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 --> 00:01:04.560 There's a smell that hits you when you step into 14 00:01:04.560 --> 00:01:05.760 deep ozark. 15 00:01:05.400 --> 00:01:06.359 Timber in the summer. 16 00:01:07.040 --> 00:01:10.519 It's cedar and wet limestone and rotting leaves and something 17 00:01:10.599 --> 00:01:14.680 underneath all of it, something old, something that's been soaking 18 00:01:14.719 --> 00:01:17.959 into the ground for a thousand years. I haven't set 19 00:01:17.959 --> 00:01:20.799 foot in those woods since nineteen eighty five, but I 20 00:01:20.879 --> 00:01:24.719 catch that smell sometimes driving through the hill country south 21 00:01:24.719 --> 00:01:28.040 of Springfield, or passing a cedar lot after a rain, 22 00:01:28.879 --> 00:01:31.760 and every single time my hand's tightened on the steering 23 00:01:31.760 --> 00:01:34.359 wheel and my chest goes cold. And I'm twelve years 24 00:01:34.359 --> 00:01:37.000 old again, standing at the edge of a tree line 25 00:01:37.000 --> 00:01:40.319 that I know I should not walk into. My name's Kevin. 26 00:01:40.640 --> 00:01:44.040 I'm fifty three. I live in Kansas City. I coach 27 00:01:44.120 --> 00:01:48.799 my grandson's Little League team on Saturdays. Normal life, normal guy. 28 00:01:49.760 --> 00:01:52.200 But when I was twelve years old, something happened to 29 00:01:52.239 --> 00:01:54.760 my family on a piece of land in rural Missouri 30 00:01:55.079 --> 00:01:57.239 that none of us have ever been able to explain, 31 00:01:58.079 --> 00:02:00.640 and I mean none of us. My dad went to 32 00:02:00.680 --> 00:02:02.920 his grave without ever saying what he thought it was. 33 00:02:03.840 --> 00:02:06.719 My mom still won't talk about it. My older sister 34 00:02:06.760 --> 00:02:09.680 brings it up sometimes, usually after a glass of wine 35 00:02:09.719 --> 00:02:12.439 at Thanksgiving, and you can see the color leave her 36 00:02:12.479 --> 00:02:15.479 face when she does. I found your show about a 37 00:02:15.560 --> 00:02:18.280 year and a half ago. I was on a job site, 38 00:02:18.479 --> 00:02:20.919 had my earbuds in, and one of the guys on 39 00:02:20.960 --> 00:02:23.639 my crew told me to check out backwoods Bigfoot stories. 40 00:02:24.360 --> 00:02:26.280 I figured it'd be something to kill time on the 41 00:02:26.360 --> 00:02:28.919 drive home, but I sat in my truck in my 42 00:02:28.960 --> 00:02:32.759 own driveway for forty five minutes that first night, just listening, 43 00:02:33.520 --> 00:02:35.759 and then I came inside and stayed up until one 44 00:02:35.759 --> 00:02:39.199 in the morning going through episodes because these people were 45 00:02:39.240 --> 00:02:43.240 describing things I'd lived through, details that I'd never told anyone, 46 00:02:43.520 --> 00:02:47.039 because I didn't think anyone would understand the feeling of 47 00:02:47.080 --> 00:02:50.800 being watched, the sounds that don't match anything you've ever heard, 48 00:02:51.639 --> 00:02:54.680 the way animals react before you even know something's wrong. 49 00:02:55.520 --> 00:02:57.400 I want to be clear about something before I get 50 00:02:57.400 --> 00:03:00.719 into this. I'm not a guy who jumps to concl illusions. 51 00:03:01.120 --> 00:03:03.879 My dad was career military before he got into farming, 52 00:03:04.360 --> 00:03:07.280 and he raised us to be observant, to think critically, 53 00:03:07.759 --> 00:03:10.400 and to not let our imaginations run away from us. 54 00:03:11.240 --> 00:03:14.759 I spent twenty two years working on engines and mechanical systems, 55 00:03:15.120 --> 00:03:18.479 and I approach problems the same way. What does the 56 00:03:18.520 --> 00:03:23.599 evidence tell you, what makes sense, what doesn't. I've asked 57 00:03:23.599 --> 00:03:26.240 myself those questions about the summer of nineteen eighty five 58 00:03:26.360 --> 00:03:29.000 more times than I can count, and I still don't 59 00:03:29.000 --> 00:03:31.639 have a clean answer. But I know what I saw, 60 00:03:32.159 --> 00:03:34.759 I know what my family saw, and I know that 61 00:03:34.840 --> 00:03:37.520 whatever was on that property with us was not a bear, 62 00:03:38.080 --> 00:03:40.680 was not a feral dog, and was not a person. 