West Virginia, 1966. Four terrified teenagers tear down a dark back road in a Chevy Bel Air with something massive chasing them through the sky — glowing red eyes, a ten-foot wingspan, and a story that would forever haunt Point Pleasant. Over the next thirteen months, dozens of locals reported the same winged figure, strange lights in the sky, prophetic dreams, and even creepy Men in Black knocking at their doors. And then, in December 1967, the Silver Bridge collapsed, killing 46 people and cementing Mothman’s place in American legend.
In this episode of Loreplay, your host Dayna Pereira dives deep into the Mothman flap — from the Scarberry and Mallette chase to Marcella Bennett’s porch-side nightmare, to John Keel’s “high strangeness” theories. Was Mothman a bird, an alien, a government oopsie with wings, or a harbinger of doom? Buckle up, buttercups — we’re making deep eye contact with West Virginia’s sexiest cryptid.
Show Notes
What you’ll hear in this episode:
- The November 1966 Scarberry–Mallette sighting that started it all
- The strange fate of Newell Partridge’s dog, Bandit
- Marcella Bennett’s chilling close encounter at the TNT Area
- Dozens of witness reports through late 1966 and 1967
- The arrival of journalist John Keel and his “ultraterrestrial” theories
- Prophetic dreams that eerily foreshadowed the Silver Bridge collapse
- Theories: misidentified bird, mass hysteria, government experiment, alien, harbinger of doom, or cursed omen
- Connections to other “disaster cryptids” like the Black Bird of Chernobyl and the omen of Fukushima
Sources & References:
- Keel, John A. The Mothman Prophecies. New York: Saturday Review Press, 1975.
- Wamsley, Jeff. Mothman: Facts Behind the Legend. Point Pleasant: Mothman Museum Press, 2002.
- Wamsley, Jeff & Donnie Sergent Jr. Mothman: Behind the Red Eyes. Mothman Museum, 2005.
- Coleman, Loren. Mothman and Other Curious Encounters. Paraview Pocket Books, 2002.
- “Couples See Man-Sized Bird … Creature … Something.” Point Pleasant Register, November 16, 1966.
- “Silver Bridge Tumbles, Toll 7 Dead, 41 Missing.” Point Pleasant Register, December 16, 1967.
- Derenberger, Woodrow. Visitors from Lanulos. 1971.
- Various newspaper archives, local interviews, and accounts collected at the Mothman Museum (Point Pleasant, WV).
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