Unraveling the Freeman Bigfoot Files: A Deep Dive with Michael Freeman

Jeremiah Byron: All right, Bigfoot society. I have the privilege of talking to Mr. Michael Freeman tonight. How's it going, Michael?

Michael Freeman: It's going pretty well. I can't complain. How about yourself?

Jeremiah Byron: Oh it's great, man. It's a nice weekend out in Iowa. We're like 33 degrees, so we're hoping it gets back to summer soon.

I think it's gonna be like 60 coming up soon, but man, I'm just excited to talk to you. It's been a a while coming, but I'm glad we got it all set up. But just a little intro about yourself. In case people don't know and most people probably know who you are, we mentioned that in the pre-chat, but of course, Michael Freeman is the son of Paul Freeman, who most people will know from the famous Freeman footage.

Where you see the Bigfoot go across the screen, and you may remember, Paul says, oh, there he goes, is the famous line. But as I read through your book the Freeman Bigfoot files there's much more to what Paul was able to do for Bigfoot, and it's amazing, and I can't wait to talk to you about it.

Is there anything else that the audience should know about you, Michael,

Michael Freeman: I guess what surprises most people is that I'm a professional gymnastics coach and have been doing that for about 22 years.

I'm married to an rn, a charge nurse. Her name is Whitney. I've got three boys, and yeah, I'm the son of a. Bigfoot legend, I guess some people would say.

Jeremiah Byron: I would agree with you that definitely a bigfoot legend, especially after you dig into this book, there's a lot more to this guy than just that few minute video.

It's intense. But in your own words, Michael, how would you describe your father, Paul Freeman

Michael Freeman: Larger than life? That's my description, for him. My first chapter in the book is entitled My Very Own Superman, and that's, pretty much sums it up to what he was, personally for me, he was a large man in stature but also a large man in, in personality and in heart as well.

He was very caring and very generous. And you will hear stories. From people about his generosity, how he was all willing to help people and give them things and take time to chat with him and things like that. But yeah, larger than life be would be the one little sentence I would use to describe him in both stature and in personality.

Jeremiah Byron: Few other things I learned about him pretty quickly from that book is I didn't know how avid a hunter he was. He was going after all sorts of different wildlife and to know that fact really, plays into and we'll talk about it later, just the story about what happened before that famous Freeman footage video is such an interesting story, we'll talk about that later though.

The first thing I really like about the book is cuz I'm a guy who loves tech. Our culture is all into that and the book has multiple QR codes where you're reading and it's oh, let me scan that. And it's literally your father Recording about different things he experienced parts of his life to do with Bigfoot.

And it is fascinating. If you ever wanted to hear what I imagined to be the Paul Freeman podcast episode that never existed, just get this book and go through the QR codes and a lot of people I think make fun of the whole, oh, there he goes. But when you take the time to read this book and you're going through the QR codes and you're listening to your dad talk and you're like, that's just the way he talked, dude.

It's not that He's like talking weird. That's, I'm a monotone guy, so I get it and I'm like, man, people need to give this guy a break. Like he's just a salt of the earth guy. Who got into Bigfoot and he had some amazing experiences. And it's all in the book. And I just wanted to say to that, to you, I learned a ton about your dad, and it was very cool.

So thank you for sharing that with the world and with me by providing a copy of the book as well. I do wanna ask you, what was it like growing up in an environment where it's Bigfoot all the time?

Michael Freeman: It was tough to be honest with you. It was normal because I didn't know any better, from the time I was five years old, that was in my life. Bigfoot was normal. It was always there, and it wasn't one of those. Things that you question of something that was but as I started to get older, it became a little tougher because I started to get scrutinized a little bit by my peers and other adult peers like, school and places like and there was a time period there where, my dad was considered the crazy guy in town, a Bigfoot nut.

It wasn't accepted in our social culture as it is today where it's an entertainment industry like itself. Back then in the mid eighties and the early nineties you, he was the crazy guy. And so I was always the son of, that, that guy that was crazy in Walla.

But at the same time, he was well liked by all my friends and my peers, and everyone that we knew because of his personality he just necessarily wasn't well liked or perceived in the media or by, other people that were passing judgment or opinion. Also, some people find it interesting to find out that, the subject of Bigfoot wasn't the topic of discussion around our house.

It wasn't what we talked about sitting around the dinner table or on Saturday afternoons. Like it's something my mother didn't allow. We all knew it existed and we were all part of it. And my mom and dad had discussions about it behind closed doors and things like that. But she didn't allow it to completely preoccupy our lives.

And, therefore me and my mom and brother and my sister didn't follow into that, obsession.

Jeremiah Byron: Is very interesting from how the book, how you wrote in the book about your mother. It sounded like she was just an incredible lady that really stood behind your dad in multiple ways because there are many sacrifices that your parents had to make to try to make this whole bigfoot research adventure work.

It was very intense. Probably more than most people realize.

Michael Freeman: And I think I, I wrote something about it in the book, but I often think about what life would've been like if yeah, we would've stayed, in Canvas, Washington and ran that deli.

And this Bigfoot obsession wouldn't have taken over and forced us to, go back to Walla. It's those little things like that butterfly effect life probably would've been completely different. I certainly wouldn't have been, on here with you today.

Jeremiah Byron: Yeah. That's it. It's crazy to think the little choices we make in our life. Your choice to make a book about. Your father, my choice to just start a podcast four years ago led to us both choices led to us talking to each other tonight, which is really weird to think about. It's a little heavy.

As you started to go out with your father in the field as you got older, do you remember any times that really stick out in your mind where it is I was out with my dad and this happened and it was a little bit crazy.

Michael Freeman: Yeah. The one time that really sticks with me is when my dad took me mushroom hunting and I was 12 and we were up on Green Peak and we had been going down this old trail looking for morales and it started to rain. On us. And the rain became, a little heavier. And my dad decided at that time that we should probably double back and go back to his pickup. We could have our lunch or whatever, and we could wait out the rain. And as we, we turned around and we started back up the trail we maybe made about five minutes from where we were when my dad stopped dead in his tracks and pointed out to me that there was a footprint, a big footprint on the side of the trail that was fresh.

And when I say fresh, the trail we were walking on was getting wet. Our clothes were wet. I remember my shoes being muddy. That's one thing I do remember is worried about my shoes. 12, 12 year old worries. And it was so fresh that this print had not yet begun to dampen with the rainfall.

And I just remember my dad doing this to me. And pointing at that. And he looked at it and he turned and he looked around the other side of the trail and he looked behind us. And then he grabbed me by the arm and we, double timed it about as fast as we could back to the pickup where we got in, it was an Old Scout international.

And what I do remember about that is he rolled all the windows up and he started it he turned the heater on and he reached behind him and he got that three 50 Norma Magnum that he carried out of the back window. And he laid it across his lap. And I remember the fogging up on the side and he was rubbing the glass off in front.

And him telling me basically to just relax. We know it's watching us. We may not have seen it, but it sees us for sure. We're just gonna sit here a little bit, and we sat there, I don't know how long it was, maybe 20 minutes, maybe an hour. I don't remember.

