Cass County Bigfoot
Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 14th, 2006
Today, media began carrying reports that Bob Olson, a Cass County grater operator has found Bigfoot tracks near Deer River, Minnesota, and NBC-TV 4 local news did a good segment on his find.
Olson first heard about the tracks from his granddaughter, relocated them and made casts of two of the 15-inch prints, which make the 6-foot-5-inch tall man’s size-14 feet look small.
A report in the Herald-Review of Grand Rapids gave more details.
The site is remote and near Six Mile Lake Road in eastern Cass County (just west of Ball Club). Carloads are coming to view the large, mysterious footprints left on the edge of the road.
Bob Olson thinks the tracks are from a Bigfoot, but everyone does not agree.
“No such thing exists,” said retired Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologist Jim Schneeweis of Grand Rapids. “If there were all these Bigfeet running around, sooner or later somebody would have found a dead one. The DNR has had cameras (in remote locations) for years. How come nobody’s ever got one on film?”
While wildlife biologists say that Bigfoot stories are not founded in scientific evidence, that does not seem to stop those who do believe such creatures exist. A simple Google search will reveal hundreds of reported sightings around the nation and entire Web sites devoted to the tracking of the creatures.
Schneeweis said that he was not aware of any sightings or other evidence reports of the existence of Sasquatch creatures out of the Grand Rapids office, but did say that he was aware of sighting reports in the Northome area in the past.
Olson, who carefully made plaster reproductions of the giant human-looking prints this week to preserve them, said that there have been numerous sightings in northern Minnesota – including some on Winnie Dam Lake Road. The self-described enthusiast, said that he has heard reports of increased Bigfoot activity in the area for the past two years.
He is not the only one who is interested.
Local resident Wayne Nelson called in the report of possible Bigfoot evidence to the newspaper on Monday, saying that, on his way to go fishing, he saw people taking pictures of the ground between the road and the woods.
After pulling over and speaking with the people there, Nelson realized what they were looking at: 17 inch long tracks, about three-quarters of an inch deep into the dirt.
Looking like human footprints, but larger and with toes of all the same size, there was speculation that the tracks were not human because human tracks normally only reach a depth of about one-quarter inch, according to Nelson.
The prints, no matter what the source, have generated curiosity and despite the disbelief of the scientific community, it has done little to sway those who are certain Sasquatch creatures exist.
This focus of new Bigfoot track discoveries in Cass County, Minnesota, reminded me of one of my favorite cases from the 1960s – known with the tag phrase "Sister Lakes" – from Cass County, Michigan.
In May and June 1964, Sister Lakes, Michigan, was the location for many reports of an 8 to 9 feet tall Bigfoot, seen by Mr. & Mrs. John Utrup, Gordon Brown, Joyce Smith, Patsy & Gail Clayton, and serveral others. It had the rather distinctive shaggy look often reported from these Midwestern accounts.
Both might be examples of Marked Hominids, the geographic race of so-called Eastern Bigfoot.
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.
Wow the first photo shows something very heavy made that track. Look at the ground around it looks very dry in the photo anyway. They could very well be close to a finding BF there. Keep us updated on this one. Wonder if they have any more photos of the tracks they found like maybe how long the stride was if they found more than one print??
Can’t really tell a lot from these photos, but those casts sure look interesting. Interested in seeing how this one develops.
There is something fishy going on here…
I don’t know much (by which I mean, anything) about footprints, but doesn’t the “waist” of the sole look awfully thin? I get the impression it would snap with heavy usage and, judging by the depth of the track, “heavy” is the right word.
A request….
Somebody out there with a good digital camera and the means to obtain some plaster…
Walk barefoot across some nominally soft ground and cast your own footprint to give the rest of us a good example of what a real biped/hominid imprint looks like in plaster.
It could offer some real objectivity… and a firm comparison when judging some of these larger bigfoot prints.
If these tracks are real, this probably does not represent a very large individual. A 6 footer. Maybe a youth looking for new territory.
There is some evidence to suggest Sasquatch may use human roads as a means of navigation; easier to travel on the edge of a road than thru brush.
From what I understand many believe the authentic bigfoot prints have ridges. I don’t see any in the print. Did anyone check for ridges running up and down the foot.
