The Logger's Story

by John Green

By no means all of the people interested in the sasquatch spend their time interviewing witnesses or digging up old stories. Some go hunting for the animal itself. Of course the odds against them are long, but if they succeed they have the satisfaction of experiencing something for themselves. They may be no more successful than any other witness in convincing other people, but they know what they have seen.

One man who spent many solitary hours in searching had phenomenal success and has contributed a great deal of information, yet is unknown to most of the public. He has passed on what he has seen, so that it is on the record, but he has asked to remain unidentified and those he has dealt with have generally respected his wishes.

His motivation to spend as much time as he did was strong and understandable, since it began with an accidental sighting that is one of the most unusual on record — the only close observation of a "family" group involving an infant. After that he spent a great deal of time in trying to see more, and at first was remarkably lucky, but later spent years having no better luck than the rest of us.

All of his experiences took place in the mountainous area drained by the Molalla and Clackamus Rivers south of Estacada, Oregon, where he worked as a logger. His first, accidental, sighting was in October, 1967, the same month that Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin got the movie. After that dedicated searching resulted in further sightings in the spring of 1968 and in November and December of that year. From then until a heart attack restricted his activities several years later he continued to search without another sighting, although he did find some very interesting tracks in February of 1969. As far as I know the report of his first encounter is the only one ever put on tape.

This is the story he told:

I was supposed to be watching a cat skinner as he was fire trailing, but it was awful cold, and I walked a mile or so down the trail, because he had no need of anyone at that time, and I thought I'd warm up and see the country. Up where he was it was a cold east wind blowing; a little farther down it was a west wind coming in. It was late fall, the last weekend of the deer season, I think, in 1967. It was just a mountain stroll — they have several of them up there — footpaths, and for horses. The elevation was about between four and five thousand feet. I came out lower down, into the fog, before I saw anything, and the fog was freezing on the trees because it was so cold, but if the wind would blow, the fog would break, and fall off. That mode it kind of noisy, it sounded like walking.

I came around a bend — well, first I noticed some rocks that were turned over. All the other rocks were wet, because of the fog, but these rocks were dry. Then I looked up, about forty or fifty feet, up on a ridge of rock, and I sow these animals there — looked like human or just about. Large male; the female wasn't so large; and a small baby — well not really small; it was moving with them. It was standing up, mostly. The two older ones were squatting down and sort of bending, as they picked up rocks and smelled them. They were kind of careful. They moved on for o few minutes, and then finally the male found possibly what he was looking for and dug real fast down into the rocks, which were targe boulders — not the round type of rock, but the flat, sharp kind.

I could not explain why those rocks were there; there hadn't been a slide or anything. They were on top of the ridge, so they couldn't have come down from anywhere. They are loose, quite o few holes underneath them. and they are as if they had been broken up — definitely not the round river-type rock. But they (the animals) would pick them up, and, after they smelled them, they would lay them down, on top of each other. They didn't just lay them back where they hod picked them up, they stacked them up, in piles. And when the male found what he was looking for he really made the rocks fly. The big rocks weighed fifty, sixty or even possibly a hundred pounds; he just jerked them out with his hand. He didn't seem to take any precautions for his safety. Later on I looked, and there was some rock there that could have fallen on him, but he wasn't concerned.

He brought out what appeared to be a grass nest, possibly some stored hay that small rodents had stored there. He dug through that, and brought out the rodents. It seems they ate them. The rodents appeared to be in hibernation, or asleep, or something. There were about six or eight rodents. The small animal, I noticed, only got one, but the others got two or three apiece. But about that time they become aware of my presence and well, just become alert. I was alongside of this trail that follows the ridge. I didn't remember getting there, but I was squatting down behind a small tree when I become aware of where I was. As soon as they realized I was there they suddenly began to move, real quiet, behind some low-hanging limbs on a tree there. I didn't see them again after that.

I tried to follow their tracks in the direction I thought they would have to go, but I couldn't find any, although there was heavy frost there. But the next day I found two tracks, a heel print and the front part of the foot, the toes, but they were in a different direction — the direction from which I had come — and I never did connect them up with exactly which direction they had gone, or know anything about them.

The footprints, I would say, were about twelve to fifteen inches, but there wasn't enough of the track to tell exactly. They were possibly five inches wide, I don't know, at the widest port. I don't think they could have been six. I didn't know if it was one of the animals I had seen that made the footprints.

I saw the toe print as I come up out of the old landing. I saw the heel print as I went in. The heel print gave me the impression that the heel protruded. The tracks were in dirt. It was just as if you hod a level piece and scooped it out for about two feet deep, and it would cave in some. It (the animal) had stepped down into that, and left a heel print, and as it stepped out on the other side you could see the toe print. When I left the catskinner, he was on Low Creek, but I had walked to Jim's Meadows, possibly a mile or more. I saw the footprints between where the cotskinner was and where I had seen the animals.