What I remember is being scared. Honestly, and I get goosebumps like talking about that still today. And then we we left and he dropped me off at the house and he went directly to Wes Summerlin's house. And he got him, and I think they called Vance Orchard or one of those guys, and they went back up there.

But that's the closest I've ever been to one. And, it was close and we didn't see it. But, as I said in the book, I'm sure that it saw us and it was close enough for me. I don't know if I wanna be closer than that.

Jeremiah Byron: Do you have any desire to go back out someday looking for Bigfoot yourself?

Michael Freeman: I'm okay with where I'm at right now. Yeah. But I do think about going back out. I would like to, and the one place that I would like to go is I'd like to go back to Deduct Spring, where my dad got, the footage.

I haven't been there in about 15 years, 16 years maybe now at this point. So I would like to go back there sometime. And I get offers all the time. I've probably had 40 people at least since, I announced that we were gonna come out with this book that have offered to go and, stay the night or stay the weekend or go on expedition or whatever and go to Deduct Spring and. Some of 'em just want to go and spend a night. Some of 'em want to, do expedition and set up cameras and record stuff, and some of 'em want to do measurements and, there's all these, different agendas, for that. But I think when I do go out that's probably where I'm gonna go.

And, on occasion we have activity around where I live in Spokane. If something does happen here and I get word of it I might drive out and check it out. I did. I, yeah, it must have been, I think it's five or six years ago we had some tracks out in the Wildlife Refuge. One winter and I went out and took a look at those and they were a couple days old at the time, and I'm pretty positive they were Moose tracks.

But it's something that made the paper and somebody thought it was Bigfoot and this and that, but I will do stuff like that. But I'm not a. Hardcore boots on the ground, spend every weekend out in the mountains, type of researcher. I don't have the resources to do it. I have too much going on at home.

I've got three kids and a wife. And the one thing I did learn, from my dad and everyone should take note of that and from René Dahinden as well, is that there's a slight little curse that comes along with this and it will pull you in if you're not careful.

And it's easy to get obsessed, and I'm not gonna let that happen.

Jeremiah Byron: I think that's very wise of you, Michael, because I've heard many times on my show many different people have mentioned. The curse and the curse is referred to as different things. Henry Franz oni talks about it going too far down the road to Seatco.

But yeah it sucks you in and unfortunately, it can lead to things that you might not want to happen with your life. So balance is definitely recommended. And that's the lesson for today for listeners. If you've never heard people talk about it, here's your introduction.

Michael Freeman: And when I first said I was gonna write this book, and I was spending a lot of time and I was doing a lot of research and all this, it's one of the things Cliff Barackman warned me of. He said, make sure you're taking time and spending it with your family and you're not just, obsessing over Bigfoot and Bigfoot related topics, so I do have him to think for reminding me every once in a while to, to take time for the other things and to you not think about Bigfoot for a while.

It's hard and I, if I can't say that, I wouldn't let it happen, honestly. If I was out there, if I went back to Deduct or I went out, with someone or by myself, and if I saw one, if I had an encounter. I can't say that I wouldn't get obsessed with trying to prove that it was real in, in trying to get evidence and get something like, I can totally understand what happened to my dad and what happens to a lot of other people.

Like I, I can see it happening. But, thankfully, or, maybe not, thankfully I've never seen one, and in, and most likely I probably never will to be honest with you. So

Jeremiah Byron: do you think there's still a activity in the deduct Springs area? Oh, absolutely. Yeah. As a matter of fact in 2008, which, really isn't that long ago Brandon Tenant from Pocatello, Idaho had an encounter. At Deduct. And also found 17, 18 inch footprints that I've seen photographs of. Also with that last summer, last August Mike Casey from Richland Washington here close to me found some tracks at Deduct as well. We're not entirely certain what they are we're pretty certain what they're not.

And there's a possibility that they certainly could be Sasquatch tracks. Also Jonathan Summerlin, who's the grandson of Wes Summerlin, and one of the contributors, to my book he's there in Walla and they still have activity there. He's he just doesn't publicize it as much as, some of the old timers from that area, publicized it and let it get out in the newspapers and things like that to draw attention to it.

There's a lot of activity still goes on in the Blue Mountains. Those people to say that, all the Bigfoot left when my dad left, that is dead wrong. There's a lot of activities that goes on there still.

Absolutely. I like to consider Mike Casey a good friend.

We've talked for many a time about his adventures, out in that area. And man, he's he really gets into it. And now he's all over the country getting into it. So we'll leave that at that. But I'll have Mike's YouTube channel linked in the resources. It's gonna be a lot of resources for this episode.

Mike has a few about Deduct Springs, so you wanna definitely check that listeners?

Michael Freeman: Mike's a good dude. When Mike and I got connected actually a mutual acquaintance of Mike and i's Suggested to him when he moved to that area that maybe he get in contact with me cuz I might have some advice on some areas to, to go and, investigate.

And Mike sent me a message and was very polite and respectful and asked me if I had any advice. And if you've read my book, first and foremost, like I don't hide that stuff. I let locations be known and I let you know the evidence be known and all that stuff.

Cause I want people, to find evidence. And so I gave him some, advice on where he might go. And he did a few videos and we chatted some more and we actually ended up becoming pretty good friends. But yeah he's a super solid guy.

I actually introduced Mike to Dar Addington. Who, was one of the contributors of my book and trusted him enough to take her camping and overnight and stuff like that.

And he's actually learned a lot from Dar as well. And they've forged, a friendship, which is good for her, cuz she's really excited that she's able to get back out there and do some big footing and some things like that. So I know she's having a good time and it's a win-win.

Jeremiah Byron: Another fun thing from the book, cause I loved how it talked about how it wasn't just your dad in that area. There was a whole Bigfoot team of researchers But you just mentioned, Dar Addington and others. And it was just so interesting to see how, he was constantly checking in with the Summerlins with Dar, and they would go out looking for stuff.

And it is just very cool. The resources in that book. I really have to say hats off to you. There's so many photos. There's all of your dad's map with annotations about, okay, this means this is this. We don't know what this means. So you're gonna have to figure this out.

And it's just so cool. It's well, worth it. Something I, I wanted to chat about is so you also have a brother, Dwayne, who is 11 years older than you. Being 11 years older than you He was maybe involved in a different way cuz he was he was older.

Were there some interesting situations that happened when he would go out with your father in the field?

Michael Freeman: Yeah. Dwayne is 11, almost 12 years older than me. And when my dad had his first encounter in 82, when he was working for the Forest Service Dwayne was 16, almost 17 years old.

And I was five and Dwayne was already an accomplished hunter and almost an adult, and things like that. So he was a little more involved in the actual, going out and going on. On, or whatever you wanna call it, and looking for Bigfoot.

But one of the best pieces of evidence, visually speaking at least that we have are the photographs from outside of the watershed from October 5th, 1988. And my brother actually took those photos and he was deer hunting with my dad at the time.

