"We Saw a Hairy Head in the Middle of the Raccoon River that Night" | Bigfoot Seen in Dallas County, Iowa

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Either you're listening to the Big Society
podcast and I'm Jeremiah Byron. Every week

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I talk to individuals who have experienced
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the show notes in Bigfoot Society.
I've taken far too much of your time

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so far, so let's get on
with the show, all right, Bigfoot

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Society. We've got the privilege of
talking to a gentleman that I met at

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the Van Meter Visitor Festival this last
weekend September thirty, twenty twenty three.

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He came up to the booth and
he had let me know that he had

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something really interesting happened to him back
in the nineteen eighties. I believe.

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So, Dave, how's it going
today? Going pretty good? I'm excited

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to chat with you, and I
wish we had gotten the time to do

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it at the festival, but it
was so busy. It was incredible,

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like just person after person coming for
hours. So I'm glad that I had

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gotten your phone number so I could
give you a call. Yeah, I

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remember, there's quite a line there. A lot of people want to get

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in. Absolutely, so, Dave, You've told me a little bit about

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what happens, But I'm just curious
if you kind of let the listeners know

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what you had experienced back in the
nineteen eighties with your sighting. Sure,

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yeah, it was. It was
in the summer of eighty four, and

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it was I can't tell you what
day of the week it was, but

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I remember that a friend of mine
by the name of Rob and I were

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catfishing, and we normally fish off
a boat, but this time we decided

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to do a little high bank fishing. In other words, we go to

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the river and fish off the high
side, the highest bank, because that's

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usually where the water cuts in deep
and the catfish like to lay down in

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there, and we just put our
lines out and kind of let it float

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down in. So it was about
ten o'clock that night and we've been there

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for maybe an hour and kind of
give you a lay of the land.

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We're about maybe a quarter mile from
the road where we pulled over and walked

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up into the river bank, and
we're in trees. It's kind of a

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wooded area, and we're just out
there fishing in the dark with one little

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dim flashlight because we don't usually need
to see much when you're just fishing,

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to kind of just let the line
do the talk until you And about that

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time, we heard something stomping through
the woods up stream from us. And

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that's not unusual for us, because
we'll hear deer, we'll occasional beaver will

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come down and splash the water,
but this time it was kind of breaking

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the sticks, making a bit of
a noise, and then all of a

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sudden there was a splash. So
we figured whatever was walking through there kind

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of fell off into the high banks
just like we were fishing. Didn't think

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much of it, and then just
a few minutes later we could hear it.

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It had swum across to the other
side, the other side of the

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bank. You could hear it kind
of stomping around on the bank, and

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then another splash, like it fell
back in. By this time it was

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swimming again. Back towards our side
of the bank, but the current of

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the river was pulling it down towards
us, and we could hear the thing

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breathing. We could hear this thing
rather breathing heavy, because I think it

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was running earlier. So we're starting
a little concerned about this thing going to

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get caught up with our inner fishing
lines. So we're really in our lines

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and it's not really splashing, just
just breathing heavy, and we finally decided

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to get our flash flight out and
try to light up what this thing was.

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At this point, I remember we
had kind of a dim flashlight.

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So what we saw right in the
middle of the river was ahead and I'll

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say it was it had like a
human head in shape. It didn't have

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any ears sticking out, it didn't
have any antlers. There was no not

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muzzle or nose sticking out. It
was it was just around head. And

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of course it was covered with hair
and the water had gotten it wet,

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so when we hit it with a
flashlight, it kind of shined a little

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bit off of the wet hair.
Its eyes were looking right at us.

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They were in front of us like
stereoptics, and when it saw the flashlight.

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It went under the water, and
that's what kind of spooked us.

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What animal would be swimming in the
water above water, breathing heavy, looks

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like a human face, human head. And then the minute we lighted up,

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it was able to grab a breath
and go underwater. We decided to

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get out of there. We weren't
too sure what the thing was. All

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we knew was it was it was
coming closer to us, and it was

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going to end up between us in
the car, and we decided at that

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time we should get out of there. That's really about it. In a

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nutshell, that's wild. And that
was in nineteen eighty four. You said,

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yes, and what river was that? I believe that was a raccoon.

