1973 UFO Flap Hits Kanawha County

West Virginia State Police Headquarters
South Charleston

Happy World UFO Day! As we celebrate flying saucers, UFOs, and little green men across the globe, let's take a second to shout out another story (or stories) from right here in the Mountain State!

 In October of 1973, UFOs dominated the skies over much of the eastern United States. West Virginia had its fair share of reports that month, with a large concentration of sightings in the southern part of the state, namely around Beckley surrounding areas. But, although less talked about, Kanawha County got it's fair share of weird reports, too. The West Virginia State Police detachment in South Charleston took calls on two separate incidents of a potential UFO CRASH! The reports came in from the Coal Mountain area of St. Albans and from the Alum Creek area. 

The St. Albans call came first, and the caller was reported as being a 'sober-sounding' male saying that he had seen a strange craft covered with lights and making weird noises descending from the heavens. Bob Gunnoe, state police dispatcher, rather dryly comments that it must have ascended just as quickly, because the only thing matching that description (lights and weird sounds, I guess) was a jukebox in the local beer joint.

The second call came in around 10pm on October 17th. This time, a lady caller from Alum Creek reported an oddly colored and illuminated object falling from the sky. When troopers arrived on scene, they didn't find any spacecraft---just a drunk guy who they arrested for public intoxication. Before the article cuts off and is continued on the next page (which is conveniently missing from the archive service I've used), one last dig at the UFO sightings is given. A story about a married Clendenin man experiencing a "flying saucer", along with a flying ash tray and cup at breakfast that morning was shared, because in 1973 domestic violence was hilarious. 

Anyway, I'm kinda bummed that the second part of the article is missing. I'll have to head out to the library to see if I can find the second page, and see whether or not it has additional information. St. Albans is no stranger to UFO sightings, and in fact, local UFO researcher, Ralph Jarrett, developed his interest in the phenomenon when he saw not one, but THREE separate UFOs over his St. Albans home between 1966 and 1967. I'd be interested to see if those sightings were cited, or if any mention was made about the weirdness over the skies of Beckley, which you can read about HERE and HERE and HERE.

Keep your eyes to the skies! 

The Charleston Daily Mail
18 October 1973

Trooper Sees UFOs Over Ashland, Kentucky

Ashland, Kentucky

Throughout 1966 and 1967, flying saucers filled the skies over the tri-state area and beyond. In Point Pleasant, WV, residents were reporting UFOs, Men in Black, psychic experiences, and of course, our infamous Mothman. But a little over an hour away in Ashland, Kentucky, there were also strange reports of things in the skies. One example comes from late November of 1967 when a former pilot turned police trooper allegedly spotted several UFOs over the course of several hours.

Despite the potential for backlash, Patrolman Roger Gussler admitted to his co-workers that he had seen four to five flying saucers on or around the weekend of November 25. For over three hours,
Gussler watched the objects fly over Ashland at an elevation of 15,000 to 20,000 feet. They appeared as red blinking lights, but behaved in a manner not common to any known aircraft at the time. The lights were blinking much slower than a human aircraft. Also, the objects would zip through the skies at great speeds, then abruptly stop---an act which the human body could not handle. 

Gussler was not outright ridiculed by his colleagues. In fact, three other patrolmen agreed to a stakeout at a ranger tower nearby later in the week. Unfortunately, I couldn't find an update as to whether or not they actually saw anything themselves. This is an interesting story, however, because the main witness is not only a member of law enforcement but is also a former pilot. Both these positions would theoretically put him at a greater advantage of discerning the difference between a normal aircraft and one not of this world, and if he were caught lying or deemed 'crazy,' then the damage to his career and reputation would be irreparable. So, even as an unverifiable event, it has earned a spot in the archives of Fortean phenomena here at Theresa's Haunted History!

Messenger-Inquirer (Owensboro KY)
28 November 1967

 

Stay Out of the Ohio River!

My AI attempt at illustrating
Naomi Johnson's attack in the Ohio River

I would NEVER advise anyone to go swimming in the Ohio River, especially around the Huntington, WV area. However, there was a time when the Ohio River flowing near Evansville, Indiana, was not only relatively clean, but it was fairly shallow at a maximum depth of 15 feet, and reasonably slow moving, at less than 1mph. Therefore, when temperatures became unbearably hot one summer day, two friends in the Dogtown area near Evansville decided the Ohio River would be the perfect place to cool off with a swim. 

It was Sunday, August 14, 1955. Naomi Johnson (35-year-old wife of Darwin Johnson) along with her three children and her friend Louise Lamble (wife of Chris Lamble) went down to the river for a swim. While the children played on the shore, Naomi swam out about 15 feet. Suddenly, she felt an enormous furry, clawed hand grab her left leg from beneath the water! It managed to pull her under, but she squirmed free. She resurfaced and managed to scream before the creature grabbed her again and pulled her under. Meanwhile, Louise was about 4 feet away and although she couldn't see what had a hold of Naomi, was desperately trying to get to her friend. Naomi managed once again to resurface and grab a rubber innertube that Louise had brought along. As she struggled to pull herself up onto the innertube, it made a loud, rubbery thump, which apparently scared the creature away long enough for the women to get safely to shore. 

Naomi's leg was covered in scratches and bruises for which she sought medical treatment. And although I couldn't find it in any of the news articles at the time, there was apparently a strange greenish-bluish handprint-shaped stain on her leg, which couldn't be washed off. My guess would be that if this 'fact' was known at the time the articles were written, it was probably just explained away as being a bruise and not some supernatural proof of contact with a strange being. 

