Astonishing Legends

You might not believe in ghosts, but it would be difficult to ignore all the furtive and orchestrated actions that were going on throughout the years at 30 East Drive, which continue to this day. Certainly, in some famous poltergeist cases, incidents could have been manipulated to gain attention for the prankster. However, unless you're contending that pre-teens have somehow gained Hollywood Special Effects level skills in every case, then some of the more bizarre and baffling examples of poltergeist activity would be worthy of investigation. Then what exactly, are the defining factors between a run-of-the-mill poltergeist and other types of spirit activity? Is a poltergeist more paranormal than supernatural? What are the rules? There are theories that poltergeist activity may be a physical manifestation of intensely directed energy emanating from people, mostly youth. As "fringe" as that may seem, then in some cases it might possibly be explained by science one day, that is, if enough scientists would be willing to endure the ridicule and ensuing damage to their reputations from their peers. However, the strange activity at 30 East Drive seems much more than that, not only because it continued long after the Pritchards left the house, but also because this energy appears to have a personality behind it, and there are indications that there's more than one spectral personality residing around the property. Whatever you think The Black Monk or "Fred" is, whether disembodied spirits or mischievous kids, this "Mr. Nobody" might not be anybody, but it sure seems like it's something.

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Poltergeists are all fun & games, that is until they try to strangle you.  The actions of whatever force was interacting with the Pritchard family at 30 East Drive in Pontefract, England had seemed playful in a way, albeit disturbing and churlish at times.  It seemed there was a primary personality that was the source of the mischief they were experiencing and so consistent were its stunts that the family became familiar with this presence they called "Fred."  However, no one really knows what someone or something is capable of until it gets angry.  The family saw another side to Fred, or The Black Monk, when it violently attacked the daughter Diane Pritchard on the stairs, leaving red marks on her throat.  But was this the doings of their ol' gadfly pal Fred, or something much more sinister?  Join us tonight as we examine this escalation of poltergeist activity at the house and try to analyze this darker, malevolent nature of the Black Monk.

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The quote, "Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days" is attributed to Benjamin Franklin. We assume the esteemed Mr. Franklin was speaking only of human guests, but it could also apply to the subject of tonight's show. Because the uninvited guest of 30 East Drive in Pontefract, England would prove to be more than an annoying visitor oblivious to hints or uncaring that they'd overstayed their welcome, it would show itself as a threat to the family's safety and sanity. In the mid-1960s and 70s, the Pritchard family who lived at that address experienced a visitor who was not only unwelcome but unseen, a capricious prankster whose sense of humor was offset by its sometimes vicious and violent power. Human beings have an astounding ability to endure hardships they are powerless against and eventually, this poltergeist presence came to be somewhat accepted, with the mother of the family, Jean, giving it the nickname "Fred." But what was this force in supernatural terms? Was Fred merely poltergeist energy in the general definition, a collective of entities, a demon, or the vengeful spirit of a condemned man? A local legend that a 16th century Cluniac Monk was tried and executed for a horrific crime on those grounds is the source for that last idea. Some have seen a dark, shadowy figure wearing a black monk's robe around the property and it has reinforced that notion. If that is the case, perhaps the Pritchards were the unwelcome visitors to the home of "The Black Monk." 

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We met filmmaker Seth Breedlove at the Kent Stage for the 2018 Kent Paranormal Weekend symposium, where our first event was a screening of his film, The Mothman of Point Pleasant.  Needless to say, we were very impressed by his documentary on the subject and then later by Seth himself.  After a very pleasant chat in the lobby, we knew we had met a kindred spirit and had to get him on the show to discuss other works by his film production company, Small Town Monsters.  Tonight we discuss Seth's oeuvre of well-researched, fascinating and enjoyable documentaries, covering such topics as the Minerva Monster, the Beast of Whitehall, the Boggy Creek Monster, Mothman of Point Pleasant, Invasion on Chestnut Ridge, the Flatwoods Monster, and his latest, The Bray Road Beast, as well as several upcoming projects.  We'll find out what captivates him about each incident and the creatures at their centers, what it was like to actually explore these towns, and what he thinks might be happening with all this High Strangeness.  

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Anyone who has experienced what is considered a paranormal event will tell you that it's not easy to tell others about what you had witnessed, especially if that experience was dramatic and significant.  Testimony about such things is often met with ridicule, scorn and sometimes violence by those who feel threatened by such challenges to their reality.  Therefore it takes no small amount of courage and resolution to tell your truth and stick to it.  Such are the qualities that we believe make up the mettle of tonight's guest, David "Dave" Davies.  Davies has had to endure bullying and beatings since he first described what he witnessed for himself and what his classmates had seen landing on the playground of the Broad Haven Primary School in Pembrokeshire, Wales in 1977.  For the 40 years since that close encounter, Davies has stood by his story with conviction and without embellishment or wavering, still ever willing to talk about his experience.  In fact, the sighting had made such an impact on him that he's spent the intervening years in a quest to find an explanation for what he'd seen.  Join us tonight as we hear from an eye-witness to one of the most well-observed UFO cases in history, The Broad Haven School UFO incident.