After the animals disappeared I watched and looked a few minutes and then decided I didn't wont to go in that direction. So I just headed back. I didn't tell the catskinner about seeing them. I didn't tell anyone about it until ...... asked me to ask among my crews, maybe some of them had seen them. That was the only time I ever mentioned it to any of the fellows out there, because I didn't want everybody to think I was a nut or something or other.

The only time I saw their faces was when they became alert. They gave me the impression of having a face a little like a cat, without the ears. I couldn't remember seeing any ears. It seemed like the nose was much flatter — it didn't stick out like a human's. The upper lip was very short, and seemed to be thin. I couldn't remember that it had a chin like a human has. So somehow or other I felt that it was a face more like a cat than a human.

The male was darker than the female, a dirty brown, where the female was a buckskin or fawn-colored animal. The male had much longer hair on his shoulder, head and neck, and hung in strings, like you see on an Angora goat. He was much heavier in the shoulders than the female. From just above the hips the male got larger; he had a very wide "small" of the back. From there on up he just got bigger and bigger. They had very rounded or stooped shoulders. The head was set lower on the shoulders than a human's. They don't seem to have a neck "stand up" as we do.

Most of the time they were not standing, but were squatting down and leaning forward to pick up the rocks. I didn't see them actually erect until they become alert that I was there. I didn't see them walk, as such. The only movement I saw was when they made a quick, short dash to get behind the limbs of the trees. I saw them move all right, but in a humped-up, stooped-over position, just moving across the rocks. But they were upright when they made that quick dash at the end. It seemed to me that the mother picked the baby up on her lap, and ran holding the baby in front of her, possibly right below the breast, and her breasts hung real low, much lower than on a human.

I couldn't say how thick through the body these animals were, but they were very heavy-set — particularly thick and heavy at the small of the back, and on up through the ribs. I think the male was over six feet tall, but I'm on awful judge of height or weight or anything. I didn't think the female was quite as tall as the male, in fact I think she come possibly up to his shoulder, but I saw them standing up so little I don't know. But they were much larger than a human, much bulkier. The baby didn't come up to the mother's hips, actually, I don't think, but I don't remember for sure. The first time I saw them standing up was as the male stepped out of the hole he dug with the grass, but it was only a very short while until they took off. I didn't see them other than that.

Q — How did they eat?

They ate just taking it in their hand and eating it as one of us would if we were eating a banana. They ate it skin, feathers and all — just bit it in two, and as they would bite part of it well then just cram the other right on in. The little one, though, he had a little more difficulty, because he didn't have quite enough room for all of it, where the older ones did. It wasn't like a human would hand the food to the baby, he had to get his — he was scratching through the grass that they had and got it himself, and the female did the same thing. They gave you the impression in that way of not taking care of the baby like people would. I've been wondering now if that group lived together as a family, and I hope to go back and look into it deeper.

Q — Did you form any impression of the proportions of, say, the legs in relation to the rest of the height? Would they be like a long-legged man, or short legged?

I don't know; I couldn't say for sure; but the arms were such that when they squat down they have to bend forward to pick up anything — their arms are not long enough to reach. This one that was digging just seemed to go right on down. I didn't remember seeing him get up, but as he was down here he was just digging and kept on going down, and... well at that time I couldn't see exactly where he was, because I was down, and they were a little bit on the side of this rock, which kind of levels off some, and he went down, and so I could not see exactly what he was doing in there, but I did see when he come out. At that time I was a little bit nervous... I'm not sure, now, about half of it seemed like a bad dream for a while. I just couldn't believe it was really happening. It just couldn't be, but it is.

Q — Did you notice the hands at all?

I noticed that it had hands. I did not notice if it had thumbs. I couldn't tell from the way it worked — it didn't seem to use the thumb. And I didn't see any ears. I didn't see any knees projecting when it squatted. They were in an awkward position because of the rocks, and they couldn't just squat down like we would on a floor. They would be on different levels, and off too far to be comfortable. That's as close as I could explain it.

When they went from place to place they would shift in position, according to the terrain. The male, well, actually both of them, seemed to be moving in o certain direction, possibly from tracing the small rodents. I thought possibly it was the scent left by the rodents coming up through the rocks, because it was not a runway that they could have been picking, because they were jlust picking the rocks up anyplace, and as they picked it up, they'd turn it over and smell it, and then lay it on the stack. They left it very definitely in a pile. They would leave anywhere from three to fifteen or twenty in one pile, as they would reach back, and then, oh, six of eight feet farther, they would leave another pile — they would start laying them in another pile.

With René and my daughter Kathryn and son Jim I went with this man to the spot where he had seen the three creatures. We found piles of rocks just as he said, not only at the spot he showed us but on almost every area of broken rock we came upon in a couple of hours scrambling around the mountain. They were obviously piles manufactured by someone or something, there was no way the rock could have come to rest In that way naturally, and there were dozens of them.

The hole he saw the male sasquatch dig was about five feet deep and almost as steep-sided as a well. No bear or anything else without hands could have lifted out the rocks. A man could undoubtedly figure out a way to do it if he had a reason to, and could also have made all the rock piles, but it would have been a great deal of work for no apparent purpose.