And, my dad was carrying a camera and. Rented video camera at that point in time, that he would rent every time he would go out or go hunting and things like that. Which my dad was holding and my brother happened to have the actual just photographic is what he was holding that day.

But yeah, my brother got those which are very important and they're always credited to my dad. The copyright is still in my dad's name and that sort of thing, but I always like to let everybody know that my brother's actually responsible for taking those pictures.

With that being said, interesting story from that day and that happening is after my brother snapped a couple of snapshots, two or three, he actually got up and ran towards my dad who was about, 150, 200 yards waves, depending on the estimate. I think that's what my dad says about 200 yards probably.

And. It changed the trajectory that the Sasquatch was walking. Cuz originally, from what I've heard the information we have is that it was walking directly towards my dad and when my brother got up to run towards him, he startled it and it changed its trajectory and went a different direction.

And so my dad has always said, damn it, Dwayne, if you could just stayed there, it would've walked out, 20 feet in front of where I was sitting. Which means either A, we could have gotten maybe better pictures or b there's a dead center shot. Because that was still the point in time where my dad was, dead set pretty much on, on shooting one of 'em.

And so just my brother getting up and getting scared and getting anxious to run towards my dad and el and tell him, what he just saw, changed, the course of what could have been future events, as well.

Jeremiah Byron: And this may be my, yeah, I'm still relatively new to the big foot field, within five years.

And I, I read the book and I was like, wait there's pictures from another event that his son took. And I looked at these and I was like, oh my goodness, these are amazing. Like, why are the Duane Freeman photos not talked about more? These are some of the best Bigfoot photos I've seen. It's nuts, Michael.

I don't know why they're not, they are talked about more, to be honest.

Michael Freeman: They are super good pictures actually. Yeah. And if you look close enough on what I call the main picture, which is the one. Where it's walking away and it's head slightly turned to the side, you can actually see its ear.

And you can see that its face is like a slightly lighter color, but you can see the outline of what looks to be an ear. You can see that it's extremely broad shouldered. You can see that it has extremely long arms. They're fantastic photos actually. There's also, there was some study done and then the early nineties to mid nineties or whatever where someone had thought they could make out some of the, the muscles in the buttocks in some anatomical features, like that.

But they don't get a whole lot of credit. Honestly, they were in the local newspaper I believe on October 9th. And I included that article, in the book and they were in there was a book that was put out, I believe in England sometime in the early two thousands that featured those photos in there.

At some point. But aside from that, you don't ever see them, and they are as, as far as still photographs go, not moving video. They've gotta be one of the, one of the top sets of pictures that's out there.

Jeremiah Byron: They should be referred to as one of the top.

I'm still blown away by it, is Dwayne still involved with Bigfoot as of currently? Anymore?

Michael Freeman: He's not really involved with it. No. That's one way to put it. My brother is different than I am.

We have different personality types. He also experienced different things than I did, and my brother being older and being in high school at the time when it all started, and being, 16, almost 17 he took a little bit more of the ridicule and the criticism that went on in Milton Freewater, Oregon when my dad was working for the Forest Service.

And that whole circus that went down there and there's a lot to that. And I didn't even touch on everything, in the book. Sure. But, there was a court injunction that was filed and, there was all kinds of things that happened surrounding that.

And my dad eventually, leaving the forest Service and we were getting crank phone calls. People were calling my dad crazy. They were teasing my brother. Our house got vandalized. Somebody spray painted crazy. On our house. I think there was a broken window, at one point in time and this all kind of led to us moving away from there.

And I think my mom, was tired of this kind of stuff, basically, which is why we left. But, Dwayne went through that and Dwayne also went through everything else in the Deduct video and all that stuff. And there just came a point in time where, he told my dad, and it's something my dad talks about in his audio recordings in the book.

I just don't wanna do this anymore. I'm tired of talking to people. I'm tired of talking to reporters. I'm tired of answering questions, and I think he was tired of being Freeman's son. Sure. To be honest, with you. And, he never got credit for the photos he took. And the one thing he really did Legitimately add to the research like he didn't get credited for.

And at this point in time now Dwayne doesn't even really talk to me about Bigfoot, sure. It's something he doesn't talk about a lot. I think he would just like to forget about it and, when we do get together, he might answer a question for me in the shortest way possible.

He's private and I think I said directly, in the book, like we all have our own personal feelings about, Bigfoot and the Bigfoot community and certain people in that community, and my brother was, also there and present and older than me to see things like René Dahinden completely belittle my father and cuss at him, in Pullman, Washington in 1989 and those kind of things.

And, it struck a chord. And I was there. In Pullman in 1989 when that happened, I was at the hotel swimming with my sister. We didn't actually go, inside to, to see that conference. But Dwayne was there and, so we have a different outlook on it.

And I did ask my brother if he wanted to be involved in the book, and if he wanted to write a chapter and he could write about anything he wanted to, and if he didn't feel like writing it, then he could record it or whatever, and I would type it out, and transcribe it or do whatever you want it to you and, to put it in context, to be honest with you I was writing the book and this conversation took place when my brother was up here because my sister had been killed.

Last summer in a motorcycle accident. And so there was some emotions going around with that as well. That's why he was up here and he was staying in my house, all this stuff. But he said he'd think about it and he went home and I think it was about two weeks later he gave me a phone call and he said, you know what, Mikey I, I don't really wanna do this, don't hold it against me, but, I'm not interested and, fine.

As I did state in the book, like I did my best to try to, include, how important he was, to, to the research. But he chose not to be a part of it and he chooses not to, be a part of it, pretty much in any way. And that's his right.

Jeremiah Byron: And I totally respect him for that. That whole, you mentioned the 89 conference, that is so fresh in my mind because I just watched the video on that literally an hour before the recording of this and my heart breaks that your brother was present for that.

Just absolute disregard for I'm just gonna, that it's not okay for a person to treat another person like that. And I'm sorry you guys had to go through that

Michael Freeman: And there's other instances of that Yeah. In that particular individual and things they said about other people and, and things and I have my own feelings, and I also, one of the things I made clear for the book was that I was not gonna speak ill of anyone. I won't do it and I have opportunities to do but one of the reasons I chose not to. Is because my dad did not do that. And you will, you won't find anything that's written or recorded or taped or said about my dad ever saying anything negative about that image.

Which is, it's pretty astonishing in, in itself that he was able to let that roll off his shoulders and take the higher ground and, not stoop to that level and not fire back ever. Absolutely.

Jeremiah Byron: Talking about, people like René Dahinden. So growing up in that, that Bigfoot research culture and you started to get involved, I believe in the book, I said around like age 10 or 11, do you remember meeting these people like René Dahinden, green Titmus, Krantz Byrne, people like that.

Are there any of that stick out in your mind?

Michael Freeman: Oh yeah, absolutely. I met all of them. Wow. Renee de Hinden really sticks out in my, from the beginning in 1982. And, he used to come, most people don't realize this. He used to come and spend the night at our home and he would sleep on the pullout sofa in our living room. And then, him and my dad would get up early in the morning and they would go up to the mountains and they would ride these little trail bikes together.

