Plane Crash at Fairfield County Infirmary

FCI from rear field/cemetery

If you were a resident (or inmate, as they were called) of the Fairfield County Infirmary in Ohio, chances are, you probably witnessed some weird stuff. Serving as the county poor house, orphanage, and overall place to house people who couldn't take care of themselves since the mid-1800's, FCI now operates as a premier destination for those interested in haunted history. But, not all the strange stories that come from the old brick building are paranormal in nature! 

For today's blog, I wanted to continue to share some of the non-spooky, yet fascinating history from the grounds of the Fairfield County Infirmary, including an incident that happened in the autumn of 1950:

On Thursday, October 5, 1950, a Cessna plane owned by Baker Aviation Corp was being piloted by 23 year old Robert W. Brocklesby, of Caledonia. The only passenger aboard the small aircraft was a 22 year old medical technician working at Marion City Hospital, named Barbara Ann Beck. According to the pilot's parents, Brocklesby became lost when he couldn't find the local airport. The reason he couldn't find the local airport was that there were absolutely no lights on at all, indicating where the runway was. After trying to find the airport for some time, the plane ran out of gas and Brocklesby crashed the plane in a hard, forced landing....in the field across from the Fairfield County Infirmary! 

The plane was returning to Marion from Detroit, and unfortunately, Barbara was injured in the landing, suffering a broken vertebra. She was treated in a local hospital until October 21, then released to her parents' care. 

Luckily, this accident was not as bad as it could have potentially been...but I can't imagine what was going through the minds of the 'inmates' as they heard, then watched all of this unfold on their property. Many of FCI's 'inmates' were elderly and/or feeble-minded. This was also 1950. A plane crashing so close by, even by today's standards, would be a scary experience. Back then, those people probably thought the world was coming to an end! But, again, luckily no one was killed or injured too badly. The mayor made sure new bulbs were ordered for the local runway, and the cornfield crash became just another wild event in a long history of strange and unexplained events that have made FCI the awesome place to investigate that it is today!

From the October , 1950 edition of the Marion Star:

Albert Brown's UFOs

Alleged UFO Photo 
from WikiPedia

Between November 1966 and December 1967, the small West Virginia town of Point Pleasant was seized with Mothman madness! Not only were residents consistently reporting a flying humanoid throughout the vicinity, the whole area was experiencing a period of high strangeness. Reports of paranormal activity including ghosts, psychic phenomenon, and other cryptid sightings were commonplace, but none so prevalent as the UFO flap that accompanied the weirdness. Throughout Pt. Pleasant and branching out to surrounding counties, UFO reports were on the rise, and one such witness was a man from neighboring Putnam County. 

Albert Brown was a shift supervisor at the new Elmwood Mines. He and his wife, Shirley, lived in Buffalo. According to an undated and unnamed newspaper article found in Mothman: Behind the Red Eyes, by Jeff Wamsley, Brown left work at 12:45 am Monday morning and noticed a white light very low in the sky, which stayed in his view along Tribble Road, on his way home. He stopped to watch the light, and it turned blue and orange, and then bobbed up and down. It would appear on top of the hill, then disappear behind the hill, only to reappear. He looked for a road that would lead him to where the object appeared, but could find none. 

After four hours of watching the object, he went home and woke up his wife, who also saw the light, reporting it was the 'brightest and strangest light she had ever seen.' They called the Civil Defense in Charleston, who referred him to the State Police. The police did come out to investigate, but by the time they got there, the light had disappeared. After their story was published, Shirley reported that Gary Davison from Spencer, WV called her to say he had seen a similar object in his area earlier that evening. 

This incident was recorded in John Keel's The Mothman Prophecies as having happened on November 20, 1967, which was in fact, a Monday. I took to Newspapers.com to see if I could find where the article cited in Wamsley's book came from. As I couldn't find it, I assume it came from one of the Huntington papers, which aren't listed on the archives. However, I did find an article about the incident from November 20, 1967 published in the Charleston Daily Mail. This much shorter article adds the detail that the light was blinking red, but omits the fact that it later turned blue and orange. It also claims that the craft was triangular in shape!

That Sunday night prior to Brown's sighting, strange lights and/or craft had been observed in Mason County. First, a black object with no visible wings was seen very low over Point Pleasant. A few hours later, a white light was seen very low in the eastern sky, just north of Point Pleasant. This light was witnessed by several people, including John Keel himself. Were these all the same craft that were seen that night, and if so, why were they all described so differently? 

Charleston Daily Mail
20 November 1967

Un-Cited Article found in
Mothman: Behind the Red Eyes, 
by Jeff Wamsley