Bigfoot vs Mummy
Posted by: Loren Coleman on September 27th, 2006
Will the above “mummy” displace efforts to seriously study the “Johor Bigfoot”?
As previously mentioned here, the group the Seekers have decided to sell the oft-photographed Johor Bigfoot footcast (see below).
The cast is the one that Joshua Gates, the host of the Sci-Fi Channel’s Destination: Truth, and his producer Neil Mandt were filming in Johor, last February. Their reality program does not seem to be on the fall schedule, however.
Syed Abdullah (left) and Dr. Kenny Fong with the Singapore-based group, SPI, are shown above with the cast.
The importance of this cast to the Seekers has waded. That Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia-based group had originally expressed serious interest in researching the hairy hominoid but they are now reportedly selling their rather famed footprint cast prize. The reason: The Seekers wish to fund their analysis of their three “mummies.” It might already be gone.
Even though I think these mummies (one pictured at the top) routinely are taxidermy-created art objects, perhaps Cryptomundo readers have more insights about these specific “mummies.”
Frankly, I’d keep the Johor “Bigfoot” cast. If the Seekers would like to contact me about it being placed safely in a cryptozoological museum, I hope they do. I suggest this versus this cast going into the increasing black market of international cryptozoological items – such as the Pangboche Yeti hand that was stolen from Nepal in the 1990s and has completely disappeared.
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.
That would be nice to see: a museum of cryptozoology. I know there are collections and small “museums,” comprised mostly of casts and framed blobsquatch images but to find an actual museum that looks at the cultural, scientific, and historical matrices of these cryptids would just be wonderful. Some place that would be educational and even-handed not schlocky and sensational, biased one way or the other.
Eireman…Perhaps you are unaware of my International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine? Although large selections from the museum are now temporarily housed in the traveling exhibition, “Cryptozoology: Out of Time Place Scale,” (as I have mentioned several times on Cryptomundo, of course) some 46 years of items – educational, scientific, historical, and cultural – exist in the museum. However, financial support and a larger space are restrictions on making such a museum “work” into the future, beyond any traveling exhibition, and this one is no exception.
I was not aware of such a place. I will have to investigate it. I suppose that’s the problem that plagues so many of these endeavors – money. Thanks, Loren, for the tip.
Are there any other casts from other sites similarly shaped to this one? I always thought it looked odd.
I would agree with fredfacker that the shape is certainly odd. In fact, it’s unusual shape almost certainly makes you want to write it off as a fake or a compromised print of some sort. Due to the recent scientific comprimises and outright falsehoods from that part of the world regarding cryptozoological evidence, I will remain very skeptical of anything that is claimed to be ‘hot’ evidence of cryptozoological existence.
There’s a museum of natural history in Idaho I think that has set up an exhibit, which I think it terribly progressive – even if it was done just to get more foot traffic. But if the end result is a more scholarly focus on the subject in a respectable venue, then I think that’s great. Such a place might be willing to house reputable evidence.
The Seekers and the Singapore Paranormal Investigators combined forces in Johor last Feb but seem to have gone mummy-mad of late.
The fact that they’ve gone “mummy mad” casts shadows of doubt on their reputation as serious researchers and calls into question the legitimacy of any previous findings. Or, at the very least, it calls into question their ability to analyze and authenticate any tracks they might investigate. This is always the problem – and the dangerous lure – of getting too excited about apocryphal finds half a world away. It takes more than photographs. The credibility of both the evidence and the investigators have to be questioned, especially in a field fraught with hoaxes, confabulation and self-delusion.
I always thought the shape was strange too. Sure it could have become like this from rain or other factors, but it still doesn’t seem to be a natural looking print for a creature of this type. What would be the biological advantage of evolving highly spread toes like that and a relatively small heel? Nature usually has a very good reason for developing certain traits and looking at that print the way it is, well, it just doesn’t seem like a form that would benefit a bipedal creature of this type. As far as I can see, it doesn’t look at all like any known type of animal, certainly no primate type animals that I know of, and usually nature sticks with what works so you would expect a logical bipedal type shape. If this is real, I wonder what other strange adaptations it has developed.
NO WAY the Mummy can beat Bigfoot, unless McMahon’s booking the match! Put your money on Sasquatch, baby!
This is the first time I’ve seen the Johor casting. It looks like two prints superimposed to me — like a person stepped into a bear’s footprint or vice versa.
By the way, I’m officially stealing the title BIGFOOT VS. MUMMY, and pitching it to the Sci-Fi Channel as one of their Saturday night movie premieres. 🙂
I would agree that it’s important for a large group of critical experts to see these remains, casts, etc. This would allow for documentation, analysis and peer review of findings. So far all they want to do is say they have these amazing things, but “oh, no! You can’t see them!”
The casts look to be more for a large orangutan or something than what I have always concidered of bigfoot origin. The shape is all wrong for something to successfully walk upright all the time. Besides some of those casts are just huge. Wouldn’t it be difficult to get those big feet thru such thick jungles? I know I would be tripping and catching my toes on everything.
This may be a surviving a Giganto. Since no full skeletons have been recovered, we don’t know if they are bipedal or knuckle walkers. From the teeth found, we do know that there at least 3 times as big as largest orangutan. Even a knuckle walker that size would be over 6 ft tall when walking and upright probably 8 ft or taller. When compared that with 5′-5 1/2′ tall and 120 lbs human male of a 40 centuries ago when modern humans entered the area, Giganto would have seemed like something from a nightmare.