Evansville Press
15 August 1955

Although it was a frightening and probably traumatic experience (Naomi even swore off ever swimming in the Ohio River again and vehemently warned neighbors that they, too, should avoid swimming there) one would think that the story really wasn't all that important to the annals of Fortean history. After all, no one actually SAW the furry claw that had a death grip on Naomi's leg. Was it actually some sort of monster...or could it have simply been a misidentification? One theory is that it could have been some plant material or other debris that Naomi got caught in. The sequel to the Creature from the Black Lagoon, called Revenge of the Creature, had just been released to theaters across the USA a few months before. And, having a 13-year-old son, Naomi was probably pretty familiar with popular movie monsters. It's possible that in that scary moment of almost drowning, those movies came to mind, and she mistook a piece of debris wrapped around her leg as being a hairy claw. 

But the story doesn't actually end there. In fact, it goes off into several directions and had me hopping down different rabbit holes, which cannot possibly be done justice in this one blog post. Nevertheless, I'll try to summarize a few of the directions in which this story took me, and as always, provide you with links and sources for more information. Anyway....

One week later, another strange incident would occur. On Sunday, August 21, 1955, a family in Kentucky were victims to a siege of "little green men," which would come to be known in the ufology field as the Kelly-Hopkinsville Little Green Men incident. The little creatures, believed to have ascended from a UFO spotted in the area, terrorized the family's property for hours. Their description, especially that of their long, webbed fingers with sharped claws, immediately resonated with Naomi when she read the story in her local paper. In a later news article, Naomi reiterates that the arms of the creature must have been long to have grabbed her the way they did (a description shared by the Hopkinsville creatures) and also was twice as strong as a human. 

Not only is she certain that the hand that grabbed her was the same as the hands on these little creatures, but hearing also that they were associated with a UFO landing nearby sparked a memory for her. Apparently, right before entering the river a week before, she and the rest of their swimming party had seen their own UFO! They had seen a shiny object in the sky, "about as big as the bottom of a bushel basket." Mrs. Lamble also saw the object, which they jokingly said at the time must have been a flying saucer, but her description was slightly different. She described a "long, slender looking light about the size of a wash pan or dishpan," but couldn't be more descriptive than that. 

Source

Within a week, two very strange incidents occurred, each involving a flying saucer and potentially a creature or creatures with long, furry, claw-like hands. And honestly, the distance between Evansville and Hopkinsville is not long, especially for a flying saucer! Presumably, such a craft would make the 83-mile journey well before the estimated hour and 15 minutes by modern car. Because of their proximity and shared details, these two events, whether related or not, are now closely tied together. But the rabbit holes don't stop with just that connection!

On Monday, August 22, an unknown woman drowned in the Ohio River at Evansville. She was described as an attractive brunette, about 20-30 years old. That evening, she had gone swimming in the river with two men she had met at a local tavern. The two men, who were questioned by police, said they tried to save the woman when it became apparent she was in trouble, but were unable to get to her in time. It wouldn't be until two days later that her body was recovered. 

I can only imagine how Naomi felt when she saw that another woman lost her life in almost the same place and same way that she narrowly avoided just a week before. But what happened? It is important to note that there is always an inherent danger when swimming, which increases exponentially in a body of water such as the Ohio River and also when you're swimming at NIGHT. Did she, too, get tangled up in some debris underwater? Were the men she was with not telling the truth about what happened that night? Or was she victim to an otherworldly creature lurking beneath the depths of the water? Again, drownings in the Ohio River were not uncommon. I actually found several articles about people drowning in the Ohio in or around Evansville, but it is kinda strange that this particular incident happened just a week after Naomi's experience, and a day after the Hopkinsville incident. 

Kelly-Hopkinsville Goblin/Little Green Men
Sketch by Bud Ledwith 
Source: UFO Evidence

These events all happened within a week during the summer of 1955. However, it wouldn't be the first time that a strange creature from the Ohio River between Kentucky and Indiana would cause problems. In July of 1903, a man named Frank Sedler was camping along the bank of the Ohio River on the Kentucky side, just across from Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Around midnight, he heard a terrible scream coming from one of his kids in a separate tent. As he rushed to see what was wrong, he saw his one-year-old child in the clutches of a half-man/half-beast. The creature took off with the child, but when Sedler yelled, it dropped it at the river's edge, before jumping into the river itself. Sedler theorized that the creature was a baboon that had escaped from a boat show. 

Lawrenceburg and Evansville are admittedly quite a way away from each other, but what is fascinating is that in both the Hopkinsville case and Sedler's experience, MONKEYS were theorized to be the culprit as opposed to a monster, terrestrial or from outer space. And, since Naomi is so sure that what she experienced was the same thing as what was going on in Hopkinsville, her experience can theoretically be linked to monkeys as well. But why monkeys? 

I honestly can't answer that. If we can rule out escaped monkeys from circuses, private collectors, and zoos, where does that leave us? I saw an interesting idea brought up that perhaps the Hopkinsville "little green men," who weren't actually green, by the way, may HAVE come from that landed/crashed UFO seen by witnesses. In the 1950's, the United States was using monkeys as test subjects in its space program. What if all these flying saucers reported throughout the decade were experimental terrestrial aircraft containing monkey test subjects? Maybe these creatures were from another planet or even plane of existence and just resemble our earth primates. Again, I have no idea. What I do know, however, is that I will absolutely not be going swimming anywhere NEAR the Ohio River any time soon!

