Another Journalist Gets Roger Patterson's Deathbed Confession Wrong

Roger Patterson, known for filming a bigfoot in Bluff Creek, CA on October 20, 1967

"I was absolutely devastated the day I heard Roger Patterson had made a deathbed confession that the 1967 bigfoot footage he shot was a hoax." --Tony Casey, perpetuating a rumor

In an article titled, "Why we're always looking for the monsters on the hillside" and published by the Johnson City Press, journalist Tony Casey claims Roger Patterson had confessed on his deathbed he had hoaxed the film. There is no evidence for this. He continues to reason in his article how the "confession" shattered his hope that bigfoot was real, while shoring up his critical thinking. Read an excerpt below:

Leading up to Patterson’s admission, I was objectively sure — albeit in a non-scientific way — that if that footage was real, bigfoot was also most likely real because the creature in the film, according to my eyes, couldn’t be anything but bigfoot. It very clearly wasn’t a bear walking on two legs. It was one of two things: a human in an ape suit or bigfoot itself. The scene shot in the creek bed that day is forever ingrained in my mind: the massive upright ape-like creature, calmly walking with an impressively taut arm swing and carriage, moving away from the camera, looking over its shoulder to acknowledge the equipment, but not in too much of a hurry.

It was too good to be true. It was literally too good to be true. When I found out it was a hoax, things changed for me, but for the better I’d argue. Instead of taking things at face value, I began to require concrete evidence for my beliefs.

How about concrete evidence for your rumors?

The BFRO.net has a great article about how that deathbed confession rumor may have started. You can read about it below.

The most commonly heard false fact about the Patterson footage:

"The guy who got the footage admitted on his deathbed that he faked it."

This is not true. This is a mixup. Here's how the mixup started.
The man who obtained the most well known photo of the Loch Ness monster (not bigfoot) admitted on his deathbed that he faked that photo.

The story of his confession popped up in newspaper headlines around the world. The story didn't last long as a news item, but every new agency, in every country, on every continent, ran the story.

The story mutated in the press, from a crypto story about one photo from Loch Ness being debunked, to "Mystery of Loch Ness Finally Solved." 

The BFRO article continues to explain how things got worse.

 The Patterson footage was mistakenly associated with a "deathbed confession" related to a famous "monster" mystery.

The Loch Ness deathbed confession story grabbed such big headlines, it was inevitable that someone would try the same formula down the line. It only took a few more years.

The heirs of a man named Ray Wallace initially reported his "deathbed confession" about faking the first famous bigfoot tracks in Northern California.

Ray Wallace left behind a few pairs of wooden feet for making fake tracks. He would sell plaster casts of fake tracks at his roadside tourist shop.

His heirs later recanted the "deathbed confession" part of the story, and instead said they "just know he started the whole thing."

The initial "deathbed confession" element helpd [sic] get the story onto the AP Wire. It became "The Father of Bigfoot Dies". 

If you are interested, click to read New York Time's Ray Wallace deathbed confession article printed January 3, 2003.

You can even go to Tony Casey's article, Why we're always looking for the monsters on the hillside to let him know that Roger Patterson's deathbed confession is only a rumor and he can keep hoping for bigfoot.

Rick Dyer Continues to Search for Redemption with "Taxidermied" Bigfoot

Illustration by Paul Blow

“The only reason I kilt [Hank] is I had to have my redemption...” --Rick Dyer; Bigfoot Hoaxer

Hank is the name for Rick Dyer's "taxerdermied" bigfoot. And yes, taxidermied deserves to be in quotes.  You can read a whole history of Rick Dyer from Bigfoot Lunch Club; starting with the 2008 bigfoot press conference. Including Rick Dyer's arrest for eBay fraud and his admission that Hank is little more than Camel Hair and Latex.

This hasn't stopped Rick Dyer from touring the Walmart parking lots of America and sharing the story of how he shot Hank near San Antonio, Texas. Recently in an an in-depth article from Texas Monthly (9600 words!), journalist Jeff Winkler spends time with Rick Dyer in a Walmart parking lot asking about the medical 3D scans of the taxidermied bigfoot body, reviewing his checkered past, and the self comparisons of PT Barnum and Andy Kaufman. Read excerpts from these three highlights below.

