YEAR: 1980

SEASON: Summer

MONTH: June

DATE: 30

STATE: Florida

COUNTY: Lake County

LOCATION DETAILS: Northwest of Alexander Springs about 5 miles.Its a pretty Dense area of woods and swamp.

NEAREST TOWN: Pittman

NEAREST ROAD: Hwy 19

OBSERVED: At the time, I lived in Umatilla, Florida.I used to work on CB radios and such and occasinally a deputy would stop by my little shop at my house and we would shoot the bull. One nite a deputy stopped and said they had a Bigfoot sighting in the Ocala National forest, and being the curious type, I asked where and he told me. The next morning 6/30/1980, I got a friend of mine and decided to go and see if we could find the prints. We stopped at the hardware store and I bought, some plaster of paris. Already had the buckets in the Jeep. When we arrived we could see where casts had previously been taken, we decided to look further. So, we drove further thru the woods and had to cross a pretty deep creek to get to the other side, where the road continued, if you want to call it a road. I stopped the jeep and we got out to look around and LOW AND BEHOLD, there were prints coming from a clear cut area (where trees have been cut down and removed), across the sandy road and leading into the swamp. It had stopped at the edge of the road and must have eaten bay tree blossoms because up about 10 to 12 feet in the tree you could see where it took the blossoms and there were pieces of the blossoms on the ground. The prints were about 4 to 5 feet apart when it walked, and about 1 to 2 inches deep. As I walked or tried to walk in its stride, it was a stretch for me as I'm a pretty big man myself, 6ft.3in. I actually put my foot in its prints as i walked deeper into the swamp. The further I got the deeper the prints went into the ground and my foot and leg went all the way to my groin area, this thing was BIG. I took 2 casts and gave one to my buddy and I kept one, which I still have.There is NO DOUBT IN MY MIND after seeing what I saw and casting the prints that this DOES EXIST.

ALSO NOTICED: Just that we had an errie feeling, that something was watching us.

OTHER WITNESSES: 2, We had Just had breakfast

OTHER STORIES: Yes, quite often. I have talked to people that have sworn they have seen it, that live in that area. I believe that it is still hanging around there because hunters see prints all the time. I'm sure I could go right now and get more casts. I have pictures of the casts also.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: 10:00AM
Clear and sunny

ENVIRONMENT: Wooded area swampy

Follow-up investigation report:

After speaking with the witness, I have no doubt he is very credible.

When asked what the deputy had told him specifically, he replied that a county employee, who was operating a road grader, witnessed a large, bipedal creature step from the woods onto the road he was grading. At first, he thought it might be a bear, however, as he got closer to the creature, he realized it wasn't a bear. At that point he became so frightened he backed the grader to where his car was parked, got into his car and left. He called the police and reported the incident once he got to a phone.

The police went to the location and upon arriving at the grader, found many large footprints around the grader as well as handprints on the cab and body of it.

UPDATE: We were lucky enough to have this witness bring his cast and share his story at a Florida Expedition. For photos of this cast, see the Expedition notes for Florida Expedition 2006.

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