Eyes in the Shadows: The Legend of Mothman (Part 1)

In this two-part Chillworthy special, we take flight into one of the most unsettling cryptid cases in American history: the Mothman. In Part 1, we head to Point Pleasant, West Virginia, where a series of bizarre sightings in the late 1960s sparked panic and fascination. Witnesses reported a towering winged creature with glowing red eyes stalking the night—and it seemed to appear just before tragedy struck. Was Mothman a warning? A weapon? Or something far more sinister? We unravel eyewitness accounts, strange phenomena, and growing paranoia in a town gripped by fear.

Stay tuned for Part 2, where we explore the devastating climax of the Mothman legend—and the chilling theories that still keep this story alive.


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DISCLAIMER The content presented on Chillworthy, including all episodes, transcripts, social media posts, and associated materials, is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The podcast does not offer legal, medical, psychological, or professional advice of any kind. While the hosts—Brent and Talia—make a good faith effort to ensure that the information shared is based on publicly available sources and is as accurate as possible at the time of recording, Chillworthy does not guarantee the completeness, timeliness, or reliability of any statements made. Listeners should be aware that cases may involve ongoing legal proceedings or developments that evolve over time. The hosts are not licensed attorneys, journalists, law enforcement professionals, or forensic experts. Opinions expressed in the podcast reflect the personal views of the hosts and do not represent factual determinations or official findings. All individuals named or discussed are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Any resemblance to real individuals or entities, outside of those explicitly named, is purely coincidental. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by any legal authority, news outlet, or investigative body. By listening to Chillworthy, you acknowledge and accept these terms and agree not to hold the hosts or producers liable for any inaccuracies, misstatements, or interpretations derived from the content.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
You're listening to Chilworthy.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
A podcast where two best friends discuss mysteries, murders, and
anything in between for your enjoyment.

Speaker 1 (00:16):
So if you're ready to hear some chilling and unsettling cases,
you're in the right place, happy listening. Hello, Hello, everyone,
Welcome back to another episode of Chillworthy with Brent and Talia.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Hi everybody, how you doing today? I'm very well. How
are you?

Speaker 1 (00:37):
Wonderful?

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Fine, freaking gorgeous out.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
It's a beautiful day, but it is chilly.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
It is chilly, yes, very breezy, but the freaking sky
is so beautiful looking, it is so sunny, and it
wasn't even supposed to be like this today.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Well wonders never sees.

Speaker 2 (00:54):
A nice surprise from mother Nature.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
Yes, you have any updates for us with your fifteen
minute chunk? Uh huh.

Speaker 2 (01:07):
No, not life updates, book updates, That is life.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Okay, Yeah, I mean you've read them in your life.
One assumes you've read them in your life, right, what
are they?

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Okay? So I did, Yeah, I talked about that last time. Okay,
so I started the night we lost him? Okay, and
for a quick minute on what that was? Author is
Laura Dave, Laura Ingleston Wilder.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
You know, when I was a little kid, I actually
thought that she literally did grow up on the prairie
like that. That was them almost like it was some
weird documentary, right, like what the hell? Very bizarre, right
you were a kidd, Oh yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 2 (01:57):
So it was good. I really liked it. It was
about a man who ends up falling off of a
cliff and it's unknown, like did he mean to do that?
Was in an accident with somebody else there with him?

Speaker 1 (02:11):
I feel like you have said this, Oh yeah, no,
a little bit, oh if you said. It starts where
he felt he fell off a cliff and it was
obvious he was pushed.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Maybe I didn't finish it. I thought it was as
if he was pushed. Okay, it seems that way how
it starts. I gave it four stars, very quick read,
very like, you know, it was just like a nice pace.
The characters I thought were all likable. It's essentially his
adult children time trying to figure out what happened to him,

(02:40):
and like there appears to be this big chunk of
his life no one really knew about, and it's they're
kind of trying to piece that together and like what occurred.
So it was I really did enjoy it started lone Women,
finished that. I was going to give that a solid
three stars, ended up moving to four. That's the one
I told you about that. It starts well, it takes
place in nineteen fifteen and it's a horror and I

(03:02):
was like, okay.

Speaker 1 (03:02):
Well, oh the daughter poor gasoline.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Yes, exactly. The book starts the opening. I don't even
know if it's the first chapter, if it's the forward
or or no, maybe it wouldn't be the foreword intro.
I don't know her parents, you know, or to cease.
They're in their beds. She's pouring gasoline everywhere and lights it.
But the way she's acting and she's like speaking to
the bodies, you're getting the impression she didn't kill them,

(03:27):
but you don't know what happened. So it was a
very like kind of like a feminist book, I would say,
but it's not. I don't know, like it doesn't like
I don't want to give too much away. It was
just it was very moving, definitely kept me interested. It
was another like not really a huge book, and I

(03:47):
was teetering. I was pretty solid on three but then
the way the ending seemed to be going, I was
thinking this might actually like go up, and oh my god,
the ending was fantastic. I gave it a four.

Speaker 1 (03:57):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (03:57):
That author is Victor LoVa or Lavalet Leavaler.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
Sure.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yeah. And then remember the Sapphok novel that I read
like probably a year or two ago, Legends and Lattes,
and it was like a fantasy. She's an orc and
she like starts a coffee.

Speaker 1 (04:18):
Shop and something bookstores and bone duster.

Speaker 2 (04:21):
Yeah. So that's this last one that I started. Definitely
not as good as the first one. This isn't even
like my genre, as you know, so I do know
this was getting a little tricky to finish. I gave
it three. I gave it three.

Speaker 1 (04:34):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
In the meantime, I have started which I think you
read this the guest List by Lucy Foley. She's the
one who read who wrote The Hunting Party, which I
freaking loved. So this is kind of along the same lines.
It's a wedding in Ireland on this island that's not deserted,
but like very isolated, and you can't reach it when
there's like a bad storm. Very Agatha Christie esque, somebody dies,

(04:58):
nobody knows who whatever.

Speaker 1 (05:00):
Let me assume there was a storm that happened.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
I don't want to give anything away. I also started
this is that author, not to say that you don't
like her, but whenever I bring this up, you just shudder.
I don't even know how to say her name, Elin
hild her Brand. I told you about, like they're like
the seashore, ocean.

Speaker 1 (05:21):
Exactly what you meant, right, Well, Christmas on the board walk.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
No, but yes, So she has like all these summer
series ones, not the holiday I mean, they're all in
Nantucket still. But so this one is called Golden Girl.
It's this woman who is like very successful, she's an author,
ends up getting killed accidentally. Well you think, I mean,
I assume it's an accident. Maybe it's not. We'll find

(05:45):
that out, but it appears it's an accident, and like
she dies, but then she's observing what's happening down after
her death, like down below on earth. She like I
don't know if it's heaven exactly, but she's in like
the after world of some kind. Yeah, so I started that.
That's good, And I also started Spirit Crossing. That's like

(06:08):
my book book the other two are on my kindle
and it's by William Kent Krueger, and I'm only at
fifteen percent. So basically, it's about indigenous an Indigenous family
and they are like affiliated with the police department. There's

(06:30):
like a police department on the reservation. Then there's like
a sheriff's apartment in town. There are relatives who work
in both. And then this white woman, a politician's daughter,
goes missing and you know, people suspect she's been killed,
but I'm not sure yet. So, like I said, it's
very very early on, but like the family goes blueberry

(06:51):
picking and they end up finding like blueberriyes recently dug grave,
and it's an Indigenous woman, so it's not the politician.
So it's like fine, Like I'm definitely into it. It's
not the most fantastic book so far I've ever read,
but you know, it's fine. And lastly, you'll be very

