'Hidden animals' subject of lecture at museum

MOSES LAKE — A lecture on animals that could be out there is scheduled for 3 p.m. Saturday at the Moses Lake Civic Center Auditorium. It’s part of the summer exhibition of stories about Sasquatch at the Moses Lake Museum & Art Center.

Admission to the lecture, by David George Gordon, is free.

Gordon, Seattle, is known for his interest in the search for what are called “hidden animals.” The “hidden animals” are the kind of creatures whose existence has never been proved or disproved, but who are focus of persistent legends around the world.

Sasquatch has a possible cousin in the Yeti, or Abominable Snowman, of the Himalayas. There’s a possible long-necked creature – or something – in the waters of Loch Ness, in Scotland, and Central Africa could be home to a creature known to the locals as Mbolel Mkembe, described as a miniature dinosaur.

Gordon will talk about those creatures and more. For instance, are there sea monsters off the Washington coast?

Gordon has written “The Sasquatch Seeker’s Field Manual” and 18 other books. He will be signing copies of his books after the lecture.

The “Sasquatch Revealed” exhibit is on display at the museum through late August, and a number of events were planned in conjunction with it. Along with Gordon’s lecture, the museum is sponsoring lectures on the Sasquatch phenomenon by Idaho State University professor Jeff Meldrum Aug. 10 and 11.

“Sasquatch Revealed” is on loan from curator Christopher Murphy, based on a 2004 exhibit he created for a Vancouver museum. Murphy called Sasquatch “a cultural phenomenon on the fringes of science.” The exhibit is provided free to public museums.

It’s been on exhibit around the Pacific Northwest, the U.S. and Canada for more than a decade. It includes casts of footprints, stories from people who claim they have encountered unusual creatures in the wilderness, models of what a Sasquatch skull could look like, and stills from a famous 1967 film, shot in northern California, that could show a Bigfoot.

Tickets for Meldrum’s lectures are $5 per lecture. The film has been analyzed and reanalyzed, and on Aug. 10 Meldrum will talk about the latests results. The Aug. 11 lecture is titled “Conversations in Sasquatch Behavioral Ecology.”