YEAR: 2024

SEASON: Fall

DATE: Nov 8th 2024

STATE: Nebraska

COUNTY: Douglas County

LOCATION DETAILS: 6th street and Martha, near Lauritzen Gardens

[Investigator (MM) Notes:

GPS coordinates for where the creature walked between structures:

41.237966, -95.923810 ]

NEAREST TOWN: Omaha

NEAREST ROAD: 6th and Martha

OBSERVED: On the 8th of November 2024, I was in backyard in the driveway of my ex-wife's house. I was standing beside my truck putting away some tools as we were talking. I don't know what made me turn and look up the driveway, as I did I saw a tall (large) hairy figure walking behind a duplex behind the garage.

This space between the building is approximately 20-25 feet. I only saw this figure for a few seconds. I turned to my ex-wife and said, "Did I just see what I thought I saw?" She asked "What did you see?" I said I believe I saw a Bigfoot. Her response was, "You finally saw it!" She meant that she has had several encounters with this thing over the years.

I walked across the street to where it was headed [into Lauritzen Gardens] in hopes to see it walking in the woods. I stood in an area where I could see where it might have went. I listened and looked for several minutes but I didn't hear or see anything else. I left knowing that I saw something and just left it at that.

About 4 hours later my ex-wife called and said there are two roofers working behind her house. My daughter's boyfriend who is hispanic heard them talking in Spanish. They were saying that they just saw a monster. This confirmed to me that I really did see one.

This area has had many sighting throughout the years. Several people have seen it like my ex-wife, my daughter, my sister, and now me.

OTHER WITNESSES: No

OTHER STORIES: Yes Ex-wife, Daughter, and Sister

TIME AND CONDITIONS: Sunny day, just around noon

ENVIRONMENT: In the neighbor hood adjacent a wooded area

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Matthew Moneymaker:

I spoke with most of the witnesses by phone, including the witnesses from the two posted reports from nearby Sarpy County (Fontenelle Forest and Gifford Point). All of them are very credible. Their stories corroborate each other and span over 50 years.

The witnesses near Lauritzen gardens are long time residents of the area (more than 50 years). The father of the family who had this most recent sighting, Alan Bogacz (pronounced BO-gotch) is the Facilities Manager at a hospital in Omaha. He doesn't just sound credible and sensible. You can safely assume that lots of people with lots of responsibilities need to have lots of faith in the perception and judgement of a facilities manager at a hospital.

He got a brief but clear view of the bigfoot from the waist up in broad daylight from roughly 150 feet away. He said it stood between 6 and 6.5 feet tall. It fur was dark brown. The other witnesses are his family members. Due to the long span of time that these sightings have been occurring, one can safely rule out the idea of a person in a costume.

The first thing I did when looking into his report is pull up aerial images of the location on Google Maps, before even speaking with any of the witnesses. When I did that I initially scoffed at the notion that a bigfoot would come so close to the center of a relatively big city. Then I spoke with some of the witnesses and I started looking closer at the aerial images.

One key factor that made me re-evaluate the potential for a bigfoot to come into the area Lauritzen Gardens was hearing about the deer seen in the same area. It is common to see deer around the botanical gardens, which is about 100 acres in size. They get there somehow, but the location is bordered by a strong river and miles of human development on every side except one. I knew that whatever pathway deer herds would use to get to the botanical gardens would likely be the same pathway that bigfoots would use.

Looking at other sighting reports in the vicinity, and hearing where there are areas with lots of deer like Fontenelle Forest, revealed the pathway: the railroad bed that follows the Missouri River. It is not a commuter line with lots of train traffic. It is for farm freight so its use is pretty light and seasonal.

Both deer and bigfoots could follow that railroad bed late at night and progress up the river toward the botanical gardens area without being noticed by humans. In the process they would pass very close to the rear of the Omaha Zoo.

In the right conditions the various smells emanating from the zoo and the botanical gardens (100 acres of fresh salad bar for deer) would drift south toward Fontenelle Forest. Deer would follow their noses to the botanical gardens.

Fontenelle Forest attracts so many deer from the vast farmlands to the south that every year in December there is a large organized hunt to cull the herds.

There are many remarkable things about this report and what it indicates. For one, it indicates that there are bigfoot(s) within the city limits of Omaha at times. The bigfoots that come there would not return to Fontenella Forest and Gifford Point during the day because it would require walking along the railroad exposed to view from a distance. If a bigfoot was in the gardens during the day then it would have come in the dark, and would only depart the area in the dark, so somewhere within the botanical gardens in a place where they will hide and wait for darkness. That place is certainly somewhere among the trees and dense brush that surrounds the grassy areas. The bigfoots probably observe people walking in gardens at times from the cover of those trees.

The other remarkable element relates to the zoo. It is one of the most prestigious zoos in the world. It is amazing to think that one or more bigfoots pass with 300 feet of the back of the zoo. A telescopic security camera mounted on a tall pole or tower near the rear of the zoo would be able to record them and any other animals moving along the railroad tracks.

How often would that happen? It is difficult to say how often it would happen. The bigfoots may venture up the gardens area only on rare occasions, in search of deer, and possibly also to feed on the exotic plants in the gardens at night. Or they may make the four mile walk up the railroad tracks on a regular basis at night.

The fact that credible sightings have occurred over such a long span of time suggests it will happen again in the future. It is a very opportune place to get them on camera, but that would be most easily accomplished by employees of the zoo, or the botanical gardens, or the works at the BNSF rail yard.

This report needs to be read in context with a few other reports. Those notes for those reports, regarding the general location, apply to this report as well.

The other sightings reports are:

Report 33545 (Douglas County 2005-2011)

Report 12482 (Douglas County 2005)

Report 44573 (Sarpy County 2012)

Report 7809 (Sarpy County 1975)

About BFRO Investigator Matthew Moneymaker:

Matthew Moneymaker is originally from the Los Feliz District of Los Angeles, California.

- Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA).

- Juris Doctorate (Law degree) from University of Akron School of Law

- Founder of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization,1995.

- Writer and co-producer of the Discovery Channel documentary "Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science", 2001.

- Co-producer of the TV Series "Mysterious Encounters" for the Outdoor Life Network (OLN Channel), 2002.

- Producer of the "2003 International Bigfoot Symposium" (Willow Creek Symposium) DVD set, 2004.

- Co-host of "Finding Bigfoot" on Animal Planet Channel, 2010 - 2017.

- Current Director of the BFRO

- Available for private bigfoot expeditions and conferences. To inquire please email ContactUS@BFRO.net

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