Feb 15th HopsSquatch Presents Bigfoot History from 3 Perspectives; Native American, Pioneer and Modern.

Todd and Diane Neiss will Speak at the Feb. 15th HopsSquatch

DATE: Sunday, February 15th

TIME: 12:30-3:00

WHERE: NW Quimby Lucky Lab  | 1945 NW Quimby St. Portland, OR 97209

WHO: Todd and Diane Neiss

We are very excited to kick off the official hopsSquatch year with the Bigfoot community's power couple, Todd and Diane Neiss.

This will be their first combined presentation and it promises to be enlightening. Topics covered will be Bigfoot history from at least three perspectives; Native American, pioneer and modern. With the combined research and knowledge of both Todd and Diane, this should presentation should inspire new and old researchers alike. 

Other topics include new research technologies and of course Todd and Diane will be available for questions and answers.

Want to know more about these two? Read a quick bio below.

Eyewitness turned researcher, Todd Neiss is an Active Duty Staff Sergeant in the Oregon Army National Guard; and a veteran of the Iraq War.  He founded the “American Primate Foundation” in 1998.  Actively researching these elusive creatures for over two decades, Neiss has been the subject of many television shows and documentaries and has been a featured speaker at numerous Bigfoot conferences across the U.S. and Canada.  He holds an Associate of Arts degree in Multi-Disciplinary Studies from Grantham University.

Diane Stocking Neiss is currently employed by the Oregon Department of Human Services (DHS) and founded “Stocking Hominid Research” in 2007.  She too has given speeches at various conferences as well as appeared on television. Diane became interested in Bigfoot at a very young age and went on to conduct research in the Southeastern United States as far back as 1974.  She co-authored the cryptozoological book “Elementum Bestia” in 2007. After visiting the Pacific Northwest in the 1990s, Stocking ultimately moved to Oregon, where she continues her research with her husband Todd.  Diane holds an Associate of Science degree in Forestry from Lake City Forestry College in Florida.

Todd & Diane Neiss live aboard a 42-foot motor yacht christened “Jadoo Shikari” (Hindu for “Mystery Hunter”) in Portland Oregon.  Upon retiring, they plan to utilize the yacht as a research vessel; exploring the numerous wilderness inlets along the British Columbian coastline in search of Bigfoot.  Equipped with a mast mounted remote-controlled FLIR camera, they intend to explore intercostal islands and scour their shorelines and interior for any evidence of these elusive creatures.

Together they host a unique, invitation-only, annual retreat for international Bigfoot researchers in the temperate rain forests of the Oregon Coast Range.  Dubbed “Beachfoot”, it provides researchers the opportunity to gather for four days in a casual setting to socialize, network, and share their research without the distraction of an audience, media or vendors.  Beachfoot has attracted researchers from five countries and nearly every state in the U.S.  This year they will mark their 8th annual gathering.  For more information on Beachfoot, please check out their Facebook page simply entitled “Beachfoot” for pictures and commentary about the gathering.  Also feel free to visit their webpage at www.americanprimate.com.  They can be reached via e-mail at americanprimate@aol.com or dstocking@yahoo.com.

About HopsSquatch: In its third year, HopsSquatch has become a venue for Bigfoot enthusiasts and those that want to learn more about the elusive Sasquatch. Internationally known Bigfoot experts travel to this event for a chance to meet up with other enthusiasts and discuss their experiences.  Over 50 annual memberships have been sold, many from out of the area. Each event is at capacity, and continues to grow. For more information, HopsSquatch.com

Wall Street Journal: $3M Initial Public Offering Investment for Bigfoot Research

Tom Biscardi has filed for an initial public offering through the SEC

“When you’re king of the mountain, everybody’s trying to knock you down,” --Tom Biscardi

In a Wall Street Journal article titled Bigfoot Isn’t Just a Mythic Figure, He’s an Investment Opportunity, a journalist reports on an initial public offering filed by Tom Biscardi to raise millions dollars by selling stock in Bigfoot Project Investments. With only sales and assets totaling a little over $6000 they are able to leverage a new 2012 law that allows start-up businesses to raise cash by offering stocks to the public through an exchange. Companies like Twitter have leveraged the same law.

Read an exerpt from the article below:

Mr. Biscardi and his partners hope to raise as much as $3 million by selling stock in Bigfoot Project Investments. They plan to spend the money making movies and selling DVDs, but are also budgeting $113,805 a year for expeditions to find the beast. Among the company’s goals, according to its filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission: “capture the creature known as Bigfoot.”