(07:13):
blown away by this. So you know, we have a
treadmill that I don't use and it's just sitting there.
What a freaking waste. So finally I was like, this
is ridiculous. I'm going to start walking on the treadmill.
So I was saying to Ashley, like, you know, what
am I going to do while I do it? Like
I'm going to get bored? And I never get bored,

(07:34):
and I guess I'll just think about things. And I
was like, you know, I'll just listen to music, I guess.
And then she's like, well, why don't you start an
audio book? Oh, an audio book? And I was like, no,
I don't do that, and she's like that could be
like what gets you to use the treadmill consistently? Like
seeing what is going to happen next in the book
and see yes, son, I don't know. So I went

(07:56):
looking to see what was available, and one that a
mutual friend of ours had sent to me like a
while ago as a possibility for a book. They had
it as an audiobook, the one by John Mars. I
don't think you'd love it. I feel like it's like
for me, it's like passing the time. It's an interesting concept. Basically,

(08:19):
it's like a it's a dating app. I don't know
if it's a dating app. I don't know if you'd
call it that. It's basically like this your DNA matched
with your match, like, but it's everyone only you know
is going to be paired with one person. And if
you haven't like signed up for this, and you may
not have your match, you have to pay money to
like do it. Then you have to pay money once

(08:41):
you are matched to get the results of your match.
And like this could be you could, you know, be
a straight person and get paired with the same sex.
You could be twenty and get paired with a sixty
year old, like, all different variables. So you're following four
characters in this story. So it's good, you know, it's

(09:01):
not fantastic. Like I said, I think it's an interesting concept.
It made me think of one that you started recently
or maybe you even excuse me, had talked about finishing it,
but the one where you said it was different narrators.

Speaker 1 (09:13):
Oh yeah, so that's.

Speaker 2 (09:14):
What this is. So that's good. But I will say
it's just my mind wanders a lot, so I have
to rewind a lot, and it's reminding me of college.
Like if I don't like the voice of someone, it's
harder for me to retain the information of what I'm hearing.
So I'm going to see this through and finish it.

(09:36):
I don't know if this is going to be something
I do again. It's definitely a better experience than when
I told you or I tried to Kill a Mockingbird,
which I knew like was a solid book that I
already liked, but it was Cissy Spasic or whatever her
name is. She was the narrator, and I couldn't couldn't
get into it, couldn't. Do you have any fishfects for
a something?

Speaker 1 (09:54):
I think we're done with those. I haven't bought any
more fish, so.

Speaker 2 (09:59):
I wouldn't say we're done with those. I think we're
just I was gonna say stalling. We're not stalling, We're having.

Speaker 1 (10:03):
I mean, the tank is still going, right, it's overgrown extremely.

Speaker 2 (10:09):
So well, this one plan I said to you earlier,
and I just can't take my eyes off of it.
The way the light is hitting it, and just how
it looks. It freaking reminds me of like a paper
fan with the design. Is that what it is? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (10:25):
Wow? So I am still in the mist Born universe obviously, right.

Speaker 2 (10:33):
Did you go into a deep dive on that for
the Chillers last time you did?

Speaker 1 (10:36):
Ex Yeah, we talked about the metals and yes, yes, yeah, okay,
And so now I'm on the second book. Oh shit,
So you know, I mean it didn't grab me like
Harry Potter did when I was a child. But I
mean it's not I'm enjoying the book, so you know, nothing,
I wouldn't. I'm I still would recommend it as I'm
going through it, but like you know, I'm a I'm

(10:58):
not quite halfway through the second book, so I assume
the last half of the second and most likely the
third should be pretty engaging, usually in a trilogy.

Speaker 2 (11:08):
So as it goes, And you did end up getting
the larger book size.

Speaker 1 (11:13):
Like yes, I got like yes, normal size books, but
these books are like six hundred to seven hundred pages each.

Speaker 2 (11:18):
I six to seven hundred dollars. I was gonna say, geese,
So these are big boys.

Speaker 1 (11:25):
Yeah, they're thick thick os.

Speaker 2 (11:27):
I feel like when I see four hundred, I'm like,
oh yikes, this is a dooozy. But freaking well, no,
I guess it's not double. What did you say, six
to seven hundred? Yeah, that's a lot, a lot, a lot.

Speaker 1 (11:39):
And I saw this thing on TikTok that I started,
which is like spine training your book. Oh so it's
like you it only it's only for paperbacks. But you know,
I remember once you said.

Speaker 2 (11:51):
To me, I can't stand paperbacks.

Speaker 1 (11:54):
I remember once I gave you like a paperback or something,
and you were like, it doesn't even look like you've
read it. And it's because I barely open it.

Speaker 2 (12:01):
You know, I'm pretty rough.

Speaker 1 (12:03):
I open it like just enough to read and then
delicately turn those pages. So these people on TikTok Go,
when they get one, they set it down on a
table so the spine is flat against the table, and
they take both sides of the book and fold it
out page well, not page by page, but like ten

(12:25):
changes at a time. Out lay it down flat, lay
it down flat, so that the spy never actually cracks.
But now all the pages are fanned out, so when
you're reading the book, it's floppy and not real stiff.
So I tried that. It was all right, you know,
but and the spine didn't crack.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
Yeah, which is good. So you'll do this now going
forward with paper potentially.

Speaker 1 (12:50):
At least with this series.

Speaker 2 (12:52):
Right, So related, unrelated, I wanted to say with my
rating system, I was looking at a review on Goodreads
the other day and this girl broke down how she
rates books, Like what A one would mean to her?
What A two? She goes up to five? And I
loved it, and it's exactly what I think. It's exactly

(13:14):
how I view Okay, here we go. It's nothing crazy,
but I just the way she should, the way she
words it. I just love it. So five is she
adored it? Four is she enjoyed it. Three is that
she liked it fine, she's neutral about it, two is
disliked it, and one has hated it. No rating is

(13:36):
she read it too long ago, doesn't remember or doesn't
have enough memory of it to even give it a rating,
like it doesn't pack enough of a lunch. I guess
I loved it.

Speaker 1 (13:47):
I thought that's how it always was.

Speaker 2 (13:49):
I have like three and four. I never knew how
to word how I differentiate between a three and a four.
I guess, more so how I would word three, You know.

Speaker 1 (14:01):
I guess.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
And I loved it. And even in two, I guess
I didn't really know how to say that. I've only
given I think two books in my life two stars.

Speaker 1 (14:08):
I see, I think.

Speaker 2 (14:12):
No, that's not true. One and then there was one
that I gave it one Carolina, Oh my god, I forgot.

Speaker 1 (14:18):
About that too, what a joke. I hated that book.
When you're telling me that this is supposed to be
a true story, and then you're telling me about some girls,
some girl who's in the kitchen making a pie, but
you weren't there to know whether she made a freaking

(14:39):
pie or not, and what she thought about the crust
bull shit. I don't know. We don't have time for that.
We haven't the time.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
Okay, your topic today.

Speaker 1 (14:49):
We're past our fifteen Okay, So my topic is not
going to be a true crime. It is going to
be a you know, folklore, legend, super nature kind of thing. Yes,
something that I think almost everyone has probably heard of.

(15:10):
You'll probably say you haven't, but I was just gonna
say that I think you. I think it will. But
it's the legend of Mothman.

Speaker 2 (15:18):
No idea what you're talking. Oh my god, Oh my god.
I almost dropped my Seltzer can. It is empty. But
as I told you this morning, I thought a can
was empty that I was like, you know, guzzling on
the way to your house, crumpled it, put it in
between my legs to hold, and I freaking got soaked.

Speaker 1 (15:35):
Yeah, you never know.

Speaker 2 (15:36):
All right, Oh, Mothman prophecies in that movie. I've heard
of that movie. I don't know anything else, but.

Speaker 1 (15:43):
Yeah, well, I I've heard of this thing for so long,
but I've like, never had an interest in finding out
anything about it. Why did you then for the podcast?
What a question?

