bigfoot creature in Illinois?

There have been numerous sightings of Bigfoot type creatures in Illinois,the earliest sighting recorded appears to be  in 1912. A woman named Beaulah Schroat reported that she and her brothers had often seen a huge, hairy creature near their home in Effingham. Then a "huge gorilla" was reported as seen in the woods near Elizabeth in July 1929.

In 1941, the Reverend Harpole was hunting squirrels near Mount Vernon and encountered a large creature that "looked something like a baboon". He struck it with his rifle and fired a warning shot that sent it scurrying back into the underbrush.

In 1962 a grey coloured creature was spotted by Steven Collins and Robert Earle . The creature vanished into the woods and the witnesses told the local newspaper that it was "like no other animal we had ever seen before."

In September 1965, four teenagers were parked in a car near an undeveloped area outside of Decatur called Montezuma Hills. It was a secluded area used by locals as a "lover’s lane". The young couples were sitting in the car when a black, man-like shape approached the vehicle. The creature seemed massive and frightened the teenagers badly. They drove off in a panic but after dropping off their girlfriends the two males returned to the area for another look. They once again saw the monster and it walked up to their car as though it were curious. They were too scared to get out, but even with the windows rolled up, they could smell the monster’s horrible smell. Then they summoned the police, who searched but did not find anything.

In 1968 there was another sighting near Chittyville . Two teenagers Tim Bullock and Barbara Smith, were driving north of town on August 11 when they spotted a 10-foot tall monster that was covered with black hair and had a round face. It threw dirt at their car and they left to summon the police. When the authorities returned, they found a large depression in the grass that was apparently a nest.

Same year in July , a couple driving near Weldon Springs State Park, outside of Clinton, saw what looked like a huge "bear" in the river. Later, a policeman and a conservation officer found tracks along the water‘s edge that definitely did not belong to a bear. They were reportedly very large and human-like.

In 1972, there were reports coming in from the Pekin and Peoria areas. In May, Randy Emmert, and some friends, reported a large, hairy creature near Cole Hollow Road. This monster was 8-10 feet tall and whitish in color. The witnesses stated that it made a loud, screeching sound and they suspected that it was living in a hole beneath an abandoned house. It also left very unusual tracks, having only three toes on each foot. Others also reported seeing a monster and it became known as "Cohomo", short for the "Cole Hollow Road Monster". This lead to local police logged more than 200 calls about the monster, including one where the creature destroyed a fence. The police departments were naturally sceptical, but the calls kept coming in. Cohomo was seen again on July 27 as East Peoria Police reported that he was spotted by "two reliable citizens" swimming in the Illinois River. They got close enough to him to know that he smelled awful and looked like a "cross between an ape and a caveman". That appears to be the last sighting of Cohomo..

In 1973, three men who were walking along the Sangamon River near Decatur saw a large, hairy man that walked like an ape. The creature disappeared into the underbrush.

In 1990, a woman living in a mobile home near Eldon reported to Cherokee County Sheriff’s Department she heard noises, noticed a bad smell, and saw a creature about 10 feet tall and about 400 pounds. A deputy investigated and found impressions big enough to place both his feet in. Just two days later, an 8-year-old girl and her mother described a creature 8 feet tall with dark brown, frizzy hair and standing on two feet rummaging through a trash pile near their house.

In 1996, a man living in the Vian Bottoms, about two to three miles north of the Arkansas River, saw a black figure moving in and out of the trees. He said it looked to be about 8 feet tall, huge, muscular build, with very long stringy hair, and walked upright on two legs.

In July 2000 in Essex, Illinois ,Andrew Souligne was driving into a local cemetery one night when a large, hairy shape walked out in front of the car. The creature froze in the headlights and turned towards the car, apparently stunned by the bright lights from the vehicle. Souligne (and the other passenger of the car) were pretty shocked themselves and the driver immediately put the car into reverse and back away from the monster. Moments later, the ape loped into the woods and vanished.

In 2001 a woman driving near Green Leaf Lake , saw something cross the road in front of her. She said it was about 6-1/2 feet tall, with long, dark hair except for the face area, and had a thick build. She described the creature further as looking “like a person with hair.”

In October of 2005, Tahlequah 911 received a call at about 6 a.m. one morning from a man near the Welling bridge who said he had just seen what he believed to be Bigfoot. It was 7 feet tall and hairy, and from the anatomy it appeared to be female.

In July 2008, a woman living in an area known as Murphy’s Hill, near 14-Mile Creek, said she was receiving a curious and regular visitor that was “getting bolder” and “coming out in the daytime.” She said one “Sunday afternoon the wind shifted, and we smelled it.” She said she went into the yard and found the door to her dogs’ pen broken almost in half. And, that the dogs get really quiet when this thing is around.

So Illinois, a haven for types of Bigfoot? There does seem to be an element of hysteria in some of the accounts, especially the 200 calls the police received in one day.  It is also reminiscent of The Swamp Ape which is said to be smelly. Could it be a relative or had people read about it and it fixed it in their minds? But with that many sightings, even if only a third are reasonably sound, it is still a lot of sightings, whether mistaken identity or not, of something strange in Illinois.

