Recently I saw a social media post touting a newly “stabilized” version of the infamous 1967 “Patterson-Gimlin film” of “Bigfoot.” I was astounded to find that this footage, which I assumed everyone knew had been debunked, was still making the rounds for folks wanting to believe.

Is it just that the debunking stories don’t get told as often because they aren’t nearly as interesting as the prospect of a seven-foot-tall hominid cryptid skulking the woods of Northern California having been caught on (excessively shaky, out-of-focus) film, or is it simply that there are still so many people willing to believe—even in the face of credible sources explaining their role in the fakery?

Wikipedia indicates that there are at least seven scientists who have conducted studies favorable to the Patterson-Gimlin film being legit. One wonders if these might be the same seven scientists denying global warming.

A few years back I attended a lecture by the man who claims to have produced the actual suit worn in the film. He tells a compelling story.

79-year-old Philip Morris of Charlotte, North Carolina is a magician and entrepreneur who began a costume and stage prop business in the early ‘60s, Morris Costumes, which has grown to become one of the largest costume companies in the country. In the 1960s, Morris Costumes was one of the few companies producing gorilla suits for magicians and carnivals. Morris claims that in 1967 a man called him, identifying himself as Roger Patterson, stating that he was a rodeo cowboy wanting to buy a gorilla suit for a “gag.”
 

 
According to Morris, Patterson swindled money out of investors to raise the money for the (relatively expensive for the time) $435 suit. Morris claims that Patterson promised seven different investors a 50% cut of the profits for a “Bigfoot film” he was going to produce (do the math). Through these “investors,” Patterson was able to send Morris a money order for the gorilla suit.

“I didn’t think it was a real big deal,” said Morris. “It was just another sale.”

Morris shipped the suit to Patterson.

Patterson later called Morris back asking how to make the suit more “realistic.” “He asked me to send him some extra fur and asked how to hide the zipper in the back and how to make the person in the costume look larger,” Morris said. “I told him to brush the fur over the zipper and use hair spray to hold it, and then get some football shoulder pads and sticks for the arms to give the illusion of being taller, and use stuffing to get more bulk.” And that was the last Morris heard from Patterson.
 

 
In October of 1967 Morris saw the famous footage on television and recognized his suit. “I was watching TV when I saw Patterson and his film on the news,” Morris said. “I called my wife from the other room and said, ‘Look it’s our gorilla costume.’”

Morris indicates that he didn’t initially go public with the information about the sale of the suit because he didn’t want to expose a fellow illusionist, stating: “In my mind it was a magic trick.”

He didn’t want to break the magician’s code.

Morris didn’t start speaking publicly about the suit until Patterson died in 1972. Even then, he mostly told his story at trade conventions.

Eventually, Morris’ story made its way to Bigfoot researcher Greg Long.

Greg Long’s The Making of Bigfoot: The Inside Story devotes an entire chapter to Morris’ claim that he provided the costume for Patterson. “I couldn’t see any motive beyond that he wanted to tell the truth,” Long said. “This was just a good story that he decided to tell.”

“Most people believe me, but there are people that are very hostile to me when I tell them it is a hoax,” Morris said. “It is like telling them Santa Claus doesn’t exist. They grew up believing it was true and do not want to admit to themselves it’s fake.”

His story seems believable, but can Morris really prove that he sold a suit to Patterson which was used to fake 59.5 seconds of jerky out-of-focus “Bigfoot” footage? I suppose not, but then again, I want to believe.
 
Here’s Philip Morris talking about the sale of the suit to Patterson:

 
And here’s the original Patterson-Gimlin film:

 
H/T: MLive.com, Rense.com

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
South Carolina woman reports sighting of ‘Lizard Man,’ captures photo evidence

 
I’m digging these Cthulhu, Bigfoot, “Ancient Alien Pyramid” and “Scholarly Skull” throw blankets by Middle of Beyond. It looks like (don’t hold me to it) they’re large enough to fit on a double bed. Although, if I had one of these, I’d probably use it on my couch.

The blankets are reasonably priced at $59.99 + shipping. According to the website, all the blankets are in stock and ships in 1-2 days. Not too shabby. 

 
This actually happened: In 1978, when I was 8 years old, we had this little black-and-white TV in the front room of our house, a room nobody ever spent much time in. We had all of 6 channels back then, and on this one day I happened to catch the In Search Of episode about Bigfoot, an episode I was probably a little too young for; it was very scary. I remember the show saying that the Bigfoot had last been sighted in Texas, but this is probably wrong—my sense of U.S. geography wasn’t too developed at the time. It probably said California. After the show was over I guesstimated how long it would take Bigfoot to walk across the country and get to our house in the suburbs of New York City. I decided it would take him about a month, not a bad guess for an 8-year-old I suppose. And so for the next month I wasn’t frightened at all, because obviously Bigfoot couldn’t get me yet, even theoretically. But once that month was up, it would occur to me often that Bigfoot might be like a block away, a couple miles away. Even today it sometimes happens that I wonder whether Bigfoot is about to pounce at me out of nowhere, on a subway platform, at the deli.

