WEBVTT 1 00:00:02.520 --> 00:00:05.759 For decades, people have disappeared in the woods without a trace. 2 00:00:06.519 --> 00:00:10.279 Some blame wild animals, others whisper of creatures the world 3 00:00:10.359 --> 00:00:14.160 refuses to believe in. But those who have survived they 4 00:00:14.199 --> 00:00:18.679 know the truth. Welcome to Backwoods Bigfoot Stories, where we 5 00:00:18.719 --> 00:00:22.879 share real encounters with the things lurking in the darkness bigfoot, 6 00:00:23.199 --> 00:00:28.239 dog man, UFOs, and creatures that defy explanation. Some make 7 00:00:28.280 --> 00:00:32.320 it out, others aren't so lucky. Are you ready, because 8 00:00:32.320 --> 00:00:34.640 once you hear these stories, you'll never walk in the 9 00:00:34.640 --> 00:00:38.920 woods alone again. So grab your flashlight, stay close, and 10 00:00:39.039 --> 00:00:41.840 remember some things in the woods don't want to be found. 11 00:00:42.520 --> 00:00:46.240 Hit that follow or subscribe button, turn on auto downloads, 12 00:00:46.439 --> 00:00:48.399 and let's head off into the woods if you dare. 13 00:01:02.759 --> 00:01:05.680 We're pulling off the road tonight, no state line to 14 00:01:05.719 --> 00:01:09.400 cross and no local legend to chase down. We're parked 15 00:01:09.400 --> 00:01:11.760 at the end of a dirt road with the engine ticking, 16 00:01:12.000 --> 00:01:15.239 and I'm digging into the mail bag. That inbox has 17 00:01:15.239 --> 00:01:18.280 been filling up for months now, email after email from 18 00:01:18.319 --> 00:01:21.480 people who never planned on telling anybody what happened to them. 19 00:01:21.840 --> 00:01:24.480 When I finally sat down and started sorting through them, 20 00:01:24.799 --> 00:01:27.359 I noticed that I had quite a few stories from hunters, 21 00:01:28.040 --> 00:01:30.719 and honestly, that makes sense when you think about it. 22 00:01:31.239 --> 00:01:34.319 Hunters are out there before dawn and after dark, sitting 23 00:01:34.359 --> 00:01:37.799 still for hours and places most people never go. They 24 00:01:37.799 --> 00:01:40.760 know what a deer sounds like walking through leaves, and 25 00:01:40.799 --> 00:01:43.879 what a squirrel sounds like, and what a man sounds like. 26 00:01:44.599 --> 00:01:47.040 So when something moves through the timber that doesn't match 27 00:01:47.079 --> 00:01:50.280 any of those, a hunter notices whether he wants to 28 00:01:50.400 --> 00:01:53.719 or not. Tonight, I've got six of those stories for you, 29 00:01:54.120 --> 00:01:57.200 from six different men in six different states, and the 30 00:01:57.239 --> 00:01:59.719 oldest one goes back to the fifties, while the newest 31 00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:03.319 come from two thousand and eight. Our first encounter comes 32 00:02:03.319 --> 00:02:06.519 from a man named Jack. Jack was hunting elk in 33 00:02:06.560 --> 00:02:10.039 western Montana in November of nineteen sixty eight, and he 34 00:02:10.080 --> 00:02:13.280 tells it like this. We packed in on a Friday, 35 00:02:13.520 --> 00:02:16.400 me and my buddy Dell, seven miles up a drainage 36 00:02:16.439 --> 00:02:19.599 off the Blackfoot, following the trail the outfitters had used 37 00:02:19.639 --> 00:02:23.800 before the war, and nobody had maintained since Del's dad 38 00:02:23.800 --> 00:02:26.199 had hunted that basin back in the forties and swore 39 00:02:26.240 --> 00:02:29.240 by it big bulls and no people, and that was 40 00:02:29.280 --> 00:02:32.319 the whole pitch. It snowed on us the first night, 41 00:02:32.759 --> 00:02:36.280 maybe four inches, wet and heavy, the kind of snow 42 00:02:36.319 --> 00:02:38.639 that bends the lodge pole over the trail, so you're 43 00:02:38.680 --> 00:02:42.280 ducking branches all morning and soaked through by noon. We 44 00:02:42.319 --> 00:02:44.400 set a wall tent and a stand of spruce near 45 00:02:44.479 --> 00:02:46.719 a little creek and strung a tarp for the meat pole. 46 00:02:47.360 --> 00:02:50.080 Deal carried a thirty aught six his dad had given him, 47 00:02:50.319 --> 00:02:52.919 and I carried a Winchester Model seventy that I'd saved 48 00:02:52.919 --> 00:02:56.240 two summers of wages to buy. The first two days 49 00:02:56.240 --> 00:03:00.039 were ordinary and better