He Chased Yeti and Tried to Solve the Silver Bridge Collapse Pt. 2

The year is 1966. The world is abuzz with events that are promising and hopeful, but also distressing. A brief recap reminds us that the Beatles release another of their ground breaking records "Revolver" continuing to transform the face of modern music. In that same year NASA conducts Gemini two-man spacecraft docking missions, lands the Surveyor satellite on the moon, and the Lunar Orbiter takes the first photos of the sun from the moon's orbit. The Soviet Luna 9 makes the first unmanned soft landing on the moon's surface. Numerous passenger aircraft suffer fatal crashes in Japan. The Dallas Cowboys will play the Greenbay Packers of the National Football League as a prelude to the first SuperBowl with the AFL. President Johnson announces his approval of more escalations of the war in Vietnam.

The visitation

Yet, in 1966 something else is afoot in a small town near the stateline of Ohio and West Virginia. On November 16th the local newspaper at Point Pleasant will release a strange story of a mystery that will lead to a number of sightings and ultimately the collapse of the Silver Bridge in December of 1967. According to the story a number of couples parked in cars at a nearby lover's lane are terrified when a man-like winged creature harasses them leaving two people suffering from conjunctivitis, an eye ailment caused by exposure to radiation as stunned teenagers give their public account of their bizarre encounter.

Disturbing incidents

The Mothman suddenly makes its way to public attention setting off a wave of frightening sightings and as a harbinger of disaster! A local single engine pilot reports a winged creature with glowing red eyes is flying over the bridge area. A woman holding her baby in the evening and walking from her house to her car is suddenly thrown into such a panic as the Mothman stands up from hiding behind a parked auto that she drops her child. Another woman is spellbound when she gazes outside of her window one evening as she's stunned to see the Mothman standing alongside a tree next to her home. She describes the entity much as others do with fiery eyes as she watches it suddenly flies off after spreading its bat-like wings.

Scenes of chaos

Around the World War II abandoned munitions dump just outside of town a number of teenagers are scared into near shock at the appearance of the Mothman where they have made the old structure a hangout when there's nothing to do. Several incidents occur here only further baffling authorities! John A. Keel leads a group of volunteers to investigate the area around the old military facility. He interviews those who were startled by the winged entity while making out on lover's lane. Then another incident occurs where young adults out for a Saturday Night spree are chased by the Mothman as it flies overhead and tries to attack the vehicle. They reach speeds of 100 miles per hour in their panic before the creature finally departs the scene!

Who is watching?

Not realizing the full scope of an impending tragedy John Keel makes several trips to Point Pleasant and on one occasion before arriving in town one of many strange phone calls occurs. While stopping in at a local health food store the clerk informs him that an unknown caller is asking for him. Keel answers the phone and the voice at the other end tells him he will need to pick up some bottled water because of what is to come. A power outage occurs not long after that! John will be the recipient of several weird phone calls that make little sense.

Visions

Calls come into the local Sheriff's office and to the town newspaper from residents who claim to be having nightmares of Christmas packages floating on the surface of the river among other enigmatic dreams. The town appears to be in the grip of hysterics. Keel befriends several of the locals who help him in his investigation and remain close to him for years to come, but who will die sudden and questionable deaths as time goes on. He will feel a sense of guilt and remorse over their untimely fates as expressed in his later books.

The inevitable

On December 15, 1967 while packed with rush hour traffic, the Silver Bride suddenly has a major structural failure plunging 31 cars into the icy waters below killing 46 passengers! John A. Keel rushes out to the town to take interviews from witnesses the next day. Even though the Silver Bridge had just been inspected and passed days before, the tragic event ominously occurred anyway. People whom Keel interviewed said that hours before the collapse of the bridge they saw strangers climbing about the structure dressed in black. They thought nothing of it after a while thinking it was inspection personnel. Now the dreams of Christmas packages turned out to be none other than clairvoyant warnings from the future!

It continues

In the aftermath of the Silver Bridge collapse, an old eye-bar suspension structure built in 1928, Mothman sightings seem to disappear all together until 2013 when new eye witnesses began reporting a rash of sightings. In 2007 the Mothman was seen near the site of another bridge calamity. The moth seems to be a harbinger of disaster in many cultures over the centuries. John A. Keel forever baffled by the evidence he compiled, attributed the disastrous failure at Gallipolis, Ohio and Point Pleasant, West Virginia as an ongoing deception that has plagued mankind for centuries in the form of hauntings, magical appearances of entities, UFO's, and angelic creatures who at times may give crucial advice or deceptively mislead those who are at a pivotal point in history. John A. Keel calls this phenomenon "The Broken Record in the Sky" as it seems to be a repetitive pattern that makes little sense even though it is being orchestrated by someone or something that wants to intervene in the affairs of humans.

Conclusion

Decades later in observance of the impact that this winged creature had upon the local towns people on both sides of the river, not only bronze plaques but statues of the winged entity itself mark the historical event that continues to haunt the memories of normal hard working residents to this day. There are some whobelievee that the Devil came a-calling. This terrible secret remains unsolved to the fascination of those who have not forgotten.