63 00:03:41.520 --> 00:03:44.520 It was something else. We moved to the farm in 64 00:03:44.560 --> 00:03:48.960 early June of nineteen eighty five, I just finished sixth grade. 65 00:03:49.000 --> 00:03:51.400 My dad had taken early retirement from the army and 66 00:03:51.479 --> 00:03:53.919 used his savings and a VA loan to buy one 67 00:03:54.000 --> 00:03:57.840 hundred and twelve acres in Dent County, Missouri, deep Ozarks. 68 00:03:58.639 --> 00:04:00.759 The property sat at the end of a gravel road 69 00:04:00.800 --> 00:04:03.879 about nine miles outside of a town that barely qualified 70 00:04:03.919 --> 00:04:07.960 as a town. One gas station, a post office, a 71 00:04:07.960 --> 00:04:09.639 feed store, and a church. 72 00:04:10.439 --> 00:04:10.960 That was it. 73 00:04:12.080 --> 00:04:14.400 The nearest neighbor was a cattle rancher about a mile 74 00:04:14.439 --> 00:04:17.000 and a half up the road, an older man named 75 00:04:17.040 --> 00:04:19.920 Elden Krieger who kept to himself and didn't seem particularly 76 00:04:19.920 --> 00:04:24.279 interested in making friends. The house was old, built sometime 77 00:04:24.279 --> 00:04:29.360 in the nineteen twenties, maybe earlier, two stories, white clapboard 78 00:04:29.360 --> 00:04:32.439 that had gone gray from neglect, a wrap around porch 79 00:04:32.519 --> 00:04:35.120 that sagged in the middle, and a stone chimney that 80 00:04:35.199 --> 00:04:37.519 leaned just enough to make you nervous when the wind 81 00:04:37.560 --> 00:04:41.199 blew hard. There was a barn behind the house, bigger 82 00:04:41.240 --> 00:04:43.839 than the house itself, with a hay loft and old 83 00:04:43.879 --> 00:04:45.319 cattle stalls that hadn't been. 84 00:04:45.279 --> 00:04:46.079 Used in years. 85 00:04:46.959 --> 00:04:50.199 Beyond the barn was a fenced pasture maybe ten acres, 86 00:04:50.720 --> 00:04:51.639 and then the woods. 87 00:04:52.360 --> 00:04:53.279 The woods. 88 00:04:53.639 --> 00:04:57.199 That's where everything happened. The property backed up against thousands 89 00:04:57.199 --> 00:05:02.319 of acres of National forest land marked national forest, all 90 00:05:02.360 --> 00:05:08.560 of it unbroken timber rolling south toward the current river, oak, hickory, cedar, 91 00:05:08.920 --> 00:05:12.959 black walnut, dentse stuff, the kind of forest where the 92 00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:15.879 canopy closes over your head and the temperature drops five 93 00:05:15.920 --> 00:05:19.199 degrees the second you step into the shade. There were 94 00:05:19.240 --> 00:05:22.519 game trails threading through it, old logging roads that had 95 00:05:22.560 --> 00:05:25.279 grown over, and a creek that cut through the southeast 96 00:05:25.279 --> 00:05:28.759 corner of our property before winding deeper into the hills. 97 00:05:29.279 --> 00:05:30.199 My dad loved it. 98 00:05:30.720 --> 00:05:33.160 He'd grown up in rural Kentucky and this was everything 99 00:05:33.199 --> 00:05:35.639 he'd been missing during twenty years of army posts and 100 00:05:35.680 --> 00:05:39.519 base housing. He had plans for a garden, for livestock, 101 00:05:39.879 --> 00:05:42.160 for clearing some of the scrub timber, and selling it. 102 00:05:43.000 --> 00:05:44.000 My mom was less. 103 00:05:43.920 --> 00:05:46.920 Enthusiastic, but she'd agreed to give it a shot. She 104 00:05:47.040 --> 00:05:50.519 was a small town girl too, originally from southern Indiana, 105 00:05:50.959 --> 00:05:53.319 and I think part of her understood why he needed this. 106 00:05:54.279 --> 00:05:57.680 My sister Beth was fifteen and absolutely miserable about the move. 107 00:05:58.439 --> 00:06:02.079 She'd left behind a boyfriend and social circle in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, 108 00:06:02.560 --> 00:06:05.160 and as far as she was concerned, Missouri might as 109 00:06:05.199 --> 00:06:07.680 well have been the moon. And then there was me, 110 00:06:08.480 --> 00:06:12.439 twelve