't
see anything but a dirt wall, and

470
00:38:37.639 --> 00:38:42.639
then on top of that is woods, and you just feel so enclosed in

471
00:38:42.679 --> 00:38:46.719
there, and it's it's a place
that has history, that has a lot

472
00:38:46.760 --> 00:38:52.719
of folklore with it to spook you
out even more. And then people find

473
00:38:52.800 --> 00:38:57.440
tracks in there, and they have
sightings and they hear vocalizations and it's just

474
00:38:57.719 --> 00:39:02.519
such a confined, dark, scary
place. And I don't know how it

475
00:39:02.639 --> 00:39:08.400
got the nickname purgatory, if that's
why it's called purgatory. But with the

476
00:39:08.480 --> 00:39:15.760
name and the just the overall atmosphere
of the area and then the environment itself,

477
00:39:15.599 --> 00:39:20.039
that's one of those places where it's
I did not like being there.

478
00:39:20.079 --> 00:39:23.599
I didn't like being there at all. We pulled off on the side of

479
00:39:23.639 --> 00:39:28.599
the road in this one area it
was like the only area where we could

480
00:39:28.599 --> 00:39:32.760
pull off, and we got out
of the vehicles and we're just like surrounded

481
00:39:32.800 --> 00:39:37.760
by thick cedar trees, Like you
can't see anything. It's just trees.

482
00:39:38.280 --> 00:39:40.760
There could be one ten feet away
from you and you wouldn't be able to

483
00:39:40.760 --> 00:39:45.440
see it. And it's just pitch
black dark, and I hated it.

484
00:39:45.519 --> 00:39:49.760
I just hated it out there.
It sounds like a very unnerving place.

485
00:39:50.760 --> 00:39:52.360
Yeah, sure, how I would
like that. It's cool to know that

486
00:39:53.000 --> 00:39:58.360
a little bit more about it though, because she wouldn't really get into it.

487
00:39:58.920 --> 00:40:01.280
Yeah, some of the stories.
I don't want to get the stories

488
00:40:01.320 --> 00:40:07.239
wrong, right, And they were
all like secondhand, but like this was

489
00:40:07.440 --> 00:40:13.639
a long time ago, early nineteen
hundreds time, if I'm remembering correctly,

490
00:40:13.679 --> 00:40:17.480
If like locals traveling through the area, you know, would break down,

491
00:40:17.719 --> 00:40:22.239
and they didn't want to break down
in this area because the monsters would get

492
00:40:22.320 --> 00:40:29.159
them. And then sometimes outsiders would
come along, and the locals didn't want

493
00:40:29.199 --> 00:40:35.079
outsiders coming through there, so they'd
send them through purgatory and just things like

494
00:40:35.159 --> 00:40:39.559
that, stories of people disappearing,
bad stuff. There's a lot of scary

495
00:40:39.599 --> 00:40:44.000
stories like that in Oklahoma. That
sounds amazing. I would read a book

496
00:40:44.039 --> 00:40:47.880
about it. And that leads me
to another question I usually bring up for

497
00:40:49.000 --> 00:40:54.960
Oklahoma. Guess why is it?
Why is it that Oklahoma has all these

498
00:40:55.199 --> 00:41:01.360
wild bigfoot stories, sometimes super aggressive. Do you think it's is there a

499
00:41:01.480 --> 00:41:07.360
storyteller aspect to those that are in
the state, or do you think it's

500
00:41:07.480 --> 00:41:10.719
just a state where a lot of
crazy stuff happens. I think it's a

501
00:41:10.719 --> 00:41:16.320
little bit of both. I think
there's definitely some storytelling going on. I

502
00:41:16.400 --> 00:41:23.480
know for a fact there's a few
famous stories out there that were fictional to

503
00:41:23.559 --> 00:41:28.079
begin with that have taken all a
life of their own. But then I

504
00:41:28.079 --> 00:41:30.880
also know the siege at ho Nubby. I remember whenever that happened. I

505
00:41:30.920 --> 00:41:36.119
remember it being on the news.
It was a major thing. It made

506
00:41:36.280 --> 00:41:43.960
national media whenever it happened, And
I've talked the micmpres and stuff and like

507
00:41:44.159 --> 00:41:49.440
that story's true, and I think
that had a lot to do with how

508
00:41:49.639 --> 00:41:55.320
bigfoot is viewed in Oklahoma. And
I haven't really had the same experiences as

509
00:41:55.360 --> 00:42:00.599
other people, so I can only
speak for myself. But I've never been

510
00:42:00.599 --> 00:42:06.599
attacked by a bigfoot. I've never
felt threatened. Maybe I was, I

511
00:42:06.639 --> 00:42:09.920
don't know. I've had rocks thrown
and stuff like that. Definitely heard some

512
00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:15.360
loud noises that were very scary.
One time I heard what sounded like a

513
00:42:15.400 --> 00:42:20.320
tree being shoved over. But I'm
here, I live to tell about it.

514
00:42:20.880 --> 00:42:23.119
So I think a lot of it
is just a lot of rumor.

515
00:42:23.719 --> 00:42:30.199
I think maybe Bigfoot are more aggressive
in some areas. I think that not

516
00:42:30.280 --> 00:42:35.079
to stereotype my fellow OKI's or anything, but a lot of them, if

517
00:42:35.079 --> 00:42:38.400
they hear somebody walking around on their
property at night, they're probably just gonna

518
00:42:38.840 --> 00:42:43.559
shoot the shotgun out the back door
and worry about it later. And I

519
00:42:43.559 --> 00:42:49.639
think maybe those type of interactions with
people have caused some problems over the years.

