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Mothman (The Actual Incident(s): Point Pleasant, WV; 1966 / 1967)

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staploe said:
Can anyone tell me what the MOTHMAN is all about .... Earl....
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Watch the film starring Richard Gere by the title 'The Mothman Prophecies' or even better (if your not the lazy type and like books) read the book of the same name, or just do a Google search.
 
Mothman sightings were primarily within the time period of Nov. 12th 1966 to Dec 15th 1967, in W. Virginia. Have there been a large number of sightings after this time period?
 
I never understood the Mothman.

Was the Mothman responsible for the Ohio River bridge to fall killing 46 people in 1967 ?
 
charliebrown said:
I never understood the Mothman.
Was the Mothman responsible for the Ohio River bridge to fall killing 46 people in 1967 ?
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The relationships claimed or suggested to exist between the Mothman sightings and the bridge collapse vary among different authors, theories, etc. Some more or less suggest Mothman may have caused - or helped to cause - the collapse. Others more or less suggest Mothman was an omen or harbinger of disaster (e.g., the bridge collapse). Yet others treat the Mothman sightings as something completely unrelated to the bridge collapse.
 
EnolaGaia said:
The relationships claimed or suggested to exist between the Mothman sightings and the bridge collapse vary among different authors, theories, etc. Some more or less suggest Mothman may have caused - or helped to cause - the collapse. Others more or less suggest Mothman was an omen or harbinger of disaster (e.g., the bridge collapse). Yet others treat the Mothman sightings as something completely unrelated to the bridge collapse.
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I'd add that all of the various ideas about and cultural items connected to the Mothman make it problematic as a "cryptid". In fact, it seems there is a clear split in cryptozoology about whether it qualifies as one or not. It's not as much a mystery animal as it is a more encompassing "phenomenon". Many cryptids take this path. They become connected with other paranormal concepts. Most cryptozoological popular content today has paranormal or supernatural elements included.
 
I'm reminded that there has never been a good comprehensive and objective book on the Mothman phenomenon. There have been collections of stories and of course, Keel's classic, but nothing that examined it with a historically careful perspective.
 
Sharon Hill said:
I'd add that all of the various ideas about and cultural items connected to the Mothman make it problematic as a "cryptid". ...
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Agreed ... Mothman has been treated as a variety of Fortean things - e.g., a cryptid, an alien and some sort of spirit or demon.
 
Sharon Hill said:
I'm reminded that there has never been a good comprehensive and objective book on the Mothman phenomenon. There have been collections of stories and of course, Keel's classic, but nothing that examined it with a historically careful perspective.
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That's an excellent point ... Most folks point to Keel's The Mothman Prophecies as a central reference, but it's loosely descriptive at best.

Phrased another way ... The Mothman 'industry' has generated more documentation than the Mothman incident(s) per se. Consider the example of this forum since its inception in 2001. There have been three major threads dedicated to Mothman matters:

Mothman & Popular Culture: Books, Films, TV, Merchandising, etc.
https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/mothman-books-films-tv-etc.1027/
(176 Replies)

Beckjord! (aka Wintermute; aka Mothman)
https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/beckjord-aka-wintermute-aka-mothman.46/
(341 Replies; essentially a circus revolving around the inimitable Beckjord)

... and this thread dedicated to the actual events - fewer than 100 Replies to date.
 
charliebrown said:
I never understood the Mothman.

Was the Mothman responsible for the Ohio River bridge to fall killing 46 people in 1967 ?
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Just watch "The Mothman Prophecies" and Mr. Gere will explain it all :)
 
I recall hearing Loren Coleman once say, in a podcast, that the original reports of the creature concerned an unidentified very large bird. Probably an owl or something. The story soon took on a life of its own, and little mention of birds was made as it grew.

Keel became, of course, part of the story as it unfolded. I've often wondered how much of the weirdness in the case got there by following him. That's around the time his "frienemies" were pulling elaborate pranks on him. Much is made of the mysterious motel reservation in his name, at the first place he stopped one night. In those days, reservations were very casual and no credit card number or anything was involved. It's easy enough to picture Moseley or one of those other jokers calling every lodging establishment within 50 miles, and reserving a room in Keel's name. From what I've read, I don't think he ever suspected that. If that's true, it would surprise me. It's straight out of the Maury Island playbook, if memory serves.
 
Austin Popper said:
I recall hearing Loren Coleman once say, in a podcast, that the original reports of the creature concerned an unidentified very large bird. Probably an owl or something. The story soon took on a life of its own, and little mention of birds was made as it grew. ...
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That matches what I've seen when digging back into the earlier / original newspaper accounts and local folklore. It seems that the earliest accounts consistently alluded to something bird-like. The "moth" and "man" (i.e., humanoid) allusions gradually emerged to become the canonical descriptions later.

IMHO this evolution from bird-thing to moth-ish humanoid was probably facilitated by cross-pollination from other local and regional stories of odd cloaked men or wildmen people had encountered over the years. These seem to recommend themselves as the sources for the 'ominous silent presence' and 'glowing red eyes' aspects of the lore. The focal period for the Mothman lore is 1966 / 1967, but the concept of a curious large flying 'something' had been in circulation for quite some time in that area.
 
Austin Popper said:
Keel became, of course, part of the story as it unfolded.
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Which is how Keel liked it, of course. He was as much an exponent of gonzo journalism as Hunter S Thompson any day. Never lose sight, however, of the fact that Keel would happily augment the story to liven up the narrative: I've always felt that Albert Finney's character in Big Fish could easily have been him (he describes a fellow journo as relating "all of the facts, but none of the flavour".) The exaggeration of the creature's size would be an obvious Keel device.
 
It took all of 5 minutes, I think, for today's bridge collapse in Pittsburgh, PA to be connected to Mothman. It was predicable that some people would obviously connect the Frick park location to the Frick brothers associated with mothman. Mothman is so in the public consciousness now (with cryptids being so pop culture), that this was inevitable. My monster-expert colleague noted it hours before Loren Coleman posted to his social feeds. It's not much of a coincidence considering the condition of bridges and the commonalities, but people really want enchantment and so they will lap this Fricking connection right up.

'Monster sound': 10 injured when bridge collapses in Pittsburgh's Frick Park
https://www.post-gazette.com/local/...int-breeze-squirrel-hill/stories/202201280075
 
Sharon Hill said:
It took all of 5 minutes, I think, for today's bridge collapse in Pittsburgh, PA to be connected to Mothman. It was predicable that some people would obviously connect the Frick park location to the Frick brothers associated with mothman. Mothman is so in the public consciousness now (with cryptids being so pop culture), that this was inevitable. My monster-expert colleague noted it hours before Loren Coleman posted to his social feeds. It's not much of a coincidence considering the condition of bridges and the commonalities, but people really want enchantment and so they will lap this Fricking connection right up.

'Monster sound': 10 injured when bridge collapses in Pittsburgh's Frick Park
https://www.post-gazette.com/local/...int-breeze-squirrel-hill/stories/202201280075
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Hmm, mysterious supernatural force or half a century of underinvestment on US infrastructure.

Yep, that's a tricky one...

Having seen the pictures, I think there were a lot of very lucky people there, as it's easy to see how that could have led to numerous fatalities.
 
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