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The Mystifying Mothman & The Lizard Man
15 Plays4 years ago
This week we are discussing the Mothman and the Lizard Man of Scape Ore Swamp.
If you have requests for future episodes or just want to hang out follow us on Instagram @sinistersisterspodcast
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Transcript
Introduction to Sinister Sisters Podcast
00:00:11
Speaker
Welcome to the Sinister Sisters podcast. I'm Lauren. I'm Felicia. We're best friends. And we like spooky stuff. And that's it. That is all true. That is all true. We love spooky stuff.
Exploring Bigfoot: Folklore and Complexity
00:00:22
Speaker
Yes. Well, how have you been? I've been good. I've been looking at some weird stuff, trying to get, I was like trying to get ahead to see if there was anything else that was interesting to me as I researched my topic this week. I don't know that I found the perfect thing yet. So TBD for next week.
00:00:40
Speaker
Yeah, well, so I think last week we talked about you doing Bigfoot and I actually I totally get where you're coming from because we texted about this and Lauren basically said it's like such a big there's so much about Bigfoot. It's like it's like the biggest United States legend, isn't it?
00:00:58
Speaker
I think pretty much. It also was hard because I was like, Oh, right. There's like many different names, many different types. Like there's some that are in Canada. There are like similar legends and other cultures even. So I was just like, I just felt like a lot to talk about. I honestly might even want to do like a more focused or like specific Bigfoot
00:01:23
Speaker
category. Yeah, so I'm gonna have to look back into that again, but it was just like, oh my gosh, this is, I forgot, he's the biggest foot. And then too, I was like thinking about, I wanted to talk about like the different movies that like have, you know, come off of that or been inspired by all those legends. So many. Every cartoon ever made has an episode with Dick, but I swear.
00:01:48
Speaker
Yes, exactly.
Switching Topics: The Lizard Man and Mothman
00:01:50
Speaker
And so I was just like, I need to not do this this week, rethink it, and maybe come back. So I am doing The Lizard Man of Scape or Swamp this week. Amazing. Which is very exciting. I came to a very similar conclusion.
00:02:06
Speaker
Because last week I said I was going to do the Jersey Devil, and that was another one that just felt pretty vast to me, and I just scaled it down. Instead, I'm going to be talking about the Mothman. Yes. That's cool. I think they're going to be good in conversation with each other. A good little pairing.
Film Recommendations: Possessor and Evil Eye
00:02:29
Speaker
Yeah, but you're doing okay.
00:02:32
Speaker
Yeah, I'm good. For recommendation corner, if we want to hop into that, I just I'm gonna work them in the movie that I watched literally today. I watched possessor. And it actually came out in in theaters a few months ago, I guess, but obviously, we're in New York and our theaters are closed.
00:02:49
Speaker
but I just hit VOD and I rented it and I loved it. It's kind of like Black Mirror Escort. There's this company that basically puts
00:03:05
Speaker
assassins brains into other people so that they can do the dirty work for them like in the body or someone that like makes sense for that particular assassination. And I thought it was really cool. It has the girl from Mandy who I love. I love that girl. I know she's so great.
00:03:27
Speaker
Andrea Riesboro. Yes, that's right. She's such a cool actress and I really like her like her vibe is just so interesting. So good. I love that. I was just thinking about I watched, I cannot think of the name now I'm really having a moment because I watched Black Box and then I watched another Blumhouse movie. Lie to me. Or what's the other one? Evil Eye.
00:03:55
Speaker
evil eye. Is that the one of the characters Indians? Yes. Yes. Okay. I did not watch it. I loved it so much. I highly recommend. I just thought it was really good. And there was, there was like a more theater actor guy that I'd, I'd seen an auditions in the room and he was great. And I just felt, I felt very proud of everyone in it. Just some really nice acting. I love that feeling in a movie. We're just like, Oh, everyone's like doing the work and they're doing a good job.
00:04:25
Speaker
Yes. So those are my two horror things.
Media Consumption: Podcasts and Shows
00:04:28
Speaker
And then I did want to say I started watching the new season of Big Mouth, which I feel like you don't like. I've just never seen it. I don't know. OK. I feel like you're not so much like an adult animation person.
00:04:39
Speaker
Only Bob's Burgers is the only one I consistently watch. Yes, but I'm liking this new season even more than the last one, I think. And then I also started listening to This American Life for the first time in my life, which is just an NPR podcast that I'm totally obsessed with. Yeah, it's just people's stories, right?
00:04:59
Speaker
Yeah, they're each like kind of like I listened to one about rom coms that I loved. And then I listened to one about breakups that I loved. And then I listened to what was the third one that I want to talk about? There was one with like how people are like dealing with the election. And I thought that was super interesting. I don't know. It's just very, it's like such
00:05:24
Speaker
Yeah, just talking to such real people and so many different lifestyles and different points of their lives. That's awesome. I want to get back into podcasts because I feel like I used to listen to so many on my commute. Yeah. And also when I was in the office. And now in remote, obviously, I barely leave my house. So I feel like I transitioned more into having random things on in the background like YouTube or Law and Order SE or things.
