Dactyloscopy

Dactyloscopy! Why do scientist always want to hang a fancy name onto something while a simple name would do? Dactyloscopy means fingerprints. Or, to be more precise, the collecting and classificaton of fingerprints. Why am I sitting here writing about fingerprints when the blog is supposed to be about Bigfoot? Well, every once in a while, some researcher, after being out researching all day, will come back to camp and they'll be a handprint on their vehicle that they think was made by Bigfoot. Hmm, now what?

A little background on me might be in order before I go any further. During my 37 years in Law Enforcement, many years were spent as a detective. As a detective, I was assigned to the State Police lab for 3 months and all I did during that time was lift and classify fingerprints. I examined so many thousands of prints, that at night, all I dreamed about was loops, whorls, arches and all the sub-catoragories. I read almost every book on the subject, testified many times in court using charts depicting 'points' and was declared an expert in both District and Superior Courts. My desk in my office was crowded with glass slides with prints on them that were lifted at crime scenes. Almost everyone one of those slides were of no value.

The reason why I say that they were of no value is because you need to have someone to compare it to, otherwise, it's just a print. Today, the FBI as well as the States top Law Enforcement office have huge fingerprint data computers where you put your lifted print in and it'll search every print on file for a match. However, if someone hasn't been printed, it's just a print.

Say, this is pretty interesting, but what has this to do with Bigfoot? Well, last year someone sent me a picture of a handprint that was found on a car's back window and the thinking was it was Bigfoot who walked by and laid it's hand on the window. I took that picture and blew it up more than it was to look for any patterns (i.e. loop, whorl, etc) and found that the finger tips was just smudges with maybe just a few ridges showing. Maybe Bigfoot did touch the window, maybe not. Maybe it was one of the research crew that inadvertently touch the window, Maybe not. But as far as I know, no one has ever printed a Bigfoot before so even if the handprint showed every ridge and groove possible, what or who do you match it to as I have previously stated? The real value would be if it was found to have ridge patterns that were never seen before. Then, the print would not have to be matched with something or someone and that may be proof enough that some unknown creature was real.

A footprint is another story. A human footprint has ridges and grooves just like the hands, but there are no actual categories such as loops, whorls, etc. Dr. M. has a footprint, supposedly a Bigfoot footprint that was cast and it was discovered to have ridges and groves. What makes this exciting versus a handprint on a window is that the ridges run differantly than what a human print would show. And that to me was a great discovery. It amazes me that a find like this hasn't been made into a a bigger deal then it has.

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