The following is taken from the Thursday, June 22, 2006 issue of the Scioto Voice newspaper, based in Wheelersburg, Scioto County, Ohio. Gilbert and Burton, the subjects of this story and Tom Biscardi’s hosts during his recent foray through Scioto County, were also the features of a story by Kirsten Stanley in the May 25, 1999 issue of the Portsmouth Daily Times (Portsmouth, Scioto County, Ohio). That story focused on the duo’s purported evidence of a Bigfoot community, and even a “graveyard”, however the preponderance of their evidence, according to local reporters who have endured the duo over the years, amounts to little more than blurry “blob-squatch” photos and rocks (tombstones) they claim bear an impression of the creature’s face.

Despite Gilbert’s and Burton’s dubious reputations among journalists I know, respect and have worked with, there is a tradition of hairy hominid sightings in the region. One well-respected source, who wishes to remain anonymous, has shared with me a story of a fleeting glimpse he caught of some unknown creature he initially took to be the rear end of a horse while jogging on bridle trails in the vicinity of Camp Oyo (the boy scout camp referenced in the article below). When the “horse” went off trail and disappeared into the thick cover of the woods however, he was spooked, and has since altered his jogging routine. My good friend and former bandmate Todd Martin (www.mothman.com) has also reported vocalizations in eastern Scioto County, where private farmlands and forested hills border the Wayne National Forest. Other reports from nearby include a “devil monkey” from the Duncansville area in bordering Adams County (as documented in Loren Coleman’s “Field Guide to Bigfoot and other mystery primates”).

Scioto County is heavily forested, bordered on the south by the Ohio River, the west by the 63,747-acre Shawnee State Forest and on the east by tracts of the Wayne National Forest, whose boundaries encompass 833,990 acres of public and forested private lands. Due to the extremely hilly terrain of the region, much of the land remains undeveloped or is managed by landowners for the growth of timber quality hardwood. Family farms, with garden plots and some cleared hilltop pastureland for cattle, are also scattered throughout the forested hills.

If there were a population of Bigfoot in Scioto County, it would almost be funny that mainstream science ignored them long enough for a probable hoaxer like Tom Biscardi to stumble across them. Biscardi’s famed “hand of unknown origin” by the way (identified by many as a skinned, mutilated bear paw from x-ray analysis) is conspicuous by its absence from the below article.  

 

 

No, it’s not your mother-in-law coming over for dinner. It is something, perhaps, much scarier. According to Dallas Gilbert, an expert in the field living in Portsmouth, they have children and can be various colors, including white, orange, and brown. They can reach up to twelve to fifteen feet large, with feet up to a size 20.

Gilbert is talking about Bigfoot, and they have been spotted in Shawnee Forest. Yeah, you read right. Bigfoot. Gilbert described his first run in with the hairy beast.

“Mine was 1996. I felt something strange, and turned around and saw a black object looking down at me. I turned and looked back up the ridge, waited a few seconds. I turned back around and it was gone,” Gilbert said, and then snapped his fingers. “From that point forward, my life has changed.”

And this is evident when stepping immediately inside Gilbert’s residence. His computer, always on, is full of photos and links to various Bigfoot Web sites, including his own. On his desk, a lighted magnifying lamp to examine pictures.

Above his computer, the wall. Something straight out of a wicked Sci-fi movie, the wall is covered with hundreds of photos he and his partner, Wayne Burton, have captured. Gilbert gave his story.

“In 1998, in January, I got that one picture right there. Out past the Boy Scout Camp in Shawnee Forest. I was standing there out towards the road taking pictures with my daughter’s little 110 camera. Before I took the snapshot. Arrughhh!” Gilbert said making his best impression of the sound he heard. “That’s right Jack. One growled at me. I took the snapshot and I stood still and didn’t move for two or three minutes.”

Yet another story (these guys had tons upon tons to tell), Burton described his first encounter in 1978.

“In Kentucky I was hiking with my favorite uncle around a place called ‘Brown Caves’. I was just goofing off, you know. One cave in there was bigger than this house,” Burton said. “I felt like something was staring at me, you know how you get that funny feeling. I looked around.”

Burton did not see anything so he went on about his business. A few hours later, he had the same feeling.

“I’m going to check this thing out. I didn’t see nothing, so I said to heck with it and started walking off,” Burton said. “But then I heard this snap, like the heavy snap of a twig or something. I was thinking it was a bear or some person. The ground shook a bit like an elephant walking.”

Still, Burton did not see a thing. However, he found a tree limb that had been snapped clear off of a tree.

“So I walked off again. I got a real pungent smell, like sulfur. It stunk,” Burton said. “I turned around, and about 40 feet or so there is a Bigfoot. I’m guessing from its height it was probably ten feet tall. It probably weighed 800 to 1000 pounds. It was big. Probably six feet wide, shoulder to shoulder.”

The creature mimicked Burton’s moves and ducked behind trees as he walked back. This was the last he saw of the beast.

The sightings have even attracted national attention. Tom Biscardi travels across the United States searching for the elusive behemoth. Biscardi came to Portsmouth last Sunday to check some of Gilbert and Burton’s photos.

Biscardi’s team has visited Portsmouth three times, and will come back within the month. They keep coming for one reason – the eerie sound they heard one winter back. Tim McMillen, a Bigfoot tracker, described the sound.

“It was shrill. Kind of a shrieking growl. It was something I have never heard in my life before,” McMillen said. “It was the most interesting sound I have ever heard. It was frightening, this sound.”

McMillen admitted to it raising the hair on his back, saying “it was scary loud.”

The group uses high tech equipment to record sounds such as these. The bionic ear can hear from 300 yards out. Night vision scopes and thermal detectors help out at night. Trail trip cameras are camouflaged in trees. The digital camera takes pictures when something activates a motion detector.

Biscardi described his first encounter.

“I’ve been going crazy ever since. It was back in 1973 and it was back in a place called Beaver Swap in Northern California,” Biscardi said. “We saw tracks going across the trail. We followed them and boom there it was. What do you do? Do you go and try to jump on the thing or do you run like hell?”

Biscardi chose the latter. For Biscardi’s first experience, he was not well prepared since he was only bear hunting. Since then, Biscardi packs the high-tech equipment and tries various methods to lure the creatures out.

“We will use glow sticks to attract them to the area. We will set up the bionic ear. We use a boom box to play back animal sounds,” Biscardi said. “We usually spend eight hours in an area.”

Using a huge searchable database, Biscardi follows up on reports across the states. But will there ever be an ending to this mystery?

“Yeah, if anybody does it, it will be me and my team,” Biscardi said. “We are a 24-7 operation and we have been all over the country.”

Not if local boys Gilbert and Burton have anything to do about it. They have their goal set on finding the definitive proof, the end of all speculation.

“Let’s see if we can prove his existence,” Gilbert said. “Already, millions of people know he exists.”