00:05:53
Speaker
versus just like listening to something. I just kind of like that in the background, but I miss podcasts. I do always listen to my favorite murder when I'm cleaning. That's my cleaning thing where I put on my headphones. And if I do the dishes, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna do the dishes. But I get to listen to my favorite murder. I love that. That's such a good incentive for yourself.
Soft White Underbelly and Spooky Family Stories
00:06:14
Speaker
Oh, I'm gonna recommend one more thing.
00:06:17
Speaker
And it actually kind of ties into my story a little bit, which is interesting. And that is a YouTube channel that has been around for a long time, I think, and I'm sure a lot of people know about it, but I just started watching and it's called Soft White Underbelly. And it's this guy that interviews people from
00:06:36
Speaker
different walks of life. He interviews people that are convicted murderers or people that are in the sex industry or people that are a lot of homeless people. And he does these drug addicts, heroin addicts, crack addicts. He does these really beautiful, in-depth interviews about their lives and how they got to that point.
00:06:58
Speaker
He also did a series of interviews about people in the Appalachian Mountains, people that live straight up in the mountains, which is really interesting. And I say that because my story today starts in West Virginia. But I don't know. I haven't watched all of them yet, but they're really fascinating. And just listening to how people got to a point in their life and
00:07:25
Speaker
like them trying to like in the interview like thinking about how they could turn it around or like what they actually want out of life like and like I said there's a lot of people that a lot of drug addicts that are homeless and like how they got there because yeah it's just really interesting um highly recommended they're very sad stories obviously
00:07:43
Speaker
Yeah, I was going to say, that sounds like a real doozy. Yeah, I know. It's definitely really sad stories. But I love that stuff. It's the same way I listen to the Dateline, where it's like, I know it's all sad, horrible information, but it's so addicting for me. Totally. No, I totally get that. Do you cry? No. One girl I did almost tear up because she was so young. There was this girl that
00:08:10
Speaker
She basically had bad things happen to her. She already had depression issues, and she ended up becoming a heroin addict. And she was just so young that it was so sad because I was like, he didn't have to end up here, but I can understand how you did. So it's interesting. And it's a great portrait of these people because a lot of them are not bad people. They're just people that
00:08:39
Speaker
wife circumstances have like spiraled them down to this place and they just don't know how to get out. And it's really interesting. But yeah, soft white underbelly. I will definitely check that out. I love things like that even if they are hard to listen to. Yeah.
00:08:57
Speaker
So should we jump in? Oh, I was gonna say yes, but I have to mention one thing before we go into stories. And that is so last week I did the devil's tramping ground in North Carolina. That evening right after we recorded I did my family zoom with my parents and my brothers. And my oldest brother Thomas, he spent a lot more time in North Carolina than I did.
00:09:22
Speaker
because he's actually my half brother. So his dad lived there. So he obviously would spend a lot of time there with his dad. And then he also moved there when he was like early in adulthood. And so I brought up that I did that on the podcast. And my brother was like, Oh, yeah, like we used to party out there all the time. And I was like, Wait, what? I was like, you've been to the devil's trimping ground. And Andres goes, Yeah, Thomas took me there one time. And I was like,
00:09:48
Speaker
Okay, so everyone's just been to this place except for me. And then actually Thomas gave me a whole list of other kind of creepy, spooky places because apparently his friend Robbie, who I've known a lot of my life as well, likes to kind of go investigate weird places.
00:10:09
Speaker
Yes. I was like, how did I not know about any of this? So it was very thrilling. And he said that nothing really spooky had happened while they were there, but they did like camp in that area. And he's, you know, he said it's a big party spot. So that was interesting. I love that. Well, we're gonna have to go party in the tramping ground with your brother. I'm ready. I'm ready. Let's do it.
00:10:33
Speaker
Um, you want to go first or me? I don't mind. I was going to say, should I
The Lizard Man Saga: Origins and Sightings
00:10:37
Speaker
go first? Since I think I made you last week. Yeah, go for it. I'm ready to listen. Okay. I'm really excited. Um, so yes, as I said, I am doing the lizard man of scape or swamp.
00:10:49
Speaker
So first off, I just looked it up before we started recording because I was like, oh my gosh, I don't know what skateboards means. Yeah, I don't know what that means either. But apparently it means like escape over. So escape or swamp is what it's called.
00:11:05
Speaker
escape over the swamp is basically yes so it's located in bishopville south carolina and it's home to the lizard man and he's also known as the lizard man of lee county which is just like another you know neighboring area but he said to inhabit the sewers and abandoned subways in town near the swamp as well as obviously the swamp itself and the first reported sighting of this creature was made
00:11:33
Speaker
by George Holloman Jr. in the fall of 1987, but it's actually the report of Christopher Davis, who was a teenager, a 17-year-old local man, and he made the lizard man famous. And I'll get into it a little bit, but they have definitely, like, this town has embraced this lizard man thing to the max. It's like a tourist, like their way that they give tourists there.
