Sasquatch Chronicles Blog

A listener writes “My encounter occurred in northcentral Minnesota, on the southern border of the Chippewa National Forest, near the small town on Longville, MN. The date was January 11, 2974 (night of…). The only reason I can track this is because the Minnesota Vikings played the Miami Dolphins in the Superbowl, that following Sunday, and we watched the game on a 14 inch screen, black/white and “snowy” TV. I was 11 and 1/2 years old.

We traveled 6 hours north of our home/farm in southern Minnesota to go snowmobiling at our family’s cabin, east of Longville. Longville is a small community of roughly 200 residents. In the 70’s, I think the town’s population sign indicated 171 people living there. Our cabin was one of two cabins on the south side of a small lake – Little Rice Lake. Today there are roughly ten cabin on that stretch, but back then it was very remote and serviced by an unplowed forest trail. Grass grew in the center area between the tire ruts on this road – pretty rugged. We would deer hunt the thousands of acres of wooded land south of our property.

To “set the stage” of the incident that our whole family experienced, you must realize how cold the night was… I recall the night being so cold that the snow was “sugar snow.” When the weather gets below zero Fahrenheit, packed snow starts to squeak under you feet. When colder than twenty below, and colder, unpacked snow becomes what we called “sugar snow” – which means it crystalizes and becomes likes grains of sugar – very slippery and granulated, in contrast to “powder snow” that is light and skiers love… Sugar snow becomes hard to drive in as wheels/tires simply spin out and cannot gain traction.

Anyway, on our way into the cabin at about 9:00 Friday evening, out truck, pulling two snowmobiles on a trailer, became stuck on the trail in about 500 yards from our cabin. I recall my father swearing as scoop-shovels were unloaded from the back of our pickup and shoveling commenced. The temperature was cold! It was right around -25 to -30 below, straight temperature. Zero wind. Extremely calm and starry night.

Dad began to complain about the “smell of a bear.” I couldn’t smell it at all. I even walked around the truck to try to smell it – to his side of the truck. It concerned him enough that he told me to “get in the truck cuz it smells close.” I told him, “Bears should be hibernating…” The smell was so concerning that he had my mother shining a flashlight in the woods to keep an eye out while we shoveled. A discussion ensued regarding the whole situation and weird smells (I still couldn’t smell it – he said it was more on his side of the truck – that’s the only place he could smell the odd odor…) and we got the truck unstuck – driving the remaining distance to the cabin. A roaring fire was started, electric space heater turned on high, and we hit the rack for the evening.

In hindsight, I have realized how 1.) no bear was out and about in -30 temps and in the middle of January and 2.) smells don’t transfer to our olfactory systems very efficiently in such temperatures – they just don’t.

Somewhere between 11:30 and midnight, we were all startled awake with an incredible sound. We all awoke immediately, as the volume of the sound was only comparable to the roar of a lion, yet it was a screaming sound. As my father put it, “The sound of a woman being raped…” I recall the sound last 30 seconds, with no break in the volume/intensity. The intensity of the sound/scream basically shook the cabin. You could feel it. Dad loaded the shotgun, turned on a floodlight that shined over the area behind the cabin but DID NOT go outside. Looking out the windows, nothing was seen. We were all extremely shaken due to the intensity of this scream. I have told a handful of people about this only to be told, “Oh, it was just a bobcat or fisher during breeding season… Bullshit. They didn’t hear/feel the volume/resonance. The definition of “resonance” includes descriptors such as “reverberating” and “synchronous vibration of nearby objects,” – yes – vibration/shaking was felt. Incredibly intense… We couldn’t sleep for an extended time and finally got back to sleep.

The following day there were tracks in the deep snow behind the cabin. Big tracks. But there was no talk of anything and any further. Year later, while deer hunting an “island” in the middle of a large swamp, I found a tree structure that looked like a tepee, except it was built out of 25-30 spruce and jackpine. The structure was 20-some logs in number and the logs were all about 12-18 inches in circumference. I am 6’3″ and 250 lbs, a former college athlete – and I couldn’t lift them. The “island” was about 60 feet wide and 120 feet long. The only reason I could get back to that island was the peat bog had frozen and I followed a deer trail through the frozen bog, in hopes of jumping a big buck. This was remote!!

The family rarely talked about that night. It was passed off as “unexplainable” – and my father always said, “It sounded like a woman being raped, or beaten, but with incredible volume. And who is going to be walking around in -30 temps, screaming. I asked my mom a few months ago of her memories of that night and she confirmed my memories. But that was it. I know what we heard/felt…”