The Patterson-Gimlin film (also referred to as simply the Patterson film) is a famous short motion picture of an unidentified subject the film makers purported to be a "Bigfoot

Bigfoot

Bigfoot, also known as sasquatch, is an ape-like cryptid that purportedly inhabits forests, mainly in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. Bigfoot is usually described as a large, hairy, bipedal humanoid...

", that was supposedly filmed on October 20, 1967, by Roger Patterson (February 14, 1926 – January 15, 1972) and Robert Gimlin (October 18, 1931) on the Klamath River

Klamath River

The Klamath River is an American river that flows southwest through Oregon and northern California, cutting through the Cascade Range to empty into the Pacific Ocean. The river drains an extensive watershed of almost that stretches from the high desert country of the Great Basin to the temperate...

 outside of Orleans, California

Orleans, California

Orleans , Karuk name Panamnik, is an unincorporated community in Humboldt County, California. It is located northeast of Weitchpec, at an elevation of 404 feet...

. The film has been subjected to many attempts both to debunk and authenticate it. Most scientists have judged the film a hoax with a man in an ape suit, but other theorists contend the film depicts a cryptid

Cryptid

In cryptozoology and sometimes in cryptobotany, a cryptid is a creature or plant whose existence has been suggested but is unrecognized by scientific consensus and often regarded as highly unlikely. Famous examples include the Yeti in the Himalayas and the Loch Ness Monster in...

, a creature unknown to science.

Both Patterson and Gimlin have consistently dismissed allegations that they had hoaxed the footage by filming a man wearing an ape suit. Patterson died of cancer in 1972. Patterson's friend and business associate, Gimlin, has always denied being involved in any part of a possible hoax with Patterson and claims that he and his partner had encountered a real Bigfoot. Gimlin avoided publicly discussing the subject from at least the early 1970s until about the year 2000 when he began giving interviews and making appearances at Bigfoot conferences.

Background

Patterson said he became interested in Bigfoot after reading an article about the creature by Ivan Sanderson in True magazine in December 1959. Patterson's book, Do Abominable Snowmen of America Really Exist?, was self-published

Self-publishing

Self-publishing is the publication of any book or other media by the author of the work, without the involvement of an established third-party publisher. The author is responsible and in control of entire process including design , formats, price, distribution, marketing & PR...

 in 1966. The book has been characterized as "little more than a collection of newspaper

Newspaper

A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...

 clippings laced together with Patterson's circus

Circus

A circus is commonly a travelling company of performers that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, unicyclists and other stunt-oriented artists...

-poster style prose." It did, however, also include 20 pages of previously unpublished interviews and letters, 17 drawings by Patterson of the encounters described in the text, 5 hand-drawn maps (rare in subsequent Bigfoot books), and almost 20 photos and illustrations from other sources. It was reprinted in 2005 under the title The Bigfoot Film Controversy, with additional material by Chris Murphy.

Some decades after the Patterson-Gimlin film's publicity, Greg Long interviewed people who described Patterson as a liar, a conman

Confidence trick

A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group by gaining their confidence. A confidence artist is an individual working alone or in concert with others who exploits characteristics of the human psyche such as dishonesty and honesty, vanity, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility,...

, and sometimes worse. Pat Mason, Glen Koelling, Bob Swanson and Vilma Radford claimed Patterson never repaid loans they made to him for a bigfoot movie Roger was planning. Later, records show that Bob Gimlin sued DeAtley and Patterson's widow Patricia, in 1975, claiming he was not receiving his share of the film's proceeds. Radford alone had corroborative evidence: A $700 promissory note

Promissory note

A promissory note is a negotiable instrument, wherein one party makes an unconditional promise in writing to pay a determinate sum of money to the other , either at a fixed or determinable future time or on demand of the payee, under specific terms.Referred to as a note payable in accounting, or...

 "for expenses in connection with filming of 'Bigfoot: Americas Abominable Snowman. (sic)'" Patterson agreed to repay her $850, plus 5 percent of any profits from the movie. The movie was supposed to be a pseudo-documentary about cowboy

Cowboy

A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the vaquero traditions of northern Mexico and became a figure of...

s being led by an old miner and a wise Indian tracker

Tracking (hunting)

Tracking in hunting and ecology is the science and art of observing animal tracks and other signs, with the goal of gaining understanding of the landscape and the animal being tracked...

 on a hunt for Bigfoot. The storyline called for Patterson, his Indian guide (Gimlin in a wig) and the cowboys to recall in flashbacks the stories of Fred Beck and others as they tracked the beast on horseback. Since the film was to be a pseudo-documentary Patterson and Gimlin would have needed actors. Lacking a real cooperative bigfoot, Patterson and Gimlin would have needed a costume to present a reasonable representation of the creature supposedly encountered.

According to Jerry Merritt, both he and Roger tried to attract investors to help further fund his bigfoot movie. They were not successful at this. Later, after Patterson died, Ron Olson (of ANE studios) made a version of this and renamed it "Sasquatch, the Legend of Bigfoot," while neglecting to give Patterson a co-writer credit. Roger drove to Hollywood often. He and Merritt visited various friends in the entertainment field including Gene Vincent and Ross Hagen (who starred on the late 60's hit television show Daktari

Daktari

Daktari is an American children's drama series that aired on CBS between 1966 and 1969. The series, an Ivan Tors Films Production in association with MGM Television, stars Marshall Thompson as Dr. Marsh Tracy, a veterinarian at the fictional Wameru Study Centre for Animal Behaviour in East...

