View AKA Bigfoot World Map in a larger map
Below is an exerpt from a page on Bigfoot Encounters titled "Many Names, Alaska's Bigfoot" which contains an article written by Mary J. Barry, author of Alaska's Ghosts, Enigmas, Outlaws and Things That Go Bump!
It should be noted that the Kustaka is more generally described as an otter-like creature. In fact according to Wikipedia, Loosely translated, kushtaka means, "land otter man". The monkey-like description below is unique to Mary J. Barry's article. To learn about the classic version of the Kushtaka, please read the Wikipedia Page.
John Active, a Yup'ik storyteller from Bethel, has gathered a large number of accounts told by the Yup'ik people of Southwest Alaska concerning their encounters with Urayuli. This being was described as standing ten feet tall, covered with hair, with glowing eyes. Its arms were so long, they reached to the creature's ankles. It was said to roam the tundra and cry out its loneliness with a voice resembling that of a loon. Although its appearance terrified the persons confronting it, the Urayuli never harmed anyone, according to the accounts gathered by Active. However, legendary accounts lore has it that children who disappear while in the woods are transformed into Urayuli.
The Southeastern Kushtaka has a less benevolent reputation. The Natives feared the creature and avoided its habitat. Harry D. Colp described a miner's encounter with the Kushtaka, in an account, which was later published as "The Strangest Story Ever Told."
Colp and three other prospectors teamed up in 1900 at Wrangell. They sent Charlie, one of the four, to Thomas Bay to look over a gold prospect, while the others sought grubstakes to pay their expenses. Charlie went about 50 miles up the coast to this location. There the rains kept him confined to his tent for several days. He then went out, trying to locate the landmarks given to him by an Indian.
By chance, he found a gold-flecked quartz ledge and loosened a piece with his gun, breaking his gunstock in the process. As he was taking his bearings, he said, a troupe of creatures he called "devils," that looked like both men and monkeys, swarmed after him. These shaggy beasts, with long, coarse hair, stinking and covered with sores, pursued him back to his canoe. During the chase, they screamed and scraped his back with "long claw like fingers."
RELATED LINKS (all are at Bigfoot Encounters)
1993 Alaska Hairy Man Article
Many names, Alaska'a Bigfoot
2005: Alaska's Bigfoot: Creature of Lore or Reality?
