In 1976 Policeman Arturo Padilla of San Benito, Texas, was driving his police cruiser through the wee hours of the morning in when something extroidinary appeared in his headlights. It looked like a big bird. Only a few minutes later fellow officer Homer Galvan reported it too. A black silhouette that glided through the air. According to Galvan it moved without ever flapping it's wings.

A short time later Alverico Guajardo, a resident of Brownsville, Texas, reported he'd heard a thumping noise outside his mobile home at about nine-thirty at night. When he looked out the door he saw a monstrous bird standing in his yard. "It's like a bird, but it's not a bird," he said. "That animal is not from this world."

Sightings of the big bird multiplied. A radio station offered a reward for the creature's capture. A television station broadcast a picture of an alleged bird track. It was some twelve inches long. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, concerned that hunters might mistake a large rare and protected bird, like a whooping crane, for this creature announced that, "All birds are protected by state or federal law."

In February 1976 several school teachers told of a large flying creature, at least 12 foot across, diving at their cars as they drove to work. One of them checked the school library and found a name for the animal: A Pterosaur.

Could there been Pterosaurs hiding in Texas for the last 65 million years? Or could it be the publicity surrounding the discovery of Quetzalcoatlus four years before triggered the misidentification of normal large birds? We will never know, because after two monthsof sightings in 1976, reports of the big birds stopped. The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was.  



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.



SUMMARY

According to eyewitness accounts, Mothman stood taller than a man, at 6 or 7 feet, perhaps taller. Its most prominent features were the huge, featherless wings spanning 10 feet across; even more unusual were the huge, red, glowing eyes on the generally featureless face. Some eyewitnesses were unable to recall seeing a head; these reports stated the eyes were actually in the shoulder area where a neck and head "should" be. Few, if any, could remember details about the presence or type of feet the creature possessed.


Eyewitnesses alleged that Mothman could fly without flapping its wings, and could match the speed of an automobile trying to flee at 100 miles an hour. The creature never seemed to flap its wings when rising from the ground -- it evidently was able to rise and float above the earth's surface with little or no effort, not making any sound or noise.
 

ENTER THE MOTHMAN


The Mothman's glowing red eyes were first reported on Novemember 14th, 1966 in Salem, West Virginia. That evening, Newell Partridge was watching television at his home.
The following is his account:

It was about 10:30 that night, and suddenly the TV blanked out. A real fine herringbone pattern appeared on the tube, and at the same time the set started a loud whining noise.....It sounded like a generator winding up.

....The dog was sitting on the end of the porch, howling down toward the hay barn....

I shined the [flash] light in that direction, and it picked up two red circles, or eyes, which looked like bicycle reflectors....

....I certainly know what animal eyes look like....these were much larger ....It's a good length of a football field to that hay barn....still those eyes showed up huge for that distance.

....It was an eerie feeling. I have never had this sort of feeling before. It was if you knew something was wrong, but couldn't place just what it was. 



Partridge described the intense, morbid fear that swept over him as a "cold chill". The dog snarled and ran toward the eyes, Bandit was never to be seen again. Newell hurried inside and slept with his shotgun all night.

The next day, he and his six-year-old son went searching for the dog, Bandit, a large, muscular German Shepherd. They followed the tracks of the dog. The tracks were going in a circle, as if the dog had been chasing his tail, though he never did that..... There were no other tracks of any kind.





The next night, the creature takes a form.....


FIRST SIGHTINGS AT T.N.T.


At 11:30 the following night (November 15th), a '57 Chevy slowly creeps through the T.N.T. area.

Inside are two young couples, Mr. and Mrs. Roger Scarberry and Mr. and Mrs. Steve Mallette. They're looking for friends who might also be out that cold, winter night.

Their search pauses at the old generator plant on the preserve.


Linda Scarberry gasps.....




"It was shaped like a man, but bigger. Maybe six and a half or seven feet tall. And it had big wings folded against its back......"

"....But it was those eyes that got us. It had two big eyes like automobile reflectors......"

".....They were hypnotic. For a minute, we could only stare at it. I couldn't take my eyes off it." 