), and who worked with Patterson on his Bigfoot song they recorded in Hollywood.

Patterson and his friend Gimlin set out for the Six Rivers National Forest

Six Rivers National Forest

Six Rivers National Forest is a U.S. National Forest located in the northwestern corner of California. It was established on July 1, 1947 by U.S. President Harry S. Truman from portions of Klamath, Siskiyou and Trinity National Forests. Its over one million acres of land contain a variety of...

 in northern California

Northern California

Northern California is the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. The San Francisco Bay Area , and Sacramento as well as its metropolitan area are the main population centers...

. Patterson chose the area because of intermittent reports of the creatures in the past and of their enormous footprint

Footprint

Footprints are the impressions or images left behind by a person walking. Hoofprints and pawprints are those left by animals with hooves or paws rather than feet, while "shoeprints" is the specific term for prints made by shoes...

s near there since 1958. The most recent of these reports was the nearby Blue Creek Mountain track find, which was investigated by journalist John Green, Rene Dahinden

René Dahinden

René Dahinden was a well-known Bigfoot researcher.Dahinden was born in Switzerland but moved to Canada in 1953, where he would live for the rest of his life...

, and archaeologist Don Abbott on and after August 28, 1967. This find was reported to Patterson soon thereafter by local resident Al Hodgson.

Though Gimlin says he doubted the existence of Sasquatch-like creatures, he agreed to Patterson's suggestion that they should not attempt to shoot any such creatures they might see. According to Grover Krantz years later, Patterson and Gimlin agreed they should have tried to shoot the creature, both for financial gain and to silence naysayers.

Patterson's expensive 16 mm

16 mm film

16 mm film refers to a popular, economical gauge of film used for motion pictures and non-theatrical film making. 16 mm refers to the width of the film...

 camera had been rented on May 13, but he had kept it longer than the contract had stipulated, and an arrest warrant

Arrest warrant

An arrest warrant is a warrant issued by and on behalf of the state, which authorizes the arrest and detention of an individual.-Canada:Arrest warrants are issued by a judge or justice of the peace under the Criminal Code of Canada....

 had been issued for him on October 17. This charge was ultimately dismissed after Patterson returned the camera in working order.

The encounter

Patterson and Gimlin by their tales were supposedly the only witnesses to their brief encounter with what they claimed was a Sasquatch. Their statements agree in general, but Long notes a number of inconsistencies. In an article in Argosy magazine, Ivan T. Sanderson

Ivan T. Sanderson

Ivan Terence Sanderson was a naturalist and writer born in Edinburgh, Scotland, who became a naturalized citizen of the United States. Sanderson is remembered for his nature writing and his interest in cryptozoology and paranormal subjects.-Biography:Born in Scotland, Sanderson traveled widely in...

 gave the time of the encounter as 3:30 p.m., which differed from the 1:30 p.m. time in other articles and in interviews by Patterson and Gimlin. They offered somewhat different sequences in describing how they and the horses reacted upon seeing the creature. Patterson in particular increased his estimates of the creature's size in subsequent retellings of the encounter. In a different context, Long argues, these discrepancies would probably be considered minor, but given the extraordinary claims made by Patterson and Gimlin, any apparent disagreements in perception or memory are worth noting.

As their stories went, in the early afternoon of October 20, Patterson and Gimlin were at Bluff Creek. Both were on horseback when they "came to an overturned tree with a large root system at a turn in the creek, almost as high as a room." When they rounded it they spotted the figure behind it nearly simultaneously, while it was "crouching beside the creek to their left." Gimlin later described himself as in a mild state of shock

Acute stress reaction

Acute stress reaction is a psychological condition arising in response to a terrifying or traumatic event...

 after first seeing the figure.

Patterson estimated he was about 25 feet (8 m) away from the creature at his closest. Patterson said that his horse reared upon seeing (or perhaps smelling) the figure, and he spent about twenty seconds extricating himself from the saddle and getting his camera from a saddlebag before he could run toward the figure while operating his camera. He yelled "Cover me" to Gimlin, who thereupon crossed the creek on horseback, rode forward a while, and, rifle in hand, dismounted (presumably because his horse might have panicked if the creature charged, spoiling his shot).

The figure had walked away from them to a distance of about 120 feet (36.6 m) before Patterson began to run after it. The resulting film (about 53 seconds long) is initially quite shaky until Patterson gets about 80 feet (24.4 m) from the figure. At that point the figure glanced over its right shoulder at the men and Patterson fell to his knees; on Krantz's map this corresponds to frame 264. To researcher John Green, Patterson would later characterize the creature's expression as one of "contempt and disgust...you know how it is when the umpire tells you 'one more word and you're out of the game.' That's the way it felt."

At this point the steady middle portion of the film begins, containing the famous frame 352 (see accompanying photo above). Patterson said "it turned a total of I think three times," the first time therefore being before the filming began. Shortly after glancing over its shoulder, the creature walks behind a grove of trees, reappears for a while after Patterson moved ten feet to a better vantage point, then fades into the trees again and is lost to view as the reel of film ran out. Gimlin remounted and followed it on horseback, keeping his distance, until it disappeared around a bend in the road three hundred yards away. Patterson called him back at that point, feeling vulnerable on foot without a rifle, because he feared the creature's mate might approach.

