WEBVTT 1 00:00:02.480 --> 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 00:01:02.799 --> 00:01:05.480 I've been building this road trip state by state, and 14 00:01:05.519 --> 00:01:08.000 I like doing it that way because it puts a 15 00:01:08.040 --> 00:01:11.799 legend down in the dirt where it belongs, a specific county, 16 00:01:12.159 --> 00:01:15.079 a specific creek, a place you could drive to this 17 00:01:15.159 --> 00:01:17.840 afternoon if you had a full tank and nothing better 18 00:01:17.879 --> 00:01:21.319 to do. The problem is that the reports don't organize 19 00:01:21.359 --> 00:01:24.239 themselves by state line. They come in the way they 20 00:01:24.280 --> 00:01:26.599 come in, and most of them don't fit into an 21 00:01:26.599 --> 00:01:30.519 episode about the Ozarks or the Alleghenies or the Cascades, 22 00:01:30.959 --> 00:01:33.439 because the person telling it doesn't care what state it 23 00:01:33.560 --> 00:01:37.439 happened in. They care that it happened to them. So 24 00:01:37.480 --> 00:01:39.640 I've got five sitting in a folder that I've been 25 00:01:39.640 --> 00:01:42.120 wanting to tell for a while, and this seemed like 26 00:01:42.200 --> 00:01:43.079 the place to do it. 27 00:01:43.640 --> 00:01:45.159 Two of these are what people. 28 00:01:44.879 --> 00:01:49.599 Call upright canine, dog man, wolf man, whatever word you're 29 00:01:49.640 --> 00:01:53.879 comfortable with. The other three are sasquatch encounters or at 30 00:01:53.959 --> 00:01:56.920 least something large and hair covered that walked on two legs, 31 00:01:57.480 --> 00:02:01.599 four decades between the oldest and the newest, five different states, 32 00:02:01.920 --> 00:02:04.519 and no connection between any of them except that the 33 00:02:04.560 --> 00:02:07.920 people involved all ended up carrying something they couldn't explain. 34 00:02:08.840 --> 00:02:12.080 I've been collecting stories for a long time now. I 35 00:02:12.080 --> 00:02:14.639 had my own sighting in Washington State in the summer 36 00:02:14.680 --> 00:02:17.400 of twenty twenty four while we were filming a documentary, 37 00:02:18.080 --> 00:02:20.479 which changed the way I do this work more than 38 00:02:20.520 --> 00:02:21.520 I expected it too. 39 00:02:22.479 --> 00:02:23.560 Before that, I was. 40 00:02:23.560 --> 00:02:27.080 A man writing down and sharing other people's stories. After 41 00:02:27.719 --> 00:02:29.879 I was still a man writing down and sharing other 42 00:02:29.879 --> 00:02:33.080 people's stories. But now I'm a man who knows exactly 43 00:02:33.120 --> 00:02:35.199 what it feels like to walk back to a truck, 44 00:02:35.479 --> 00:02:38.560 understanding that you've crossed a line and that most of 45 00:02:38.560 --> 00:02:40.319 the people in your life are going to stay on 46 00:02:40.360 --> 00:02:43.719 the other side of it permanently. It's a lonesome thing, 47 00:02:44.080 --> 00:02:46.080 and it's a lonesome thing even when you host a 48 00:02:46.120 --> 00:02:48.919 podcast about it. So I try to keep that in 49 00:02:48.960 --> 00:02:51.680 mind when somebody's sitting across from me working up the 50 00:02:51.759 --> 00:02:55.000 nerve to start. Three of these five people never went 51 00:02:55.039 --> 00:02:58.639 looking for anybody to tell. They got found, or somebody 52 00:02:58.680 --> 00:03:01.479 in their family pushed them forward, or they answered a 53 00:03:01.560 --> 00:03:03.759 question at a table after an event when the room 54 00:03:03.800 --> 00:03:07.000 felt safe enough. Only two of them came looking for 55 00:03:07.039 --> 00:03:07.919 a place to put it. 56 00:03:08.639 --> 00:03:09.639 That ratio has. 57 00:03:09.520 --> 00:03:12.520 Held roughly steady for forty years, which is why I'll 58 00:03:12.520 --> 00:03:15.000 sit at a signing table until the building manager runs 59 00:03:15.039 --> 00:03:18.400 me off, because the story you actually want almost never 60 00:03:18.479 --> 00:03:21.400 walks up to the microphone on its own. And I'd 61 00:03:21.400 --> 00:03:24.400 also say that the apology is almost as common as 62 00:03:24.439 --> 