Sources and Further Reading:

Green Clawed Beast of the Ohio River

An Evansville Legend: The Attack of the Green Clawed Monster at Dogtown

The Courier-Journal 
24 July 1903

The Paducah Sun
16 August 1955

Evansville Press
15 August 1955

Evansville Press
23 August 1955
Pt. 1/2

Evansville Press
23 August 1955
Pt. 2/2

The Republic
26 August 1955

Happy Holidays From a UFO Witness!

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is exchanging Christmas cards with friends and family. Although I'm guilty of relying on mass-produced store-bought options, one of these years, I'd love to create my own. When I do, I'll be using the following card as inspiration!

Back in July, I visited the Gray Barker Archives in Clarksburg, WV. West Virginia's (in)famous ufologist saved just about everything, and the collection is not only home to books and film, but also props, newspaper clippings, unpublished writings, and of course, correspondence.

One such piece of correspondence was a Christmas card sent by a man named Jennings Frederick. Does that name ring a bell? Fans of West Virginia folklore and weird history might recognize Frederick as being the man from Fairmont, who, in the summer of 1968 saw the strange creature now known as Vegetable Man!

Frederick would go on to report his experience with Veggie Man, along with his further UFO/unexplained experiences and research, to Gray Barker. Among their correspondence was a hand-drawn Christmas card featuring Santa Claus apparently piloting a UFO. Inside was a sweet holiday sentiment, a small poem, and a note requesting further communication with Barker. 

As Veggie Man becomes more popular among West Virginia's menagerie of strange creatures, I'm so happy that I stumbled upon this interesting little piece of adjacent holiday history. I'm also thrilled that I get to share it with you this Christmas season! But, if you'd like to check it out for yourself, it's available in the Gray Barker archives, open by appointment. 

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!

The Frametown Monster

Frametown Monster
Drawing by Frank Feschino

Just one day after Kathleen May, Gene Lemon, and five young boys encountered what would become known as the Flatwoods Monster, the Snitowsky Family had a similar experience. On September 13, 1952, George Snitowsky, along with his wife Edith and their 18-month-old son were traveling along Route 4 between Frametown and Sutton (about 17 miles south of Flatwoods). 

The family, who lived in Queens, New York, was returning from visiting family in Cincinnati. It was around 8pm when their car suddenly stopped on that lonely stretch of highway. After a few attempts at restarting it, George got out of the car to check under the hood, but he couldn't detect what the problem was. The air was filled with a foul odor of sulphur, and as the stench worsened, George got back into the car and rolled up the windows. Edith grabbed the baby from the backseat, as he woke up and began crying. 

The smell was worsening, and George was at a loss as to what to do. According to their map, it appeared that Frametown was the closest town to them, and it was a twelve-mile walk. George didn't want to leave his wife and baby alone for that long at night, so they decided to stay put and hope a vehicle would come by. A vehicle would come by...but it wouldn't be a local citizen driving past in their car!

Noticing a bright light coming from a wooded area nearby, George rolled down the window for a better look. The area had a hazy, purplish tint to it, and as George opened the window, that cloudy haze flooded into the car, making the family gag. The stench was sickening. However, George, overcome with curiosity, followed the light source. The ground sloped downward off the road towards the woods, and George could see a large sphere-shaped object behind the trees, only about 200-300 feet away. The glowing object seemed to be floating, and the closer he got to it, the heat and the stench increased dramatically. He also experienced what felt like small, electrical shocks or vibrations.

Still sick to his stomach, and having vomited a few times, George stumbled back to the car. When he was almost there, he stopped to catch his breath, leaning against a tree. He then heard Edith let out a horrific scream. He turned to look and saw that a strange creature was behind him. Off to the right of the road and illuminated by the glowing sphere, stood a humanoid creature, 8-9 feet tall. The creature had what appeared to be a bloated, reptilian upper body and a solid metallic lower half. 

George ran and jumped in the car. He pushed Edith and baby onto the floorboard and threw himself on top of them, but not before grabbing a large knife out of the glove compartment. The creature approached the car and touched the hood with one of its creepy, forked claw-like hands. It then moved back towards the woods. After a few minutes, George noticed the sphere slowly rise, stopping a few times on its ascent. At around 3000 feet, it swung back and forth like a pendulum and then shot out of sight. The smell and the fog started to dissipate, and the family was able to get the car started.

They headed to Sutton and made a stop at a local truck stop/diner before finding a hotel for the night. As they were leaving the next morning, they noticed the car had a V-shape singed into the paint down to the primer where the creature had touched their car. 

The Snitowsky's decided to keep quiet about the incident and made it back to New York without further ado. However, several years later, George decided to tell his story to Paul Lieb, president of the Flying Saucer Research Institute. Paul wrote a story about the incident, which was published in the July 1955 edition of Male magazine. 

So, what was it that the Snitowsky's saw that night? It is theorized that they saw THE Flatwoods Monster. The area where the strange creature was sighted was an area near Strange Creek known as James Knob. It is believed that after making an emergency landing (after potentially being shot down by our government) in Flatwoods, the monster made its way south. The reason why the creature appeared without its trademark spade-shaped head and was reported as being shorter than the previous witnesses claimed, was that it had taken off the top part of its spacesuit/spacecraft vehicle!

