Grover Krantz and the Footprint From Indiana
Posted by: John Kirk on September 2nd, 2013
Let’s get the story on Krantz straight. Yes, he was fooled by the Indiana footprint. I was there when Doug McCoy confronted Krantz to his face with indisputable proof that the footprint was manufactured by J W Parker of Bloomington in Indiana with the avowed intent of deceiving Krantz. Parker revealed his methodology to Michael Dennett and one can read about it here.
Parker created one of the best fake sasquatch prints I have ever seen because it looked very plausible and so much work went into making it look authentic. This wasn’t your usual wooden feet in the ground type print. It was meticulously created.
Therefore it was no surprise that Krantz was fooled. So were a lot of other people, such as Bob Titmus and Ed Palma of the San Diego Police Department. Krantz did make some incredible statements in his life, but all in all he was pretty darn scientific in his whole approach to sasquatch when his ego wasn’t in the way. I knew Krantz and found him sometimes too sure of himself when others wouldn’t be. But he was not a bad guy nor was he a dunce. Perhaps his two secret traits of a genuine sasquatch track were flawed. I believe that one of them was dermal ridges which we know can be faked because Matt Crowley has shown it can be done. I believe that Krantz was also fooled by the Mill Creek tracks obtained by Paul Freeman because they have supposed dermal ridges in them as well.
David Daegling boasted he could imitate the compliant gait from the Patterson film. I have a copy of a video him doing it. In my opinion: FAIL. While he stretches his legs well, he walks totally unnaturally, unlike the sasquatch in the Patterson Film who does so with naturalness and fludity.
That film must stick in the craw of scofftics because they still haven’t debunked it. Skeptics are fine, but scofftics who argue poorly are not. Skepticism is something I respect, but cynicism is not.
corrick’s riposte says that Krantz retired after that incident with the fake print. Not from the sasquatch world he didn’t. He was still involved after that incident at the International Sasquatch Symposium in 1999 and gave his opinion on the Skookum cast on which he was consulted in 2001. He started to drop out of the Sasquatch scene soon after because he began an eight month battle with pancreatic cancer which he lost on Valentine’s Day in 2002.
Now onto corrick’s assessment of Melvyn Georgekish. Did you listen to the man’s interview? If you did then you heard him say that the footprints were in the location where he saw the red eyes. Did he find bear prints there? No. What he did find were unusual prints that may have come from a sasquatch.
Melvyn Georgekish doesn’t sound to me like a publicity seeker. He sounds like a man who has had a distressing encounter with something that upset him. Even if the eyes were from a bear, that doesn’t explain the footprints. Don’t tell me Georgekish created them because you have absolutely no proof that he did.
I have known corrick for over a decade and I think he’s a great guy, but I am sorry I must disagree with his presentation of error as fact in regard to Krantz and speculation as gospel in regard to what Melvyn Georgekish witnessed. Only Georgekish knows whether he saw a sasquatch or not, but to say it was his imagination is unwarranted..
About John Kirk
One of the founders of the BCSCC, John Kirk has enjoyed a varied and exciting career path. Both a print and broadcast journalist, John Kirk has in recent years been at the forefront of much of the BCSCC’s expeditions, investigations and publishing. John has been particularly interested in the phenomenon of unknown aquatic cryptids around the world and is the author of In the Domain of the Lake Monsters (Key Porter Books, 1998).
In addition to his interest in freshwater cryptids, John has been keenly interested in investigating the possible existence of sasquatch and other bipedal hominids of the world, and in particular, the Yeren of China. John is also chairman of the Crypto Safari organization, which specializes in sending teams of investigators to remote parts of the world to search for animals as yet unidentified by science. John travelled with a Crypto Safari team to Cameroon and northern Republic of Congo to interview witnesses among the Baka pygmies and Bantu bushmen who have sighted a large unknown animal that bears more than a superficial resemblance to a dinosaur.
Since 1996, John Kirk has been editor and publisher of the BCSCC Quarterly which is the flagship publication of the BCSCC. In demand at conferences, seminars, lectures and on television and radio programs, John has spoken all over North America and has appeared in programs on NBC, ABC, CBS, PBS, TLC, Discovery, CBC, CTV and the BBC.
In his personal life John spends much time studying the histories of Scottish Clans and is himself the president of the Clan Kirk Society. John is also an avid soccer enthusiast and player.
Grover Krantz was fooled a number of times. He said a number of wrong things.