00:03:28.319 the confusion about what they experienced. Most of the messages 63 00:03:28.360 --> 00:03:31.560 I get start with something like I'm sorry to bother you, 64 00:03:31.840 --> 00:03:34.800 I know how this sounds, or I've never told anybody this. 65 00:03:35.520 --> 00:03:38.199 I've read some version of that opening line, probably a 66 00:03:38.240 --> 00:03:41.840 thousand times by now. The first story tonight is from 67 00:03:41.919 --> 00:03:44.800 right here in my neck of the woods, the mountains 68 00:03:44.800 --> 00:03:47.599 of North Carolina, in the summer of nineteen eighty five, 69 00:03:48.280 --> 00:03:51.159 and it involves a front porch that didn't survive the week. 70 00:03:51.879 --> 00:03:54.680 He'd graduated high school that spring, and he was supposed 71 00:03:54.680 --> 00:03:57.680 to be getting ready for college. His mother had taken 72 00:03:57.680 --> 00:04:00.800 a job about fifty miles away, which was far enough 73 00:04:00.840 --> 00:04:03.840 that driving it twice a day made no sense, so 74 00:04:03.879 --> 00:04:06.280 she stayed near her work during the week and came 75 00:04:06.319 --> 00:04:09.199 home when she could. That left him alone in the 76 00:04:09.240 --> 00:04:12.159 house most of the time, which at eighteen is either 77 00:04:12.280 --> 00:04:14.919 the best thing that's ever happened to you or the worst, 78 00:04:15.439 --> 00:04:19.319 depending on the week. You're having no neighbors within shouting distance, 79 00:04:19.959 --> 00:04:23.759 a grandfather's place off through the trees somewhere, a telephone 80 00:04:23.759 --> 00:04:26.319 on the wall, and that was his whole connection to 81 00:04:26.360 --> 00:04:27.360 another human being. 82 00:04:27.439 --> 00:04:28.360 Once it got dark. 83 00:04:29.279 --> 00:04:31.639 The house sat up in the mountains, where the daytime 84 00:04:31.680 --> 00:04:34.839 temperatures ran into the eighties that summer and dropped into 85 00:04:34.879 --> 00:04:38.279 the fifties overnight, which is the reason people build houses 86 00:04:38.360 --> 00:04:40.839 up there in the first place. There was no air 87 00:04:40.839 --> 00:04:43.959 conditioning and no need for any He'd opened the window 88 00:04:43.959 --> 00:04:46.160 at the head of his bed, let the cool air 89 00:04:46.199 --> 00:04:49.279 come through the screen, and sleep with the mountain moving 90 00:04:49.319 --> 00:04:52.800 around outside the way it had every summer of his life. 91 00:04:52.839 --> 00:04:54.720 I need to give you the layout of that house, 92 00:04:55.079 --> 00:04:58.279 because the layout is most of the story. The couch 93 00:04:58.279 --> 00:05:00.800 in the den sat about five feet the front door. 94 00:05:01.399 --> 00:05:03.519 The door itself was a seven foot door with a 95 00:05:03.600 --> 00:05:07.040 narrow window set into it, roughly twenty four inches tall 96 00:05:07.079 --> 00:05:09.720 and six inches wide, running from the top of the 97 00:05:09.759 --> 00:05:11.879 door down to about the five foot mark. 98 00:05:12.800 --> 00:05:14.839 It wasn't a picture window. It was a. 99 00:05:14.720 --> 00:05:17.519 Slot about as wide as your hand, and through it 100 00:05:17.800 --> 00:05:20.240 he could see whatever was going on out in the yard. 101 00:05:21.120 --> 00:05:23.360 That first night, it was the last of the twilight, 102 00:05:23.759 --> 00:05:26.920 and then it was moonlight. After the twilight went he'd 103 00:05:27.000 --> 00:05:30.639 driven his girlfriend home that evening, he came back, opened 104 00:05:30.639 --> 00:05:33.240 his bedroom window the way he always did, and then 105 00:05:33.279 --> 00:05:36.240 went into the den and put his feet up. Anybody 106 00:05:36.240 --> 00:05:38.439 who spent a summer in those mountains knows what a 107 00:05:38.480 --> 00:05:42.120 house like that sounds like after dark, the screen breathing 108 00:05:42.199 --> 00:05:44.920 in and out with the air, the boards ticking as 109 00:05:44.959 --> 00:05:48.079 they give up the day's heat, whipper wheels going somewhere 110 00:05:48.120 --> 00:05:50.759 down the ridge, and a dog answering another dog