520
00:42:49.960 --> 00:42:53.800
What are your thoughts on the whole
area X thing, since we're talking

521
00:42:53.960 --> 00:43:01.800
about Oklahoma. I know Kathy and
Bob Strain and I've talk to them a

522
00:43:01.840 --> 00:43:07.440
long time ago about their experiences there
that part of the country. It's just

523
00:43:07.840 --> 00:43:15.639
that's Bigfoot's territory. I don't know
anybody in that area, researcher wise,

524
00:43:15.719 --> 00:43:22.400
that hasn't experienced something. I think
the people involved with that location are some

525
00:43:22.599 --> 00:43:28.960
very intelligent people that know what they're
doing. I don't keep up with their

526
00:43:29.039 --> 00:43:34.719
current research that much anymore, but
I was at the beginning and they were

527
00:43:34.760 --> 00:43:39.840
doing some stuff that I thought was
groundbreaking. Now, I believe while it's

528
00:43:39.920 --> 00:43:44.239
not a real popular thing and I
don't think they publicize it a lot,

529
00:43:44.280 --> 00:43:47.280
I think they're trying to take one. I think they're just actively trying to

530
00:43:47.320 --> 00:43:52.760
take a specimen. I don't know
if they'll accomplish that or not, but

531
00:43:52.599 --> 00:43:55.559
if they do, good for them. I know a lot of people that

532
00:43:55.599 --> 00:44:00.960
have tried to do that for a
very long time, a lot of seasoned

533
00:44:00.320 --> 00:44:08.480
outdoorsmen and hunters and intelligent people that
have never accomplished the mission. So I

534
00:44:08.519 --> 00:44:13.519
think if it were up to me, I would spend my efforts elsewhere.

535
00:44:14.079 --> 00:44:20.079
But to each their own. Do
you think that's ever happened in Oklahoma?

536
00:44:20.800 --> 00:44:24.840
Yeah? Ever? Yeah? Oh
really, yeah, there's actually been specimens.

537
00:44:25.159 --> 00:44:32.480
I heard a story from someone that
I believe to be true about a

538
00:44:32.599 --> 00:44:38.400
landowner that shot one and disposed of
the body in a cistern on their property.

539
00:44:38.960 --> 00:44:45.159
And this wasn't like a researcher or
anybody affiliated with research at all.

540
00:44:45.800 --> 00:44:51.000
This was just a person that thought
they had a trespasser and thought they were

541
00:44:51.039 --> 00:44:58.280
stealing something and gave them a verbal
warning and then shot them and went out

542
00:44:58.320 --> 00:45:02.360
and saw that it wasn't a person
and freaked out and threw it in their

543
00:45:02.400 --> 00:45:10.440
systern. And it was something that
relatives people involved knew about, and they

544
00:45:10.440 --> 00:45:15.960
were It just came up in a
conversation and the right person just happened to

545
00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:17.559
hear the story, and that's the
only reason I even know about it.

546
00:45:19.039 --> 00:45:22.639
But I can't really give away too
many details. I know that's so frustrating

547
00:45:22.639 --> 00:45:28.920
the listeners. But because of the
details, I believe that story is true,

548
00:45:29.400 --> 00:45:34.199
which is totally understandable, as we
both know half the things that we

549
00:45:34.320 --> 00:45:39.920
get told can never be told.
Yeah on the actual podcast. Yeah,

550
00:45:39.960 --> 00:45:45.800
which is probably infuriating to listeners of
both of our shows. Oh, it's

551
00:45:45.840 --> 00:45:50.559
so bad, that's how guys.
I'm sorry. Yeah, I will not

552
00:45:50.719 --> 00:45:54.320
break anyone's trust. Yeah, that's
right there with you. You know,

553
00:45:55.079 --> 00:46:00.800
there's you know, I'm sure there's
probably been a few episodes of your shows

554
00:46:00.840 --> 00:46:05.280
where it's taken a year or so
for a person to actually get to the

555
00:46:05.320 --> 00:46:10.880
point where they will chat with you, let alone beyond air. It's wild,

556
00:46:12.480 --> 00:46:16.639
you know how it is trying to
find new guests and stuff like that.

557
00:46:17.320 --> 00:46:22.400
And every once in a while,
I'll run across someone somewhere saying something

558
00:46:23.039 --> 00:46:27.920
I've listened to your show for years, and then you find out that they

559
00:46:27.920 --> 00:46:30.119
have an encounter or something. You're
like, okay, so why haven't you

560
00:46:30.400 --> 00:46:34.920
emailed me if you've been listening and
you had an encounter, Why haven't you

561
00:46:35.000 --> 00:46:37.480
talked to me? And a lot
of people just don't want to talk about

562
00:46:37.480 --> 00:46:40.440
their siding. Yep, they just
don't want me. And I still think

563
00:46:40.480 --> 00:46:44.800
that not only do they not want
to talk about their siding, but the

564
00:46:44.880 --> 00:46:49.599
number of sightings that happen that never
even make it to the bigfoot world.

565
00:46:50.280 --> 00:46:53.960
I think that's still a thing.
I don't think everybody runs to the internet

566
00:46:54.039 --> 00:46:59.320
and types in Bigfoot and tries to
submit a report or go on a podcast

567
00:47:00.079 --> 00:47:05.320
talking about has one ever been shot
in Oklahoma? That's another story. I

568
00:47:05.480 --> 00:47:13.239
was actually at a doctor's appointment and
I was sitting there filling out the paperwork

569
00:47:13.320 --> 00:47:17.079
or whatever, waiting for my turn. And I'm sitting by the door going

570
00:47:17.159 --> 00:47:23.239
in, and this old man's like
leaving and the door is glass. It's

571
00:47:23.280 --> 00:47:25.840
open, but it's glass, and
I'm sitting right next to the door,

572
00:47:25.920 --> 00:47:30.880
so I can like see through it
with the corner of my eye. As

573
00:47:30.960 --> 00:47:35.480
he's walking out, and I see
him stop and look at me, and

574
00:47:35.519 --> 00:47:38.239
then he like steps back, so
I turn and I look at him and

575
00:47:38.280 --> 00:47:42.800
he's like, nice shirt, and
I was like, oh, thanks.

