After finalizing Hacking Bigfoot, I have a bunch of info that did not make it into the book.
“We all make mistakes, and it’s been said that a mistake isn’t a mistake unless we refuse to correct it. There are several people who owe an apology to John W. Green, Bob Gimlin, and anyone else they wrongly implicated in this most ridiculous tale.” (1) — The late Bill Miller, Sasquatch researcher B.C Canada
The reason the world of Bigfoot knows about David Paulides is because he has the unique distinction of being fired from a job for asking for Lionel Richie’s autograph. (2) It’s true. Not even Quentin Tarantino would have come up with such an unusual plot device.
There’s no shame in losing a job for whatever reasons but if Lionel Richie is also involved, that is a world-class exit!
Today, every time I see Dave at a Bigfoot conference, I want to grab his microphone and sing (badly) “Hello…” but I don’t want to rub it in. We all make mistakes. Would anyone in the audience get the reference anyway? I wonder.
After he left law enforcement, Dave’s luck changed when he met Wally Hersom, a millionaire who just couldn’t help himself from throwing money at Bigfoot ventures in the late 90s. Wally put Dave on a payroll as a Bigfoot investigator and may even still be enabling him.
Wally was obsessed with the search for Bigfoot. Wally is a decent guy, or so his reputation suggests, but he did not use good judgment on how his money would be spent when he invested in David Paulides.
Things started off okay as Dave proceeded to spend time in the field, cranking out a few worthwhile books in the process. He even created a North American Bigfoot Search group and blogged for a few years.
However, after acquiring the late Ray Crowe’s entire collection of Bigfoot ephemera, Dave haphazardly claimed a 16mm film in the collection was an original unedited copy of the Patterson-Gimlin Film with additional footage. In reality, the film was simply a promotional film edited together by the late René Dahinden, an old school Bigfoot investigator.
Dave was seeing things that were not there. To him, a new conspiracy was afoot (3) as he expressed in an email to the late Al Hodgson, which Al inadvertently shared with the internet (4).
“I actually got my hands on a fairly old copy of the PG film, full framed with segments on it nobody has seen. It’s in the expert’s hands and many of our impressions of what actually occurred is playing out. I actually believe that John Green and Gimlin are harboring a very, very dark secret, really.”
Dave handed the film off to another individual involved in Bigfootery, MK Davis. MK’s a guy who basically manipulates film and digital footage and then somehow thinks he’s revealing secret, hidden truths.
MK transformed René’s mundane film into a “Bluff Creek Massacre” that became a viral sensation, appealing to other individuals who actually believe that film represents Bigfoot killings. There’s too much detail for a full debunk here. I wrote about it in Hacking Bigfoot and will post the full chapter eventually, somewhere.
Next, Paulides burned through at least half a million USD of Wally’s funding of the faceplant of the Sasquatch Genome Project.
By far, the SGP was the worst faux science ever done in Bigfootery. For 500k spent, the SGP produced a ridiculously inept “scientific” paper, which attempted to demonstrate Bigfoot’s genetic origins.
Amazingly, both the Sasquatch Genome Project and the Bluff Creek Massacre endure in Bigfoot mythology. By way of funding from Wally Hersom, David Paulides has had a budget to generate implausible scenarios which have damaged the credibility of Bigfootery.
Think about that. Bigfoot doesn’t have any credibility as a subject, and David Paulides has managed to take it to an even lower level.
At a MUFON meeting in 2013, he answered a question from the audience regarding a personal experience he allegedly had with a Bigfoot. (5) I strongly suspect that he lifted parts of that experience from one of the Bigfoot Bulletins he likely found in the late Ray Crowe’s collection. (6) In the 1970s, Bigfoot investigator Ben Ford, a logger in upper Northern California, claimed to have been face to face with a Bigfoot from around 60-70 yards for about a minute or so during which the Bigfoot mimicked his actions. It was big news during the 1970s among Bigfooters.
In the 2013 MUFON clip, Paulides claimed he experienced mimicking in a similarly described manner. (7) In my view, it seems too much of a coincidence that he acquired access to the details of that particular Ben Ford story around the same general time that he adopted parts of it in his apparently spontaneous personal story.
Dave is on a regular rotation of controversial people who receive notoriety on social media and wayward prattling on Coast to Coast AM broadcasts. Dave’s controversy isn’t just about Lionel Richie. He was the kind of cop who sported a pornstache (still does actually) and jack boots. (8) So, controversy can always be expected when he is involved in something. He should be more proactive in using that as a marketing tactic.
References
- A posting by the late Bill Miller, “The Massacre at Bluff Creek…just when you think you’ve heard it all!” re-posted in Thomas Steenburg’s blog: “Here We Go Again – Part Two.” January 2019.
- San Jose Assistant District Attorney Karyn Sinunu quoted in “David Paulides S.J. Officer Accused of False Solicitation Autographs: A Force Veteran Allegedly Used City Stationary to request memorabilia” by Sandra Gonzales, San Jose Mercury News, December 21, 1996.
- David Paulides on Coast to Coast AM radio, March 25, 2012.
- A posting by the late Bill Miller, a Sasquatch researcher, on the Sasquatch-British Columbia website forum, October 2009.
- David Paulides, guest speaker at a Los Angeles Area Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) event in Studio City, California, U.S. Feb 19, 2013.
- Bigfoot Bulletin #21. Oakland, California, September 30, 1970.
- “Bigfoot Expert Discusses his Sighting at MUFON Meeting” by Mike Szymanski, patch.com, Feb 20, 2013
- “G/Men in action.” by Tom Rogers. Bay Area Reporter, April 28th, 1983.