00:12:01
Speaker
There's t-shirts and all of this stuff, but we'll get to that. That's the same with mine. I feel like our stories are going to be perfectly paired. Yes, we didn't even mean to. We're perfectly paired. Christopher Davis, the 17-year-old, this is the first account of the lizard man. He said he came upon the creature while driving home from work at 2 AM on June 29, 1988.
00:12:26
Speaker
According to him, he stopped on a road bordering the swamp in order to change a tire which had blown out. When he was finishing up, he reported hearing a thumping noise from behind him and turned around to see the creature running towards him. Davis said the creature tried to grab the car
00:12:44
Speaker
and then jumped on the roof of the car as he tried, as Christopher Davis tried to escape. So the creature was clinging on to the roof of the car as he swerved from side to side in an effort to throw it off. And he described, I know, right? He described this creature as having red eyes, three fingered, big web tans, long black nails, and green rough skin.
00:13:10
Speaker
I know so it stood about seven to nine feet tall it was very fast and very strong but thankfully he was able to shake it off the top of his car. So when he made it home he found his side view mirrors be badly damaged and scratch marks on the roof of the car but no other physical evidence of his encounter.
00:13:31
Speaker
I mean, the scratch marks. That seems like good evidence. Yes. His parents said he was so afraid that it took him two hours to settle down after this. And he actually went to the police station and was able to make a sketch of the creature for the police. I'll have to show you a sketch, but it's basically like a very simple, tall figure.
00:13:56
Speaker
Oh, I can't wait. We'll put it on our Instagram. Put it on our Instagram with not really anything super specific about it, in my humble opinion. But the sheriff said that his story never wavered. So the sheriff, it seems like I was watching some interviews with the sheriff at the time. And he honestly, in the sweetest old man sheriff way, really seems like he believed this kid really was like, we got to get to the bottom of it.
00:14:25
Speaker
And in the month that followed there was several further reports of a large lizard like creature and people reported unusual scratches and bite marks found on cars parked close to the swamp. So ask is this a two legged runner or a four legged runner seemingly.
00:14:44
Speaker
two-legged upright. Oh, that's like a man. Yeah, everything that people say about it is like half lizard half man. Yeah, some people some people describe it as like an alligator with like walking upright but having a shorter nose and longer legs. What?
00:15:04
Speaker
It's been an alligator. I know. I love it so much. I just love- I showed Felicia right before we started the only real picture of this lizard man, supposedly, and it just looks like a dude in a suit. Nah, it can't be real. I do like that there is a source on it though. There's a source, Sarah Barra.
00:15:27
Speaker
Yes, yes, we will get to Sarah. Oh, okay, great. Yes, so most of the occurrences that people were reporting were taking place within a three-mile radius of the swamps. And at the time, yes, at the time the local law enforcement was concerned because there were a sufficient number of sightings and apparently reliable people, but they sort of felt like it was probably a bear or a coyote or something that is an actual animal.
00:15:56
Speaker
But at least 12 people claimed to have seen it. So two weeks after the original sighting by Davis, the police were called to the scene of a car that was attacked in the night, not too far away from the swamp.
00:16:10
Speaker
The fenders had been ripped off, the antenna bent, deep scratches along the body, and the chrome trim had been seemingly chewed off. So this was at the time that the sheriff's department was able to make plaster casts of the footprints that were seemingly three-toed footprints.
00:16:28
Speaker
14 inches in length and like not I know and not so they had a marine resources. So the South Carolina Marine Resources Department spokesman whose name is Johnny Evans, he looked at the tracks and said that they did not match the footprints of any recorded animal. And you can still see pictures of these molds and they look like three fingered, you know, long toes.
00:16:55
Speaker
But the local law enforcement decided against sending them to the FBI for further analysis after biologists advised them that they were unclassifiable.
Cultural Impact of the Lizard Man
00:17:05
Speaker
So I'm like, why don't you just send it to the FBI? I mean, yeah, and also what biologists? That's what I always wonder. I'm just like the local South Carolina biologist. Who was the expert? Yeah, let's send it to the FBI and just see.
00:17:22
Speaker
But anyway, the local law enforcement tried to find out if there was anywhere else in the southeast that had any reports of mauled cars, but they weren't able to come up with anything. So this is sort of the time where after these two occurrences, it kind of blew up in the media.
00:17:41
Speaker
So it started attracting tourists and hunters who were interested in tracking this animal. A nearby radio station called WCOS offered a $1 million reward to anyone who could capture the creature. And it just created this real monster mania. So this is where they started selling lizard man t-shirts. And the local chamber of commerce encouraged the media attention.
