The International Sasquatch Conservation Society was founded in 1988 by Richard Vasquez in Humboldt County in the hopes that we could save the endangered bigfoot from being wiped out. While sightings remain numerous throughout the country, they simply don't seem to be large enough in number to consider the species safe.
The earliest reported sighting of a sasquatch in San Bernardino county may have been in the late 19th or early 20th century, but accounts are hard to come by, all we have are rumors for the time being. Sightings and rumors are sparse until the later half of the 20th century when Bigfoot starts to enter the public consciousness. The first recorded sighting we have of a sasquatch in San Bernardino County on record was in the 1950s by Philip J. Hawkins during an Old Miners' Day Burro Race. On his way up the mountain his burro was spooked by a mysterious figure in the trees and ran off. Philip Hawkins didn't know what caused the burro to run like it did, until he turned around to find himself face-to-face with a near seven foot-tall ape! His tale was met with ridicule and no one believed him until we officially established our local chapter of the International Sasquatch Conservation Society in 1994. We founded our chapter after hearing about a report from Barton Flats a year earlier, realizing we have history with this majestic ape.
For a few years after our foundation, Big Bear Lake was home to the International Sasquatch Research Institute, where our very own local Chairman, Professor Larry Robbins, was once a scientist! We are very sad to say that the institute has been closed for some time, however, and we don't know when or if it will ever reopen.
We had our own mascot named Pokey, a wonderful and sweet shetland sheepdog, who served us for many years on searches for any sasquatch in our mountains until she passed in 2005. God bless Pokey, 1989-2005.