than ordinary. Really. We cut the 50 00:03:00.039 --> 00:03:03.639 elk tracks everywhere we went, fresh ones, and on Saturday 51 00:03:03.680 --> 00:03:06.400 evening Dell passed on a Raghorn bull because we were 52 00:03:06.439 --> 00:03:09.479 greedy and it was still early in the hunt. That 53 00:03:09.639 --> 00:03:11.840 night we ate beans and elk jerky from the year 54 00:03:11.879 --> 00:03:15.080 before and played cribbage on a little board Dell kept 55 00:03:15.120 --> 00:03:18.280 folded up in his coat pocket. I remember every bit 56 00:03:18.319 --> 00:03:20.919 of that, the jerky and the cribbage, and the way 57 00:03:20.960 --> 00:03:24.360 the lantern hissed. And I've often wondered why the ordinary 58 00:03:24.400 --> 00:03:27.360 part stuck so hard. I think it's because of what 59 00:03:27.479 --> 00:03:31.039 came after. Once something splits your life into a before 60 00:03:31.120 --> 00:03:34.919 and an after. You hang on to the before. Sunday night, 61 00:03:34.960 --> 00:03:37.520 we turned the lantern down and I was drifting somewhere 62 00:03:37.560 --> 00:03:40.960 between awake and asleep when something walked past the tent. 63 00:03:41.560 --> 00:03:44.240 And when I say past the tent, I mean close, 64 00:03:45.000 --> 00:03:47.479 close enough that there was no mistaking it for anything 65 00:03:47.560 --> 00:03:50.840 moving farther off in the timber. Now you have to 66 00:03:50.919 --> 00:03:54.520 understand what fresh snow does to sound out there. Four 67 00:03:54.560 --> 00:03:57.960 inches of wet snow turns every footstep into a distinct 68 00:03:58.039 --> 00:04:01.680 crunch with real weight behind it. A deer makes a 69 00:04:01.759 --> 00:04:04.840 light ticking crunch in four quick beats, and an elk 70 00:04:04.919 --> 00:04:07.719 is heavier, but it still four beats. And a bear 71 00:04:07.759 --> 00:04:10.479 in November is mostly in bed for the winter, and 72 00:04:10.520 --> 00:04:14.159 a bear shuffles anyway. What walked past our tent that 73 00:04:14.319 --> 00:04:18.079 night walked in two beats, slow ones, with long spaces 74 00:04:18.120 --> 00:04:21.480 between them, and every single step sounded like a sack 75 00:04:21.519 --> 00:04:25.439 of cement being dropped flat on the ground. I heard 76 00:04:25.519 --> 00:04:28.120 del sit up in the dark, heard his cock creak 77 00:04:28.199 --> 00:04:30.319 under him, and neither one of us said a word 78 00:04:30.680 --> 00:04:33.680 while those steps carried up the creek maybe forty yards, 79 00:04:34.000 --> 00:04:37.279 and then stopped. And after they stopped, there was nothing 80 00:04:37.319 --> 00:04:40.480 at all, no sound of anything walking away, and no 81 00:04:40.600 --> 00:04:45.079 sound of anything walking back. The steps just ended. After 82 00:04:45.120 --> 00:04:47.399 a long while, Dell whispered that it was a moose, 83 00:04:47.959 --> 00:04:51.199 and I said, yeah, a moose, And neither one of 84 00:04:51.279 --> 00:04:53.959 us believed it for a second, because a moose doesn't 85 00:04:54.040 --> 00:04:57.000 walk in two beats, and we both knew that perfectly well. 86 00:04:57.759 --> 00:05:00.240 But moose was the best word either of us had, 87 00:05:00.360 --> 00:05:02.560 so we used it. And we lay there in the 88 00:05:02.639 --> 00:05:06.319 dark until morning. Morning came and I got up first, 89 00:05:06.639 --> 00:05:09.160 built the fire and got the coffee going, and then 90 00:05:09.160 --> 00:05:11.360 I walked up the creek with my rifle because I 91 00:05:11.360 --> 00:05:13.720 wanted to see moose tracks, and I wanted to see 92 00:05:13.720 --> 00:05:17.160 them badly. The tracks were right there where we'd heard them, 93 00:05:17.319 --> 00:05:20.920 but they weren't moose. They were flat, long and wide, 94 00:05:21.360 --> 00:05:23.680 and when I set my size eleven boot down inside 95 00:05:23.680 --> 00:05:26.319 one of those prints, there was at least five inches 96 00:05:26.319 --> 00:05:29.600 of room to spare. There were five toes pressed into 97 00:05:29.639 --> 00:05:32.720 that snow, splayed wide at the front and driven in deep, 98 00:05:33.079 --> 00:05:35.519 and the stride between one print and the next was 99 00:05:35.600 --> 00:05:39.079 longer than I could stretch. I tried it. I stood 100 00:05:39.079 --> 00:05:41.279 in one print and lunged for the next one, and 101 00:05:41.360 --> 00:05:43.800 came up short and fell over sideways into the snow. 102 00:05:44.240 --> 00:05:46.000 And I lay there for a second, looking up at 103 00:05:46.040 --> 00:05:49.920 the spruce tops, and I remember thinking, very calmly that 104 00:05:50.000 --> 00:05:53.160 we should go home. I didn't say that to Dell, though. 