Sources of Information on 'Forest Man' - True or False!

 Prof. Nguyen Dinh Khoa

"Forest-man - Mystery of the century", that was Prof. Dao Van Tien's article
written on Quan Doi Nhan Dan Newspaper, no. 10494 (dated 11-8-1990). I would
like to discuss a number of points and contribute some of my ideas.

The article gave some information on the Forest-man by 2 groups of Russian
scientists when they explored the mountainous areas Ghit-xa (Republic of Pakistan) 
and Thien Son from 1979 to 1985. Some scientists said that they saw foot
prints on the beach, and others said they actually saw the Forest-man. In Thien Son,
they could only gathered information from the locals which led on to a practical
conclusion that the percentage of Forest-man's male and female are 56.3~o and 43.7%
(?) Another source of information from China: local people in Ho Nam province
caught a Forest-man, but it turned out to be just a short-tailed monkey. But there are
still rumours of Forest-man in China.

At the end of the article, Prof. Dao Van Tien said - with the support from almost
all scientists- that Forest-man discovered in Russia (and possibly in China) are only a
type of ancient-man "Ne-an Dac Lan". Prof. Tien appealed for their protection before
they face extinction.

The Forest-man subject that Prof. Tien has raised, caused a lot of attention
because of its internationally wide spread rumours since the last half of 20th century.
It started out in 1954 from a discovery of big foot prints in the snow by a group of
Himalaya mountain climbers. The locals of Sec pa considered them as I-e-tis' (Yeti) foot
prints (local's word for Forest-man named by explorers) who were still scattered
around the area. In the book titled 'Snowman to the locals people' written by
Zoologist Charles Stonor (1958), gave some information on this matter.

This piece of information certainly had raised a strong interest in the scientist
circle, lots of English, French, Japanese, even the affiliated explorers had come to
Himalaya with the hope to seize a Forest Man or at least to catch a glimpse and take a
photo.

Following the Snowman was the Forest Man rumours at different stages with
different names such as: Almast; A-da-mi I-a-voi, Sasquatch (Monlagnes Rocheuses)
in North America, etc. All of these were investigated and could be concluded as
follows:

The research for Forest Man in North America was put to a halt in l 958 when
the researcher  I. Sanderson spent lots of his time travelling to many
mountainous areas without success.

In other areas, lots of photos and moulds of footprints were collected. One
group of explorers (1960-61) was shown, by a Buddhist Monastery, a piece of
scalp covered with hair and a desiccated hand, supposedly from an 'I-e-ti'. The
explorers had taken photos and brought back a piece of 'hand'. The result of
this exploration was summarized in a book titled 'On the freezing Summits'
published in England in 1963, the book was translated into Russian in 1983.

Both authors E. Hillaret and D. Doik, refused to believe this because of the
following reasons: The footprints were not convinced enough, as for the scalp
and desiccated hand they could belong to any kind of hairy animal with claws
that even at the age of 300 years, still not much different from a human's hand.
Furthermore, there was only rumours that people either had seen or heard but
not any photo as a proof.

Even in Vietnam, there is also a rumour about the Forest Man.

- During the Vietnam war against the Americans, Department of Biology (University
of Hanoi), twice received information on the Forest Man and was requested an
investigation. The first time, it was reported from Na Meo (adjoining between
Lao and Vietnam), but when the investigation took place, the party was told that
workers in that particular area were working in shifts most of the time, and no
one knew who reported the incident. The second time, from a location in Dac
Lac, again a group of explorers was sent only to come back with a report that
it was only a rumour.

- In the Environment and Resource 10 year Program, code 5202, there was a
project on researching rare species, the first 5 year (1981-85) did report that
they discovered a foot print from which they made a mould and they also gave
a number of discussions on this discovery but to date, no more was heard.

Connected with this research in Vietnam, there was a book with an interesting title
'The Neanderthal still exist' published in 1974 written by a French scientist
Bernard Heuvelmans, and a Russian Scientist Borio Porchnev. The book is
500 pages consists of 25 chapters and pictures of the Forest man's corpse
preserved in a big block of ice which was displayed in a number of places in
the U.S. like Wisconsin and Chicago. This corpse belonged to Frank D.
Hansen, who was born in Minnesota and was an American pilot during the
Vietnam war, therefore, Heuvelmans's theory was: the Forest man was killed in
western region of Vietnam and found by Hansen, He saw the opportunity to make
money, so brought back to the U.S. Still according to Heuvelmans, from the
looks of this corpse, it could be one of the Neanderthal survivors. However,
Prof. M. Gloor, a specialist in Genetic Department in University of Geneve,
believes that it was a very clever trick. As for myself, I do think there are a lot
of doubts about the forest man (in general, not particularly the Hansen's case),
and if it was a big monkey or an orang-outang theory, it could be accepted, but
a Neanderthal! it is hard to believe.

Is it true about the Forest man? this question was discussed within the scientist
world, there were lots of sources of information but not real facts. However, science
is a world of unpredictables, out of 1000s rumours, only needed one genuine fact
would solve the whole mystery.

Source: Nhan Dan 39 (85) 23-9-1990 p.40