Recently on the program, Coast to Coast AM with George Noory, I appeared to discuss Mothman. Lots of folks called in with questions and their sightings. Interest remains high in the 1966-1967 elements of the story of John A. Keel’s investigations in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, of a giant flying creature. Today the accounts are associated with all kinds of elements of occultism, demonology, and ufology, mostly due to how Keel told the tale. But cryptozoology underlies the initial reports, of course.

Nevertheless, it is remarkable how fiction and the facts have become mixed and confused in the Mothman chronicles. Take for example, Parthena Black’s current essay "Dreams That Predict the Future" and its use of the Mothman story. Black writes:

Eerie dreams that pointed to waking life events have been featured in films and literature. A good example appears in the movie "The Mothman Prophecies". Connie has a recurring dream where she repeatedly hears someone say, "Wake up, number 37." Connie is not able to connect the dream with reality until after the fact, when Klein rescues her and prevents her from becoming the 37th victim of a bridge collapse.

Unfortunately, Ms. Black used a fictional example to make her point. I think it would have been just as compelling if Black would have told about how reporter Mary Hyre (who helped John Keel) did actually have a recurring dream of Christmas packages floating in the Ohio River, a scene that would come true on December 15, 1967, when 46 (not 36) died during the collapse of the Silver Bridge at Point Pleasant. It had been 13 months since the November 15, 1966 "first" sighting of Mothman. In a mere 26 months (13 months times 2), Mary Hyre would be mysteriously dead, after a four week illness, at the age of 54. See #47 on the "List."

I will be talking about Mothman on December 3, 2005, in Virginia. I guess Virginia is not just for lovers!