00:18:06
Speaker
because it was good for the community to have all these tourists. My favorite story though is that there was a woman who reportedly covered herself in aluminum foil to try to attract the lizard man as he was like seemingly attracted to the chrome of cars. Is that also a thing with like people
00:18:27
Speaker
I don't know, there's something about aluminum foil that's supposed to, oh, I think it's supposed to detract from people being able to get you or something. Haven't you seen that in movies and stuff? I think it's a, I was gonna say, I feel like it's the alien, the alien idea, like the twin foil hats and all that. Totally. Um, so. But she did the opposite where she was like trying to get him to go towards her. I know, now I'm like, maybe whatever Wikipedia article I was reading is also incorrect. Maybe she was really trying.
00:18:57
Speaker
But I just like the idea of covering yourself in aluminum foil. Me too. That feels nice. So anyway, there were many cases this summer obviously, or many sightings, but they started to sort of decline at the end of the summer. And on August 5th, Kenneth Orr
00:19:15
Speaker
who was an airman stationed at the Shaw Air Force Base. He filed a report with the police saying that he had encountered the lizard man on Highway 15 and that he had shot and wounded it. He presented several scales and a small quantity of blood as evidence. So then two days later, he went away, supposedly got away.
00:19:41
Speaker
He withdrew this account two days later when he was charged for unlawfully carrying a pistol and for filing a false police report. So he claimed to have just invented this sighting in order to keep stories of the lizard man going. But I'm like, he had to come up with scales and blood.
00:20:00
Speaker
This was a lot of steps. What if he's not an actual actual alligator? That would be so mean. I feel like he must have shot something. Maybe a fish. I don't know. But over the over the decades following, there have been a couple of sightings on occasion and automobile similar like damage to cars reported, but nothing like that summer. So, as I said earlier, the law enforcement officials sort of speculated that it was likely to have been caused by a bear or a coyote.
00:20:30
Speaker
But the next big sighting was by this incredible woman named Dixie Rawson, who you can see interviews of. She is just like a South Carolina born and bred woman, and I love her. But in 2008, she sent WIS News 10 an email about a big surprise at her house on the morning of February 28th.
00:20:55
Speaker
So the whole front half of their van was chewed up with bite marks right through the front grill. Both sides of the van about above the wheel wells were bitten and the metal was bent and they found blood on the car as well. So now we've got blood again. I made such a nice surprise.
00:21:16
Speaker
Just a little surprise that she found. And then in addition to the car damage, they also had, this is just the best part of the story. So they had cats that they kept in cardboard boxes on their porch. And by cats, I mean they had 20 plus cats on their porch. That's a lot of cats. So they did not find, so some of the cats
00:21:43
Speaker
They didn't find any of the cats in the boxes where they usually sleep and the towels inside the boxes were totally shredded. And the same story with like the morning paper on their porch. So they at the time that like this, the article that was written about this, so that was, you know, again in 2008, that there were cats that were still missing at the time, which is deeply upsetting to me, but I'm hoping that it was just because they had 20 plus cats and they just ran away and then they all came back.
00:22:14
Speaker
I hope so. I'm really sad if they ate the cats. Yeah, right. So because of, you know, new science, they were able to do DNA testing on the blood. And unfortunately, they concluded that it was a domestic dog. No.
00:22:33
Speaker
I know. I have a lot of questions. So I guess the more I was looking into it, I guess the DNA, or at least what they determined in this test, it could have been similar enough to be a coyote or a wolf. But I still feel like being able to chew into a van. To meddle. There's no way. Yeah.
00:22:55
Speaker
But when I think about, I know crocodiles and alligators, their downward bite is really strong. And I know they have, I can't remember if it's crocodiles or alligators because I don't remember the difference between them. But I know when my aunt lives in South Carolina, one time I was at her house and we walked over to a pond where there was the alligators. I know that they have those there.
00:23:21
Speaker
Yeah, that's what I mean, I don't know. I feel very confused about all of it because I'm also like, I don't know that I mean, I guess a bear could do it, too. I don't know. I don't know. But also, like, was there a dog that, like, cut itself on the car and then also a bear or an alligator or Elizabeth King? Whatever did the damage, like, had attacked a dog and, like, just got it. Yeah.
Debunking and Skepticism of the Lizard Man
00:23:49
Speaker
Oh, I like that, Felicia. Thank you. So that was 2008. Then the next case was 2011. There was a similar case of kind of mysterious car damage. It was Leon and Adam Marshall, and they found their vehicle riddled with what appeared to be teeth marks that went completely through the fender, according to WLTX television.
00:24:15
Speaker
And then the next, uh, sighting was in the summer of 2015, which is that woman that took her name, Sarah, uh, that took a picture of the creature with her phone, which also it says as she left church, which I'm like, what? So did everyone see it? And also like 11am or like 10am. I mean, that picture looks outrageous.