576
00:47:43.079 --> 00:47:47.679
Now at the time, I'm wearing
a T shirt that's got a bigfoot on

577
00:47:47.719 --> 00:47:51.679
the back of it. It's but
it's got the state of Oklahoma, like

578
00:47:51.719 --> 00:47:55.320
the silhouette of Oklahoma on the front. And I wasn't I just thought he

579
00:47:55.519 --> 00:48:00.599
was another Okie, you know.
Another fellow Claholman saying nice shirt because he

580
00:48:00.719 --> 00:48:05.000
I wasn't even thinking about the bigfoot, and I was just like, oh,

581
00:48:05.039 --> 00:48:07.199
thanks, And I went back to
what I was doing, and he

582
00:48:07.239 --> 00:48:10.760
started to walk out again. Then
he stops and he comes back again,

583
00:48:12.360 --> 00:48:15.079
and I look back up at him, and his eyes are searching around the

584
00:48:15.159 --> 00:48:17.960
room and everything, and then he
looks back at me. He says,

585
00:48:19.480 --> 00:48:22.880
I shot one when I was twelve, and I'm just like what he was,

586
00:48:22.960 --> 00:48:27.519
like, yeah, whenever I was
a kid, And he proceeds to

587
00:48:27.559 --> 00:48:31.360
tell me the story about when he
was twelve, he was staying the night

588
00:48:31.400 --> 00:48:37.400
at a friend's house. His friend's
dad was like a local sheriff. He

589
00:48:37.480 --> 00:48:42.400
told me, like, where are
the property's at and everything. They were

590
00:48:42.400 --> 00:48:47.039
there by themselves. They heard something
messing around outside. They shined a light

591
00:48:47.079 --> 00:48:52.679
out back, and they saw this
thing out by the horse corral and the

592
00:48:52.800 --> 00:48:58.119
kid's dad had I think a rifle
sitting by the back door, and the

593
00:48:58.159 --> 00:49:02.199
guy grabbed it and started shooting.
The thing yelled and ran off into the

594
00:49:02.280 --> 00:49:08.400
darkness. They were freaked out.
They waited for the dad to come home.

595
00:49:08.480 --> 00:49:15.199
I think told him. Sheriff's department
comes out. They tried tracking the

596
00:49:15.199 --> 00:49:20.360
blood trail and everything. They follow
it. It goes to the neighbor's property.

597
00:49:21.239 --> 00:49:24.840
They contact the neighbor. The neighbor
said that he saw the thing run

598
00:49:24.880 --> 00:49:28.920
by. He was like sitting out
on his front porch or something and saw

599
00:49:28.960 --> 00:49:31.440
the thing running by. He couldn't
make out what it was. It looked

600
00:49:31.480 --> 00:49:36.519
like a man, but it was
dark. And this guy's telling me this

601
00:49:36.679 --> 00:49:39.800
story, and he's got to be, I don't know, in his late

602
00:49:39.880 --> 00:49:45.440
seventies at least. And as he's
telling me the story, he's jeremi.

603
00:49:45.519 --> 00:49:49.840
He's giving me details of what this
is, how the house was shaped,

604
00:49:49.880 --> 00:49:52.320
This was the room that we were
in, this is the property, this

605
00:49:52.360 --> 00:49:55.360
is the layout. Like it was
silhouetted against the horse craw and then it

606
00:49:55.440 --> 00:49:59.480
ran across in front of the side
of the barn. And like tears are

607
00:49:59.559 --> 00:50:02.639
welling up in this old man's eyes
as he's telling me this story. And

608
00:50:02.800 --> 00:50:07.159
he's never met me before in his
life. He doesn't know what I do.

609
00:50:07.000 --> 00:50:10.880
He just saw a guy with a
bigfoot shirt on, and he just

610
00:50:12.559 --> 00:50:15.480
you could tell he just wanted to
get the story out. He'd wanted to

611
00:50:15.480 --> 00:50:17.960
tell somebody that would listen. And
I just sat there and I was just

612
00:50:19.039 --> 00:50:23.760
like amazed. I asked him just
like a couple questions and told me,

613
00:50:24.239 --> 00:50:30.119
hey, I really appreciate you sharing
your story with me. And that was

614
00:50:30.159 --> 00:50:34.039
it. We parted away as he
left, and the first thing that happened,

615
00:50:34.079 --> 00:50:36.599
my wife is like, why didn't
you get his name or something to

616
00:50:36.599 --> 00:50:38.199
have him on your podcast. I
was like, I didn't even think of

617
00:50:38.239 --> 00:50:42.559
it. I completely forgot to even
do a Bigfoot podcast at that point.

618
00:50:42.599 --> 00:50:47.119
It was just such such a pure
moment. Yeah, and the guy is

619
00:50:47.119 --> 00:50:52.119
telling me like the story of a
lifetime and like tears are welling up in

620
00:50:52.159 --> 00:50:54.760
his eyes. It was just amazing. But so yeah, I guess that

621
00:50:54.760 --> 00:51:00.559
would also count as another story about
one being shot in Oklahoma. I believe

622
00:51:00.880 --> 00:51:06.239
when you think about your podcast,
Bigfoot Crossroads, is there an episode that

623
00:51:06.360 --> 00:51:09.760
kind of you're like, God,
that was one of my favorites that people

624
00:51:09.840 --> 00:51:15.480
might want to check out. Oh
jeez, man, I know it's hard

625
00:51:15.519 --> 00:51:22.880
to answer that question. That's such
a hard question without looking all of them,

626
00:51:22.039 --> 00:51:28.239
is that the correct answer. There's
a few, there's one, you

627
00:51:28.280 --> 00:51:32.559
know, you've got some of the
more popular ones. A guy named Mike

628
00:51:32.599 --> 00:51:38.599
Blueler, who I believe started his
own podcast, actually had an amazing story

629
00:51:39.480 --> 00:51:45.159
about having this standoff with one while
he was in a tree stand hunting.

630
00:51:45.800 --> 00:51:50.480
This thing came down to the base
of his tree stand and wouldn't leave.

631
00:51:51.119 --> 00:51:54.840
Pretty terrifying account. Guy got a
pretty good look at the thing. Definitely

632
00:51:54.920 --> 00:52:00.199
had an impact on his life.
I've had a lot of great discussion with

633
00:52:00.320 --> 00:52:05.880
researchers Shane Corson recently. I really
enjoyed doing that episode. But yeah,

634
00:52:05.920 --> 00:52:10.599
there's just man, there's just been
so many. Got a great episode with

635
00:52:10.719 --> 00:52:16.360
a guy from Iowa that had some
really interesting things happened. So if I've

636
00:52:16.400 --> 00:52:20.599
got listeners from Iowa, I know
I've got a lot of listeners from Iowa.