105 00:05:53.920 --> 00:05:56.240 Dell came up the creek carrying his coffee and stood 106 00:05:56.240 --> 00:05:58.439 looking at that line of prints for a long time, 107 00:05:59.000 --> 00:06:01.079 and then he walked the whole line out to where 108 00:06:01.120 --> 00:06:04.199 it crossed the creek on the far bank. Those prints 109 00:06:04.199 --> 00:06:06.160 went straight up a slope that I would have needed 110 00:06:06.160 --> 00:06:09.279 my hands to climb, and they went up it in strides. 111 00:06:09.959 --> 00:06:12.480 Dell came back and poured his coffee out into the snow, 112 00:06:12.920 --> 00:06:15.240 which was a thing I had never once seen him do, 113 00:06:15.959 --> 00:06:20.279 because coffee was sacred to Dell. And all he said was, well, 114 00:06:20.680 --> 00:06:24.560 we come seven miles. That was the entire discussion. We'd 115 00:06:24.600 --> 00:06:28.079 come seven miles, so we were staying. Young men make 116 00:06:28.160 --> 00:06:30.759 decisions like that all the time, and some of them 117 00:06:30.759 --> 00:06:33.160 don't get to be old men because of it. And 118 00:06:33.199 --> 00:06:36.360 we got lucky. We hunted Monday, and the whole day 119 00:06:36.439 --> 00:06:38.759 was wrong. And I can't put it any better than that. 120 00:06:38.920 --> 00:06:42.759 Even now, the basin had gone quiet on us. Two 121 00:06:42.839 --> 00:06:46.240 days earlier, we'd had squirrels chattering, and ravens working the ridges, 122 00:06:46.519 --> 00:06:49.879 and elk signed so fresh it was steaming, and now 123 00:06:49.959 --> 00:06:54.240 there was nothing but old tracks and silence. Somewhere around midday, 124 00:06:54.279 --> 00:06:56.439 I sat down on a log to eat, and I 125 00:06:56.480 --> 00:06:58.120 got that feeling on the back of my neck that 126 00:06:58.160 --> 00:07:01.720 everybody talks about and nobody can prove. And I turned 127 00:07:01.720 --> 00:07:04.600 around fast, and of course there was nothing behind me 128 00:07:04.680 --> 00:07:08.079 but dark timber, going back and back and back. Any 129 00:07:08.120 --> 00:07:10.000 one of a hundred shadows in there could have been 130 00:07:10.040 --> 00:07:13.040 a stump, or could have been something standing very still, 131 00:07:13.480 --> 00:07:15.839 and there was no way on earth to tell the difference. 132 00:07:16.639 --> 00:07:18.959 Late that afternoon I found out where all the elk 133 00:07:19.000 --> 00:07:22.000 had gone. Their tracks funneled out of the basin through 134 00:07:22.040 --> 00:07:25.560 a saddle on the east ridge, dozens of animals moving together. 135 00:07:26.079 --> 00:07:28.519 And the weird part was they had gone through in 136 00:07:28.560 --> 00:07:32.079 the night, in the snow at a trot. You can 137 00:07:32.160 --> 00:07:34.319 read gate and tracks as plain as print on a 138 00:07:34.360 --> 00:07:37.160 page if you know what to look for. Elk don't 139 00:07:37.160 --> 00:07:39.600 trot seven miles away from good feed in the middle 140 00:07:39.600 --> 00:07:42.319 of the night because of weather, and they don't do 141 00:07:42.399 --> 00:07:45.600 it for wolves that aren't there. So the only conclusion 142 00:07:45.639 --> 00:07:48.040 the snow would let me draw was that something had 143 00:07:48.079 --> 00:07:50.560 emptied that basin the way a man empties a room, 144 00:07:51.120 --> 00:07:53.399 and that me and Dell were the only things left 145 00:07:53.399 --> 00:07:56.639 in it, too dumb to leave. On my way back 146 00:07:56.680 --> 00:07:59.279 to camp, I cut one more piece of sign. It 147 00:07:59.319 --> 00:08:02.680 was a single, just one pressed into the snow on 148 00:08:02.720 --> 00:08:05.399 top of a flat boulder beside the trail, and that 149 00:08:05.439 --> 00:08:08.360 boulder came up to my chest. It looked for all 150 00:08:08.399 --> 00:08:10.839 the world like something had stepped up onto that rock 151 00:08:11.120 --> 