years old, skinny, covered in freckles, and honestly pretty 111 00:06:12.480 --> 00:06:15.600 excited about the whole thing. I'd been a boy scout 112 00:06:15.639 --> 00:06:19.720 for two years. I liked being outside. I liked exploring 113 00:06:20.160 --> 00:06:22.480 in one hundred and twelve acres of woods and fields 114 00:06:22.519 --> 00:06:25.160 with a creek running through it. That sounded like the 115 00:06:25.199 --> 00:06:28.680 greatest summer of my life. For about three weeks it was. 116 00:06:29.279 --> 00:06:31.600 I spent the first part of that June exploring every 117 00:06:31.639 --> 00:06:34.600 inch of the property I could reach. My dad gave 118 00:06:34.639 --> 00:06:38.040 me two rules. Be home before dark, and don't cross 119 00:06:38.079 --> 00:06:41.360 the creek. The creek was the boundary line between our 120 00:06:41.480 --> 00:06:44.279 land and the National Forest, and he didn't want me 121 00:06:44.360 --> 00:06:47.240 wandering off into timber that stretched for miles in every 122 00:06:47.279 --> 00:06:52.240 direction without any landmarks I'd recognize fair enough. I had 123 00:06:52.279 --> 00:06:55.360 plenty to work with on our side. I found an 124 00:06:55.360 --> 00:06:58.160 old root cellar dug into a hillside about two hundred 125 00:06:58.240 --> 00:07:01.720 yards behind the barn. The door had rotted off its hinges, 126 00:07:01.720 --> 00:07:05.160 but the interior was still solid, cool and dark, and 127 00:07:05.240 --> 00:07:09.000 smelling like wet earth. I found a natural spring bubbling 128 00:07:09.079 --> 00:07:12.160 up through rocks near the northwest fence line. I found 129 00:07:12.199 --> 00:07:18.759 deer trails everywhere, and the tracks to go with them, raccoon, apossum, turkey, rabbit, 130 00:07:19.560 --> 00:07:22.079 the usual stuff you'd expect in that part of Missouri. 131 00:07:23.000 --> 00:07:25.279 I found a massive red oak near the creek that 132 00:07:25.360 --> 00:07:27.800 had to be three hundred years old, with the trunk 133 00:07:27.920 --> 00:07:30.639 so wide I couldn't get my arms even halfway around it. 134 00:07:31.439 --> 00:07:34.040 I was comfortable in those woods. That's what I want 135 00:07:34.079 --> 00:07:37.800 to emphasize. I wasn't a nervous kid. I wasn't jumping 136 00:07:37.800 --> 00:07:41.839 at shadows. I spent hours out there every day, sometimes 137 00:07:41.839 --> 00:07:45.040 from right after breakfast until late afternoon, and I felt 138 00:07:45.079 --> 00:07:45.560 at home. 139 00:07:46.360 --> 00:07:47.920 The woods felt safe. 140 00:07:47.600 --> 00:07:50.079 And familiar and full of the kind of quiet that 141 00:07:50.120 --> 00:07:52.720 a twelve year old boy with an imagination doesn't get 142 00:07:52.839 --> 00:07:56.240 enough of. I'd sit by the creek and watch crawdads 143 00:07:56.319 --> 00:07:59.279 work their way along the bottom. I'd climb the easier 144 00:07:59.319 --> 00:08:01.199 trees and see see how far I could see from 145 00:08:01.240 --> 00:08:04.199 the upper branches. I built a rough fort out of 146 00:08:04.240 --> 00:08:08.240 fallen branches near the old Root Cellar. Nothing fancy, just 147 00:08:08.279 --> 00:08:10.240 a lean to shelter where I could sit in the 148 00:08:10.279 --> 00:08:12.480 shade and pretend I was a mountain man from one 149 00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:16.360 of those Jeremiah Johnson type stories. My dad loved. The 150 00:08:16.399 --> 00:08:20.000 birds were everywhere that first part of the summer, cardinals, 151 00:08:20.000 --> 00:08:24.399 blue jays, woodpeckers hammering on dead limbs, hawks circling up 152 00:08:24.399 --> 00:08:27.399 in the thermals above the ridge line. The woods were 153 00:08:27.480 --> 00:08:30.360 loud with life, and it felt like they'd accepted me, 154 00:08:30.959 --> 00:08:33.679 like I was just another animal moving through the territory 155 00:08:34.159 --> 00:08:37.759 and nothing out there paid me much mind. That changed 156 00:08:37.799 --> 00:08:40.279 in the last week of June. I was walking the 157 00:08:40.320 --> 00:08:43.039 fence line on the east side of the property, heading 158 00:08:43.120 --> 00:08:46.240 south toward the creek. It was a Thursday, I'm fairly 159 00:08:46.279 --> 00:08:49.159 sure because my mom had gone into town for groceries, 160 00:08:49.480 --> 00:08:53.080 which she did every Thursday. The sun was out, probably 161 00:08:53.120 --> 00:08:58.240 mid eighties, Cicada's buzzing everything normal. I was just walking 162 00:08:58.279 --> 00:09:02.440 and looking at the ground I usually did, checking for tracks, 163 00:09:02.759 --> 00:09:07.320 looking for interesting rocks, regular kid stuff. And then I stopped. 