Next, Gimlin rounded up Patterson's horses, which had run off before the filming began, and "the men then tracked it for three miles (5 km), but lost it in the heavy undergrowth." They returned to the initial site, measured the creature's stride, made two plaster cast

Plaster cast

A plaster cast is a copy made in plaster of another 3-dimensional form. The original from which the cast is taken may be a sculpture, building, a face, a fossil or other remains such as fresh or fossilised footprints – particularly in palaeontology .Sometimes a...

s (of the best-quality right and left prints), and covered the other prints to protect them. The entire encounter had lasted less than two minutes.

A few hours after the encounter, Patterson telephoned Donald Abbott, whom Krantz described as "the only scientist of any stature to have demonstrated any serious interest in the (Bigfoot) subject," hoping he would help them search for the creature. Abbott declined, and Krantz argued this call the same day of the encounter is evidence against a hoax, at least on Patterson's part.

Forestry worker Lyle Laverty happened upon the site a day later and photographed the tracks. Taxidermist and outdoorsman Robert Titmus went to the site with his brother-in-law nine days later. Titmus made casts of the creature's prints and, as best he could, plotted Patterson's and the creature's movements on a map.

Patterson initially estimated its height at six and one-half to seven feet, and later raised his estimate to about seven and one-half feet. (Some later analysts, anthropologist Grover Krantz among them, have suggested Patterson's later estimate was about a foot too tall.) The film shows what Patterson and Gimlin claimed was a large, hairy biped

Biped

Bipedalism is a form of terrestrial locomotion where an organism moves by means of its two rear limbs, or legs. An animal or machine that usually moves in a bipedal manner is known as a biped , meaning "two feet"...

al apelike figure with short black hair covering most of its body, including the figure's prominent breasts. The figure depicted in the Patterson-Gimlin film generally matches the descriptions of Bigfoot offered by others who claim to have seen the creatures.

Aftermath

Krantz writes that "Patterson had the film developed as soon as possible. At first he thought he had brought in proof of Bigfoot's existence and really expected the scientists to accept it. But only a few scientists were willing to even look at the film, and most of them promptly declared it a fake. It was then incorporated as the centerpiece of the documentary film that Patterson had set out to make in the first place." This film was a modest financial success after it was shown in local movie houses around the Pacific Northwest

Pacific Northwest

The Pacific Northwest is a region in northwestern North America, bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Definitions of the region vary and there is no commonly agreed upon boundary, even among Pacific Northwesterners. A common concept of the...

. Patterson sold overlapping distribution rights for the film to several parties, which resulted in costly legal entanglements.

Though there was little scientific interest in the film, Patterson was still able to capitalize on it. Beyond the documentary, the film generated a fair amount of publicity. Patterson appeared on several popular talk show

Talk show

A talk show or chat show is a television program or radio program where one person discuss various topics put forth by a talk show host....

s to show the film and promote the documentary on Merv Griffin

Merv Griffin

Mervyn Edward "Merv" Griffin, Jr. was an American television host, musician, actor, and media mogul. He began his career as a radio and big band singer who went on to appear in movies and on Broadway. From 1965 to 1986 Griffin hosted his own talk show, The Merv Griffin Show on Group W Broadcasting...

's program, with Krantz offering his analysis of the film, and also on Joey Bishop

Joey Bishop

Joey Bishop was an American entertainer who was perhaps best known for being a member of the "Rat Pack" with Frank Sinatra, Peter Lawford, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Dean Martin...

's talk show.

While Patterson sought publicity, Gimlin was conspicuous by his absence. He only briefly helped to promote the film and avoided discussing his Bigfoot encounter publicly for many subsequent years. He would later report that he'd avoided publicity after Patterson and promoter Al DeAtley had broken their agreement to pay Gimlin a share of any profits generated by the film.

Krantz reports that "[a] few years after the film was made, Patterson received a written letter from a man in Thailand

Thailand

Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...

 who assured him a Sasquatch was being held in a Buddhist

Buddhism

Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

 monastery

Monastery

Monastery denotes the building, or complex of buildings, that houses a room reserved for prayer as well as the domestic quarters and workplace of monastics, whether monks or nuns, and whether living in community or alone .Monasteries may vary greatly in size – a small dwelling accommodating only...

. Patterson spent most of his remaining money preparing an expedition to retrieve this creature" only to learn it was a hoax. Patterson died of Hodgkin's lymphoma

Hodgkin's lymphoma

Hodgkin's lymphoma, previously known as Hodgkin's disease, is a type of lymphoma, which is a cancer originating from white blood cells called lymphocytes...

 in 1972.

Filming speed

One fact which complicates discussion of the Patterson film is that Patterson says he normally filmed at 24 frames per second, but in his haste to capture the Bigfoot on film, he did not note the camera's setting. His Cine-Kodak K-100 camera had markings on its continuously variable dial of 16, 24, 32, 48, and 64 frames per second and was capable of filming at any frame speed within this range. The speed of the film is important because, as Napier writes, "if the movie was filmed at 24 frame/s then the creature's walk cannot be distinguished from a normal human walk. If it was filmed at 16 or 18 frame/s, there are a number of important respects in which it is quite unlike man's gait." Unfortunately, the film is so shaky that it is difficult to be certain which speed is correct.

Krantz argues, on the basis of an analysis by Igor Bourtsev, that since Patterson's height is known, a reasonable calculation can be made of his pace. This running pace can be synchronized with the regular bounces in the initial jumpy portions of the film that were caused by each fast step Patterson took to approach the creature. On the basis of this analysis, Krantz argues that a speed of 24 frames per second can be quickly dismissed and that "[we] may safely rule out 16 frames per second and accept the speed of 18."

