Go ahead and call Scott Snook crazy. He's heard it before, when people learn that he investigates Bigfoot sightings in central Pennsylvania.
"I just blow it off," he said. "I can understand a lot of people don't want to believe what they can't see."
Snook, 38, of Lewistown has been a member of the Penn-sylvania Bigfoot Society for five years. This year, the group is presenting the annual East Coast Bigfoot Conference on Satur-day in Jeannette.
"It's open to the public, and there'll be a lot of neat stuff going on," Snook said.
The "neat stuff" in-cludes speakers from throughout the country, who'll present sessions from noon to 8 p.m. at Gator's Lounge, Pitzer's Townhouse Restaurant, in Jeannette. General admission tickets are $10 and available only at the door; doors open at 11 a.m.
Close to 500 people attended the 2005 conference, said Eric Altman, Pennsylvania Bigfoot Society director.
Fact Box
If you go
What: 2008 East Coast Bigfoot Conference
When: Noon to 8 p.m. Saturday; doors open at 11 a.m.
Where: Gator's Lounge, Pitzer's Townhouse Restaurant, Jeannette
Admission: $10 at the door
For more information and directions: visit www. pabigfoot society.com.
"We're expecting between 300 and 500 people, maybe more," Altman said. "We're not sure."
Snook's Bigfoot territory includes Huntingdon County and expands eastward to include Mifflin, Juniata, Perry and Snyder counties. He said there haven't been many sightings in Blair County lately.
In November 2006, he received an e-mail from a woman in the Huntingdon area who found "thick structures" in the woods.
"One of the theories is that these things make structures out of sticks," Snook said. "I looked at them, and there was nothing I could positively say (was made by a Bigfoot). It could have been made by a hunter."
One investigation in Perry County found tracks, and Snook also responded to a sighting in Snyder County.
"I'm willing to go if someone else is willing to go and meet them somewhere," he said.
Snook works as a pattern technician at a foundry and said he's been interested in Bigfoot since 1976, when his grandmother took him to see "Sasquatch: Legend of Bigfoot."
"It was just your B-movie, but it sticks," he said. "I don't care what people think. I hand out business cards. If I go to restaurant and they have a bulletin board, I pin one up. I think people see these more than they're willing to tell. They're afraid they'll be ridiculed and made fun of."
Bigfoot sightings were last reported in Cambria and Bedford counties in 2004, according to the society's Web site, and sightings were reported regularly in the Rockton Mountain area of Clearfield County from 2001 to 2003.
"I don't have to see one to be convinced," he said. "I've seen enough to be convinced."
Mirror Staff Writer Ashley Gurbal is at 946-7435.