Farmer City Bigfoot article

http://mywebtimes.com/archives/ottawa/display.php?id=206288

The Yeti

The Yeti is a large hairy bipedal creature, like a bigfoot, sometimes described as white other times as brown haired  and seen mainly in high mountain ranges such as the Himalayas. The Himalayan mountain range straddles the border between India, Nepal, and Tibet. The Range includes the tallest land based mountain in the world, Mount Everest, which is about 29,000 feet high. The high ranges are snow bound most of the year and few people live there. The search to find the Yeti is not a modern one, in the time of Alexander the Great, around 326 BC he set out to conquer the Indus Valley and having heard the stories of the yeti asked to see one. Apparently, the locals told him the creature could not survive in the lower atmosphere and could not be brought down the mountain. Legend perhaps but reports continue.

In 1925 a Greek photographer, N. A. Tombazi, was working as a member of a British geological expedition in the Himalayas, when a creature was pointed out to him. It was moving in the distance across some lower slopes. "Unquestionably, the figure in outline was exactly like a human being, walking upright and stopping occasionally to uproot or pull at some dwarf rhododendron bushes," said Tombazi, "It showed up dark against the snow and, as far as I could make out wore no clothes." The creature disappeared before a photograph could be taken but as he went through his descent Tombazi found footprints in the snow. "They were similar in shape to those of a man, but only six to seven inches long by four inches wide at the broadest part of the foot. The marks of five distinct toes and the instep were perfectly clear, but the trace of the heel was indistinct." There were 15 prints which were 12 inches (30 cms) to two feet (60 cms) distance apart . Tombazi asked the locals about the creature he'd seen and they said it was a demon.

In 1938 another encounter with a Yeti was reported. . Captain d'Auvergue, the curator of the Victoria Memorial in Calcutta, India, was travelling the Himalayas alone when he became snow blind.( This is where the reflection of the snow causes temporary blindness and is the reason people wear snow goggles these days to cut down the glare) As he lay fearing death from exposure he was rescued. He claimed he was found by a nine foot tall ( 3 metres) Yeti and that he/ she /it nursed him back to health. Captain d'Auvergue was then able to descend the mountain and return home.

In 1951 Two British mountaineers Eric Shipton and Michael Ward found and photographed some tracks in the snow. They were on the south western slopes of the Menlung Glacier, which lies between Tibet and Nepal, at an altitude of 20,000 feet. The footprints were 13 inches( 32.5 cms) wide and 18 inches( 45 cms) long. Shipton and Ward followed the prints for a about a mile before the trail disappeared on hard ice. They have been accused of a hoax but it seems unlikely that anyone would be walking about in those temperatures in their bare feet.

In 1953 Sir Edmund Hillary and his Sherpa guide, Tenzing Norgay, on their record ascent to the top of Mount Everest, in 1953, saw giant foot prints on the way up. Hillary however later said he did not believe in the Yeti. .

In 1970, British mountaineer Don Whillans claimed to have witnessed a creature when scaling Annapurna. Whillans was scouting for a campsite when he heard some odd cries which his Sherpa guide said were a Yeti's call. That night, he saw a dark shape moving near his camp. The next day, saw some large human-like footprints in the snow, and later that same day viewed a bipedal, ape-like creature for 20 minutes through binoculars .

In 1972, footprints were found by Edward Cronin and Dr Howard Emery around Everest base Camp. They followed these to a steep incline. They said a person could not have climbed the slope. A mould of the footprint was taken  for Jeffrey McNeely.
1978 Lord Hunt, also known as John Hunt, who led the successful 1953 expedition to climb Mount Everest, took a photograph of what some thought could be Yeti tracks.

In 1984, mountaineer David P. Sheppard of Hoboken, New Jersey, claims to have been followed by a large, furry man over the course of several days while he was on the southern side of  Everest. No proof has been found and a photograph proved inconclusive.

More recently :

Dec 12, 2007

(MountEverest.net)

In the past weeks, world media have had another Yeti frenzy - with Reuters this time breaking the news of supposed Yeti tracks found in Nepal. In a later report, there was also news of a runaway elephant in the area. Late last week, Ang Tshering shot over a report with his own take on current events, including the Yeti and a stay with Everest climber Prague mayor Bem who just recently released a book about his eventful climb.

On October 20th, 2008 seven Japanese adventurers photographed  prints possibly made by a Yeti. The leader, Yoshiteru Takahashi claims to he saw a Yeti on a 2003 expedition, and wants to record a Yeti in action on camera.

The Yeti is also reported in Siberia and several expeditions have attempted to find it. 

So Yeti, real or a local legend? Well the thing I find anomalous is who would be walking about in their bare feet at those altitudes and in those low temperatures? The Sherpas don’t normally go barefoot and wear a sort of sandal. The prints all seem to be of a bare foot. It may be an ape or some description rather than a man like creature but lets hope the future brings forth some more expeditions to find the truth.

A site with lots of info:http://www.abominablesnowman.co.uk/

killer cryptids?