164 00:09:07.759 --> 00:09:10.600 I didn't decide to stop, My body just did it 165 00:09:11.039 --> 00:09:13.279 the way your hand jerks back from a hot stove 166 00:09:13.360 --> 00:09:16.799 before your brain even registers the heat. I stood there 167 00:09:16.840 --> 00:09:19.480 on the trail, and every muscle in my body locked up, 168 00:09:19.720 --> 00:09:23.000 and I felt something I'd never felt before in my life. 169 00:09:23.039 --> 00:09:25.000 I was being watched. Now. 170 00:09:25.039 --> 00:09:27.759 I know how that sounds. People say it all the time, 171 00:09:27.799 --> 00:09:30.759 and it sounds dramatic or made up. But I need 172 00:09:30.799 --> 00:09:33.720 you to understand that this wasn't a thought. It wasn't 173 00:09:33.720 --> 00:09:37.399 me imagining something or psyching myself out. It was a 174 00:09:37.440 --> 00:09:40.720 physical sensation, as real as the ground under my feet. 175 00:09:41.519 --> 00:09:44.440 The back of my neck went tight, my stomach dropped, 176 00:09:44.840 --> 00:09:48.559 and I had this overwhelming, almost crushing awareness that something 177 00:09:48.639 --> 00:09:50.879 was looking at me from the tree line to my left. 178 00:09:51.519 --> 00:09:54.960 I turned my head slowly. I scanned the woods. I 179 00:09:54.960 --> 00:09:59.879 didn't see anything. The trees were thick, there lots of underbrush, honeysuckle, 180 00:10:00.120 --> 00:10:03.759 BlackBerry tangles growing between the trunks. I couldn't see more 181 00:10:03.759 --> 00:10:06.039 than maybe thirty or forty feet into the timber. 182 00:10:06.559 --> 00:10:07.159 But I knew. 183 00:10:07.879 --> 00:10:10.960 I knew something was in there watching me, and I 184 00:10:11.000 --> 00:10:12.960 knew it was close enough that I should be able 185 00:10:13.000 --> 00:10:16.480 to see it. I stood there for maybe a full minute, 186 00:10:16.519 --> 00:10:20.960 just looking, listening. The cicadas had stopped. I don't know 187 00:10:20.960 --> 00:10:23.759 if you've ever noticed when that happens, but once you do. 188 00:10:24.279 --> 00:10:28.519 It's the most unsettling silence you'll ever experience. The woods 189 00:10:28.559 --> 00:10:32.080 go from being loud and alive to being absolutely dead quiet, 190 00:10:32.440 --> 00:10:35.519 and it happens all at once, like someone flipped a switch. 191 00:10:36.480 --> 00:10:40.120 Then I heard something move. It was deeper in, maybe 192 00:10:40.159 --> 00:10:43.159 sixty or seventy feet from where I stood, A single 193 00:10:43.159 --> 00:10:47.039 footstep heavy, Not the light crunch of a deer picking 194 00:10:47.120 --> 00:10:50.399 its way through dry leaves. This was something with real 195 00:10:50.440 --> 00:10:53.399 weight behind it, something that pressed down hard enough to 196 00:10:53.440 --> 00:10:55.639 snap a stick that sounded like it was as thick 197 00:10:55.639 --> 00:11:00.279 as my thumb. Just one step, then nothing. I didn't 198 00:11:00.279 --> 00:11:03.080 wait for a second one. I turned around and walked 199 00:11:03.080 --> 00:11:05.320 back to the house as fast as I could without running. 