a 111 00:05:50.800 --> 00:05:54.160 half mile off. It's a lot of noise, and you 112 00:05:54.279 --> 00:05:57.079 quit hearing any of it after about a week, the 113 00:05:57.120 --> 00:05:59.160 same way you quit hearing a train if you live 114 00:05:59.240 --> 00:06:02.199 near a track. He turned the television off and picked 115 00:06:02.240 --> 00:06:04.720 up his guitar and played for a while, and he 116 00:06:04.720 --> 00:06:06.600 hadn't been at it long when he got the feeling 117 00:06:06.639 --> 00:06:08.800 that somebody was watching him. 118 00:06:08.879 --> 00:06:09.519 So he put the. 119 00:06:09.480 --> 00:06:12.680 Guitar down and he listened, and what he heard was 120 00:06:12.680 --> 00:06:16.720 the porch boards creaking. That porch was small, twelve feet 121 00:06:16.759 --> 00:06:19.600 across or thereabouts, and the boards on it were doing 122 00:06:19.639 --> 00:06:23.279 what boards do when weight moves across them. When he 123 00:06:23.319 --> 00:06:26.399 looked toward the door, the window in it was completely black. 124 00:06:27.399 --> 00:06:29.680 No moonlight was coming through the bottom of it, and 125 00:06:29.720 --> 00:06:32.040 none was coming through the top of it either, which 126 00:06:32.079 --> 00:06:34.839 meant whatever was standing out there was covering the entire 127 00:06:34.920 --> 00:06:37.800 opening on a seven foot door frame. And then the 128 00:06:37.839 --> 00:06:40.680 door started to jiggle, so he shouted and asked who 129 00:06:40.720 --> 00:06:43.399 was out there, and nobody answered him. 130 00:06:43.600 --> 00:06:44.439 He said later that. 131 00:06:44.399 --> 00:06:46.800 The thing he couldn't get past sitting there in the 132 00:06:46.879 --> 00:06:49.720 dark that first night was the top of that window. 133 00:06:50.560 --> 00:06:52.560 A man on the porch would have blocked the bottom 134 00:06:52.600 --> 00:06:55.199 of it and left light at the top. Whatever was 135 00:06:55.199 --> 00:06:57.720 out there had it covered all the way up, and 136 00:06:57.800 --> 00:06:59.839 he was looking at a piece of glass that started 137 00:06:59.879 --> 00:07:03.399 at the five foot mark and ran to seven. What 138 00:07:03.519 --> 00:07:07.519 broke it was the dog's, his grandfather's dogs came in barking, 139 00:07:07.839 --> 00:07:10.839 and it wasn't a warning bark They were coming in wild. 140 00:07:11.800 --> 00:07:14.600 The whole port screeched at once, the way a structure 141 00:07:14.639 --> 00:07:17.399 screeches when weight comes off it in a hurry, and 142 00:07:17.480 --> 00:07:19.839 the moonlight came back through that slot in the door. 143 00:07:20.720 --> 00:07:24.120 The dogs went past the house, still barking, chasing whatever 144 00:07:24.160 --> 00:07:26.800 it was, and that was the end of it. He 145 00:07:26.879 --> 00:07:29.560 got his three point fifty seven black Hawk revolver and 146 00:07:29.639 --> 00:07:32.279 he stayed on the couch with it until daylight, without 147 00:07:32.279 --> 00:07:35.399 getting up and without going out to look. There was 148 00:07:35.439 --> 00:07:37.920 a softball tournament at the local field the next day, 149 00:07:38.399 --> 00:07:40.720 and he got home right as it was getting dark. 150 00:07:41.319 --> 00:07:43.399 He didn't turn on the television, and he didn't turn 151 00:07:43.439 --> 00:07:46.720 on any lights. He sat down on that same couch 152 00:07:46.759 --> 00:07:49.480 with the revolver and he waited, which is not what 153 00:07:49.519 --> 00:07:51.720 most eighteen year olds do with a Saturday night and 154 00:07:51.759 --> 00:07:54.160 an empty house. And it tells you where his head 155 00:07:54.319 --> 00:07:58.319 was after the night before hours went by a house 156 00:07:58.360 --> 00:08:01.800 that age ticks and settles, it cools off, and every 157 00:08:01.800 --> 00:08:05.680 time it did, he came up off the cushions. Around midnight, 158 00:08:05.720 --> 00:08:08.480 the porch started squeaking again, and this time he could 159 00:08:08.480 --> 00:08:12.600 hear the footsteps clearly. He described them as heavy. The 160 00:08:12.600 --> 00:08:15.040 window in