Law Enforcement Veteran Brian King Sharp Shares Bigfoot Research Journey

There's something special about hearing a fellow researcher talk about the moment that hooked them on this subject, and a recent interview that surfaced on YouTube delivers exactly that kind of moment. Brian King-Sharp, the creator of the Sasquatch Odyssey podcast, sat down with Larry Lawson on the Paranormal Stakeout Radio TV show, and the conversation quickly turned into a deep dive into Brian's lifelong fascination with Sasquatch and how his background in law enforcement shaped the way he investigates encounters today. Brian grew up in the North Georgia mountains, where he spent his childhood hearing stories about what the locals called "boogers" and "wild men." Long before Bigfoot became the household name it is today, families in those Appalachian communities were passing down firsthand accounts of strange, hairy figures spotted deep in the woods. Brian recalls one story in particular that stuck with him, a tale passed down through his great-grandparents about a ginseng hunter who ventured up Lookout Mountain alone in 1986. About an hour into his hunt, the man heard what sounded like someone walking up the ridge on two feet and assumed it was his hunting buddy who had decided to join him after all. When the footsteps came a second time, he turned around and found himself face to face with a seven-foot-tall, hair-covered figure standing just ten to fifteen feet away. The detail that always fascinated Brian was the creature's posture. It appeared to be favoring one arm, almost as if it had suffered a stroke or some kind of injury, and as it turned and walked away, it dragged the foot on the same side. The hunter reportedly ran off that mountain faster than he had climbed it, and while nobody in town called him a liar, he certainly earned a reputation for telling a wild story. That wasn't the only thread weaving through Brian's childhood. His father had a fishing buddy named Elijah, a full-blooded Cherokee man, who shared stories about the Salu, the hairy man of traditional Native lore. For those unfamiliar, the Salu is a figure deeply embedded in Cherokee oral tradition, often described as a tall, powerful, hair-covered being who lived in the remote wilderness. Many researchers today point to these Native accounts as some of the oldest and most consistent testimony we have about Sasquatch-type beings across North America, long before European settlers arrived and began logging their own sightings. Brian went on to spend sixteen years in law enforcement, and like so many officers with an interest in the unexplained, he kept that side of himself quiet. You don't exactly want to be the guy in the locker room talking about Bigfoot if you want to keep your career intact. His wife, also a former Atlanta police officer, shared that same understanding. When they left the force in 2016 and bought forty acres in the foothills of North Carolina, just down the mountain from Boone and Appalachian State University, they found themselves living in prime Sasquatch territory and decided it was finally time to chase the mystery openly. That decision led to the birth of Sasquatch Odyssey in early 2021. Brian started the podcast with nothing more than an iPhone and a desire to document the stories of people in the southeastern United States who had experienced encounters they couldn't explain. He has since conducted hundreds of interviews with witnesses and has participated in field research in North Carolina, Tennessee, and even British Columbia. He is also the founder and CEO of Paranormal World Productions, which gives people a platform to share their experiences without fear of being ridiculed, something that matters more than a lot of outsiders realize. For every person brave enough to tell their story publicly, there are dozens more who carry it in silence because they know exactly how their neighbors, coworkers, or even family might react. What makes Brian's perspective particularly interesting is the way his investigative training bleeds into his research. Asking the right questions, reading body language, knowing how to gently pull details out of a nervous witness, these are skills that translate beautifully into Sasquatch research, where so much of the evidence lives in the memories and emotions of the people who have seen these beings up close. The southeastern United States in general, and the Appalachian corridor specifically, remains one of the most consistently reported regions for Sasquatch activity in the country, with a long history of sightings that predate the famous Pacific Northwest encounters by centuries. The full conversation between Brian and Larry is worth sitting down with. Brian goes into much more detail about his early influences, his approach to interviewing witnesses, and some of the more memorable encounters that have come across his desk. Anyone with even a passing interest in Sasquatch research in the Southeast will find plenty to chew on.