200 00:11:06.080 --> 00:11:08.759 I don't know why I didn't run. Something told me 201 00:11:08.799 --> 00:11:12.279 not to. Something told me that if I ran, whatever 202 00:11:12.399 --> 00:11:14.960 was in those woods would know I was afraid, and 203 00:11:15.000 --> 00:11:20.159 that felt dangerous. So I walked fast, my heart hammering 204 00:11:20.159 --> 00:11:23.080 in my chest, sweat running down the sides of my face, 205 00:11:23.519 --> 00:11:26.039 and that feeling of being watched boring into my back 206 00:11:26.120 --> 00:11:28.679 with every step. I got to the house and went 207 00:11:28.679 --> 00:11:31.600 inside and locked the door behind me. Beth was in 208 00:11:31.639 --> 00:11:34.159 the living room watching MTV on the Rabbit Ears. We 209 00:11:34.200 --> 00:11:37.000 could barely get a signal on. She looked at me 210 00:11:37.039 --> 00:11:39.440 and asked if I was okay. I told her I 211 00:11:39.519 --> 00:11:42.960 was fine, just hot. She went back to her show. 212 00:11:43.320 --> 00:11:45.200 I didn't go back to the woods for three days. 213 00:11:45.759 --> 00:11:48.279 When I finally did go back out, I told myself 214 00:11:48.320 --> 00:11:51.279 I'd been ridiculous. I was a twelve year old kid 215 00:11:51.279 --> 00:11:54.240 who'd gotten spooked by a deer or a coyote, or 216 00:11:54.279 --> 00:11:57.799 maybe even a turkey moving through the brush. The Ozarks 217 00:11:57.799 --> 00:12:00.639 were full of wildlife. Of course, something had been in 218 00:12:00.679 --> 00:12:04.240 the woods. That's where animals live. I was being a 219 00:12:04.279 --> 00:12:07.559 baby about it. I followed the same path along the 220 00:12:07.600 --> 00:12:11.240 east fence line, deliberately proving to myself that there was 221 00:12:11.279 --> 00:12:14.240 nothing to be afraid of. The sun was out again, 222 00:12:14.759 --> 00:12:18.200 the cicadas were screaming, and everything felt exactly the way 223 00:12:18.240 --> 00:12:23.039 it had before normal safe. I walked all the way 224 00:12:23.080 --> 00:12:25.320 down to the creek, sat on the bank for a while, 225 00:12:25.679 --> 00:12:27.879 threw some rocks in the water, and started to feel 226 00:12:27.919 --> 00:12:31.360 pretty stupid about the whole episode. I decided to head 227 00:12:31.399 --> 00:12:34.639 back along the creek instead of following the fence line. 228 00:12:34.679 --> 00:12:37.639 The creek bank was mostly clear, easier walking than the 229 00:12:37.679 --> 00:12:40.879 brush along the fence, and there was a nice breeze coming. 230 00:12:40.720 --> 00:12:41.240 Up the draw. 231 00:12:42.120 --> 00:12:44.600 I was maybe a quarter mile upstream from where our 232 00:12:44.600 --> 00:12:47.799 fence line met the water when I saw them, tracks 233 00:12:48.679 --> 00:12:51.080 in the mud along the creek bank, right where the 234 00:12:51.120 --> 00:12:53.360 water made a shallow band and left a bar of 235 00:12:53.440 --> 00:12:57.919 soft clay exposed. I noticed them because of the size. 236 00:12:58.039 --> 00:13:00.360 At first I thought they were dog tracks, because the 237 00:13:00.360 --> 00:13:04.080 shape was right, four toes each one tipped with what 238 00:13:04.200 --> 00:13:07.120 looked like a claw mark and a large central pad 239 00:13:07.840 --> 00:13:13.799 classic canine print. But the size was wrong, completely impossibly wrong. 240 00:13:14.600 --> 00:13:17.519 I'd seen plenty of dog tracks, We'd had dogs my 241 00:13:17.519 --> 00:13:20.440 whole life. A big german shepherd will leave a track 242 00:13:20.480 --> 00:13:23.879 about four inches long, maybe four and a half. These 243 00:13:23.919 --> 00:13:27.080 prints were enormous. I didn't have a tape measure with me, 244 00:13:27.559 --> 00:13:29.840 but I put my hand down next to one for reference, 245 00:13:30.200 --> 00:13:32.440 and the track was wider than my spread fingers and 246 00:13:32.480 --> 00:13:36.159 almost twice as long. I was twelve, so my hands 247 00:13:36.159 --> 00:13:40.039 weren't full grown. But still we're talking about prints that 248 00:13:40.120 --> 00:13:42.840 had to be at least seven inches long, maybe eight 249 00:13:43.639 --> 00:13:45.720 deeper than any dog track I'd ever seen. 250 00:13:45.759 --> 00:13:45.960 Too. 251 00:13:46.799 --> 00:13:50.039 Whatever made them was heavy. The impressions were sunk a 252 00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:52.360 good inch and a half into that clay, and the 253 00:13:52.399 --> 00:13:56.240 clay along the creek wasn't particularly soft. I counted six 254 00:13:56.320 --> 00:13:59.039 clear prints before they disappeared into the leaf litter on 255 00:13:59.080 --> 00:14:03.159 the bank. They followed the creek upstream, toward the deeper timber. 