Joe
Makes sense…fox and other animals will use human roads, why not Sasquatch?
re: #7
the way Jeff Meldrum explained it a couple of months ago in San Antonio, the “ridge” (which would show up as a “dip” in the negative cast) is a result of mid foot flexion, such as we find in more flexible chimpanzee and other primate foots, but not in the more rigid human foot.
It looks like that MIGHT be there in the “narrow waist” of the print that Nachzehrer mentions in post #4, but the photos are just too grainy to tell conslusively.
I like the quotes from the redneck: “Well, thar aint no such thang as a bigfoot so it cant be that, ah tell you whut.” Man, ignorant people are just annoying. Also, not enough data to tell if this is a hoax or not.
this made some top story news here in Minneapolis. of course, it was laughed off by every news caster. :\
You would expect to tell something from the depth of the prints. If we assume that footprint depth in solid ground is proportional to pressure (weight/area), a 3/4″ print where human prints are normally 1/4″ deep suggests 3 times the pressure. A 17″ foot would be nearly twice the length of a human and have about 4 times the area. Combining this suggests a beast 12 times the weight of a human or nearly a ton. So:
– there is something really scary out there.
– the footprints have been ‘improved’ artificially, perhaps by building up earth around them.
– my assumptions are wrong.
Anybody who knows soil mechanics and can do this properly ?
I’m sorry to say but I think that a joke was played on the person who found the prints. I find the cast way too flat/thin. When we walk we but all our weight on our heels so if you have a creature that weighs almost a ton, where is the the impression of the heel. It should be a lot thicker in the heel area and thinner in the arch area of the foot.
I’d like to respond to bluerose3 about his impression that the heel impression should be thicker because of all the weight We(humans) put on our heel. Well apes do not walk like this. I invite you to check it out for yourself. I don’t know were you can find this out but I’m sure a few minutes googling it and you should find it. Also I’m not saying the famous Patterson film is real but watch that video once and you can see the stride does not put it’s heal down first.
I would be truly happy to find out that these are real tracks. However, they are not particularly convincing. An amateur could make these, or better.
Hopefully someday we will have something we can really call definitive proof. This is not it.
If the foot prints are genuine, they cannot exist in isolation. They have to lead somewhere. An expert tracker could easily determine, by examining the surrounding terrain, if lighter, less definite prints in grass or leafy areas are consistent with the prints in the formerly muddy roadside dirt. The trouble with reports such as these is that there is no followup of this kind.
Hey bigfoot.. If your reading this right now.. U have me convinced.. well almost..
okay you all, get this, and get it good. I have never or will ever believe in bigfoot, how come noone ever gets out the hounds to chase or track him down? any guy can have that size feet, look at all the basket ball players, look at all the giants out there. go to the guiness book and see what the biggest feet are. see what the biggest or tallest man is, anyone can get in a costume and run the roads barefoot.
Just for the sake of correct attribution, the tracks were actually initially discovered by a man named Cory Frazier, while he was grading the 6 Mile Road for the county.
It should also be noted that the tracks *do* lead somewhere – back into a swampy area off the road, an area that would be very difficult for people to traverse in trying to track something. There were a dozen or so tracks found on the side of the roadbed, and several more tracks leading off into the swamp.
I personally think belief in a ‘bigfoot’ type of creature is pure speculation, as there is no proof of anything existing to this point. That said, I find it very difficult to believe that someone would take the trouble to fake these tracks – especially the off-road ones – in such an out-of-the way place as 6 Mile Road where it would be very unlikely that anyone would actually see them.
It’s interesting, that’s for sure.
well i only live about 45min away from where the track was found. i was thinking about going there this weekend or next to check it out. i also have some plaster. maybe i’ll get my own little cast of it. i’ll keep my eye out for some hair too. i plan on going in the dead of night so there is nobody around. i’ll probably end up camping. (i’ll look for the hair in the morning) is bigfoot dangerous. i think i’ll bring a can of pepper spray just in case. i might as well make a night of it.
This have to be real..and that guy has a nice pair of feet..they’re big too.
Yeah….. I think there is someone up there with alot of time on their hands and needs to get a life. If there is such a thing as BIG FOOT…. then there should be more pictures, findings and sightings. It’s funny, but we see other wild life wondering around… where is this so called BIG FOOT????
Well thanks, wabibinay, for revealing the truth to us all- giant, barefoot basketball players are roaming the countryside in gorilla suits…it all makes sense now!