Rene Dahinden Documentary

A friend of mine has provided a link to a documentary about Rene Dahinden and his search for the sasquatch. The documentary was aired in 1976 on the CBC network in Canada. You can view the clip here.

Dahinden is often mentioned as one of the "Four Horsemen" of sasquatch research. This group consisted of Dahinden, Grover Krantz, Peter Byrne, and John Greene. Of these four, Dahinden's life seems the most tragic. His obsession with the sasquatch cost him everything. He never was able to hold a steady job (not that he wanted to), his wife divorced him when he willingly chose his research over her, and he lived, at best, an extremely spartan lifestyle. At worst, he lived in poverty. In all the years Dahinden searched he never laid eyes on his quarry.

Dahinden's tale is a cautionary one. It is fascinating but demonstrates the dangers of obsession. While one can be obsessed by work of any kind, as well as any number of other things, this danger is not uncommon to those involved in the search for cryptid animals. Seeing something that is not supposed to exist can truly change one's world view. It is not unusual for a witness to dream nightly of their encounter for many years and to dwell on it in their daytime thoughts often. Many who have had a sighting and are experiencing these sorts of things would do anything to prove to the world, and maybe even themselves, they are not crazy. When their efforts to do so do not work out they can become bitter. Such was the case for Rene Dahinden.

I hope you enjoy the clip. It provides a lot of insight into Dahinden and also serves as a sort of time capsule as it takes you back to the mid 1970s.