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May 29--SAN ANTONIO -- Sure, there's the Bigfoot conference in the East Texas town of Jefferson each October, and that's where a permanent Bigfoot museum is envisioned.
But here at the University of Texas at San Antonio's Institute of Texan Cultures, an exhibit and lecture series called "Bigfoot in Texas?" is lending long-sought credibility to a scientific inquiry that has struggled to gain academic respect.
Viewed by many scholars as a figment of folklore, for others Bigfoot is an elusive creature hiding in the damp woods of East Texas, where scores of sightings have been logged over the years.
Giant footprint casts, photographs, videos and other artifacts are offered as evidence in the exhibit, which opened April 8 and ends July 30. Items and information including eyewitness accounts were provided by the Texas Bigfoot Research Center and other private investigators who pounced on the institute's invitation to assemble the displays.
Experts say the exhibit is the first backed by a university since a 1978 conference in Canada. The institute's Bigfoot project director, Willie Mendez, said he got the idea last year as he pondered what to do next after a highly popular event on dinosaurs.
"I love what I do and I want to keep these doors open," he said. "I thought, 'What else is out there that would attract people to come in?' "
He conferred with UTSA and other academics before enlisting the Dallas-based research center, with its extensive archives and 50 volunteers with assorted expertise.
"These guys have some incredible investigators with them -- wildlife biologists, DPS officers. They're doing a really good job," Mendez said.
Yet, the institute asserts strict neutrality on the issue of Bigfoot's existence, as suggested by the question mark in the exhibit's title.
"We don't take any stance on it at all. The way the exhibit is set up is -- you decide. We present the pros and cons and at the end of the exhibit, we ask you whether you believe. So far the vote has been 2-1 'yes,' " Mendez said.
Many area schools requested group tours, and the kids "love it," he said.
For those wishing to delve deeper, lectures have been given by some of the nation's best known Bigfoot researchers, including primate fingerprint expert Jimmy Chilcutt of Conroe and Idaho State University anatomist Jeff Meldrum, who analyzes large primate prints.
Meldrum praised the institute for "going where few have ventured before in providing us a serious venue for this type of presentation." He said Bigfoot research is gaining credibility as more investigators and new technologies are deployed and events such as the one here are staged around the U.S.
"It used to be if you went to a bookstore and asked for a book about Bigfoot, you would be directed to the occult section between 'Bermuda Triangle' and 'Crop Circles.' Now you can actually find books about Bigfoot in the natural history section," Meldrum said.
Mendez said Meldrum is among a limited number of Bigfoot researchers in academia who operate with their universities' approval and, even rarer, financial support.
"There are some credible people sticking their necks out to say that this creature does exist," Mendez said, "but there have been other professors that have been told by the universities, 'No, we don't want you to talk about this.' "
As an employee of a plumbing company in Dallas, Craig Woolheater freely pursues his passion to prove Bigfoot's existence, which he has accepted as fact since 1994, when he and his wife claimed they saw one while driving through Louisiana. His interest had been piqued earlier as a youth during the spate of "Lake Worth Monster" sightings in Tarrant County in 1969.
Now Woolheater is co-founder and director of the Texas Bigfoot Research Center, whose confab in Jefferson the third week of October will be its sixth annual event. He, too, is buoyed by the interest in Bigfoot generated by the ITC exhibit.
"It represents the latest and most significant university-related effort to present a serious scientific treatment of this subject," Woolheater said.
In his opinion, among the best evidence on display are replicas of a large body cast made in 2000 in Washington state. The "Skookum Cast" was co-discovered by Rick Noll of Seattle, who gave a presentation on the find here on May 6.
"It has been looked at by leading primatologists and they feel that it shows signs of some kind of primate that laid down in the mud to grab the fruit. People with large credentials have looked at that and found it compelling," Woolheater said.
Native American accounts of Bigfoot also are referenced, along with many tribal names for Bigfoot, such as Sasquatch, Wildman, Tall Man, Stone Giant, Night People and Evil God of the Woods.
"All these tribes had names for what they considered a tribe of hairy giants that lived in the forests," Woolheater said.
It won't be long before another academic institution gives Bigfoot a full hearing. In June, Idaho State has a "Bigfoot Rendezvous" to present findings from a dozen experts, including Noll and Meldrum.
For more information: www.texancultures.utsa.edu
www.texasbigfoot.com
john.gonzalez@chron.com
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Copyright (c) 2006, Houston Chronicle
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