Scientist: Bigfoot Is the Real Deal

By John Elvin

It's become quite routine to see the glaring headlines in the tabloids touting tales such as "Bigfoot Stole My Lunch!" but it's another thing entirely when the mysterious, apelike creature shows up in a reputable, solid journal such as National Geographic. But there he is in a recent Geographic news story, introduced by the headline: "Forensic Expert Says Bigfoot Is Real."

The article goes on to quote Jeff Meldrum, an anatomy professor at Idaho State University, saying that the scientific evidence he has reviewed convinces him that "there's a creature out there that is yet to be identified." That may sound as though Meldrum is hedging his bets a tad, but it's a pretty decent stretch of the neck for an academic. Perpetrators of hoaxes have made vouching for Bigfoot a precarious position to take.

Meldrum has a collection of more than 150 casts of footprints of the legendary creature, also known as the Yeti or Sasquatch. In conjunction with his own investigations, the professor turned the collection over to a Texas fingerprint/footprint expert, Jimmy Chilcutt of the Conroe Police Department. Chilcutt says there's one particular footprint in the assemblage that made a believer of him as well. The print, discovered in Walla Walla, Wash., in 1987, wasn't made by a human or by any known primate, the investigator says.

Not convinced? Well, you and quite an army of skeptics. The Geographic article concludes with the note that the controversy won't be resolved in favor of Bigfoot until a carcass is produced. And when you think back on cases such as the Cardiff Giant and the Piltdown Man, you have to wonder if even a carcass will settle the question of Bigfoot. Maybe we should leave the poor critter alone and thereby perhaps save a few tabloids from extinction.

From: Insight Magazine, 13 November 2003.