00:24:37
Speaker
The picture is truly like a man in a suit. Oh wait, for the 2011 one, are there pictures of the car damage? I mean, that feels really recent. I think there are. I should find a picture. If we have some pictures, maybe we'll post those too. Yeah. There are some good car pictures of the damage that look crazy to me. Yeah, that's wild. Like across the cases, I mean. There were pictures that I was able to see and be like, what the heck? Like, how does that happen?
00:25:05
Speaker
Right? And then I'm like, was it like a rabid animal that's like going crazy? I don't know. But the 2015 case was like, you know, definitely blown up and like made fun of like James Corden had like a thing on his show about like, are you kidding? Like, who is this? And then the other thing that I thought was so funny was that in 2017, when there was the like the big solar eclipse,
00:25:30
Speaker
The South Carolina Emergency Management Division tweeted out a maybe humorous maybe I guess it's a joke tweet about like watch out for lizard people because like they're nocturnal and so in the solar eclipse like they're going to get confused and come out of hiding.
00:25:51
Speaker
I love a promotion of mass panic. Yeah, that's why I was like, I guess this is a joke, but like some of the people in South Carolina are not joking. Yeah, they believe. So maybe don't like raise alarm at this time in a solar eclipse. But anyway.
00:26:09
Speaker
So now there's like a little bit of debunking I wanted to talk about. There was an investigator, a skeptical investigator named Ben Radford, who kind of looked into Chris Davis's like original story and kind of felt like it didn't hold up to scrutiny.
00:26:26
Speaker
So he said that over weeks and months and repeated tellings, the details changed. I guess at some point, I mean, so obviously most of the accounts are the creature has scales or reports of the creature having scales. But then at some point he said that the creature looked like it was packed with mud. So then he was like, how could he tell that there were scales? And then sort of the distance away, like how far he was away from the creature.
00:26:54
Speaker
And having it being so late at night, it was like how much could he really have seen? It was a heavily wooded area. The moon wasn't bright that night. And also the account, or I guess one of the accounts that Davis talked about was he saw the creature in the shadows while he was closing the trunk of his car, but he still had time to like go around, get back into the car and take off.
00:27:21
Speaker
But then also claims that the creature was so fast that it caught up to the car going 40 miles an hour. So there's some discrepancies on how speedy this creature is. And then the other part of this story, so Christopher Davis, this first case, there actually were no pictures of any car damage evidence. Later cases had pictures, but not this first case.
00:27:50
Speaker
But I don't know, I feel like there are enough people. That first case was in the 80s, right? Yes. And then when was this? It was really all the summer of 88 was when it was like multiple people, multiple car, car maulings. And then each of the, like basically it was like 2008, 2011, and then that one picture in 2015 were all sort of individual stories. I see, I see, okay, got it.
00:28:18
Speaker
which like I don't know I feel like in some ways it's kind of a cool thing for this town like if you google scape or swamp it's like everything that comes up as lizard man and even if you look up bishopville south carolina a lot of what comes up is is this lizard man which I think is
00:28:37
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. But anyway, my last little thing I'll say is if you want to learn more, I haven't looked into these things yet, but there's a TV program called Destination Truth that featured the Lizard Man. And there's also the children's book, Maniacal Monsters and Bizarre Beasts. And then Linda Godfrey's American Monsters also has a chapter on the Lizard Man. And he also appeared on the sci-fi show Fact or Faked.
00:29:05
Speaker
in an episode titled Reptile Rampage. So if you want to look into more Lizard Man details, you can look there. And then the other thing is that the original story ran in more than 100 newspapers across the country. And there is also a festival named after him now that takes place in the town and people do cosplay and dress up and I just love it. Love that, Lizard Man.
00:29:32
Speaker
That's amazing. I really hope on that whatever that show you said factor or whatever. I hope they addressed Sarah's photo. Me too. I think they have to. Yeah. But the other thing I wanted to say is that there's like some funny stuff out there with the Ripley's believe it or not lizard guy. Do you know him? Oh, yeah.
00:29:57
Speaker
Yeah, he was totally tatted up and has his tongue forked and he has all this funny stuff about the lizard man being his arch nemesis and not believing he's real because he has never been seen in daylight where the Ripley's guy is real. Because he's in the daylight. Yeah, it's just really silly, but that's the lizard man.
00:30:27
Speaker
Since we don't have official ads for the podcast yet, we'll do one for ourselves. We would love if you could subscribe to us and leave a review. Also, if you want some pics to go along with the episodes, follow us on Instagram at sinister sisters podcast. And now on to the next story.
00:30:44
Speaker
That was fun.
Introduction to Mothman: Modern Folklore
00:30:45
Speaker
It's so funny because as you were talking, there was just so many similarities between yours and mine. Oh, now I'm sorry I went first then. No, it's kind of a cool thing though, just in terms of a town kind of capitalizing on this crazy stuff that happened. Yes, I can't wait. I can't wait to hear.
