Montana Bar Owner Recounts 2013 Bigfoot Encounter Inside His Tavern

A 64-year-old former Montana bar owner has come forward with what might be one of the most grounded, level-headed Bigfoot encounter stories to surface in a while, and it's worth paying attention to. The video, posted by Bigfoot Records on YouTube, features a man who spent 27 years running the Rimrock Tavern on Highway 200, east of Thompson Falls, Montana. He's not a hunter, not a paranormal hobbyist, not someone looking for attention. He's a practical guy who fixed cars after selling the bar in 2019 and has been sitting on this story for over a decade because, as he puts it, he had nobody to tell it to. That changed when the property sold again last spring, with new owners talking about clearing the timber stand behind the old building. That's when he decided it was time to talk. The encounter happened on October 15, 2013, a stormy Tuesday night with an early cold snap rolling through the Clark Fork country. He'd closed early, last customer out at 9:15, and was about to do his usual end-of-night routine when he heard something in the storage corridor behind the walk-in cooler. Not the usual settling sounds or compressor cycling. Something organic. Something large trying very hard to be quiet in a space that wasn't built for quiet. He grabbed his flashlight and went to investigate. What he found wasn't a bear. Standing upright in the 12-foot-wide, 7-foot-tall space, with its back against the far wall, was an 8-foot tall being that had positioned itself tactically between the storage shelving and the door. It had put the shelving between itself and the only exit. It was making itself as small as possible in the available space, which was still considerable. What makes this account stand out is the witness's description of the creature's behavior. There was no aggression, no flight response, no defensive display. Just calm, rapid assessment. The look of a very intelligent being running through its options in real time after being discovered somewhere it didn't plan to be discovered. The witness admits he was the more rattled of the two. His heart was pounding, his flashlight hand wasn't steady, and the word forming in his mind wasn't anything from his usual practical vocabulary. Here's where the story gets really interesting, and where the video cuts off mid-sentence. He didn't call the police. Didn't call fish and wildlife. Didn't call his wife Sheila, who was three miles down the road. His reasoning was that bringing official attention to the situation would mean losing control of how it resolved, and the being in his corridor hadn't done anything that warranted that kind of response. It was holding still, presenting no aggression, waiting to see how things developed. The video is clearly part of a longer story, and the witness mentions there's a "secret" he's been unpacking for 11 years that requires context. The discussion ends right as he's about to get into what he did in the first hour after the encounter. For anyone interested in witness testimony from people who don't fit the typical Bigfoot researcher profile, this one's worth the watch. The man's matter-of-fact delivery, his detailed knowledge of his own property, and his careful reasoning about why he made the choices he made that night give the account a weight that a lot of encounter stories lack. He's not selling anything. He's just finally telling the story because circumstances forced his hand. Check out the full video on the Bigfoot Records YouTube channel to hear the rest of what happened.