256 00:14:03.879 --> 00:14:07.240 The stride between them was long, longer than my dad's 257 00:14:07.279 --> 00:14:10.799 walking stride, and my dad was six foot one. I 258 00:14:10.799 --> 00:14:13.360 squatted there looking at those tracks for a long time, 259 00:14:13.799 --> 00:14:15.960 trying to figure out what could have made them. 260 00:14:16.200 --> 00:14:16.720 A wolf. 261 00:14:17.519 --> 00:14:20.480 There weren't supposed to be wolves in Missouri, not anymore. 262 00:14:21.240 --> 00:14:24.240 A really big dog, maybe some kind of mastiff or 263 00:14:24.279 --> 00:14:27.600 great Dane that had gotten loose from somebody's property. That 264 00:14:27.759 --> 00:14:31.240 was possible, I guess, but it didn't feel right. The 265 00:14:31.279 --> 00:14:34.039 stride length was too great and the tracks were pressed 266 00:14:34.039 --> 00:14:37.679 in too deep. Whatever left these prints wasn't just big, 267 00:14:38.159 --> 00:14:41.639 It was heavy and moving with purpose. I pulled a 268 00:14:41.639 --> 00:14:43.679 stick out of the undergrowth and laid it across one 269 00:14:43.759 --> 00:14:46.360 of the clearest prints to mark the size. Then I 270 00:14:46.399 --> 00:14:49.159 went home and got my dad. He was under the 271 00:14:49.200 --> 00:14:52.279 truck changing the oil, and he wasn't thrilled about crawling 272 00:14:52.320 --> 00:14:54.360 out to go look at animal tracks in the creek, 273 00:14:55.080 --> 00:14:57.879 but I was persistent. I told him they were huge, 274 00:14:58.399 --> 00:15:01.039 bigger than anything I'd ever seen. Stay tuned for more 275 00:15:01.039 --> 00:15:06.759 Backwoods bigfoot stories. We'll be back after these messages. And 276 00:15:06.840 --> 00:15:11.080 eventually he sighed and said, all right, show me. We 277 00:15:11.120 --> 00:15:13.679 walked down to the creek together. I found the spot 278 00:15:13.720 --> 00:15:15.440 easily because of the stick I'd left. 279 00:15:15.879 --> 00:15:16.639 But here's the thing. 280 00:15:17.519 --> 00:15:20.120 In the maybe forty five minutes between when i'd left 281 00:15:20.159 --> 00:15:22.559 and when we came back, the best two prints had 282 00:15:22.600 --> 00:15:26.000 been disturbed. Something had walked through the area and scuffed 283 00:15:26.039 --> 00:15:29.320 the mud. The remaining prints were still visible, but not 284 00:15:29.399 --> 00:15:33.360 as crisp, not as dramatic. My dad looked at them, 285 00:15:33.600 --> 00:15:36.679 looked at the stick I'd placed, looked at the surrounding ground, 286 00:15:36.720 --> 00:15:38.799 and told me it was probably a big farm dog 287 00:15:39.039 --> 00:15:42.080 from one of the neighboring properties. He said, tracks in 288 00:15:42.159 --> 00:15:44.960 soft mud always look bigger than they are because the 289 00:15:45.080 --> 00:15:46.879 edges spread out as the mud settles. 290 00:15:47.519 --> 00:15:48.960 I tried to argue. 291 00:15:49.039 --> 00:15:51.639 I told him these weren't spread out, they were deep 292 00:15:51.879 --> 00:15:55.159 and clearly defined. He put his hand on my shoulder 293 00:15:55.159 --> 00:15:59.200 and said, son, it's a dog, A big one maybe, 294 00:15:59.559 --> 00:16:02.679 but a dog. And that was the end of the conversation. 295 00:16:03.399 --> 00:16:05.679 I should have pushed harder, I should have made him 296 00:16:05.720 --> 00:16:08.879 really look, But he was my dad, and when your 297 00:16:08.960 --> 00:16:11.600 dad tells you something with that kind of certainty, you 298 00:16:11.639 --> 00:16:15.600 figure he's probably right, so I let it go for 299 00:16:15.679 --> 00:16:19.559 a while. July came in hot and mean. Missouri in 300 00:16:19.639 --> 00:16:23.080 July is a special kind of miserable. The humidity sits 301 00:16:23.080 --> 00:16:25.200 on you like a wet blanket, and the temperature doesn't 302 00:16:25.240 --> 00:16:28.480 drop below eighty even after the sun goes down. The 303 00:16:28.600 --> 00:16:31.600 nights were worse somehow. You'd think it would cool off 