Renee used to like to ride those. And I got some pictures of them. I actually have family photographs. That weren't included in the book. They're just family photographs from the family album that have René Dahinden in them. And him and my dad would, challenge each other to do these, crazy stupid things on these trail bikes and ride off this hill or through this, pile of mud or whatever, but he was around a lot. I remember that. I remember he used to gimme candy, these butterscotch candies. Wow. That he used to eat.

People don't realize, him and my dad were, they were buddies like, for a while. Just, one of those things.

But Krantz as well. Krantz is the other one that I really remember. And I remember being, I've been in France's lab at W S U wow. He was at the house a lot. I remember looking at, all the things in his lab. And I remember as a kid being fascinated with a cat skeleton.

Of all things, that he had on one of the lab tables and stuff like that. And just the kind of cloud of smoke that was always encircling Grover Krantz, cuz he was this, two or three pack a day, chain smoker. And so he kinda looked like Pigpen, from peanuts with the dirt, around him, but it was like cigarette smoke and but he was always really nice.

And I have really fond memories of being around Krantz, but yeah, I've also met Bob, Ted and I've met John Green, as well. And some some other people along the way and, lots of memories of those people. Yeah, for sure.

Oh, Peter Byrne, that's the other one I've met. I met Peter Byrne in 1987. Yeah.

Jeremiah Byron: Thinking of all the different pieces of evidence that your father was able to gather over the years, was there a, did you have a favorite piece of evidence from all those different things that he found regarding Bigfoot?

Michael Freeman: Oh, man, that's a tough question. My favorite piece of evidence. Just personally speaking, I think my favorite piece of evidence is the 1988 print. That's my favorite. And that's the. Cast that has the big rock, which that when it stepped on the rock and forced that, forward and down into the ground.

It's about an 18 inch cast, 18 inches long, nine inches wide. Cliff Barackman talks about it, pretty extensively in, in the chapter he wrote for my book. I think it's my favorite piece of evidence because I think it's the coolest cast anyone's ever taken, and yeah, just personally, I am rather taken back though with anything that has to do with Wrinkle Foot and that particular individual, and I'm not quite sure why.

She has just always seemed to be my favorite of, the individual Sasquatch that we're rounded and. That location during that time period. And I just like the name, I like the fact that Kranz named her that because, she had these odd looking textures to the bottom of her feet, that reminded him of these wrinkles and how her toes have this extra display to them and her feet.

Her cast at least, and prints look slightly different than what you would normally think that you would see from these, but, cran surmised that they might actually be more accurate to what Sasquatch Foot actually looks like than that a lot of the casts, that we're getting.

But she's always been intriguing to me and the 1988 rock footprint. At this point we're pretty sure that it is wrinkle foot and, it's 18 inches long because the foot slid. When it made contact with the Rock and it turned what normally would be about a 14 inch print into an 18 inch print and over exaggerated a toast play.

And so you get this big, massive looking cast that looks like this giant alpha male, and in reality it's this little old lady, who may or may not have had some injury to her foot, and that's something that, that Krantz had talked about as well. And I believe it was chill cut if I'm pronouncing the name correctly.

You found scarring like on the feet, like pretty deep scars that had healed and they had healed, inward as cuts would. And so it surmised that, at some point in time there could have been a somewhat of a significant injury, that had taken place to at least one of her feet but's yeah.

There's those. As far as, aside from just my favorite, but as far as importance goes, I think that the dermal prints. From June 16th, 1982 at Elk Wallo are probably the most important evidence that he ever found. Even more so than the deduct spring video. And I say all the time that, I look pictures and I like though, and I like the Patterson film, don't get me wrong, I like my dad's film.

I like my brother's photos. But I think footprint casts are much more important in the scope of proving the existence of Bigfoot than some photos. And I think that we can learn more from them. And, it's tangible physical evidence that you can hold in your hand and you can make comparisons to.

And, with the dramatic glyphic and, the scarring and water striation lines and skin pores, and you can see, the Midtarsal break and the dorsiflexion and, all these anatomical features that come along with the footprint cast. I think they're really important.

And those dermal prints from 82, certainly are some of the most important tracks that were ever found. And the originals of those, the left and right dermal are still in the Smithsonian. They've got them somewhere, Grover Grand from there and, they kept them. Wow.

So

Jeremiah Byron: There's a story that's, or sorry, I should say account. It is an account that's called out in another book about your dad that I don't believe was called out in Freeman Bigfoot files. And I'm really curious if you have any thoughts or on, on it. It's in May nine, May, 1993 in Dry Creek the casting of the Buttocks of a Bigfoot.

I gotta hear your thoughts about this dude. It's wild. Oh, sorry. This is called out in Sasquatch Legend Meat Science by Dr. Jeff Meldrum.

Michael Freeman: Yes. Yeah. Dr. Meldrum, it is in his book the the Dairy Air or the aqua is how I refer to it, from time to time. But yeah, there's people on both sides of the fence, on that one.

Dr. Meldrum can break it down for you and how it has all these anatomical features and it has, these biological feminine features. I guess that's the most smartest way I can, yeah, that's the modest to put it Good call. Yeah. And can point that out. And, there's other people on the other side, that think that's it could have been an elk that had backed up, against this mud bank and sat down.

The funny thing is with that's actually one of the pieces of my dad's evidence that I'm the least familiar with. To be honest I don't have a personal copy of that cast. So I, it's not something that I have personally, studied extensively. So I, I haven't really formed, a strong opinion on it.

But when it comes to the matters of, physical evidence and anatomical features that are present in that evidence, I tend to trust people that have spent their entire lives getting doctorates in that field. And when Jeff Meldrum points things out to me and says, this is what this is and this is what this is, I have a tendency to, belief, the things that, that he's telling me.

And I don't have a problem with that. There's the Skookum cast, as well. So my dad's isn't the only one that has, shown this type of behavior. And for people that think that it's odd it's funny or whatever, they can't stand up their whole lives.

Exactly. They've gotta sit down at some point. Exactly. Yeah. They've gotta lay down at some point. We've had instances in the past of, hand prints with knee prints next to, ponds and creek banks and things like that.

They've gotta sit down. They've gotta lay down, they're gonna kneel down. They're gonna rest, they're gonna do all these things that we do, as well. So I, I don't think it's out of the ordinary. People just like to. Point at and laugh I think it's something to take, seriously, actually. Yeah. And when I was down at, when I was down at the North American Bigfoot Center last August and I was, and Larry Lund was there, and Larry Lund is, oh, a skeptic here and there and whatever.

And I got to meet him. He's actually interested in that. He thinks it's pretty interesting, I don't know what that tells you, but yeah.

Jeremiah Byron: Speaking of the N A B C, which is a great place and everyone should support them that's Cliff Barackman Museum in Boring, Oregon. Are there a lot of your dad's artifacts in that museum?

I would imagine there's a few.