637
00:52:21.159 --> 00:52:24.559
So that's where I'm from. Ye, Bigfoot Crossroads has a great Bigfoot

638
00:52:24.599 --> 00:52:29.639
Iowa episode. It's not maybe a
month or two back, I can't remember

639
00:52:29.639 --> 00:52:37.360
exactly. But also the classic the
podcasts you were involved with before Bigfoot Crossroads,

640
00:52:37.679 --> 00:52:44.320
The Outlaws, How Can People is
how do people listen to that older

641
00:52:44.360 --> 00:52:47.760
podcast? Is there a special way
to do that or there is? Okay,

642
00:52:49.199 --> 00:52:53.440
that one's kind of tricky. So
you'll learn things whenever you're a podcast

643
00:52:53.599 --> 00:52:59.480
in the Bigfoot world. And uh
so, back in the day, we

644
00:52:59.480 --> 00:53:05.519
were on a platform called blog Talk
Radio. Oh boy and man, that

645
00:53:05.679 --> 00:53:09.599
was a mess. That platform sucked, but at the time, that's what

646
00:53:09.679 --> 00:53:16.360
we had. And eventually things happened. We quit doing the podcast, and

647
00:53:16.400 --> 00:53:22.280
then years later I started the podcast
back up with just Bearing Cumbo. Originally

648
00:53:22.320 --> 00:53:27.119
we had multiple members of the Outlaws
on there, but eventually it just became

649
00:53:27.199 --> 00:53:31.679
me Baron Cumbo, and I gave
them the spotlight and I took the production

650
00:53:31.880 --> 00:53:37.320
role and it was the third seat. But we did the show on YouTube.

651
00:53:37.840 --> 00:53:42.719
I started, this is going to
be a really long drawn out answer,

652
00:53:43.519 --> 00:53:45.679
but I feel that it needs an
explanation. Okay, we'll understand.

653
00:53:46.559 --> 00:53:52.639
So in these episodes, I was
only putting them on YouTube, and so

654
00:53:52.840 --> 00:53:57.840
I put a loop of a campfire
as the video for people to watch as

655
00:53:57.840 --> 00:54:04.159
they're listening. And that loop has
caused me so much grief. So there's

656
00:54:04.559 --> 00:54:08.760
an audio track with that loop of
the campfire crackling and stuff, and this

657
00:54:09.400 --> 00:54:17.920
third party company that licensed audio to
content creators has software that scans YouTube for

658
00:54:19.000 --> 00:54:22.480
their content to make sure everybody's on
the up and up with it, and

659
00:54:22.519 --> 00:54:29.320
it kept on pegging my videos,
the big Foot out Law videos with copyright

660
00:54:29.360 --> 00:54:34.719
strikes. I was getting like ten
a day, okay, and on YouTube

661
00:54:34.719 --> 00:54:37.239
that's dangerous territory. That will yank
your channel and it will be gone forever.

662
00:54:37.840 --> 00:54:44.480
It was a year long headache.
I wasn't doing anything wrong. Eventually

663
00:54:44.559 --> 00:54:49.519
it was sorted out with the company, but in that process I learned how

664
00:54:49.840 --> 00:54:53.480
dangerous certain things can be on YouTube, and I didn't want to lose the

665
00:54:53.559 --> 00:54:59.280
channel or anything. My best option
was to take all of the big Foot

666
00:54:59.320 --> 00:55:02.920
out Law video that had that content
with the campfire on there and put it

667
00:55:04.000 --> 00:55:08.000
behind a paywall. And that has
made people so angry, but I said

668
00:55:08.000 --> 00:55:13.000
it at the lowest amount. It's
like under three dollars, and whenever you

669
00:55:13.079 --> 00:55:17.280
pay the three dollars become a member, you get access to the entire archive

670
00:55:17.920 --> 00:55:23.360
of big Foot out Law Radio,
including old blog talk shows that I still

671
00:55:23.400 --> 00:55:28.519
have. I still have everything.
I have every episode that the big Foot

672
00:55:28.519 --> 00:55:31.440
Dollars I've ever done. But to
keep from losing my channel, and to

673
00:55:31.480 --> 00:55:37.639
stop the stupid software from flagging my
content, I had to put it behind

674
00:55:37.639 --> 00:55:44.239
a paywall. It was either that
or go through over two hundred episodes and

675
00:55:44.320 --> 00:55:46.440
redo all of them. And I'm
sorry, I just can't do that.

676
00:55:46.920 --> 00:55:54.639
Over the years of you being out
in on it's say, different expeditions,

677
00:55:54.679 --> 00:56:00.480
et cetera, were you did you
ever hear any vocalizations? Yeah? What

678
00:56:00.559 --> 00:56:04.719
kind of vocalizations would you hear?
What kind do you want to know about?

679
00:56:04.800 --> 00:56:09.920
All right, okay, fine,
I've heard screaming. I've heard growls.

680
00:56:10.840 --> 00:56:17.239
I've heard some sort of what sounded
like language being spoken between two different

681
00:56:17.239 --> 00:56:24.440
individuals. I've heard whoops, of
course. I've heard wood knocks. I've

682
00:56:24.480 --> 00:56:30.440
heard rock clacking. I've heard am
I missing anything? Like? I've heard

683
00:56:30.440 --> 00:56:35.519
a lot of strange stuff. Man, we used to one of the first

684
00:56:35.559 --> 00:56:37.760
piece of equipment I ever bought was
called a bionic ear. Oh yeah,

685
00:56:38.079 --> 00:56:45.800
a big parabolic dish that was like
super sensitive and I would record audio the

686
00:56:45.840 --> 00:56:49.960
whole time. Other members of the
group all had parabolic dishes like that.

687
00:56:50.199 --> 00:56:54.039
They would be recording an audio.
Thousands and thousands of hours of audio has

688
00:56:54.119 --> 00:57:00.480
been gone over and listened to.
I've heard all kinds of vocalizations. Probably

689
00:57:00.559 --> 00:57:07.119
the most impressive one was again in
Eastern Texas, where I heard what I

690
00:57:07.159 --> 00:57:15.400
can only describe as a roar crossed
with a man screaming. It was crazy.

