Bigfoot is a little deer — but one believer is still on the lookout for the mythical creature.
The FBI analyzed a sample of alleged Bigfoot hairs in the 1970s "in the interest of research and scientific inquiry" — and turned up deer hair, newly released records show.
Peter Byrne, then the director of the Bigfoot Information Center, wrote a letter in 1976 asking the FBI "set the record straight, once and for all," on a previous instance of the bureau purportedly analyzing hair that was not identifiable as "that of any known creature on this continent," the documents show, CNN reported.
FBI Assistant Director Jay Cochran, who headed the bureau's laboratory division at the time, responded he could not find any records of such an examination. But Byrne, touting his group's affiliation with the Academy of Applied Science in Boston, requested an examination of what he saw as an exciting new sample, CNN reported.
"Briefly, we do not often come across hair which we are unable to identify and the hair that we have now, about 15 hairs attached to a tiny piece of skin, is the first that we have obtained in six years which we feel may be of importance," Byrne wrote, the documents show.
Cochran gave the green light.
"It was concluded as a result of these examinations that the hairs are of deer family origin," Cochran wrote to Academy of Applied Science Executive Vice President Howard Curtis early the following year, the documents show.
The now 93-year-old Byrne told CNBC on Wednesday he still has not given up hope of proving Bigfoot is a real — albeit rare — creature.
"It's a great challenge," Byrne told the news outlet about his interest.
Told about the FBI documents showing his correspondence with the agency in the 1970s asking for the test of hair samples, Byrne laughed, CNBC reported — but added: "I don't remember this."
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