The infamous Minnesota Iceman will be exhibited at the Museum of the Weird in Austin, Texas, starting next week after touring at fairgrounds and malls across the country in the late 60s and early 70s.
The museum's owner, Steve Busti, said Wednesday that the frozen, Neanderthal or Bigfoot-like monster will be on display beginning July 3.
The iceman, 6-feet-tall, was billed as "The Siberskoye Creature" or "The Creature of Ice" beginning in 1968. The hairy creature was displayed in a solid block of ice inside a refrigerated coffin.
A man named Frank Hansen exhibited the iceman and claimed to have been behind its discovery, according to the book "Bigfoot Exposed: An Anthropologist Examines America's Enduring Legend".
Two cryptozoologists, Ivan Sanderson and Bernard Heuvelmans, examined the body during their search for evidence of Bigfoot the same year the iceman became a carnival exhibit. The pair believed the creature to be a real, unknown species, with Sanderson even remarking he could smell a decomposing corpse through cracks in the icy tomb.
The pair believed the creature to be an evolutionary missing link--Heuvelmans even dubbed him Homo pongoides.
After the two cryptozoologists examined the creature, Sanderson convinced someone at the Smithsonian Institution to launch an official investigation. Unfortunately, Hansen reportedly switched the real body with a latex dummy before an investigation took place.
At first, Hansen suggested he found the iceman in Siberia, but he confessed he shot the creature in Minnesota woods before putting it on ice. As a result of these new claims, the FBI almost became involved, thinking Hansen had been exhibiting a murder victim.
When the Smithsonian assessed the Iceman - after Hansen said he switched it with a dummy -the museum stated it was "satisfied that the creature is simply a carnival exhibit made of latex rubber and hair...the original model and the present so-called substitute are one and the same."
After touring through the early 70s, the creature and its eccentric owner remained out of the public eye until 10 years ago, The Huffington Post reported.
After investigating its whereabouts for two years, Busti tracked down Hansen's family and bought the frozen beast or rubber impersonation, depending on who's talking.
Korean Language
전설의 괴수 빅풋, 전시회에 모습 드러내
한때 미국을 떠들썩하게 했던 미네소타의 설인 ‘빅풋(Bigfoot)’이 오는 7월 3일부터 텍사스 주 오스틴의 괴상한 박물관(Museum of the Weird)에서 전시를 시작한다. 이 빅풋의 역사는 1968년에 시작되었다.
프랭크 한센이라는 한 남성은 자신이 빅풋을 발견했다며 냉동관에 빅풋을 담아 전시했다. 그는 자신이 전설의 괴물 키 180cm의 털복숭이 설인 빅풋을 발견했다고 자신의 저서 “Bigfoot Exposed: An Anthropologist Examines America's Enduring Legend”를 통해 주장했다. 이에 미확인 동물학자인 아이반 샌더슨과 그 동료는 조사에 착수했고, 빅풋의 시체가 부패하는 냄새가 난다며 빅풋이 진짜 생물이라고 생각했다.
이에 샌더슨은 스미스소니언 협회에 공식적인 조사를 요청했으나, 한센이 처음에 시베리아에서 빅풋을 발견했다고 주장했던 것과는 달리 미네소타주의 한 숲에서 빅풋을 총으로 쐈다고 고백했다.
이에 FBI는 한센이 사람을 살해한 뒤 이를 전시했다는 명목으로 조사를 하려 했다. 그러나 스미스소니언 협회가 이 설인은 고무 재질로 만들어진 빅풋 모형이라는 것을 밝혀내어 사건은 해프닝으로 마무리되었다.
이후 10년간 빅풋과 한센은 종적을 감추었으며, 괴상한 박물관장인 스티브 부스티가 한센의 가족을 찾아내 이 빅풋 모형을 사들였다고 한다.