691
00:57:15.119 --> 00:57:23.440
I actually tried to recreate it digitally
using some software, just to try

692
00:57:23.480 --> 00:57:28.320
and like put something with it,
because nobody was recording audio at the time

693
00:57:28.400 --> 00:57:32.840
whenever this happened. And so I
made like this digital audio track of this

694
00:57:34.000 --> 00:57:39.880
scream roar thing. And little did
I know that somehow people got a hold

695
00:57:39.920 --> 00:57:45.679
of it and used it for nefarious
means on the Internet. And there's like

696
00:57:45.280 --> 00:57:52.360
several famous videos using my digitally created
scream how thing that I made on my

697
00:57:52.480 --> 00:57:57.760
computer way and I didn't even know
about it. Somebody sent me a TikTok

698
00:57:57.880 --> 00:58:04.559
video one time. It was a
clip from an old video called the Mushroom

699
00:58:04.639 --> 00:58:09.199
Hunter video. If it is it's
you, that's my scream, Oh man,

700
00:58:09.239 --> 00:58:14.639
I'll send you the file. No, I know the sound by heart

701
00:58:14.679 --> 00:58:17.199
because I've heard it so many times
on TikTok. That's your sound. That's

702
00:58:17.199 --> 00:58:22.320
why I created that on my computer
in a program called Acoustica Mixed Craft,

703
00:58:22.400 --> 00:58:27.960
and I just did it as an
example of what I had heard, and

704
00:58:28.199 --> 00:58:35.280
I used it on blog talk radio
on somebody else's podcast that predates any of

705
00:58:35.360 --> 00:58:38.199
my own podcasts. It was the
first podcast I was ever associated with,

706
00:58:38.360 --> 00:58:45.719
and I was just like a background
producer person and I created it. I

707
00:58:45.719 --> 00:58:50.559
think they played it. Stan Courtney
had it posted on his website because Stan

708
00:58:50.679 --> 00:58:57.159
Courtney was a veteran in the bigfoot
world that was focused on audio and vocalizations,

709
00:58:57.360 --> 00:59:00.440
and he wanted to post it on
his website because he liked it,

710
00:59:01.400 --> 00:59:05.880
and so I gave him permission to
do it. And I guess maybe that's

711
00:59:05.920 --> 00:59:07.719
where somebody got ahold of it at
some point. I don't know how they

712
00:59:07.719 --> 00:59:14.400
found it. I've seen it used
as the soundtrack for an old clamation dinosaur

713
00:59:15.039 --> 00:59:19.199
movie. I keep on running across
it, and I've tried to put out

714
00:59:19.239 --> 00:59:22.400
the word I made like a short
video saying, hey, if you run

715
00:59:22.440 --> 00:59:25.800
across this sound I made it.
Whoever's posting it is a liar because the

716
00:59:25.880 --> 00:59:29.679
Mushroom Hunter video I didn't even know
about it. Man, I didn't know

717
00:59:29.679 --> 00:59:32.280
about it until a couple of years
ago. And the Mushroom Hunter video like

718
00:59:32.320 --> 00:59:37.559
got on TV and stuff. It
was millions. Oh my goodness, when

719
00:59:37.599 --> 00:59:43.280
you heard the woofs. Was there
a pattern to the ones that you heard

720
00:59:43.400 --> 00:59:46.320
or anything? Yes, yeah,
I'm not going to share the pattern though.

721
00:59:46.800 --> 00:59:51.079
Let me tell you this much,
okay. So I told you,

722
00:59:51.800 --> 00:59:53.800
Okay, I'll leave it up to
you whether you leave this in or not.

723
00:59:54.239 --> 01:00:00.239
Okay. I told you that Baron
Koombo knew how to make calls.

724
01:00:00.360 --> 01:00:07.960
Yeap, So Baron Cumbo knew how
to make calls independently like Kombo knew how

725
01:00:07.960 --> 01:00:09.480
to do it, and Baron knew
how to do it before they ever met

726
01:00:09.480 --> 01:00:15.480
one another. They were doing calls
before anyone else. Now, whenever I

727
01:00:15.559 --> 01:00:22.719
say before anyone else, I mean
at that point in time, nobody in

728
01:00:22.840 --> 01:00:30.079
the Bigfoot community, in the research
field was doing vocalizations. Not Bobo,

729
01:00:30.960 --> 01:00:37.760
not the BFRO, nobody Baron Combo. We're taking a task on it.

730
01:00:37.920 --> 01:00:43.119
Nobody really believed that it was possible. Nobody was like, you can't call

731
01:00:43.159 --> 01:00:46.400
these things in where did you learn
the calls? Nobody wanted to believe them.

732
01:00:46.719 --> 01:00:57.119
The BFRO started doing call blasting.
The BFRO offered Baron Cumbo a spot

733
01:00:57.639 --> 01:01:01.920
with the BFRO. They turned it
down. Then the BFRO offered to purchase

734
01:01:02.000 --> 01:01:07.960
recordings of their calls so they could
sound blast them, which they also turned

735
01:01:07.960 --> 01:01:14.039
down. They did not sell them
the calls. There are certain individuals that

736
01:01:14.159 --> 01:01:20.960
do calls are very similar to the
ones that Bear and Cumbo have done,

737
01:01:21.559 --> 01:01:28.559
at least some of them. But
Bear and Cumbo used to do abbreviated versions

738
01:01:28.559 --> 01:01:32.000
of the calls whenever we were on
outings that had large groups of people.

739
01:01:32.599 --> 01:01:39.960
Because one they work and a person
who's inexperienced or doesn't know what they're doing

740
01:01:40.159 --> 01:01:45.599
or is in the wrong situation,
they did not want the responsibility of those

741
01:01:45.599 --> 01:01:49.920
individuals being hurt by trying to go
somewhere and repeat the calls on their own,

742
01:01:50.559 --> 01:01:55.159
and so they would do these shortened
abbreviated calls basically in a public setting.

743
01:01:55.840 --> 01:02:02.320
And somehow other people started doing those
abbreviated calls. I don't know if

744
01:02:02.320 --> 01:02:09.719
somebody recorded them doing the calls and
then it got passed around. I don't

745
01:02:09.760 --> 01:02:15.719
know. Maybe nothing happened, maybe
it's just coincidence, but I've heard a

746
01:02:15.719 --> 01:02:20.440
lot of people doing the abbreviated call, which is not the correct call.

747
01:02:21.320 --> 01:02:28.000
But there is certain calls that I
have seen be extremely effective. Now with

748
01:02:28.079 --> 01:02:31.480
that being said, I have also
seen a woman screaming at the top of

749
01:02:31.480 --> 01:02:37.800
her lungs be extremely effective. I've
heard led Zeppelin being blasted through the car

750
01:02:37.840 --> 01:02:43.360
speakers being extremely effective. I've heard
people sitting around the campfire being extremely effective.