00:08:12.920 with one foot to get a better look down the 152 00:08:12.920 --> 00:08:16.319 back trail, and then stepped off again. I stood there 153 00:08:16.360 --> 00:08:18.480 a while trying to figure out how anything could get 154 00:08:18.519 --> 00:08:21.399 one foot up there without leaving a single mark around 155 00:08:21.399 --> 00:08:24.199 the base, and I couldn't do it. So I quit 156 00:08:24.240 --> 00:08:27.000 trying and walked that last half mile back to camp, 157 00:08:27.040 --> 00:08:30.079 a good deal faster than I'd walked all day. I 158 00:08:30.120 --> 00:08:32.679 told Dell about the elk leaving, but I never told 159 00:08:32.759 --> 00:08:35.679 him about the boulder. To this day, I couldn't tell 160 00:08:35.679 --> 00:08:38.279 you why, except that saying it out loud would have 161 00:08:38.360 --> 00:08:40.600 made it real, and I didn't want it any more 162 00:08:40.639 --> 00:08:44.440 real than it already was. Monday night, it came back, 163 00:08:44.480 --> 00:08:48.080 and this time it wasn't walking quiet. A little after 164 00:08:48.120 --> 00:08:50.919 ten o'clock. Something hit the meat pole tarp. We had 165 00:08:50.919 --> 00:08:53.639 no meat hanging yet, just the tarp and the rope, 166 00:08:54.080 --> 00:08:56.919 and whatever hit it slapped that canvas hard enough to 167 00:08:56.960 --> 00:09:00.480 crack it like a flag in a windstorm. Up out 168 00:09:00.480 --> 00:09:02.200 of his cot with the lantern, and I came up 169 00:09:02.240 --> 00:09:04.960 with the two seventy, and we stood shoulder to shoulder 170 00:09:05.000 --> 00:09:07.720 in the tent door, throwing that weak yellow light out 171 00:09:07.759 --> 00:09:10.480 into the spruce, and all it showed us was falling 172 00:09:10.519 --> 00:09:14.159 snow and tree trunks and our own breath. Then the 173 00:09:14.200 --> 00:09:17.399 smell rolled in on us. I grew up on a ranch, 174 00:09:17.440 --> 00:09:19.960 and I've smelled everything that can die and rot on 175 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:23.720 a ranch. I've smelled boarhogs, and bears and a bull 176 00:09:23.799 --> 00:09:25.960 elk in the full of the rut. And this was 177 00:09:26.000 --> 00:09:28.159 none of those things, and it was worse than all 178 00:09:28.200 --> 00:09:30.720 of them together. It was like a wet dog that 179 00:09:30.759 --> 00:09:33.639 had been dead a week, with something sharper underneath it, 180 00:09:33.919 --> 00:09:36.759 something like ammonia. And it came into that tent so 181 00:09:36.879 --> 00:09:39.679 thick you could almost feel it. Dell gagged on it, 182 00:09:39.879 --> 00:09:41.879 and I'm not embarrassed to tell you my hands were 183 00:09:41.919 --> 00:09:45.720 shaking on that rifle. Then it screamed at us. I 184 00:09:45.759 --> 00:09:48.919 have spent fifty years trying to describe that sound to people, 185 00:09:49.320 --> 00:09:52.320 and the best I've ever managed is this. You take 186 00:09:52.320 --> 00:09:55.600 a woman screaming the worst scream you've ever heard in 187 00:09:55.639 --> 00:09:59.440 your life, tearror and pain all wound together, and you 188 00:09:59.519 --> 00:10:01.960 give that sam the chest of a bull and lungs 189 00:10:02.000 --> 00:10:05.200 the size of feedsacks. You make it go on for 190 00:10:05.240 --> 00:10:08.000 eight or ten seconds without a single breath, and you 191 00:10:08.080 --> 00:10:10.360 put it sixty yards away from you, in the dark, 192 00:10:10.679 --> 00:10:13.240 with four inches of snow on the ground, so you 193 00:10:13.360 --> 00:10:16.200 know beyond any doubt that whatever is making that sound 194 00:10:16.480 --> 00:10:19.600 has weight to it. That scream ran all the way 195 00:10:19.639 --> 00:10:22.360 down the drainage, and the echo came back off the 196 00:10:22.399 --> 00:10:25.600 far ridge, and then the basin went silent, and I 197 00:10:25.639 --> 00:10:29.240 promise you the silence was worse. We didn't sleep that night. 