In mid-November of 1966, five men were digging a grave near Clendenin, West Virginia when they reportedly saw a “bird man” with a seven foot wingspan swoop down over them. The next month, two couples were cruising the backroads in a area called TNT outside of Point Pleasant, West Virginia (named for the old munitions plant that was located there) when they saw the same creature swoop down over their car. It allegedly followed the car for some distance and understandably freaked the couples out. This was big news and in all the papers at the time.
In mid-December of 1967, I was preparing to go to my eighth grade dance when a special news announcement came over the television. The “Silver Bridge” that crossed the Ohio River at Point Pleasant failed and crashed into the cold, dark water below during rush hour. The bridge was filled with holiday shoppers and workers going home to their families. Forty-six people died. There were conspiracy theorists then, too. They thought the disaster was related to the Mothman. Or, perhaps it was the Curse of Chief Cornstalk in retaliation for the attacks on his people by the settlers pushing into the west. At any rate, there was never a sighting of the Mothman after the bridge collapsed. Scientists theorized what the hapless victims actually saw was a particularly large sandhill crane that had wandered off its migratory path. They can grow as tall as a man and have seven foot wingspans and reddish feathers around the eyes.
Those were the days of flying saucers and little green men, duck-and-cover drills in grade school, and the very real threat of annihilation by atomic bombs just 90 miles from Miami. Our parents still remembered Orson Welles broadcasting the drama series “War of the Worlds” on the radio causing mass hysteria across the country when people thought we were actually being attacked by creatures from outer space. The Roswell Incident was just twenty years old when this now mythical creature made its appearance over the sleepy town of Point Pleasant.
Mass hysteria, mob mentality, and the power of the imagination still wreaks havoc when something gets a foothold. And now, with the whole world separated by mere nanoseconds thanks to the Internet, large crowds of people are seen in videos as they rush down the streets of college campuses chasing scary clowns. The psychology of that fascinates me.
Anyway, I digress. I went for a drive the other evening. It was warm and the colors were really starting to look gorgeous so I meandered down the river roads till I found myself near Point Pleasant. I had never seen the Mothman statue nor the bridge that replaced the fallen Silver Bridge so I went the extra fourteen miles to see them. I was a little disappointed that I got there after the Mothman Museum had closed for the night…fall hours, you know. West Virginia is a fascinating state. You never know what you’re going to find around the next bend.
❤️
“And this is how I saw the horses in my vision and those who rode them: they wore breastplates the color of fire and of sapphire and of sulfur, and the heads of the horses were like lions’ heads, and fire and smoke and sulfur came out of their mouths.”
Revelation 9:17 ESV