751
01:02:44.159 --> 01:02:47.599
So I don't know. You can
put whatever you want to into that,

752
01:02:49.519 --> 01:02:53.199
right, But that's the story behind
those calls. That's why I could

753
01:02:53.320 --> 01:02:58.159
never do the calls. I sucked
at it. That's just cool to think

754
01:02:58.159 --> 01:03:05.480
about that. There's a version of
a bigfoot call that is so powerful that

755
01:03:05.559 --> 01:03:08.920
if it was to be used,
it would like that or that's not being

756
01:03:08.960 --> 01:03:14.880
a sort of distress call. It's
got to be wow it. I don't

757
01:03:14.880 --> 01:03:19.599
know, like it was. It
got to the point where there were different

758
01:03:19.599 --> 01:03:22.360
times where I was like, don't
do that call, really, just don't

759
01:03:22.360 --> 01:03:29.000
do it, just because of the
response was intense certain environments, like in

760
01:03:29.119 --> 01:03:32.280
certain situations, because I'll be honest, man, sometimes it gets scary out

761
01:03:32.280 --> 01:03:37.199
there, and if I'm a mile
away from my vehicle, I don't want

762
01:03:37.199 --> 01:03:42.239
somebody calling them in. I would
like to experience them at a distance.

763
01:03:42.880 --> 01:03:45.679
I don't like it. I don't
like the idea of them coming in up

764
01:03:45.679 --> 01:03:49.719
close. Can you think of a
time where it was just too intense,

765
01:03:50.159 --> 01:03:52.920
I'd like to get out of here, or yeah, whenever I heard the

766
01:03:52.920 --> 01:03:57.079
tree being pushed over, I'm alled, asked, I've experienced some crazy things,

767
01:03:57.119 --> 01:04:01.039
man, some crazy things. There
was another time whenever I was out

768
01:04:01.039 --> 01:04:05.639
with the guy that I used to
research with actively. So after that sighting

769
01:04:05.679 --> 01:04:12.239
that I had down in Sulfur,
Sulfur became my main research area. I

770
01:04:12.320 --> 01:04:14.960
was like, I know they're here, this is where I'm research. Why

771
01:04:14.960 --> 01:04:17.440
would I go anywhere else? I
did, but for the most part,

772
01:04:17.960 --> 01:04:26.000
I stayed in the Sulfur and I
my house is like basically three hours away

773
01:04:26.000 --> 01:04:30.840
from there, and I just was
fortunate enough at the time where I could

774
01:04:30.840 --> 01:04:34.480
spend a lot of time down there. The majority of my time was spent

775
01:04:34.519 --> 01:04:41.280
down there. And this one particular
time, it was just me and him

776
01:04:41.320 --> 01:04:46.960
in this area and basically I had
we had heard something do a call,

777
01:04:47.000 --> 01:04:50.679
like as soon as we got out
of the vehicle, a whoop, probably

778
01:04:50.719 --> 01:04:57.000
not even fifty yards from where we
were, extremely loud, and there was

779
01:04:57.000 --> 01:05:00.199
a creek running through the area,
and we to hear it run across the

780
01:05:00.239 --> 01:05:06.519
creek and we knew exactly where it
was. So we hauled but trying to

781
01:05:06.519 --> 01:05:11.159
catch up with it, trying to
see it, which we didn't, and

782
01:05:12.119 --> 01:05:15.920
we split up, which was a
mistake. And this was right at dusk.

783
01:05:16.039 --> 01:05:20.400
It was rapidly getting dark. We're
in the middle of the woods and

784
01:05:20.719 --> 01:05:28.199
I'm going down this trail and off
to my right, where all the tree

785
01:05:28.239 --> 01:05:32.519
cover is, something is whistling,
just a single tone whistle. It sounds

786
01:05:32.559 --> 01:05:38.760
like a person, but I can't
see anything. I could hear the whistle,

787
01:05:39.400 --> 01:05:43.800
and I could hear footfalls as it
ran, and as I'm going on

788
01:05:43.800 --> 01:05:48.199
this trail, it just stays at
my I walked on the trail twenty more

789
01:05:48.280 --> 01:05:55.440
yards. It's still to my right, so it's like paralleling me and whistling,

790
01:05:56.119 --> 01:06:00.280
but it's staying just to my right
in just a little bit ahead me.

791
01:06:00.800 --> 01:06:03.920
And I'm going down this trail and
I'm just the whole thought process is

792
01:06:04.639 --> 01:06:09.320
it's gonna screw up. It's gonna
screw up. It's gonna step out from

793
01:06:09.320 --> 01:06:12.960
behind a tree, or there's gonna
be too big of a gap, and

794
01:06:13.000 --> 01:06:16.440
I'm gonna see it. So I'm
trying to just keep on going, and

795
01:06:16.480 --> 01:06:19.000
it's just staying a little bit ahead
of me, a little bit ahead of

796
01:06:19.000 --> 01:06:25.079
me. And as I'm going down
this trail, The tree line's getting closer

797
01:06:25.119 --> 01:06:28.480
and closer to me, And on
my left side is the creek that we

798
01:06:28.519 --> 01:06:33.000
heard it running across. But eventually
that creek gets real narrow and then you're

799
01:06:33.280 --> 01:06:36.840
sandwiched in the woods on both sides
of you, and the trail just goes

800
01:06:36.840 --> 01:06:42.000
straight through the woods. And I
got almost to where that point happens,

801
01:06:42.079 --> 01:06:45.320
that choke point, and I was
like, what am I doing? It's

802
01:06:45.360 --> 01:06:49.559
getting darker, I'm by myself,
the trees are getting closer to me.

803
01:06:50.159 --> 01:06:54.960
This thing is am I being lured
right now? Is that what it's trying

804
01:06:55.000 --> 01:06:59.480
to do? And just that whole
thought process unfolding scared the crap out of

805
01:06:59.480 --> 01:07:04.360
me, because according to folklore,
whenever something whistles for you in the woods,

806
01:07:04.400 --> 01:07:09.920
you're not supposed to follow it.
That's been a thing forever. If

807
01:07:09.960 --> 01:07:13.559
you hear whistling in the woods,
you go home. You do not go

808
01:07:13.599 --> 01:07:17.280
into the woods after it. And
I just like that thought that might be

809
01:07:17.400 --> 01:07:24.599
what's happening right now scared me so
bad, man, so bad. And

810
01:07:24.639 --> 01:07:27.519
whenever that ice water starts running through
your veins, all of a sudden,

811
01:07:28.239 --> 01:07:30.320
it's a whole new feeling, and
I don't care how brave you are.