the door went black, the same as before, 161 00:08:15.639 --> 00:08:18.079 and then something took hold of the doorknob and started 162 00:08:18.079 --> 00:08:21.079 shaking it. He was specific about that sound when he 163 00:08:21.120 --> 00:08:23.839 told it. He called it a jiggle, and he said 164 00:08:23.839 --> 00:08:26.600 it happened twice, which is a small detail, but it's 165 00:08:26.639 --> 00:08:29.279 the kind of thing that stays with a person. Nobody 166 00:08:29.360 --> 00:08:32.840 was pounding or slamming. Something was working a doorknob the 167 00:08:32.879 --> 00:08:34.720 way you'd work a doorknob if you were trying to 168 00:08:34.720 --> 00:08:35.120 get in. 169 00:08:36.000 --> 00:08:37.279 He pointed the revolver at. 170 00:08:37.200 --> 00:08:38.960 The door and yelled that he'd blow it to hell, 171 00:08:39.840 --> 00:08:41.559 and the thing on the other side of that door 172 00:08:41.600 --> 00:08:44.279 screamed back at him, and what he heard it scream 173 00:08:44.559 --> 00:08:47.879 was straight to hell. He'd been holding a gun on 174 00:08:47.919 --> 00:08:50.360 that door for two nights running, and he'd never once 175 00:08:50.440 --> 00:08:54.240 considered the possibility that whatever was out there might answer him. 176 00:08:54.519 --> 00:08:56.840 It hit the side of the house after that and 177 00:08:56.879 --> 00:08:59.320 it kept screaming the whole time it was doing it, 178 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:02.759 And when the screaming finally stopped, he heard his grandfather's 179 00:09:02.799 --> 00:09:05.879 dogs coming again, and it left. He stayed on the 180 00:09:05.879 --> 00:09:08.440 couch the rest of that night and eventually dozed off, 181 00:09:08.879 --> 00:09:10.639 which is what happens to all of us, no matter 182 00:09:10.679 --> 00:09:13.080 how scared we are, And he woke up when the 183 00:09:13.080 --> 00:09:15.879 front door opened and came very close to shooting his 184 00:09:15.919 --> 00:09:19.840 own grandfather. It was daylight by then, and his grandfather 185 00:09:19.919 --> 00:09:22.679 had some questions. He wanted to know whether the boy 186 00:09:22.679 --> 00:09:25.440 had been drinking, he wanted to know whether he'd backed 187 00:09:25.440 --> 00:09:28.600 the jeep into the porch, and more than either of those, 188 00:09:28.679 --> 00:09:31.279 he wanted to know how in the world he'd managed 189 00:09:31.320 --> 00:09:33.440 to tear the siding off the outside. 190 00:09:32.960 --> 00:09:33.799 Wall of the house. 191 00:09:34.360 --> 00:09:36.200 So the two of them walked out and looked at 192 00:09:36.240 --> 00:09:38.919 it together, and the damage was worse than the boy 193 00:09:38.960 --> 00:09:42.519 had understood from inside. The porch had been knocked off 194 00:09:42.519 --> 00:09:46.559 as supporting pillars, not scuffed and not cracked, knocked off. 195 00:09:46.559 --> 00:09:49.480 The pillars that had been sitting on and beside the 196 00:09:49.480 --> 00:09:52.879 front door pressed into the damage siding. There was an 197 00:09:52.879 --> 00:09:55.639 impression that looked like an arm as thick as his 198 00:09:55.720 --> 00:09:59.279 own leg and about twenty inches long. He told his 199 00:09:59.320 --> 00:10:03.399 grandfather what had happened both nights, all of it. His 200 00:10:03.480 --> 00:10:05.919 grandfather didn't believe a word of it, and the old 201 00:10:06.000 --> 00:10:09.080 man's working theory was that his grandson had come home drunk, 202 00:10:09.440 --> 00:10:12.360 driven into the porch, and then gone after the siding with. 203 00:10:12.360 --> 00:10:13.279 A baseball bat. 204 00:10:14.240 --> 00:10:16.399 That's the part of this account I keep coming back to, 205 00:10:16.879 --> 00:10:20.080 and it doesn't involve the creature at all. This kid 206 00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:22.320 had spent two nights in a dark house with a 207 00:10:22.360 --> 00:10:25.639 revolver in his hands. He'd had something scream at him 208 00:10:25.639 --> 00:10:28.120 through his own front door, and the first adult he 209 00:10:28.200 --> 