Dahinden stated that "the footage of the horses prior to the Bigfoot film looks jerky and unnatural when projected at 24 frame/s." And Dahinden experimented at the film site by having people walk rapidly over the creature's path and reported: "None of us ... could walk that distance in 40 seconds [952 frames / 24 frame/s = 39.6], ... so I eliminated 24 frame/s."

Others (including primatologist John Napier, who published before Dahinden and Krantz) have expressed a different opinion, contending it was "likely that Patterson would have used 24 frame/s" because it "is best suited to TV transmission," while conceding that "this is entirely speculative." More recently and University of Florida

University of Florida

The University of Florida is an American public land-grant, sea-grant, and space-grant research university located on a campus in Gainesville, Florida. The university traces its historical origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its present Gainesville campus since September 1906...

 anthropologist David Daegling has asserted that even at 16 frame/s the creature's odd walk could be replicated: "Supposed peculiarities of subject speed, stride length, and posture are all reproducible by a human being employing this type of locomotion [a "compliant gait"]."

Legal status

Henry Franzoni reports that "Mrs. Patterson, Roger Patterson's widow, who still lives in Yakima, Washington

Yakima, Washington

Yakima is an American city southeast of Mount Rainier National Park and the county seat of Yakima County, Washington, United States, and the eighth largest city by population in the state itself. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 91,196 and a metropolitan population of...

, has the TV and movie rights to the actual film. René Dahinden

René Dahinden

René Dahinden was a well-known Bigfoot researcher.Dahinden was born in Switzerland but moved to Canada in 1953, where he would live for the rest of his life...

 had the rights to the 953 still frames from the film." Five known copies were made of the original film. The five copies were once in the possession of René Dahinden, John Willison Green, Grover Krantz, Jon-Erik Beckjord

Jon-Erik Beckjord

Jon-Erik Beckjord was a San Francisco-based paranormal investigator and photographer known for his far-reaching ideas regarding such phenomena as UFOs, crop circles, the Loch Ness Monster, and his specialty, Bigfoot, which he believed to be an extradimensional ghost-like entity that lives in...

, and Peter Byrne. René Dahinden possessed one of the copies up until his death. The film now is in possession of Dahinden's family. It is no longer known who possessed the other four original copies, or if they still exist.

Analysis

The Patterson-Gimlin film has seen relatively little interest from mainstream scientists. As anthropologist David Daegling writes, "[t]he skeptics have not felt compelled to offer much of a detailed argument against the film; the burden of proof, rightly enough, should lie with the advocates." Yet without a detailed argument against authenticity, Daegling notes that "the film has not gone away." Similarly, Krantz argues that of the many opinions offered about the Patterson film, "[o]nly a few of these opinions are based on technical expertise and careful study of the film itself"

Neither humans nor chimpanzees have hairy breasts as does the figure in the film, and critics have argued these features are evidence against authenticity. Napier has noted that a sagittal crest is "only very occasionally seen, to an insignificant extent, in chimpanzees (sic) females."

David J. Daegling and Daniel O. Schmitt

When anthropologists David J. Daegling and Daniel O. Schmitt examined the film, they concluded it was impossible to conclusively determine if the subject in the film is nonhuman, and additionally argued that flaws in the studies by Krantz and others invalidated their claims. Daegling and Schmitt noted problems of uncertainties in subject and camera positions, camera movement, poor image quality, and artifacts of subject. They concluded: "Based on our analysis of gait and problems inherent in estimating subject dimensions, it is our opinion that it is not possible to evaluate the identity of the film subject with any confidence."

Daegling notes that in 1967, movie and television special effects were primitive compared to the more sophisticated effects in later decades, and allows that if the Patterson film depicts a man in a suit that "it is not unreasonable to suggest that it is better than some of the tackier monster outfits that got thrown together for television at that time."

M.K. Davis

Developments in computer technology permitted enhancements of the Patterson-Gimlin films to be made. Bigfoot enthusiast M.K. Davis created a version that removes the shakiness of the camera, permitting the creature to be seen from a more stable perspective. Davis has produced a second stabilized version incorporating enlargements of specific elements that he believes are significant. In the latter enhanced version there appears a separation of material or large cut on the right arm of the creature and a mysterious object or deformity above the breasts.

Dmitri Donskoy

A formal academic study of the Patterson film was conducted by Dmitri Donskoy, Chief of the Dept. of Biomechanics at the USSR Central Institute of Physical Culture, and later associated with Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

's Darwin Museum.

Donskoy concluded the creature was non-human on the basis of its weight, and especially its gait, which Donskoy judged would be difficult if not impossible for a human to replicate. He inferred the film's subject was weighty from the ponderous momentum he observed in the movements of its arms and legs, in the sagging of the knee as weight came onto it, and in the flatness of the foot. Its gait he considered non-artificial because it was confident and unwavering, "neatly expressive," and well-coordinated, and yet non-human because its arm motion and glide resembled a cross-country skier's. Krantz describes Donskoy's conclusion as being that the film depicts "a very massive animal that is definitely not a human being."

D.W. Grieve

Anatomist D.W. Grieve of the Royal Free Hospital

Royal Free Hospital

The Royal Free Hospital is a major teaching hospital in Hampstead, London, England and part of the Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust....

 School of Medicine studied a copy of the film in 1971, and wrote a detailed analysis. He notes, "The possibility of a very clever fake cannot be ruled out on the evidence of the film" but also writes that his analysis hinges largely on the question of filming speed.

