Memorial Day Footage: 13 Years Later
Posted by: Loren Coleman on May 25th, 2009
Thirteen years ago, on Memorial Day, video footage of an alleged Sasquatch was captured and named after this holiday.
Some have declared that the second-best piece of Bigfoot film/video footage, after the Patterson-Gimlin film, is this series of moving pictures, while others give their vote to the Redwoods footage. Needless to say, other films and videos receive various researchers’ attention, depending upon their points of view or focal areas of study. Truly, to each to their own, of course, but the name of this video will automatically have a temporal reminder tied to it.
The Memorial Day video is a Hi-8mm video that is purported to show a rapidly moving Bigfoot, going from left to right. It was videotaped on May 26, 1996, by Lori Pate while they were on a fishing trip with family and friends at Chopaka Lake, in Okanogan County, north central Washington. (Some credit the footage to both Lori and Owen Pate.) It was preceded by two sightings of an anthropoid, hair-covered seemingly bipedal hominoid, at lesser distances, by others on the trip.
The Memorial Day video shows a figure, matching the description of a Bigfoot, running across a hill. It disappears behind a less-inclined, sloped area, then reappears briefly, walking this time, before going into the trees at the extreme right of the frame.
This is the third clip analyzed in the program Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science (the so-called Exhibit 8). The History documentary produced and directed by Doug Haijcek (today most recalled for “MonsterQuest”), was released January 9, 2003. In the hour-long program, the location where the Memorial Day footage was taken is used to make forensic measurements to determine the film subject’s height, path, speed, and stride by measuring the subject against fixed objects in the background.
Derek Prior, a three-time All-American sprinter from the University of Washington, runs the same route as the filmed figure to determine if the alleged Bigfoot’s running speed was too fast for a human to duplicate, to compare his speed and stride to the subject’s, and to give a visual comparison to the figure in the footage.
In the concluding segment of Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science, the results of the forensic measurements are revealed. The film subject – supposedly a Bigfoot – has the following alleged measurements:
A height of 5.3 ft (1.61 m)
A leg length of 2½ ft (0.76 m)
A running speed of 8.56 mph (13.77 km/h)
A stride of 4.25 ft (1.29 m)
Derek Prior, a Homo sapiens, on the other hand, was able to run the same path at 17.1 mph (27.51 km/h) and had a stride of 6.8 ft (2.07 m).
One aspect of the film continues to remain a mystery. At the end of the Memorial Day footage, before the subject disappears into the tree line, it seems to grow taller by 8 inches (20.32 cm). One possible explanation was suggested that if it was indeed a real animal, it could be carrying a younger animal that had climbed higher on its back.
As the years have passed, more and more skeptics within the Bigfoot field have surfaced, regarding the footage. It has been pointed out that Dr. Grover Krantz decided to avoid any discussions of the Memorial Day footage when he revised his book on Sasquatch, commenting that “he wouldn’t waste ink on that footage.”
It appears Daniel Perez has become one of the most outspoken critics from within Bigfootery to question the footage. He wrote, for example, in part:
When the Memorial Day footage is displayed, the audio is silent without any narrative explaining why. If the producers of the program felt the remarks made on camera were racist, they could have bleeped the questionable dialog. The real reason, I believe, is that the audio is both illuminating and revealing.
Here are excerpts of the audio:
“He was right behind that small pine tree, right?”
“I’m freak.”
“Yeah, I’m scared.”
“I could make a million bucks.”
“That’s a guy with a big hair cut. . . .”
“Sure is ambitious, running a lot. . . .”
“It’s a Bigfoot.”
“That’s not a Bigfoot. . . .”
“It’s a Dickfoot.”
“It’s all on video!”
“I’ve only had two drinks.”
“Me, too, two too many.”
And somewhere in the audio, as the subject comes into view is this: “looks like a white boy to me,” a statement made without a doubt by the late Fred Bradshaw, an avid Bigfooter from Elma, Washington. Having known Fred Bradshaw since 1995, his voice is easily recognizable. Isn’t it convenient, or too convenient, that a Bigfooter would be present when a camping couple just happens to film a Bigfoot? What was Fred Bradshaw’s connection to Owen and Lori Pate? And why has the couple never acknowledged Bradshaw was there? Their reluctance to be interviewed or questioned on the matter speaks volumes. ~ Daniel Perez, 2007
The following is Rick Noll’s Texas conference presentation on the Memorial Day footage, added to YouTube four months ago:
Since there are new readers here, what do you think?
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
First I dont’ think it’s the second best footage of sasquatch. That title goes to the Freeman footage which is in my opinion a pretty good clip.
