Tracks in the Snow

by John Green

I generally tend to downgrade reports of tracks in the snow, because snow is a very changeable material, and is often soft enough so that there is no problem making imprints of any size desired. There are exceptions, however, one of the most notable of which was a set of tracks seen by several elk hunters on Coleman Ridge, near Ellensburg, Washington, on November 6, 1970. Those tracks were studied by more than one hunting party, and reports and pictures of them have come from more than one source. I have a letter from one of the hunters, Oscar Hickerson Jr., of Renton, Washington, giving a brief description of the tracks, but there is a better account in a letter which Nick Carter, an old friend of Mr. Hickerson's as well as a sasquatch researcher, wrote to George Haas. The following is an excerpt:

Oscar is about 55 and has spent most of his recreation time in the Washington, Idaho mountains and wild areas oil his life. He had read about the California Bigfoot sightings in True magazine but had never seen anything like that line of tracks in the snow before. At first he, and his hunting partner, Mr. Jess Helton, thought it was some sort of hoax, but a little investigation convinced them otherwise. Both are experienced hunters and trackers.

The two men had gone to a campsite, previously selected, in Hunting Unit 4E on a Washington Game Dept. map. The spot is about 30 miles N.E, of Ellensburg, not very far east of a game preserve. They followed Coleman Creek up to their camp, which was on Coleman Ridge. They pitched their tent on Nov. 5 and intended to spend the 6th cutting wood in preparation for elk hunting which opened Nov. 7 at dawn. During the night of Nov. 5-6 some six inches of fresh snow fell, the first of the year. It stopped about 5 a.m. Nov. 6.

They woke up, knocked the heavy wet snow off their tent where it was sagging in, made breakfast and were getting out the chain saw when a man, name not given, came up from his camp about 100 yards farther down the ridge. He was all excited about something that had made big tracks through the camp along a somewhat circular route. He was scared, or somewhat upset, for the tracks went right alongside his camper truck and he thought the thing had looked in his windows. From the lack of new snow in the prints they must have been made between the time the snow stopped, at about 5a.m., and when he got up about 7 a.m. Then he went back to his camp, also to cut wood.

Oscar and Jess sawed down-logs and talked about the news. They thought then it was some joke, but about 11 a.m. the took a break and went over to take a look. The sun was out and it was just above freezing, not thawing very rapidly. They saw the tracks, made by something walking on two legs, and measured some with a yo-yo tape. This is Boeing slang for a six-foot roll-up tape measure. (Both Mr. Hickerson and Mr. Carter worked for Boeing Aircraft Co.) The tracks measured 17 inches long and 9 inches wide. Oscar said he could stand with both his boots on one track touching each other and the two boots together did not reach the outside edge of the track across the ball of the foot.

He was impressed by the depth the tracks sank into the snow and by how hard packed the bottom was. Like packed ice, and very flat, no arch showing at all. At first glance he thought about boards on a man's feet but the stride was far too long and they sank too deep. A second glance showed toe action, snow kicked up as the thing stepped ahead, and some heel drags behind individual prints.

In the men's camp area the tracks were fairly close together, 30 to 40 inches, and Oscar got the feeling the Bigfoot had been looking around, moving slowly, for the stride widened beyond the camp as it strode off normally. They followed and came to a place where Bigfoot had stepped over a down log without disturbing the ridge of fresh snow on top. Oscar and Jess looked carefully for some signs of tracks going around the ends of the log, still thinking hoax, but there were no marks at all in the fresh snow except the one line of prints right over the log. He and Jesse had to crawl up over the log where Bigfoot simply stepped over. Oscar is 5' 9½" and Jesse 6ft 1" tall. They figured Bigfoot must have legs five feet long to make that step. His description of crossing the log was "like getting on a horse" and there were several more along the track farther on.

At that time they followed the tracks for about half a mile, zigzagging through the woods, curving bock up behind their own camp. They cut across to the tent, got their rifles and continued following. Bigfoot, also looking for elk sign, most of that afternoon, for a total of about three miles, with all the curves and zigzagging, meandering around etc. to where the tracks finally went down out of the snow into Coleman Canyon. He said that at times Bigfoot idled in one place, back and forth, then would stride out for a way, then idle around some more. The tracks did not circle but switch backed around contours. Full stride was measured at between four and five feet, length between tracks varied, some were four, some five and others in between.

The pictures were taken first, in the camp area. Oscar started down to see the tracks without his camera, but went back and got it, fortunately. He took the three shots around 11 a.m. before they tracked Bigfoot into the woods...

Oscar tried to match stride where prints were close together, and it took his maximum stride to "almost" reach. When Bigfoot really stepped out it took two of their strides to match one of his...

The one thing about those tracks which astonished Oscar most, and impressed him deeply, was the flat bottom of those huge feet, and how hard the snow was packed.

In his letter to me, Mr. Hickerson said that if he had been wearing something on his feet the size of the prints it would have been like wearing snowshoes, and there would have been very little depth penetration in comparison with the tracks. Normally with tracks in the snow there is no way to be certain of the condition of the snow at the time the tracks were made, so that it is impossible to judge how much weight was involved in making them, but there would have been no such problem on this occasion. In any event there would have been no way a man could have cleared the fallen logs without breaking stride or disturbing the snow on top of them.