In both incidents, the bottom half of the creature was described similarly, and was accompanied by the same noxious gas that made the witnesses vomit. Personally, I think that the Snitowsky's DID witness the same creature (or a different creature of the same species) as the Flatwoods Monster seen the previous night. Over the course of a few days in mid-September, a strange set of phenomena involving suspected meteors, UFOs, and even a few alien entities were reported in and around West Virginia. Fank Feschino, in his ground-breaking book, The Braxton County Monster: The Cover-Up of the Flatwoods Monster Revealed (2004), goes over the entire conspiracy of just what was going on that late summer day of 1952. I highly recommend checking out his book for a more comprehensive account of how the 'Frametown Monster' would become an integral part of the Flatwoods Monster lore.

Hinton Daily News
13 September 1952

The Fire-Breathing Monster of Flatwoods and Other Weirdness

On September 12, 1952, seven people in Flatwoods, WV would witness a sight that would not only affect their lives forever...but would become an event cemented in the study of ufology for decades.  After a group of boys playing football observed what they thought might have been a meteor or even a plane crash on a nearby farm, five of the boys, including Eddie and Freddie May, were accompanied by their mother, Kathleen May and Gene Lemon, a 17 year old National Guardsman in pursuit of the wreckage.

You know I love to share vintage newspaper articles covering strange happenings, and since I've already discussed the Flatwoods Monster incident a few times before (plus, there are so many other great resources on this case) I thought today would be a good day to just share the UP article that hit newspapers across the country! The clipping I chose at random comes from the Record American (Pennsylvania) of September 15th, but the same article, with differing headlines, would be published in MULTIPLE newspapers on the 15th and 16th. I'll transcribe it below for easier reading:

The Record American (Pennsylvania)
15 September 1952

West Virginia Folks Saw Monster with Green Body, Red Face

Sutton, W.Va. (UP)---Eyewitness accounts of a tall, glowing monster with a blood-red face skulking in the hills divided Braxton County Monday into two camps---believers and skeptics.

Seven persons said they saw the unearthly being, described as "worse than Frankenstein," in the hills above Flatwoods, W.Va. Friday night.

State police and a number of residents hooted at the reports as a product of mass hysteria. Police said the eyewitness' guess as to the monster's height varied from seven to 17 feet.

The excitement began when the two young sons of Kathryn May, a Flatwoods beautician, said they saw a "flying saucer" land on C.B. Fisher's farm near here.

Mrs. May, National Guardsman Gene Lemon and five boys climbed a hill on the Fisher farm to look for the "saucer."

Mrs. May said a "fire-breathing monster, 10 feet tall with a bright green body and a blood-red face," bounced and floated toward them."

"It looked worse than Frankenstein," she said. "It couldn't have been human."

Lemon, 17, said he thought he saw a 'possum or coon until he put his flashlight on "the thing." It was then that he saw the monster with the blushing face and green body "that seemed to glow."

Mrs. May said Lemon stared and then screamed as the monster duckwalked toward them. All of them fled, occasionally looking over their shoulders. 

The monster, Mrs. May said, had an overpowering metallic odor that nauseated them. She said they vomited for several hours. A. Lee Steward, co-publisher of the Braxton County Democrat, received the first report from Mrs. May. The veteran newspaperman organized an armed posse and went to the scene. 

"The odor was still there," Stewart said. "It was sort of warm and sickening. And there were two places about six to eight feet in diameter where the brush was trampled down." 

Stewart did not know what to think. 

"I hate to say I believe it, but I hate to say I don't believe it," Steward said. "Those people were scared---badly scared, and I sure smelled something." 

Authorities said they believed the "flying saucer" which Mrs. Mays' sons saw was a meteorite. The incident occurred during a meteor shower over a three-state area. 

Theresa's Note: On September 13, 1952 newspapers along the East Coast noted that reports of meteorites being seen in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Virginia, and Ohio had flooded local law enforcement the night before. Many witnesses assumed they were witnessing planes going down in fiery crashes. A woman in McMechen, WV reported seeing a noiseless object, shooting blue and white flames out of one end. A man in West Liberty stated he saw several objects that looked like Roman candles. And, a Hinton preacher saw what he described as an "old time streetlight". Many witnesses to these "meteorites" claimed that the objects were moving horizontally and at very low altitudes. 

I'm not an expert in astronomical matters, but it seems like these were a little more than your normal meteorites, especially when you take into consideration the incident at Flatwoods, as well as similar incidents at Frametown and Wheeling (more about those in upcoming blogs!). There was even a couple of UFO reports from Raleigh County that occurred on the 13th of September. Was there a massive invasion across the East Coast that September...or was it simply a combination of natural phenomena and mass hysteria? 

Hinton Daily News
13 September 1952

Charleston Police Officers See UFO

ECHO-1 Satellite
Source: Wikipedia

When dealing with reports of UFOs, the problem of witness reliability is always present. However, few can argue that fraudulent or untruthful claims are an issue when no less than SEVEN members of the Charleston, WV Police Department reported seeing a strange object in the early morning sky!

It all started on Wednesday, May 11, 1966. At around 2:58 a.m. Company B of the West Virginia State Police, stationed in South Charleston began receiving calls about a strange object in the sky. Twelve minutes later, the object apparently had traveled to Charleston, where it was spotted by Patrolmen Bob Easley and Robert King. The two reported a "blazing light of spectacular appearance." 