00:10:32.120 told looked at the damage, looked at him, and landed 210 00:10:32.159 --> 00:10:35.480 on drunk with a temper. They spent the day repairing it. 211 00:10:36.039 --> 00:10:39.759 New siding, porch back up on its pillars, everything squared 212 00:10:39.759 --> 00:10:42.879 away before supper, the two of them working side by side, 213 00:10:42.919 --> 00:10:45.399 with one of them furious and the other one trying 214 00:10:45.440 --> 00:10:47.559 to find a way to say it again that would land. 215 00:10:48.360 --> 00:10:51.000 There's something in that repair day I've never been able 216 00:10:51.039 --> 00:10:54.200 to shake loose. He spent eight or nine hours with 217 00:10:54.240 --> 00:10:56.360 a hammer in his hand, next to a man who 218 00:10:56.440 --> 00:10:59.080 thought he was a liar, putting new siding over the 219 00:10:59.120 --> 00:11:02.320 exact spot where an arm shaped impression had been, and 220 00:11:02.399 --> 00:11:04.759 every board they nailed up took away the only thing 221 00:11:04.799 --> 00:11:08.039 he had that might have backed him up. By supper, 222 00:11:08.279 --> 00:11:11.279 there was nothing left to show anybody. His mother got 223 00:11:11.279 --> 00:11:13.679 home from work before the third night, so we had 224 00:11:13.679 --> 00:11:17.200 to sit through the lecture two drinking, losing his temper, 225 00:11:17.519 --> 00:11:20.759 beating the house with a baseball bat, driving into the porch. 226 00:11:21.480 --> 00:11:23.759 Both of the adults he answered to had now told 227 00:11:23.840 --> 00:11:26.480 him that the thing he'd lived through hadn't happened, and 228 00:11:26.519 --> 00:11:29.200 that he was the one who broke the house. So 229 00:11:29.240 --> 00:11:31.879 he went to his bedroom and opened the window. He 230 00:11:31.879 --> 00:11:34.960 turned the lights off, let that cool mountain air come 231 00:11:34.960 --> 00:11:38.279 in the way he always did, and called his girlfriend, Kelly. 232 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:41.240 He had his own telephone and his own number, and 233 00:11:41.320 --> 00:11:44.320 his mother had a separate line, which sounds like nothing 234 00:11:44.440 --> 00:11:46.919 right now, but turns out to matter a great deal 235 00:11:47.000 --> 00:11:49.960 inside of ten minutes. The two of them talked for 236 00:11:50.039 --> 00:11:53.320 a long time. Then the smell came into the room, 237 00:11:53.639 --> 00:11:56.840 and he described it as putrid, like urine and death. 238 00:11:57.759 --> 00:12:00.000 If you've listened to this show for any length of time, 239 00:12:00.559 --> 00:12:03.600 you know that exact comparison turns up over and over 240 00:12:03.679 --> 00:12:08.879 in these accounts different witnesses, different states, different decades, and 241 00:12:08.960 --> 00:12:11.639 somehow the same two words keep coming out of people 242 00:12:11.679 --> 00:12:15.360 who've never spoken to each other. He could hear footsteps outside, 243 00:12:15.720 --> 00:12:18.399 and he told Kelly they sounded like two legged footsteps, 244 00:12:18.799 --> 00:12:20.840 and she laughed at him and said it was a skunk. 245 00:12:21.559 --> 00:12:24.320 He told her no, that he'd smelled this before, and 246 00:12:24.360 --> 00:12:27.399 that he could hear it walking. And then less than 247 00:12:27.440 --> 00:12:29.559 twenty four inches from his head, on the other side 248 00:12:29.600 --> 00:12:31.919 of that screen, something started breathing. 249 00:12:32.639 --> 00:12:33.000 He said. 250 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:36.200 The inhale ran something like fifteen seconds, and then it 251 00:12:36.279 --> 00:12:39.120 exhaled with a low growl, writing on the end of 252 00:12:39.159 --> 00:12:42.759 it for about that long. Again, fifteen seconds is longer 253 00:12:42.759 --> 00:12:46.159 than it sounds when you say it out loud, long, slow, 254 00:12:46.279 --> 00:12:48.679 deep breaths right there at the head of his bed, 255 00:12:49.240 --> 00:12:52.200 close enough that he could feel the air moving toward him. 256 00:12:52.360 --> 00:12:53.600 And it wasn't in any. 257 00:12:53.440 --> 00:12:54.480 Hurry about it either. 