Investment advisers caution that this IPO may not be for everyone. For starters, it involves DVDs, a dying technology, said Kathy Boyle, president at Chapin Hill Advisors. Then there is the Sasquatch issue. She reckons only true believers would be interested in such a speculative venture.

“This would be the kind of thing where if you believed in Bigfoot, or you thought there really was a Bigfoot and you actually had some money to burn and wanted to play with this, then go for it,” Ms. Boyle said. A lot of ifs.


It turns out the IPO doesn’t have many fans in the Bigfoot community, either. Purists are chafing at what they see as the crass commercialization of a serious pursuit.

Mr. Biscardi, who has trumpeted a number of Bigfoot sightings and captures that didn’t pan out, is a controversial figure among Bigfoot enthusiasts. In 2008, he held a news conference in Palo Alto, Calif., to detail his examination of what he said was the carcass of a male Bigfoot that checked in at 7 feet 7 inches tall and weighed more than 500 pounds. The Bigfoot, found by two men in Georgia, turned out to be a rubber gorilla costume stuffed with animal parts and outfitted with a set of teeth that may have been bovine in origin.

Asked about the incident, Mr. Biscardi said he had been deceived. But that hasn’t quieted skeptics in the community like Kathy Strain, who said she is astonished the Georgia debacle didn’t put an end to Mr. Biscardi’s pursuit of Bigfoot.

“It just makes it a big joke,” she said.

Ms. Strain has been fascinated with Bigfoot since she was a girl in California and mistook the 1972 documentary style film called “The Legend of Boggy Creek” as real. Now a 46-year-old U.S. Forest Service worker, she wants to bring the rigors of science to Bigfooting.

Mr. Biscardi is well aware of his many detractors and says it comes with the territory of being such a high-profile member of the Bigfoot community.

“When you’re king of the mountain, everybody’s trying to knock you down,” he said.

 Click the following link to read our entire coverage of Tom Biscardi dating back to 2008. Our favorite Tom Biscardi post is Finally! A Journalist Does Real Research on Tom Biscardi

Who Is Thomas Steenburg

British Columbia Sasquatch Researcher Thomas Steenburg

“Since I moved to B.C., I have focused on research and taken the approach to not deviate from the facts,” --Thomas Steenburg

After John Green, Thomas Steenburg is probably the best known Sasquatch researcher in Canada, focusing most of his work in Alberta and British Columbia. Like most long-time researchers, Thomas Steenburg's research and perspective was offline in books and conferences. Fortunately this year, we may get more access to Mr. Steenburg's insights online via Thomas Steenburg's YouTube channel and his brand new website aptly named ThomasSteenburg.com.

He is even making the local news. In a recent article titled, "B.C.'s Sasquatch investigator Steenburg investigated Norgegg reports," he gives John Green credit for laying the goundwork in British Columbia while modestly adding his own contributions to Sasquatch research in BC.

“John L. Green laid the groundwork for many modern researchers like myself,” said Steenburg, who once hailed from the Nordegg-Kananaskis area. “Hairy giants were first recorded in the Mission-Harrison Lake area in the late 1920s by J.W. Burns, a Chehalis Indian agent, but stories date back to pre-contact. He became somewhat of a sensation, with his work being published in McLean’s magazine nationally and coined the name sasquatch as a mispronunciation of the Indian name.”

Steenburg added that his initial exposure to sasquatch sightings came when he lived in Alberta’s Nordegg area. When he was called out to investigate, he went two or three times to B.C. for one local investigation.

“The Kananaskis-Nordegg area was a hotbed from 1948 to 1984 for sasquatch activity,” said Steenburg. “A string of sightings of a 13- to 15-foot tall creature with 19-inch long footprints were not uncommon in a 100-mile radius of Nordegg.”

He added that the construction of the Bighorn Dam seemed to put a stop to sasquatch activity.

“Since I moved to B.C., I have focused on research and taken the approach to not deviate from the facts,” said Steenburg, noting there is a lunatic fringe that hangs on to every supposed sighting as if it was 100 per cent verified. “While I cannot say for certain that I have seen a sasquatch, or Bigfoot if you’re American, I have seen a very large creature from 500 yards that may have been a sasquatch, but I could not verify it.”

So far, his website has three posts:  The Ongoing Sasquatch Question, BE PREPARED and Hucksters and Hoaxers. At Bigfoot Lunch Club we are looking forward to more of  theses bite-sized insights from one the most prolific thinkers in Sasquatch research.

Below you can witness for yourself the thinking process that is unique to Thomas Steenburg.