Easley radioed back to the station, where interested parties on duty stepped out to look skyward. No less than seven members of the police department, including Desk Sgt. James C. Robinson saw the craft. Robinson, who had a clear view of the object, noted that the object was very bright and fast-moving. He states, "When it got almost directly in my line of vision, there was something that went from the side of it at a much higher rate of speed. After about 15 seconds it completely disappeared.

Many of those who saw the object said it took off, straight up at a very high speed. One officer, who did NOT see it this interesting takeoff however, but did claim to see the object had a theory as to what was witnessed. John Bailes believes what the men saw was an ECHO Satellite. According to Wikipedia: 

"Project Echo was the first passive communications satellite experiment. Each of the two American spacecraft, launched in 1960 and 1964, were metalized balloon satellites acting as passive reflectors of microwave signals. Communication signals were transmitted from one location on Earth and bounced off the surface of the satellite to another Earth location."

Sgt. Robinson did agree that the object resembled the ECHO Satellite, but moved way too fast and was much brighter. In 1966, the United States was not only under threat from the Cold War, but was also deep into a Space Race with the former Soviet Union. Did a group of Charleston police officers really spot an extraterrestrial craft...or was it something from either our own or a foreign government?

The Charleston Daily Mail
11 May 1966

The Raleigh Register
12 May 1966

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

12 Foot Tall Humanoids in West Virginia

From The Twilight Zone 
"To Serve Man"
This is what I see when I read the description, lol!

In 1897, the little West Virginia town of Ogden was in the midst of an oil and gas boom. Located in Wood County, Ogden quickly became home to numerous drill sites dotting the former farm lands. Tycoons, businessmen, investors...all would descend upon the town in order to try their hand at making a fortune. However, that spring, another type of visitor would also show up.

According to sources, on April 21, 1897 a man witnessed an astonishing sight. This unnamed man observed a well-lit aerial object land nearby. Out of the craft came eight creatures, each 11-12 feet tall with disproportionately large craniums. As luck would have it, these creatures spoke English, and told the man they were there, "exploring the planet." Further, they were observed eating small pills and 'drinking air.'  This crew remained in Ogden for about an hour before taking off again.

Okay, wow. That's quite a story! Unfortunately, that's all there currently is to it. Researcher Albert Rosales included this little blurb about a run-in with giant UFO occupants in his book, Humanoid Encounters and Others Among Us: 1 A.D.-1899. He cites HIS source as a book by Phillip  L. Rife called It Didn't Start with Roswell.  The case was also mentioned in Strange West Virginia Monsters, by Michael Newton, which is where I first heard it and began my (feeble) attempts to track down more information. 

Although all three books recount the exact same details, no more no less, Newton's book did offer a little insight into where this tale may have possibly come from. It seems as if, despite Rife's jumbled notes, the story most likely came from an article in the Parsons Advocate, a newspaper out of Tucker County, WV, located over 2 hours away, all the way across the state from Ogden. The article allegedly appeared in the April 23, 1897 edition, but neither Newton nor myself have been able to get ahold of an archival copy. 

So, I'll have to take Rife's word on it, I guess! But, I think there are some important things to consider when looking at the authenticity of the sighting. If we put away how much like an episode of Scooby Doo this reads as (shady oil and gas tycoons scaring off potential threats to their claims), there is some contemporary precedence for this event. 

While I haven't gotten a chance to read further than the free Google Books preview, Rife's work documents a huge number of both 'ufos' and encounters with the beings inside them dating from late 1896 into 1897. In fact, West Virginia was no stranger to this flap of reported 'phantom airships' that were seeming moving east across the United States during this time frame. 

On April 19, 1897, only TWO DAYS before this weird encounter, witnesses in Sistersville, WV reported seeing red, white, and green flashing lights in the sky. When observed through 'strong glasses,' witnesses could see an 180 foot, cone-shaped craft with fins on either side. It was seen for at least 20 minutes, but seemingly it never landed in that area. (Read Sistersville Phantom Airship)

Sistersville is only about 35 miles north of Ogden, both being right along the Ohio River and accessible via today's Route 2. Was the craft seen in Ogden the same one seen two days earlier only 35 miles north in Sistersville? Or, was the story made up, playing on the sheer number of other newspaper articles from various other locations all reporting weird phantom airships and/or strange humanoid encounters?

There's a good chance we'll never know just how true this story was...but one last thing to consider. Remember how I said Ogden was located in Wood County, West Virginia? Around 70 years later, Wood County would be the location of ANOTHER humanoid from a spaceship encounter...possibly one of the most famous in modern ufo history. In early November 1966, Woodrow Derenberger, returning home to Mineral Wells from a business trip in nearby Marietta, OH would meet a fellow who would call himself Indrid Cold. But, that story is for another day! 

Keep your eyes to the skies!

Did Members of the Flatwoods Monster Fleet Make it to Raleigh County?

Source

1952 was a BIG year for ufology, especially here in the Mountain State! By now, most of my readers are going to be pretty darn familiar with the September 12th sighting in Flatwoods (Braxton County) by a group of school boys, National Guardsman Eugene Lemon, and mother of two of the kids, Kathleen May. What they encountered up on a hill on the Fisher farm would forever be known throughout the world of high strangeness and eventually into the mainstream, as the Flatwoods Monster. 