198 00:10:29.879 --> 00:10:31.639 We sat back to back on the cots with the 199 00:10:31.720 --> 00:10:34.879 lantern burning wasting fuel that neither of us said a 200 00:10:34.879 --> 00:10:37.960 word about, and Dell talked about his dad's old hunts 201 00:10:37.960 --> 00:10:41.759 in that basin. Every story he knew one after another 202 00:10:42.320 --> 00:10:45.200 all night long, just so there'd be a human voice 203 00:10:45.240 --> 00:10:48.399 in that tent. Somewhere around four in the morning, he 204 00:10:48.480 --> 00:10:50.519 ran out of stories, and we sat there listening to 205 00:10:50.559 --> 00:10:53.240 the creek, because the creek was the only thing left 206 00:10:53.279 --> 00:10:57.240 in the whole world that still sounded normal. At first light, 207 00:10:57.320 --> 00:11:00.399 we made a decision without ever actually discussing it, which 208 00:11:00.440 --> 00:11:03.240 was that we were packing out, but Deal still wanted 209 00:11:03.240 --> 00:11:06.879 his elk, and I understood that because we told everybody 210 00:11:06.879 --> 00:11:09.240 back home we'd be bringing meat, and Deal was the 211 00:11:09.320 --> 00:11:11.519 kind of man who'd rather be scared half to death 212 00:11:11.559 --> 00:11:15.519 than embarrassed. So we agreed on one last still hunt 213 00:11:15.559 --> 00:11:18.480 together down through the meadows at the bottom of the basin, 214 00:11:18.960 --> 00:11:21.279 and after that we'd break camp and be walking out 215 00:11:21.279 --> 00:11:24.919 by noon. We never fired a shot that morning, but 216 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:28.360 in the second meadow I saw it. That meadow ran 217 00:11:28.440 --> 00:11:32.000 maybe two hundred yards across, snowed over and ringed in timber, 218 00:11:32.399 --> 00:11:35.639 with the creek cutting along the far side. We came 219 00:11:35.720 --> 00:11:38.440 up to the edge of it, slow glassing as we went, 220 00:11:38.840 --> 00:11:41.279 and Deal had the binoculars up when his hand closed 221 00:11:41.279 --> 00:11:44.639 on my sleeve. He didn't say a word, He just 222 00:11:44.720 --> 00:11:47.519 grabbed and squeezed, and I followed the line of those 223 00:11:47.559 --> 00:11:50.840 glasses out across the snow. It was crossing the far 224 00:11:51.000 --> 00:11:54.200 edge of the meadow, right along the timberline, moving left 225 00:11:54.200 --> 00:11:57.360 to right, and it was upright, walking on two legs 226 00:11:57.399 --> 00:12:00.279 the entire way. I want to be as clear I 227 00:12:00.320 --> 00:12:02.799 know how to be about that, because people always ask 228 00:12:02.879 --> 00:12:05.639 me whether it may be dropped down at some point, 229 00:12:06.120 --> 00:12:08.080 whether it might have been a bear that stood up 230 00:12:08.120 --> 00:12:10.919 for a second. The answer is that it walked upright 231 00:12:10.919 --> 00:12:13.600 across two hundred yards of my vision, and it never 232 00:12:13.679 --> 00:12:16.480 once looked like anything but a man, except it was 233 00:12:16.519 --> 00:12:19.320 far too big to be a man. It was dark 234 00:12:19.360 --> 00:12:22.279 brown going on black, and the snow out there stood 235 00:12:22.360 --> 00:12:25.399 higher than where its ankle should have been. And it 236 00:12:25.440 --> 00:12:28.440 moved through that snow the way I moved through mode grass, 237 00:12:29.320 --> 00:12:32.759 arms swinging long and low, the head set forward on 238 00:12:32.799 --> 00:12:35.840 the shoulders, with no neck that I could see. It 239 00:12:35.879 --> 00:12:39.480 never looked at us, not once, and I thanked God 240 00:12:39.519 --> 00:12:42.919 for that small mercy. For fifty years. It took maybe 241 00:12:42.960 --> 00:12:46.039 thirty seconds to cross that whole meadow, and then it 242 00:12:46.080 --> 00:12:48.559 walked into the timber on the north side, and the 243 00:12:48.600 --> 00:12:51.240 timber closed around it, and the meadow was just a 244 00:12:51.279 --> 00:12:55.240 meadow again, white and empty and quiet, with the creek 245 00:12:55.320 --> 00:12:57.960 talking away on the far side like nothing had happened. 