812
01:07:31.440 --> 01:07:35.719
Whenever you spook yourself, there's no
coming back from that one. So I

813
01:07:35.800 --> 01:07:40.119
hauled it out of there. I
met up with my friend. He was

814
01:07:40.199 --> 01:07:45.039
actually at this point he had gone
around and circled back around and was on

815
01:07:45.079 --> 01:07:48.360
the opposite side of the creek.
I could see him, but I had

816
01:07:48.400 --> 01:07:51.639
to walk the long way to get
back to where he was. So I

817
01:07:51.760 --> 01:07:58.360
come back and making my way to
him, and off to the left of

818
01:07:58.360 --> 01:08:02.639
the trail, now there's this old
dead log, like a huge tree that

819
01:08:02.679 --> 01:08:09.320
had fallen down years ago, just
a massive tree, probably two and a

820
01:08:09.360 --> 01:08:12.960
half three feet in diameter, laying
right next to the trail, running parallel

821
01:08:12.960 --> 01:08:16.319
with it. And as I'm walking
by it, keep in mind it's not

822
01:08:17.279 --> 01:08:21.680
pitch dark yet, but it's hard
to see, and we don't have any

823
01:08:21.720 --> 01:08:28.439
flashlights or anything. But on the
back side of this log, there's like

824
01:08:28.479 --> 01:08:32.680
this what looks like grass like growing
over the back of it, like long

825
01:08:32.800 --> 01:08:39.119
grass, dead grass. And I
stopped, and at this point in time,

826
01:08:39.479 --> 01:08:43.359
I had like a walking stick with
me that I just take with me

827
01:08:43.479 --> 01:08:47.319
whenever I got into the woods,
and something flashed in my head to poke

828
01:08:47.359 --> 01:08:53.319
at the grass, but I didn't
I was just like that stupid and I

829
01:08:53.399 --> 01:08:57.920
just kept walking. Met up with
my partner, told him about the whistling

830
01:08:57.960 --> 01:09:01.359
and everything. He's where was it. Let's go back there. Okay,

831
01:09:01.399 --> 01:09:05.560
So we're going to go back see
if it'll start whistling again. So we're

832
01:09:05.600 --> 01:09:12.920
walking down the trail, we come
to the log and Jeremiah, the grass

833
01:09:13.000 --> 01:09:16.720
is gone. There's nothing there.
It's just an empty space on the back

834
01:09:16.760 --> 01:09:21.039
side of the log. And I'm
just like what And I like stop him,

835
01:09:21.079 --> 01:09:23.760
I like put out my arm and
stop. And I was like,

836
01:09:24.199 --> 01:09:28.159
I told him what had just happened. Now, I don't know, I

837
01:09:28.199 --> 01:09:32.000
don't know. The only thing I
can think of, and I know this

838
01:09:32.079 --> 01:09:36.960
is reaching, but for the sake
of a good story, that dead grass

839
01:09:38.000 --> 01:09:42.399
was hair. That's all I can
think of. And it was just laying

840
01:09:42.439 --> 01:09:45.520
against the backside of that log,
frozen, still waiting for me to walk

841
01:09:45.560 --> 01:09:49.319
by. It's the only thing that
makes sense, dude. Yeah. It

842
01:09:49.359 --> 01:09:55.239
was such an obvious, such a
dramatic change in the environment. Anybody would

843
01:09:55.239 --> 01:09:58.520
have noticed it. And all I
could think about was like, oh man,

844
01:09:58.880 --> 01:10:00.680
what if I had poked it?
What if I had just gone in

845
01:10:00.720 --> 01:10:03.560
and poked it with that stick?
What would have happened. Did you ever

846
01:10:03.600 --> 01:10:10.039
hear any baby cries when you're out
in the woods? No, that is

847
01:10:10.079 --> 01:10:14.479
it weird that I wanted to not
a real baby, of course, but

848
01:10:15.199 --> 01:10:17.840
no, I never did. But
those stories always freak me out whenever people

849
01:10:17.880 --> 01:10:24.399
talk about it, for people using
it as a call blasting technique, and

850
01:10:24.680 --> 01:10:28.680
I yeah, heard stories that come
out of that that are very unnerving.

851
01:10:28.840 --> 01:10:32.840
You can bring in certain predators of
all times. We had thought about doing

852
01:10:32.880 --> 01:10:39.840
that before. We had an idea
about setting up a dummy camp and actually

853
01:10:40.439 --> 01:10:44.119
having people go in and set up
camp and having like a baby doll with

854
01:10:44.159 --> 01:10:47.600
them and then going in the tent
and leaving the baby doll and leaving camp

855
01:10:48.000 --> 01:10:51.680
and then having like audio play out
of the tent of the baby grind.

856
01:10:53.199 --> 01:10:56.159
But we never did it, but
we thought about it. So if anybody

857
01:10:56.199 --> 01:10:59.359
would like to use that idea,
feel free. I got one last question

858
01:10:59.439 --> 01:11:04.800
for you, and maybe this is
so, I've been in this whole Bigfoot

859
01:11:05.399 --> 01:11:12.520
cultured adventure thing, whatever you call
it, for close to five years now.

860
01:11:13.159 --> 01:11:16.880
Is it because I'm just noticing a
certain way, or does it feel

861
01:11:16.920 --> 01:11:27.279
like there are new hoax videos every
other day now? Or has it always

862
01:11:27.359 --> 01:11:32.239
been like that. No, I
think you're nose incorrectly. Used to be

863
01:11:32.600 --> 01:11:36.359
a lot bigger deal. They would
make a major event out of it.

864
01:11:36.840 --> 01:11:45.079
And I think just because of technology
and the popularity of Bigfoot, how much

865
01:11:45.119 --> 01:11:49.199
it's grown, that it's so much
easier for people to do now. But

866
01:11:49.279 --> 01:11:56.520
there's definitely a lot more coming out
most of the hoax scene that was taking

867
01:11:56.600 --> 01:12:00.520
place back in the day, which
sounds ridiculous to me because there's obviously days

868
01:12:00.640 --> 01:12:06.640
long before I came around, it
wasn't in video form. You would have

869
01:12:08.520 --> 01:12:13.239
a lot of hoaxed audio and you
would have just people making up stories,

870
01:12:13.319 --> 01:12:17.119
which I still think you do.
But the video stuff, with everybody having

871
01:12:17.159 --> 01:12:24.800
access to apps and stuff and different
things that they can use to perform hoaxes,

872
01:12:25.319 --> 01:12:28.479
the idea that like anybody can go
on the Internet and buy that one

873
01:12:28.520 --> 01:12:31.960
big Foot costume for like one hundred
bucks. Yeah, absolutely, Yeah,

874
01:12:32.199 --> 01:12:36.680
hoaxes. In my time, Georgia
hoax as I call it the Rick Dyer

875
01:12:36.760 --> 01:12:41.800
Hosts, I used to spend a
lot of time exposing hoaxers. That was

876
01:12:42.399 --> 01:12:49.000
kind of my thing and it used
to matter. But now, quite honestly,

877
01:12:50.119 --> 01:12:58.319
certain people have a large following and
those followers are going to believe their

878
01:12:58.399 --> 01:13:02.439
person that nobody wants to feel like
they've been duped, and the Internet has

879
01:13:02.479 --> 01:13:09.079
such a short memory that it really
doesn't matter anymore. You can point out

880
01:13:09.199 --> 01:13:11.960
hoaxes, you can point out whatever
you want, but really all you're going

881
01:13:12.039 --> 01:13:15.319
to do is piss people off and
they're not going to care anyways. Absolutely,

882
01:13:15.720 --> 01:13:21.239
what do you think the focus of
the community should be instead of maybe

883
01:13:21.680 --> 01:13:27.520
let's out all the hoaxers or it
may be a better focus to Yeah,

884
01:13:27.560 --> 01:13:30.760
for sure, I respect people that
are still going out there and fighting the

885
01:13:30.800 --> 01:13:36.279
good fight. I definitely appreciate research
groups that are out there and doing the

886
01:13:36.319 --> 01:13:43.000
documentation and putting in the boots on
the ground time and trying to bring forth

887
01:13:43.119 --> 01:13:49.279
evidence. But I think people really
just need to let people do their thing,

888
01:13:49.520 --> 01:13:53.920
and let them do it however they
want to have fun with it.

889
01:13:54.600 --> 01:13:58.319
If you're not having fun, you're
doing it wrong. You shouldn't be doing

890
01:13:58.319 --> 01:14:00.079
it. If you're not having fun, you've got to be able to laugh

891
01:14:00.119 --> 01:14:05.199
at yourself a little bit. As
I've gotten older and spending less time in

892
01:14:05.239 --> 01:14:10.359
the field, the folklore and the
story side of it matters to me now

893
01:14:11.399 --> 01:14:16.000
way more than it used to,
and I think that it's not just this

894
01:14:16.319 --> 01:14:25.239
scientific endeavor to prove some uncategaloged species. I think it's much bigger than that.

895
01:14:25.239 --> 01:14:28.960
At this point. I think it's
a whole thing. I think it's

896
01:14:29.000 --> 01:14:33.600
the folklore. I think it's the
entertainment along with the encounters with the creature,

897
01:14:34.199 --> 01:14:38.680
whatever it may or may not be, the experiences that eyewitnesses have.

898
01:14:39.319 --> 01:14:44.039
I think it shares all those categories
at the same time. And people need

899
01:14:44.079 --> 01:14:49.039
to understand that what your purpose is, what you're trying to accomplish, isn't

900
01:14:49.079 --> 01:14:54.479
necessarily what somebody else's focus is or
what they're trying to accomplish or why they're

901
01:14:54.520 --> 01:15:00.479
here, and just live and let
live. I like that. That's that

902
01:15:00.600 --> 01:15:03.600
is so true. I'm one hundred
percent on board with that. Matt.

903
01:15:03.920 --> 01:15:11.399
This has been a very enjoyable conversation. I'm glad we finally were able to

904
01:15:11.560 --> 01:15:17.439
chat. Do you mind reminding people
or how can they keep up to date

905
01:15:17.800 --> 01:15:26.439
with your episodes and also contact you
if they would like to report anything to

906
01:15:26.520 --> 01:15:30.079
you down in Oklahoma about what's going
on all that good stuff. Yeah,

907
01:15:30.439 --> 01:15:35.439
the easiest way is Bigfoot Crossroads dot
com. You can find contact information,

908
01:15:35.640 --> 01:15:40.279
you can find links to all the
social media you can find past episodes.

909
01:15:40.479 --> 01:15:45.720
Everything's all right there, fantastic and
Bigfoot Society. If you're not already,

910
01:15:45.720 --> 01:15:51.319
please make sure that you are subscribed
to Bigfoot Crossroads on all the platforms that

911
01:15:51.399 --> 01:15:58.319
you can. It's a very good
podcast. If you're listening to mine,

912
01:15:58.399 --> 01:16:02.319
you will also love Matt. It's
a good time. I like listening to

913
01:16:02.359 --> 01:16:05.880
it. But Matt, thank you
so much for coming on man, and

914
01:16:06.399 --> 01:16:10.000
have a great night. Yeah,
of course, thanks for having me Man.

915
01:16:10.039 --> 01:16:24.640
I have thoroughly enjoyed it, sir. Here at Bigfoot Society, our

916
01:16:24.760 --> 01:16:30.279
goal is to provide a platform for
those that have encountered Bigfoot to share their

917
01:16:30.399 --> 01:16:34.479
encounter and a safe and respected environment. But we need to hear your story.

918
01:16:34.560 --> 01:16:40.640
If you've experienced something that you just
can't explain, please send me an

919
01:16:40.640 --> 01:16:45.960
email at Bigfoot Society at gmail dot
com. Then we can start the conversation.

920
01:16:46.159 --> 01:16:51.000
And I know a lot of you
have not shared your encounter at all.

921
01:16:51.159 --> 01:16:56.840
It's been twenty years and it's time
that you get this off your chest

922
01:16:57.640 --> 01:17:00.800
and then you can get some well
deserved for rest. I know you haven't

923
01:17:00.800 --> 01:17:05.520
been sleeping. I understand what you're
going through and I appreciate every one of you listening