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Creatures, Myths & Legends

Bigfoot was once included in an official US Army atlas of Washington state

By T.K. Randall
January 22, 2025 · Comment icon 38 comments
Bigfoot.
It remains unclear why the cryptid was included in the book. Image Credit: Midjourney
The inclusion of Sasquatch as being part of the state's recognized wildlife has long proven a curiosity.
Back in 1975, the US Army Corps of Engineers published a comprehensive 114-page book entitled The Washington Environmental Atlas which cost $200,000 to produce.

The book took several years to compile and contained detailed information on the wildlife, environment and geography of the region, as well as maps, diagrams, photographs and more.

It contained entries on plants, archaeological sites, rivers, forests and just about anything and everything else that anyone could ever need to know about Washington state.

But there was one addition that continues to raise eyebrows to this day - an inclusion that has sparked a great deal of debate and speculation over the intervening 50 years since the book's release.

In a part of the book about wildlife, the authors had oddly decided to include an entire section all about Bigfoot - treating the cryptozoological creature as though it was a genuine, accepted part of the state's established inhabitants.

While it does acknowledge that the existence of such an animal is disputed, its inclusion in a US Army Corps of Engineers atlas remains a rather baffling peculiarity.
The book makes reference to hair samples being tested in FBI laboratories and claims that no matches could be found to any existing known species.

It also goes on to describe the creature's physical characteristics in great detail, including the size of its feet (as determined from footprint plaster casts) and even its facial features.

It even mentions other similar cryptids sighted in the USSR.

Ultimately, it's not particularly clear why such a serious, expensively-produced and thoroughly-researched publication would include a cryptozoological creature in its guide to native animals.

There is even a cartoon on the same page poking fun at the decision to include it.

You can check out the page from the book below (courtesy of The Black Vault).




Comments (38)




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Recent comments on this story
Comment icon #29 Posted by Nobu 7 days ago
I’ve said it here before…. And I’ll say it again. The History of North American civilization isn’t as archaic and afraid as all of you city people think it is. There exists NOT A SINGLE square 10 meters that has not had human boots on it in North America in the last 300 years. Maaayyyyybbbbeeeee Alaska and north Canada. But there we would be talking a square 100 meters.   look. I promise you there exists no bigfoot today. I actually pity you guys.  I have lived a life of hiking  through the most extreme and remote parts of North America. You know what I’ve always found??? lol othe... [More]
Comment icon #30 Posted by Resume 7 days ago
Apparently you haven't read the posts of "city people" and others who also do not feel there is evidence for the mythical creature known as bigfoot.  And you do come off as condescending because many posters here, myself included, have spent considerable amount ot time in remote locations in NA, and have studied the natural history of NA, including academics in that field.
Comment icon #31 Posted by Trelane 6 days ago
1) Footage provided or released thus far have been overwhelmingly hoaxes while the rest remain as likely misidentifications. 2) Who "told them"? Was it the customer service rep from Bass Pro Shops? Was it someone for the Best Buy "Geek Squad"? I mean seriously Al, I feel you're trolling with this sort of vapid nonsense. 3) Absolutely zero proof of this at all. How can this even be established? Sure, Mountain Gorillas use infrasound. I feel this is a ham fisted/ shoe-horned attribute the pro BF crowd are slapping onto the myth. Again, a wheelbarrow full of garbage. 4) That thought process has b... [More]
Comment icon #32 Posted by Alchopwn 5 days ago
So how do you account for the fact that there have been hundreds of sightings, and large numbers of footprint casts taken, and several hair samples which have shown up as being "unknown", as well as many photos ?  I don't like the chances of being able to take a carcass intact without a bloodbath ensuing.
Comment icon #33 Posted by Resume 5 days ago
So what?  People lie, are mistaken, etc., everyday.. So what?  Has anyone ever in the history of NA linked a footprint to an actual bigfoot foot. Citation, and so what?  "Unknown" does not equal footie. You've been gulled well and true.
Comment icon #34 Posted by Trelane 5 days ago
That is simply false. Here is what a known Bigfoot/Yeti proponent, Bryan Sykes had discovered with multiple samples tested. Alas, nothing of the creature, as described, "Genetic analysis of hair samples attributed to yeti, bigfoot and other anomalous primates" Bryan C Sykes 1,✉, Rhettman A Mullis 2, Christophe Hagenmuller 3, Terry W Melton 4, Michel Sartori 5,6 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4100498/     "back to you Al....."
Comment icon #35 Posted by Alchopwn 5 days ago
But they are correct, far more often than they are wrong, or we would likely all be dead.  I think most people can tell the difference between a bear and an ape for example.
Comment icon #36 Posted by Alchopwn 5 days ago
I suspect they have, and for its own arcane reasons, the Parks and Wildlife service doesn't want the info getting out.  The fact that it is so very difficult to get documents out of them via FOI should be an indicator of how suspiciously they operate. When "unknown" is a hair sample provided by a BF witness, it is a big deal.  You'd think that it would at least show up as a primate. That is what the French Academy said about people who witnessed rocks fall from the sky.  The Academy said "there are no rocks in the sky, ergo, rocks cannot fall from the sky".  This despite hundreds of people... [More]
Comment icon #37 Posted by Resume 4 days ago
Actually being wrong is an evolutionary advantage: Better to be mistaken about the noise in long grass being a lion, than to miss the one that is actually there. Sure, when they're at the zoo.
Comment icon #38 Posted by Resume 4 days ago
I suspect you're wrong.  And, argument from conspiracy. First of all, citation. Where was this "sample" analyzed and by whom? Were the results replicated?  Where were these results published and peer-reviewed?  This is yet another story. This is another so what.  "Rocks" exist.  Meteorites exist and we have many examples of them.  We can point to them and say that there is a meteorite, no matter how it got there. No one has demonstrated they can do that with a footie.  Sure, anyone can tell a story, but no one can show us the goods. A continentally distributed breeding population of 6 t... [More]


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