Searching For Bigfoot: Minnesota August 2006

Another Look in Minnesota

It had been a few weeks since we left our new associates in Deer River Minnesota. Bob and Nancy Olsen. We decided to stop by and see what he had discovered in his home area. Bob had called us and told us about some recent activity around Carey Lake. Carey Lake is a small day use park outside of Grand Rapids Minnesota near the town of Hibbing.

We left Oklahoma around noon on 8/3/2006 and drove straight through to Minnesota. We arrived in Deer River Minnesota about 9:30 in the morning. We got a room at the White Oak Lodge and called Bob. We agreed to meet him at his business at about 3:30 that afternoon to make plans to check out Bob’s latest findings. This way we were able to sleep a few hours prior to going into the field.

We packed up the truck and met Bob at his Business, Olsen Auto Body, at about 4:00. There we met Donald Sherman. Don has joined our team along with Bob. Don is a member of the Ojibwe Indian Tribe, centered on the Leech Lake Reservation here in Minnesota.

The following brief snippet of the history of the Ojibwe was written by Lee Sultzman and is a short section of a detailed history found on his website:

http://www.tolatsga.org/ojib.html

“The Ojibwe were the largest and most powerful Great Lakes tribe; perhaps the most powerful east of the Mississippi; and quite possibly the most powerful in North America. The Lakota (Sioux) and Apache have gotten better press, but it was the Ojibwe who defeated the Iroquois and forced the Sioux to leave Minnesota. Very few Americans realize that the Ojibwe were a major power. Their location was well north of the main flow of settlement, and their victories over native enemies have never received proper credit. A variety of names (Ojibwe, Chippewa, Bungee, Mississauga, and Saulteaux) and division of their population between Canada and United States has masked their true size. In addition, the Ojibwe never fought with Americans after 1815. Even before this, their participation in wars between Britain and France or fighting Americans in the Ohio Valley was fairly limited. Considering the prowess of Ojibwe warriors, this was probably just as well for the Americans. However, this does not mean they have been ignored by government. As the Chippewa, they signed more treaties with the United States than any other tribe ¬ fifty-one! North of the border, the Ojibwe have "touched the pen" more than thirty times with the French, British, and Canadians.“

The team assembled was; Tom Biscardi, his son Tom III, Don Monroe, Tim McMillen , Bob Olsen, Don Sherman, Steve Kulls "The Squatch Detective", and myself JavaBob . Bob Olsen filled us in on the history and happenings around Carey Lake.

It seems that Carey Lake in an area that was once owned by Dupont Chemicals. They used this area for making and storing ammunitions and mortars used during WWI. As best as we could see on the building ruins, it was built in 1919. The area has many abandoned building sites and unused bunkers spread all over. It has since been turned over to the city and is currently used as a day use park. The park is closed at sunset and reopened in the morning. The area is rich is grasslands and wild berries, with a large lake in its center. There are thick wooded areas throughout with wild plum, hazel nut, and oak trees. Clearly, all the ingredients we look for are here. There is shelter in the bunkers, food in the abundant fields and forests, and fresh water from the lake. There would be no harassment for a nocturnal animal here because the area is secure after dusk. There had been stories of sightings in this area for many years and we were anxious to begin our investigation. We began by contacting the Park Ranger, Mike. Mike agreed to come back later that evening, after closing and meet us at the gate. He had agreed to meet us there after hours and let us enter to continue our investigations. We invited him to join us and he agreed to tag along.

One of the standing walls from one of the abandoned buildings around Casey Lake

We began by scouting the area in general. We were able see right away that there are plenty of food items, a large lake for water, lots of tree cover, and many places that could be used for shelter. This area could easily be used as a stop over place for a pod of migrating creatures. We were excited about coming back after dark and seeing what we might find.

Some views of the Casey Lake at sunset

Although difficult to discern in a photo, if you look closely, you can see depressions formed by the folded down grass. It shows steps taken by something large and bipedal.

We finished our preliminary investigation and headed to town for dinner. After we ate, we started back to the park to pick up were we left off, but this time after dark. We met Ranger Mike at the gate as planned and he led us back into the park towards the abandoned bunkers. The ranger opened a pole gate for us and we drove as far back as we could into the back reaches of the park. We parked our rigs and broke out the night equipment. We had night scopes, heat sensors, thermal imager, bionic ears, and strong lights along with our standard gear. We hiked up a small knoll that overlooked a field leading up to a dense wooded area. Tim McMillen set up a bionic ear. Tom Biscardi and I set up an observation spot at the top of the knoll. Mike the Ranger stayed with us. Don Monroe moved down the hill and found a spot to our right and behind the tree line where he could hunker down and sit quietly to listen for anything unusual. Tom III and Steve Kulls headed down the hill and to the right, towards the tree line to see if they could flush anything out. Don Sherman and Bob Olsen headed down the hill and to the left to see if they could intercept anything that Tom III and Steve might flush out. It was too dark for me to see them clearly, so I tried to monitor them with the thermal imager. A thermal imager is a device commonly used by fire fighters for finding people trapped in smoke filled buildings. This unit will show the heat signature of anything that is warm blooded at up to 300 yards. Any warm blooded object will show as a white image on the screen. I used this tool to check on the progress of the team at the bottom of the hill we used as the observation point. What I saw totally amazed me. I shared it with Ranger Mike, who was totally shocked! He saw what I saw, when I saw it and how I saw it! I have placed a drawing of what we saw, below.

The large image in the center of the picture was watching Tom and Steve. As soon as Don and Bob came in from the left, the large image turned towards the tree line and calmly walked into the trees. What ever we saw was much larger than any person I know. Even Mike the Ranger was at a loss to explain what we both saw on the thermal imager screen.

We called the team back in to discuss what we had just seen. Once up the hill, Don Monroe told us that from his position behind the tree line, that he had heard some light rustling followed by some breathing. He wanted to know who had been back there. We explained that no one except him had made it into the trees before we called them back.

We tried several more times to find our elusive friend including “tree knocking” and other forms of communications, but to no avail. After several hours, we decided to call it a night. We still had a long drive to get to our next scheduled destination and were scheduled to be on the Joe Mazza radio show the next evening. We gathered up our gear and reluctantly headed back to the Motel. It was difficult for any of us to sleep. We all knew that we would be back and until then we would continue Searching for Bigfoot!

At our first stop following Minnesota, Tom Biscardi received the following email from the City Manager in Hibbing Minnesota…

“Mr. Biscardi:

I was surprised to hear of your visit to Hibbing on Friday night at 23:00. It was too bad that I was not contacted to meet you personally. One of my employees told me this morning that one of his sons saw a large black animal in a nearby forest which was bi-pedal. He was certain that is was definitely not a black bear. If you are interested in more detailed information on the sighting, please get in touch with me.

Brian J. Redshaw City Administrator City of Hibbing”

We have contacted Mr. Redshaw and are planning our next trip in the near future…