Bigfoot Wood Knocking: 1959
Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 9th, 2011
In Dr. Jeff Meldrum’s Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science (New York: Forge Books/Macmillan, 2006), one of the earliest uses of wood knocking to communicate with a Bigfoot/Sasquatch, is cited. According to Meldrum, the original source is contained in a letter from John Green.
The early non-Native wood knocking incident involved Bob Titmus in the Bluff Creek area in 1959. This would have been during his Tom Slick-sponsored work in the area, no doubt, because Art Long was also present.
Below is page 185, from Meldrum’s book, with the specific passage in question:
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.
Nicely done Loren. Show them where the woodknocking really came from. Next thing you know , Al Gore will claim to have invented the internet…. what , he did what?
Right on Loren.
Hey weren’t you the first one to discovered that Bigfoot like sex?
Nicely done my friend. no substitute for fact. This should settle the debate over who did what first….
Great article. Moulder and Scully were right…the truth is out there.
Titmus decribed one experience. Titmus didn’t say all bigfoots do that. He didn’t know that. Titmus didn’t give a presentation about it. He didn’t teach hundreds of people how to use wood knocking to find bigfoots. Titmus merely recounted one observation. That’s a whole different thing.
When Meldrum says that wood knocking has long been associated with bigfoots, he’s talking about what I and the BFRO have been talking about and actually putting to use since the early 1990’s.
MM
There is nothing wrong with taking what someone else has discovered and expanding and improving upon it. But you can not claim to be its discoverer or inventor. Clearly in the text above, you can read that he heard the sounds, deduced that it was a coded message and replied and was answered. He later wrote his findings and was published. Meets all the requirements for discovery of something. I don’t think anyone will argue the fact that Mr. Moneymaker and his group have taken this and used it and improved it and even went a step beyond by endeavoring to gain more knowledge and then teach others this knowledge. But with this said, you can not claim to be the discoverer. Mr. Moneymaker may be able to call himself a pioneer of advancing the research. I call this the Columbus Syndrome. Where someone claims to discover where someone already lives and claims it because no one says any different or doesn’t have a loud enough media backing to argue the point. Kudos to you Matt for advancing our knowledge of wood knocking, but you clearly did not discover that Bigfoots use it to communicate.
I have a question. Why is it so hard for some people to give the proper respect to those they clearly owe their entire passion or at least part of that passion to? I don’t understand the clear disdain for the originators and the colleagues and the potential followers of ones passion that some people have. If it were not for the asking of questions and the questioning of the validity of evidence then we would never get to the truth. This may not be a proper post in this thread but I am curious.
Geez Matt, quit while you’re way behind!
You’re saying that Titmus merely observed in 1959 the one ‘unique’ bigfoot that hit wood with a stick? And that he and nobody else possessed the pure genius that you have, to extrapolate that as common behavior of all bigfoots? That’s like saying someone observed the only salmon catching bear…
On top of that you have monopoly on teaching people how to expertly hit a tree with a stick?? And now hundreds of people have a degree from the Matt Moneymaker school of wood knocking?
Then you devalue the work of Meldrum saying that his statement about wood knocking being associated with Bigfoots was talking about You and BFRO? You don’t think he just might have heard about it before you put on your Columbus hat?
Well I must say you are not only making history, you are creating it!
We need to get Matt together with Dr. Phil asap! Pretty soon he’ll claim he shot the patterson footage, displaying the mn iceman, along with founding Cryptomundo!
I really wasn’t going to get into this. I tried to ignore the palaver I hear and see regarding the ridiculous claims made by MM, who has now, apparently, lost any modicum of credibility he once enjoyed.
But, alas something just have to be said. The research is just too important to be totally hijacked by a bunch of overenthusiastic, sophomoric, self proclaimed “experts”. My sincere apologies to those BFRO members for which the above does no apply—I’m sure there are many such frustrated individuals having corresponded with a few of them.
For me; the Carolina episode wasn’t worth viewing.
And by the way; is anyone else as annoyed by the BFRO group members use of the slang: “squatch” and “squatchy”. The dialog gives me a glimpse into the atmosphere of these expeditions—innocent though it might be in this regard.
Enough of that and—getting on to more important issues.
As I’m getting tired of stating—I have spent several thousand hours hunting, trapping and low impact / survival camping in some of the East’s deepest, most pristine wildernesses—most if not all areas perfect sasquatch habitat, and as I’ve already mentioned I don’t believe I’ve ever perceived anything that could be interpreted as any kind of sasquatch sign or behavior. Yet the BFRO wants us to believe that these made for television episodes complete with field production crew and a truckload (at least) of equipment, are getting hits with every entry into the woods. Yes, I understand that they are cherry picking their sighting locations and this may or may not allow a slight advantage; but, this too may be a hindrance, as the locales have already seen increased traffic due to the every curious public etc..
I Suppose that MM must not realize that some of us are a bit older than he—and that some of us already had a profound interest in the sasquatch phenomena even while he was having his diapers changed.
MM did not discover nor develop “Wood Knocking”. [ As per personal phone conversation with Ivan T. Sanderson cir 1968-1969, Sussex, N.J.] It was a topic of conjecture then just as now. As far as call blasting goes and his claim as to being the first “researcher” to develop it use; I don’t know…Maybe? If MM did develop the popular use of “call blasting”, I fail to understand why he would be so proud of the fact. In my opinion it is useless at best, if not actually counterproductive. I say this after hearing everything available out there in the public domain.
The fact that MM places such importance as he has on “who done it first”, regarding wood knocking etc. is akin to Al Gore’s claim, to having “developed the internet”—both are indicative of at least a mild manifestation of megalomania.
Regarding “call blasting”; think about it; how would you react while hiding in the woods from someone obviously hell-bent on your possible discovery / demise; and by these same someone’s using strange, other worldly devices to light up the landscape and see in the dark? Now think about how you’d react to suddenly hearing non-humanly, loud nonsensical gibberish like; “ big brown bear on the skunk cabbage fall my rain ate”…followed by “scare sleeping trees trout” following; “here I am”! As a sasquatch; would this bolster your confidence in assuming a trusted clan member is scouting up ahead? To a great extent the same applies to wood knocking. Exactly does three loud knocks followed by one softer knock mean. Probably; “stupid human go home!”. You get my point; we don’t know their code, their language, so how can we use it effectively?
If by hypothesis we are to (correctly BTW) assume that the creature is operating with human like intelligence then lets be consistent in our protocols for its observation (within its own intimately known habitat, no less!). What’s dumber than trying to call a hyper-wary sasquatch in close enough to observe with phony, amplified gibberish. Or has MM now secretly broken the sasquatch language code? Is it any wonder that this creature has been able to remained hidden for as long as it has! While the big guy sits around a never humanly seen wildflower adorned glade high in the mountains discussing the weeks events with his family group they must all be rolling around the ground in hilarity telling stupid human jokes! The topic of MM must be an oft repeated subject.
My apologies for the dropped word, wordiness and awkward phraseology in the above post, I need to slow down a bit:
Exactly does three loud knocks followed by one softer knock mean. Probably; “stupid human go home!”.
Should read as follows;
What exactly does three loud knocks followed by one softer knock mean? Probably; “stupid human go home!”.
AND:
While the big guy sits around a never humanly seen wildflower adorned glade high in the mountains discussing the weeks events with his family group they must all be rolling around the ground in hilarity telling stupid human jokes!
should read;
While the big guy relaxes around a never seen by human eye, wildflower adorned glade high in the mountains, discussing the weeks events with his family group—they must all be rolling around on the grass, in hilarity—telling stupid human jokes!