Intangible Alberta

Welcome to Intangible Alberta. Here at the Royal Alberta Museum, we tell stories through objects. But what about those stories that have no objects? Those experiences that go beyond the material, beyond the tangible? On this podcast, we'll share stories outside the display case, bringing the museum to you.

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Intangible Alberta

Sasquatches and Sow Bugs

October 20, 2021 • Royal Alberta Museum • Season 2 • Episode 1

What do Sasquatch and sow bugs have in common? What would it take for a Sasquatch sighting to be considered a scientific discovery? How do curators identify creatures from a blurry photo?

Find out on the newest episode of Intangible Alberta, the podcast where we explore Alberta’s stories that can’t be told from within a display case.

In this episode, Mat chats with RAM Live Animals Supervisor (and unofficial Sasquatch expert), Pete Heule about unexpected isopods discovered in Rat’s Nest Cave, and what they can tell us about cryptozoological efforts to prove the existence of Bigfoot.

And what better day to dive into this lore than on the anniversary of the famous Patterson-Gimlin Sasquatch footage? (October 20, 1967)

Listen on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Intangible Alberta is produced in partnership between the Royal Alberta Museum and Strathcona County Museum & Archives.

Patterson-Gimlin Sasquatch image by Patterson–Gimlin film, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=434396

CORRECTION: At 15:40 Pete mentions Loren Coleman and Paranthropus robustus being another large fossil ape. Paranthropus robustus was not a giant ape found in Southeast Asia, but a rather short South African human relative that was usually less than 45 kg. Because there are only giant molars and a lower jaw fragment fossils for Gigantopithecus blacki, Loren Coleman once told Pete that Paranthropus robustus was a better Sasquatch candidate as we have much more extensive skeletal evidence for them. How these apes could have made it from the Cradle of Humankind in Africa to the woods of North America is open to debate, while the 3 metre tall, 300 kg forest-dwelling Gigantopithecus blacki in China, Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia could arguably have crossed from Asia into North America through existing forested corridors on the Bering Land Bridge. Southeast Asia was indeed home to a diversity of human relatives, including the Hobbit Homo floresiensis, Homo erectus and others.