You just can’t say if the creature in the Memorial Day footage is a sasquatch, a guy in a suit or just a black-dressed drunk running along the hill. The quality is just too poor. But I don’t think that the thing you see at the end is a mask. Something is going on with it’s head and I think it could be a baby sasquatch that dangles there. But who knows…
I didn’t know that a bigfooter was on the scene when it happened. Has anyone more infos on that? Can somebody confirm it?
“One aspect of the film continues to remain a mystery. At the end of the Memorial Day footage, before the subject disappears into the tree line, it seems to grow taller by 8 inches (20.32 cm). One possible explanation was suggested that if it was indeed a real animal, it could be carrying a younger animal that had climbed higher on its back.”
OR he/she is taking off the mask/hood of the suit. Gotta get a little warm running around in an ape suit.
I don’t think the creature grows. Thats a hill it walks behind, showing only its
head, then walks away from the hill ,slowly growing larger.
there isn’t really much to be told by this footage. the circumstances don’t seem favorable in the creditability department and the visual is ambiguous at best. opinions may be varied on the story, but the film contributes nothing of value. without clear evidence, the tale is just like any other.
“At the end of the Memorial Day footage, before the subject disappears into the tree line, it seems to grow taller by 8 inches (20.32 cm).”
We can all imagine the delight felt by a paranormalist reading this.
When watching the program where they were recreating the scene with the sprinter running the near-identical route it seemed it bit dubious to me.
Doug
I do not like this footage one bit. It’s very strange. At first, the “bigfoot” is running and personally, it seems to be running as would a human until it gets close to the hill. And then it seems like it’s just flailing it’s arms at body. Sort of looks to me like it’s dancing XD.
And then we see it again at the end and it’s supposed to be walking. I’ve watched this over and over again and to me, right before it enters the woods, it looks like it’s hopping. But it looks like it’s sort of walking like a gorilla would with it’s arms. Like it’s sitting down or kneeling down and using it’s arms to hold it’s weight and jumping without using it’s legs. Could just be the way the film looks but that’s what it looks like to me.
This is definately not one of the best pieces of footage.
In my opinion this is a HOAX. I get sick of hoaxes being touted as “evidence”. The guy grows at the end because he is exahausted and probably totally out of breath and ready to pass out so he lifts his mask or costume to get a breath and to stop from overheating and passing out. Plus he totally runs like a human. Nothing in this footage says non-human. Plus the quality is so low, to enhance this and find details is absurd. This could be bad pixilation and artifacts from “enhancing” and to claim details out of it would be disengenous at best. We need to provide good video evidence of bigfoot, and this is NOT it, not even by a long shot. I am a believer in Bigfoot being a possibility, but when we claim footage like this to be genuine, we show the skeptics and scientists that we are not to be taken seriously.
Over the course of the last few years, I have done some analysis of the MD Video…..mainly the ‘lift’ sequence, in the second part of the video.
I just posted a long explanation, with still frames and short animated-gif’s, detailing why I think the video shows an adult Bigfoot, lifting an infant up onto it’s shoulders.
My username is SweatyYeti, on the thread/comments that are here and here.
🙂
I stand open to being corrected.
But I have seen two sasvids that could in my opinion possibly be the real thing. This ain’t one of them. (The Redwods isn’t either. Shoot, that could be a sasquatch. But a blobsquatch is what it IS.)
Everything I see in this video is too close to being human…and the measurements above bear that out. I wouldn’t think thing one of a human covering ground like that, at that pace. No problem, and you don’t need to be an Olympian to do it.
Good post, Loren.
It is good to revisit these “controversies” once in a while to separate the “wheat from the chaff.”
All sides should be allowed and discussed for pros and cons.
Personally, it looks fake to me. But hey, one never knows…:)
I have a request for everybody who takes footage of the Sasquatch. It’s a small request. It’s a simple request. It will take a small moment of your time, and a small effort on your part. It can be done with all but the cheapest of cameras and takes but a few moments to learn how to do.
FOCUS!
Thank you.
The LMS analysis of the video analysed the wrong part of the video….the run. There is nothing unusual, or in-human about it. The unique, and anomalous feature of the video is the sudden increase of the subject’s height.
An interesting sidenote about this video/multiple-eyewitness event….is that Lori Pate’s father wrote a lengthy email, to me, in response to an email I sent him, a year or so ago, inquiring what Make and Model camcorder the Pate’s used to take this video.
He had a lot to say about their sighting/filming….and he stated that he firmly believes his daughter and Owen saw a real Bigfoot on the mountainside that day.
Putting that fact together with Owen’s (up-close) eyewitness testimony, on the LMS dvd….
“It came up from behind that bush, and looked me straight in the eye”…….and you have a major problem for the “hoax” theory.
It’s a sure bet that Lori and Owen didn’t hoax, or lie to, her own father…..so that makes Owen’s testimony sincere, and honest, beyond a reasonable doubt….since he clearly wasn’t part of a hoax attempt.
