January 7, 2016
Forty years ago today – On Wednesday, January 07th, 1976 at around 8:30pm, Alverico Guajardo was eating dinner in his trailer home, just outside of Brownsville, Texas. Suddenly, there was a loud thud, as if a large bag of sand or concrete had struck the outside wall. Fearing for his family’s safety, Guajardo grabbed a knife and stuck it in his pocket before venturing out into the darkness. He could only make out the silhouette of a large animal lying on the ground. Because he had no flashlight on hand, Alverico went to his station wagon and switched on the headlights. This caused the thing to rise and Guajardo could see that it was a brown, winged creature standing about four feet tall. He would later state, “I was scared. It’s got wings like a bird, but it’s not a bird. That animal is not from this world.”
Alverico later described the animal as having silver dollar sized “terrible-looking eyes” a three to four-foot beak and large wings that covered most of its body. As the two beings stared at each other at a distance of fifteen feet for about two minutes, the creature made a “terrible” pulsing noise which seemed to emanate from its throat. At no time did Guajardo see the bird’s beak move. Curiously though, the animal did not fly away, but instead chose to back slowly into the darkness until it could no longer be seen. Alverico seemed genuinely terrified by his encounter, according to reporter George Cox of the Brownsville Herald, who interviewed him the next morning. “I’d say he saw something,” Cox stated. (From Big Bird: Modern Sightings of Flying Monsters by Ken Gerhard) Please note that this remains one of the iconic encounters with Texas’ Big Bird and that news services seized on this particular story… making it worldwide news!
About Ken Gerhard
Ken has investigated reports of mysterious beasts around the world including Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, the Chupacabra, giant winged creatures and even werewolves. In addition to appearing in three episodes of the television series Monster Quest (History Channel), Ken is featured in the History Channel special The Real Wolfman, as well as Legend Hunters (Travel Channel/A&E), Paranatural (National Geographic), Ultimate Encounters (truTV) and William Shatner's Weird or What? (History Television). His credits include multiple appearances on Coast to Coast AM, major news broadcasts and Ireland’s Newstalk radio, as well as being featured in major books and in articles by the Associated Press, Houston Chronicle and Tampa Tribune. Ken is author of the books Big Bird: Modern Sightings of Flying Monsters and A Menagerie of Mysterious Beasts: Encounters with Cryptid Creatures, as well as the co-author of Monsters of Texas (with Nick Redfern) and has contributed to trade publications including Fate Magazine, Animals and Men, The Journal of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club and Bigfoot Times. He currently lectures and exhibits at events across America. Born on Friday the 13th of October, 1967 (exactly one week before the famous Patterson Bigfoot film was shot), Ken has traveled to twenty-six different countries on six continents and most of the United States. An avid adventurer, he has camped along the Amazon, explored the Galapagos, hiked the Australian Outback and has visited many ancient and mysterious sites, from Machu Pichu to Stonehenge.
Filed under Avian Mysteries, Books, Cryptozoologists, Cryptozoology, Eyewitness Accounts, Texas Monster Hunter, Thunderbirds, Winged Weirdies