00:31:08
Speaker
So yeah, I'm talking about the Mothman. And the thing about both our stories I want to bring up first is that they're both kind of modern folklore, like mine takes place in the 60s years in the 80s. I feel like typically when we think about like, folklore, like urban legends, like, they feel so old. To us, like they feel like they've always been a part of our culture. And honestly, like the US is like a young country in terms of the world. But it is, it's cool that both of these are like, you know, in the last
00:31:39
Speaker
70-ish years. Totally. So that's kind of cool. So most of the story is going to take place in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, but it actually is going to start about an hour away. So
00:31:51
Speaker
sometime in 1966. That's where our story begins. There are a group of grave diggers in Clendenin, West Virginia. They look up from their work and they see something huge soaring over their heads. All of them described it as a man with wings, a massive figure. They said it was huge, at least six to eight feet tall.
00:32:20
Speaker
they described it, they said it was like brown in color, and it started jumping from tree to tree rapidly, which sounds like a Pokemon to me. More like a monkey. And then, so that's the first like official, the official sighting from what I can find. But the first kind of more documented one is from November 15 1966. And this just feels like the start to a movie to me, which I love.
00:32:50
Speaker
So we have two young couples from Point Pleasant, West Virginia, Roger and Linda Scarberry and Steve and Mary and Mallette.
00:32:59
Speaker
They were driving, and they told police that a large gray creature with eyes that were glowing red were picked up. It was picked up by the car's headlights. So as they were driving, the headlights picked up these glowing red eyes. And they described it as a large flying man with 10-foot wings. And they too said it was six to eight feet tall, so standing on its hind legs.
00:33:27
Speaker
And it started following their car as they were driving and they got so freaked out They started speeding and they got up to a hundred miles an hour and said they could not outrun this flying creature at a hundred miles an hour And then finally it like veered off
00:33:45
Speaker
And that's the first official, official sighting that was reported on in the newspaper, I think the very next day in the Point Pleasant Register. And I think the article is titled, couples see man-sized bird, dot, dot, dot creature, dot, dot, dot something.
00:34:03
Speaker
Yes. I feel like when it's a couple, it's like, I don't know. Two people thought. They went directly to the police. Like they went to the police and was like, something is out there.
00:34:15
Speaker
Oh my gosh. It was wild. And then from then on, basically for an entire year from 1966 to 1967, there started to be a ton of sightings of a large bird-like creature, man-birdish creature with red glowing eyes. And as some people said it, the eyes were like bicycle reflectors, which I think is like a good image of that, like those big red circles.
00:34:39
Speaker
And so there were sightings from firefighters, citizens, all kinds of people. And they all basically had the same type of story in terms of six to eight feet tall.
00:34:54
Speaker
10 foot wingspan, large glowing eyes. They said it would either be like brown or gray. It's kind of like the mixture of colors, they would say. And something else that consistently came up is that it could fly really fast. And it was clumsy on its feet, which I think is such a funny thing to say. So it was like very fast flying. Yes, very good at flying, not great at walking. I don't know. But some people
00:35:22
Speaker
once again, described it jumping from tree to tree, flying, sitting on cars. There were some reports of it walking on people's roofs and people, which I think is also like a Jersey Devil thing as well, people hearing something walking on their rooftops. It ain't Santa. And it ain't Santa Claus, that's for sure.
00:35:43
Speaker
So as the sightings went on, national news started picking it up and the story started spreading across the country, which sounds similar to your lizard man as well.
Mothman and the Silver Bridge Collapse: Omen or Coincidence?
00:35:55
Speaker
It became this big thing and nobody could figure out what it was. And it got to the point where citizens of Point Pleasant were going out and trying to hunt it down because they thought it was dangerous and they were trying to catch it and they never did obviously. And then, so about 13 months after the first sighting, this big tragic event happened in Point Pleasant.
00:36:22
Speaker
Which, by the way, is a town where nothing really ever happened. And two giant events happened. So first of all, Mothman. Which, by the way, the name was, I think, coined by an Ohio newspaper. And the name kind of stuck. But before that, they were calling it Birdman.
00:36:39
Speaker
flying man creature, like all these different names. But an Ohio newspaper coined the term Mothman and that ended up sticking. And on December 15th, 1967, a bridge called the Silver Bridge in Pleasant Point collapsed and caused the death of 46 people. Oh my gosh. Yeah, totally awful.
00:37:04
Speaker
It basically was a bridge that was built, apparently, when cars were lighter, and there was a ton of traffic on that bridge that day, and the bridge was just not built to stand up with the times. And it collapsed, and as I said, 46 people died.
00:37:22
Speaker
because sort of two things happened. One, that sort of stops people talking about the sightings of Mothman because everybody was focused on this tragedy. And then the other thing is that a lot of people, it kind of also at the same time gave rise to the legend because people thought it was connected somehow, that the Mothman, like there was also people saying they had seen the Mothman on the bridge the day before or the week before.