So, how does one then account for his CLOSE-UP eyewitness testimony???
I must side with Krantz. The “choppy stride” is indicative of a drunk trying to keep his footing while running. What I mean by this is, he is running and being almost overly cautious where he plants his feet making the stride appear unnatural.
I have always felt that this footage is hoaxtacular…..
Greg102 is exactly right…this kind of crap should NEVER be heralded as “evidence”….
from the first time I saw this footage years and years ago I have always believed that it was clearly not a bigfoot, It really doesn’t look like anything other then a person running down the hill imo.I dont even believe this to be a hoax film or a man in a fuzzy suit , I really believe this is nothing more then a man running .
tropical wolf wrote:
“Greg102 is exactly right…this kind of crap should NEVER be heralded as “evidence”….”
Just because the Pate’s were camping a long way away from where the subject ran….doesn’t mean that the video, and sighting event, is nothing more than “crap”.
There have been many sighting reports over the years…..should they ALL be considered ‘crap’???
The sighting reports are, for the most part, ‘evidence’ of an unproven creature…indicating at least a chance, some probability, that the creature actually exists.
Given the fact that Bigfoot, if it does exist, would be a close relative of ours….the evidence (all of it) deserves to be treated with respect, and careful thought.
The running looks like that of a perfectly normal Homo sapiens. If we assume there is a species called sasquatch, “normal Homo sapiens” is one thing it is quite certainly not.
Just one more thing…
The Mods at Jref moved my Memorial Day Video post from the Patterson Film Thread, over to the MD Video Thread….so the first link in my earlier post here, won’t be of any use.
But the other link will go to where the post is located now.
Did anyone else notice at about 41-43 seconds a similar looking bipedal being walking along the hill? Its right after the camera looks down, then looks up, you can see a similar looking figure to the first figure filmed. Maybe I’m seeing things, but it looks to me like another of whatever the first figure is.
Did anyone notice that the guy running was pumping his arms EXACTLY like a human when he is trying to run faster.
Ridiculous!!!
I’ll agree that the Freeman footage is much better than the memorial day footage. The resolution and distance is superior.
I also wasn’t surprised by the measurements they gathered from the experience with Derek Prior. I’m not sure if that points to a hoaxed film though.
-T
I’m amused at some of the comments here claiming it’s this or that. It’s nothing of the sort. I don’t know if this shows a bigfoot. I don’t know if this shows somebody in a bigfoot suit. It’s too obscure to see exactly what it is……………..but it does have back up evidence of a closer sighting of an alleged bigfoot around the same time.
By the way some alleged bigfoot reports have claimed the subject ran ‘just like a man’. Quite obviously, some of the folks in this thread must assume a bigfoot would run like an ostrich or a hippo.
As for the running like a drunk comment, I see no evidence of a shaky swaying stumbling stride. That’s what drunks have. This footage (whatever it shows) doesn’t.
“There have been many sighting reports over the years…..should they ALL be
considered ‘crap’???”
No.
And as someone who has read tons of them, I can tell you why: they all tend to point to a consistently-described – this in subtle ways you wouldn’t expect from fakes lies and hoaxes – something that is very definitely not human.
There are no such markers here.
And it is very dangerous – as has already been pointed out – to the proponents’ credibility to pump up something like this, in a field where fakes are known to happen.
ANY of the sightings could be a fake a lie or a hoax. Any one, any five, shoot, any fifty.
All of them? Tell me the odds on that.
Not so this one. It’s just one; and there’s nothing that even points intriguingly to it being what it says it is.
THAT’S the problem.
In my opinion it’s gonna be difficult to come to any conclusion/agreement/cooperation in dealing with the whole BIGFOOT category. There are too many organizations that rarely share/cooperate with each other. I have been kicked off the BFRO site/forums for actually sending people on there links to known wild life sounds/pictures as to actually get the truth not just have your BIGFOOT blinders on and say “It exist not matter what!” it’s ignorant to say they don’t too. Another reason I got kicked out also was for my signature which read ” If you look for logic FIRST, you won’t look like an idiot LATER “.
Loren you rock dude! Keep up the good work! Peace to all the other Crypto Freaks out there! 🙂
1) P/G film
2) Freeman footage
3) Redwoods
Only 3 that I think show the real thing. Memorial day footage just doesnt cut it for me.
“Patterson-Gimlin film” sigh :C
Even an animal demonstrating below average instincts would likely circumvent the exposed area and remain in cover to pass by, additionally an animal of that size wouldn’t need to sprint across such a clear-cut, that is unless a thunderbird was seen in hot pursuit.
Can any one place Mr. Biscardi on that Memorial Day Weekend?