Recent Cryptobits

Let us pause to remember these three folks linked to cryptozoology, who have passed away recently.

(1) Joseph Neminich, 58, a Pennsylvania Bigfooter, died (he was recently ill) on February 6, 2009, at his Johnstown home (the one in which he was born). In July 1994, Neminich and a friend, Tom Johnson, saw a dark brown, barrel-chested Bigfoot on Route 422, between Revloc and Colver (old mining towns, with a mirror reversal of names). Born on June 22, 1950, in Johnstown, Neminich was the son of the late Joseph and Mary (Hrebar) Neminich. He is survived by his cousins. He had been employed as a security guard, and was a member of St. Therese Catholic Church, where friends and family will meet at 10 a.m., Monday, February 9, 2009, for a funeral Mass, with the Rev. Bernard Karmonicky, OFM.

(2) Dan Reed (above), 50, the “Bigfoot beat” reporter for the Oakland Tribune and most recently the San Jose Mercury News, died on January 8, 2009, in Oakland, California, caused by medical problems related to his smoking and drinking lifestyle. The Mercury News remarked that “there was no mistaking his hulking 6-foot-4, 330-pound frame, long beard, uncombed hair and untucked shirts. He rarely did anything quietly. But more than that, the Falstaffian Reed, with his legendary appetite for life and a ribald sense of humor, was a shoe-leathered journalist whose dogged reporting spanned more than two decades and won him many awards.” An example of his Bigfoot work is here.

(3) James E. Colvin (pictured above, in the US Navy, 1943), 96, who was the director of two expeditions in search of the Loch Ness Monster for World Book Encyclopedia, died of natural causes, on January 4, 2009, in Greenville, South Carolina. He had lived for many years in the Chicago, Illinois, area, having worked for Encyclopaedia Britannica as director of public relations, before going to World Book Encyclopedia. Colvin was one of the three founders of the Great Books Foundation. He retired in 1972, and then moved to the Carolinas.

The Loch Ness launch in July 1969 of the World Book Encyclopedia Expedition’s Viperfish, involving minisub builder Dan Scott Taylor, Dr. Roy Mackal of the University of Chicago, and Harry Reucking, Vice President of the World Book Encyclopedia. James Colvin ran the operation from Chicago.

Information on recent deaths thanks to Craig Woolheater, Eric Altman and Stan Gordon.

Loren Coleman 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.

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