There was something in the woods near Ligonier where Sam Sherry of Wilpen had stopped for some night fishing. He got out his flashlight to probe the shadows.

“I shined the light up there on that and I see two big eyeballs – as big as golf balls,” Sherry said at his home.

Sherry, 80, said he never heard the word, “Bigfoot” until a few days later, but that’s what was behind the fiery-red eyes he first saw that night in 1987. Only seconds later, Sherry learned of the power of the legendary man-ape.

“He come busting out of that woods, swinging his arms and pounding his chest,” Sherry said, demonstrating the motions.

Though most-often associated with the mountains of the West, there have been many reports of Bigfoot sightings in this area. Investigators will discuss evidence collected in this area during the fourth annual East Coast Bigfoot Conference and Expo on Sept. 21 at Pitzer’s Townhouse Restaurant in Jeannette.

Pennsylvania is fourth behind California, Washington and Oregon in the number of reported sightings, the Bigfoot Field Research Organization Web site says.

Sherry says there is good reason for the number of reports here. He has been tracking the animals in the Chestnut Ridge forests near his Westmoreland County home for 15 years.

Since his first encounter on May 17, 1987, at the causeway near Sleepy Hollow Inn, Sherry claims he spotted Bigfoot creatures six more times – one was a white female. He said he knew it was a female because he had been tracking her for months and she always had a “yearling” with her.

But isolated mountaintops aren’t the only places Bigfoot has been reported here.

In August 1982, the James Young family of Frankstown Road told authorities of a snorting, heavy breathing and stench that terrified them and drove their four dogs to the brink of insanity. An 18-inch footprint was found on the Conemaugh Township property just outside Johnstown.

Two years later, David Gustkey of the 200 block of Main Street in Franklin Borough said he saw a Bigfoot crossing Truman Boulevard just outside the borough.

The fleeting encounter with the 8-foot-tall beast has had a lasting impact, Gustkey said in a telephone interview from his home, nearly 20 years later.

“I was scared,” Gustkey said. “I had never seen anything like that. I remember the size of it. It was all hair.”

Gustkey said people didn’t believe him, but that didn’t matter. He went to Bigfoot groups for information. He was even given, and passed, a lie-detector test. He said he knows what he saw.

“It was not a gorilla. It was not a bear,” Gustkey said. “It was not human.”

The thing was 7 or 8 feet tall and had no visible neck, he said. It crossed the 30-foot highway in two steps.

Gustkey said he has done some research to learn more about the creatures, but he doesn’t understand why there haven’t been more reported sightings in the area – especially when hundreds of hunters invade the Bigfoot habitat every fall.

“I can only say what I’ve seen,” Gustkey said. “I guess I’m one of the unlucky ones, or maybe lucky ones that have seen it.”

Pennsylvania Game Commission spokesman Mel Schake said he also wonders why more hunters don’t report seeing a Bigfoot – if it exists.

“That’s a good question,” Schake said in a telephone interview from the game commission district office in Ligonier. “You have all these hunters out there, why haven’t there been a lot more reports of people seeing them?”

Some Bigfoot authorities suggest it’s because the creature is nocturnal, but Schake said the game commission often has its forces out at night.

“I never say ‘never,’ ” Schake said. “But we have a lot of people out there at all hours of the day and night. To my knowledge, no one has ever reported seeing anything like that.”

Eric Altman, president of Pennsylvania Bigfoot Society, said he thinks most sightings go unreported.

“People are afraid to come forward because of ridicule from the general public,” Altman said.

His group is hosting the Jeannette conference. He hopes research and publicity will help others come forward with Bigfoot information.

“We’re trying to collect as much hard evidence as possible,” Altman said.

Hard evidence includes photos, audio recordings, hair and blood samples, and the signature track castings. The problem is, even the investigators can’t agree on what constitutes strong evidence, Benjamin Radford said in The Skeptical Inquirer magazine’s April issue.

“There is no shortage of evidence,” Radford wrote. “The important criterion, however, is not the quantity of the evidence, but the quality. Lots of poor evidence does not add up to strong evidence.”

Scientific analysis of recordings, photos, tracks, hair and blood have been inconclusive at best, Radford wrote. Bigfoot also has been the subject of many hoaxes and pranks, he added.

That’s why Sherry is out to take one alive.

“What I’m interested in is a live specimen,” Sherry said. “I have to catch one.”

The mission has taken Sherry to the ridges for the last 15 years, searching for evidence of his quarry. He said he has learned a lot.

“I can tell you more about Bigfoot than anybody in the whole world,” Sherry said, grinning and pulling his chair up to the table.

During his research, he said he has identified Bigfoot beds, feeding spots and favorite paths. Although he has seen many tracks, he said the creatures are very smart and hide their tracks and other signs.

“They’re smarter than the average guy. They hide their tracks. They hide everything,” he said.

Not only is it nocturnal, but the Bigfoot is an underground dweller, Sherry said. He based that opinion on his first encounter with the Bigfoot while fishing. The animal’s odor stank of dampness found underground, he said.

It also helps explain why more Bigfoots are not reported.

“I think they spend more time underground. There are lots of caves on that ridge,” Sherry said. “If they were on the surface more of the time, they would be seen more often.”

Although his eyesight has deteriorated to a point where he can’t drive a car, Sherry said he still hopes to catch a Bigfoot. He has been feeding two families of the animals on the ridge and has a trap set.

The bear snare is adapted with a locking mechanism he designed himself to outwit the wily creatures. So far, none have stepped into the snare with an entire foot, he said.

“Their feet are too big,” Sherry said.

• Story originally published by:
The Tribune-Democrat, Johnstown / PA | Randy Griffith - Sept 8.02

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