246 00:12:58.919 --> 00:13:01.440 Dell lowered the binocular and his face had gone gray. 247 00:13:02.279 --> 00:13:04.279 He held the glasses out to me and I told 248 00:13:04.360 --> 00:13:07.200 him I didn't need them. I'd seen it plain, and 249 00:13:07.240 --> 00:13:11.320 he said no, look at the snow. I looked, and 250 00:13:11.399 --> 00:13:13.600 even without the glasses, I could see the trail the 251 00:13:13.600 --> 00:13:16.559 thing had left behind it, a line of dark holes 252 00:13:16.639 --> 00:13:19.960 running across all that white, steady and even as a seam. 253 00:13:20.799 --> 00:13:23.039 We broke camp in under an hour and did seven 254 00:13:23.080 --> 00:13:25.960 miles out with full packs before dark, and I don't 255 00:13:25.960 --> 00:13:29.960 remember being tired even once. At the truck. Dale finally 256 00:13:29.960 --> 00:13:33.000 spoke about it. What he said was, we don't tell 257 00:13:33.039 --> 00:13:36.200 my dad. I said okay. Then he said we don't 258 00:13:36.200 --> 00:13:39.480 tell anybody, and I said okay to that too. Dale 259 00:13:39.559 --> 00:13:41.759 kept that deal until the day he died in nineteen 260 00:13:41.840 --> 00:13:44.320 ninety four, and I kept it a good while longer. 261 00:13:45.039 --> 00:13:47.679 My wife knew, because you can't stay married to somebody 262 00:13:47.720 --> 00:13:50.240 for forty years and hide a thing that sits on 263 00:13:50.279 --> 00:13:53.080 you the way that thing sat on me. But she's 264 00:13:53.120 --> 00:13:56.159 gone now too. And here's what finally got me to 265 00:13:56.200 --> 00:13:59.159 write all this down. I got to thinking that the 266 00:13:59.200 --> 00:14:02.159 meadow is still up there, and the drainage is still 267 00:14:02.240 --> 00:14:05.279 up there, and I'm the only living soul left who 268 00:14:05.320 --> 00:14:08.080 knows what walked across that snow in nineteen sixty eight 269 00:14:09.039 --> 00:14:11.720 that started to seem wrong to me. A thing like 270 00:14:11.759 --> 00:14:14.799 that shouldn't have to die with me. So there it is. 271 00:14:15.519 --> 00:14:18.000 I never went back to that basin, and DLL never 272 00:14:18.039 --> 00:14:22.039 went back either. And it was his father's basin, his birthright, 273 00:14:22.639 --> 00:14:25.799 seven miles of the best elk country in Montana, and 274 00:14:25.879 --> 00:14:27.759 he never set foot in it again for the rest 275 00:14:27.799 --> 00:14:30.759 of his life. People can make of that whatever they want. 276 00:14:31.200 --> 00:14:34.080 That was Jack and what gets me about his story 277 00:14:34.600 --> 00:14:38.600 is the fifty years of silence. One email sent for 278 00:14:38.639 --> 00:14:41.000 no other reason than that the last other witness was 279 00:14:41.080 --> 00:14:44.159 gone and the story needed somewhere to live before he 280 00:14:44.240 --> 00:14:47.440 was gone too. I think about that meadow more than 281 00:14:47.480 --> 00:14:51.360 I probably should. But let's keep digging because our next 282 00:14:51.440 --> 00:14:54.559 encounter comes from a man named Curtis, and it takes 283 00:14:54.639 --> 00:14:58.720 us south down into the Washita Mountains of Arkansas in 284 00:14:58.759 --> 00:15:01.519 the fall of nineteen seis seventy seven. Stay tuned for 285 00:15:01.639 --> 00:15:05.480 more backwoods bigfoot stories. We'll be back after these messages. 286 00:15:07.639 --> 00:15:10.960 In nineteen seventy seven, Curtis was hunting whitetail deer on 287 00:15:11.000 --> 00:15:14.440 his uncle's lease in the Washataus west of hot springs, 288 00:15:14.840 --> 00:15:18.000 and he tells it like this. My uncle Ray had 289 00:15:18.039 --> 00:15:21.320 eight hundred acres leased up with three other men. It 290 00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:25.200 was big timber country, pine ridges and hardwood bottoms, cut 291 00:15:25.240 --> 00:15:28.600 through with creeks that ran clear over gravel. And I 292 00:15:28.639 --> 00:15:31.399 had hunted that ground since I was a boy. I 293 00:15:31.440 --> 00:15:33.519 knew that least the way you know your own house 294 00:15:33.559 --> 00:15:36.799 in the dark. It was the second week of gun season, 295 00:15:37.080 --> 00:15:39.039 and I was hunting a ladder stand that Ray and 296 00:15:39.080 --> 00:15:41.799 I had built together in a white oak flat above 297 00:15:41.840 --> 00:15:45.399 Cedar Creek. That spot had never once in my life 298 00:15:45.440 --> 00:15:48.840 failed to show me deer. The acorns were thick that year, 299 00:15:49.200 --> 00:15:51.080 and you could sit that stand of an evening and 300 00:15:51.120 --> 00:15:53.919 count six or eight or ten deer feeding through before 301 00:15:54.039 --> 00:15:59.399 dark every set without fail. That particular evening I counted zero. 302 00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:02.679 I don't mean the deer were slow coming in. I 303 00:16:02.720 --> 00:16:05.159 mean there was not one deer and not one squirrel, 304 00:16:05.600 --> 00:16:07.840 And a white oak flat in the middle of acorn 305 00:16:07.879 --> 00:16:10.799 season should have had squirrels raining out of the trees. 