Speaker 2 (15:58):
But what made you? Like, of all things?

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Why are you bothering us with this?

Speaker 2 (16:02):
You never had an intro?

Speaker 1 (16:04):
Because it's popular. I guess we should know about that.

Speaker 2 (16:07):
Oh, it's popular.

Speaker 1 (16:09):
So anyway, listen to this little this little thing.

Speaker 2 (16:13):
Here, I'm listening.

Speaker 1 (16:14):
Okay. I feel like this is like a little like
rhyme that you would tell like your children about mothman.

Speaker 2 (16:22):
To scare them. Yeah, oh, good for sure.

Speaker 1 (16:26):
Okay, when silence swells and winds grow still you love
this shit. The air will shift, the night turns chill,
The shadow moves where none should be. With burning eyes,
you're meant to see a creature glides on silent wing.

(16:48):
Fear within you starts to ring an owl, a bat
or something more, perhaps the moth man at your door,
under the covers, in the blink of an eye, And
hope morning light soon fills the sky.

Speaker 2 (17:04):
I'm easy.

Speaker 1 (17:05):
So that'll keep your children in at night and safe.

Speaker 2 (17:10):
Full of nightmares.

Speaker 1 (17:11):
So yes, that's just a little nursery rhyme about mothman. Mothman.
All right, so picture this. It is a chilly November
night in nineteen sixty.

Speaker 2 (17:26):
Six Cecily nineteen thirty eight.

Speaker 1 (17:29):
Nineteen twenty two. We are in the small town of
Point Pleasant, West Virginia. Two young married couples. The first
couple is Roger and Linda Scarberry or Scarberry as.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
I would say, Thornberry, Thornberry. I just hit the microphone
against my tooth. That's how good I'm being about keeping
it in front of my mouth.

Speaker 1 (17:55):
See yeah, I mean I think you're being good. But
I'll never know when man until I get into editing.
But anyway, and then the other were Steve and Mary Malette.
So they're driving down a very kind of desolate, lonely
back road near an old World War two like real, yeah,

(18:18):
it says sight known as the TNT area, So which
like from those you know, Looney Tunes cartoons.

Speaker 2 (18:27):
Totally thinking of the little dynamite stick thing.

Speaker 1 (18:30):
That wiley coyote, Yeah jackass, I didn't like him.

Speaker 2 (18:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (18:35):
No, So all of a sudden there's there are car headlights.
They catch something strange by one of these old power
plants that are there. And it's a large figure. It's
six or seven feet tall. It has huge wings, and
it has glaring red eyes. And one of the quotes

(18:56):
was it was like a man with wings, one of
the couples had said. They later recalled like with it,
you know, during an interview, not like anything you'd seen
on TV or in a monster movie. So in the
next frantic moments of like these people seeing this, the
creature spreads its wings and ends up chasing the car
as they speed away, apparently in terror, which I mean,

(19:19):
I'd say that's.

Speaker 2 (19:20):
Fair Jurassic Park, if you've seen.

Speaker 1 (19:22):
Yeah that, yes, must go faster.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
I'm alcome, what was that show that we watched but
I didn't know you watched it. I watched it, I
think possibly Netflix, and I kind of want to rewatch it.
It wasn't that outstanding, but I freaking loved it. The
description of this thing is making me think of the
Devil or whatever it was in this show. It was

(19:49):
like very catholic base.

Speaker 1 (19:51):
Oh, I know, I don't know that island, yes, yes.

Speaker 2 (19:54):
That little seashore town. Yeahl was that show? Call? I
don't remember and I feel like there was something catholic sounding.

Speaker 1 (20:01):
It was very religious.

Speaker 2 (20:03):
Yeah, oh gosh, yeah, yeah, anyway, that's what I'm imagining.

Speaker 1 (20:06):
Okay, yeah, that's fair enough.

Speaker 2 (20:07):
Yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (20:09):
So the creature, like I said, starts chasing this car.
There's trying to speed away. Roger, I guess, is the
one driving. He like puts the pedal to the metal,
as they say. He claimed he hit speeds over one
hundred miles an hour. But apparently this winged creature just
like swooped and glided behind them, just keeping up, not

(20:32):
having a hard time.

Speaker 2 (20:33):
Like just effortlessly right there. Now, I'm picturing Winnie on
the in the car, i'd stop. Can we chat in?

Speaker 1 (20:42):
Please? Can we please talk?

Speaker 2 (20:47):
Yes?

Speaker 1 (20:53):
I just want to let's just do some stuff while
I have you. I picture yours isn't a batter reference either,
But what I picture is the guy from Jeepers. Creepers,
I never saw that that movie is horrific.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
For you to say that, just it's very.

Speaker 1 (21:12):
It's a very scary movie in my opinion, like especially
the original. Like they made two like following movies which
are like a little bit lackluster, but that first movie
that was some scary ass shit. I think it was
based on a real story, so, like, which is kind
of crazy because this thing is like a monster mutant but.

Speaker 2 (21:33):
It's a bug or this is about bugs a bug.

Speaker 1 (21:37):
No, it's like it's like a man, but he has
wings like a bat and stuff. So I mean that's
what I picture. And you know, the thing is definitely
he's a scary son of a bitch.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
Yeah. So while we're discussing this, just so that chillers
can look this up if they wish, I want to
find the name of that show that I was just
referencing that we both watched mid Yes Midnight Mass, Yes, Yes,
Midnight Mass. And you know how I heard about it.
I again didn't know you watched it the girls, that
podcast that we've been listening to for years that we're

(22:11):
both obsessed with. Ah, yes, they talked about it and
I thought, what is this and then.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
It was a good show?

Speaker 2 (22:18):
Oh hell yeah, except I feel like it was kind
of I didn't love the ending, Like I felt like
they could have kept this going. You didn't need to.

Speaker 1 (22:29):
End, But sometimes that's the best way to do it
when you want more, yes, instead of when you're.

Speaker 2 (22:34):
Like what continue, where are they going? In this direction.

Speaker 1 (22:37):
Yes, I think that that should be one of our
off days. Is we watched cheapers creepers.

Speaker 2 (22:45):
If you thought it was really scary, though, I feel
like I'm going to be super scared.

Speaker 1 (22:50):
Maybe. All right, So anyway, this thing's flying effortlessly behind them,
you know. Fine, So now the couples they they escape,
they read the town and they're very like shaken up,
and they are like in disbelief of what they had
just seen. And sounds just like your alien story.

Speaker 2 (23:09):
I was thinking that too. Now, were these two couples
boozing it up beforehand?

Speaker 1 (23:15):
Say that?

Speaker 2 (23:16):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (23:16):
Didn't you know? Nowhere was it saying that they were
doing that? Right? I mean maybe? But so so. Roger
describes himself as a tough guy, just so you know,
and he said, even as a tough guy, I'm hard
to scare. But last night I was forgetting out of there.

Speaker 2 (23:40):
I was. I'm sorry what I was.

Speaker 1 (23:42):
I'm a hard guy to scare, but last night I
was forgetting out of there, which I do love the rhyme.
They are like convinced that they had encountered something otherworldly. Well, yeah,
if that's what you're saying is flying behind your car,
then I yeah, if I saw that, I would be convinced.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
As well, sir.

Speaker 1 (24:03):
Now, unlike your two men, they actually went right to
the police, not to the news, not to.

Speaker 2 (24:10):
The newspaper in town with the locked door.