Skeptics will just say that the boys followed a meteor, and were surprised by an owl sitting in the tree branches. And, while its true that reports of a meteor were reported that night over several states (including West Virginia) what they saw was no owl. It was a spade-headed, red-faced monstrosity with glowing yellow eyes, stick-like arms, and what can only be described as a lower half shaped like a pleated skirt. 

Sounds pretty far-fetched, right? Despite the documented physical effects from the encounter and the fact that none of these witnesses had any reason to lie...or to NOT be familiar with what an owl looked like...it's a super strange story. It just doesn't FIT in with more common UFO reports. But because of all that, that's why I think this story has continued to fascinate so many people over the years. However, the story doesn't end in Flatwoods...

Following the Flatwoods encounter on September 12th would come the Frametown Monster incident the next evening, when a couple with a young baby driving along State Route 4 between Frametown and Gassaway had their car engine stall, and witnessed a reptilian creature before finally being able to drive off. There was also the Bashful Billy incident in Wheeling, WV on September 15th where a 'meteor' crashed near the Vineyard Hills housing development, but disappeared...not before the rumors started flying though. I'll be covering both of these cases in future blogs, but for today, I wanted to focus on two reports from Raleigh County that came out in the days following the Flatwoods sighting.

Flatwoods Monster

The first sighting comes just the day after the initial Flatwoods encounter, on Saturday September 13th. Around 11pm, 16 year old Franklin Smedley and two other boys witnessed what looked like gallon-bucket sized orange objects flying over an area of Raleigh County called East Gulf. Franklin initially saw two of the objects, which moved faster than any airplane he'd ever seen, but didn't say anything because he didn't believe in flying saucers. However, when four more of the objects showed up, he alerted his friends, and all three got a good look at the objects.

The next morning, Smedley's father would tell the tale of the flying saucers during Sunday school. It was then that Mr. Shelby Deaner felt brave enough to confirm that he and his wife had also seen the objects the previous night. The couple was out watching for meteors, but shortly after going inside to get ready for bed, Mrs. Deaner looked out the window and alerted her husband. They both saw two orange objects at the same time the boys' had seen them and noted that they appeared to be moving at least twice as fast as an airplane that had passed overhead thirty minutes earlier.

The Smedley/Deaner report of East Gulf was documented in the Tuesday, September 16th edition of the Raleigh Register and reported without bias. However, an article appearing a few days later in the same publication would be a little more...tongue-in-cheek. It shared the story of Mrs. Earl Hutchinson of Skelton who reported 'something shiny' seen in the sky near the Greenbrier Dairy (Interesting side note: My grandfather was working at the Greenbrier Dairy at this time!) This thing didn't zoom across the sky like the Smedley/Deaner objects. Rather, it hovered. Mrs. Hutchinson initially believed it was a man with a parachute, as the object appeared to swing back and forth and jump up and down. That article expresses the idea that maybe the Flatwoods Monster was en route to Beckley to meet up with some other monsters? (Check out my Beasts of Beckley blog!)

So just what was going on in mid September of 1952? Why were all of these UFO/Monster sightings reported across the state within just days of each other? It simply could have been monster mania brought on by a recent meteor shower and a series of misidentifications and hoaxes. Or, it could be something else. In his book, The Braxton County Monster: The Cover Up of the Flatwoods Monster Revealed, author Frank Feschino poses a very interesting theory. Feschino believes that there was actually some sort of 'invasion' of the east coast by flying saucers.  In the case of the Flatwoods Monster, perhaps it was either shot down or crashed and subsequent sightings were follow-up rescue missions, other crafts that crashed/were shot down, etc. I can't possibly do this theory justice within a few lines, so definitely check out the book for a better understanding. 

What's important to remember is that the Flatwoods Monster is just the tip of the iceberg. That's the story that everyone seems to know, and for good reason. It has solid witnesses who stuck to their story, a unique creature unlike any other, and has been well-documented and shared throughout the years. But, the Flatwoods Monster was not the only strange thing reported in West Virginia that week! 

Keep your eyes to the skies and your heart and mind open! 

The Raleigh Register
21 September 1952

The Raleigh Register
16 September 1952

Beans Mill Monster and UFO Sighting (1976)

Eyewitness Sketch
Source: West Virginia UFO's by Bob Teets

In July of 1994, Willis 'Willie' Spence contacted West Virginia UFO researcher/author Bob Teets about an encounter he had back in 1976 while working as a night security guard. Spence worked the 6pm to 6am shift at Crown Creek Coal Company's Beans Mill mine in Upshur County. One evening, a group of local boys approached his guard shack with quite the story. They said they had just heard that a woman living nearby had called the police department because there was a gray, hairy monster on her porch!

Despite the outrageous claim, apparently the authorities did do a check. It is said that they also saw SOMETHING, which they shot and wounded as they chased it back into the woods. Two days later, Spence would have his own sighting. As he was leaving work and returning home one morning, he caught a brief glimpse of some type of creature hiding behind a tree. He didn't get a great look at it, but noticed that it had a humped back, similar to how the woman had described the creature on her property.