On balance, he was right; NAWAC wouldn’t be in X without him.
Better right on balance than bigfoot skeptic, every time.
Were the “Mill Creek” tracks the one’s associated with the Freeman video or another set of tracks alltogether? The reason I ask this is I thought Jeff Meldrum made casts of Freeman’s tracks from his video and they were thought by Meldrum to be legit? Why would Freeman have to fake tracks if he had a legit set? It doesn’t make much sense to me.
Craig,
You must have confused me with someone else. I’ve never met nor ever directly corresponded with you.
Anyway…
I wrote that despite claiming he knew how to identify fake sasquatch footprints, Krantz was once intentionally and successfully fooled. You, yourself, confirm this as a fact. Logically, this means that no opinion by Krantz on any sasquatch footprint can be accepted as absolute fact. Nor can those of “other people, such as Bob Titmus and Ed Palma of the San Diego Police Department.” Or would you deny the wisdom of Dr. Spock?
About that Melvyn Georgekish sighting.
I wrote, “A black bear’s eyeshine is commonly described as red or orangish-red.” I could have added that Georgekish states he was driving at night going 85-90 mph! But let’s just say he meant to say 85-90 kph. That’s still 55-60 mph. Glancing left at even that speed he couldn’t possibly have viewed those “red eyes” for a maximum two seconds. And, btw, nothing but general location ties those red eyes to the subsequently found footprints.
As for the footprints? Just one single print, photographed by Melvyn Georgekish in some moss without any size reference whatsoever. “Don’t tell me Georgekish created them because you have absolutely no proof that he did.” And you have absolutely no proof that he didn’t.
But hey, let’s all just agree to be friends. 95% of the people on this site are absolutely convinced that bigfoot exists. I’m a part of that 05% that doesn’t. But we wouldn’t all be here if 100% of us didn’t think it was a fascinating subject.
Craig, since I’ve gotten your attention…
Do you know exactly who owns the current copyrights to the P-G film and its images? Even if Patterson’s widow is always cited that only indicates a majority ownership in the profits. Good example is the Mansi photo. Copyright always says Sandra Mansi, but it’s split three ways. Would appreciate any information. From anyone.
I suppose I should add on reading the Dennett article:
This fake is one of the strongest single pieces of evidence I have seen for sasquatch.
I tend not to think about sightings that way. I think one can’t. Each sighting is a story, and can only be evaluated as such. A decently-read great storyteller could tell a great fake story, and a relatively inarticulate but genuine witness a poor one. Were somebody to promise to turn over to me, no further questions asked, that truckload of beer he’s got parked outside my door if I did rank them, however, I would put Melvyn Georgekish’s near the top, even though he didn’t get a good look at an animal.
Back to the fake. Note from reading the link that only one thing was determined to be fake: The Indiana track. Dennett tries to crap all over a lot of stuff, but this is the only fake he comes up with. And here’s what the faker said about his fake, of, remember, a single track:
“After an eight-month effort, I was able to talk with Parker, then living on the East Coast. He told me the footprint was a fake. He knew this because he had made the imprint and the cast! Originally he had intended only to see if Krantz could, as he bragged, “differentiate between [a track] made artificially or naturally.” Parker said he now feels the thing has gone too far and regrets he made the [Bloomington] track. I asked how it had been made. “It took about twenty minutes to form the print in the mud,” he said. The dermal ridges came from his foot and hands, placed in areas where the “least amount of wear or abrasion would occur.” What about the “two traits”? “Oh,” Parker replied, “I wasn’t sure about that. I thought they might be toenails and scars, so I added both.” Parker also told me he made “the ball of the foot appear deeper near the inside of the foot to simulate the weight-bearing area during a light push-off.” At the last minute, he embedded the shell of an American black walnut where the fifth toe would have been to make the print look more realistic.”
That is ONE track.
Does anyone think that level of craftsmanship has gone into ALL the trackways that appear possibly genuine?
You have to prove that. Because it’s a silly postulate unless one can show how one is doing it.
“Georgekish states he was driving at night going 85-90 mph! But let’s just say he meant to say 85-90 kph. That’s still 55-60 mph. That’s still 55-60 mph. Glancing left at even that speed he couldn’t possibly have viewed those “red eyes” for a maximum two seconds. And, btw, nothing but general location ties those red eyes to the subsequently found footprints.”
