Ken Gerhard - Encounters with Flying Humanoids: Mothman, Manbirds, Gargoyles & Other Winged Beasts

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

Encounters with Flying Humanoids: Mothman, Manbirds, Gargoyles & Other Winged Beasts 2013 by Ken Gerhard.

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First e-book edition 2013

E-book ISBN: 9780738738901

Book design by Bob Gaul

Cover illustration by Dominick Finelle/The July Group

Cover design by Kevin R. Brown

Interior photos by Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker, Thomas E. Finley, Jonathan Lackey, Linda S. Godfrey, Ginger Bertline, Ken Gerhard, Frank Ramirez, Jon Huston, and Nick Redfern

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Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

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Woodbury, MN 55125

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Manufactured in the United States of America

Contents

by Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker

Flying Humanoids
The Manbirds and Other Incomprehensibles

Dawn of the Twentieth Century:
Man Takes Flight

Flying Saucer Invaders!

The Manbirds

Gargoyles and Chimeras

The Mothman Cometh

Mexico: The Sky Gods Return

Recent Reports

Winged Beings in Mythology
and Folklore

Foreword

One afternoon during the early 1980s, I was browsing through the upstairs second-hand department of Andromeda Booksthe once-celebrated but now long-demised science fiction and fantasy bookshop in Birmingham, Englandwhen I came upon a paperback entitled Earths Secret Inhabitants , which had been published in 1979. Its front cover illustration was extremely eyecatchinga full-color depiction of two feathery-winged humanoids flying through the sky in a scene captured within the hulking silhouette of a bigfoot-type man-beast.

Initially Id assumed that this book was a sci-fi novel, but then I noticed that its authors were none other than D. Scott Rogo and Jerome Clarktwo leading American non-fiction writers specializing in the field of mysterious phenomena. And when I turned to the back cover, the blurb revealed that its contents featured a wide range of surreal entities that apparently share our planet but have never been scientifically explainedincluding a veritable phalanx of winged batmen. Until then, Id been largely unaware of these aerial apparitions, but after reading about them in Rogo and Clarks bookbecause, needless to say, I purchased it immediately!I was totally captivated by their bizarre histories and extraordinary appearances, and from then on I made a point of collecting as much information concerning them as I could find.

The most immediate problem that I have always faced whenever doing so, however, is that such material is extremely disparate, scattered loosely among countless publications, yet rarely compiled or assimilated into any kind of lucid or lengthy coverage. This is why I was delighted to learn recently that Ken Gerhard was writing a book-length treatment of these winged wonders and even more delighted when he very kindly invited me to write a foreword for it.

Reading through his book, Encounters with Flying Humanoids , it is evident that Ken shares my own fascination with the batmen and man-birds that have haunted our skies for many centuries, continue to be encountered even today, in all parts of the world, and assume a diverse assortment of forms. Moreover, unlike previous writers, he has not been content to limit his coverage to such perennially chronicled enigmas as Mothman, Owlman, and the man-bats of Texas, but has cast his gaze like a vast skyborne net far and wide through time and space, encompassing many much more obscure examples that even I, despite having spent years of collecting material myself, had never previously heard of.

Consequently, Encounters with Flying Humanoids very commandingly fills a sizeable, (all-too-)long-present gap in the Fortean and cryptozoological literature, and it also makes enthralling, if not a little disturbing, reading. What are these mysterious flying figures with plumes of bird or pinions of bat, and where have they originated? Do they truly belong somewhere within our planets grand scheme of things, or are they visitors from the great beyondfrom alien worlds, planes, or dimensions, rarefied realms stranger than we can even begin to suspect? And if so, why are they here? What might their purpose be?

A worthy successor to his previous highly acclaimed volumes on winged mystery beasts and cryptids of Texas, Kens latest, superb book is a timely reminder of just how outlandish our land can sometimes be, how otherworldly our world may sometimes seem, and that there truly are more thingsespecially with wingsin heaven and earth, gentle reader, than are dreamt of in anyones philosophy!

Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker,
Wednesbury, England,
December 2012

Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker with a friend Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker

Introduction:

Flying Humanoids
The Manbirds and Other
Incomprehensibles

On a dark and desolate rural road, two young couples are chased at high speed by a terrifying apparitionan unearthly winged entity that defies explanation by our understanding of the natural world. Suddenly and inexplicably, a sleepy West Virginia community is thrust into a vortex of the oddest nature, culminating in a tragic disaster that touches everyone within reach. There are still many who believe that the so-called Mothman that was encountered by dozens of residents during the 1960s was a bad omen, a shadowy portent of destruction, and that its manifestation spelled doom for all who were unfortunate enough to cross its path. Skeptics have since argued that individuals had misidentified a large owl that was lurking in the area and that the rest was merely the product of mass hysteria and overly fanciful imaginations. Yet in many cultures, the appearance of an owl outside someones window is considered to be a premonition of death a connection perhaps?