A fanciful Bigfoot tale starring Sultan

Published 7:43 pm Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Ian Schimmel has never been to Snohomish County.

In fact, he’s never set foot in the Pacific Northwest.

That didn’t stop the Boston-area literature professor from spinning quite the tale about a Bigfoot sighting near Sultan.

His most recent work of fiction, “What Is Known,” follows the misadventures of a “Snohomish County Police Department” cop and his buddy, a corrections officer. Their small-town lives unravel after they spot Bigfoot on a backwoods road off of U.S. 2.

Earlier this month, Schimmel’s story was announced as a finalist in The Chicago Tribune’s 2010 Nelson Algren Short Story Awards. The awards celebrate the importance of fiction and literature in today’s society.

In addition to bragging rights, Schimmel gets a $1,500 prize, he said.

The idea for “What Is Known” started brewing in 2008, he said. It took him about 10 months — and lots of research — to write it.

He picked the Pacific Northwest as the setting because that’s where most Bigfoot sightings are reported. Sultan caught his eye as a good petri dish for a mystery story, he said.

“I saw these pictures of just tremendous amounts of snow and an almost kind of gothic, almost sublime landscape,” he said. “It was a wild place.” A lot of local towns make an appearance in the story, including Monroe, Gold Bar and Index.

The story explores themes of life in rural America and shows how people in the wilderness stick together, Schimmel said. The fictional Snohomish County Police Department symbolizes consequences in society, he said.

It all starts with a press conference at the “Sultan Town Hall” in October 1986. The tired Snohomish County police chief has to explain to reporters why one of his troops is telling people he saw Bigfoot.

The wild tale spreads, and media across the country run wild with it — to the chagrin of the Sultan townsfolk.

The story wanders around the state before ultimately ending in a cave deep in the Cascades.

Sultan city officials got a kick of the story when they read it Tuesday night.

Mayor Carolyn Eslick is planning to invite Schimmel and his family to come see “the real Sultan,” city administrator Deborah Knight said. They’d love to meet him and talk to him about why Sultan inspired him.

“There were some facts that were obviously wildly inaccurate, but there were some things that were surprisingly close,” Knight said.

Schimmel was a bit sheepish about some of the holes in the story, but they’re part of the fun, he said. He teaches literature and writing at Newbury College in Brookline, Mass.

He grew up in rural Connecticut, and bits of the story are based on his experience knowing all the police officers in his town, he said.

“That’s what the story’s about,” he said. “It’s about being in a place where you’re alone and you’re at the edge of a wilderness, and you’re looking for other people out there.”

The full version of “What Is Known” is posted on The Chicago Tribune’s website.

Rikki King: 425-339-3449; rking@heraldnet.com.