He DID say kph; and I sure would have been able to see red eyeshine for far longer (unless all the times I have done it with other eyeshines at faster speeds wouldn’t work with red ones for Some Skeptical Reason). Red eyeshine is frequently reported for sasquatch; the eyeshine seen seemed to indicate animals of different sizes, as later indicated by the prints; and…eyeshine schmeishine, THE PRINTS ARE ENOUGH, as I have detailed on that thread.
“As for the footprints? Just one single print, photographed by Melvyn Georgekish in some moss without any size reference whatsoever. “Don’t tell me Georgekish created them because you have absolutely no proof that he did.” And you have absolutely no proof that he didn’t.”
He photographed TWO prints (am I the only one who has seen both of them? They cycle regularly on that thread, a left and a right). Another bigger one was found the next day. And anyone who thinks he constructed those hasn’t tried to construct one of those in caribou moss, a substrate in which he made no imprint (and I haven’t, hip deep in it with lug boots and heavy pack). Such work would make the fake we are talking about here look like a three-year-old did it.
As I have said: if I considered it a relevant thing to do to rank sightings (Ploughboy said as well as it can be said why it’s wrong to do that), this one would be well up there. Natives are natural scientists; it’s a matter of survival for them. I prick my ears a bit higher for their observations.
Corrick –
In your above post to Craig you make a statement that concerns me, and I hope you didn’t mean it the way I’m reading it. You said that since he was fooled by an intentionally false print, “no opinion by Krantz on any Sasquatch footprint can be accepted as absolute fact.” Are you equating opinion with fact? One can give an opinion, and hold it up as truth (to them), but it still is their opinion, which they certainly can give, and it is up to anyone who listens to give weight to that opinion by what the know of the person and of the subject.
If Dr. Krantz made a mistake of identification, do we therefore not believe any of his opinions, whatever the rest of his track record? And you appear to include Bob Titmus and Ed Palma, too, as unbelievable? One honest mistake (without intent to deceive) and one’s opinion on anything dealing with that subject if worthless?
Note I am saying opinion, not fact, as they are not the same, though it seemed to read that way in you post. We have to decide what we accept as fact, and hopefully (to me) it will be based on many factors, from many different sources.
You and I agree that this is a deeply fascinating subject that will benefit from open, respectful discussion.
Oh, BTW, Dr. Spock was a physician who wrote a book very popular in the 1950s. It was about raising babies and many of my generation were raised by it, chapter and verse. The science officer of the Enterprise was Mr. Spock. No relation as far as I know.
I don’t know why the author of this is Craig Woolheater because I wrote this response to corrick.
In regard to the Patterson film let’s get some things straight.
The Patterson film rights are divided thusly: Pat Patterson owns TV and film rights and Erik and Martin Dahinden own the publishing and electronic rights. I don’t know where corrick is going with the profits angle but the estimated total income since 1967 is about $100,000 according to Rene Dahinden in 2000. Since then I estimate only another $50,000 has been made from TV rights. That’s not a huge amount of money.
When someone tries their best to pooh pooh an eyewitness statement they do themselves a disservice when they argue for the sake of argument.
Look, if you don’t have professional experience in regard to what can and cannot be seen when driving at 65 kph then don’t come on here and poniticate as to what Melvyn Georgekish can and cannot see. You do not work in law enforcement or traffic reconstruction so you are not qualified to make this argument.
Be a skeptic, I get that and it’s fine to be one. I am hugely skeptical too. Melvyn Georgekish’s argument that he saw red glowing eyes is better than yours that he didn’t. His account is plausible.
When you become a traffic reconstructionist and expert in eyewitness reliability then refute Mr. Georgekish’s testimony. Mr. Georgekish is a fellow Canadian and First Nation’s one at that. The First Nations Are not given to making things up and you do him a great disservice in trying to make square peg fit into a round hole.
That being said I still respect corrick as he has been pretty good about questioning things that I also found dubious. Yes, we’ll keep it friendly and not used charged lingo like “believers”. I am not a believer, but a concluder if such a word exists.
Where to begin.
EastTexan
Sorry for the confusion. Naturally everyone can have an opinion, even me. Guess what I tried to say was that there is no such thing as a “genuine” sasquatch footprint. And all “experts” opinions are merely speculation.
DWA/Others Red Eyeshine
I never wrote Georgekish was a liar, I just questioned what weight should be given about his eyeshine testimony. He states he was driving at night at about 85-95 kph. That he saw reflected back from a stationary object what he perceived to be four red eyeshines. Traveling at 85-95 kph, at 80-90 feet per second while peering through a truck window at something stationary beside the road outside his direct headlight beams. His imagination? Budweiser cans? For what, at the most, half a second.