306 00:16:11.639 --> 00:16:13.879 I sat there from two in the afternoon until shooting 307 00:16:13.960 --> 00:16:16.679 light was nearly gone, and the wood stayed empty and 308 00:16:16.720 --> 00:16:19.840 shut up like a church on a Monday. Honestly, I 309 00:16:19.919 --> 00:16:23.000 was more annoyed than anything, because I figured somebody had 310 00:16:23.039 --> 00:16:25.799 walked through and stunked the place up. Figured one of 311 00:16:25.879 --> 00:16:29.759 Ray's lease partners had gone and ruined my evening. Then 312 00:16:29.840 --> 00:16:32.720 right at dark, from the ridge across the creek, something 313 00:16:32.799 --> 00:16:37.399 knocked wood against wood, one loud, sharp knock, like a 314 00:16:37.440 --> 00:16:40.559 man swinging a baseball bat full force against a tree trunk, 315 00:16:41.120 --> 00:16:43.559 and the sound rolled across that bottom in a way 316 00:16:43.600 --> 00:16:46.559 I felt in my chest as much as heard. Then 317 00:16:46.559 --> 00:16:49.679 from way off to the east, maybe half a mile out, 318 00:16:50.039 --> 00:16:53.120 another knock answered it. Now, I'd love to tell you 319 00:16:53.159 --> 00:16:57.480 I understood something significant was happening, but I didn't. This 320 00:16:57.600 --> 00:16:59.720 was nineteen seventy seven, and I was a kid from 321 00:16:59.759 --> 00:17:02.799 Guard County who had never heard the words would knock 322 00:17:02.919 --> 00:17:06.880 strung together in his life. What I thought was somebody's 323 00:17:06.920 --> 00:17:10.880 building something at dark in the middle of eight hundred 324 00:17:11.039 --> 00:17:14.119 least acres. And I settled on that in about two 325 00:17:14.119 --> 00:17:17.160 seconds flat, because the truth is, I did not want 326 00:17:17.200 --> 00:17:20.240 to think about it any harder than that. I climbed 327 00:17:20.240 --> 00:17:22.160 down and walked out to the truck and drove back 328 00:17:22.200 --> 00:17:25.240 to Rai's camp. And I never mentioned it to a soul. 329 00:17:26.119 --> 00:17:28.440 You'll notice that every man in this story keeps not 330 00:17:28.559 --> 00:17:31.960 mentioning things. There's a reason for that, and we'll get 331 00:17:32.000 --> 00:17:34.319 to it. The next day, I didn't hunt at all 332 00:17:34.359 --> 00:17:37.400 because it rained, and we sat around camp, and something 333 00:17:37.440 --> 00:17:40.240 happened that afternoon that I didn't connect to anything until 334 00:17:40.279 --> 00:17:43.359 much later. Ray kept a couple of beagles at camp, 335 00:17:43.759 --> 00:17:46.480 good Stout, little woods dogs that lived to run rabbits 336 00:17:46.519 --> 00:17:50.039 between deer sets along. About four o'clock, both of those 337 00:17:50.119 --> 00:17:52.279 dogs came out from under the porch at the same 338 00:17:52.359 --> 00:17:55.720 time and stood facing east toward the ridges, and growled 339 00:17:56.119 --> 00:17:59.240 low and steady, hackles up both of them at once. 340 00:18:00.119 --> 00:18:02.359 Ray got up and looked east and there was nothing 341 00:18:02.359 --> 00:18:05.440 out there but rain and pine. He hushed them and 342 00:18:05.480 --> 00:18:08.000 they would not hush, and he finally put them both 343 00:18:08.000 --> 00:18:10.759 in the cab of his truck, and those dogs stood 344 00:18:10.799 --> 00:18:13.640 up on the seat with their noses pressed against the glass, 345 00:18:13.680 --> 00:18:17.759 still facing east until it got dark. Ray said it 346 00:18:17.799 --> 00:18:21.000 was probably a cat moving through, and I said probably. 347 00:18:21.720 --> 00:18:23.720 I've thought a lot over the years about how much 348 00:18:23.759 --> 00:18:25.759 work that word does for men who don't want to 349 00:18:25.799 --> 00:18:29.000 talk about something. Two evenings later I was back in 350 00:18:29.039 --> 00:18:31.519 that stand, and this time the deer were back two 351 00:18:32.359 --> 00:18:35.279 a dough and two yearlings came through around four o'clock, 352 00:18:35.799 --> 00:18:39.839 feeding easy, with their tails loose, everything looking normal again. 