Michael Freeman: Yeah, I would surmise close to 50% of the evidence that's on display is from the Blue Mountains. Not entirely. All my dad's, there is a lot of evidence from my dad. The 82 dermal are there.

The thumbprint from the dermal, the knuckles is there. My dad's 94 Biscuit Ridge hand print. The 86 hand print, the 88 Rock foot. The 84 wrinkle foots are there. 1991 Mill Creek Road has its own display. The juvenile prints from 1992 at Gifford Peak. Are on display there. The butt print from 93 there's a ton of evidence from my dad and the Blue Mountains there, which I think is funny.

Because I have encountered at least on one occasion someone who is not a fan per se of my father. And his research Go into the NABC and make public comments that the information and the evidence on display is so good that it will turn any non-believer into someone who seriously considers this not realizing at the time what they were even looking at.

And that, it probably 50% of it or close to it is my dad's are from the Blue Mountains. Which, wow. Yeah. I guess that's all I have to say about that. But it's really funny. I, I say all the time I wish people would judge Bigfoot evidence, not just Bigfoot, but all crypted, paranormal whatever.

I wish they would judge by the evidence. And take a look at the evidence for yourself and educate yourself with the evidence. Make yourself familiar with it. Read about it. Get all the education you can on each particular piece of evidence, and then draw a conclusion from there.

And stop listening to, something René Dahinden said in 1989, or whatever. But let's actually take a look at the evidence because, like I've said we have instances of people who didn't know that this cast or whatever was from Paul Freeman and they think it's fantastic.

But then you ask them about Paul Freeman and they will tell you a bunch of discouraging and negative things about him. And it's because they're not familiar with the evidence whatsoever. They're just listening, to rumors and hearsay. And, one of my, taglines that I was throwing around for a while there, and I was making it really prominent was, this business of Bigfoot is the business of evidence.

That's it, period. And if you're not bringing evidence, you're not bringing anything. We don't listen to rumors and hearsay. We want the evidence, bring me something that I can look at and I can draw my own conclusion from. And, something that somebody who's grumpy or, jealous or, whatever may have said or said to somebody else that said to somebody else, I don't care about that.

I don't care about any of it.

Jeremiah Byron: Evidence is number one for sure. I am a guy who, if I'm reading a book and there's pictures of people and I don't know a person, I'll try to look up the person. There was a person that I couldn't find anywhere. Is, I'm curious if you know who this guy is.

It's in your book. Who's Ted Butters? I don't know that.

Michael Freeman: Ted Butters. Do you know Ted Butters? Ted Butters. Ted Butters is the gentleman on the cover. Yeah. Of my book, dad and Bob Te and the Picture it's also featured in inside the book as well. I don't know, to be honest with you whatever became of Ted Butters Okay.

Or how he's doing, or e even if he's still around or anything like that. But he was a pro, excuse me, a protege so to speak Bob Titmus at the time. And certainly when that stuff was taken, that was June 26th, I believe, 1982. Probably had no idea of the level of giants in the field that, that he was, next to when they took that photograph.

But yeah he was a I get you or understudy or someone that was, hanging around with Titmus at the time. But we chose that photo as the book cover because it's cool. I'm gonna be honest with you, that's why we, that's why we chose that picture.

We chose that picture because all three of those guys look like maybe they're, had James Dean lived and not died in that car wreck. Yes. Maybe they represent James Dean at a different periods of his life. And they all just look like they're badass. Excuse my language there. Totally.

And totally, I see that photograph. I want to be there with those guys. Like that's, I wanna hang out with those three guys. And that's honestly, that's why he chose that picture.

Jeremiah Byron: Thank you for answering about Ted Butters. That picture is awesome. So the search for Ted Butters starts right now.

So listeners, if if Ted Butters is still around or if you're Ted Butters research, just reach out to me@bigsocietygmail.com. Let me know if if Mr. Butters is not with us either. And that. That would be unfortunate. But he just seems I'm like, man, this guy is so young. He's so young in these photos.

He has to still he's such a young looking guy. Yeah. I don't know. We'll

Michael Freeman: see. Think So. The other person that's in my book, and there's photographs of him in there as well that, if we're gonna start a public service announcement for missing persons is Greg May and Greg May was the wilderness survival instructor at Washington State University and a proje of Krants.

And I know it has to be a fact that he is not deceased because, Washington State university publishes the deaths of their, alumni. And he's not listed as a former professor of that. Cause I, I did look it up. That's deceased. But he was an integral part for a while of some of that, Research and wrote some field reports and did a lot of tracking with my dad and I would love to get ahold of that guy.

So if anyone knows where Greg may is, yeah. Reach out to Jeremiah or myself as well. I have a feeling he got wrapped up in his job and his wilderness survival training, all that and probably went off the grid somewhere. But I don't know. We're gonna pull 'em back.

I tried to find him. I can't find him.

Jeremiah Byron: We're gonna pull 'em back in Bigfoot society. You need to find Ted Butters and Greg May and you need to let me know so I can let Michael Freeman know. We're gonna find these guys and then I'm gonna interview 'em. Wink, if they're up for it. It's awesome. Yeah. This as community is, as they have a lot of knowledge, so we'll see what happens.

In the book you mentioned that. Your father at some point thinks he found some Nest sites. Is that anything that you remember or being involved with, finding those or anything of that nature?

Michael Freeman: I was not there for finding the Nest sites that, that was in the early nineties. 92, 93, right around there.

I'm involved in that. I do remember though a story from him of trying him in advance, orchard actually trying to preserve these nest sites and move them away from where they were to bring them, home to our house to, to put them with the other evidence and like begging some of it up on I think they tried to put them on like big pieces of cardboard and then yeah, put that board in trash bags from each end or something like that.

And as the story goes they were driving home and it was cold. And my dad turned the heater on in his truck and as it got warmer and warmer in the car, both of 'em started smelling this foul awful stench as things were warming up. And come to, VAs over here rolling the window down, accusing my dad of smelling and my dad's rolling the window down, accusing fans of smelling or whatever.

And coming to find out it was their closing hands and stuff from handling, the Nest site. That's also one of the things, cuz there's a couple things, but that's one of the things that my mother would not allow in the house. Was remnants of this nest site. The other was, what my dad had thought at the time, maybe scat from a Sasquatch that if you read the tile interview in my book, you can hear that funny story that my, my dad had wanted to try it oven or whatever.

And my mother had told that he, did that, that he better not come home ever again or, some, something like that, yeah, she did keep check on him. But yeah, there were some nest found. I believe there's a picture in my book of my dad checking out the Nest site and I say, I believe you, you think that I would know every picture, you know that's in there cuz there's 180 photographs that were used in the book.

But to be honest with you, at one point in time, literally had 500 photos laid out on a big table. And I was trying to decide which 100 of them I was gonna put, I was gonna put in the book and actually ended up with 180 of them. Sometimes I'm like, wait, did I stick that in the book?

