Review - The Locals

The Locals: A Contemporary Investigation of the Bigfoot/Sasquatch Phenomenon by Thom Powell. Another book reviewed by The Fortean Times that I wanted to check out, especially since I live in the Seattle area, which is near enough to the heart of bigfoot activity to keep me interested in the topic. And, overall, it's a very well written book with some slight flaws that make it difficult to accept completely.

The first thing that struck me as I started reading this book was the similarities between ghost hunting and bigfoot hunting. Folks tend to not believe in bigfoots or in ghosts until they've had an experience, then they are often convinced. Also, both subjects tend to be really difficult to gather proof for, putting them on the fringes of science, which is more concerned with repeatable evidence. On the science front, I really like how Powell has put together lesson plans for science classes using bigfoot to teach the scientific method (the conclusion, according to the scientific method, is that bigfoots either don't exist, or that we simply don't have enough evidence to prove it).

I also liked how he described the witnesses he'd spoken to who called in bigfoot sightings. I've always figured that I could never be a credible witness, because I have a vivid imagination and an interest in the paranormal. Plus, I've had experiences with ghosts, and I've seen a UFO (which was seen by quite a few people besides me that night and was later identified as a satellite burning up in the atmosphere). While I still think I'd never make a credible witness, I suspect that if I ever did have a real sighting, the folks at BFRO would accept it. As an aside, I'll just point out here that it's really really unlikely for me to have a sighting as I tend to stay in urban or suburban areas that are well-populated and far away from major greenbelts, and I don't go camping often at all.

Unlike other bigfoot books I've read (including Bigfoot! by Loren Coleman), this book sticks mostly to recent sightings and stories. While Powell doesn't neglect the historical aspect, he's more concerned with giving a big picture of the nature of the bigfoot species today, and how people should be reacting to them. The picture he paints is remarkably comforting. Some really general conclusions I took away from the book: bigfoot species tend to travel in groups, not alone; most people who have a bigfoot "sighting" never actually see a bigfoot; bigfoots tend to avoid hurting humans whenever possible, but will use intimidation to scare unwanted humans away; bigfoots are smart enough to figure out when humans are trying to observe them, and will get irritated by guns or cameras; bigfoots know that humans have good food, and have no problem taking it from humans if they can without being seen; if you have bigfoots in the area, you likely don't have other large predators, and that's a good thing.

Powell also answers a question I've had about bigfoot research for a few years now. Not too long ago there was a huge media buzz when it was reported that researchers had found an imprint of a bigfoot body and made a cast of it. While the reporters were pretty dismissive of this possible breakthrough, I was curious. But I never heard anything more about the Skookum cast, and eventually I presumed it had turned out to be something else. Well, Powell was present when the cast was made, and his explanation of how it came to be made me more convinced than ever that the cast was probably genuine. In any case, I now know the hows and whys of the incident, which is more than I got from the media reporting it at the time.

Now come the troubling bits of the book. There are four problems that Powell tackles, and each one undermines his premise just a little. The first is the intelligence he ascribes to bigfoots. Among other things, he makes it clear that he thinks they know what cameras are for. While this alone isn't a book-breaker, at times he seems to be putting the intelligence level of bigfoots into the supernatural realm. And that's the second problem. The BFRO has had a number of sightings that involved slightly supernatural aspects, particularly the ability of bigfoots to vanish into thin air. He includes those in a chapter and speculates on the possibilities that they might have dimension-bending powers. It's cringe-worthy if you want to think of bigfoot as an undiscovered primate, which is the way I lean, but again, not book-breaking on its own. The third problem is the old UFO chestnut. Again, he devotes a chapter to this aspect and is very sober and logical in how he addresses the issue, but it still makes me cringe inside. The last problem is his worries about a government coverup. I won't say much more about this except his evidence is really shaky, but he clearly knows and accepts that. Still, it's enough to make you roll your eyes and start to dismiss the rest of the book, which would be a shame because overall it's a good book.

So, for the most part, I'd call this a pretty solid book about an interesting topic. This is a must-read if you have had a bigfoot experience yourself, and probably good to read if you live in a rural enough area. And if you are a teacher looking for a good lesson plan to teach the scientific method, you gotta get this book.