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I believe you're on the raccoon.
Yeah, that's what I figured,

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being over by Minburn. That's your
main river over there. And have you

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ever shared this with anyone else before? No, well, other than my

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family the night of, but didn't
really talk about it a lot. The

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gentleman I was fishing with was a
one of the local teachers of the school

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system in that area, and he
was a science teacher, and he really

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he kept it to himself. He
told me later on when we got together,

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he said that he really was concerned
about telling anybody about that because of

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his position. Well that's you know, being a teacher, that's even inches,

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so he was a science teacher.
Man. What kind of conversation did

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you guys have afterwards after you saw
that that Harry had kind of disappeared down

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into the water, And we did
have a little bit of a conversation like

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what did we just see? I
mean, we tried to rule it out

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because, like I said, we
both dow a lot of cat fishing,

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and we've been on the rivers before, and you know, if you've ever

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been out at night, the beaver
sometimes will slap that water pretty hard with

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their tails, and that's kind of
what we thought. The first splash was

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might have been a beaver or that
thing had fallen in. So he ruled

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that out because beavers don't duck.
I mean, yeah, they can swim

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under water, but this head was
as much larger than a beaver head would

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ever have been when we let it
up, So we ruled out beer and

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muskrat, any kind of critter that
likes the water, and of course the

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fact that we didn't see any years
or antlers kind of took care of anything

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like gear, so we just kind
of checked off what it wasn't and kind

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of left us with what could it
be? And that's where we kind of

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felt that, you know, if
anybody tries to we tell this story to

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anybody, they probably won't believe us. And remember in nineteen eighty four,

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you know, a couple of guys
out fishing, they would I could just

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hear them, you know, oh
yeah, how much beer do you have

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before you go fishing? The truth
of matter was that we didn't have any

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beer that night, so we were
stone cold sober and just did not enjoy

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what happened to us. You know, that's a great detail to know because

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sometimes you know, I have these
interviews and the person can't say that they

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were actually one hundred percent sober,
and that makes a huge difference. So

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that's a that's a huge detail that
you were actually you know, you weren't

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drinking that night. And you know, when you remember, if you can

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remember back looking at the head in
the water, the hairy head was the

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was the hair mostly on one part
of the head or was it just like

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completely covered with hair that you could
see or do you remember any details like

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that. Yes, it was looking
right at me. Rob was doing my

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right and by the time I had
the flashlights, so the time I lit

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it up, it was basically straight
in front of me. And I'd say

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the distant from from where I was
standing to wherevers and wherever might have been.

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We'll be back with more big Foot
society after these words from our sponsors,

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maybe fifteen. So I got a
really good look at it, and

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what kind of surprised me was that
it was wet topped the bottom dome shaped

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head, if you will, hair
all the way around, and they did

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have eyes. I could see its
eyes and they did not reflect They were

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normally you know, when you light
up a raccoon or something, those eyes

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flashback gold at you and the flashlight. Now these eyes are just black,

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cold black, not reflective, just
two black spots. And the only thing

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that was reflecting was the wet hair. Very very interesting. Could you see

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the skin color at all? No, No, we couldn't see the thin

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color. But I will say the
hair overall was a very dark colored,

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very dark brown, maybe black.
It was night. It was dark,

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the river was black, the sky
was there was no moon or anything that

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night. If I remember, and
like I said, the flashlight wasn't that

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bright. We just had an old
flashlight with us. Wasn't a very bright

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light enough light to make sure you
didn't step in a hole or something when

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you're trying to walk back to the
car. Can you think back to what

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the let's say, the soundscape,
you know, what kind of things were

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you hearing around you at that time, if you remember any certain animals or

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anything out of the plate, out
of place, or anything like that.

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Okay, before before the big splash, the first splash, I'd say,

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we could hear it in the woods. You know. It was like you

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could hear it breaking twigs or snapping
branches, if you will. So we

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kind of thought maybe a deer was
being you know, it was on the

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run or something. But it was
ten o'clock at night and that's dark here,

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and so something we could hear the
cracking and the breaking of the twigs

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and then the splash, and I
mean it's like if you had jumped in,

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just jumped in off the bank,
a big splash. Then there was

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silence for a while. Then the
next thing we heard was I'm going to

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say, like stopping feet stopping on
on a muddy bank if you will.

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It's like it was trying to get
us balanced or climb up the bank and

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it couldn't. So here there was
no real pattern. It was a thumb

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splash and then then more of a
splash again, but not near as big

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as splash, more like someone entering
the water just turned around and kind of

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jumped back in. At that point, we didn't hear anything for a while.