304 00:16:31.639 --> 00:16:35.000 after dark, but the air just hung there, thick and 305 00:16:35.080 --> 00:16:39.240 still pressing against the house like something with weight. I 306 00:16:39.279 --> 00:16:42.559 spent most of the hottest hours inside reading or playing 307 00:16:42.600 --> 00:16:45.399 with the atari we'd brought from Fort Campbell, and then 308 00:16:45.399 --> 00:16:47.600 I'd go out in the late afternoon when it started 309 00:16:47.639 --> 00:16:50.720 to cool down a little. My dad had settled into 310 00:16:50.759 --> 00:16:54.480 a routine by then, up before dawn, coffee on the porch, 311 00:16:55.000 --> 00:16:57.240 then out to work on whatever project was next on 312 00:16:57.279 --> 00:17:01.039 his list. He was clearing brush along the south fence line, 313 00:17:01.320 --> 00:17:04.440 repairing the barn roof, fixing the WEHLL pump that kept 314 00:17:04.440 --> 00:17:08.039 losing pressure. He was happy, or at least he seemed 315 00:17:08.039 --> 00:17:11.319 to be. This was the life he'd wanted, the life 316 00:17:11.359 --> 00:17:15.400 he'd spent twenty years in the army dreaming about my mom. 317 00:17:15.440 --> 00:17:18.319 Had planted a garden near the house, tomatoes and peppers 318 00:17:18.359 --> 00:17:21.160 and squash, and it was doing well in all that heat. 319 00:17:22.079 --> 00:17:24.920 Beth had made a tentative friend in town, a girl 320 00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:28.039 named Jenny whose parents ran the gas station, and she'd 321 00:17:28.119 --> 00:17:30.759 ride her bike the nine miles into town to visit her, 322 00:17:30.960 --> 00:17:33.759 which meant she was gone most afternoons and slightly less 323 00:17:33.799 --> 00:17:37.319 miserable about the whole situation. It should have felt perfect 324 00:17:37.880 --> 00:17:40.599 in a lot of ways. It did, but underneath all 325 00:17:40.640 --> 00:17:44.160 that normalcy, something was wrong, and I could feel it, 326 00:17:44.359 --> 00:17:45.920 even if I couldn't name it yet. 327 00:17:46.759 --> 00:17:47.759 I was still going. 328 00:17:47.559 --> 00:17:51.000 Into the woods, but something had shifted. I can't pinpoint 329 00:17:51.079 --> 00:17:53.799 exactly when it happened, but at some point in. 330 00:17:53.799 --> 00:17:56.440 Early July, the woods started to feel different. 331 00:17:57.079 --> 00:18:00.440 Not every day, not every time I went out, but 332 00:18:00.519 --> 00:18:03.039 more and more often I'd be walking a trail or 333 00:18:03.079 --> 00:18:05.640 sitting by the creek and that feeling would come back, 334 00:18:06.480 --> 00:18:10.720 that prickling, electric awareness of being observed. Sometimes it would 335 00:18:10.759 --> 00:18:13.920 last a few seconds and fade. Sometimes it would settle 336 00:18:13.960 --> 00:18:16.759 in and stay for twenty minutes or more, this heavy, 337 00:18:16.799 --> 00:18:20.279 oppressive sense that something was tracking my movements from just 338 00:18:20.400 --> 00:18:23.400 beyond the edge of what I could see, and then 339 00:18:23.440 --> 00:18:26.079 the sound started. The first time was on a night 340 00:18:26.119 --> 00:18:30.200 in mid July, maybe the fifteenth or sixteenth. I was 341 00:18:30.279 --> 00:18:32.559 lying in bed with my window open because we didn't 342 00:18:32.559 --> 00:18:35.599 have air conditioning and my room upstairs trapped heat like 343 00:18:35.680 --> 00:18:39.680 an oven. It was late, probably eleven or so. My 344 00:18:39.759 --> 00:18:43.839 parents were asleep, Beth was asleep. The house was quiet, 345 00:18:43.880 --> 00:18:46.759 except for the usual creaking and settling that old houses do. 346 00:18:47.759 --> 00:18:50.200 From somewhere out in the woods south of the house, 347 00:18:50.519 --> 00:18:53.920 toward the creek, I heard something call out. It's hard 348 00:18:53.920 --> 00:18:56.839 to describe. I've spent forty years trying to put this 349 00:18:56.960 --> 00:19:00.400 sound into words, and I've never gotten it right. The 350 00:19:00.440 --> 00:19:03.039 closest I can come is that it was like a howl, 351 00:19:03.200 --> 00:19:07.759 but not a howl. It started low, almost guttural, like 352 00:19:07.799 --> 00:19:10.119 a growl, that built in volume and then climbed in 353 00:19:10.200 --> 00:19:14.599 pitch until it became something between a scream and a whale. 