According to the August 20, 1977 issue of the Great Falls Tribune, Fred Wilson and two of his fellow military men had a terrifying encounter with a truly enormous hairy humanoid creature on April 22nd of that same year. When they first saw the creature, it was standing in some bushes seemingly minding its own business - but the men made a very bad decision when they shot at the creature...
A California Colossus[]
A cropped version of an illustration by Franz-Josef73 on DeviantArt
Sycamore Flats Campground is to be found in Big Rock Canyon of the San Gabriel Mountains just above Los Angeles - and in 1977 it would become the site of a brief but harrowing encounter with what can only be described as a giant. Staff Sergeant Fred Wilson and two of his friends were driving through the campsite in their pickup truck when they became aware of a 15.5ft humanoid stood in some nearby bushes. It was described as having tan-coloured hair and as seemingly lacking a neck. It had an oblong-shaped head, a flat nose and notable canine teeth.
Likely alarmed by this highly unusual sight, the men's military training presumably quickly kicked in - and they were driven to shoot at the ape-like anomaly stood upright in the foliage. In doing this, they caught the creature's attention - an action that they would probably come to regret extremely quickly. The monster suddenly darted out from the bushes and flailed its hairy arms at the men as it ran towards them. Slamming a foot down on the gas pedal, the terrified witnesses sped away from the scene as quickly as possible, and the creature apparently chased after them for about 20 seconds before giving up and once again fading away into the foliage - turning off suddenly and heading into a canyon, with its head brushing up against a 12ft high treebranch.
Once they got back to civilisation, the stricken men reported their sighting to the sheriff of the nearby city of Lancaster. Presumably now accompanied by the police, the witnesses returned to the site of the event and were able to find footprints seemingly belonging to the monster. Interestingly enough, they were described as having three toes as opposed to the normal five expected of a Bigfoot creature. Plaster casts were apparently taken of these prints. Professional Bigfoot hunters soon descended on the area - with all manner of people speculating about what the monster could be and where it could've come from. One such hunter by the name of Margaret Bailey alleges that she saw an enormous figure illuminated by the moonlight one night in Sycamore Flats, and something is said to have left 21-inch tracks in South Fork Campground, which seemingly provided evidence for the existence of a monster with a 12ft stride.
Writing for the website Frogstorm, Josh Troy points out that Sycamore Flats has something of a history of paranormal activity - with UFOs been seen over the area and mechanical noises apparently having been heard coming from underground - which reminds me of Skinwalker Ranch.
A Sasquatch-Sized Headache of Sources[]
Trying to figure out where (and to whom) this happened has given me a headache likely hefty enough to fell the monster involved in the case. There seem to be at least two distinct versions of this event. The descriptions of the actual sequence of events are almost identical, save for the fact that this alternate version (listed in Janet and Colin Bord's Bigfoot Casebook) supposedly takes place in Belt Creek Canyon, Montana as opposed to in Sycamore Flats, California. This would arguably make more sense - seeing as the source was a Montana newspaper. Then again, the Californian version seems not to have been in error judging by the context in which it was presented in the sources. It is also sometimes said to have been experienced by an unnamed group of young men as opposed to Sergeant Fred Wilson and his friends.
The details of the monster itself also seem to get foggier the more one looks into this happening. George Eberhart provided the description of the creature as having an oblong head, flat nose and large canine teeth - while some other sources have disputed the height of the entity. Weird California by Greg Bishop contains an assertion that the monster was 11ft tall, and according to Sasquatch Chronicles blog, some authors have erroneously reported the entity as only standing a meagre 8ft instead.
I think that I might conclude that the Belt Creek Canyon incident and the one that took place at Sycamore Flats were actually different events which have been conflated - because otherwise I see no reason for there to be so much detail about the Sycamore sightings (provided here) and for the 'original' report of this panic to have been published in a Montana newspaper. Separating the incidents would also allow for Fred Wilson's sighting and that of the mystery youngsters to exist independently, which probably makes the most sense. It's just distinctly odd how the details of these two events are effectively identical, and yet it seems as if they must've been two distinct happenings.