And then I wanna look and check, to make sure it was in there. But I'm pretty sure there's a picture of my dad who's bent over next to, what we at least think are one of these nesting sites. And there's a few nesting sites or beds, I believe he called them beds that are documented on the map.

Yeah.

Jeremiah Byron: Yep. I believe you're right. That's just it's fascinating. Think of, your dad had. Dealings with that. You've got the Olympic project with their nest, and, even there's I believe it was an interview with Emily Fleur from the forest fleur when she was talking to Peter Byrne.

And he was talking about finding nesting sites of some area way back in, in the day. So it's just, it's an interesting, Bigfoot thing that comes up every once in a while and we'll see what

Michael Freeman: comes. Oh yeah.

As we touched on earlier, they have to sleep somewhere.

They're not gonna, you just lay out on the road, and all great apes, you don't make nest and build nests. And I think, there's two different sides of, people feel different about it, but at least in my dad's opinion they weren't living in caves.

He had come to that conclusion. There's a lot of caves in the, Wenaha two Canon wilderness, which is, part of the Blue Mountains there. He had been in a lot of those cave systems and had not found sign of them ever. And he had surmised that they weren't living in caves.

They probably wouldn't live in caves. They would never inhabit a cave that didn't have more than one opening to it where they could, get out. And my dad's kind of feeling on it was that they would probably only seek shelter in a cave in an emergency. Some kind of, increment severe weather or something like that.

But they did. Prefer to live out in, the more open where they could see and hear everything. And that they were building nests and that they probably moved frequently. So they weren't nest in the same place, for very long. That's that's just his, his thoughts on that.

But I tend to agree with the cave hypothesis there at least of his.

Jeremiah Byron: That's very interesting. In the book there are few times where things are called out in the audio clips from your father that are not necessarily called out in the book itself in the writing, which is really interesting cuz they're almost like little hidden Easter eggs, and there's one of 'em where. I wanted to ask you. He refers to there was a point where, or a time where your father actually had a Bigfoot in the crosshairs. But it's gloss. Do you have any information, more information about that time where there was he says he had a big foot in the crosshairs and I believe it was a view of his, the creature's back, but he couldn't pull the trigger.

Michael Freeman: Yeah, that's when my brother took the photographs October 5th, 1988. Oh okay. Yeah. After my brother had taken those and ran off towards my dad and it had changed its trajectory instead of walking out right in front of him. And I, I don't know. All I have as far as information goes on that is.

Just the story, that I've heard sure about that, which is my dad did have the crosshairs on its back. He said he had a center shot. And as he was watching it, it turned its head and looked back at them, at which point he couldn't pull the trigger because it was too human, and that's actually the catalyst, him deciding that he didn't want to kill one, and moving forward from that, eventually, by the time that he died at the end of his life, just wanting them to be completely left alone. There is another reference possibly earlier 83, 84 maybe in the winnek wilderness of catching a glimpse of one and trying to.

Get the crosshairs on it. But it just being too elusive and too quick to ever sit still long enough to be able to possibly take a shot. But those are, the two in its instances that I know of, where there was at least an opportunity, to do that. One thing I do know though that always made my father nervous was he knew, suspected, knew that they weren't traveling alone.

And that you hardly ever were encountering one of them, and we have a bunch of instances in my book as well, in, in one of the sections of all the times that we have documented, cases of them, them being together in, small groups. But he was always worried a little bit that if he did shoot one that he may not make it home.

That, that type of thing, and that you'd be putting yourself in danger and whoever was with you in danger as well. That's also sitting on your shoulder whispering in your ear as you're trying to get a shot. You're trying to look at one. I believe it's Grover Krantz even said, it's not the one you shoot that you have to worry about.

The best thing you can do is reload.

Jeremiah Byron: It's mother you have to worry about.

Michael Freeman: Yeah. Or it's mother or it's me or Yeah. Whatever. But yeah, there's, he definitely was dead set. He was unskilled one, in, in his mind that was the only way that he was gonna prove to the world that, he wasn't crazy and this thing existed, and Krantz was behind him at the time, a thousand percent.

And Wanted him to shoot one as well. And at one point in time everybody knows, you know who Tom Slick is. At at one point in time slick had offered my father a million dollars if he would kill one and give him the body.

Wow.

Jeremiah Byron: Interesting.

That is a really interesting piece of information.

Michael Freeman: That that never happened. But yeah. I have some information that leads me to believe as well that Grover Krantz had been in contact with the Smithsonian Institution and had claimed to the Smithsonian that he and my father could deliver to them irrefutable evidence of the existence of Sasquatch if they'd be willing to pay the sum of $1 million.

Hello. Now I'm not sure you know what Grover was talking about with irrefutable Yeah. Evidence, but I can only believe that it would have to be a body because the Smithsonian ended up with the dermal prince, he couldn't have been talking about that. Dude,

Jeremiah Byron: that's intense, man.

Michael's got the receipts or something. That's awesome.

Michael Freeman: Michael's got the receipts for something. Yeah. Yeah. But and to backtrack on that, just talking about that conversation Grover, had told my father, basically you don't kill one. If you kill one.

You don't kill one, and then go to the news and it exclaimed that you've killed one because he told my dad what's gonna happen is some people are gonna show up at your door. And they're gonna take the body away from you. Yeah. And they're gonna discredit you to the point where no one's gonna believe you.

So Grover gave my dad the advice that the first thing you do is you find a buyer and you kill one, and you sell it privately. And then when they come to your door to discredit you and make you look like a lunatic, you still have a million dollars. And that's the advice that Grover had given to my dad, which makes perfect sense.

Like you can be the crazy millionaire, or you can be the crazy person that has nothing,

Jeremiah Byron: that's awesome, man. Oh man. Your dad was a smart guy too. Like in the book it talks about how he had plans, like if he got one, obviously it's gonna be so big you can't drag the whole thing out. So he is do I take a hand?

Do I take the head? And it's very similar to the Artemis protocol that the N A W A C has, which is. Public knowledge in the wide open research episode with Daryl Collier. If listeners wanna go check that out, that's a fantastic episode from Dr. Russ Jones. But their thinking is very similar to what your dad was thinking.

Okay, I'm not gonna be able to drag this out. I'm gonna have to maybe just, take a hand or something, but crazy stuff. Crazy stuff.

Michael Freeman: Take what you can. You take a head Exactly. You take a hand, you take a foot.

Jeremiah Byron: Yeah, no doubt. I would love to, to spend some time talking about the actual Freeman footage that, most people are gonna be familiar with.

Would you be able to, walk us through what happened to your father that day that he was able to film the Sasquatch

Michael Freeman: at Deduct Springs? Oh yeah, absolutely. It, it was more than a day, honestly.

It had been leading up, to that day for quite some time. The week leading up to him getting the footage, he had actually been at deduct every single day. And he'd been up there for hours. And he was, getting off work cuz he's, he was working a night job and he was going about 4:00 AM and he was getting up there about 6:00 AM.

And he knew they were gonna be there, that's no secret at this point in time. We had years and years of map data, like telling him that they were gonna be there and what time of year, they were gonna be there and they were gonna find evidence. And he had been going there.

