September 1, 2012
POCATELLO, Idaho — Academia is a lonely place for Sasquatch hunter Jeff Meldrum.
Meldrum, who teaches anatomy and anthropology at Idaho State University, might be the only college professor in the U.S. researching and publishing work on Bigfoot, or at least the only one putting his name to the subject.
Meldrum brought attention to the subject with his 2006 book, “Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science.” Nearly all of the 13,000 copies of the book have been sold.
The Sasquatch limb is a thin branch to venture out on, and in the academic world, some would say it’s more akin to thin ice.
“People say, ‘You are paid by Idaho State and you are doing this?'” Meldrum said. “But this is legitimate research. This could be one of the most outstanding questions in natural history and human anthropology that we have today.
“I’ve gone to great lengths to go about it in a very objective, very professional manner in order to cultivate credibility.”
The work will pay dividends if 54-year-old Meldrum or someone else proves the existence of a bipedal hominid that isn’t a human or known primate, something Meldrum thinks will happen in his lifetime.
In the meantime, criticism follows.
“Each time you get these (different species) pushing closer to the present, you have to ask, ‘why do we assume we’re the only ones?'” – Meldrum
Meldrum’s research lives in two realms.
The first is anthropological, taking into account the fossil of many species of hominid distinctly different from the primates on the human evolutionary track or our extinct cousins, Neanderthal’s.
With one species as modern as 11,000 years ago, the crux of Meldrum’s argument is that we can’t be sure a species hasn’t persevered in some remote corner of wilderness. This doesn’t mean Sasquatch exists. It means he could.
Meldrum’s second realm is field work. His office is filled with more than 200 molds of Sasquatch footprints taken from all over North America. He said the molds, some 16 inches or bigger, indicate creatures more than 7 feet tall and weighing 700 pounds.
Read the entire article here: Approaching Sasquatch hunt as an academic
Source: The Sacramento Bee
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films:
OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.
Filed under Bigfoot, Bigfoot Report, Cryptozoologists, Cryptozoology, Evidence, Footprint Evidence, Forensic Science, Sasquatch