ABOUT THE 3D MEDICAL SCAN

"Rick’s confidante and second-in-command, Andrew Clancy, explained that the embalming process and the use of a resin had given the exposed skin a chalky, plaster-of-Paris appearance. He told us the feet and hands had been covered because the big reveal of Hank’s extremities was being saved for a later date (though no hints were given as to what abnormalities might be hiding under the black sheet). Both Rick and Andrew enumerated, with exacting detail, what we were seeing on the 3-D medical scan being passed around, a diagnostic image, we were told, that would be impossible to fake. True, it had been Photoshopped, but only to hide the serial number at the bottom, the one that would identify the hospital where it was taken (there were only three such scanners in the world, they said)."

ABOUT RICK DYERS CHECKERED PAST

"[Bigfoot Tracker News], however, doesn’t just disagree with Rick. It has published all of Rick’s previous, non-Bigfoot-related brushes with the law. In 2012 Rick was arrested for aggravated battery of a pregnant person (his wife), with more than one anti-Rick blog indicating or flat-out saying that he beat the hell out of her. In 2011 Rick was charged with eBay fraud, involving the false sale of vehicles, in San Antonio. That same year, in Arkansas, Rick had been contracted to run a used-car lot after claiming he had worked at one in Las Vegas. The Arkansas business filed charges against him because, as someone associated with the company cautiously described, “the tickets didn’t add up . . . to the extent that we felt obligated to press charges.” Around the same time, Rick allegedly worked for a tow-truck company—called, appropriately, Bigfoot Towing—and a woman accused him of illegally impounding her car."

COMPARING HIMSELF TO PT BARNUM and ANDY KAUFMAN

How would you differentiate between a fraud, a hoaxster, and a prankster? What was P.T. Barnum or Andy Kaufman, the two men to whom Rick enjoys comparing himself?

Even Rick, usually so loquacious, struggled for the right words when I asked him about this in Paris. “I believe they were showmen,” said Rick after declaring the two men hoaxsters but definitely not frauds. “They knew how to work people, and I believe I know how to work people. The people who think that I’m a hoaxster, people who think I’m just a showman with nothing to show for it, they’re all going to have to eat their words.”

Click to read the whole article titled, "Rick Dyer’s Believe It Or Not!"

FOX News Affiliate Searches for Sasquatch in Colorado

KSNT FOX21’s Abbie Burke Looks for Bigfoot

"Probably two or three in the morning we heard loud tree knocks and whooping or calling, from some sort of creature or more than one." --Kevin Lynn; Colorado Sasquatch Searcher

The Sasquatch Outpost has become more than a store with bigfoot mechandise, it has become a bgfoot museum, complete with a map for local Coloradians to pin their own bigfoot encounters. 

Two local TV news rporters decided to go "squatchin'" with Jim and Daphne Myers who co-own the store.

Below is the video with a snip-it from the companion article from KSNT FOX21 News.

FOX21’s Abbie Burke and Ray Harless went out with the Myers in search of Bigfoot, but were unsuccessful.
However, just months before, Kevin Lynn said he had an encounter nearby.

Lynn and a friend went searching for Sasquatch in late July along the Colorado Trail in the Lost Creek Wilderness Area.

“It started to get dark and we decided we needed to find a flat place to set up camp and also get a fire going,” said Lynn.

“We did some calls and some tree knocks at night and after about 11 p.m. we kind of settled in and called it a night. Probably two or three in the morning we heard loud tree knocks and whooping or calling, from some sort of creature or more than one. We heard it from behind our tent as well as out in front of our tent. The only thing we figured is that they were calling between each other and they knew we were there. We actually got to the point where we couldn’t go back to sleep because it happened for several hours.”

No one has officially been able to prove Bigfoot’s existence, but those who believe say a mind can be changed in an instant.

“It only takes one sighting and you’re an instant believer,” said Daphne.

Visit the official site for the Sasquatch Outpost!