Georgekish & the footprint photos
Again, I don’t state he’s a liar or a hoaxer. I only point out that we have just his word as to the size of the photograph prints. In moss, not clay or sand or even dirt. With no surrounding context.
John Kirk,
I do know you from the old cz.list. I even have a personally autographed copy of “In the Domain” from you. I like to think of you as that non-skeptical Matt Bille which from me is high praise, but not worth much.
In my opinion, skeptic or not, cryptozoology needs a whole lot more John Kirks than it does the Linda Godfrey’s, Linda Mouten Howes, among too many others. Vaya Con Cryptos John.
Kirk’s right on all points.
There is nothing excessively problematical about noting eyeshine at the stated vehicle speed. By itself, it might just be interesting. But Georgekish, a hunter keep in mind, found tracks corresponding to what he had seen in the same place. One cannot just toss that without evidence that something else but the putative source made the tracks, which most would consider unlikely, I think, when considering the case objectively. (Sometimes bigfoot just might be the mundane answer.)
All one has to do is prove him wrong. That’s it. But one has to prove him wrong, or lying, or we have another one to toss on a huge and growing pile of consistent, unaddressed evidence. Simple as that. One can’t say something is impossible because one just thinks it is, especially when the experience of others seems to indicate it isn’t.
And as EastTexan notes, one can’t just call a scientist wrong on everything because he was wrong once. Think of all the stuff we would have to “un-know” if we had to do that.
I would like to say again that “dermal ridges” on plaster casts in no way proves anything. I have worked with plaster every day of my sculpting career (35+ years) and I can tell you plaster, being an endothermic material will do all sorts of things when it is not mixed properly in both terms of water to powder by volume and time/speed of mixing. Many times I have watched videos of investigators mixing plaster in a pail with a paint stick and then troweling the porridge-like mixture over the supposed Bigfoot track. The ratio of water to materials were wrong, the mixing speeds and timing were wrong and the application of material was wrong. Surely a recipe for a poor quality cast (not mold – the footprint is the mold) with all sorts of problems and distortions guaranteed to appear. One of these distortions can be stress lines running North to South or East to West along the sides and bottoms of the cast. As plaster sets – not dries – a high amount of heat builds up from the center or thickest area of the cast and radiates outward to the sides. When not mixed correctly, the pressure of this heat build-up will cause the outer areas a lot of stress and sometimes the material will sink or fold back in upon itself…causing stress lines. If the thermal stress is great enough these lines can cover large areas of the casting. These could be mistaken for dermal ridges. Remember that well mixed plaster is a great medium for capturing detail…even the minutest lines and such. If proper steps in the mixing and pouring of plaster were taken, then I think that much more real anatomical details would could be observed the casts. Serious field researchers should take courses on print and ground preparation, correctly mixing and applying plaster and sealing the casts when done. Of course, all this is easily done in the studio where mixers and equipment are available but good high-quality castings can be achieved by anyone with a minimum of instruction and simple inexpensive tools. The most important of these tools would be an electric drill and a paint mixing bit/attachment obtained at any hardware store. Plaster as a rule is mixed one to one by volume but an easier way to get a good quality “pouring” mix is to add plaster to water until the water will accept no more plaster as in that you will see the plaster just at the waterline. Waiting for five minutes or so to let the plaster soak will also help disperse air naturally contained in the powder. As you can tell, we’re not mixing oatmeal here which is what I see being slogged over and into prints on many videos.
Plaster needs to be mixed -not stirred- for at least one and one half minutes for a small mix of say one quart, longer if more up to 3 minutes for large amounts. Forget the porridge, the final mix should resemble heavy cream or a milkshake in consistency. Any air bubbles can then be stirred out. Then the mix can be poured into the prepped footprint and left to set for at least 1/2 to one hour. This mix will pick up any details that are present in the footprint. Unfortunately, it will also pick up anything else that is in or lying on the print including sand, dirt, leaves, sticks, which brings me to print/ground preparation…
But more about that later – if anyone’s interested.
Michael Dennett was on the old Bigfoot Forum for a while. He said the “Indiana man” was a fabrication he created to protect the identity of the real perpetrator. She was a disgruntled student and Rene Dahinden was behind it all.