April 20, 2007
Famed Mothman Witness Loses Son
The Scarberrys and Mallettes saw Mothman on November 15, 1966. On November 16, Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wamsley and Raymond’s sister, Mrs. Marcella Bennett with her baby daughter Tina visited friends, Mr. and Mrs. Ralph Thomas, who lived in a bungalow in a residential area near the location of the “igloos” (concrete dome-shaped dynamite storage structures erected during WWII) near the TNT plant. Marcella Bennett and the others saw Mothman, and Marcella was so upset she fell on her daughter. The story is well-known within the Mothman literature. Marcella told me she will never forget those red eyes.
When I interviewed Marcella Bennett in 2001, I was able to meet her son Mark. It is upsetting to hear that he has passed away at the young age of 45. My heart goes out to Marcella who has now had to see two of her children go before her.
Here is the obituary from the local newspaper.
Mark A. Bennett, a longtime Point Pleasant resident, passed away in his home Monday, April 16, 2007.
He was born Sept. 10, 1961 in Point Pleasant and was a 1979 graduate of Point Pleasant High School.
He joined the Navy Seabee’s in September 1980 and served in the Navy for more than five years, traveling to Guam, Spain, Hawaii and Portugal for the Seabee’s, building roads and airports. Following his Naval service, he lived in Naples, Fla., for 10 years, eventually returning home to Point Pleasant.
He was preceded in death by his sister, Robin S. Bennett of Denmark, Maine, in October 2001.
He has left behind his loving parents, Robert and Marcella Bennett of Point Pleasant; his sister, Kristina “Tina” (John) Meehan of Naples, Fla.; his niece, Melissa (Elliot) and her sons, Elliot and Charles Elijah Cortes, and nephews, Christopher and Nathaniel Wardell, all of Naples; and nephew, Robert Samuel Chaney, and niece, Kristen Michelle Chaney, both of Wallingford, Conn.
Funeral services will be 1 p.m. Friday, April 20 at Deal Funeral Home in Point Pleasant with the Rev. Charlie Birchfield officiating. Burial will follow with full military graveside services at Austin-Hope-McLeod Cemetery in Gallipolis Ferry.Point Pleasant Register, April 19, 2007
My condolences to the family.
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.
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