354 00:19:14.720 --> 00:19:17.319 There was a roughness to it, a kind of ragged, 355 00:19:17.440 --> 00:19:20.799 torn quality, like whatever was making the sound was pushing 356 00:19:20.799 --> 00:19:24.000 it through vocal cords that weren't built for it. It 357 00:19:24.079 --> 00:19:27.440 lasted maybe four or five seconds, echoed off the hills 358 00:19:27.839 --> 00:19:31.599 and then cut off abruptly, no fade out, just there 359 00:19:32.160 --> 00:19:35.960 and then gone. I lay in my bed, completely still, 360 00:19:36.279 --> 00:19:39.359 staring at the ceiling. My heart was going so fast 361 00:19:39.400 --> 00:19:42.039 I could feel it in my temples. I waited for 362 00:19:42.079 --> 00:19:48.279 it to come again. Five minutes, ten nothing. Eventually I 363 00:19:48.319 --> 00:19:50.759 got up and closed my window, even though it meant 364 00:19:50.759 --> 00:19:52.720 I'd swept through my sheets the rest of the night. 365 00:19:53.839 --> 00:19:56.119 The next morning, at breakfast, I asked my mom if 366 00:19:56.119 --> 00:19:58.160 she'd heard anything unusual during the night. 367 00:19:58.720 --> 00:19:59.640 She said she hadn't. 368 00:20:00.359 --> 00:20:03.079 My dad said he'd heard a coyote yipping around midnight, 369 00:20:03.319 --> 00:20:06.160 but nothing out of the ordinary. I asked him if 370 00:20:06.200 --> 00:20:09.200 it sounded like a howl that turned into a scream. 371 00:20:09.440 --> 00:20:12.240 He looked at me over his coffee and said, coyotes 372 00:20:12.279 --> 00:20:14.920 make all kinds of sounds, and that I'd get used 373 00:20:14.920 --> 00:20:18.680 to it, but it wasn't a coyote. I'd heard coyotes 374 00:20:18.720 --> 00:20:21.680 plenty of times. We'd had them around the base housing 375 00:20:21.720 --> 00:20:24.119 in Kentucky, and you could hear them at night almost 376 00:20:24.200 --> 00:20:28.119 every week. Coyotes yip and bark and howl, and even 377 00:20:28.119 --> 00:20:30.519 when a whole pack gets going at once, you can 378 00:20:30.559 --> 00:20:34.599 tell what they are. This was a single voice, one animal, 379 00:20:35.200 --> 00:20:37.799 and the sound it made was unlike anything I'd heard 380 00:20:37.799 --> 00:20:41.599 before or have heard since. Over the next two weeks, 381 00:20:41.640 --> 00:20:45.599 I heard it three more times, always at night, always 382 00:20:45.599 --> 00:20:49.279 from the same general direction, south and east, toward the 383 00:20:49.319 --> 00:20:52.759 deep timber along the creek. The second time I heard it, 384 00:20:53.039 --> 00:20:56.240 I was already awake, reading by flashlight under my covers, 385 00:20:56.559 --> 00:20:58.200 and I was able to get to the window and 386 00:20:58.279 --> 00:21:02.200 listen more carefully. It was the same call, that low 387 00:21:02.279 --> 00:21:06.039 building growl that escalated into something high and terrible and 388 00:21:06.079 --> 00:21:10.160 then stopped cold. But this time, about fifteen seconds after 389 00:21:10.200 --> 00:21:14.640 it ended, I heard a second call, fainter, farther away, 390 00:21:15.400 --> 00:21:17.960 coming from somewhere to the west, on the other side 391 00:21:17.960 --> 00:21:18.640 of the property. 392 00:21:19.240 --> 00:21:22.000 Two of them. There were at least two of them. 393 00:21:22.240 --> 00:21:23.960 I pulled back from the window and sat on the 394 00:21:24.079 --> 00:21:26.200 edge of my bed and felt a kind of fear 395 00:21:26.240 --> 00:21:29.920 that I didn't know existed. Not the fun, thrilling fear 396 00:21:30.000 --> 00:21:32.200 of scary movies and campfire stories. 397 00:21:32.799 --> 00:21:34.720 This was primitive, ancient. 398 00:21:35.559 --> 00:21:37.279 It was the fear of something out there in the 399 00:21:37.359 --> 00:21:40.559 dark that you cannot see and do not understand, and 400 00:21:40.599 --> 00:21:42.599 that is aware of exactly where you are. 401 00:21:43.480 --> 00:21:46.319