258 00:12:55.600 --> 00:12:58.080 He told Kelly what was happening, and she joked at first, 259 00:12:58.639 --> 00:13:01.200 because what else does a teenage do when her boyfriend 260 00:13:01.200 --> 00:13:04.080 says there's a monster at his window. He told her 261 00:13:04.159 --> 00:13:06.399 he was going to shoot through the screen, but he 262 00:13:06.440 --> 00:13:10.639 didn't because he couldn't make himself move the breathing got 263 00:13:10.679 --> 00:13:13.600 louder and deeper, and the smell got worse, and then 264 00:13:13.639 --> 00:13:16.519 he watched a huge hand press flat against that window 265 00:13:16.559 --> 00:13:20.480 screen and push it inward. That's when the dogs came back, 266 00:13:20.840 --> 00:13:23.919 and he said they sounded completely different this time, not 267 00:13:24.039 --> 00:13:27.120 the wild, aggressive barking from the first two nights, but 268 00:13:27.279 --> 00:13:30.399 high pitched yelping, which he described. 269 00:13:29.840 --> 00:13:33.360 As pure fear. What ended it was a shotgun. 270 00:13:34.200 --> 00:13:37.080 Right after the blast, he heard BlackBerry bushes and grapevines 271 00:13:37.120 --> 00:13:39.960 being torn apart, and a scream going away from the 272 00:13:40.000 --> 00:13:43.399 house and fading off into the distance, And then his 273 00:13:43.480 --> 00:13:46.080 grandfather's voice came through the window, asking if he was 274 00:13:46.120 --> 00:13:49.759 all right. Here's how the old man got there. Kelly 275 00:13:49.799 --> 00:13:51.879 had hung up the phone and called his mother, and 276 00:13:51.919 --> 00:13:55.399 his mother called his grandfather. Kelly had heard the breathing 277 00:13:55.440 --> 00:13:58.639 and the growling coming through the telephone line, and she'd 278 00:13:58.639 --> 00:14:02.000 heard what her boyfriend's voice sounded like, and she decided 279 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:04.559 this wasn't a joke and started making calls. In the 280 00:14:04.600 --> 00:14:07.639 middle of the night, his grandfather put a load of 281 00:14:07.639 --> 00:14:10.440 buckshot into what he later called the bear's rear end. 282 00:14:11.039 --> 00:14:12.679 The next morning, the two of them went out to 283 00:14:12.679 --> 00:14:15.039 look at the grapevines, and the witness said they looked 284 00:14:15.080 --> 00:14:17.519 like a truck had driven through them. Out in the 285 00:14:17.519 --> 00:14:21.679 middle of the garden, they found footprints five toes about 286 00:14:21.720 --> 00:14:24.600 twenty inches long, with the distance between them working out 287 00:14:24.679 --> 00:14:27.519 to a stride of around nine feet. Then he went 288 00:14:27.600 --> 00:14:29.759 back and looked at the screen on his bedroom window, 289 00:14:30.200 --> 00:14:32.559 and there was a handprint pressed into it, roughly three 290 00:14:32.600 --> 00:14:36.000 times the size of his own hand. His grandfather told 291 00:14:36.080 --> 00:14:38.320 him they'd never speak of it again, and as far 292 00:14:38.360 --> 00:14:40.960 as I can tell, for the better part of forty years, 293 00:14:41.399 --> 00:14:44.559 they didn't. The second one comes out of West Virginia, 294 00:14:45.000 --> 00:14:49.039 which is around seventy eight percent forest, mountains and hollows 295 00:14:49.080 --> 00:14:51.399 and creek bottoms folded up on top of each other, 296 00:14:52.000 --> 00:14:55.320 roads that run out into nothing, and more standing timber 297 00:14:55.399 --> 00:14:57.840 than most people in this country have ever seen in 298 00:14:57.919 --> 00:15:01.559 one place. Stay tuned for more bad back woods bigfoot stories. 299 00:15:01.879 --> 00:15:06.919 We'll be back after these messages. The witness was twenty 300 00:15:06.960 --> 00:15:09.559 three years old, and he was the kind of fisherman 301 00:15:09.600 --> 00:15:10.919 who isn't really doing it. 302 00:15:10.840 --> 00:15:13.720 For the fish. There was a secluded. 