Grieve concluded that "the possibility of fakery is ruled out if the speed of the film was 16 or 18 frames per second. In these conditions a normal human being could not duplicate the observed pattern, which would suggest that the Sasquatch must possess a very different locomotor system to that of man." If filmed at the higher speed, Grieve concluded that the creature "walked with a gait pattern very similar in most respects to a man walking at high speed."

Grieve stated, "I can see the muscle masses in the appropriate places... If it is a fake, it is an extremely clever one." Like Krantz, Grieve thought the figure's shoulders were quite broad. Also like Krantz, Grieve thought Patterson's estimate of the figure's height was inaccurate. Grieve concluded the figure in the Patterson film revealed "an estimated standing height for the subject of not more than 6 in 5 in (1.96 m)." He notes that a tall human is consistent with the figure's height but also notes that for a tall human "[t]he shoulder breadth however would be difficult to achieve without giving an unnatural appearance to the arm swing and shoulder contours."

Grieve notes that his "subjective impressions have oscillated between total acceptance of the Sasquatch based on the grounds that the film would be difficult to fake, to one of irrational rejection based on an emotional response to the possibility that the Sasquatch actually exists. This seems worth stating because others have reacted similarly to the film."

Bernard Heuvelmans

Bernard Heuvelmans

Bernard Heuvelmans

Bernard Heuvelmans was a Belgian-French scientist, explorer, researcher, and a writer probably best known as "the father of cryptozoology"...

 — a zoologist and the so-called "father of cryptozoology

Cryptozoology

Cryptozoology refers to the search for animals whose existence has not been proven...

" —thought the creature in the Patterson film was a suited human.

Grover Krantz

Anthropologist Grover Krantz

Grover Krantz

Grover Sanders Krantz was a professor of physical anthropology at Washington State University, perhaps most famous to the general public as one of the few scientists not only to research Bigfoot, but also to express his belief in the cryptid's existence...

 offered an in-depth examination of the Patterson film. He concluded that the film depicts a genuine unknown creature. Primarily, Krantz' argument is based on a detailed analysis of the figure's stride, center of gravity

Center of gravity

In physics, a center of gravity of a material body is a point that may be used for a summary description of gravitational interactions. In a uniform gravitational field, the center of mass serves as the center of gravity...

, and biomechanics. Krantz argues that the creature's leg and foot motions are quite different from a human's and could not have been duplicated by a person wearing a gorilla suit.

Krantz pointed out the tremendous width of the creature's shoulders, which (after deducting 1" for hair) he estimated at 28.2 inches, or 35.1% of its full standing height of 78", or a higher percentage of its 72" "walking height," which was a bit stooped, crouched, and sunk into the sand. The creature's shoulders are almost 50% wider than the human mean. (For comparison, André the Giant

André the Giant

André René Roussimoff , best known as André the Giant, was a French professional wrestler and actor. His best remembered acting role was that of Fezzik, the giant in the film The Princess Bride...

 had a typical human ratio of 24%. Wide-shouldered Bob Heironimus (see below) has 27.4%. Only very rarely do humans have a shoulder breadth of 30%.) Krantz argued that a suited person could not mimic this breadth and still have the naturalistic hand and arm motions present on the film.

Krantz wrote, "the knee is regularly bent more than 90°, while the human leg bends less than 70°." No human has yet replicated this level lower leg lift while maintaining the smoothness, posture, and stride length (41") of the creature.

Krantz and others have noted natural-looking musculature

Muscle

Muscle is a contractile tissue of animals and is derived from the mesodermal layer of embryonic germ cells. Muscle cells contain contractile filaments that move past each other and change the size of the cell. They are classified as skeletal, cardiac, or smooth muscles. Their function is to...

 visible as the creature moved, arguing this would be highly difficult or impossible to fake. Hunter and Dahinden also note that "the bottom of the figure's head seems to become part of the heavy back and shoulder muscles... [and] the muscles of the buttocks were distinct"

Krantz also interviewed Patterson extensively and, as noted below, thought Patterson lacked the technical skill and knowledge needed to create such a realistic-looking costume.

Krantz reports that in 1969 John Green (who at one point owned a first-generation copy of the original Patterson film) interviewed Disney

The Walt Disney Company

The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...

 executive Ken Peterson, who, after viewing the Patterson film, asserted "that their technicians would not be able to duplicate the film." Krantz argues that if Disney personnel were unable to duplicate the film, there is little likelihood that Patterson could have done so.

More recently, Krantz showed the film to Gordon Valient, a researcher for Nike

Nike, Inc.

Nike, Inc. is a major publicly traded sportswear and equipment supplier based in the United States. The company is headquartered near Beaverton, Oregon, which is part of the Portland metropolitan area...

 shoes, who he says "made some rather useful observations about some rather unhuman movements he could see."

Jeffrey Meldrum

Jeffrey Meldrum

Jeffrey Meldrum

D. Jeffrey Meldrum is an Associate Professor of Anatomy and Anthropology and Adjunct Associate Professor of the Department of Anthropology at Idaho State University...

 of Idaho State University

Idaho State University

Idaho State University is a public university located in Pocatello, Idaho. It has outreach programs in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho Falls, Boise, and Twin Falls....

 cites efforts by John Green as important in his own studies of the Patterson film. "It has been obvious to even the casual viewer that the film subject possesses arms that are disproportionately long for its stature." Meldrum writes that "Anthropologists typically express limb proportions as an intermembral index (IM)" and notes that humans have an average IM index of 72, gorillas an average IM index of 117 and chimpanzees an average IM index of 106.

