BIGFOOT EXPOSED: by Dr. David J. Daegling, Ph.D.,
                  An anthropologist examines America's enduring legend... 

There are parts of it that are worth reading, but mostly peripheral to the main issue. The book cover appears to promise skilled dissection by a qualified scientist that disposes of all evidence that sasquatch are real animals, but in that regard the book contains nothing at all.

Leaving out "could be" material like old newspaper stories, Indian traditions,  unidentified sounds, smells and hair, mysteriously thrown rocks, and so on, there are three lines of evidence that Dr. Daegling has to explain away: hundreds of casts and photos of footprints; thousands of eye-witness accounts, and one remarkable movie.

As to the footprints, Dr. Daegling has read about them, but there is no indication that he has studied them. Since he is sure that there can be no such animal and that the footprints can easily be faked, he has seen no need to, even when he planned to write about them in a book. What has been reported by the people who actually have investigated such footprints has to be mistaken, because if it were correct the likes of Ray Wallace and Rant Mullens could not have made them, and they have "revealed" that they did. 

Eye witnesses? Dr.Daegling goes on at length about the fallibility of human memory.

A lot of truth in that, but if its memories were as completely useless as he suggests the human species could never have survived, let alone written books. He has read the stories of some witnesses, but since there is no such animal and memories are so fallible he has seen no need to talk to any, even when he planned to write a book dismissing all of them as dupes and liars and hallucinators.

Paradoxically, one witness who happened to be a friend of his does seem to have made quite an impression on him, even though hers was a partial on-a-dark-road sighting. He stresses that this lone interview happened to him "not by design," and considering his reaction it seems likely that avoiding talking to people with clear and detailed sightings to describe was absolutely necessary for him to be able to write his book.

It is different regarding the Patterson movie. He has indeed spent time and sought  assistance in studying that. Not to prove that it is a hoax, which isn't necessary since there is no such animal, just to try to disprove evidence that what it shows can't be a man in a suit.

Throughout the book there are enough factual errors and ill-founded assumptions to thoroughly mislead anyone who has no other source of information on this subject, but since such a person would not be likely to see this review it hardly seems worthwhile to deal with them here. 

John Green
Harrison Hot Springs, B.C. Canada
December 23, 2004
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