Bigfoot fear, man. It’s a powerful, primal thing.

Bobcat Goldthwait’s upcoming movie is about Bigfoot, and it sounds pretty good. It’s called Willow Creek, and it mixes regular narrative moviemaking with documentary elements. It sounds like he investigated the places in northern California where all the Bigfoot enthusiasts hang out—what you might call Bigfoot Country—and then made a regular fictional movie in that setting. He interviewed a bunch of the Bigfoot experts, but didn’t tell them that he wasn’t filming a documentary, rather a fictional feature, which is either an ethical nightmare or smart filmmaking or both.

In case you haven’t been paying attention, Bobcat’s become one of the better directors we have working right now. He may not be the most subtle moviemaker out there, but he’s honest and interested in taboo subjects, and his directness of address ensures a distinctive movie experience. Bobcat’s endlessly quotable, and his scripts all have that Bobcat feel of coming from a smart source and coming from someone who’s tired of bullshit. It takes someone who was in three Police Academy movies, as Bobcat was, to be as tired of bullshit as Bobcat probably is.

You can pinpoint the nationwide origin of interest in Bigfoot almost as precisely as you can with the JFK assassination. Basically all contemporary interest in Bigfoot, Sasquatch, the Yeti and so on begins with the Patterson-Gimlin film, the Bigfoot movement’s Zapruder film. The picture above of poor Mrs. Bigfoot (apparently it is a female) looking back at the camera is from the Patterson-Gimlin film, the footage was shot by Roger Patterson and Bob Gimlin in northern California on October 20, 1967, and when you look at the picture it’s easy to see why it captured people’s attention.

The Patterson-Gimlin footage kicked the movement off, as sure as that bullet in Dallas set the JFK conspiracy guys in motion. Bobcat recently appeared on The Dana Gould Hour (he comes in at 4:48), and he explained a little about the new movie. He said that “really what it was was, the 9-year-old me wanted to go to where the footage was shot all those years ago.” He met a guy who wrote a Bigfoot-related coming-of-age book (think Twilight) called Yeti Or Not and he met another guy he called “the Bob Dylan of the Bigfoot community.”

Some people have surmised that John Landis, who would later become a famous movie director with Animal House, The Blues Brothers and Michael Jackson’s longform Thriller video, is the one in the Bigfoot suit in the Patterson-Gimlin film. Landis denies it.
 

 
‘In Search of Bigfoot’ with Leonard Nimoy and the trailer for Bobcat Goldthwait’s ‘Willow Creek’ after the jump…

 
Have you ever seen the shitty 1977 Italian horro flick Yeti: The Giant of the 21st Century? I hope not. It’s one of those bad, bad movies you can feel all superior to and laugh at, but it really laughs at you baby, because YOU are the asshole who sat through it! The King Kong-esque plot involves a Yeti that is preserved for a million years in an iceberg near Greenland who is taken into captivity and into civiliazation. The inept film’s best moment comes at the end, when this ridiculous song, Funny Disco Sound (credited to the Yetians!) comes on during the closing credits. Dig the “I barely speak English” lyrics. Score by Sante Maria Romitelli.

The Yeti’s big
The Yeti’s tough
But he’s so good

He is so big
The Man of stone
But he won’t harm you
The Yeti
He is so tough
The man of stone
But he won’t kill you
The Yeti

I can’t embed it here, so click through to the Trash Palace blog and have a listen there. Be warned, this atrocious tune will be in your head for the rest of the day. Should you find yourself tonight, awake in bed, grinding your teeth to this song, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
 

 
Is Bigfoot a scary, cryptozoological enigma or a crime fighting action hero? Seldom seen Krofft Supershow oddity, Bigfoot and Wild Boy.

Orphaned at a young age, Wildboy was raised in the Pacific Northwest by Bigfoot, a large, hairy man-thing. Together, Bigfoot and Wildboy combated the various forces of evil in their part of the country. Besides being extremely strong, Bigfoot could also use super powered jumps to get to high places or to cover far distances. Helping (and occasionally hindering) Bigfoot and Wildboy were Suzie (first season only), the 12 year old daughter of the Ranger Lucas, and Cindy (second season only), an archeology student.

Thank you Robert Christian Stevens!