Discovering the Pacific Northwest's Legendary Bigfoot: A Historical Overview

Title: Unearthed Realms: Bigfoot: The Unseen Giant of North America - A Fresh Look at the Legend Hey Squatchable fans! Today, we're diving into a fascinating video from the YouTube channel Unearthed Realms, where they explore the myth, hoax, or hidden truth behind Bigfoot. As a Bigfoot enthusiast, I couldn't help but be drawn in by the intriguing title and the promise of a fresh perspective on this age-old legend. The video starts off by discussing the origins of the Bigfoot legend, tracing it back to the folklore of the Pacific Northwest. The Salish people have told stories of the Sasquatch for centuries, describing it as a small bear-like animal that walks on two legs. The creature from their mythology is quite different from the 7 to 8-foot tall, 400 to 600-pound hairy monster we're more familiar with today. As the video progresses, we're taken on a journey through the history of Bigfoot sightings, starting with the gold prospectors who moved into the Pacific Northwest during the mid-1800s. They claimed to see a large, hairy man-like beast that stood up on two legs and walked away from them. This marked the beginning of the Bigfoot craze, but it wasn't until almost 100 years later that the legend really took off. In 1958, a newspaper in Bluton, Ohio, ran a story about a huge, hairy, and apelike creature that had been spotted in the nearby woods. This story caught the attention of two local businessmen named Roger Patterson and Bob Gilman, who went on to become the most famous cryptozoologists of all time. On October 20th, 1967, Patterson and Gilman claimed to have captured the most compelling Bigfoot evidence ever found. They were driving down a riverbank when they saw a large female Sasquatch and her baby walking along the opposite bank. They quickly turned around, followed them, and managed to get within just 20 feet of the animals. That's when Patterson rolled down his window, raised his camera, and snapped several frames of the creature. The footage, known as the Patterson-Gimlin film, shows what appears to be a large bipedal creature covered in dark hair walking through a clearing. The creature is far too humanlike to be a bear, and this footage sparked a wave of interest in Bigfoot across the country. However, doubts have begun to creep in about the validity of the original footage. The problem with the Patterson-Gimlin film is that it's not hard evidence. Without hard evidence, skeptics can continue to claim that the entire thing was nothing but a hoax. One popular theory claims that the film was actually a person in a gorilla suit, but there is no motive for this. If Patterson and Gilman were looking for fame, they certainly achieved it. However, if they were also looking for money, then they missed out on a lifetime of riches. It's true that the film doesn't prove the existence of Bigfoot, but the lack of evidence that the film was a hoax doesn't prove anything either. It's not just the footage that's brought scientists to the table either. For decades, reports of strange tracks have been pouring into the US government. From 1969 to 1976, the US military collected plaster casts of mysterious footprints and even offered a reward for any information related to the mysterious prints. Sadly, the only conclusion they came to was that the tracks were probably nothing but misidentified deer tracks. So, why haven't we found any bones or bodies? Well, maybe we have, and they're just misidentified bears. When the fur trade was at its peak in the early 1800s, trappers were paid based on the quality and quantity of pelts they brought back. If a trapper killed a grizzly and it looked particularly hairy, well, maybe he took the extra hide to town and sold it as a giant ape instead. Over the years, body parts have washed up on river banks and mountain peaks. And while most of them can be traced back to a credible source, some remain unidentified. Most recently, a hunter in Northern California claimed to have shot a Sasquatch, but he never recovered the body. All he had to show for his adventure was a bloodstained piece of lung that a biologist could unidentify. Unfortunately for Bigfoot believers, every single sighting, footprint, and body part can be explained away with science. So unless we find a dead Bigfoot, there's no reason to believe it exists. Science may never give us an answer, but that hasn't stopped people from searching. In total, there have been between 30 and 40,000 reported Bigfoot sightings, with most of them taking place between May and October. The most active state for Bigfoot hunting is California with Texas, Washington, and Oregon following close behind. Bigfoot researchers even claim that they've found DNA evidence left behind from hairs, skin, and saliva. But once again, these tests have revealed nothing but inconclusive results. It's hard to imagine how so many people can believe in something that's been proven not to exist. But if you ask any researcher, they'll tell you that the evidence is overwhelming. While the scientific community argues over facts and figures there, there's another school of thought that believes our desire to find Bigfoot may have more to do with our fear of the unknown than anything else. After all, we've been tracking Bigfoot for decades, and we have yet to come up with anything concrete. Maybe we do want to believe in Bigfoot because it would mean admitting that somewhere in the woods there's something that we don't understand. Maybe we do want to believe in Bigfoot because it would mean facing the possibility that the world we live in is full of things we can't control. Because when it comes down to it, I think we all crave the comfort of knowing that there's nothing out there that we can't explain away. What are your thoughts on the video? Let us know in the comments, and don't forget to subscribe to Unearthed Realms to stay up-to-date on all things Bigfoot!