Things seemed pretty quiet for awhile, but two weeks later, Spence would have an experience he'd never forget. He was chilling out in his guard shack, listening to the radio and sipping on a cup of coffee. He was interrupted by what sounded like two pieces of metal slapping together. He looked out and saw what he assumed at first was a helicopter. A bright light came over the trees, and into view popped what appeared to be a spinning top-shaped craft, 40 to 50 feet in diameter and flying at a 60 degree angle. The main body of the craft was gray, but it was covered with rectangular windows in shades of red, green, orange and purple. The lighted rectangular windows would dim and brighten back up, each time making a 'va-room, va-room' sound. It was surrounded by a grated deck with a five foot high railing. A light came down, and a section of it turned orange as it stopped spinning.

Eyewitness Sketch of the
bottom of the craft
Source: WV UFOs by Bob Teets

Spence watched this craft for about three minutes, noting how beautiful it was, and how it evoked a happy feeling for him. Eventually, the craft went up and over a nearby mountain, out of sight. After this encounter, there were no additional sightings of that particular craft, nor the gray, hairy beast.  As seen in various other UFO cases (notably the Flatwoods Monster case of 1952), this case begs the question as to whether there was some sort of connection between the creature and the UFO. Was the creature an inhabitant of the UFO, either out exploring the West Virginia country-side (or perhaps even ESCAPING)? Did the occupants of the UFO send this creature down as a recon to see how it would react to our atmosphere? Or, were the UFO occupants sent to study this strange beast that happened to just be here naturally?

There could be no correlation at all between the sightings of the UFO and the sightings of the monster. It could all be a coincidence. But, after years of studying this phenomenon, I tend to believe that there is some over-arching force that links all this high strangeness together. Even today, many Bigfoot reports are accompanied by mysterious light anomalies and nearby UFO reports. I'll let you decide what to believe. Keep your eyes to the skies! 

**The information for this blog post comes entirely from Bob Teets' 1995 book, West Virginia UFOs: Close Encounters in the Mountain State.  There was a brief mention of this case in the West Virginia UFO Newsletter Volume 2, Number 11 (1996), but no additional information was given and unfortunately, I haven't found anymore substantial info on this case anywhere else. 

Circleville UFO!

The Circleville Herald
28 March 1957

Happy World UFO Day!

If you've followed this blog for awhile, you know I love to post a fun UFO-related story every year on July 2nd in honor of this most esteemed holiday, and this year is no exception. But, this post is coming at you from the past; I'm writing it on June 30th because today I'll be recovering from Spectral Research and Investigation's follow-up investigation of the Gregg-Crites Octagon House in Circleville, Ohio. We absolutely had such a great night there a few months ago, that we had to return. 

It's actually the Octagon House, though, that has inspired today's blog. Well, not the Octagon House, exactly, but the town of Circleville, Ohio. Not only is this unique lil' hamlet full of haunted history and ghost stories...it's also known for quite a few UFO sightings. Strange aerial phenomenon continues up through today, but it all started in February of 1948.

C. Bruce Stevenson was a farmer who lived just outside of Circleville. Everyone who knew him attested that he was an honest, hardworking man who would never lie or make up stories. That's why it came as somewhat of a shock to the locals when in August of 1952, the Circleville Herald ran a story about Stevenson. That summer, the country was abuzz with talk of UFOs. 1952 saw a huge UFO flap across the eastern United States, with reports of flying saucers even flying over the Washington, DC. Skeptics and believers were hashing it out over the validity of visitors from other planets and people from all walks of life were following the events.

That's when Bruce Stevenson decided to share his story that he had been keeping a secret for four years out of fear of ridicule. Back in February of 1948 Bruce saw a UFO over his farm.

It was a cold, moonlit night early in the month, and there was snow on the ground. Bruce awoke around 2am, and while getting a drink of water, looked out the kitchen window and saw what he at first thought were flames. Afraid that one of his farm buildings was on fire, he headed outside in that direction. What he saw was way bigger than any fire.

Bruce reported that a strange craft slowly and silently floated over his tool building, no more than 150 feet away from him. The craft was saucer shaped, with a silvery underbody containing portholes or vents. On top sat an 8 foot tall dome filled with a glowing amber/orange light that dulled slightly when he approached. It was the amber light that he originally mistook for fire. The base measured about 60 feet across and something whirled beneath, making no noise and causing no motion on the base itself.  

After watching the craft for a few moments go over the roof of the tool building and a building containing the farm's hogs, it floated on away and into the night. And, for four years, Bruce stayed tight-lipped about what he saw. When he finally contacted the newspaper, he remained adamant that what he saw was not an air pocket, a reflection, or any other natural phenomenon. On his behalf, the newspaper reached out to Wright Patterson Airforce Base to report the sighting, but they simply acknowledged they had received the letter and never followed up. Bruce's daughter would later tell reporters that a retired military officer DID come to visit her dad after he reported it in 1952. 

Over the years, more people would report strange lights and mysterious craft in the Circleville area. One such witness, Pete Hartinger, has had at least four sightings beginning with his first in 1958. Inspired by his own experiences, as well as the Bruce Stevenson case (which is now regarded as one of the best eyewitness UFO sightings in history), Pete took action. In 1985, he and several others formed the Roundtown UFO Society. The society still meets once a month to study, investigate, and document the UFO phenomenon in Circleville and beyond. 

Dipping into the UFO history of Circleville, OH has made me even more anxious for our investigation, and I'll certainly be keeping my eyes to the skies in addition to huntin' for ghosties. 

For more information on this case, please check out the Project 1947 website. It includes a letter written by the Circleville Herald writer, as well as an essay by Pete Hartinger about the Stevenson sighting! 