In determining an IM index for the figure in the Patterson film, Meldrum concludes the figure has "an IM index somewhere between 80 and 90, intermediate between humans and African apes. In spite of the imprecision of this preliminary estimate, it is well beyond the mean for humans and effectively rules out a man-in-a-suit explanation for the Patterson-Gimlin film without invoking an elaborate, if not inconceivable, prosthetic contrivance to account for the appropriate positions and actions of wrist and elbow and finger flexion

Flexion

In anatomy, flexion is a position that is made possible by the joint angle decreasing. The skeletal and muscular systems work together to move the joint into a "flexed" position. For example the elbow is flexed when the hand is brought closer to the shoulder...

 visible on the film. This point deserves further examination and may well rule out the probability of hoaxing."

Meldrum does not address Bob Heironimus' contention that shoulder pads were worn under the costume. A misjudgement of the location of the shoulder upward would have effectively increased the length of the arm thereby increasing IM within the range that Meldrum estimates. Heironimus' contention provides a conceivable method to increase the perceived length of arm and shorten the perceived length of the neck.

John Napier

Prominent primate expert John Napier

John Napier (primatologist)

John Russell Napier, MRCS, LRCP, D.Sc. was a British primatologist, paleoathropologist, and physician, who is notable for his work with Homo habilis and OH 7, as well as on human and primate hands/feet...

 (one-time director of the Smithsonian's Primate Biology Program) was one of the few mainstream scientists not only to critique the Patterson-Gimlin film but also to study then-available Bigfoot evidence in a generally sympathetic manner in his 1973 book, Bigfoot: The Sasquatch and Yeti in Myth and Reality.

Napier conceded the likelihood of Bigfoot as a real creature, stating, "I am convinced that Sasquatch exists." But he argued against the film being genuine: "There is little doubt that the scientific evidence taken collectively points to a hoax of some kind. The creature shown in the film does not stand up well to functional analysis."

He adds, "I could not see the zipper; and I still can't. There I think we must leave the matter. Perhaps it was a man dressed up in a monkey-skin; if so it was a brilliantly executed hoax and the unknown perpetrator will take his place with the great hoaxers of the world. Perhaps it was the first film of a new type of hominid, quite unknown to science, in which case Roger Patterson deserves to rank with Dubois, the discoverer of Pithecanthropus erectus, or Raymond Dart

Raymond Dart

Raymond Arthur Dart was an Australian anatomist and anthropologist, best known for his involvement in the 1924 discovery of the first fossil ever found of Australopithecus africanus, an extinct hominid closely related to humans, at Taung in the North of South Africa in the province...

 of Johannesburg, the man who introduced the world to its immediate human ancestor, Australopithecus africanus

Australopithecus africanus

Australopithecus africanus was an early hominid, an australopithecine, who lived between 2–3 million years ago in the Pliocene. In common with the older Australopithecus afarensis, A. africanus was slenderly built, or gracile, and was thought to have been a direct ancestor of modern humans. Fossil...

."

Janos Prohaska

After viewing the Patterson-Gimlin film, costume designer Janos Prohaska

Janos Prohaska

Janos Prohaska was a Hungarian United States based actor and stunt performer on American television from the 1960s. He usually played the roles of animals or monsters....

 (noted for his work on the late '60s television program Star Trek

Star Trek

Star Trek is an American science fiction entertainment franchise created by Gene Roddenberry. The core of Star Trek is its six television series: The Original Series, The Animated Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise...

and Lost in Space

Lost in Space

Lost in Space is a science fiction TV series created and produced by Irwin Allen, filmed by 20th Century Fox Television, and broadcast on CBS. The show ran for three seasons, with 83 episodes airing between September 15, 1965, and March 6, 1968...

) concluded the film's subject could be a man in a costume. If the film was hoaxed, Prohaska thought it was remarkably realistic and sophisticated, and the best costume he had ever seen, and the only plausible explanation was that someone might have glued false hair to a costume. Prohaska, in fact, had used this technique himself on his own costumes. It must be pointed out that this interview given by
Prohaska was originally made for Roger's fictional bigfoot movie. It was then used for other films. This calls into question the validity of Prohaska's statements.

Bill Munns

Artist Bill Munns has performed his own analysis of the film. The skin fold or loose materials at the arm pit is a new feature that is pointed out by this report. Munns' analysis has been featured in an episode of the television series MonsterQuest.

Stan Winston

Multiple Academy Award winner Stan Winston, after viewing the PGF, summed it up simply as "it's a guy in a bad fur suit, sorry!" He went on to comment that the suit in the film could have been made today for "a couple hundred dollars" or "under a thousand, in that day". He also added that "if one of my colleagues created this for a movie, he would be out of business." This is from the T.V. series "Movie Magic" which aired from 1994 to 1997.

Other analyses

In a first season episode of the History Channel series Monster Quest

Monster Quest

MonsterQuest is an American television series that originally aired from October 31, 2007 to March 24, 2010 on the History channel...

focusing on the Bigfoot phenomenon, one test is performed on the Patterson-Gimlin film in an attempt to verify whether the creature was real. The show states that the original film was microscopically examined and, through digital enhancement, previously unknown details were revealed, such as possible facial movements. The film is examined on a frame-by-frame basis for the show, but it is stated that the analysis was inconclusive. It was later determined that in fact the film used was not the original film but was in fact a copy. The series producers have reluctantly refused to advertise that fact to the public. No previously unknown facts of significance were shown.

