Badlands Bigfoot - North Dakota Sighting
In February, 2004, sasquatch made an appearance in Mountrail County, North Dakota. His trek cross country both excited and frightened many people.
The story begins on a Sunday, February 22. Several of the children from the trailer park were outside playing in the middle of the afternoon when they noticed a large, hairy being. It was standing on two legs, watching them play. They became frightened and ran, screaming towards the trailers.
The mother of two of the children came running out of her trailer when she heard the screaming. She watched the figure walking quickly away from the area. "I don't know how big it was, but it just pushed through those trees like you're going through bushes and it was moving fast," she stated.
This witness wouldn't meet with the BFRO researcher and told everyone that she would no longer talk about the event. Her children were so frightened, especially at night and that they would no longer go outside to play. She just wanted to forget about the entire thing.
Later that day, the 22nd, there was a second sighting reported approximately 8 miles south of New Town (trailer park located). No details were provided by the Tribal Council.
On Tuesday, February 24, two women reported a night time sighting. They said that while looking out their window, they saw a hairy man-like animal. Their home was located approximately 5 miles southwest of Mandaree and approximately 17.5 miles southwest of the second report on the 22nd and 25.5 miles south/southwest of the first report, also on the 22nd. The researcher was unable to obtain more details of this third sighting as the women had no phone in their house and he was not permitted to "drop in" on them to discuss anything with them.
A fourth sighting was reported on Wednesday, February 25 by two men driving south from Mandaree on Highway 22. As the car crested a rise in the road, they both saw a "very large, hair-covered animal walking on two legs down the middle of the road."
The older man was driving and he quickly stopped the car. When the headlights hit the creature, it walked to their right and down into the ditch. It then walked out of sight directly to the south. There had been another vehicle following closely behind the two. It did not stop, but veered abruptly around them and sped away. The two men felt that whoever was in that vehicle had also seen the creature in the road.
Thursday, February 26, the older witness, the driver, took his nephew and one of the nephew's friends back to the location of their sighting to look for possible tracks. The nephew also invited three other friends to come along. All 6 men were witnesses to the long line of footprints they found in the snow, running parallel to the highway.
The nephew estimated the trackline to be nearly 300 yards long; the stride was estimated at 4 to 5 feet. Several of the tracks had clear toe impressions. They were 15 to 17 inches long and 4 to 5 inches across, widening near the toes. Many of the tracks displayed evidence of a mid-tarsal break, or flexible foot.
The group of men followed the line of tracks which eventually drifted back to the pavement and then stopped. This seemed to indicate that the creature returned to walking on the roadway. The searched for more tracks down the road for a mile or so. But they were not able to find any more.
While the 6 had been examining the footprints, a car with two more friends stopped to see what was happening. They also were witnesses to the tracks.
On Friday, February 27, two men set out to see the tracks for themselves and to photograph them : Dennis Fox, Jr., Director of the Independence Program and Paul Danks, administrator of the Natural Resources Department.
The photographs were unable to support much of the story as during the two days that passed between, there was warmer weather and a great deal of snow melt. This resulted in erosion of the quality of detail. Only large rounded impressions remained in the snow. They were able to document the length of the trail and the stride between steps. However, Fox was unwilling to release any of the photographs to allow further analysis.
It is also said that at some point a game warden and a couple of law enforcement officers went to search for the "monster" that people were reporting that they were seeing. The men returned from their search only stating that they had seen at a distance "something or someone very tall and moving very fast".
All the information that was shared came through the Tribal headquarters at Ft. Berthold Reservation of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation. It is good to remember that anyone who wishes to research on the reservation must go through tribal headquarters and should also realize that many of the people may be unwilling to share any stories or information that they may have about sasquatch.
[Please Note: Sadly Nancy passed away at the first
of January, 2022. We will continue to honor her and her research by
sharing her work. RIP Nancy. -Thomas]
Nancy
This Post By TCC Team Member Nancy Marietta. Nancy has had a lifelong interest in the paranormal and cryptids. Nancy is also a published author and her book, The Price of war, has been met with great reviews.
I suspect that these North Dakota sightings of this individual bigfoot -- very much like so many other sightings of "out of place" individual bigfoots -- is that of a dispersing male. "Dispersing" implies an excess individual of a species, often a male, that is undertaking a long journey to find suitable habitat that is currently unoccupied. He may have come from Canada's forests, from farther west, or even from farther east. He just happened to get caught for a few days in the plains region of ND, which is wide open country with narrow ribbons of trees and brush only along creeks and rivers. Dispersal is one of nature's ways of keeping a gene pool healthy.
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