303 00:15:13.240 --> 00:15:15.919 Spot he knew about beside the water, back in the 304 00:15:15.960 --> 00:15:18.679 woods where nobody else went, and if he got up 305 00:15:18.720 --> 00:15:20.440 in the middle of the night and hiked in through 306 00:15:20.480 --> 00:15:23.879 the dark. That spot belonged to him and nobody else 307 00:15:23.919 --> 00:15:27.480 for about three hours. Most serious fishermen I've known have 308 00:15:27.519 --> 00:15:29.960 a place like that, and most of them won't. 309 00:15:29.720 --> 00:15:33.240 Tell you where it is. So that's what he did up. 310 00:15:33.120 --> 00:15:35.399 In the middle of the night, in through the woods 311 00:15:35.399 --> 00:15:37.639 in the dark, and by the time the sun started 312 00:15:37.639 --> 00:15:40.879 coming up, he'd caught three fish. At some point, his 313 00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:43.080 mother called and asked him to pick up her medication 314 00:15:43.159 --> 00:15:45.320 on the way home, and he got off the phone 315 00:15:45.360 --> 00:15:47.840 and got ready to cast again. And that's when he 316 00:15:47.919 --> 00:15:51.639 noticed that something had changed. Everything around him had gone 317 00:15:51.720 --> 00:15:55.799 extremely quiet. He thought it was odd, particularly because he 318 00:15:55.840 --> 00:15:58.039 was standing in the middle of the woods, where quiet 319 00:15:58.080 --> 00:16:02.360 isn't the normal state of things. Birds, insects, water, wind, 320 00:16:03.399 --> 00:16:05.080 all of it had dropped out at once. 321 00:16:06.080 --> 00:16:06.759 He noticed it. 322 00:16:07.240 --> 00:16:09.399 He sat with it for a second, and then he 323 00:16:09.480 --> 00:16:13.360 let it go and kept fishing. Shortly after he cast 324 00:16:13.399 --> 00:16:15.759 his line, he heard splashing in the water, and he 325 00:16:15.799 --> 00:16:18.879 figured somebody else had come in, so he called out 326 00:16:18.919 --> 00:16:22.679 and asked if anyone was around. Nobody answered him. He 327 00:16:22.759 --> 00:16:26.000 waited a bit and cast again, and the splashing came back. 328 00:16:26.759 --> 00:16:29.799 Now he decided somebody was hidden nearby throwing rocks into 329 00:16:29.879 --> 00:16:32.639 the water, and he was annoyed about it because he'd 330 00:16:32.679 --> 00:16:34.720 gotten up in the middle of the night and walked 331 00:16:34.759 --> 00:16:38.000 in through the dark specifically to have this place to himself. 332 00:16:38.919 --> 00:16:41.200 He called out again and told whoever was doing it 333 00:16:41.200 --> 00:16:43.720 to knock it off and quit playing games. And he 334 00:16:43.759 --> 00:16:47.360 didn't get anything back that time either. Rocks landing in 335 00:16:47.360 --> 00:16:50.120 the water near somebody fishing alone shows up in these 336 00:16:50.159 --> 00:16:56.360 reports constantly, different states, different decades, different creatures being described. 337 00:16:57.080 --> 00:16:59.639 Somebody's on a bank or a gravel bar by themselves, 338 00:16:59.679 --> 00:17:01.879 and stof start coming out of the tree line and 339 00:17:01.960 --> 00:17:05.039 landing in the water near them, never on them, and 340 00:17:05.079 --> 00:17:08.440 it's one of the most consistent patterns in everything I've collected. 341 00:17:09.079 --> 00:17:11.079 He caught another fish and put it with the rest, 342 00:17:11.599 --> 00:17:14.720 and then he heard something different. Twigs and sticks were 343 00:17:14.759 --> 00:17:17.960 snapping somewhere back inside the woods, the way they snapped 344 00:17:18.000 --> 00:17:21.799 when something's walking through vegetation. The movement went a short 345 00:17:21.799 --> 00:17:25.279 distance and then it stopped. He called out again, asked 346 00:17:25.279 --> 00:17:28.599 whether somebody was walking around, told them to stop, and 347 00:17:28.680 --> 00:17:32.079 got no answer. That went on for several minutes, back 348 00:17:32.119 --> 00:17:36.000 and forth, movement and silence, and movement again. Then the 349 00:17:36.000 --> 00:17:39.319 pace picked up, and whatever was making the sound was 350 00:17:39.400 --> 00:17:41.400 moving faster and getting closer. 