Page 75 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - September 2021

Trickster Created Bigfoot, Family Says 75

Trickster Created Bigfoot,

Family Says

Seattle Times

Bigfoot is dead. Really.

``Ray L. Wallace was Bigfoot. The reality is,
Bigfoot just died,' said Michael Wallace about
his father, who died of heart failure Nov. 26. He
was 84.The truth can finally be told, according
to Ray Wallace's family members. He
orchestrated the prank that created Bigfoot in
1958.

Some experts suspected Wallace had planted the
footprints that launched the term ``Bigfoot.' But
Wallace and his family had never publicly
admitted the 1958 deed until now.
a Bigfoot sitting peaceably with other animals, ``These rumors have been circulating for some
``The fact is there was no Bigfoot in popular said Chorvinsky, who received several hundred time,' said Jeff Meldrum, an associate professor
consciousness before 1958. America got its own pages of correspondence from Wallace. of anatomy and anthropology at Idaho State
monster, its own Abominable Snowman thanks University.
to Ray Wallace,' said Mark Chorvinsky, editor of But Wallace's chief contributions to bigfootery
Strange magazine and one of the leading were films and photos he supposedly captured of Meldrum said he has casts of 40 to 50 footprints
proponents of the theory that Wallace fathered the creature in the wild. There were depictions that he concludes, from their anatomical
Bigfoot. of Bigfeet eating elk and frogs, of a Bigfoot features, come from authentic unknown
sitting on a log and of a Bigfoot munching on primates.
Pranks and hoaxes were just part of Wallace's cereal.
nature. ``To suggest all these are explained by simple
``Ray's contribution was study into the actual carved feet strapped to boots just doesn't wash,'
``He'd been a kid all his life. He did it just for the behavior of Bigfoot, what it eats, how it acts,' he said. Even if the family's claims are true,
joke and then he was afraid to tell anybody said Ray Crowe, director of the International Meldrum added, there are historical accounts of
because they'd be so mad at him,' said nephew Bigfoot Society in Hillsboro, Ore. Bigfootlike creatures going back to the 1800s.
Dale Lee Wallace, who said he has the ``How do you account for that?'
alderwood carvings of the giant humanoid feet Chorvinsky believes the Wallace family's
that gave life to a worldwide phenomenon. admission creates profound doubts about It's easy, replied Chorvinsky; the historical
leading evidence of Bigfoot's existence: the so- accounts were mistakes, myths or hoaxes. ``I
It was in August 1958 in Humboldt County, called Patterson film, the grainy celluloid would like to see the evidence beyond the
Calif., that Jerry Crew, a bulldozer operator for images of an erect apelike creature striding away anecdotal. Jeff Meldrum's job is show us the
Wallace Construction, saw prints of huge naked from the movie camera of rodeo rider Roger beef, something beyond old newspaper articles.'
feet circling and walking away from his rig. Patterson in 1967. Wallace said he told Patterson
where to go - near Bluff Creek, Calif. - to spot a As for Meldrum's claim about authentic
The Humboldt Times in Eureka, Calif., ran a Bigfoot, Chorvinsky said. footprints, Chorvinsky said: ``Jeff Meldrum is
front-page story on the prints and coined the not an expert in creating hoaxes. I was a
term ``Bigfoot.' ``Ray told me that the Patterson film was a hoax, professional magician and special-effects film
and he knew who was in the suit,' Chorvinsky director; anything can be faked.'
According to family members, Wallace smirked. said.
He had asked a friend to carve the 16-inch-long Michael Wallace said family members knew
feet. Then he and his brother Wilbur had slipped Michael Wallace said his father called the about his father's hoax but never let on.
them on and created the footprints as a prank, Patterson film ``a fake' and said he had nothing
family members said. to do with it. But he said his mother admitted she ``The family just sat back and grinned,' he said.
had been photographed in a Bigfoot suit. ``He ``He didn't mean to hurt anyone.'
His joke soon swept the country, which was had several people he used in his movies,'
fascinated by rumors of Himalayan Abominable Michael Wallace said. To them, it was just another one of his jokes.
Snowmen in the 1950s, Chorvinsky said. Like the time he dropped a firecracker down the
Wallace never received proper credit in the chimney of a bunkhouse while loggers played
``The Abominable Snowman was appropriated Bigfoot community, Chorvinsky said. ``He got it cards inside. Or the time he convinced his crew
by Ray Wallace. It got into the press, took on a off the ground, and he kept getting glossed over. that wild cats with bushy tails were living in
life of its own and next thing you know there's a He's been consistently marginalized or ignored forest treetops. []
Bigfoot, one of the most popular monsters in the by authors,' Chorvinsky said.
world,' he said.
Why? ``Because it hurts the case for Bigfoot if TO LISTEN TO
Wallace continued to milk. He offered to sell a you talk too much about Ray Wallace,' he THE ‘X’ ZONE
Bigfoot to Texas millionaire Tom Slick and then replied.
backed out when Slick made a serious bid. CONSPIRACY
Wallace later put out a press release saying he The Wallace family's revelation does not faze FILES
wanted to buy a baby Bigfoot for $1 million, some Bigfoot experts, and the debate about
said Loren Coleman, who has written two books Bigfoot's existence rages on. VISIT
about Bigfoot. Wallace also cut a record of XZONEUNIVERESE.COM
supposed Bigfoot sounds and printed posters of