It was a hot summer that year. It was dry. A lot of good water sources and, he, expected that he was gonna find them there. But, he wasn't having, a whole lot of luck to be honest. Maybe some disturbances, things like that he was noticing. But, nothing groundbreaking.

No the big moment, honestly came the night before when, he got a phone call from my sister. And her car had, broken down and it wasn't starting. And she had asked my dad if, he would come over and fix it for her in the morning. And, of course he said yes.

And that morning, instead of getting up and going to deduct, he went to my sister's house and, fixed her car. And then he went and got a cup of coffee and, he was gonna come home and about halfway home, as it goes he decided what the hell my, my mom was at work, she had a job at that point in time and I was hanging out with some friends and, he didn't have anything else to do.

And, if he listened to any of his audio, the one thing you'll pick up on is there's no place else. He would rather be anyway. You know that, that's the only place he wanted to be was the mountains. And so he decided just to go up there and take a look around cuz he was thinking, Hey, maybe I'm gonna find some evidence, maybe you know this or that.

You never know. Hell, I'll just kill some time. It'll be a good day or whatever. But by all estimations, he ends up getting up there three to four hours later than he normally was getting there. So we think sometime after 10:00 AM and normally he was getting there around six.

And what do I say? He, walked right up on one and, it's always led me to believe in him as well. That, they were there every day that he was there and, they were watching him. And when he was leaving, Then they were coming to the pond and they were getting, water or they were doing whatever it is that, that they were doing after he was gone.

And, they were, somewhat used to him, but, still not enough to, to wanna hang out and socialize, and say, Hey Paul, that, that type of thing. I firmly believe that they were watching him and they were waiting for him to leave and he had it in his mind that they were coming before him and that they were leaving and that he was missing them.

And it was actually, it was, the exact opposite. So what ends up happening, happenstance, because my sister's car breaks down and he's got, go spend a couple hours to fix that, and he's late getting up to his normal spot and he's not there at his normal time. They since he's not there that day, I guess you could say they made a mistake.

That's usually the way that, that I phrase it. But it's just one of those things. He was able to walk right up on one due to him not being present when he normally was and when they were used to him being there.

Jeremiah Byron: The thing that gets me about your father's encounter that comes out in the book, people will watch this video. So if you've seen the video hundreds of times, probably if you're into Bigfoot, you've seen the Freeman footage over and over, but what you didn't know is what happens after it. And for a while there stuff gets really touch and go for your dad.

And like when I read that part in the book, I was, I had to step away for a minute. I was like, this is really intense. He almost, man, I Is that something you feel comfortable sharing? What happened after that sighting to your dad? It's intense. Michael.

Michael Freeman: Yeah. Absolutely no mistakes were made.

And we know that the individual Sasquatch, in that footage made a mistake. That day my dad made a mistake as well, and the mistake that he made on that day was he actually thought that there was two of them, and that there were two adult Sasquatch, which I'm not saying there weren't.

But we don't have evidence to support that. We have one set of footprints that were found there that all the footprints belonged to the same individual. And so in my mind, at least what I think happened was that when she moves from to left, my dad lost track of her. He was trying to track her, and she pops up in a different location.

Than where he had thought she went to. And we, now, we know why she went to that different location and why she was trying to be elusive to go there. And that's because that, there was a small, juvenile there that we can now clearly see, in the enhanced footage in those things.

But when she pops up there for the second time, my dad, she was farther away. She was about a hundred feet away. He was at a higher elevation than she was when he gets that shot. And to him she looked like she was a smaller adult, and so he thought that she was a second one. And that immediately put it in my dad's brain that he had one on each side of him.

And so he started to get a little bit nervous. And what he decided to do was to continue down the trail and loop himself back. To where he was parked out, outside of the pond instead of turning around and going the direction he came in because he thought that he had one behind him at that point in time.

And so he started to get a little scared as you would and, by his account the one that was there, at least the one started to become somewhat aggressive and to make some aggressive vocalizations toward him. And, that's put him in a worried state of mind I guess you would say.

Yeah. And there's a decent I believe it's the Tushi Valley ramblings. But Vance Orchard wrote a pretty good article where my dad talks about this, Oh wow. And gives an account as well, but if something you ever wanna, you wanna look up. But my dad ended up crawling down into a hole under some tree roots where a tree had been, fallen over and pulled out of the ground.

And it made like a little din under there. And, my dad's estimate, was that, that he was there between, over an hour, possibly one to two hours. Which I don't believe, I don't think that's true. And I'm not saying that I don't believe my dad but the timeframe doesn't fit with when he got home and when we think the video was taken, there's not enough time for that to happen.

Sure. I think that, my dad never wore a watch, not one day in his life. The camera was off at that point in time, but it didn't have a timestamp on it anyway, and this was pre-cellphone. So I think, most likely what happened was my dad got down on there and he was scared and this thing was making aggressive sounds cuz it wanted him to leave because it's, it has a baby.

And that my dad may have been there between 20 and 30 minutes and in, by his own admission, sweating profusely. Yeah. And cowered down, and I think that 20 or 30 minutes maybe felt like two hours. To be honest with you.

And what ends up happening is after some of these aggressions subside a little bit, he ends up crawling himself up out of there. And he actually uses like a drainage ditch from the spring that leads back to the main road. And he kind of army crawls through it halfway and halfway, walks through it, to get up

and get out of there. And is brave enough or, whatever, I guess you wanna call it. When he gets back to the main pond to, stop for a second to check out the first tracks that he sees as he's going in again, real quick. Which you can tell at that point at the very end of the video.

And you didn't even see that part a lot. And I believe it's in the raw footage section of my, in my book, but it's not in the enhanced footage is a little shaky at that point in time before he gets in the car and, drives back home. But yeah, it's, it was touch and go and, he thought there was two of them.

And like I said, I'm not saying there wasn't, but still, all we have is one matching set of footprints. All the footprints match to the individual we call big Jill. And so I think it's a case of mistaken identity, although he wasn't entirely wrong because there was two of 'em, but one of 'em happened to be a baby. Yeah. Also what's really interesting is in the interview that he gives to Vance Orchard about that situation. He tells vance orchard that the second one that he saw, what he presumes to be the second one. And we've touched on that, that I, I don't believe is the second one.

That it looked like it was deformed and that it could have possibly been a hunchback or it had a lump on the side of its neck and head. This is after it had picked up the baby, and the baby had crawled onto its back, and that's what he was seeing that he perceived to be a hunchback, and for all the listeners out there, if you're not familiar, keep in mind you know that this video was shot in 1992, August 20th. And my father never knew that there was a baby in that video. Never spoke of it, never even knew the existence of it. Wow. Until the year, 2008 years later. When Doug Haijcek discovered it and brought it to my father, my dad never had, he never knew that.

And so when he says that he thought it was deformed, he thought it was a hunchback at a hundred feet through the trees. He couldn't tell that it was a baby, but he certainly did see it. He just didn't realize it until eight years later when Doug Haijcek happened to find that, little anomaly in the film and break it down and zoom in and figure out what it was.