Speaker 1 (24:14):
So they go to the police at two am. And
apparently the sheriff's deputies seemed to believe to some extent.
I don't know, maybe it was just the way they
seemed so serious or scared or shaken up, but they
did kind of like send out some search units to
like just look around this area that they were claiming

(24:34):
to be. Like, shaw me, what's happening, right, So they
go out to that remote area, they have flashlights, they
have radios. They find nothing. So there was no sign
of this birdman as they put it, or whatever it was,
which of course reminds me of Darthy. Don't forget the
birdman God, But that's neither here nor there, right, But

(25:00):
they could tell that these witnesses were, like I said,
absolutely serious and freaking scared. So, oh, you know what,
I'm sorry. It does say none of the four had
been drinking, so and all of them stuck to this same.

Speaker 2 (25:15):
Consistent nuts story right stable.

Speaker 1 (25:19):
So you know, in a small town obviously, news is
going to travel very fast, certainly of a moth birdman thing.
So the very next day, so November sixteenth, nineteen sixty six,
the local newspaper, the Point Pleasant Register, Uh put out
a very now famous headline, and the headline was couples

(25:44):
see man sized bird dot dot dot creature dot dot
dot something exclamation point wow. That reminds me of when
we go to the Holistic health fair and we go
Italian and I go to a table, big table with

(26:05):
a bunch of crystals, a big boy and they'll.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
Write like, oh my god, yes.

Speaker 1 (26:11):
Ctrine wow or you know, amethyst rare. They like to
let us know, which I don't mind.

Speaker 2 (26:21):
With their exclamation points. I just don't know why the
satrine is getting it and not the bumby jassper like
it's you know, it is the more like flashy stuff,
I suppose, but not always no, not always certainly, not
just SuDS. But good call, man.

Speaker 1 (26:36):
So this encounter was the talk of the town and
was you know, because everybody's wondering, like, was there this
red eyed winged creature just haunting the woods in the
back roads of Point Pleasant? You know, I don't know,
something sounds creepy but cozy to me about that, I
guess more because it's like, you know, it's the backwoods,

(26:59):
the back roads, So if you stay out of the
backwoods and back roads, you should be fine. True, you
know you want to go right, Yeah, I'm just saying
you want to go get a fright, like, go back there.
But if not, just chill out right, go get some
ice cream. So in the days that follow this report,

(27:19):
there's kind of like there's a little bit of panic
in the town, I guess, And there's a lot of
curiosity and point pleasant is just immersed in this happen.
So of course, obviously many people laughed it off as
just like a loaf, loaful a bread of loaf, a

(27:40):
local prank, or a misidentified animal. Well that's one hell
of a big.

Speaker 2 (27:45):
Animal, exactly, I maintain.

Speaker 1 (27:50):
Yeah, yes, But then more sightings begin.

Speaker 2 (27:54):
To happen with other people.

Speaker 1 (27:56):
Yes, And once these other sightings started to happen, the
legend of Mothman was born. So the name Mothman, We're
not totally sure, but it was likely coined by the press,
inspired by what was going on at that moment, which

(28:17):
was the Batman TV craze.

Speaker 2 (28:20):
Interesting well, and also how you just said that it
most likely came from the press, Like that's how serial
killers are typically nicknamed by the press.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
Okay, yeah, yeah, I guess there was a killer moth
Man in the Batman or something. No, I think, like,
I'm thinking it was like through the comics that got
to the TV. So I don't think they had released
Batman movies yet in nineteen sixty six. I don't know though, right. So,
but within three days of the of this couple's initial

(28:50):
well the two couples initial sightings, eight other people had
said that they saw a similar giant flying creature flying
around Point Pleasant.

Speaker 2 (29:03):
And that's a good number. Like we're not even talking
three other people, which even that I think would be
like wow, but eight, that's almost ten.

Speaker 1 (29:14):
You're saying a lot of very obvious sentences in a row. Now,
Three is less than eight, Eight is a little less
than ten, Ten's a little less than twelve.

Speaker 2 (29:32):
I'm just amazed that there were that many. My eyes
are water, you know, I mean, that's pretty insane.

Speaker 1 (29:42):
I wasn't wild times. I'll say, yeah, I don't even
know where to go from there. Okay, yeah, so eight
people saw this a similar flying creature.

Speaker 2 (29:53):
Now, may I ask, I guess were these eight were
like two or three to get other or these all
eight separated. I don't have that information, right, I was
just asking.

Speaker 1 (30:05):
But thank you surely. Now, two volunteer firemen reported what
they saw, so I guess two of them were together.
It's at least they saw a large bird with red
eyes and they said it was did not look like
a man. There was another local woman named Marcella Bennett,
but she might have had the scariest encounter of the eight.

(30:29):
So this is what happened to her on the evening
of November sixteenth. She was twenty one years old.

Speaker 2 (30:35):
Oh baby.

Speaker 1 (30:37):
Marcella Bennett visited friends who lived near that. It literally
says her TNT.

Speaker 2 (30:44):
Area that that World War two, right, yes.

Speaker 1 (30:47):
And she had with her her infant.

Speaker 2 (30:49):
Daughter, Oh my god, a legit baby.

Speaker 1 (30:53):
So as Marcella walks back to her car, she says,
a big gray figure suddenly rose up from the ground
behind her.

Speaker 2 (31:04):
No, thank you.

Speaker 1 (31:06):
She said it was quote unquote bigger than a man
with terrible glowing red eyes end quote. So she's shocked
at what she sees. Marcella dropped her baby. Now it
does say thankfully the baby was all right, but she
dropped her baby.

Speaker 2 (31:27):
Please don't tell me, and then she ran.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
No and froze in fear at the sight of what
this whatever, this creature was kind of standing before her.

Speaker 2 (31:38):
She went to go fight it.

Speaker 1 (31:40):
I don't think so, I said, she froze.

Speaker 2 (31:41):
Oh, I.

Speaker 1 (31:46):
Feel like your next thing is like, well, froze starts
with an F, and fight also starts with an F,
and so they also have like they almost like that
they have the same amount of letters, So like, could
that also be that No, I meant froze, not fight.
Oh my god, I guess there was a friend with her,

(32:08):
and this friend grabs Marcella, who's I guess, like hysterical
at this point, and they all run inside the house.
I'm assuming somebody picked up the baby, I would hope so,
and they locked the doors.

Speaker 2 (32:20):
Wait wait wait wait wait, yeah, they're at the TNT thing.
What house was there?

Speaker 1 (32:25):
They lived near the TNT area of this World War
II area. Okay, so they weren't. They weren't like walking
around abandoned gold mines or whatever the hell happens there,
but they were just close to it. So they all
run inside. So this mysterious thing starts shuffling around on
the front porch and looking in the windows at them,

(32:50):
which I know is Chilworth. I just got legitimately, so
it watched them through the windows for a little while
before vanishing into the night. Marcella was so traumatized by
this encounter that she sought medical treatment for anxiety right afterwards. Again,
kind of it reminds me of your ball, yeah, guy, Yeah,

(33:12):
so this was her description. It rose up slowly from
the ground, a big gray thing, bigger than a man,
with terrible glowing red eyes. So that description became one
of the classic first hand accounts that investigators would just
cite over and over again as the description Yeah as
just right, like, hey, have you seen the moth band?

(33:34):
It was blah blah blah blah kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (33:36):
The gray comment makes me imagine almost like this huge wolf,
like a skinny kind of like the thing dare I
say again from Midnight Mass? But but that was, if
I remember correctly, hairless. This I'm imagining, not that anybody's
talking about fur, but I'm imagining like a like the
thing from Midnight Mass covered in like a wolfy gray.

Speaker 1 (33:58):
Fur sort of Well, some moss have that little fuzz
they do have the little suzz I was one for Halloween,
if you recall, so I know what must have. That
was her report. So now there were even more reports
that started coming in. Newell Partridge n E W E LLL.