At that time the logger had already had his second experience with a sasquatch, and he showed us that site also. It was a good deal lower down, quite close to a logging road. He was not actually searching, but had stopped at what he thought would be a good place for some shooting to sight in a rifle, when he saw a dark brown animal five or six feet high and very heavily built standing eating leaves from a willow bush in an overgrown clearing. It was about 100 feet from him. He noted that it had breasts, again located somewhat lower than human breasts, but not hanging; and that its thumb was short and set farther back on the hand than a human thumb. It was using its hands to strip the leaves from the bush and stuff them in its mouth, but after a few seconds it noticed him and fled into cover.

He said that he had noticed that the animals on the rock pile did not use their thumbs in picking up the rocks, but gripped them between the fingers and the palm of the hand, and he wondered if the thumbs were any use at all.

In another conversation he mentioned that the small creature had seemed to be afraid of the male and had always kept on the other side of the female away from him.

For the next half year he hunted without success, but in November he again hit the jackpot. Crossing a ridge at about 3,500 feet he found two sets of tracks, both about 16 inches long, and followed them for several miles in the snow, going down a logging road. They were not always on the road but kept coming back to it. Eventually they reached a level where the snow was petering out and he lost them in the woods. Next day he went back to where he had left off, and while casting about for more tracks he saw something dark on the snow across a small open area.

Using binoculars at a distance of less than 200 yards, he found himself looking at two sasquatches sleeping in the open, with their backs to the sky and their knees and elbows drawn in under their bodies. I have since read that convicts put in solitary confinement in Alcatraz without bedding slept in exactly that position to minimize the loss of heat on the cold floor. He settled down for a long vigil, and they slept for about an hour, with very little movement, then one got up, and then the other. They went to a creek a few feet away and began pulling up and eating water plants. Both were obviously females, with more pendulous breasts than the ones he had seen before, and one appeared to have a swelling in the genital area and kept rubbing itself. It also gave an occasional loud call, which he described in a computer questionnaire as "like a scream in an echo chamber." He also saw one defacate in the creek. It stepped up on a wide, low stump that was in the water, "bent forward about 45 degrees with its knees slightly bent and let fly." It then wiped itself with one hand, and then licked the hand briefly.

After feeding for about half an hour, working their way up the creek away from him, they lay down again in a new location for about an hour, then both got up and crossed the road. The one with the swelling climbed a few feet up in a dead yew tree and wailed, then both moved off into the timber above the road.

He estimated them to be only about six feet high, but very heavy. They were both dark brown, covered with shaggy, dirty hair. When they lay down they did not seek shelter, although there were trees nearby and at one time snow was falling. After they left the observer went home. He said he was "too spooked" to go over where they had been. Next day there was new snow.

His final encounter took place only about a month later. He was following some elk tracks, walking on top of old, deep snow, when he happened to look back and saw, right behind him only about 10 feet away, a scruffy looking, dark brown sasquatch at least nine feet tall. Its arms were raised in what he took to be a threatening manner, and he scrambled to try to get a revolver out from under his rain gear. However the animal quickly ran and ducked behind the roots of a blown-down tree. He himself "left the area running" as the computer form notes. His impressions of that individual are pretty spotty, but he realized afterwards that there had been a mild smell "like an old outhouse," and that it had a long upper lip that fluttered as it blew through its mouth. He also noticed that its hands were very large and long, but with the thumb "not up where a human thumb is."

The last thing he found, in February, 1969, was the tracks of two creatures, one with a 14-inch foot, the other 11-inch, that came out of the forest into a field where it appeared they had been eating the lower stems of clumps of grass. The tracks were made at night, for several nights, but then he found them taking off across country, entering an area where there was no snow. He then back-tracked into the woods and found that the animals had been sleeping just a short distance in out of sight. What particularly interested him was that the two tracks were always near each other but never right together.

There is a wealth of information in these observations. They depict creatures that do not have an effective opposable thumb, or if they do don't use it much. There are three accounts of sasquatches actually eating something — rock rodents, willow leaves and water weeds — and circumstantial evidence that the juvenile hanging around its mother but not welcome. The other pair was made up of two adult females, again suggesting that family groups may not be the norm. Female chimpanzees have to put up with large sexual swellings when in heat, but other apes do not, and there is no other report of a sasquatch in that condition. That, plus the calling, indicates reproductive arrangements unlike those of any other ape but perhaps suitable for a species very thinly distributed. On that point, however, note that he describes a total of seven individuals all different, and tracks that appear to belong to two more, all in an area of about 200 square miles.

It is always doubtful whether any story is true, and when one person has several stories extra caution is indicated, but this man gained nothing, not even notoriety, and there were other people who confirmed that he had taken to spending all his free time in the woods. Also there were other reports from that area around that time, and some tracks photographed in snow on a road.

From: Encounters with Bigfoot by John Green.