Jeremiah Byron: The chapter with Doug Haijcek alone is worth the price of admission for the book because you literally get Doug shares with you. Okay, here's my criteria for looking at a Bigfoot footage and knowing if it's fake or not. And it is fascinating. And also you share in there one of the QR codes, two of 'em are the enhanced version of the Freeman footage.

And it is wild the way that you can stuff is brought out in man that is just the coolest. Are there things being worked on with the Freeman footage and maybe other things that are still in progress tech-wise for the future?

Michael Freeman: Always. We always want to get, the best version of it.

Of course. Yeah. And so there, there's all kinds of, ideas that, that have been floated around and this and that and AI and using forensic tools and all this stuff cuz we, we want the best version of it. The problem with my dad's footage, is it's eight millimeter digital magnetic tape.

It's not actually film. It's more like what in a cassette tape, to play music from like the eighties. And it's 400 pixels max, something like that. You go to zoom in on it and it blurs out. Now for the time it was convenient technology and it was cool. And you have your little camera and, you pop the tape in and all this stuff.

And you could come home and plug that into your VCR and you could watch it immediately. And it was good for, family videos and it was cool technology. But it's not good technology and you basically can't do anything with it. And Even though it was shot, in 1967, the Patterson Gimlin film, at least it's film.

And film is much easier to work with. And it's much more clear and we can enhance it better. My dad's footage, honestly it may not get a whole lot better. And people have tossed around the AI thing and, why don't use AI to enhance it. And we have this program and that program and this and that and, it's something we're looking into and we've done a little bit with stills not, all the main footage, but with some stills from the footage and other stills as well.

The problem with AI is that AI adds things that aren't there. You're not getting a true representation, of what you're looking at. And right now, that's like the issue that I have with. With AI is, it's going to add things that aren't actually there.

And then, how reliable is that? The one thing I can tell you, as far as the film that has been done or that is being done, is there have been some, measurements taken at deduct recently. And, just trying to really decipher, this is exactly where we think he was standing.

We know where the tree is because, there it is. It's right there. And we know where the stump is and we know how tall they are now and things like that. But there's been some measurements done, really trying to figure out and first and foremost the size of this thing.

How big was she really?

Jeremiah Byron: Fascinating stuff. I, and I think. Another researcher, Jonathan Easley was there at one time with Mike Casey too at Deduct and I think he's got a future video coming out. People wanna make sure that you're subscribed to Western Bigfoot Exploration.

I think Jonathan's gonna get that out eventually, but one last question, Michael, before I let you go. Did your dad ever make any audio recordings? Did he ever have a audio recorder out in the field?

Michael Freeman: He did. Okay. He tried, nothing fancy. We're talking like, cassette tape and a, the player handheld player.

I can tell you it's not in the book. I chose not to use it. In the book I have one potential Sasquatch audio. The problem with it is that it's very staticky. And although you can hear my father talking and him talking about, listen to that, you can't hear it. Gotcha. And that's one of those things that in the future maybe I can try to, have that pulled out a little bit or enhance so we, we can get some type of audio on that.

But I, we didn't do that for this time and it's there, there's not really a whole lot there. Interesting. But, that, that is like the real one instance we have of that we do have some, references of him talking about them, producing vocals and making audio.

And we have some references of him saying that they could mimic other animals and he's heard them try to mimic elk. Bowl, elk and like bugle, like an elk. But even though it sounds like an elk, you can tell if you know what you're listening to, that it's not exactly the same. And that there is a difference there.

And that he thought that they could potentially mimic other things as well. And that fits with some of the modern thinking we have, as well as that they mimic sounds, really well and things like that. But no no super audio, sorry, everybody out there, we have the video.

We don't have a lot of audio recordings. Nothing that's good enough to hang my hat on, at least at the moment. Also interesting, no tree knocking in, in that 15 years of research, oh yeah. And interesting but not interesting, really at the same time you get sometime in the seventies of reference to it.

Bob Titmus makes a reference to it at some point, maybe once, but it's not something that's really talked about until the last, like 20 years. That's true. Or maybe that's true, even newer than that, all of a sudden it's like a thing. My dad never talks about any type of tree knocking no structures either.

Ever found or thought to be found? The only thing my dad ever discovered that, that correlates with that was I believe up on top of it might have been Black Snake Ridge one of those ridges. I'd have to go back and check. But some type of rock formation potentially.

But my dad thought that it was possibly like very old Native American and didn't really equate it with Bigfoot, but there is a reference to it. And at least that's something, that's a possibility. Right there. But I always, when I talk to people, I think it's interesting in this day and age where, it's every time this person A or person B goes out, here's this stick structure, here's, this thing that's built though, and I heard all these wood knocks or whatever, but we have my dad in Bill Lowry and Vance Orchard in West Summerland and Dar Addington and David Bean and all those guys from the Blues for, 20 plus years.

And we don't get a single mention of structures or wood knocking.

Jeremiah Byron: That's so interesting. Wow. Yeah.

Michael Freeman: It's, it's either something you're not paying attention to or it's regional for some reason, or it's, I don't know. It's just, it wasn't part of their research.

Jeremiah Byron: It's been a. Delight, getting a behind the scenes of you being involved and really the first part of your life and being able to talk to about your father. And everyone needs to go out, get a copy of this book. It's worth it. You'll be able to see the video, hear the audio. You need to pick up Freeman, Bigfoot files if you haven't already.

But Michael, if there's anything else that you'd like to, make sure the listeners know at this time, feel free to share that right now.

Michael Freeman: Yeah. If, first of all, if anyone wants to get in contact with me in any way Facebook is a good way. Michael Freeman, pretty accessible on there.

But yeah, before I go, I just, I wanna say that first of all, it's a pleasure speaking with you. It's been a long time coming. I know I called into your show once I think people should, what I would really like to see, and what I'm really trying to promote is just, people do educating themselves and out and looking at evidence and, drawing their own conclusions based on, the education that they've given themselves.

And drawing their own conclusions on, each piece of evidence instead of. Listening to what somebody else thinks about it. And that's great. If you want to read meld m's book or Krantz book or my book or whatever, that's fine. And there's always good information in there.

But, educate yourself outside of that as well. And you take a look at the evidence, and at the end of the day, if you decide that's you don't believe in something that's fine as well because we're all entitled to our own opinions and, everybody has one and we all have the right to that.

It's just, the one thing I grow tired of a little bit is people forming opinions about, my father or myself or my family when they're uneducated on the amount of research that actually went into, his life. So that's just the one thing that I would like to see a little bit more of.

But I think the tide is changing a little bit and Things are starting to, they turn into, we'll see. We'll see what the future brings and if I ever get back out there, and if I do I'll make sure to come on the show and tell you about it.

Jeremiah Byron: Heck yes. We'd love to have you back on for an update in the future and thanks again for coming on

Michael Freeman: Michael. Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate it. It was a fun conversation. I was looking forward to it.