(34:20):
He was a contractor and he lived about ninety miles away,
so he lived in Salem, West Virginia. He told a
story of strange happenings on the same November night as
the original two couples saw the creature. He says, around
ten thirty at night, he was watching TV and the

(34:43):
TV started acting like weird. It started being like fuzzy,
and you know, back then, reception right, yes, you know.
Now it's like, oh Netflix stopped working, like son of
a bitch. But then it was like, hey, what's going
on here? Satellites and stuff. Yes, so there were like
bas a patterns on the TV, weird buzzing noises, things
like that. Ah. He had a German shepherd, oh what

(35:08):
was its name? Banned it, banned it. He started howling
outside at like just an empty field.

Speaker 2 (35:14):
We assume, yeah, the dog sure shit knows that it's
not empty, and you know it.

Speaker 1 (35:19):
So when Newell used a flashlight to look into the darkness.

Speaker 2 (35:23):
I'm getting the jills, literally every.

Speaker 1 (35:25):
Like perfect, wonderful, that's what we're here for. He saw
two red circles. He said, they looked like bicycle reflectors
looking back at him from the darkness.

Speaker 2 (35:37):
Which is such a specific like I think that makes
his version all of these people I believe but that
they saw this. But I feel like Noule's is so
genuinely like honest and like just has that vibe because
of what he compared it to. That was such a
specific comparison. You know, sure, I just think it it
really solidifies his claim.

Speaker 1 (35:59):
Okay, I mean a bicycle as wheels like a car
has wheels, and those couples were driving in a car.

Speaker 2 (36:08):
It must be true.

Speaker 1 (36:11):
So I guess Bandit sprinted towards the glowing eyes and vanished.

Speaker 2 (36:15):
What a brave soul trying to save his dad.

Speaker 1 (36:18):
Tragically, Bandit never came back?

Speaker 2 (36:20):
Are you effing kidding? That's what he said, The dog
never returned.

Speaker 1 (36:25):
Which of course makes me go right back to that
heinous movie which you love, Jaws, where that dog never
comes back? Your comfort movie. What did you do that
in the Exercist? Yes, but you won't watch Jeeper's Creepers
me anyway. So poor little Bandit never comes back from

(36:48):
what from what Newell.

Speaker 2 (36:49):
Reports that makes me want to vomit.

Speaker 1 (36:51):
The next day though new Old because I mean he
wasn't going out searching, I guess after seeing these huge
red eyes and a dog that doesn't come back. The
next day though, during the daylight, he finds paw prints
that went in circles and then just stopped without continuing,
as if something just lifted the dog in the air

(37:13):
and left. Oh, like he was following dog tracks and
then the dog tracks just stopped. There wasn't like a
scuffle or like you know, like a clearing of like
scratches and stuff, just dog prints and then no dog prints.

Speaker 2 (37:31):
Yeah, and he I assume you would have said this
if this was the case. He didn't report hearing like
bandit yelping or crying or anything.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
No. Yeah, So then he heard about the reports from
Point Pleasant and Partridge then suspected that this could have
been the same creature. And yes, he was miles and
miles away. But if you're a huge ass creature who
can fly, I guess that's not that crazy. I mean
flying on big ass moth wings might get you pretty
are pretty quick. It's you know so, or maybe there

(38:03):
were more than one.

Speaker 2 (38:04):
Who knows more than one moth man?

Speaker 1 (38:07):
Maybe so. Anyway, so he's thinking that's what happened with
his encounter and his dog being missing.

Speaker 2 (38:17):
Rest in peace Beand of.

Speaker 1 (38:19):
Course now meanwhile, a group of grave diggers in a
nearby county, which, of course that one brings me back
to double double toil.

Speaker 2 (38:27):
In Trouble the Moonstone.

Speaker 1 (38:33):
I haven't seen that movie in a while.

Speaker 2 (38:34):
Saying that one is hard to find. I think I
found it on Some have it.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
On TVD so I never have to find it.

Speaker 2 (38:40):
For you, man. I found it in some weird obscure
app years ago. I haven't even tried since the clarity
was so bad, but I freaking sat there and watched it.

Speaker 1 (38:50):
Oh. I love that movie. That's a good So the
there's a group of cave cave grave diggers in a
nearby county, and they also had an odd story. They
claimed that a few days before the Scarberry encounter, they
had seen what they described as a brown being swoop

(39:13):
low over a cemetery while they were digging a grave.
One of the men, whose name was Kenneth Duncan said
the flying figure glided through the trees for about a
minute before it disappeared.

Speaker 2 (39:27):
So did not try to come near them, didn't.

Speaker 1 (39:30):
That's correct. So these tales they spread throughout the local area,
and there was a lot of gossip and newspapers, and
because there was so many different sightings all of a
sudden from so many different people, you know, people were
becoming convinced that something very weird was going on in
the backwoods of West Virginia. Hell yeah, So night after night,

(39:51):
armed locals go out looking for this creature.

Speaker 2 (39:54):
Armed they were gonna shoot it.

Speaker 1 (39:56):
Or something, I guess, and reporters from all over flocked
to this town to get a piece of the action.

Speaker 2 (40:03):
This is insane.

Speaker 1 (40:05):
Which I don't know why all these movie references are
coming to me, but that remains reminds me of Gail weathers.

Speaker 2 (40:12):
Oh, I haven't watched that's another comfort movie, and I
haven't seen that one in a long time.

Speaker 1 (40:17):
I haven't watched it in a long time either, But
I'm very excited for Hell yeah, Jurassic Park. Like what
I thought you were gonna say, They are doing a
next screen too, Yeah, but but yes.

Speaker 2 (40:27):
No, I'm totally in agreement with you on that about
Jurassic Park. That's the summer correct, Yeah, July, I was
gonna say Heaven in the calendar.

Speaker 1 (40:34):
So Mary higher h y are E. I don't know
why I like to spell these last names, but I
want everyone to know.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
Exactly and if they want to look up these particular people,
they have the correct spelling.

Speaker 1 (40:46):
Authors, right. So Mary, she is a journalist and she
works at the Athens Messenger in the neighboring state of Ohio,
and she was one of the first people to write
an article describing this winged, red eyed thing that's been
chasing people around this one specific area of West Virginia.

(41:09):
So national press then they start picking up this story
because it just keeps growing and growing in popularity and
fascination and curiosity whatever. So now the national press services
pick it up and they start calling this creature Mothman,
and soon the entire country knows about Point Pleasant and

(41:29):
this mysterious flying monster that they apparently have on their hands.
So as sightings continue to multiply, some people started to
like genuinely fear that there was a dangerous monster flying
around this town. Of course, so which I mean that
is an interesting thing to think about, Like if people
in a town were where you lived, were just like, yeah,

(41:52):
I saw this thing. It followed me for three blocks,
and then the other ones' like yeah, I was taking
out my trash and I saw this thing sitting up
in a tree.

Speaker 2 (42:00):
I saw the bicycle reflectors.

Speaker 1 (42:02):
Yeah, Like I mean, you would start getting a little paranoid,
one would imagine.

Speaker 2 (42:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (42:06):
So some people were taking it very seriously, in others
or just kind of like excited about a local monster hunt.
So local police in the county sheriff George Johnson, I'm
not going to spell that.

Speaker 2 (42:19):
One, which Johnson can be spelled.

Speaker 1 (42:21):
Well, it's spelled the regular way. They were trying to
assure everybody that there was no monster on the loose,
and the very least it wasn't a supernatural being. You know,
maybe they were misidentifying something. Surely, Yes, So the sheriff
publicly stated that he believed that the reported creature was

(42:44):
just a heron.

Speaker 2 (42:45):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (42:46):
Like the bird, ye, a big bird that locals called
a shitty poke.

Speaker 2 (42:56):
It's probably pronounced like a poke or something. Well s
h I t e p ok e shitte poke.