00:37:49
Speaker
And so they thought that maybe the Mothman had something to do with that. And then later on, and I think this is more because of the Mothman's appearances in
00:38:01
Speaker
more pop culture stuff, which I'll bring up later. But they started to have this idea that the Mothman appearing was an omen, that something bad was going to happen. If you saw the Mothman, death was going to come. Something bad was going to happen. Almost like a demon. And if you look up pictures of the Mothman,
00:38:21
Speaker
And there are a lot of versions, but it does have this flying demon-like structure to it, like a man with these big eyes and these wings. It has this demonic look to it. And apparently, I read also that this shape of creature is reported a lot for people with sleep paralysis. I don't know if you've ever looked at sleep paralysis, but it's freaking horrifying.
00:38:50
Speaker
But this kind of creature is described a lot for people that have that, as well as the one that you hear about all the time is like the man with the hat. They always say like a man with a hat at the end of their bed, which is where Freddy Krueger came from. Scary, scary. Scary stuff, scary stuff. And so once again, when that bridge collapsed, it kind of stopped people reporting on the Mothman in terms of people reporting to the police that they had seen it.
00:39:18
Speaker
but it also gave rise to the legend of its causing the collapse itself. Geez, that's always so tough when something fantastic gets mixed in with real tragedy. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. I feel like, I don't know, people hold on to what they want to believe that somehow it's related or connected, but it's like for the people who lost someone that must be very
00:39:43
Speaker
Awful and confusing. Yeah. I think it's like, oh, actually, it's just because this bridge couldn't hold all these cars. Totally. Totally. So there's a couple of things that people think the Mothman might be.
00:39:58
Speaker
Yeah, so here's some possible explanations. The one I found most interesting is that this area is that it was seen a lot and it's known as the TNT area. And basically during World War Two, the government had a nuclear power plants in this area.
00:40:20
Speaker
that they were using to, it was like a munitions plant. And so they were making weapons and they apparently had a lot of toxic runoff.
00:40:31
Speaker
And so there was this idea that maybe it was an animal that had just experienced all this toxic radiation or something and had morphed. Oh my gosh, like the toxic Avenger. And then it started attacking because it was messed up. I also think that's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, maybe.
00:40:55
Speaker
Oh yeah. That's like- Don't quote me on that. No, that is what happens. It's like something from a lab drips into the sewer. Yes, yes. Love. So this facility shut down. It was basically there from I think like 42 to 45, and then it shut down the day the US bombed Hiroshima in 1945.
00:41:17
Speaker
And so I think it's still there and it's just this empty kind of warehouse-ish space slash like bunker-y style kind of place that's really spooky and creepy. And so a lot of people say that that's where the Mothman lives, which seems more like local legend as a way to
00:41:40
Speaker
you know, spookify an already spooky place. Totally. If that makes sense. And then another explanation that seems possible but
00:41:53
Speaker
not quite, is that people, so a biologist named Robert L. Smith at West Virginia University, he thought that the Mothman might be a sandhill crane, or just an especially giant sandhill crane. So this is an American crane that can stand up to like seven feet, or no, it can stand as high as a man. So I don't know what that means. I guess five to six feet.
00:42:21
Speaker
And then it has a seven foot wingspan and it has these reddish coloring around their eyes. And I looked up pictures and
00:42:32
Speaker
Yes, it does have reddish coloring around its eyes. And he said that maybe it was a bird that just had wandered off its migration route and it was kind of in the wrong place and couldn't figure out how to get out. I don't know, which sounds sad. But it doesn't really fit the rest of the description in terms of the colors of the body and the
00:42:55
Speaker
I understand that when you're driving and your headlights catch on to a cat or a deer, their eyes do glow. Yeah, or cats. Cats are famous for their glowing, spooky eyes. But to me, the glowing that is red feels very strange and feels different. Because even if they don't have red eyes, they just have red coloring around their eyes. So why is it glowing so harshly red is a weird thing. Right.
00:43:23
Speaker
Then it started to kind of get out of control when John Keel, so he wrote a book in 1975 called The Mothman Prophecies. He sort of in that book claimed that that supernatural
00:43:39
Speaker
events were related to the sightings or that the sightings were correlated with tragic things that happened, as I said, with like the bridge. And he kind of popularized that idea of it being an omen. And then that book was turned into a film called The Mothman Prophecies starring Richard
00:44:01
Speaker
Yes, that came out in 2002. And at that point, you know, the sightings, once again, most of the sightings were in that 113 month span from 66 to 67. But now in the early 2000s, there's kind of like this resurgence of the Mothman because of this book and this movie coming
Mothman in Popular Culture and Legacy
00:44:21
Speaker
out.
00:44:21
Speaker
And I don't know when this stuff started, but they also, that Town Point Pleasant, sort of capitalized on the Mothman legacy. So they have a Mothman museum. There's a big Mothman statue. They have a Mothman festival that where I guess people, from what I saw online, people dress up as the Mothman.
