Doc Bashford
Ohio, 1977
August at approximately 10:30 p.m. on a clear night, Southern Ohio. Nearest town would be Minford in Scioto County. My grandma was on the phone with a church friend and my grandpa was out doing something related to school. I stepped out on the back porch to get guitar strings I had left in the car parked in the short drive way.
As soon as I stepped outside I noticed a very foul smell like a skunk and rotten meat. Very weird smell. I had NEVER smelled that before. I reached down and picked up a broken axe handle and started tapping in of the concrete as I walked. I wasn’t interested running into a skunk! I proceeded to the rear of the car and started to put the keys in the lock, but heard a rattling sound that seemed to be coming from everywhere. I stopped and looked around and there was complete silence. That struck me as odd because the pond behind the house normally was raging with crickets and frogs, but it was silent.
I again went for the lock and again the rattling sound. I could see clearly but saw nothing. Then I realized I was being watched from behind me. As I turned the rattling sound returned and there 30 for 40 feet away was a huge creature at least 8 foot tall… no neck, very long arms and reddish black in color. It was covered from head to toe with hair which was longer on its forearms and around where its neck should have been. Its face was hairless around its mouth eyes and nose and had a heavy brow. I could not see its eye color.
Its armed swung forward and hit the barbed wire fence it was standing behind. That was the rattling sound! I have no idea how long I stood there in shock! I do know I hit the kitchen table on the way into the house. My grandma said I was making too much noise since as I ran down the hall to my room, not knowing what just happened.
My gun cabinet was locked so I began breaking the glass as grandma came in telling me to calm down. I told her there is a monster outside. She said” It’s one of your friends playing a joke -if you take that gun out I will call the sheriff”. I told her to call the sheriff, the game warden and the state police. Then I zipped past her carrying a loaded 30/30 and she was right behind me. I ran out and the thing was gone. She asked me “Where is this monster and what on earth is that smell”.
I kept telling her it was right there. After saying that a couple times we both heard something going through the trees beside the house back towards the fence. Then the entire fence line shook AND there it was, running through the field and onto the hill which was void of trees until you get to the top. My gun was on it, but it was amazingly fast. I think I was saying “It runs like a man”. Don’t know if I was saying it aloud or not but something in my head said “What if it is a man, but its way to big and no man can run like that uphill”.
I lowered the gun as it got to the top and it turned and screamed at us. It started out low pitched then went up very high. Maybe five to ten seconds long then walked into the woods. Scared the bajeebies out of grandma. I told very few people and they just laughed. I always told myself “One day I will bring whatever it was in, then we will see who is nuts”!
Poor grandma! I’m sure back in those days it was seen elsewhere in the area.
California, 2009
My second encounter happened in early Nov-2009 in the Smith river area (Del Norte County, Northern California). I got a call from a ranger friend of mine whom I had met many times before in this area. We’ll call him Scott. Scott had asked if I wanted to go with him on a hike looking for illegal bear hunters. We crossed at Patrick Creek-headed south.
All I heard for an hour and 45 minutes was, “There is no such thing as bigfoot, just in my imagination”. We came up on a ridge that had an open area to see the valley below. I had my binoculars scanning below and there below us were 3 creatures about a quarter mile away in a grassy area by the edge of a cliff. I had to laugh. Scott asked, “What was so funny”? I pointed and said, “Right down there is my imagination”. He looked and his words were, “Holy shit! You’ve gotta be kidding me”!
The male stood erect facing us, as if he could see us. You could see that the female had breasts and was doing something in the grass with a much smaller creature. The big guy stood still. We watched them for at least 10 minutes. Then the big guy, my rough guess he stood about 8 feet, did something with his right hand. They all stood, got in a single file line, turned and went into the tree line along the cliff which was above them. GONE! Scott was very nervous and actually in a panic as in his fifteen years of service as a ranger, he’s never seen anything like that.
I insisted we go down there and we did, but it took us a while to get to their location. We could see where they had been and he was now very paranoid. We followed their trail and they went in along the cliff and after about 45 yards went up the cliff. Straight up the cliff! We did the same also and trust me, Scott didn’t want to. It took about 45 minutes to get to the top and we tracked them west along the edge of the cliff. Then to my surprise, they went straight back down. Left us sitting there with miles between us! Scott even said how smart that was, which made him even more paranoid.
Well it was getting dark and I had no night gear with me, I wasn’t gonna talk him into going farther anyhow! So we headed back. He never said a word on the 4 mile track back to the river, but was very scared. We said our goodbyes and I called him the next day; he turned in his resignation and he now lives in Santa Barbara!
I have seen 5 in 26 years.