Speaker 1 (43:05):
Fine, a shitty poke and he was thinking that this
bird just must have strayed from its normal habitat habitat
and ended up here, and people are just mistaking this
big ass heron for a moth man.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
As I've told you, I think, well, I've definitely told you.
I don't know if I've ever said it on here,
that blue heron that I met where we used to live,
and I've named him Frank, and he pops up every
now and then, and I will never forge I mean,
I think I did say it on here. How I'll
never forget the first night that I saw and I

(43:44):
was walking one of the dogs and it was totally
quiet outside, and I heard this like odd sound and
I like looked, well, she looked up, and then it
made me look up and it was majestic like it was.
I couldn't believe the size it was flying solo. The sound,

(44:06):
I absolutely got dinosaur vibes. I mean, I get freaking
dinosaur vibes from a freaking robins right exactly, so it
doesn't take much. But this thing was total pterodactyl material
and it was so moving and it wasn't like a
super dark night. There must have been moonlight or something,
because I could see it pretty well. There's no way

(44:28):
in hell, even though that is such a large bird
that I would have ever thought, actually that might be
a monster. Like you just knew what it was, all right,
Well you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (44:43):
I do. I can't say what these people saw are
what they didn't right. Wildlife experts also weighed in, so
a biologist from West Virginia University. He offered his two cents.

Speaker 2 (44:57):
Great blue hair and knowledge, and.

Speaker 1 (44:59):
He thought that that it might be a sand hill crane.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
Oh my god, they're all so beautiful.

Speaker 1 (45:05):
Which is a tall crane with a seven foot wingspan
and reddish coloring around the eyes.

Speaker 2 (45:11):
Which would match two of these, yes, supposed traits.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
That he thought might have been blown off course from
its normal migration.

Speaker 2 (45:18):
That also, do you know, do you have a picture
of that? Are they normally gray or are they white?

Speaker 1 (45:23):
I don't have a picture of it.

Speaker 2 (45:24):
Because I was going to say if they're gray, that
would also make sense with some of the descriptions describing
it as gray.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
Right, I feel like colors if you're seeing this at night, yeah,
it can all be the same color, and you might
just depending on the way the light's hitting it. How
much light there is what's being reflected. Yeah, yeah, I
don't know. But so not everybody though, buys this bird theory,
especially those who have seen the red flying man up close.

(45:51):
So and of course there is no bird, including like
a peregrine falcon, which is the fastest bird out there
that can match speeds of one hundred mile.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
Now, well good, I'm not used to managing the weight
of the microphone for so long. I'm fumbling it. Yeah, no,
you're right, I forgot about the speed factor in all
of this.

Speaker 1 (46:15):
And yeah, that's and some people said that it like
when they saw this creature and when it took off,
it took off like straight up like a helicopter, not.

Speaker 2 (46:25):
Like a bird, right, like a plate.

Speaker 1 (46:27):
You got it. So now there's this like debate between
the skeptics and the believers about what the hell's flying
around Point Pleasant. So, by one estimate, over one hundred
people may have seen this mothman creature during that year.

Speaker 2 (46:44):
Over a hundred people by.

Speaker 1 (46:46):
One estimate, nineteen sixty six to nineteen sixty seven, though
many refused to talk about it much after, like just
saying they saw it to avoid ridicule, which probably means
a bunch of people, a bunch of others saw it
and just never said a word, Like you said.

Speaker 2 (47:01):
You wouldn't Tippens exactly.

Speaker 1 (47:03):
So yeah, I don't know. I mean, I'm assuming that
probably there was a bunch of people who saw it
and just didn't say anything else.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 1 (47:09):
So whatever this thing was, whether it was a misidentified bird,
mass hysteria, or a legitimate monster, the creature, whatever it was,
did seem to favor this specific area known as the
TNT Area, a deserted track of woods and abandoned concrete
igloos that were high with explosives during world like where

(47:33):
explosives were stored during World War Two. So if you
or anybody else wants to find them, moth Man, that's
where you should be headed.

Speaker 2 (47:43):
And we're talking present day people are still claiming that
there are sightings. Well, would we actually go there? If
we would?

Speaker 1 (47:51):
If we I think the place still exists. Yes. So now,
so fourteen months has gone by and there's you know,
a bunch of Mothman reports that just keep trickling in
and then just as abruptly as it started, it just stopped.
The creature just vanishes. Now what's interesting about this though,

(48:12):
is that when the creature vanished, it coincided with a
pretty much horrible tragedy.

Speaker 2 (48:19):
That happened in the bird community.

Speaker 1 (48:21):
No, that would link Mothman to this catastrophe, like in
many people's minds. So on December fifteenth, nineteen sixty seven,
during the busy Christmas shopping rush, the Silver Bridge, which
ran across the Ohio River at Point Pleasant, completely collapsed

(48:43):
without warning, and it sent cars and trucks plummeting into
the freezing water.

Speaker 2 (48:53):
And I'm sorry when in December was.

Speaker 1 (48:54):
This December fifteenth, right before Christmas. Forty six people died.
It was the worst bridge disaster in American history up
to that time, and it pretty much devastated the community
of Point Pleasant.

Speaker 2 (49:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (49:10):
So in the aftermath, the cause was found to be
a failure of a single eyebeam in the suspension chain.
So essentially a tragic structural flaw that happened.

Speaker 2 (49:23):
That really could have been prevented.

Speaker 1 (49:25):
So almost immediately though after this bridge locals begin to
wonder was this in any way connected to the Mothman.
I'm not sure why you'd connect that, but you know,
because there they were basically saying, like Mothman was around,
he was around, He was around, everybody was seeing him,
everybody seeing him. Now nobody sees him, and the bridge collapses,

(49:45):
and nobody sees this Mothman again, like he like wanted
to go out.

Speaker 2 (49:50):
With a bang, collapse the bridge.

Speaker 1 (49:54):
So now some Point Pleasant residents recalled that a few
people claim to have seen a strange flying creature or
near the bridge just before the bridge fell. To those
inclined like to the supernatural stuff, it seemed like a
very eerie, you know, coincidence. So they began to wonder
if Mothman might have been a like a warning to

(50:16):
this town of Point Pleasant about this impending doom, like
he was like projecting this disaster, a harbinger of disaster,
they called him.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
So not that he did something to the bridge to
cause the collapse, Okay, because I was going to say,
in all these reports that people are making, he did
not inflict harm on howyone, but possible to band it.

Speaker 1 (50:37):
I view it like they were talking about him, like
how the Irish would talk about like a banshee, Like
when you hear a banshee called because somebody's gonna die,
Like the banshee isn't actually killing you, so.

Speaker 2 (50:48):
But just the little warning call you will.

Speaker 1 (50:51):
So more skeptical townsfolk believed that the timing was, like
I said, just a coincidence, because the bridge had been
built in the nineteen twenties and it was old and
over stressed, and maybe a large mothman didn't actually know
what was going to fall down and decide to show
up to tell everybody. But after nineteen sixty seven, there
were no more reported Mothman encounters in Point Pleasant. It

(51:12):
was as if the creature had just come and gone
with the chaos of that year. And then the real
life horror of the bridge collapse happened and it put
an end to the frenzy, and for a long time,
the Mothman legend went completely quiet in Point Pleasant. And
then you know, of course, people are just like distracted,
they're grieving, they're recovering from this disaster, so any talk

(51:34):
of what this giant flying monster was took a back
seat to you know, just trying to rebuild their lives.
So but like I said, there was this huge association
between Mothman and this bridge catastrophe, and it kind of
like cemented itself into American folklore. So in later years,

(51:55):
folks would dramatically talk about that whenever Mothman appeared, some
terrible event may follow, Like I said, harbinger of doom.
This idea that the creature was like a prophetic creature
of doom became one of the central themes of the
legend of Mothman. Stories even cropped up linking Mothman like

(52:17):
apparitions to other disasters around the world. So, for example,
some claim that a Mothman was seen was seen near Chernobyl. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
before the nuclear accident happened in nineteen eighty six.