351 00:17:42.319 --> 00:17:42.680 He said. 352 00:17:42.720 --> 00:17:45.480 The character of the walking changed right at the end. 353 00:17:46.240 --> 00:17:48.279 It had been the kind of movement you'd expect from 354 00:17:48.279 --> 00:17:51.839 a person picking their way through brush, And then it 355 00:17:51.920 --> 00:17:55.440 wasn't careful anymore, and whatever or whoever was in there 356 00:17:55.720 --> 00:17:58.519 quit worrying about the noise it was making and came 357 00:17:58.559 --> 00:18:01.839 on through the vegetation towards the water. The first thing 358 00:18:01.880 --> 00:18:05.359 he actually saw was an eye. There was an opening 359 00:18:05.359 --> 00:18:07.599 in the foliage, and through it he saw a single, 360 00:18:07.640 --> 00:18:09.400 bright yellow eye looking. 361 00:18:09.119 --> 00:18:10.240 Back at him. 362 00:18:10.440 --> 00:18:12.920 Then the leaves got pushed apart, and he was staring 363 00:18:12.960 --> 00:18:15.640 at what he described as an enormous wolf's head. 364 00:18:16.359 --> 00:18:18.160 He used the word werewolf. 365 00:18:17.680 --> 00:18:19.759 When he finally told it, and he said it looked 366 00:18:19.799 --> 00:18:22.720 like something out of a horror movie. The creature came 367 00:18:22.759 --> 00:18:26.119 out from behind the foliage and walked upright on two legs, 368 00:18:26.480 --> 00:18:29.799 down toward the edge of the water. He froze and 369 00:18:29.839 --> 00:18:32.519 the fishing rod came out of his hands, and he 370 00:18:32.559 --> 00:18:35.960 stood there staring at it while it stared back at him. 371 00:18:36.200 --> 00:18:40.039 What he described was an enormous head, bright yellow eyes, 372 00:18:40.400 --> 00:18:43.839 massive shoulders, and unusually long arms hanging down in front 373 00:18:43.839 --> 00:18:47.279 of the body. The hands were extremely large, and there 374 00:18:47.279 --> 00:18:50.480 appeared to be claws coming off the fingers. The lower 375 00:18:50.480 --> 00:18:53.480 body looked canine to him, and he was specific about 376 00:18:53.480 --> 00:18:56.400 the legs, which he said were like a dog's legs. 377 00:18:57.119 --> 00:18:58.319 That combination is. 378 00:18:58.279 --> 00:18:59.000 What wrecked him. 379 00:18:59.599 --> 00:19:04.039 A wolf's head, a heavy human like upper body, long arms, 380 00:19:04.279 --> 00:19:08.160 clawed hands, and dog legs underneath all of it. He said, 381 00:19:08.160 --> 00:19:10.079 he couldn't make sense of what he was looking at, 382 00:19:10.519 --> 00:19:12.559 and as far as I can tell, he never really has. 383 00:19:13.599 --> 00:19:15.640 There's a thing that happens to people in the first 384 00:19:15.640 --> 00:19:18.559 second of one of these encounters, and he described it 385 00:19:18.599 --> 00:19:21.559 as well as anybody I've talked to. He didn't run, 386 00:19:21.839 --> 00:19:23.559 and he didn't yell, and he didn't reach for the 387 00:19:23.599 --> 00:19:26.400 gun he was carrying. He stood still, with his hands 388 00:19:26.400 --> 00:19:28.799 empty and the rod down in the mud at his feet, 389 00:19:29.319 --> 00:19:32.480 looking at an animal that shouldn't exist, while it stood 390 00:19:32.519 --> 00:19:36.039 in the shallows looking back at him. Whatever the human 391 00:19:36.079 --> 00:19:38.680 body does first, it isn't any of the things we 392 00:19:38.839 --> 00:19:42.319 like to imagine it would be. He started backing away, 393 00:19:42.720 --> 00:19:44.599 and he left the gear and the rod right where 394 00:19:44.599 --> 00:19:46.799 they'd fallen and headed for the trail out of there, 395 00:19:47.359 --> 00:19:50.200 and as he moved he could hear the thing following him. 396 00:19:50.440 --> 00:19:53.200 Then he noticed the pattern that changed the whole situation. 397 00:19:54.039 --> 00:19:58.079 When he stopped, it stopped. When he started walking again, 398 00:19:58.359 --> 00:20:01.599 the movement behind him started up again. He was standing 399 00:20:01.640 --> 00:20:03.839 at the edge of the water, with everything he'd carried 400 00:20:03.839 --> 00:20:07.400 in scattered behind him on the bank, doing the arithmetic 401 00:20:07.480 --> 00:20:10.200