1950 Rectangular UFO Over Charleston

Photo Source

This month,Theresa's Haunted History blog has been filled with UFO stories! I didn't plan on it, but it's been an interesting ride, documenting some of West Virginia's forgotten cases of strange objects in the skies. For the last day of the month, I've got yet another saucer tale for ya!

So, back in the Spring of 1950, there was somewhat of a significant UFO flap occurring across the Mountain State. Between March 14th and March 18th, UFOs were seen in both Bluefield and in Fairmont. But, a month later, on April 8, 1950 another UFO was spotted over the skies of Charleston. The report was published in the 13 April 1950 edition of The Leader (Hinton, WV). It states that Mrs. Hazel Lewis, a Statehouse telephone operator, saw a RECTANGULAR shaped craft flying at a terrific speed. It circled the area, high above the city, then shot straight up and out of sight. It did all of this without making any noticeable sound. 

What's interesting is that up until Mrs. Lewis' sighting, all the flying saucers being reported around the area were described as round or saucer shaped. No one had reported such an angular craft. Did Mrs. Lewis simply misidentify a saucer-shaped UFO, possibly based on her angle of viewing it? Or, was she lucky enough to be one of the first to witness a new type of flying saucer, different from those previously recorded in West Virginia and beyond? Today, there are actually quite a few reports of rectangular shaped UFOs, but even still, they pale in comparison to other forms. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below, and remember to keep your eyes to the skies! 

Flying Saucers Over Follansbee

This news clipping above comes from The Weirton Daily Times and is dated Thursday, 09 February 1967. Two days earlier, on Tuesday February 7, 1967  John Casale of Hoover Heights (located just outside Follansbee, WV in Brooke County) spotted a UFO flying over his home on 2nd Street. The craft was described as being yellowish in color and round, flying from the direction of Steubenville, OH towards nearby Mingo Junction around 8pm that evening.

Among the other witnesses were John's wife, and his children, Mary Ann and Peggy. A handful of others witnessed the flying saucer as well. They were reported as being Louis Casini, Larry Kofur?, Dan Buffington, Richard Banfi?, and Lenny Baldauf. 

Unfortunately, I couldn't find any additional details about this particular sighting, but a quick search led to a handful of other UFO reports coming in from Follansbee between 1989 and 2017! In addition to this 2007 highly detailed account of a black, arrow-shaped anomaly with red lights seen over Rt. 2 submitted to UFO Net (read report HERE), incident reports from NUFORC can be found for 1989,  1999, 2001, 2005, 2007 (which closely resembles the other 2007 report from UFO Net, but happened a few days before), and 2017.  With the exception of the 2007 incidents, all of these craft seem pretty different in their descriptions, and not once did the round, yellow saucer of 1967 seemingly return. 

There is no shortage of UFO sightings from the Mountain State and I'll continue to share and document as many as I come across. Keep your eyes to the skies, and feel free to contact me with your own sightings of strange aerial anomalies! 

Hinton Furniture and UFO Craze of 1947!

It's finally Friday, and this week I've got a Friday Funny coming to you from Hinton, West Virginia! As we talked about before here on Theresa's Haunted History, people from Hinton definitely had a penchant for seeing flying saucers throughout the years, and it all started back during the 1947 UFO wave during July. After the nation was swept up with speculation as to just what exactly crashed outside of Roswell, New Mexico and if it was from another planet or not, people from all over the country began coming forward with their own stories.

One such woman was Lee Ramsey, a housewife living on Summers Street. On July 10, 1947 she witnessed a series of six unidentified flying objects over her Hinton home. The sighting was written up in one of the local newspapers, The Leader. (Read my blog post, Hinton Has Saucers, Too for more info). However, it wouldn't be until the following May (and after another sighting by a Hinton resident) that an enterprising employee working for the Hinton Furniture Company would come up with a clever, tongue-in-cheek way to incorporate the UFO craze into the company's advertising!

The advertisement above was published in the May 21, 1948 edition of the Hinton Daily News. It reads, "Flying Saucers: Those people who saw the flying saucers last year were a little behind the times. An astronomer in Italy saw a flock of flying saucers on November 30, 1880. You will be right up with the times if you purchase your furniture and home appliances from us." 

I'm not sure if it was Hinton Furniture's owner, Ray Walker himself, or another employee who was tasked with advertising, but I have to applaud whoever it was who came up with this ad! If my assumptions are correct, the author evidently was a fan of the OG Fortean Historian---Charles Fort! It was Charles Fort who collected the strange little story about an Italian astronomer's experience and brought it to the public forefront. But, I wouldn't necessarily call what was seen a flock of 'flying saucers.' Rather, it sounds like a flock of flying CREATURES! Here's what was published:

Signer Ricco, of the Observatory of Palermo, writes that, Nov. 30, 1880, at 8:30 o'clock in the morning, he was watching the sun, when he saw, slowly traversing its disk, bodies in two long, parallel lines, and a shorter, parallel line. The bodies looked winged to him. But so large were they that he had to think of large birds. Sig. Ricco's estimate is that these objects … must have been at least five and a half miles high. -Source

I'm not sure if the winged bodies observed by Signer Ricco were humanoid in shape, but even with the description of birds makes me automatically think of West Virginia's own favorite winged creature: Mothman. However, even I have to admit that three parallel lines of Mothmen flying around the sun (the greatest lamp in the solar system) is more than a little frightening! 

The Plumley Building
Later home to Hinton Furniture
Source: WV History on View