The year is 1856. Paul Duchyue, a French-American explorer, is deep in the forest when he stumbles

on some tracks.

It was the first time I had ever seen these footprints.

I'm imagining his reaction, heart palpitations, sweaty palms, a shot of fear, coursing through

the heart. Finally, he'd found fresh footprints, and now he'd get to see the creature that

made them.

That monster, of whose ferocity, stength and cunning, the natives had told me so much.

An animal scarce known to the civilized world.

Abeseed the locals called the Wild Man of the Woods.

And finally, after weeks of tracking the animal, Paul Duchyue is face to face with it.

Nearly six feet high, with immense body, huge chest and great muscular arms, like some

nightmare vision.

The stood before us.

This king of the African forests.

The Gorilla.

Surprise, you thought this was a story about Bigfoot, didn't you?

Well it is, indirectly.

I'm Laura Kranz, and this is Wild King, a series about the Sasquatch Science and Society,

the search for Bigfoot, and why we want so badly for it to be real.

Paul Duchyue, explorer, naturalist, and the first non-African to confirm the existence

of the Gorilla.

He wrote about it in his book, Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa.

...