The Strange Case of the Flatwoods Monster

One of the most infamous close-encounter cases in the field of UFOlogy is that of the "Flatwoods Monster," also known as the "Braxton County Monster" or the "Phantom of Flatwoods."  The Flatwoods Monster was popularized by Gray Barker in his 1956 nonfiction book THEY KNEW TOO MUCH ABOUT FLYING SAUCERS, which also introduced to the world the concept of the "Men in Black."  Late one evening on September 12, 1952, in the town of Flatwoods in Braxton County, West Virginia, seven people saw a bright object land on the property of a local farmer, soon after which the group witnessed a ten-foot-tall humanoid with a blood-red face and clawed hands gliding towards them across the farmer's field.  Some claimed that the creature was "a robot, controlled mechanically," as suggested by Barker in Chapter Two of his book.  An artist's interpretation of the "Flatwoods Monster" can be seen below.... 

The strange case of the "Flatwoods Monster" was only the beginning of West Virginia's intersection with the paranormal, as evidenced by John A. Keel's thorough investigation into the rash of UFO/Men in Black/Phantom Clown/Mothman sightings that plagued the state in the late 1960s.  Keel wrote extensively about this investigation in his 1975 nonfiction book THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES, the High Weirdness quotient of which surpasses even Gray Barker's descent into the rabbit hole of UFOlogy over twenty years earlier.  To learn more about West Virginia's reluctant love affair with the "Flatwoods Monster" (and the peculiar field of UFOlogy in general), I recommend acquiring a copy of Seth Breedlove's polished and thorough documentary entitled THE FLATWOODS MONSTER:  A LEGACY OF FEAR (Small Town Monster, 2018).  As noted by Brian Tull in his Horrorbuzz.com review of this documentary, the film's special effects possess "a hand-painted quality that gives [THE FLATWOODS MONSTER] a unique feel and texture" while its clever use of 1950s-style miniatures "imbue the film with an eerie surrealism as the set pieces of this story are presented as a series of lovingly crafted dioramas."  One can only wonder what Mark Pellington's ill-fated 2003 adaptation of THE MOTHMAN PROPHECIES could have looked like if that film had taken a similar approach to its phantasmagorical subject matter.

You can hear paranormal researcher Dr. Ivan Sanderson--author of such books as ABOMINABLE SNOWMEN:  LEGEND COME TO LIFE (1961), UNINVITED VISITORS (1967), "THINGS" (1967), MORE "THINGS" (1969), and INVISIBLE RESIDENTS (1971)--discussing the "Flatwoods Monster" in this 1953 radio interview: 

A previous documentary about the "Flatwoods Monster" sightings, Frank Feschino's THE BRAXTON COUNTY MONSTER (2006), can be seen on YouTube: