The Mysterious Creatures of Cottage Grove—Bigfoot’s Real

0:00 You're listening to Big for Society, and I'm Jeremiah Byron. Tonight's story isn't from a tourist or a hunter. It's from a man who lived in Oregon's Cottage Grove and spent countless hours in the thick forest. But what he encountered out there wasn't just another creature. This was something from the legends. He saw Bigfoot, heard its calls, and found its prints in the mud. But that wasn't all. Curtis also encountered strange, unexplained lights in the sky and even an alien like being. This is a first hand account of a man who found more than he bargained for in the woods, and it's a journey that will leave you wondering what's truly out there. To stay with us, all right, Big Society, I've got the privilege of talking to Curtis today. Curtis is an individual I got connected to and he's had some interesting things happen in the Cottage Grove area of Oregon. I believe we were connected after the Daryl Adams episode that I did, and this takes place back in the mid nineteen nineties, so it's going to be very interesting. But welcome to the show, Curtis.

1:01 How's it going, man, I'm okay. Jeremiah, how are you. I'm doing great. It's starting to get warm out here in Iowa. I can't complain. The weather's good for now. They had I'm in South I'm in South Florida, so yeah, I know what the warmth is. Oh that's nice. Maybe I'll have to It's been a while since I've been on the Florida but that sounds pretty warmed down there. Man. I have to do that someday. But you know, Curtis, I've I've been wanting to connect with you for a while. I love talking to people about this area of Oregon, this Cottage Grove area over to Oakridge. We were talking about that before the show. But you know, you know, feel free to take us back to this this time frame of the mid nineteen nineties, and you know, if you can maybe share were you living here in the Cottage Grove area at that time.

1:56 Actually what happened was I was living in Washington, about fifty miles south of Mount Saint Helens. Then I went down to visit my sister in Cottage Grove and ended up getting you know, some work and a job and visitation turned into a couple of years of working and and visiting and being in the cottage. Grove's pretty much. That's that. That's fantastic. So you became very, very familiar with how that area is. This isn't a thing where you were just driving through. You became pretty familiar. I would imagine.

2:38 Exactly. I lived in town, I lived in Grove, gotcha, gotcha. But was always was always going out to the mountains and hills. I mean, all my friends and everybody, we all camped and hunting and you know, go out there and shoot guns and stuff like that. I mean, we're always in the hills. Now you spend some time down there, did you start to realize really quick that there's something going on out there in the woods. Were you hearing stuff like, oh, so and so saw something maybe it was a bigfoot? Or was that stuff not really talked about in the nineties.

3:20 No, that it was not talked about. Bigfoot never crossed my mind in my entire life, even when I lived in Washington and didn't it. My first experience was my first experience was I was working. I was at a friend's house working on a woman's car for a van, got her van going, and she said, well, do you think it'll run. I said, yeah, let's put it on the road and test it. And we went to where I think Jeremiah is drain, but I the town drain gotcha, but I can't remember. It was out. It was west what I believe is west of Cottage Grove. And this was my first experience. So we get through her either her brother's farm or her uncle's farm, I don't know.

4:18 She wanted to take a shower and get some pack a bag of clothes or something, I don't know. Anyway, waiting for her, I saw a rifle by the front door, so I grabbed that rifle, made sure it was loaded. And there was a little dog, like a little hunting dog type thing, and me and him just took a hike up into the hills, up into the mountain, well, the hill behind them, and we got up in there, me and that dog, and I heard a bunch of I don't know, branches break in and something was running. Okay, So I crouched down and the dogs stopped right next to me, and I crouched down and I'm looking through I'm looking up the hill, and you know in between the brush. Through the brush, I saw something brown run past. Okay, never had big foot in my mind or nothing figured.

5:25 You know, it's either a deer or elk. Well, me and that dog got to that point, like, man, this is a ditch. You know. It's like a little creek or reservoir or not reservoir, but a ditch running alongside the hill whatever. Okay, So we're walking and we follow that, and we finally get to the end of that and there's like a I don't know if twenty by well twenty foot diameter mud puddle, A big mud puddle. Okay, so big deal. Whatever. I go to grab a cigarette.

6:15 I'm lighting up a cigarette and I happened to look down and brand new there's a print right at the end of my feet, my boots. There's a perfect big foot print. And then next to that was a skinny one the same length, only it was skinny, which I've never seen anybody in the community have a skinny one like I saw. And then my jaw dropped, my heart rate went sky high. I looked at the dog. The dog was shivering, and me and that dog split. We ran out of there as fast as we could. Something wasn't right, and and then I knew, Wow, they exist, They're for real. It was brand new the print, and we ran out of there and we got to the open spot. That's all I remember. That's all I wanted to do was get to this. It was like a cut down hayfield behind her farm. And all's I want to do is get out in that, get out of the woods. And we got out there, I mean that dog we ran and stopped, started walking, and then I

7:49 heard a huge limb. I could tell it was huge because it took forever to crack, so finally it's cracked and it's cracked. It's cracking and it's cracking and it's cracking, and finally it broke and hit the ground. And when it did, it started and me and that dog just ran back to the farm and my blood pressure was sky high, and I was scared. Something just happened. And I just saw those prints and I got in there and I told Linda, I said, I don't know what's out there, but there's something real, really big out there.

8:42 She goes, you saw a big foot, didn't you. I said, I don't know if I saw one, but I saw the prince and I heard this big, huge branch break, and she goes, yeah, they're out there. She acted like it was no big deal. Then in retrospect, I figured out, I think what I did see that was brown running through the brush was a Sasquatch. I don't think it was a deer or an elk, because when I got to the point where that ravine was, I would have never saw it because it was too deep to be for me to see a deer or an elk. So, oh boy. Then that's when it all started, Jeremiah. I was scared, but really intrigued. Man, it's when I got addicted.

9:54 That was my it started to turn into my addiction to hunt for him and find them and look for clues. Oh wow, so you and then you really went down the road after that. Oh man? Hardcore? Yes, yes, I was full blown addicted. Matter of fact, every time I went into the woods out there, every time, well this is throughout you know, more experiences, a few more experiences on the other side of the county. I think it was Lane County, I can't remember. Then I started seeing more, I started having more experiences, and I just kept on teaching myself, and then I figured out start looking up. Everybody looks down for prince. Start looking up and look for something that's abnormal that you're not gonna see up, and then usually nine times out of ten, when you look down, you will see Prince.

11:11 Hi, gotcha. So that's that is so smart, Curtis. So you're looking up, looking, scanning the horizon through the trees, finding the abnormal stuff. Then you look down and you see the Prince. Wow. I wrote down a couple of notes here because I can't remember. See. Oh, the mining shack we went there to shoot guns. Well, I think it's a mining shack. It's either a old mining shack or a logger shack. I mean that's the country I was in logging, went there to shoot guns. And around that shack there was all kinds of prints, I mean a lot, and they're they are what they are. You know, I'm not making this up. Nobody makes this stuff up. I call them hills.

12:11 I guess people they'll say they're mountains, but I call them hills because I'm used to you know, Mount Saint Helen's, Mount Hood, Mount Adams, those are mountains. But anyway, so I'm running down and I fell and rolled down and got hurt. I finally made it through a logging road and uh finally landed, pulling branches out of my eyes and my and uh off me and brushing myself off. And I happened to look over, just by chance, there was a tree growing sideways out of the hill and the side of the hill, or by the road, in the side of the hill. It was growing. It was growing I don't know, forty five degrees out the side, but anyway, at the bottom, by the trunk it was, there was like a hole in it where you could like get in there in the trunk of a tree.

13:21 And I happened to look over, and I saw an alien. There was an alien squatted down, crouched down in that in there. It had blue like a bluish transparent skin. Its butt was touching the ground, but its knees were above its head. I'm guessing that thing, if it was to stand up, I'm guessing it would have been fifteen foot tall or close to. It had like a like a triangle head kind of. Well, once my brain recognized that and saw that I had that, I ran faster than what I was running before. I was falling down that hill, and I had mentioned that to Daryl, and Daryl goes, yeah, I know what you're saying.

14:37 I know he's had he's seen things. I believe. When he was on my show, he talked about that he was seeing stuff like that. Yeah, that's wild. He had set me up like a picture of a portal off the side of a tree, and he also sent me a picture of what he believes and I believe is an alien like what I saw holding or one hand has a light coming out of his hand or something. Uh So that's when I see all this stuff, Jeremiah.

15:20 And when I see other people know what I'm talking about that I'm not crazy. It's like they saw the same thing I saw. You know, I'm freaking. And yes, it was all in Cottage Grove. I have been called the Eugene College one time. Oh really, I said, I need. I told them I need. I need to talk to somebody because there is some stuff that you people need to check out down here in Cottage Grove. And uh, I can't remember who, Like I said, who I was talking to her, whatever, But they're like, what I said, you need to come investigate sasquatch down the Cottage Grove.

16:09 Whoever I was talking to laughed and hung up. That was that, Curtis. When you ever would go out and do your investigations, would you have issues with electronic devices or I guess in that time you probably didn't have a lot of electronic devices, correct when you're out. No, okay, I never had a cell phone. I never had a camera. The only thing I had in my pocket was a little twenty five pistol, which would have done absolutely nothing. But it was just something in my pocket.

16:53 But I never, like I said, never had a camera, cell phone, nothing, Now that I think about it, when I when I look at what I look when I look at what's going on now, back in early night, mid nineties, I would have liked to hooked up with any of these researchers. Back then, I like turn myself into a researcher and nobody else. They all thought I was. Crazy exactly because at that time, I mean you had people like Peter Burn and Henry Franzoni was working the more the mount Hood area, but he would come down to Oakridge in the nineties and yeah, that's wild. I mean you were out there by yourself. Now, I've never had to do this before. And sometimes when you talk about bigfoot stuff. Really weird stuff happens with technology. I don't know if you've ever heard that or I've I've never had this particular thing happen where so my recorder just went bonkers and I look over and it's not working.

18:21 Now. The last five minutes we did get but I've never had to ask someone to tell something over again. Would you be able to share how you saw the female and the baby visually and then the one in the tree and then the two on the logs. I apologize, I do not know what happened to my equipment. Okay, Well, the one, like I said, my friend was down in it gully area, whole area, clipping those branches off those bushes, and probably I don't know, eighty to one hundred feet behind him, the female holding the baby popped out from behind the tree, and then a second later, the other one, which I think is a male, popped out from another tree. And then that's when I started yelling at Bill, hey, they're right freaking behind you, and that's when he yelled back to me, don't move or don't you know, Let's just let me finish doing what I'm doing. I don't want to do nothing bad, you know, you know, spook him or scare. He didn't know, We

19:54 didn't know. But those are those are the first two four shore sightings that I had right then and there at that moment, I was up by where the bowler was up on the trail, up on the cliff. He was down in the hole, okay, And I saw those. And then when we left, uh, like I said, got in the truck and noticed in the rear view mirror one tree shaken up the hill. Everything else calm, and at the top of that tree, and like I said, before you know one O Douglas first one hundred anywhere from one hundred foot to two hundred foot. They're tall trees.

20:57 I'm in the forest. That one tree was shaken. So therefore I grabbed my binoculars that I zoom in on and there he's sitting on that on that limb, that branch, and uh, breaking another one right above him. And that I saw very very distinctive because I had binoculars, and like I said, that's the one I did see. I did see his teeth because he was, like, I don't know, screaming.

21:41 It wasn't howling. He was he was mad. And I did see his teeth and they're kind of like ours, only only they've got bigger or that one had bigger canines. He had big canines. So and that was that one. Thank you, Thank you, Curtis. And you you had said, uh, when we were talking before the tech issue happened, that if you had to say if it if it felt either and looked either ape like or or human like, you had some thoughts about that.

22:32 I'm going to go more human like facial with all of them, more human, not not gorilla or a monkey, more human, a flatter face, a flatter nose, Yes, compared to a flatter face, come compared to a gorilla or a monkey, more human, more human. You had also mentioned an interesting account that I want to make sure is documented where you had been. You took your flashlight and flatted shined it into the woods on something.

23:26 Yeah, the two of them laying on that that tree going across the creek. Yeah, there was two of them laying right there, like like I said, like spooning, you know, like you know, a guy and a girl spooning, right, That's what they look like on that log. And the weird thing is, you know a lot of animals you know some of them their eyes glow red when you shine light on them. On their eyeballs, these were like a glowing yellowish green that night for them to sasquatch.

24:16 And like I said before, there's another Uh. I wasn't by. Myself, Curtis spending so much time, I got more stuff. Oh, I know, and. I'm just thankful that we got the tech figured out. We're good. I apologize again for that. It's never happened on the show, but you know I do. Before you continue with your notes, I want to ask you real quick. There's so many people in this area that have reported they go out looking for Bigfoot in this area. They spend time in there, and then weird stuff happens to them, sometimes physical issues. Is that anything you ever experienced just spending time in there.

25:08 I can tell you one thing that I've experienced, Uh, nothing like what you just asked me. But ever since ever since my cottage Grove days, I mean it was only a few years and I ended up leaving. Hum. It seems to me like this is gonna sound psycho. H It seems to me like I have more like I have some kind of special power, Like uh, oh, how do I put it reading people's minds, knowing what's gonna happen before it happens. YadA, YadA, YadA. I mean these aren't I've pulled my family and my friends. These aren't coincidences. I mean, when it happens multiple times every day, that's not a coincidence. It's like I got some kind of I don't know, power or something and it all started from me then. And I don't want to sound like a nut No, you try not to sound like a nut man, but you.

26:31 Are not going because this kind of thing is repeated over and over to me over the last few years. And my theory is that being in certain areas or having contact with these individuals does unlock something within either the human brain or humans in general. And I feel crazy saying that, but people keep saying it over and over and their encounters, and it is so interesting. That's freaking awesome, Jeremiah, because I've never known that to you just now told me, and that makes me feel a hell a lot better that I'm not the only one.

27:19 Can you give an example of how that that works, Like you know someone's gonna say something before they do, or or how this this plays out in your life. Uh uh, that would Yeah, that happens all the time. Knowing what somebody is gonna say before they do. That's constant. It's like almost every conversation. Ah So I never really took that, you know, to a you know, to the extreme, because a lot of people are kind of like that.

28:02 I guess, you know, you know what somebody's gonna say before they say it. But man, it's like all the time with me, constantly. And that's just one thing, a just life life in general, walking walking down the block, walking down the street right here, you know. I mean, it's hard to explain. I can't explain it. It's like I know stuff without knowing it. M it's weird. Do you feel like maybe go ahead, No, you go ahead.

28:54 I was going to ask, do you feel that at any point there was anything or I'll I won't lead it. Do you feel like there was ever any communication happening in any. Way with my experiences? Yeah? Maybe any communication between yourself and Bigfoot in anyway. As far as I can remember, I don't believe so.

29:37 But physically between me and them, it's like my friend Bill always said, they're allowing us. I'm like, why are we the only ones that are seeing this stuff, and He's like they they're allowing us. So there was some kind of an intimate fight. Maybe that's the wrong word, but you know, some kind of I wanted to see them and they were checking me out too.

30:19 Curtis, I think you're you're onto something really interesting there. Something I've noticed from your account so far is that you weren't an individual that was going out there trying to take photos or video or record things. What was How would you say your intention was when you were out there trying to to have a connection with these creatures? That was me personally. I was addicted. I wanted more and more and more. Matter of fact, if I could have talked to one, I would have. I was fibergacien.

31:02 I can't believe that I'm seeing a myth that for all these years people have been saying it doesn't exist. Uh, there's no such thing. You're a whack job, blah blah blah blah. No I'm not. It does exist. I've got all kinds of proof, but I can't prove it, you know what I mean. So your proof is in what you experienced. I take it. I'm sorry, you're proof saying that your your proof would be and then the things that you're experienced in the stories you can share. Correct, that's the only proof I have, right. But see, I don't have to I don't have to tell or prove it to anybody else. I know it for a fact absolutely, I've already seen it. I've already experienced it.

32:01 I've seen it. Uh. Everything that I've told you is just you know, I wrote down notes. Those are just some of what's going on. And it's like what I just said with Bill, they're allowing us or me for sure, to see everything. Everything Prince Prince is a joke, broken trees as a joke, structures as a joke, all that kind of stuff that that that's like, that's a diamond dozen to me and and everybody else other researchers to Uh.

32:49 Like I said, Darryl, Darryl's had some hardcore experiences and and what's his name, Tobe? Yeah, Yeah, that's a great guy him too. Curtis, was there ever a time you feel that you were out there and things went too far? Say that again? Do you do you. Feel like there was an ever there was ever a time when you're out there in the field, and having interactions and things went too far? Or was everything always manageable for you?

33:29 No? What went too far is when I walked through that that arch and saw those uh I needle mountains. That was uh I thought maybe I crossed the line there built built too, Maybe we crossed the line. We didn't know what it was. Was this a burial ground? What is this? And then ten fifteen minutes later I see alien. Oh, and that's another thing I wanted to tell you about. Oh, the I was helping my brother in law. This is in Cottage Grove in Town. I was helping my brother in law. This was at nighttime work on a on a car. We were doing a car thing, and I happened to notice like the north Star, but it wasn't the North Star. But it was a bright light up in the sky. And I'm like, that's not a tower light because light tower lights flash. This wasn't flashing. It was just a bright light. Okay, yeah, big deal. Okay, looks like the North Star. Well it

35:01 wasn't the North Star because I don't know. Two three hours later I look out there again and both the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper had already moved there. Across the sky, but that light is still in the same spot. And I couldn't figure that out. Man, I'm like, how is the rest of the sky moving but that light's not? And then, oh, I don't know. Maybe it was eleven o'clock at night. I called Johnny out out of the garage. I said, man, dude, I said, remember when I showed you that light? He goes, yeah, I said, how many hours ago was that? It's like, I don't know who And I said, look at it, he goes, It ain't move. I said, exactly, what does it? There's some strange stuff out there in uh Nevada and Oregon.

36:10 Absolutely one hundred percent. The Pacific northwest end Nevada is extremely, extremely weird. Do you ever feel drawn to go back to that area of Oregon? Always? Every day, especially ever since I joined your uh your your thing, you know, and uh uh Darryl and men and Tobe and all that. That's all I think about anymore. Man. I wish I could get out to I wish I could win the lottery and buy all the equipment and go back out the cottage grove. It might be empty, maybe they all moved, but I don't care. I still want to go out there and do it.

36:59 You, Curtis, it's weird, but I and I hear that same sentiment repeated by a lot of people that get drawn back to these areas, and myself, I feel, you know, the past year, I feel drawn back to the area in Oregon that I had stuff happen out in Oakridge on fifty eight, and it's very weird. It draws you back in. But you're not an Oregon right now you're in Well, we'll just say you're not an Oregon. What made you right? What made you? What made you leave the area? Was there a time in your life where you stepped away from from looking at this these big foot related things.

37:49 No, it's always been in my head. The reason I left the area was because I went back home, which is our south in Chicago. Start a new job. Blah blah blah blah, YadA, YadA, YadA. I got back with old girlfriend. Okay, that's gonna work out. I ended up getting married, Okay, okay, now start in my new life. And I had told my wife, my new wife, my experiences, and of course she thought I was crazy, cuckoo a couple other people. So I just decided to keep my mouth shut, just like Bill always said, just keep your mouth shut. Well, anyway, then I ended up buying my first computer. I think that was in ninety nine or two thousand, I can't remember, so it was my first computer.

38:47 I finally got a computer. Well, I'm sitting there and I'm thinking to myself, Okay, I've got the Internet. What can I look for? Bam, let's check out Bigfoot? And I punched that in and then man, I and then I realized I'm not the only one. There's sightings everywhere. There's almost sightings in every state almost, or at least one or two in every state or whatever. And then there I was. I was jacked up again, man, all back in it. I joined, Uh, what's that bdf O or something I can't remember. Yeah, okay, you know I just started, uh getting into everything again, and then uh left it alone for a while, then got back into it again, and then left it alone for a while.

40:06 And then when I saw your program with Daryl, now I'm back in it. I can't leave it alone. It's part of my life. I'll die with this. Everything that I've told you today is fact, it's true. And that's what I used to tell my wife, what do you think that I sit here and just I'm making all this stuff up that makes me more of a whack job than it being real. Why did you feel it important to finally come out and share things that happened out in Oregon.

40:54 Oh with you? Yeah, because I'm seeing everybody else doing the same thing. And like I said, I'll say it again, Darryl just he lit the fire for me. He's from Cottage Grove and he's he's basically seen everything that I've seen, if not, and also more in the same area, Cottage Grove area. So I just felt that I had a if he did it, I got to tell my story too, because everything he said is correct absolutely.

41:38 So you're you're saying that you think that a lot of the things you experienced were in the same area that Daryl has had experiences specifically. Well as I can say is Cottage Grove is not a big town, true, or at least back then it wasn't. Yeah, I got you. I mean, but the area, of course is because you know, you're in the middle of the foothills or the Cascades and the Blue Mountains or whatever was out there by Cottage Grove. I don't care if Daryl was thirty miles away from me. It's to me. I'm still going to say, that's the same area.

42:28 Absolutely, and your accounts and their accounts, Daryl's accounts do have some really big similarities. It is fascinating, Curtis. I want to make sure that you were able to share everything that you had notated down. Kid the light. I already told you about the bones. The bones that I found must have been an elk. Anyway, it was to that elk was tore apart, And yeah, it had it been the elk, because it wasn't a deer.

43:21 It's bigger. That thing was tore apart. I found them bones, and I grabbed some bones, and I brought them back to town to my sister and brother in law's to give to the dog and that dog. When I took them out of the back of the truck, that dog ran away. He didn't want anything to do with them bones. I said, come here, man, it's a freaking bone. Now. He ran to the other side of the yard. He smelt something that I didn't know anything about. That was pretty odd. Give a dog a bone and he runs from it, right, Wow, No, that's probably about it, Jeremiah.

44:19 Curtis, thank you for coming on the show and for helping to expand what people know about encounters in the Cottage Grove area of Oregon. It's been extremely enlightening and just thank you for chatting today. No problem, man, I enjoyed it. It was kind of cool. I was nervous at first because I can't remember everything, but it all kind of fell in place. I just want to take a minute to say thank you truly for listening to this episode of the Big for Society podcast. Curtis's experiences in Cottage Grove show us that big Foot is not just folklore. It's a mystery that's still waiting to be solved. So big thanks to Curtis for sharing his incredible and sometimes frightening journey with us.

45:08 If you enjoy this conversation, please subscribe to the podcast on YouTube, hit the bell icon so you don't miss any future episodes, and share this one with your friends. If you're listening on Spotify or Apple podcasts, don't forget to hit follow and leave a review. It helps us reach more listeners and keep these stories alive. And if you or anyone you know has had a Bigfoot encounter, whether an organ or beyond, email me at Big for Society at gmail dot com. We'd love to hear your story and maybe feature it in a future episode. Also Sasquatch Summer FESTUS coming up on July eleven through the twelfth in Oakridge. Organ Big for Society listeners can use code BFS to get a two day pass for the price of a one day. You won't want to miss this gathering of researchers and enthusiasts that is unlike any other.

45:53 Thank you again for being part of the Big for Society, and until next time, keep your eyes open, trust your instincts, and always ask what else might be out there? And see you in the woods.