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So many popular culture misconceptions abound with stories of UFO sightings; that it's always some farmer, alone in his fields when an unidentified flying object appears. The "hayseed farmer" is an easy target to dismiss with ridicule and hubris. Sure, sometimes it is a farm, as it was in 1977 at the Coombs family farm in southern Wales, but it is far from the norm. And it wasn't a singular farmer who witnessed a UFO then, prominent townsfolk and a group of schoolchildren also saw bizarre craft and phenomena during a series of events that would become known as the Broad Haven incident. The Coombs family would also go on to experience High Strangeness that would rival the happenings at Skinwalker Ranch. If you still think that remote farms are still the most likely places for such incredible tales to emerge, you might be surprised that schoolyards also seem to be just as common for alien interactions, with notable cases happening all over the world, in countries like Australia, Zimbabwe, and Russia. Decades later, questions about these cases emerge: Were the goings on in Broadhaven, this "Flap," connected to the incident at Berwyn Mountain, three years prior? Does a "Welsh Triangle" exist? Why do otherworldly visitors want to communicate with our children? Is it because they are more likely to learn lessons we adults are too proud or stubborn to heed? Join us tonight as we examine these cases with a friend and fellow podcaster, Rob Kristofferson, host of Our Strange Skies, as we go in search of answers to these fascinating questions.

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On January 23, 1974, villagers in the community of Llandrillo in the Edeirnion area of Denbighshire, northern Wales, experienced a tremendous jolt and noise a little after 8:30 p.m., akin to a magnitude 3.5 earthquake.  Highly strange, colored lights were seen over the surrounding hills at the same time.  Another unusual occurrence was that the British Military was immediately on the scene as if they were tracking the "geological event" in real time.  The official Ministry of Defence conclusion was that the event was caused by a simultaneous earthquake and meteor impact, with the meteor being the cause of the freakish light show.  However, a meteor impact that would cause a shock of that magnitude would have left a visible crater, which was not found.  And of course, there were reports by witnesses on the scene of the military carting off bodies and wreckage.  Does this sound familiar to you?  It did enough to some tabloid papers at the time who dubbed it, "The Roswelsh Incident."  What's your conclusion?

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Many people enjoy a good mystery.  However, mysteries often leave us slightly disturbed and unsettled, because we're also always searching for answers and when we look for answers, we're sometimes comforted the most by the simplest explanations.  With the case of the Flannan Isle Lighthouse Keepers, most are willing to accept that a massive "Rogue Wave" swept the three men into oblivion.  But what if meteorological science matched against clues left from the scene could show that this theory may not be the most plausible?  What if several simple, yet extreme events combined to plunge this mystery into the depths of the unexplained?  Join us tonight as we interview Keith McCloskey, author of the book, The Lighthouse: The Mystery of the Eilean Mòr Lighthouse Keepers.  We'll discuss his in-depth research into the case and the possibility that the simplest explanations, while the easiest to accept, are often not where the real truth lies submerged.

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In 1899, construction on the Flannan Isles lighthouse was completed, perched atop Eilean Mòr, one of the highest points in the Outer Hebrides off the western coast of Scotland. It would soon experience its first tragedy and an enduring mystery. For several days, it's light could not be seen and on December 15, 1900, the ship Archtor documented this concern in its log while heading to port in Leith. However, 11 days would pass before the lighthouse tending ship Hesperus would be able to dock at Eilean Mòr due to foul weather, for which the area is well-known. What they discovered, or rather, didn't discover, would lead to one of the biggest mysteries of this enchanted region. Serious storm damage was evident on the island, but nothing seemed amiss inside the lighthouse itself except for the fact that the three lighthouse keepers had vanished and would never be seen again.  

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Something or someone of great importance and influence had convinced and motivated these neolithic hunter-gatherers to put their way of life on hold and come together as a group to undertake such a tremendous project as Göbekli Tepe. This is likely the first time hundreds of prehistoric peoples had formed an organized collective in order to build a religious sanctuary. The work would've taken years to accomplish and the temple would be built upon for many centuries more. The result of this work is believed to have spurred civilization as we know it today. But what beliefs or legends could have generated such a monumental task?  In Part Three of our series, we examine the hypotheses put forth in Andrew Collins' book, Göbekli Tepe, Genesis of the Gods: The Temple of the Watchers and the Discovery of Eden. With his comprehensive and detailed research, Collins goes beyond the boundaries of interpretation where Processual archaeologists would not stray. Could the memory of a global, natural catastrophe which nearly wiped out humanity be the impetus for creating a shrine to assuage the gods into sparing them more devastation? Could the builders have been directed by foreign and mysterious visitors who seemed to have knowledge of the heavens and history far beyond their own? If they did indeed fear destruction from the cosmos, then a connection from them to us could be made, because we're subject to those very same dangers. 

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