Matthew Heines podcast

If You Haven’t Heard of Bigfoot in Alaska

If you haven’t heard of Bigfoot in Alaska, you haven’t heard of Abandoned: The Port Chatham Hairy Man Accounts.

First, when author and Bigfoot researcher Beans Baxter and Stephen T. Major of Extreme Expeditions Northwest agreed to sit down for an interview, it wasn’t intended to end up as a blog.

Originally, the interview was meant to be a podcast and YouTube video. Sometimes, if the subject is interesting enough, I may even write a blog about it and post it on my Encounters USA website.

In this case however, it was more through my own technical ineptitude that Beans Baxter and Stephen T. Major ended up on the famous Encounters USA Blog! and not a podcast or video.

The sad fact is, in an effort to squeeze a better sound out of my microphone, I turned up the gain on my amplifier. When I checked the Zoom meter everything was green. As I lowered the gain, it turned red. I turned it up until I got green again. It turned out that was a bad idea.

There Were Clues

The first thing Stephen T. Major said when we started talking was he was going to buy me a new microphone. That started a whole new conversation about the fact I am, indeed getting a new microphone!

This revelation in turn led me to lament the fact the Shure MV7 Microphone is so popular it’s on back order and has been for some time. 

None of this is really relevant except that it explains why I didn’t pay attention to the sound coming from my microphone.

To make a short story long, we ended up recording for over an hour. It was some of the most thought provoking, mind blowing, cosmically expanding dialogue in the history of oral communication. 

Unfortunately, for the sake of my listeners and viewers, I couldn’t use any of it. Well, I could but the hate mail and comments would be overwhelming. Not exactly conducive to people relaxing and listening to a really good podcast.

What Blogs Are For

It was this exact situation that led to the epiphany: blogs were created by those and for those who don’t do videos or podcasts. 

Indeed, I have already spent most of the blog telling you about my microphone issues and the fact I am getting a new microphone hopefully soon.

So now, let me tell you a little about Larry “Beans” Baxter and Stephen T. Major.

Better, let me start off by telling you what I knew about Larry “Beans” Baxter and Stephen T. Major before the interview.

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That’s it. I knew Stephen was going to be debuting his new Sullivan Creek Encounters movie at the Metaline Falls Bigfoot Festival.

I also knew he and his father had encountered a Sasquatch in British Columbia in 1979.

Beans Baxter

What did I know about Beans Baxter? Before the interview, I only knew his name, and I got that wrong. 

When I asked Stephen to do the interview initially, I ended up pretty much begging. After he agreed, he informed me Beans Baxter of Homer, Alaska would also be attending. 

As the interview began, we started off with a couple of stabs at Stephen’s Canadian nationality and quickly shifted to the conversation to Beans. 

Author on the Panhandle

It was just a few sentences into our conversation that Beans Baxter informed me he is a budding Jack London. Beans isn’t writing about a sled dog named Buck. 

Instead, Larry Beans Baxter is writing about the history and horror of the abandoned town of Port Chatham, Alaska in his book titled Abandoned: The History and Horror of Port Chatham, Alaska.

And so, slowly did I learn the fabulous things these two Bigfoot bloodhounds these Hairy Man Habitators and these Sasquatch Sleuths have been about.

The Hairy Man in Native Lore

I have always been curious as to how far the Sasquatch communities reached into the Alaskan Panhandle, although I never thought they would go beyond.

My line of questioning developed regarding the differences in how the natives spoke of the Sasquatch and what qualities did they ascribe to it.

Between Bean’s fascinating revelations and Stephen T. Major’s long winded, sometimes tortuous pontifications regarding the nature of the Northwest Sasquatch or his often less-than-interesting exploits, we began to develop a picture of the Alaska Sasquatch. 

Sasquatch Diversity

That picture was somewhat different from the Alaska Sasquatch Stephen T. Major encountered off the coast of Vancouver Island.

Unlike a brown or dark color, Baxter and Major spoke of a sighting of a grey colored hominid. It was thin and muscular, “like a runner” Stephen Major said.

The two estimated its height at around 7 to 8 feet.

In contrast, the Northwest Coast Sasquatch has been reported up to 15 feet. The Northwest Coast Sasquatch is generally darker in color.

Stephen Major attributes the availability of resources to the diversity in the sightings.

Could adaptation play a role? Does the ability to move in a snow covered region dictate a gray as opposed to a dark coat of hair?

Could it have been an older specimen?

And so, through a process of discovery, I learned of a documentary called In Search of the Port Chatham Hairy Man.

Master Baiter

The documentary features Beans Baxter, Stephen T. Major and a pair of researchers who Stephen T. Major was most likely using as bait to lure in the Bigfoot. 

During the Bigfoot encounter, we must wonder if it was Major’s idea to get photographic evidence of the horrific beating or kidnapping of the two younger researchers as proof.

Did Stephen T. Major then plan to use that footage as evidence that Bigfoot does exist?

Fortunately, Stephen didn’t get that footage, but in a way, he got more.

Stephen T. Major and Beans Baxter will return next week for the YouTube video and Podcast interview that will knock your knickers and shorten your shorts.

Until then, 

Always 

Watch Your Back!