Patterson and/or Gimlin

Patterson and Gimlin claimed that they sought various experts to examine the film. Patterson claimed to have screened the film for unnamed technicians "in the special effects department at Universal Studios

Universal Studios

Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....

 in Hollywood ... Their conclusion was: 'We could try (faking it), but we would have to create a completely new system of artificial muscles and find an actor who could be trained to walk like that. It might be done, but we would have to say that it would be almost impossible.'" However, critics have disputed the accuracy of this claim.

Anthropologist David Daegling writes that the "more cynical skeptics" see Patterson's luck as "more than a little suspicious: He sets out to make a Bigfoot documentary, then almost literally stumbles across a Bigfoot." Daegling, however, offers the benefit of the doubt, noting that Patterson's reasoning is sound: In seeking something elusive, he went to where it had been reported. Bluff Creek was also the site of well-known Bigfoot hoaxer Bill Wallace. In Roger Patterson's book, he mentions meeting with Wallace twice.

Krantz thought Patterson might have perpetrated such a hoax, given the opportunity and resources, but he also argued that Patterson had "nowhere near the knowledge or facilities to do so—nor for that matter, did anyone else ... When I talked about some of the more technical details of biomechanics

Biomechanics

Biomechanics is the application of mechanical principles to biological systems, such as humans, animals, plants, organs, and cells. Perhaps one of the best definitions was provided by Herbert Hatze in 1974: "Biomechanics is the study of the structure and function of biological systems by means of...

, he (Patterson) showed the familiar blank look of a student who had lost the drift of the explanation, but was still trying hard to pay attention. Yet he must have known all these details to create a hoax. For instance, he could see the anterior position of the front of the shin, but how that related to foot lever

Lever

In physics, a lever is a rigid object that is used with an appropriate fulcrum or pivot point to either multiply the mechanical force that can be applied to another object or resistance force , or multiply the distance and speed at which the opposite end of the rigid object travels.This leverage...

age was quite beyond him".

Similarly, Daegling writes that "Most acquaintances of Patterson volunteered that neither he nor Gimlin were clever enough to put something that detailed together"

Philip Morris

In 2002, Philip Morris of Morris Costumes (a North Carolina

North Carolina

North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...

-based company offering costumes, props and stage products) claimed that he made a gorilla costume that was used in the Patterson film. Morris says he discussed his role in the hoax privately in the 1980s but first admitted it publicly on August 16, 2002, on Charlotte, North Carolina, radio station WBT-AM. Morris claims he was reluctant to expose the hoax earlier for fear of harming his business: giving away a performer's secrets, he said, would be widely regarded as disreputable.

Morris said that he sold an ape suit to Patterson via mail-order in 1967, thinking it was going to be used in what Patterson described as a "prank" (ordinarily the gorilla suits he sold were used for a popular side-show routine that depicted an attractive woman changing into a gorilla.) After the initial sale, Morris said that Patterson telephoned him asking how to make the "shoulders more massive" and the "arms longer." Morris says he suggested that whoever wore the suit should wear wide football-type shoulder pads and hold sticks in his hands within the suit. His assertion was also printed in the Charlotte Observer.

As for the creature's walk, Morris said:

The Bigfoot researchers say that no human can walk that way in the film. Oh, yes they can! When you're wearing long clown's feet, you can't place the ball of your foot down first. You have to put your foot down flat. Otherwise, you'll stumble. Another thing, when you put on the gorilla head, you can only turn your head maybe a quarter of the way. And to look behind you, you've got to turn your head and your shoulders and your hips. Plus, the shoulder pads in the suit are in the way of the jaw. That's why the Bigfoot turns and looks the way he does in the film. He has to twist his entire upper body.

Morris' wife and business partner Amy had vouched for her husband and claims to have helped frame the suit. Morris offered no evidence apart from testimony to support his account.

Bob Heironimus

Bob Heironimus claims to have been the figure depicted in the Patterson film, and his allegations are detailed in Long's book. Heironimus was a tall (6' 2), muscular Yakima, Washington

Yakima, Washington

Yakima is an American city southeast of Mount Rainier National Park and the county seat of Yakima County, Washington, United States, and the eighth largest city by population in the state itself. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 91,196 and a metropolitan population of...

, native, age 26, when he says Patterson offered him $1000 to wear an ape suit for a Bigfoot film. Bob Gimlin was on Bob Heironimus's horse

Horse

The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...

, Chico, when the PGF was being filmed. Herionimus is one of numerous people who are claimed to be visible in an unreleased second reel of the film. It is unclear which if any of these claims is authentic.

Eventually Long uncovered testimony that corroborates Heironimus's claims: Russ Bohannon, a longtime friend, says that Heironimus revealed the hoax privately in 1968 or 1969. Heironimus says he did not publicly discuss his role in the hoax because he hoped to be repaid eventually and was afraid of being convicted of fraud had he confessed. After speaking with his lawyer he was told that since he had not been paid for his involvement in the hoax that he could not be held accountable. In separate incidents, Bernard Hammermeister and Heironimus's relatives (mother Opal and nephew John Miller) claim to have seen an ape suit in Heironimus' car. The relatives say they saw the suit two days after the film was shot. No date was given by Long for Hammermeister's observation, but it apparently came well after the relatives' observation, as implied by the word "still" in the justification Heironimus gave Hammermeister for requesting his silence: "There was still supposed to be a payola

Payola

Payola, in the American music industry, is the illegal practice of payment or other inducement by record companies for the broadcast of recordings on music radio, in which the song is presented as being part of the normal day's broadcast. Under U.S...

 on this thing, and he didn't have it."

