YEAR: 1973

SEASON: Fall

STATE: Mississippi

COUNTY: Jackson County

LOCATION DETAILS: South of town, near the gulf about half mile from the ocean.

NEAREST TOWN: Ocean Springs

NEAREST ROAD: Don't remember

OBSERVED: This is the second report I have submitted. The first was of screams in Arizona where I am living now. This one took place in Jackson County Mississippi in 1973. My father was living in Ocean Springs and working for Littons Ship Systems in Pascagoula. I had joined him there from Arizona when I decided to try my hand at pipefitting instead of Mining. I had bought an acre of land and put a trailer house on it before I had my wife join me. We were on the south side of town in an area of bayous.

One night we were at my Dads place playing dominoes when we ran out of diapers for my baby daughter. It was only about a half mile from Dads to my house, so the wife and I jumped in the pick-up and went to the house for more diapers.

I had two Red Bone hounds penned in the back of the house and when we got there they were barking as if they had something treed. I was curious as to what they were barking at, as they seldom barked while penned. When I got out of the truck, I noticed a rancid smell coming from the back of the house. I ask my wife what she had given the hounds and she said nothing that smelled that bad. I left the truck running and we went into the house and gathered the new diapers then back to the truck and left. We didn't give it anymore thought that night. I didn't pay much attention when we got back home later, but didn't remember smelling anything then.

The next night we were back at my Dads playing dominoes again, and listening to the news from the TV. We heard a report from Pas Christian that a woman had called the police and reported a hairy ape looking man outside her backyard, looking in her kitchen window. She said it was looking over her back fence, which was six foot tall, and she could see it's head and shoulders above the fence. Also, the kicker was that it was accompanied by a rancid smell like rotting meat. The same smell I encountered around my house the night before. Wow, was that weird. I looked around the next morning, but couldn't find any tracks or anything around the house. And there was no smell of rotting meat to be detected. I think we had a close encounter.

ALSO NOTICED: The rotting meat smell that was not there when we returned.

OTHER WITNESSES: My X-wife and I.

OTHER STORIES: Nothing prior to that, and only the TV news after the encounter.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: Very dark night around 10:00 PM Light fog.

ENVIRONMENT: Swampy with heavy woods and bayous.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Richard Hucklebridge:

In summary: The reason that I have made this report a class B report is the fact that what Ron and his ex-wife smelled was substantiated by a report, on a local television station the following night, of a possible bigfoot sighting which included a similar smell.

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