Speaker 2 (52:30):
Did you watch that documentary?

Speaker 1 (52:31):
No mean either, or some people had claimed that they
saw a Mothman like creature in New York before nine
to eleven, or in Japan before the twenty eleventh tsunami.
People were saying that they thought they saw Mothman. Now,
of course these tales are unconfirmed and mostly just veer
into the urban legend territory, but it shows how Mothman

(52:53):
has grown into a big symbol for the supernatural community
and all that stuff. So while point Pleasant then tried
to move on from this story, this story, Mothman was
not dying, so if anything, it evolved and grew in
the telling of it, you know, it's like that. It's

(53:13):
like how like fishermen or like, oh, I caught a
fish this big, and then he comes back and I
caught a fish this big, and oh it was this
big if it was a mile long.

Speaker 2 (53:21):
Or whatever you whispered down the lye.

Speaker 1 (53:23):
Right, So it just kept growing and gaining more momentum
of this urban legend and stuff like that. So in
the late nineteen sixties and seventies, a few investigative writers
and researchers began determined to basically chronicle what had happened
in West Virginia. So one of these people was Gray Barker,
and he was a West Virginia native and a UFO

(53:46):
enthusiast who had earlier popularized the legend of the flat
Woods Monster, which I don't know what that is, but
maybe we'll do one on that. In nineteen seventy, Barker
wrote a book called The Silver Bridge, which was the
first to put the Mothman saga into print for a
wider audience. Barker's account blended factual sightings with speculative fiction,

(54:11):
introducing readers to this eerie notion that point Pleasant had
been visited by something beyond explanation. But it was another
researcher by the name of John A. Keel who truly
put Mothman on the map and gave the legend its
paranormal flare. Because Kiel was a New York journalist and

(54:32):
a UFO researcher, and he arrived in Point Pleasant in
nineteen sixty six at the height of the Mothman sightings because,
like I said, it was drawing a bunch of people
in and he teamed up with the local reporter Mary
Hyer to interview witnesses and document the wave of weird occurrences,
so not only sightings of the creature, but also reports

(54:54):
of strange lights in the sky, electrical gadgets going weird
like that man with TV. People were also claiming that
they had encounters with the ominous men in black who
would like show up, they would be dressed nice, they
would warn people to keep quiet about what they saw.
So Keel became convinced that the Mothman was part of
a larger web of supernatural phenomenon that were afflicting the area.

(55:19):
So in nineteen seventy five he published The Mothman Prophecies,
a book that wove together the creature's sightings talked about
UFO activity, spooky coincidences, and the Silver Bridge disaster, but
he kind of made it into like a whole story,
which doesn't sound like a bad book, I guess. Keel's

(55:40):
book suggested that an intelligent form from the beyond, whether
it was alien spirits or something else, was at work
in Point Pleasant, and he even claimed to have received
cryptic phone calls predicting the bridge collapse and encountered the
other worldly messengers. So I don't know about that, sir,

(56:02):
but I guess that that's what I take issue with,
not the large flying Mothman, but that this man got
a phone call. I need to check myself. So in
his book's conclusion, it basically linked Mothman as a harbinger
of the bridge collapse. And you know, it just became
super popular with fans of like the legend and stuff

(56:25):
like and the paranormal community, like they were hooked on
the Mothman.

Speaker 2 (56:32):
It's just fascinating. Like, I mean, I'm definitely curious about it,
you are.

Speaker 1 (56:37):
I am. So decades go by, and the Mothman occasionally
pops up in pop culture and TV shows, but it
wasn't until Hollywood came calling in the early two thousands
that the creature truly got brought into like the Spotlight
two thousand and two film The Mothman Prophecies, which was

(56:57):
loosely based on Keel's book Hit Now. I've never seen this.

Speaker 2 (57:01):
I was just going to ask you when I assumed
you head Nope.

Speaker 1 (57:04):
But it starred Richard gear Oh wow as a journalist
investigating strange events in West Virginia. And of course, you know,
this took a lot of liberties from with the true story,
but it captured the eerie vibe of the legend and
these shadowy like apparitions and creatures and weird phone calls
from the beyond. So the film's release introduced a new

(57:27):
generation to Mothman, and once again, now suddenly, now that
it's a Hollywood film, millions of people who have never
heard of point pleasance winged creature were very intrigued, just
as you are. So Sadly, the movie wasn't a blockbuster,
but it did achieve cult status like hocus Pocus, that
too was not a blockbuster.

Speaker 2 (57:48):
That's a good point, which I it flopped. I can't
like wrap my head around that either.

Speaker 1 (57:55):
Fact it's pure art. Right. So one of the low
Charles Humphreys, he said, until that movie came out, I
just never thought much more of Mothman. But the film's
popularity made Point Pleasant newsworthy again, which you know, at
this point, it's like you should start profiting off of this,
oh for sure, like regardless of if it's a bad

(58:19):
thing or not in terms of like Salem and the
Witchcraft trial. You know, the witch trials, like that was horrible,
but it's certainly making their community pretty prosperous now. So
but speaking of that, Mothman does live on in Point
Pleasant now because they decided that they started to do

(58:40):
festivals and created a museum for him.

Speaker 2 (58:44):
Wow. So I think that's nice. I do too, especially
the museum.

Speaker 1 (58:51):
All right, Well, the renewed fame of the film did
something very interesting. It prompted the people of Point Pleasant
to just start like, instead of being like no, no, no no,
I don't want to play in this, I don't want
to play in this, they started to embrace it and
embrace their legendary monster with pride. So they stopped trying
to put the story down or like they act like

(59:12):
they were embarrassed by it, and they began to see
Mothman as their claimed fame, a unique piece of local
heritage that could even attract tourists and unite the community.
So in two thousand and two, like I said, kind
of inspired by the movie and stuff, Point Pleasant hosted
its first annual Mothman Festival. So it started as a

(59:36):
small gathering of a few hundred curious folks and since
has exploded into a major event. Every third weekend of September,
thousands of people from around the world flood this small
town's main street to celebrate their favorite red Eye cryptid.

Speaker 2 (59:58):
Do you know the amount of revenue that probably brings
in the in the town. That's good for them.

Speaker 1 (01:00:03):
I agree, good for them. This festival features guest speakers
like you know, like authors, paranormal people, eyewitnesses. There's live music,
there's costume contests. I should have gone, uh, and even
bus tours that take visitors out to the old tnt
igloos where the creature was once sighted.

Speaker 2 (01:00:24):
Would you go out there for a bus tour? Probably
daytime or evening.

Speaker 1 (01:00:30):
I think if I was in a bus, I think
I do it at night.

Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
You get out of the bus though, as a group, As.

Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
A group that's fine. Yeah, yeah, I'm not interested in
like I don't want to go just like with one
person and we're just taking our you know, we're taking
a Kia out there and parking somewhere and like exploring
like Scooby Doo. No. But if I was like a
tour guide and like like let's look around, let's see

(01:00:58):
what there is to see you and the other thirty
five people, that's a little more. Yeah, I think that's
a little better. Would you? I think you would.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
I wouldn't do it at all at night in a
group or single anything, no daytime, I would do anything.
I wouldn't need that. I don't think I would actually
want to do the group. I would like a guide
sort of person to like, you know, be talking as

(01:01:27):
you're walking and maybe point things out.

Speaker 1 (01:01:30):
But doctor Alan Grant, oh.

Speaker 2 (01:01:32):
My god, what a dream that would be.

Speaker 1 (01:01:34):
It's like, I tell you, what are those Gala Gala gala?

Speaker 2 (01:01:38):
My miss.

Speaker 1 (01:01:41):
Tell you? What is that? Matha matha matha man? So
during this festival you will see families taking selfies with Mathman.
He has a statue. Now he has a statue. Oh oh,
but I'm sure people are dressed up as him.