353 00:18:40.559 --> 00:18:42.640 I let them walk because Ray had us holding out 354 00:18:42.680 --> 00:18:45.160 for bucks, and I settled in for the Golden Hour, 355 00:18:45.279 --> 00:18:47.680 feeling like the woods had gotten over whatever had been 356 00:18:47.680 --> 00:18:51.400 bothering them. At about five point fifteen, that same dough 357 00:18:51.440 --> 00:18:54.519 came back through, only this time she was running flat 358 00:18:54.559 --> 00:18:57.279 out with her ears pinned back and the yearlings scrambling 359 00:18:57.279 --> 00:19:00.519 to stay behind her. They blew past my stain, close 360 00:19:00.599 --> 00:19:02.279 enough that I could have hit them with a rock, 361 00:19:02.880 --> 00:19:05.839 and they were not running the way deer run when 362 00:19:05.880 --> 00:19:09.000 they've smelled a hunter, because deer that smell you bounce 363 00:19:09.039 --> 00:19:11.599 and blow and stop to look back over their shoulders. 364 00:19:12.640 --> 00:19:15.559 These deer ran like the ground behind them had caught fire, 365 00:19:15.960 --> 00:19:19.119 straight down into the creek bottom, splashing through the water 366 00:19:19.519 --> 00:19:22.440 and gone. I got the rifle up and pointed it 367 00:19:22.480 --> 00:19:25.599 back the way they'd come, because my first thought was dogs. 368 00:19:26.400 --> 00:19:28.799 We'd had trouble with dog packs running deer on that 369 00:19:28.880 --> 00:19:32.279 least before, so I sat there waiting on dogs, and 370 00:19:32.319 --> 00:19:35.640 what came instead was a smell. The wind was in 371 00:19:35.680 --> 00:19:39.119 my face, coming down off the ridge, and it carried 372 00:19:39.160 --> 00:19:42.480 something rotten and rank and musky all at once, like 373 00:19:42.480 --> 00:19:46.079 a skunk had died in a septic tank. It arrived 374 00:19:46.079 --> 00:19:49.240 slow and kept getting stronger, which meant whatever was making 375 00:19:49.279 --> 00:19:52.279 it was getting closer. And I still had that rifle 376 00:19:52.319 --> 00:19:55.599 pointed at the ridge, and my heart had started going hard. 377 00:19:55.960 --> 00:19:59.519 And I had not yet seen one single thing. That's 378 00:19:59.519 --> 00:20:01.519 the part I I always tell people who weren't there. 379 00:20:02.039 --> 00:20:04.680 I hadn't seen anything at all, and I was already 380 00:20:04.720 --> 00:20:07.200 more scared than I had ever been in my life. 381 00:20:07.240 --> 00:20:09.480 Off nothing but a smell and two knocks and some 382 00:20:09.599 --> 00:20:13.039 running deer. Your body knows things ahead of your eyes. 383 00:20:13.480 --> 00:20:17.200 It always has. Then I heard it walking coming down 384 00:20:17.240 --> 00:20:20.039 off the ridge through the leaves. And here's the thing 385 00:20:20.079 --> 00:20:23.480 you have to understand about hardwood leaves in November, which 386 00:20:23.519 --> 00:20:27.000 is that they tell on everything that touches them. I 387 00:20:27.039 --> 00:20:30.319 have heard one hundred men walk through November leaves, and 388 00:20:30.359 --> 00:20:33.359 every one of those men made a racket, boots, dragging, 389 00:20:33.640 --> 00:20:37.359 sticks popping, no rhythm to any of it. This was 390 00:20:37.400 --> 00:20:42.359 nothing like that. This was slow, even two legged steps, heavy, 391 00:20:42.400 --> 00:20:46.079 but somehow careful at the same time. Something coming down 392 00:20:46.119 --> 00:20:49.440 that slope, one deliberate foot at a time, placing each 393 00:20:49.480 --> 00:20:51.400 foot the way I would walk if I were trying 394 00:20:51.400 --> 00:20:53.960 my best to be quiet, but weigh too much for 395 00:20:54.039 --> 00:20:57.759 quiet to ever really work. It stopped inside the cedar 396 00:20:57.799 --> 00:21:00.720 thicket at the base of the ridge, maybe sixty yards 397 00:21:00.759 --> 00:21:04.240 from my stand, and then it just stood there. The 398 00:21:04.319 --> 00:21:07.680 light was going fast. By then I had maybe fifteen 399 00:21:07.720 --> 00:21:10.519 minutes left where the scope would gather anything at all. 400 00:21:10.880 --> 00:21:13.200 And I sat in that ladder stand with the rifle 401 00:21:13.279 --> 00:21:16.880