Synopses & Reviews
Last August, two men in rural Georgia announced that they had killed Bigfoot. The claim drew instant, feverish attention, leading to more than 1,000 news stories worldwideand#8212;despite the fact that nearly everyone knew it was a hoax. Though Bigfoot may not exist, thereand#8217;s no denying Bigfoot mania.
With Bigfoot, Joshua Blu Buhs traces the wild and wooly story of Americaand#8217;s favorite homegrown monster. He begins with nineteenth-century accounts of wildmen roaming the forests of America, treks to the Himalayas to reckon with the Abominable Snowman, then takes us to northern California in 1958, when reports of a hairy hominid loping through remote woodlands marked Bigfootand#8217;s emergence as a modern marvel. Buhs delves deeply into the trove of lore and misinformation that has sprung up around Bigfoot in the ensuing half century. We meet charlatans, pseudo-scientists, and dedicated hunters of the beastand#8212;and with Buhs as our guide, the focus is always less on evaluating their claims than on understanding why Bigfoot has inspired all this drama and devotion in the first place. What does our fascination with this monster say about our modern relationship to wilderness, individuality, class, consumerism, and the media?
Writing with a scientistand#8217;s skepticism but an enthusiastand#8217;s deep engagement, Buhs invests the story of Bigfoot with the detail and power of a novel, offering the definitive take on this elusive beast.
Review
and#8220;The mistaken assumption of past Bigfoot investigation is that the phenomenon is best understood from the perspective of natural history. Joshua Blu Buhs has written an original and engaging book that tells us the meaning of the hairy beast that wonand#8217;t go away yet we cannot seem to find.
Bigfoot is the definitive history of the legendand#8217;s social and cultural context, and it offers an explanation for the phenomenon that will be pondered and discussed for years to come.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;While Bigfoot researchers have grown weary of skeptical treatments of the topic, Joshua Buhsand#8217;s examination of the Sasquatch is refreshingly crisp and insightful, as opposed to demeaningly debunking. His grasp of the popular cultural significance of Bigfoot is outstanding and his overview of the legacy of these creatures is topnotch. Highly recommended.and#8221;
Review
"Buhs is at his amused best when following the exploits of Bigfoot's human handlersand#8212;the colorful band of true believers, hoaxers and pseudo-documentarists who constructed this greatest of all shaggy-hominid stories."
Review
and#8220;Thoroughly discredited hoaxes regarding seeing or shooting an actual Bigfoot notwithstanding, media interest in whether giant wild humanoids exist is readily re-ignitable. In 1962, Robert Hatfield struck the match when a and#8216;half-man, half-beast monsterand#8217; chased him into a cabin but ran off before Hatfield trained a gun on it. Good for Hatfield, maybe, since the gun wasnand#8217;t loaded, but fortuitous, anyway, for keeping the Bigfoot legend going, since once again there was no physical evidence of the fabled creature. Buhs undertakes the telling of and#8216;how the modern myth of Bigfoot emergedand#8221; and uses the terms
Bigfoot,
Yeti,
Abominable Snowman, and
Sasquatch more or less interchangeably throughout, since all refer to not-quite-human creatures living in the wild that are preternaturally elusive. Proceeding era by era and place by place, Buhs evaluates the stories of encounters with the giant creatures, deconstructs hoaxes, and evaluates genuine studies in service of tracking down the truth. His conclusions seem well-founded but are highly unlikely to end debate.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;The value of Buhsand#8217;s book is in its synthesizing of the many historical Bigfoot/Sasquatch stories into one readable narrative, and its summing-up of the state of Bigfoot research and belief today.and#8221;
Review
"Adroitly researched and well-documented. . . . Much more focused and thorough than G. Reeceand#8217;s
Weird Science and Bizarre Beliefs and a very suitable cultural history complement to the anthropological focus of C. Daeglingand#8217;s
Bigfoot Exposed. Highly recommended.and#8221;--
ChoiceReview
"The stories are invatiably interesting, sometimes strange, often humorous and always entertaining. It's a good read, particularly if you've ever camped in a wilderness and wondered what lurks in the darkness just beyond the dying campfire light."
Review
"[Bigfoot] is an oversized footprint of Americana, and a fun read. Bigfoot may not be stomping through the American wilderness, but his legend still lives in the forests of our imagination."
About the Author
Joshua Blu Buhs is an independent scholar and the author of The Fire Ant Wars, also published by the University of Chicago Press.
Table of Contents
Preface
Dramatis Personae
and#160;
1 Wildmen
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Wildmen through History
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; What-Is-It
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Abominable Snowman
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Life and Times of Bigfoot
2 Yeti: 1951and#8211;1959
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Sensation
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Yeti, Science, and Zadigand#8217;s Method
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Britain Hunts the Yeti
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; America Hunts the Yeti
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; What the Evidence Told
3 Sasquatch: 1929and#8211;1958
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Great Sasquatch Hunt
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Kidnapping of Albert Ostman
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; and#8220;Occamand#8217;s Razor Cuts on the Side of the Sasquatchand#8221;
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Slick Eyes the Sasquatch
4 Big Foot: 1958
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Folkloric Origins of Bigfoot
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Big Foot Makes the Papers
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Confirmed and Converted Confront Bigfoot
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Humbug!
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; and#8220;Maybe Bigfoot is Lost Relative of Old and#8216;Sasquatchand#8217;and#8221;
5 ABSMery: 1959and#8211;1961
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The (Weird, Wacky) Wonderful World of Ivan T. Sanderson
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; ABSMery
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Pacific Northwest Expedition
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Enter Peter Byrne
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Wipe: Or Trueand#8217;s Trouble with Truth, and Ivan Sandersonand#8217;s
6 Melting the Snowman: 1961and#8211;1967
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Melting the Snowman
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Sandersonand#8217;s Failed Debunking of the Debunking
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Quiet Years
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Big Foot Daze
7 The Return of Bigfoot: 1967and#8211;1980
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Bigfoot Filmed!
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Making Sense of the Movie
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Return of Bigfoot
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Bozo, the Minnesota Iceman
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Bigfoot on Tour
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Secret of Sasquatch
8 A Contest for Dignity: 1969and#8211;1977
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Bigfoot Community
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Cripplefoot
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Center that Wasnand#8217;t
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Hoaxing, the Unconquerable Problem
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Laugher Curtain
9 Cryptozoology: 1978and#8211;1990
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Grover Krantz, Sasquatch Scientist
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Anthropology of the Unknown
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Cryptozoology
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Science Police
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; and#8220;Definitive Proofand#8221;
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Arrested by the Science Police
10 The Death of Bigfoot? 1980and#8211;2002
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Green Man
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Death of Bigfoot
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; and#8220;The Most Abominable Hoaxerand#8221;
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Bigfoot is Dead! Long Live Bigfoot!
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Not The End, but An End
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Curse of the Sasquatch
and#160;
Bibliography
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Archival Collections
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Select Bibliography
Index