Man spent 50 years tricking entire town into believing Bigfoot lived there

Sometimes you might prank your mates by telling them the wrong dress code for an event or you might wrap your uni flatmate’s room in foil.

Or perhaps your pranking days started off as a kid with simple games of knock-and-run.

But rarely is a prank so extravagant that it crosses decades and fools a whole town.

And one man in Alabama, US, spent 50 years tricking his entire town of Brantley into believing Bigfoot lived there.

Prankster-genius Eugene Hendrick’s plan hatched back in the 70’s, when locals spotted tracks by the river.

Hendrick told WFSA: “I got a wild hair one day. I wanted to do something about a Sasquatch.

“I cut some big ole feet and bolted some shoes to them and walked around by the river making tracks. I even made claw marks in the trees.”

However, speculation soon filled Brantley as they were convinced that something-out-of-the-ordinary was going on and it got so wild even the police and search dogs showed up.

WFSA

Local Jimmy McGinty was just a child when the mysterious Bigfoot was supposedly wandering around their town.

He remembered: “I was just going out by the river and saw some unusual tracks on the sand bar. I went and looked and saw these big footprints, and I’m going, am I seeing this right or not?’”

But, with such fear in the community and the police involvement, Hendrick decided to abandon his antics.

He said: “I put the cut-out feet and shoes away and kept it a secret until 2017."

And for a long while, no one knew that he’d been behind it.

Douglas Sacha/Getty Images

But then Hunter Royal, who owns the Old Gin Greek County Store in Brantley, decided he’d start selling a 'monster' burger – ‘The Sasquatch Burger’.

And Hendrick decided it was time. He was going to come clean about his epic pranking.

McGinty couldn’t believe it was him behind it all, and said: “I knew I wasn’t crazy then. But, he got me.”

The store then went on to sell all kinds of Bigfoot merchandise, even picking up a 3,500-pound, solid concrete Sasquatch.

Hunter was pretty surprised when his father-in-law McGinty showed up with the huge creature, saying: “I was in shock. It has made a landmark for the community.”

And in almost sweet end to his operation, Hendrick was the one to paint the giant statue, using his professional artist skills to design the ‘landmark’.

Although, it seems that locals do still reckon some kind of creature exists in the town as Hunter said: “If you don’t believe in Sasquatch, you’re the problem.”

Topics: Weird, US News, Bigfoot, Conspiracy Theory

Jess Battison

Jess is an Entertainment Journalist with a love of all things pop culture. Her main interests include keeping up with the Twitter girlies, waiting for a new series of The Traitors and losing her voice at a Beyoncé concert. She graduated with a first in Journalism from City, University of London in 2021 and has previously worked at MyLondon.

@jessbattison_