I was watching a film recently called “ Snow Beast” or something similar. It was about a Yeti like creature that ate people and was very aggressive. It got me thinking about how most films depict cryptids as aggressive and eaters or killers of humans. We have yet to hear of anyone being killed by a cryptid so why this portrayal of them as such bad creatures?

The film with Peter Cushing made in black and white in I think 1957 “The Abominable Snowman” showed Yetis as wise and more humane. So what has changed? Is it the modern need for more and more gory films?

Hammer horror in the 60s and 70s had an array of hungry beasts from giant blood sucking moths (The Blood Beast Terror) to people who turned into giant snakes(The Reptile) .All of whom attacked without provocation.

In reality, there are few stories of cryptid attacks. Bigfoot has been said to hurl rocks but in general remains shy and elusive.

I can’t help thinking it is bad propaganda for cryptids  and if one were found would it lead to it being killed out of fear? It may make good movies or attract more viewers to have killer cryptids  ,let’s face it we all like to be scared, but does it do more harm than good for the cause of cryptozoology?

Claims that Yeti seen near Moscow

Has the Yeti Come to the Moscow Region?

    By Edward Crabtree

A group of Russian enthusiasts says they have new evidence of the existence of a Russian bigfoot — and it was found just outside of Moscow. On a table inside the capital's illustrious State Darwin Museum last month, surrounded by glass cases containing beetles and moths, lies the purported proof: a fragment of tree bark that appears to have been marked by a large primate.The bark sample was taken by Andrei Stroganov, a biophysical technologist at Moscow's Agricultural Academy, from an uprooted two-meter-long tree trunk that he says had been planted in the earth and marked with horizontal scratches. Stroganov found the curiosity in July in a forested area near a railway line in the Solnechnogorsk district — just five kilometers from the Moscow satellite town of Zelenograd — while scouring the forests for signs of the Almas, as the Russian bigfoot is known, after hearing reports that such a creature had been spotted in the area.
Read rest here :http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/has-the-yeti-come-to-the-moscow-region/507329.html

Politics and cryptozoology.

I have noticed over the last few months  some cryptozoology bloggers are using their blogs to make political statements,as in who they support etc. This is wrong as far as I am concerned. Cryptozoology should not be political nor have territories or boundaries. It should be free from the influence of politics and  not used to promote such things. Cryptozoology is in every country and continent and dabbling in politics will cause divisions just as in setting boundaries i.e. our country, our monster etc. Cryptozoology has a bad enough image as it is with all the infighting and hoaxes,using it for your own political ends  or that of your political party will only degrade it further. There is enough internal politics in cryptozoology without including national politics as well. Some times I feel like throwing in the towel because cryptozoology will never be anything or become accepted whilst this sort of thing goes on. What will be next....you have to support a particular political party or stance to go cryptid spotting? You can only set up your cameras here if you voted for this law or party? Where will it end if this continues? Cryptozoologists should be concerning themselves with cryptids not external politics.

a P.S. I am suffering from double vision at the moment so please excuse any strange typos.

a new cryptozoology talent

This is a cartoon by a talented man called Ghostman Rains. You can find his blog here and can contact him if you would like a cartoon done for your blog or book/article :
http://strangeanimalsaghostman.blogspot.co.uk/

giant swimming dinosaur fossil unearthed

Spinosaurus fossil: 'Giant swimming dinosaur' unearthed

By Rebecca Morelle Science Correspondent, BBC News

A giant fossil, unearthed in the Sahara desert, has given scientists an unprecedented look at the largest-known carnivorous dinosaur: Spinosaurus. The 95-million-year-old remains confirm a long-held theory: that this is the first-known swimming dinosaur. Scientists say the beast had flat, paddle-like feet and nostrils on top of its crocodilian head that would allow it to submerge with ease. The research is published in the journal Science.

Lead author Nizar Ibrahim, a palaeontologist from the University of Chicago, said: "It is a really bizarre dinosaur - there's no real blueprint for it. "It has a long neck, a long trunk, a long tail, a 7ft (2m) sail on its back and a snout like a crocodile. "And when we look at the body proportions, the animal was clearly not as agile on land as other dinosaurs were, so I think it spent a substantial amount of time in the water."

Read rest see pics here :http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-29143096

Very interesting and makes me think of several lake monster reports .The last  reported sighting of the Wast Water Creature  stated about a spiked back......perhaps a frill like this creature?  Could there be more types of these creatures found? All exciting stuff for cryptozoologists .

The latest on the Kraken,Toothy dolphin fossils and a dreadnought dinosaur

Fantastically Wrong: The Legend of the Kraken, a Monster That Hunts With Its Own Poop     By Matt Simon 

Read rest here: http://www.wired.com/2014/09/fantastically-wrong-legend-of-the-kraken/

Ancient 'toothy' dolphin fossils found in Peru desert By Laura Geggel

Read rest here: http://www.foxnews.com/science/2014/09/10/ancient-toothy-dolphin-fossils-found-in-peru-desert/

'Dreadnought' dinosaur yields big bone haul

By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

New fossils found in Argentina represent the most complete giant sauropod dinosaur ever discovered.Scientists say they have 70% of the key bones needed to fully describe the creature, Dreadnoughtus schrani.

Read rest here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-29050114