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While looking through some newspaper microfilm for something unrelated, I ran across this. Sherman Democrat, in Sherman TX. For those unfamiliar, Sherman is in Grayson County. Lake Texoma, and the Red River is along it's northern border. The article refers to "Highway 82" which is present day "Highway 56". I made a copy, but it was hard to read, so I re-typed it. Looked on Mapquest and Blue Creek crosses the highway in a couple of places. Huge Ape Reported Seen At Blue Creek By WILLIE JACOBS Democrat Staff Writer (July 20, 1960) BLUE CREEK- Is there a gorilla loose near this small community? J.O. Conrad, his wife and son, who live here three miles east of Sherman on Highway 82, say they saw "a seven-foot gorilla or some kind of monster" Monday night near their home. His story came to light only Friday. The animal has been reported seen near Bells by one other person. Some people merely shake their heads and smile at the story while others stand behind Conrad's report. Gorilla or not the citizens of Blue Creek are keeping their doors locked tight and firearms handy. Conrad said he had just gone to bed Monday night about 10:30 or 11. "I was smoking a cigarette when the dog started barking," he said. " I looked out the east window and saw him, He looked to be seven feet tall and about three feet wide across the back. He stood upright but hunched over." At first glimpse Conrad said he thought it might be a man walking through his yard. "Then I saw it was too big to be a man," he explained. "I jumped out of bed and got my flashlight and gun." Mrs. Conrad and their son, James, 13, watched the creature from the bedroom window. Conrad said he stepped off his front porch toward the animal and fired three times. "I know I hit him at least once. but he didn't even flinch. That's when I went after my shotgun," Conrad said. Mrs. Conrad called the sheriff's office in Sherman. Deputies warned against shooting the animal, afraid a bullet wound would cause it to attack. "I fired the shotgun over his head, but he didn't run, just shuffled of to the east down the side of the highway," Conrad continued. "I jumped in my car and followed. I got a real good look at him in my headlights while I was following him. "He looked black as coal. He was real hairy except for his face," he said. "I was about 20 feet from him when I shot, and I didn't try to get closer. I was scared." All the way to the Blue Creek bottom, a few hundred yards east of the community, Conrad said the animal swayed and shuffled slowly along on his back legs. "His front legs were just hanging down and swinging around," he said. After the animal went into the underbrush at the creek, Conrad said he gave up the search, afraid to follow the beast in the brush. Mrs. Curtis Wilson, who lives about 100 yards east of Conrad across the highway, said she and her husband were awakened shortly before Conrad saw the animal. "We heard something rattling around in the shrubbery beside the house, and our two dogs were going crazy," Mrs. Wilson said. "Then we heard something thump against the house and the dogs hushed, just like they had been turned off." When her husband went outside, Mrs. Wilson said the dogs were cowering in a corner on the porch and "shaking just like somebody had whipped them." At the same time, Mrs. Wilson said the Wilson's cows hehind the house had begun an uproar. The Wilson's first thought of a wolf. "Then we heard Mr. Conrad shooting and my husband got his deer rifle. But by the time he got out to the highway, whatever it was had gone into the creek bottom brush," she said. Mrs. Wilson said most of the people living near the community had kept their dooors locked since. Conrad said his wife was so scared that she did not go to sleep the rest of the night and had to have medical treatment the next day. W.B. Thompson of 716 S. Burdette, Sherman was working the same night at an all-night station in the Star community between Bells and Denison. He said a man drove into the station for gas and told him he had just seen a large, strange-looking animal along the roadside near Bells. Thompson did not get the man's name. Conrad said that as he started to follow the beast in his car another car came down the highway approaching the animal from behind. "That fellow must have seen the gorilla because he threw on his brakes and almost stopped at the side of the animal. Then he stepped on it and got out of there. I thought he would stop and help me, but he must of been scared, too." Grayson Sheriff's Deputy James Spaugh answered Mrs. Conrad's call for help. He said that as far as he is concerned "Conrad definitely saw something and it wasn't a man." Next morning Conrad took his wife to the doctor. When he returned around noon, he could find no tracks on the hard dry ground. "Some men who work around here had drug a wrecked car over the spot where I saw that thing standing. There weren't any tracks left," he said. Conrad said he had never seen a gorilla before. "I looked in my dictionary the next morning and found one. I know I saw a gorilla," he said. At the suggestion of a possible hunt for the beast in the Blue Creek bottom, Conrad said: "With that gorilla down there? Not me, buddy. I'm scared."

Don't plus my post you nimrods, plus the OP!