Long argues that the suit Morris says he sold to Patterson was the same suit Heironimus claims to have worn in the Patterson film. However, Long quotes Heironimus and Morris describing ape suits that are in many respects quite different from one another; Long speculates that Patterson modified the costume, and offers corroborating evidence and testimony to support this idea. Among the notable differences are:

• Heironimus says he was told by his brother Howard that Patterson claimed he manufactured the suit from a "real dark brown" horse
  Horse
  The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...
  
   hide.
• Morris reports that the suit was a rather expensive ($450) dark brown model with fur made of Dynel
  Dynel
  Dynel is a trade name for a type synthetic fiber used in fibre reinforced plastic composite materials, especially for marine applications. As it is easily dyed, it was also used to fabricate women's wigs...
  
  , a synthetic material. Long writes that Morris "used Dynel solely in the sixties--and was using brown Dynel in 1967".
• Heironimus described the suit as having no metal pieces and an upper "torso part" that he donned "like putting on a T-shirt." At Bluff Creek he put on "the top." Asked about the "bottom portion," he guessed it was cinched with a drawstring.
• Morris made a one-piece union suit
  Union suit
  A union suit is a type of one-piece long underwear. Created in Utica, New York, United States, it originated as women's wear during the 19th-century United States clothing reform efforts, as an alternative to constricting garments, and soon gained popularity among men as well...
  
   with a metal zipper up the back, and into which one stepped.
• Heironimus described the suit as having hands and feet that were attached to the arms and legs.
• Morris made a suit whose hands and feet were separate pieces. Long speculates that Patterson riveted or glued these parts to the suit, but offers no evidence to support this idea.

Heironimus' statements about the multiple pieces and upper torso part is promoted by "Bigfoot-Sewing it Up", a video study of M. K. Davis' enhancement about how the costume is put together. He made the comment that he wore football shoulder pads which, according to Heironimus, explains why the shoulders and arms appear to be out of proportion to the rest of the body. The zipper of the suit was in front and could not have been seen from the back. The position of the zipper would raise a question about Morris' participation or his recollection.

Some skeptics say that Heironimus' arms are too short to match that of a bigfoot and that he was about a few inches shorter than the creature on the film but "Bigfoot-Sewing it Up" explains that the relative position of the elbows and hips are those of a human. Some have speculated that bigfoot appears to be about seven foot three when Heironimus was only six foot two. Heronimous was also not as bulky as the creature but a suit would prohibit a reasonable comparison.

Ray Wallace

After the death of Ray Wallace

Raymond L. Wallace

Raymond L. "Ray" Wallace was an American Bigfoot researcher.Wallace was born in Clarksdale, Missouri. He worked as a logger for much of his life, but also in road construction throughout much of Washington, Oregon and California. He served in the Army during World War II as an aircraft gunner...

 in 2002, following a request by Loren Coleman

Loren Coleman

Loren Coleman is an author of books on a number of topics, including cryptozoology, who was born in 1947 in Norfolk, Virginia and grew up in Decatur, Illinois.-Education:...

 to Seattle Times reporter Bob Young to investigate, the family of Wallace went public with claims that he had started the Bigfoot phenomenon with fake footprints (made from a wooden foot-shaped cutout) left in Californian sites in 1958. In addition, David Daegling stated that Wallace "had a degree of involvement" with the Patterson-Gimlin film, and that this gave grounds for suspicion of it.

The evidence for this involvement is Wallace's alleged statement, "I felt sorry for Roger Patterson. He told me he had cancer of the lymph glands and he was desperately broke and he wanted to try to get something where he could have a little income. Well, he went down there exactly where I told him. I told him, 'You go down there and hang around on that bank. Stay up there and watch that spot.'"

Coleman has written that Patterson was an early Bigfoot investigator, and that it was only natural that he sought out and interviewed older Bigfoot event principals, which included Wallace, because of the 1958 Bluff Creek incidents. Coleman has asserted that Wallace had nothing to do with Patterson's footage in 1967, and has argued in an analysis of the media treatment of the death of Wallace that the international media inappropriately confused the Wallace films of the 1970s with the Patterson-Gimlin 1967 film.

Dr. Meldrum has written extensively about Wallace, his allegations (continued by his family after his death), and the significant problems with them in his book Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science.

Further reading

• Robert Todd Carroll
  Robert Todd Carroll
  Robert Todd Carroll , Ph.D., is an American writer and academic. Carroll has written several books and skeptical essays but achieved notability by publishing the Skeptic's Dictionary online in 1994.-Early life and education:...
  
   (2003). The Skeptics Dictionary: A Collection of Strange Beliefs, Amusing Deceptions, and Dangerous Delusions. John Wiley & Sons
  John Wiley & Sons
  John Wiley & Sons, Inc., also referred to as Wiley, is a global publishing company that specializes in academic publishing and markets its products to professionals and consumers, students and instructors in higher education, and researchers and practitioners in scientific, technical, medical, and...
  
  . ISBN 0-471-27242-6. pp. 55–57.

External links

• The Patterson-Gimlin film on YouTube
  YouTube
  YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....
  
  
• The entry on Bigfoot at the Skeptic's Dictionary
  Skeptic's Dictionary
  The Skeptic's Dictionary is a collection of cross-referenced skeptical essays by Robert Todd Carroll, published on his website skepdic.com and in a printed book. The skepdic.com site was launched in 1994 and the book was published in 2003 with nearly 400 entries. As of January 2011 the website has...
  
  
• Stabilised animated gif of the film
• The "Truth Before Our Eyes"—A Bigfoot supporter's view of the film
• Report on the Film of a Supposed Sasquatch by D.W. Grieve