Another impressive set of tracks in snow was seen and photographed in 1934 by Dave Zebo, who was aviation director for Humboldt County, California, at the time when he was interviewed by a correspondent for the Humboldt Times at Eureka in 1960. He said that while living at Weaverville he obtained permission from the Forest Service to spend a night at the lockout on top of Mount Bally, south of the city, and set out on an 11-mile ski trip to the top of the mountain. The story continues:

Two miles above the timberline, Zebo ran into strange tracks in the snow. There was no animal or human to be seen within range. He stated, "I have never seen anything like these indentations of tracks before or since." The tracks were deep and heavy, but the spacing was what especially drew his interest. The tracks were from 4 to 6 feet apart. Too far for the stride of a normal man, but they were single tracks of a two-footed person or creature.

Pointing to the human element, Zebo said, was the fact that an animal will meander. A human, usually takes a straight path, (and sometimes the hardest way) to his objective; while an animal is known to meander to find the easiest direction.

The footprints in the snow, of which Zebo was so curiously engrossed that he took photos of them, went from the bottom of the mountain to the top, from west to east; there was no deviation at all.

"I followed the old trail, and as far as I could see I saw the tracks, making a single line," Zebo said, "There were no other tracks around and I stayed the night in the lockout and came back down the next morning. A heavy snow fell during the night and covered the tracks."

The photos gave Zebo proof that the experience really had happened, and upon returning to Weaverville, he had the pictures developed. He showed these to a number of persons in the vicinity. Speculation ran high, but no one came up with a solution, nor among those contacted had anyone ever seen such an incidence, The forest personnel were among those contacted, with no better luck at a solution. Everyone was interested and intrigued, and discussed the event for days without solving the mystery. "In those days," Zebo said, "we had not heard of Bigfoot." He has since wondered if Bigfoot was the answer to the puzzle.

To summarize the experience: The big tracks were definitely there. They were single, as a human's would have been, but too wide apart in stride (they never hesitated but went energetically up the mountain, as if made by a creature with gigantic strength) for an average man's....

When I spoke to him on the telephone in 1970, Dave Zebo said the tracks seemed to show considerable weight, sinking four to six inches in hard snow that would have supported the weight of a small animal. No toe prints were discernible. The tracks went on down the other side of the mountain. Another man who observed strange tracks in the snow long before Bigfoot was ever heard of was Jim Atwell, of Skamania, Washington. He wrote to me in 1969 describing something that had been on his mind for more than 40 years:

In 1927 and 1928 the city of Port Townsend let a contract to Coyne Construction Co. to lay a large water line from Port Townsend, Washington about 28 miles through rough foothills to the upper Quilcene River.

I subcontracted backfilling part of this ditch or covering the pipe in other words, I used a gas power shovel.

Either December of '27 or January of 1928 we had a light snow of approx. 3 inches. This stopped our work but at that time I was 25 years young and payments to meet of $1,000 per month so I hiked the several miles to the water line to check on the equipment. This morning on reaching the water line via a small trail, I crawled up on the pipe for easier walking, the pipe was wooden with metal rods around it every few inches but about 30 inches in diameter and easy to walk on top of.

Soon after I started along the pipe a set of tracks appeared ahead of me in the fresh snow. These tracks came out of a heavy stand of timber and downfall, near where the trail was, never once using the trail. I inspected the tracks on the water line and they appeared to be made by a barefoot man. I did not measure the tracks but would guess from memory that they were made by a large man and about a number 10 or 11. I had never heard of the Abominable Snowman at that time so just guessed that it was some nut of a mountain man that one might find around Quilcene. This bare foot track walked down the pipe about 100 yards and on leaving the pipe he or she jumped about 6 feet across the ditch and landed on a 12-inch log covered with snow, something no logger could have done with caulked shoes, and then headed up the mountain through the roughest kind of going, downfalls, brush and rocks all covered with snow, I went on to where my power shovel was and returned back to town on a different trail. The following day I was down town and I mentioned this track and another man said that he had also seen this same track. I have often thought of this track since then over the 42 years but have never mentioned it much because any listener would wonder what I was drinking or dreaming, Humans often do crazy things' but this track appeared a little inhuman or more animal.

First it avoided the trail and chose very hard country to travel over. After reaching the pipe it did choose easy walking for 100 yards, then it again chose the roughest going that was leading into the mountains without a house or road for miles. The snow gave evidence that this was not a hoax. No others around any place within miles and a hoaxer would need to get his shoes back on quick and then he would leave telltale tracks.

Being young and anxious to make my business pay and just thinking one finds bigger nuts every day and most of them are harmless.... I missed learning something. I was unarmed and anyway I just wasn't interested in following the tracks up over such rough country .... but I should have inspected the tracks where it came from, Nowhere did I see where it came down out of the mountains. It must have come before the snow, which could have been a day or two...

To get to salt water shore he would have had to go through town and had he dug clams he would have left tracks in the snow. Unless after filling with clams he slept in the brush and woke up after the snow fell. I now kick myself for not backtracking the tracks because they were between the pipeline and town and the distance was not too great even in heavy brush. These tracks were not near as large as some of the reports indicate. ...the tracks were not too wide apart as I walked down the pipe between them except when it left the line over onto the log. This was a far greater step or jump than I could make, it left the pipeline across a ditch of about six feet and landed on the small log two feet higher than the pipe and did not mess up the snow but landed neatly. This impressed me more at the time than the barefoot tracks in the snow did. He or she did have powerful muscles.

From: Encounters With Bigfoot by John Green