The creature slowly turned toward the door of the abandoned generator plant. The door was open...apparently ripped off its hinges.

Scarberry slammed on the accelerator pedal, trying to get to the highway. As they sped past a small hill, the creature appeared and took off straight up in the air. The auto skidded out of the exit road onto Route 62

"My God, it's following us!"

"We were doing one hundred miles an hour and that bird kept right up with us. It wasn't even flapping its wings....." 


It followed the car to near the city limits until the "bird" broke its pursuit.

The couples immediately contacted the sheriff's office....
THE DEPUTY INVESTIGATES




"I've known these kids all their lives. They'd never been in any trouble and they were really scared that night."


Deputy Millard Halstead was on duty in the Mason County Courthouse that evening. He accompanied the couples back to T.N.T. to find the cause of their fear.....




I was on patrol that night....There was a couple parked up in the T.N.T. area and this big bird - or they called it "the monster" - came up and pecked on their window. Nearly scared the life out of 'em.....

.....They met me up there and we looked around. Now, I couldn't see anything at the time..... it was dark. .....We did have a real frightened couple there. 


As Halstead switched on his police radio, a loud screech came out of the speaker - a garble, like a tape recording being played at very high speed. Noticably shaken, the deputy quickly turned off the radio. He left soon after that and reported the incident to his department.




...The next day we had reportings of seeing the same 'bird', they called it, flying near the area. In fact, on the highway, it came down near a car. And just flew over top of the car. And these people were scared also. 


The following morning, Sheriff George Johnson held a press conference about the sightings. All the witnesses were interviewed by reporters.

The news story went out that day.....


WHO NAMED HIM
"THE MOTHMAN"?

As the fervor over the sightings mounted on November 16th, 1966, Mrs. Mary Hyre, editor of the Point Pleasant register, had it put on the Associated Press wire.

The copy editor who sent out the article is reportedly now a professor at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia. Since "Batman" was a popular series at the time, he dubbed the creature "moth-man".




"It rose up slowly from the ground. A big, gray thing. Bigger than a man, with terrible, glowing, red eyes."
---Marcella Bennet, a visitor to the home of Ralph Thomas, then superintendent of the Trojan-U.S. operations in Point Pleasant. Mr. Thomas lived in a bungalow among the igloos of T.N.T.

More and more sightings were reported in the Point Pleasant area. Descriptions of the creature were consistent. All reported the same basic build and features. The same red, glowing, hypnotic eyes. Associated phenomena such as failure of communications devices w
 
And above all, the same uncontrollable, indescribable terror....




"I've never had that feeling before. A weird kind of fear. That fear gripped you and held you."


On November 24th, two adults and two children were driving past T.N.T. and reported spotting the Mothman.

Inside the preserve, thousands of visitors were streaming in every night - fueled by just such reports. It became a media event. Television crews set up at the old generator plant for a glimpse of the nightmarish creature.

To add to the confusion, an inordinately large amount of dog disappearances and mutilations were happening in and around T.N.T. One charred carcass was found inside T.N.T., although none of the surrounding earth was burned.

It has been speculated that this was the end result of "some secret magical ritual by some unknown local warlock," and that this ritual "brought the Mothman into being."

Others theorized that the explosives and chemicals routinely moved around in T.N.T. had leaked and inadvertently caused a biochemically-conceived freak of nature. Perhaps an errant bird, displaced by the igloos, had been forced to rely on spilled chemicals as sustinence, thereby mutating from the nourishment? The Mothman, to them, was the embodiment of our ecological sins.

Still others brought up the Curse of Chief Cornstalk. They believed his 200-year spell had conjured up a winged purveyor of terror. The Mothman, in this case, would be the final realization of Shawnee revenge.

Time passed. The reports continued long into 1967 - over one hundred total. The one-year anniversary of the first sighting came and went during the Christmas season. 


