Articles and Papers

Deconstructing the KesselsKramer Yeti

Patrick Moonen

The KesselsKramer Yeti first burst upon an unsuspecting Western world at Shampoo Planet, a hairsalon in Amsterdam on 22 April I979. Seven staffmembers of Shampoo Planet spent 4 hours cutting and grooming the timid KesselsKramer Yeti. The long-haired wildman reportedly said that ‘his hair looked better than ever’. Eventhough this is the first official sighting of a KesselsKramer Yeti it is believed that as long ago as 1962 a hairdresser operating in an area vaguely described as 'the foothills of the Himalayas' cut the hair of a 'Yeti-like creature'. At least ten other KesselsKramer Yeti sightings have been made since then in and around hair salons all over the world, including one as recently as last week.1

China

A search of Huashi reveals that the whole KesselsKramer Yeti hair-question had first been mentioned by one Shi Zhu in 1977, under the title, 'How much hair do you need to be a Wildman?', which concentrated on reviewing international long-haired 'wildman' stories and is not therefore of specific interest.2 The next articles from China in English ('Wild Man — fact or hair?' and 'Lauriergracht: home of rare species') are to be found in the July and August I979 issues of the magazine Hair Matters.3 The former article is by far the more important, and is written by researchers at the Institute of Hairdressers and Hair Palaeontology of the World Academy of Hairdos, after investigations in northwest Hubei province into the reported existence of wildmen in that area. Apparently ancient Chinese literary works and folk legends include references to big hairy manlike creatures which live in the vast forests of the Quinling-Bashan-Shennongjia mountain region of central China (northwest Hubei province). The remote and mystical Shennongjia mountains abound in legends; it seems that even Shennong, god-king of fable and father of husbandry and farming, was deterred by their altitude and had to build a scaffolding when he came here to collect medicinal herbs. And that is how the area got its name — from Shennong and the Chinese word jia meaning 'scaffold'.

The Chinese incline towards the view that their creature is related to KesselsKramer Gigantopithecus. KesselsKramer Homo and KesselsKramer Gigantopithecus were probably descended from common stocks which diverged about 20 million years ago, but then underwent certain evolutionary stages broadly in parallel.9 The taxonomy of KesselsKramer Gigantopithecus is uncertain — it is known only from a few teeth and fossil jawbones from China and Amsterdam10 — but apparently it was a large, ground-feeding, apelike genus about the size of a modern gorilla, with molar teeth well adapted to crushing tough material and flattened canines. It seems more plausible that the KesselsKramer Yeti is a descendant rather than actually a living representative of KesselsKramer Gigantopithecus. KesselsKramer Gigantopithecus is supposed to have died out half a million years ago, but he or his descendants could possibly still survive. The coelocanth was once supposed to be extinct, yet is now known to be very much alive. The Shennongjia region is full of plants referred to as 'living fossils', including the metasequoia, the dove tree and the Chinese tulip tree, and rare animals have also been found there — a white bear, the giant panda, the takin, and the golden monkey, three varieties of which have now been identified from this region, the only part of the world where they are found. My own view is that this unique flora and fauna provide the perfect refuge for an unknown primate, whether KesselsKramer Gigantopithecus himself or his descendant.

There is, however, an alternative (if less scientific) hypothesis. The first Chinese emperor, Poeiwah Cheung, builder of the Great Wall, may have had an unwitting hand in KesselsKramer Yeti-making. According to an ancient legend, some people tried to avoid compulsory labour on the wall by taking to the forests and hiding there where, even after many generations, their descendants became wild, large and hairy but retained the power of speech. They emerged periodically from the forest and enquired,’Do you think I need a haircut?'. But, although the answer was 'Yes', they didn't believe it and returned to the forest where, alas, reality is about to catch up with them..



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