00:44:43
Speaker
Oh, and one thing I saw that I didn't find a ton of information about, but in the 1966-67, during around the time that they started seeing the Mothman, there was also a lot of UFO activity reports around the state line, which is very interesting. And so I didn't really find much that people thought it was like an alien or anything, but
00:45:08
Speaker
It is interesting that there was a lot of those intense reports happening around the same time. Yeah. That's kind of it, honestly. For me, I don't know what it is.
00:45:25
Speaker
I don't know what it is. But there's a lot of interviews online, because obviously, once again, the similar with yours, it happened in kind of our recent history. So a lot of the people that spotted the Mothman are still alive. So there's a lot of good interviews. And they feel very like are they like all very like West Virginia kind of people?
00:45:44
Speaker
I guess that's I mean, I don't really know because yeah, there's there's all kinds of people from stereotypical. I know. But I know I know what you mean. I know what you mean in terms of like a stereotypical like country folk. But I will say that everyone that I saw interviewed seemed very like smart and honest and faith truly like seemed like they were telling their truth.
00:46:07
Speaker
which I thought was pretty cool. There was also a kid or a guy that was a kid when he saw it and hearing him tell the experience, I was like, oh my God. And he was terrified and he is so sure he saw it. And all the stories were kind of like that where it's just like, yeah, people were scared. That's to the point where they were calling the police about it, which seems more than just someone being like, oh, I might've seen it too. I don't know.
00:46:36
Speaker
Right I feel like both of ours it's like there's enough like I don't know I like it feels to me like both of them are probably creatures of some kind yeah that like are either you know yeah above whatever freakishly big for their type of animal or
00:46:53
Speaker
something funky going on. But I agree that it's like these didn't just like, you know, people didn't just like not see something. Yeah, people aren't just making this up. Some people I'm sure some people are. But yes, especially those initial reports. And also, like birds can be freaking huge, huge and scary. Yes. And scared. Like I remember one time when I was a teenager, I was driving and there was a vulture in the middle of the road, like eating, you know, something that had got hit by a car.
00:47:21
Speaker
And it was so, I couldn't believe how big it was. It literally was like a person crouched down. It was fucking huge. Oh, sorry. It's freaking huge. And it also wouldn't move. It wasn't scared of my car, which that scared me more. I kept inching closer and closer to it, and it just was not going to move.
00:47:44
Speaker
And eventually it did, obviously. But I just couldn't believe, yeah, the size of it. And same with like, I mean, I've never seen an eagle in real life, but like, eagles are freaking huge. Like birds are freaking big. That's what I like. We always talk about like pelicans in Florida are like dinosaur. Like they look like prehistoric, like giant animals. Yeah. And I think
00:48:10
Speaker
Yeah, we're so I mean, especially us who spend a lot of our time in New York with no animals. Yeah, we're very separated from wildlife in that way, where it's like, I mean, but I will say these people in West Virginia, like, they're not separated from wildlife. So this was different for them and South Carolina too, I'm sure that that it there was something going on there. I totally not of the every day. I really want to watch that Richard Gere movie now.
00:48:40
Speaker
Yeah, me too. I didn't watch it. I did watch The Mothman Legacy, which just came out actually in 2020, I think a few months ago, but it's on Amazon. It's a new documentary about it, but it was pretty good. I think I found more concise information.
00:48:56
Speaker
classic on YouTube. There was like a PBS special on the Mothman and oh, there was I didn't watch the whole thing because I didn't really like the host of it. But there is a BuzzFeed unsolved. I guess they have like a series on BuzzFeed of like unsolved mysteries or something. And they had two guys do a do a thing of the Mothman.
00:49:18
Speaker
But yeah, I always find a lot of my information on the YouTube and of course Wikipedia. Yes, we love Wikipedia. We do. We do. But that's it. That's the Mothman. I love it. I thought those were really good in, you know, to have be the same episode. Yeah. And also just like the idea of these two places.
00:49:41
Speaker
being really known for something supernatural. Yes, these small towns with these giant, you know, creatures who now have festivals based on their creatures. I think we have to go to one of them. I don't know. I'm down. I'll go to either. A moth festival will show up with like giant moth wings. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, I can't wait. I love that. Maybe we should not say what we're going to do next week because we'll just change it.
00:50:09
Speaker
Yeah, and I also have no idea. I've got I've got to think about it. But I'm really enjoying looking up these like weird stories. Especially like right now, a lot of ours, I feel like take have taken place like in the south southern, like in the south, which I think is really fun. So we love it. They will do more of that. Maybe we won't. I don't know who knows not even us.
00:50:34
Speaker
I love it. Cool. Well, I guess that's it for this week, right? Yeah. Thanks so much for listening. If you haven't yet, subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast and follow us on Instagram and we'll hang out again next week. Give us five stars if you feel the need.
00:50:54
Speaker
Give us six, give us a hundred. But thank you all so much. Yes, and have some sweet, sweet nightmares. That's right. Bye. Bye.