Mothman and Christmas
Posted by: Loren Coleman on December 24th, 2012
In 2005 on the program Coast to Coast AM with George Noory, I appeared to discuss Mothman. Lots of folks called in with questions and their sightings. Interest remained high back then, as it does today, in the 1966-1967 elements of the story of the late John A. Keel’s investigations in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, of a giant flying creature. Today the accounts are associated with all kinds of elements of occultism, demonology, and ufology, mostly due to how Keel told the tale. But cryptozoology underlies the initial reports, of course.
People often forget the 13 months of Mothman happenings came to a head at this time of year, so near Christmas.
Today, however, it is remarkable how fiction and the facts have become mixed and confused in the Mothman chronicles. Take for example, Parthena Black’s essay “Dreams That Predict the Future” and its use of the Mothman story.
Black writes:
Eerie dreams that pointed to waking life events have been featured in films and literature. A good example appears in the movie “The Mothman Prophecies”. Connie has a recurring dream where she repeatedly hears someone say, “Wake up, number 37.” Connie is not able to connect the dream with reality until after the fact, when Klein rescues her and prevents her from becoming the 37th victim of a bridge collapse.
Unfortunately, Ms. Black used a fictional example to make her point. I think it would have been just as compelling if Black would have told about how reporter Mary Hyre (who helped John Keel) did actually have a recurring dream of Christmas packages floating in the Ohio River, a scene that would come true on December 15, 1967, when 46 (not 36) died during the collapse of the Silver Bridge at Point Pleasant.
It had been 13 months since the November 15, 1966 “first” sighting of Mothman. In a mere 26 months (13 months times 2), Mary Hyre would be mysteriously dead, after a four week illness, at the age of 54. See #47 on the “List.”
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
