SPEAKERS

Linda Godfrey: “The Dogmen of the Upper Midwest”

Former journalist Linda S. Godfrey broke the original news story on sightings of southern Wisconsin’s Beast of Bray Road, 25 years ago, and immediately began receiving similar reports from around the nation and world. She has been researching and investigating cryptids of all types ever since, and with seventeen published books has become known as a foremost authority on the upright canines now often called Dogmen. She lives in southern Wisconsin near the Kettle Moraine State Forest, a unique habitat with a long tradition of Bigfoot, Dogman and even Goatman sightings. Her book, The Beast of Bray Road (2003), is the groundbreaking text on Dogmen accounts.

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Robert Damon Schneck: “Ape Canyon: Another View”

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Craig Woolheater: “Wild & Wooly in Texas: Twenty Years Searching for Bigfoot”

Craig Woolheater obtained a copy of John A. Keel’s book Strange Creatures from Time & Space in 1970. He found it influential to his life. Interested in Bigfoot, he also saw the movie The Legend of Boggy Creek. He actively began his search for the hairy creatures. In 1994, his reality came crashing down, when he had a sighting of what he feels was a Bigfoot creature. It occurred while driving back to Dallas from New Orleans on May 30, 1994. He got more deeply involved in organized Bigfootery, and was a cofounder of the Texas Bigfoot Research Center in June of 1999. In 2005, he founded Cryptomundo. In January, 2007, the TBRC reorganized as a 501(c)(3), non-profit, scientific research organization. The organization’s name was then the Texas Bigfoot Research Conservancy, which he resigned from in 2010, due to differences with the leadership. On December 24, 2013, Woolheater resurrected the original TBRC, the Texas Bigfoot Research Center. He has appeared on or contributed to several Bigfoot and cryptozoology television programs, documentaries and films. He has hosted the Texas Bigfoot Conferences for over a decade.

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Steve Bissette: “The Vermont Monster Guide”

Stephen R. “Steve” Bissette is an American comics artist, editor, and publisher with a focus on the horror genre. He is known for working with writer Alan Moore and inker John Totleben on the DC comic Swamp Thing in the 1980s, as well as Neil Gaiman ‘s Midnight Days TPB (2000). He did the illustrations and cover for Joseph Citro’s The Vermont Monster Guide (2009). He teaches courses in Comic Art History, Drawing, and Film at the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Vermont, where he co-curates with Denis St. John the CCS/Main Street Museum ARTifacts Film Series. Since 2005, Bissette has also edited and published Green Mountain Cinema, a trade paperback journal devoted to the independent cinema scene in his home state of Vermont, as well as five volumes of Blur, collecting his film reviews and criticism.

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Joe Citro: “The Vermont Monster Guide”

Joseph A. Citro is a Vermont author and folklorist. Occasionally referred as the “Bard of the Bizarre,” he has extensively researched and documented the folklore, unexplained activity and strange happenings of New England. Citro decided to make an attempt to catalogue all of the eccentric legends, folk tales, mysterious monsters, and general uncanny activity of New England. His books on these subjects are an exclusive collections of the bizarre of the region. His published work includes Weird New England: Your Guide to New England’s Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets, Passing Strange: True Tales of New England Hauntings and Horrors, and The Vermont Monster Guide, illustrated by his friend, Stephen Bissette.

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Seth Breedlove: “The Mothman of Point Pleasant”

Seth Breedlove is a filmmaker who has written, edited, produced and directed shorts and features about a variety of topics but is best known for his production company and the films they’ve produced under the Small Town Monsters banner, which he began in 2013. The first chapter in the Small Town Monsters series is the film, Minerva Monster. Seth wrote and directed the film. He has since begun working on more projects under the Small Town Monsters umbrella including, including, Beast of Whitehall, Boggy Creek Monster, and the new Mothman documentary being introduced by Seth at this conference.

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Paul LeBlond: “Remembering the International Society of Cryptozoology”

Paul H. LeBlond is an ocean scientist who specialized in the study of waves, tides, tsunamis and ocean currents.  LeBlond is an emeritus professor at the University of British Columbia, a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and of the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society. In parallel to his research and teaching in physical oceanography, he has also pursued an interest in marine cryptozoology, with a special focus on Cadborosaurus, including writing two books on the subject.  He was one of the founders of the International Society of Cryptozoology, and a co-founder of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club. LeBlond is the first President of the new International Cryptozoology Society, founded in 2016. As a result of the First International Cryptozoology Conference 2016, he saw his translation of Bernard Heuvelmans’ book on the Minnesota Iceman published during 2016.

