Something with heavy footfall paced me in the woods. If I stopped, it stopped.

(Tracy Arvin, founder of Smokey Mtn. Squatch Shine)

I was an 8-year-old kid who grew up in Eastern Kentucky. It took me a long time to get to the bus every morning because it was about a quarter-mile walk down to the end of my driveway. That spring, something began to pace me in the woods as I would walk to the bus each morning.

You couldn’t see exactly what it was because the thick woods were up a roughly 6-foot embankment, but you could hear it. Something with heavy footfall paced me in the woods. If I stopped, it stopped.

About three-fourths of the way down the drive, there was another house where an old coon dog named Dixie took its primary residence on the front porch. Prior to the thing in the woods, the Dixie would bark at me on my way past, sometimes even loping down the first few steps of the porch. Once I passed the house, she would always return to her previous lazy perch. However, the old dog’s behavior changed as soon as the unseen creature started taking an interest in me. Instead of barking forth a tired warning for me to stay away from her property, she now slinked deep into the back recesses of the porch, sending forth a very low, snarling growl.

I told my parents about the thing in the woods. To my dismay, they told me it was probably a hobo that had taken up residence in the woods. It wasn’t a bear; they were terribly shy of people, and this sort of behavior would be unheard of. It wasn’t a bobcat, which would certainly warrant alarm, because I would have heard four feet instead of two, and I was adamant that this was someone walking in the woods. Well, it was something bipedal, at least.

“No, it was definitely a hobo,” they said. “I was just poking fun at you and probably drunk as a skunk. We’ll call the sheriff and have him check it out.”

I wasn’t sure if or when the sheriff ever did check out the woods, or if my parents even called, but the thing in the woods kept following me. Not only that, but it started to whistle, too. I was scared. Several weeks after our first talk, I had to tell my parents about the encounters again. I think they could hear the fear in my voice, and I could see they were visibly more upset now as well. They decided this was a case for Red, our very own coon dog.

“Take ol’ Red with you tomorrow morning. Let him walk down the driveway with you until you get to the bus, then send him back home.”

So that’s just what I did. The next morning, I was cautiously on my way to the bus, with Red swaggering along right beside me. Once a hobo saw Red with me, they were sure to abandon this silly game of cat and mouse, right? About half way to the bus, however, Red picked up on something in the woods. He began to bark and carry on ferociously. Suddenly, Red and I were overcome by a powerful, skunky, cadaverous smell. My brave defender, Red, tucked his tail between his legs and scorched a path of dust straight back to the house.

That night at supper, I told my dad what happened.

“The dog is scared. I’m scared. I don’t walk to the bus anymore, dad,” I said. ‘

Trying to reassure me, dad said, “I’ll call the sheriff, and we’ll both go out and have a look, first thing tomorrow morning.”

Early the next morning, the rotary phone on the wall rang. It was the sheriff. Dixie was missing.

What had initially been planned as a two-man search for a hobo now became a three-person manhunt for a missing dog and a suspected dog-napper as Dixie’s owner joined the fray. What they encountered in those woods shook them. It was the overwhelming smell of death.

Dixie never returned to that porch in Eastern Kentucky, and the thing in the woods never returned for me that spring either. That summer, we moved away from our house at the top of that long dirt road.

Years later, I asked Daddy, “Why did we move?”

Dad replied, “Son, we found Dixie. We didn’t like the way we found her. It looked like something had picked her up by the hind legs and smashed her against a tree.”

Dixie was a big coon dog, nothing short of 50 pounds. Whatever did that to her, it was not a person.

Epilogue

Tracy Arvin’s encounter in the spring of 1978 made a profound impact on his life. He is convinced that what was lurking in those woods was none other than the legendary sasquatch, aka Bigfoot. Tracy has gone on to find Smokey Mtn. Squatch Shine, a tribute to his childhood encounter with the ancient cryptid.

(Eastern Kentucky, 1978. Based on an interview with Tracy Arvin)