The Mystery of Bigfoot

Topic: Myth

Sources:

"Big Foot of North America"

http://www.unmuseum.org/bigfoot.htm

 

"The Big Foot Field Researchers Association"

http://www.bfro.net/

Relation:

As a child you are always open to the mysteries of the world, you are curious and you believe so easily.  When my sister and I were young, we were camping with our family in Humboldt County; we had been hearing stories of Big Foot, went to the museum, and were hoping to get a glimpse of him. One afternoon during the trip, we were playing in the forest when we heard a loud cracking noise we stopped in our tracks and looked around us. We were in a small clearing, and saw nothing, but the ground seemed to shake under our feet as something slowly walked through the woods. We didn’t wait to see anything, and jumped up and ran back to the campsite screaming “It’s bigfoot!! It’s bigfoot!!” Even today we both remember it, and aren’t quite sure what it was we heard, but we still like to joke that it was Big Foot. The myth of Big Foot is huge in Humboldt County, it’s a fun thing to joke about, whether or not he is real, I’m not sure, but it’s fun to pretend.

Discussion:

The myth of Big Foot, or Sasquatch, has been around for many years, and even Native American’s myths surrounding Sasquatch, or the “hairy giant” long before white settlement. Yet the first recorded sighting of Big Foot was in “1811 near what now is the town of Jasper, Alberta Canada. A trader named David Thompson found some strange footprints, fourteen inches long and eight inches wide, with four toes, in the snow” (Bigfoot of North America). The description of Big Foot is often that he is Huge, around 8-9ft and weighs about 500lbs, that he is very hairy, and walks bipedally. People have found footprints, taken castes of them, and put them in Big Foot museums, along with videos and photographs.

The legend of Big Foot is growing even larger due to contemporary culture and the rise of reality t.v., with shows such as “Finding Bigfoot” on Animal Planet. This show has four researchers on the hunt to find Bigfoot, and find if this myth is true or just a hoax. Mysteries such as this are exciting for people, and they search to find the answer. Many scientists think that the Bigfoot myth is just a joke, but along with that, many other people have set up whole research teams such as the “Big Foot Field Researchers Association,” or the “Finding Bigfoot” team. Whether or not this myth is fact or fiction, I don’t know, but it is an interesting and entertaining mystery.