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Bruce Champagne: “Sea Serpent Types ~ An Introduction”

Following the advice of earlier researchers, Bruce Champagne began to examine reports of large, unidentified marine animals, eventually proposing generic types to advance the dataset and explore a possible relationship with large, unidentified freshwater animals. Champagne has examined the Clark San Francisco Sea Serpent 2004 video, and published a marine sea serpent type proposal in the Dracontology and Elementum Bestia journals. Champagne’s recent study was published in the fourth edition of the peer-reviewed Journal of Cryptozoology (December 2016). Champagne holds an undergraduate degree in marine biology, conducting shark predatory research. Champagne has been a member of past and present cryptozoology organizations.

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 YOUNG CRYPTOZOOLOGISTS PANEL

Wen C., Andy M., others: “The Future of Cryptozoology”

The Young Cryptozoologists Panel is made up of the upcoming cryptozoologists in America. Wen C runs a blog on cryptozoology, and Andy M. has worked on cryptozoology documentary films and runs, with his father, a Bigfoot podcast. Other young people will be announced before the start of the conference.

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GUESTS

Snuffy Destefano: “Chainsawing Bigfoot”

Chris “Snuffy” DeStefano is from Ridgway, Pennsylvania, the home of the largest chainsaw carving event in the world. He has been carving for ten years, now specializing in burl wood chainsaw creations and large and small Bigfoot carvings. DeStefano is also a singer/songwriter with five CDs. He has traveled throughout the eastern USA to chainsaw carve and has carved in Canada, England and Germany. DeStefano is the artist who created the nearly 9 ft tall wooden Bigfoot in front of the International Cryptozoology Museum.

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Mark Matze, Emcee

When he was six years old, Mark Matzke read Marian T. Place’s On the Track of Bigfoot, and has been fascinated by unknown creatures ever since. At Seth Breedlove’s invitation, he became co-host of SasWhat: A Podcast about Bigfoot in 2014. Mark has served as a production assistant on two Small Town Monsters films, Boggy Creek Monster and Mothman of Point Pleasant; emceed Minerva Monster Day in 2016; and written about cinema and cryptozoology for Cryptid Culture, Nostalgia Digest, Mad Scientist and G-Fan magazines. Mark and his son Andy currently co-host two podcasts: SasWhat and Monsterland Ohio Radio. Mark earned a Masters degree from Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and serves in full-time pastoral ministry in Northeast Ohio, where he lives with his family.

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HOSTS

Jeff Meuse, Assistant Director, International Cryptozoology Museum

Jeff Meuse, a native of the Sea Serpent rich area of Nahant, Massachusetts, has been associated with the International Cryptozoology Museum since 2006 and is the Assistant Director. Meuse regularly gives introductions, guided tours, and media interviews, as well as soliciting artifacts, research files, and contributions for the Museum. Meuse has engaged in on-site investigations of unknown animals (from the Lake Champlain Monster, Alux, Thunderbird, Bigfoot, Loup Garu), discovered archival material (especially regarding North Shore Massachusetts Sea Serpents and Maine cryptids), conducted community charity benefits, and delivered group, school and university presentations. Meuse is, as well, a local business manager and coordinator of small businesses in southern Maine. He also is currently attending college to further his scholarship in the nonprofit business/science education field. He presently lives in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, the site of infrequent Sea Serpent sightings.

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Loren Coleman, Director, International Cryptozoology Museum

Often called the “World’s Leading Living Cryptozoologist,” Loren Coleman has been investigating cryptozoological evidence and folklore since the Abominable Snowmen caught his interest in 1960. He is the author, coauthor, editor, and/or contributor of or to over 100 popular books on natural history mysteries and the media, including 40 directly of his own, such as The Field Guide to Lake Monsters and Sea Serpents, The Field Guide to Bigfoot and Other Mystery Primates, Mysterious America, Bigfoot!: The True Story of Apes in America, Cryptozoology A to Z, The Copycat Effect, Tom Slick and the Search for the Yeti, and Mothman and Other Curious Encounters. He regularly appears on and consults to documentary television programs – including MonsterQuest, In Search Of, Mysteries at the Museum, CBS News Sunday Morning, Unsolved Mysteries, Animal X, Ancient Aliens, Ancient Mysteries, Unsolved Mysteries, and other media as an authority on strange creatures and inexplicable phenomena. He is the founder in 2003, and director of the nonprofit, 501(c)3 International Cryptozoology Museum. The world’s only cryptozoology institution is routinely recognized as one of the top ten weirdest, strangest, most unique, and not-to-be missed museums on the globe.