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Then you could hear the breathing and
I'm gonna say heavy nasal breathing through

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through like a nose, and it
was breathing heavy, big, heavy breaths.

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There was no splash into the water
and like it's like someone doing a

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swim with their arms, you know, breaking the water. There was none

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of that, So it was it
was it's nothing breaking the water just says,

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you know, almost like someone's out
of breath breathing. It was getting

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louder. That's when we turned the
lights on. That's when what is making

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that noise? Because I've never heard
of an animal breathing in the water like

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that. So then the duct it's
very very interesting. What about let's say,

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any any birds or other creatures of
the forest or was it maybe no

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other sounds at all that you were
hearing. No, there was no other

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sounds. Ten o'clock, most of
the birds are asleep, trying to think

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if I've heard anything else. Not, No, not, I don't think

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I even heard any any of the
farm dogs in the area. I think

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it was pretty quite that night.
Was interesting. By the Minburn area and

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the raccoon there's a few nature areas. Were you in close proximity to any

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of those nature areas. We were
about two to three miles west of men

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Burn itself, and we were down
in the valley. And this is a

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pretty good little valley. This is
some really nice bluffs and hills in that

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area, So that I can't tell
you if there was a nature valley or

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a nature area that, but I
do know it was really would it In

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that particular part There was some crop
land, but that was only in the

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floodplains. But for the most part
we were in between the hills, which

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were all of all good of hills
that that yeah, that's I mean,

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that's that's the area. Yeah,
the valleys, the ridges, the gulches,

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I mean, that's it. Man. Do you remember around that that

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time, or maybe a few years
before, were there any other reports of

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creatures or being seen like Bigfoot or
anything else in this area. Uh No,

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I can't say I remember. And
at that time I really wasn't following

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anything. I wasn't even looking for
anything, so unaware of anything at that

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time. Interesting if I don't know
if you're familiar with the BFROO at all,

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which is a big Foot Field researchers
or organization, but if you look

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up Dallas County in there, there
there were a few reports by the Raccoon

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River around nineteen seventy eight. I
believe you may find find that interesting.

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So in the reports around the Raccoon
River, albeit you know, not in

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Minburn area per se, but in
other areas. Uh you know, they've

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even gone into the two thousands where
there's been sightings, and it's just it's

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a very very interesting area, the
Raccoon River. But man, do you

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ever do you ever feel like you
want to see that kind of creature again?

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Or how did that affect the rest
of your life? Well, I

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will say that it it put a
question mark in my in my belief so

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of what's out there and what's not
out there. I've got room for a

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lot of things that could be walking
on this planet. And and when I

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listen to people that stories, I
you know, I'll give them the benefit

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of the doubt. But in this
case, since I can have an experience

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that I did have an experience,
I'm going to say that I guess I

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lean more towards they're out there.
But how can they be? You know,

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how what what allows them to continue? I mean people talk about where

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the bones, you know, where's
more evidence yet yet I saw one,

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or I think I saw one,
and so more of a believer, But

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as far as I wanting to see
another one, maybe not at night with

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a dim flashlight. That's that's a
little too close for comfort. Absolutely,

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And and I'll I'll end out with
this question. If you had to categorize

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what you saw, because people categorize
Bigfoot in many different ways, would you

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some people say maybe more more of
an eight type creature, more of some

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type of human creature, or something
in the middle. Do you have any

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leaning towards what you might categorize what
you saw? As what I saw,

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I would lean towards more of a
humanoid type person, more very very hairy.

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I don't see a lot of ape
features in it. It was more

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human shape with hair from head to
the shoulder, and of course the shoulders

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are underwater, so that's where I
would categorize it very interesting. Well,

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Dave, I really appreciate you taking
a few minutes to chat with me today.

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And this is pretty cool because it's
yet another incident that happened in Iowa

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that was not documented and now it's
documented. So I really appreciate you talking

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to me this afternoon. Well,
my pleasure. I enjoyed it. You're

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a big for Society article is to
provide a platform for those that have encountered

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Bigfoot to share their encounter in a
safe and respected environment. But we need

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to hear your story. If you've
experienced something that you just can't explain,

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please send me an email at Bigfoot
Society at gmail dot com. Then we

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can start the conversation. And I
know a lot of you have not shared

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your encounter at all. It's been
twenty years and it's time that you get

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this off your chest and then you
can get some well deserved for rest because

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I know you haven't been sleeping.
I understand what you're going through and I

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appreciate every one of you listening