And Mrs. Mary Hyre, editor of the Point Pleasant Register, had a dream

"I had a terrible nightmare. There were a lot of people drowning in the river and Christmas packages were floating everywhere in the water.....There were so many people. I've been feeling uneasy ever since. And everybody else feels the same way. You can't really put your finger on it....but it's like something awful is about to happen."
----Mrs. Mary Hyre, in a discussion with author John A. Keel on November 19th, 1967

The Silver Bridge stretched across the Ohio River from Point Pleasant, West Virginia to Gallipolis, Ohio. The suspension bridge was considered quite an engineering achievement when it was built in 1928.

On December 15th, 1967, the bridge was heavy-laden with Christmas shoppers. The I-beams swayed slowly in the biting, December wind. Workers on both sides of the river were heading home. It was the thick of rush hour. The time was 5:04 p.m.

Slowly, a low moaning of metal rang out, echoing across the river bed.

And then the metal roared.

The bridge ripped out of its moorings on both banks. Broken electrical lines whipped across the traffic like fire-spewing serpents. The cars began to careen into the chilling, black waters of the Ohio River below. Screams and tumultuous cacophony arose to deafen the local communities.

Scattered Christmas packages were battered among the icey waves, as victims cried for help.

Forty-six people plunged to their frozen deaths, many of whom had previously reported sighting the Mothman.

As this living nightmare unfolded, no one stopped to place blame on curses or the occult. The surrounding towns first learned how to deal with their tremendous losses and pain. It was only


Speculations grew as to the cause of the collapse. The curse XXXXXXXX

"The mothmen....got underneath the span of the bridge right where it connects on to the road, and ....flap[ped] their wings until they reached the resonant point of the bridge ....That's what made the bridge fall..... that was all part of Chief Cornstalk's Curse."
-----a Gallipolis native describing one popular theory on the collapse (involving not one but two mothMEN)

There was also a different side of the Mothman.

CREATURE'S KINDNESS?

One Point Pleasant resident, who was a very young girl at the time of the collapse, reported having seen the Mothman outside her bedroom window one night prior to the catastrophe. He just hovered, studying her with his illuminated, red eyes.
 
On the day of the tragedy, the same girl and her family were scheduled to leave on a trip. Their route would take them over the bridge.

As they pulled out of the driveway, her father suddenly had a massive headache, and went back inside to lie down. When he recovered a short time later, they turned on the radio to hear of the disaster they narrowly avoided.

Was the Mothman protecting this child he favored? Did the Mothman have mind control powers that allowed him to cause her father's headache?

Whatever the cause of the collapse, it put an end to most of the Mothman sightings. The resulting suffering of the area residents no longer allowed them time to entertain the unexplained.

There have been more sightings since then, but none to match the frequency of which the reportings came in that 13 month period between November 1966 and December 1967.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Most every question regarding the Mothman will, most likely, go forever unanswered. But what do we know about him from the available information....?

Be approximately 7 feet tall
Have a wingspan over 10 feet wide
Have grey, scaley skin
Have large, red, glowing, and hypnotic eyes
Be able to take off straight up in flight
Travel up to 100 miles an hour
Like to mutilate or eat large dogs
Screech or squeal like a rodent or electric motor
Like to chase cars
Like to "nest" in remote, unpopulated areas
Cause radio and television interference
Be drawn to, and protective of, small children
Have some mind control powers



The Theories


Chief Cornstalk's 200-year curse on the town of Point Pleasant

Chemical spills or experimentation by chemical companies or the military

An occult ritual that summoned him from the the other side

A mutant strain of the "sandhill crane"

An extra-terrestrial

Projection

US Army psy-op  eg: test of a XXXXXXXXXXXXX






What has happened to those who reported sighting the Mothman?

ROGER AND LINDA SCARBERRY DIVORCED

MANY MOVED TO DISTANT STATES

SEVERAL SUFFERED NERVOUS BREAKDOWNS AND SOME WERE FORCED TO UNDERGO LONG HOSPITALIZATIONS

A FEW COMMITTED SUICIDE

MANY DIED WITHIN SIX MONTHS OF THE SIGHTINGS....ESPECIALLY ON THE SILVER BRIDGE

MRS. MARY HYRE DIED WITHIN THREE YEARS OF HER DREAM PREDICTING THE SILVER BRIDGE COLLAPSE