Run by Eric Altman. I posted about last years event and many were disheartened it was on such short notice: http://www.pabigfootcampingadventure.com/ It's a good time if you're in the area.

I think Hiflier's idea is a good one. Not for finding remains, although it helps in that regard, but to focus in an area where there is an elder BF which may be easier to track or kill. Like any other animal, BF's physical abilities must degrade as it gets older and its helpful to know an area which may have one. Hiflier, you should use the SSR for this, it easily creates google earth maps of search results. Below is a google earth layer of all Class A sightings in WA between 1990 and 1995. Load it into google earth and go to town... This is the KML file: WA-1990-1995-Class-A.kml A screen shot of part of the SSR search function is below, the form is so big it won't fit in a single screen....

I can't recall one single description of an ape-type hand on a BF, nor an observed limitation that would indicate an ape-type hand on a BF. Another reason I think they're some kind of primitive man. (And I don't trust all those footprints)

Interesting thought. ^ There have been cultures throughout human history that honoured their dead family members by consuming their flesh shortly after death, thereby "absorbing" the ancestor's spirit.

I had to plus that! (MIBs love irony ...)

I found another small article a couple of weeks after this one about a man of about 50 and a couple of teenagers. They lived about 20 miles west of Sherman in Cooke county. The man was dressed in a gorilla mask and they were trying to frighten people. They were apprehended and said they got the idea from the previous article in the Sherman Democrat. Said they were just trying to have some fun.

Without proof of such fabrication you are doing exactly what you accuse the witnesses of: fabrication and having insight others do not have. It is not at all surprising that different witnesses report different experiences. After all they are dealing with different Sasquatch in different locations interacting with different humans. That there is variation, in my estimation, lends credibility to most witness experiences. Some, outside of the forum have reported experiences I do not believe. Things usually fall apart if you look at the details and changes in the story each time the event is recalled. If witness reports and BF behaviors were all identical and all looked and acted like Patty, I would be very suspicious. I think some evidence of that is in artists renditions. Many of them look too much alike, suggesting mutual influence. As with humans, I would expect some wide variations on appearance of individual BF. Especially since BF are geographically isolated from each other and have been for thousands of years. An artist always brings in artistic license and preconceptions into their art. Other than Patty, most images of BF are artist renditions. While some may be accurate, I think artistic renditions may have been given too much emphasis and influence, perhaps to the point of influencing memories of witness experiences. The human mind tends to fill in the blanks if memory or someone should have a fleeting glimpse of a BF through the trees. Blanks in memory are filled in from prior experience. Without that prior experience to draw from, I would not be at all surprised if what is remembered is all the various artists renditions of BF a person has seen in their life.

Interesting, thanks for the post. Well before the PGF too, when most people never heard of Bigfoot. I imagine the man just thought it was some sort of animal and expected it to travel on all fours, or like a gorilla would. Being it was bipedal he didn't know how to explain it. Also possible it was an old BF that had physical problems, which was why it was prowling around houses looking for an easy meal. It is, what the heck is wrong with you people, plus his post.

As Mendoza suggest, most of these adaptions are not biological in nature, though the basic framework for survival at the top of the food chain was established in the biology of the creature over time. It always was a primate, probably not quite so large, but as with Bergman's law, being forced out of the temperate tropical rain forest habitat and into colder climates, it certainly increased its mass through natural selection. The result of the biology we see today took place over long periods of time, or if you may it was by design. Either way, it has resulted in a very large body mass, also a large brain. It has intelligence on par with our early ancestors, simply because it does not fabricate tools from non primitive sources, or use fire, does not require that it must be of a lesser intelligence, only that it does not need either. It is maximizing it's capacity of intelligence in it's means of survival, which is obviously completely other to ours. Certainly other animals exhibit brain capacity and intelligence and precognition in very human types of ways, Killer whales teeming up to create a wave that will knock a seal off of a small iceberg. That takes a good amount of understanding and intelligence to teem up with that express purpose. Perhaps it was discovered by accident, but none the less it shows that intelligence among mammals has surprising similarities at times. I have heard of coyotes faking being injured to lure prey out to the pack, these things litter the animal world when we look around. So the particular adaptions that allow Sasquatch to persist are ones that took place in the mind of the creatures, it developed this type of intelligence, necessary to its mode of survival. It is the boss of it's environment as the result, and other animals know that and avoid them...we might not be so intelligent in that regard. One need not be a scientist to arrive at certain conclusions, if it exists, it has specialized in some pretty unique manners.

And yet, there are consistent reports in arid areas also.