Thursday, July 10, 2008

MONSTER QUEST: Ohio Grassman

History Channel - Original Air Date: 6/20/08

In Ohio, eyewitnesses continue to report a strange, bogey-man like creature known as the grassman.  Sightings of the creature date back to the 1860s, when a man and his daughter claimed to be attacked by the creature.  The creature may, in fact, be bigfoot by another name.  A mysterious skull found in the wilderness proves to be that of a baboon -- possibly escaped from captivity.  But a baboon doesn't resemble a seven-foot-tall grassman.  A woman claims to have seen the monster in her yard, and an investigator claims to have found an igloo-like grass hut, or nest, on February 19, 1995.  Investigators bring in small surveillance helicopters to survey a park in the "sasquatch triangle."  At night, they intend to use a thermal camera to try and find the grassman. (Why not use real helicopters?)  A man named Keating has a tape that may show a grassman in the background; the tape is given to an expert for analysis.  A 2002 print of a hand may be of grassman, and another expert is called.  Investigator Cook puts up a fake bigfoot decoy to try and lure a real one out of the woods.  Then he does some wood knocking in an attempt to signal the creature.  When the knocking fails, he tries bigfoot calls, but that fails, too.  In 2007, though, he thinks he captured a bigfoot cry on tape.  That cry, too, goes off to an expert, but the expert reaches no conclusion as to what made the sound.  While winter camping, a couple saw a sinister creature lurking just beyond the light of their campfire.  A truck driver also had a compelling sighting.

The hand print expert concludes the cast is of a non-human primate similar to (or possibly belonging to) a gorilla; it is not a fake.  The video doesn't have enough information to reveal what the moving figure in the background is.  An attempt to recreate the woven "nest" reveals it would have take a long time to build.  The camera traps and decoy find nothing.  Nor does the helicopter catch the elusive creature.  After another expensive snipe hunt for bigfoot (I think this is at least the 4th bigfoot show in the series), perhaps MQ would consider a longer, more concerted expedition.  Otherwise, I fear that their continuing efforts are doomed to get the same disappointing results.

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