“We’re definitely finding Bigfoot,” Chad Allen declared on Facebook before traveling with his family to Gatlinburg, Tennessee, this past weekend.
The Allens met up with friends on Saturday (July 25) and were set to explore all that the 8th annual Smoky Mountain Bigfoot Conference — one of dozens of similar events held annually in the U.S. — had to offer. All wearing Bigfoot T-shirts and bringing plenty of enthusiasm, the group was among hundreds who attended this year’s event to hear featured speakers, visit booths loaded with Bigfoot swag and take lots of selfies with a sasquatch — at least those wearing a Bigfoot costume — while roaming the Gatlinburg Convention Center.
Allen, a member of First Baptist Church Hendersonville, was especially excited about the T-shirt he wore at the event — one that featured his face on the body of a sasquatch.
While Allen acknowledged the conference started out as “the excuse we used to get away,” the experience turned out to be “awesome!!” “One of the speakers we saw was really cool,” he later reflected in a text. “She is a legit scientist.” The conference also had at least one enthusiast who seemed to believe “Bigfoot could open portals and spoke to them in their minds,” he added.
Jeff Wallace, another member of FBC Hendersonville, attended with his daughter for a daddy-daughter adventure. The week before in Sunday school class, he had heard Allen talking about going to the Bigfoot event and decided it sounded like a good idea.
“It was fun … family friendly,” said Wallace, comparing the feel of the event to a political rally and a monster truck event. “Fun stuff to hear and a lot to laugh about. … People were lined up to take pictures with Bigfoot Santa.”
Serious business?
While the conference definitely appeared to poke fun at itself with costumes and light-hearted joking, it also draws people who have dedicated their lives to researching and finding Bigfoot.
Cliff Barackman, owner of the North American Bigfoot Center in Boring, Oregon, has spoken before at the conference and similar events. He wasn’t able to make this year’s event, but he is staying busy fielding interviews, conducting related research and running his museum. He also is known for the reality TV series “Finding Bigfoot” that ran on Animal Planet from 2011–2018.
“Nothing against the feed store, but we are the most exciting thing (in Boring),” he quipped as he took time for a phone interview with The Baptist Paper.
While his show was unable to uncover any physical proof that Bigfoot exists, Barackman said the one thing he wants people to know is that Bigfoot is “actually out there” somewhere. He maintains there is plenty of space for “rare, allusive, intelligent animals to be roaming around here in North America and not be discovered.”
What is Bigfoot?
In simplest terms, Barackman hypothesized that sasquatch could be some type of “ape species” that walks on two legs. He acknowledged there is no way to know for sure without concrete, physical proof.
He added he’s unfortunately only had “two lousy sightings.”
“One was through a thermal imager in North Carolina back in 2011,” he recalled. “I think I may have seen one (for a) brief, six, seven seconds … across a hillside. It was either a human or a sasquatch. We were about a mile or two off a trail at 2 a.m., and I thought I saw … one color, head to toe, which implies it wasn’t wearing clothing. That’s an odd thing for the mountains in February. There’s room for error because it was a thermal imaging sighting, but I’m inclined to think that was probably one.”
The most recent possible sighting, Barackman noted, was in 2017 about 300 yards away while he was riding along in a car on a road in Tyler, Texas. “I saw a large dark, uniformly-colored figure walk out of the tree line as we were zipping by at 75 mph. And I just saw it briefly for a few seconds. I think that might have been one, but I don’t know.”
For Barackman, who enjoys searching the woods every week for evidence of Bigfoot, his dedication is driven by a “deep curiosity.”
“Over the last four or five years, particularly in one area … we’ve been finding tracks, seemingly the same individual sasquatch over time,” he said.
“It’s a deep curiosity about what these critters are up to,” he added. “Because every single Bigfoot alive today is out there this very second, doing something. I want to know what that is. … I think they’re just fascinating. That’s going to keep me going the rest of my life.”
What about faith?
Barackman dismissed ideas about Bigfoot having a soul or related spiritual questions. While he doesn’t profess to be a Christian, or affiliate with any particular religion, he noted he doesn’t consider himself an atheist either. “Something is up, something is up,” when considering some type of supreme being.
“I just have a hard time putting whatever God is into a box called religion,” he said candidly. “I’ve got all sorts of things in my life that don’t fit well in boxes, and the word ‘god’ is one of them. … I just kind of avoid all that.”
Not ready to rule Bigfoot out
So, what about first-time conference attendees Chad Allen and Jeff Wallace? Do they think Bigfoot really exists?
They’re apparently not quite ready to rule it out.
“I’ll give you the same answer I give when people ask me if I believe in aliens,” Allen noted in a group text chat, “I’d be silly to say it’s not possible.”
“I would agree with Chad,” Wallace noted.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Shawn Hendricks, director of content for The Baptist Paper.