Speaker 2 (01:02:01):
Yeah, but I thought you meant he freaking comes and
they're doing something.

Speaker 1 (01:02:04):
Yeah, that's exactly what I meant. I don't know, but
I picture his statue to be very much like the
Samantha Stevens statue in Salem. Like people's probably wait in
line to take a picture or something like that. So
they sell Mothman t shirts and cookies, and there's a

(01:02:24):
there's even a Miss Mothman pageant.

Speaker 2 (01:02:27):
Wow. Hell yeah, you really should go with your costume.

Speaker 1 (01:02:33):
So the town that once cowered in fear to this
creature has now found a way to laugh, celebrate, and
profit a little bit from this monster. By the late
twenty tens, festival attendance was estimated at fifteen thousand people
each year, a huge boost for a town of only

(01:02:53):
four thousand residents normally.

Speaker 2 (01:02:55):
So fantastic for them.

Speaker 1 (01:02:56):
I think it is too.

Speaker 2 (01:02:58):
Yeah, if you Chillers have been to this or live there, please.

Speaker 1 (01:03:03):
Tell us, please please tell us.

Speaker 2 (01:03:06):
Get in titched.

Speaker 1 (01:03:07):
Yeah, please. So I told you about the statue. So
it's a twelve foot stainless steel Mothman statue in downtown
Point Pleasant, West Virginia.

Speaker 2 (01:03:17):
I want to see this.

Speaker 1 (01:03:18):
While you're looking enough, I'll continue to tell you about it.
It was sculpted by Bob.

Speaker 2 (01:03:23):
Roach Bob Bobby's Boy.

Speaker 1 (01:03:26):
In two thousand and three, and it stands as a
tribute to the town's legendary creature.

Speaker 2 (01:03:32):
No, wait a minute, did you say, wait a minute?
Did you say the dimensions twelve feet?

Speaker 1 (01:03:38):
Shit?

Speaker 2 (01:03:40):
Do you know? That's always like my image of what
twelve feet is as being a kid at the pool
and that was the deepest section of the pool, fascinating,
which felt like another town to me at the time.
When I would get to the bottom, I loved it.

Speaker 1 (01:03:56):
We went to the bottom of the hell.

Speaker 2 (01:03:58):
Yeah, I loved it. Was when I was super brave.

Speaker 1 (01:04:01):
Yeah, not for me.

Speaker 2 (01:04:03):
Uh, not at all? What I imagine? Dare I say,
I'm a little disappointed. Can you see?

Speaker 1 (01:04:11):
Oh? I can see? Well, what did you imagine? I
think it's pretty.

Speaker 2 (01:04:15):
I guess I get it.

Speaker 1 (01:04:17):
It looks like steel man I said it was a
stainless steel.

Speaker 2 (01:04:23):
Now, but my god, do you see this one with
a freaking dog? God? Love it right underneath him a
little bandit.

Speaker 1 (01:04:32):
I this just looks Listen, don't take Talia's word for it.
Go see it for yourself, or look it up.

Speaker 2 (01:04:40):
I thought he'd look friendlier. I will say, they nailed
the red eyes and they make him look, how.

Speaker 1 (01:04:46):
The hell is that put red eyes on a on
a statue.

Speaker 2 (01:04:50):
Look at them. They're different. It's not like they're they're
creepy red beads. They're like fly eyes. And he sort
of is like very insect like for his I mean,
I don't get a bird vibe at all. Even the wings,
the poor wings have all these holes. I'm not impressed.
Not what I was imagining at all. All right, can
I tell.

Speaker 1 (01:05:10):
You about the museum? Now?

Speaker 2 (01:05:11):
You surely ken? Okay, thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:05:14):
So besides the festival, one of the towns must see
things is the Mothman Museum that was opened in two
thousand and six by Jeff Wamsley.

Speaker 2 (01:05:26):
Wham bam, thank you mam.

Speaker 1 (01:05:28):
He was a lifelong Point Pleasant resident who as a
kid heard the Mothman tales from his father and later
became one of the legend's biggest curators. The museum proudly
calls itself the world's only Mothman Museum and is filled
with fascinating memorabilia, like, for example, the original newspaper clipping
that said man sized bird creature something copies of police

(01:05:53):
reports and handwritten witness statements, photographs of the T and
T area, and exhibits on the nineteen sixty seven and
Bridge collapse. There are also displays about the making of
the two thousand and two film, including some of the
props and costumes used in the movie. So if you
walk inside, you'll be face to face with Mothman artwork

(01:06:14):
and a life life and a life like replica of
the creature, complete with its glowing red eyes. There are
two books that he wrote about Mothman, The Facts Behind
the Legend in two thousand and one and Mothman Behind
the Red Eyes in two thousand and five, and they

(01:06:34):
are books that compile a bunch of interviews and evidence
about the case. So thanks to efforts like his point pleasance,
Mothman legacy has been preserved and transformed into a source
of local pride and revenue. So, since there is a
whole bunch to talk about with Mothman, we are actually
going to do a two parter. So as we wrap

(01:06:56):
up the first part, tell you what do you think
of the moth Man. I mean, you said you'd never
heard of this before besides the movie, Right, when I
think about what you've heard him as a entity himself.

Speaker 2 (01:07:10):
I'm super intrigued, right, I mean, he definitely sounds sinned,
like an alarming fellow to come into contact with. But
like I said earlier, he doesn't hurt anyonet well accept bandit.
But I'm even curious what happened. I mean, did he
take bandit on in his pet? Oh my god? Did
he take bandit on as his pet?

Speaker 1 (01:07:30):
Probably not go for walkie to go get a pup cut.

Speaker 2 (01:07:37):
Right, you know I would venture to guess no, but
you never know. And but that's the thing. It's like
that's the only harm he that we know of his
really inflicted on someone. So I like that he's not
known as this like violent creature. I'm very curious about him.
I love this story. I'm very intrigued. I believe I

(01:08:00):
sure do.

Speaker 1 (01:08:01):
All right, what about you? Yeah, I think like I said,
I think it's a cool concept. I like that it
does mix the creepy factor but not the deadly factor. Yes,
I'm always a big fan of.

Speaker 2 (01:08:13):
That, like do no harm?

Speaker 1 (01:08:14):
Yeah, well yeah, just like okay, you know, like again,
this isn't something you necessarily want to see looking at
you in a window at night. But he's also not
from what we are aware of, a crazed killer who
breaks the glass comes in strength.

Speaker 2 (01:08:27):
Okay, all right, thank you, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:08:29):
Eats your head, got it. So anyway, like I said,
we are going to do a two parter just because
there's a few other things to talk about and a
few other stories to tell.

Speaker 2 (01:08:39):
So quite like a packed topic. And I feel like,
even with what you have done, what you're about to
do in the next episode, there's probably like oodles and
oodles more you could It's just such a huge topic.

Speaker 1 (01:08:50):
But you know, so that's where we're going to pick
up next time. So having said that, until then, everybody.

Speaker 2 (01:08:58):
Stay safe and stay chill.

Speaker 1 (01:09:01):
Bye everybody, Bye, everybody, catch in the next episode. You've
just listened to Chilworthy. Thank you for joining us on
this latest episode. While we strive to keep our discussions
engaging and lighthearted, we also wanted to take a moment
to acknowledge the real lives and events that are at
the heart of these stories.

Speaker 2 (01:09:23):
We try to approach each topic with a sense of
curiosity and respect fully aware of the impact these events
have had on the individuals and their reloved ones. Our
goal is to honor their memories by keeping their stories
alive and shedding light on the mysteries that surround them.

Speaker 1 (01:09:39):
If you enjoyed this episode, please remember to subscribe, rate,
and leave a review, and don't forget to join us
on the next episode of Chillworthy.