NARRATOR: Point Pleasant, West Virginia.
November 15, 1966.
Two young couples were driving down
a dark road outside of town.
As they pass by an old building, they were startled
by a frightening sight.
[screeching]
They claim to have seen a large, winged creature
6 to 7 foot tall, gray in color, and two large red eyes.
They said this creature flew over their car
and followed them back into town.
That was the beginning of the Mothman sightings.
NARRATOR: The young couple's harrowing account
was picked up by the local press and incited panic across town.
The legend of the Mothman was born,
and dozens of encounters with the winged monster
would be reported over the next year.
There were over 100 reported sightings
to the local authorities.
You had some people who, you know,
claimed to have seen it while driving in their car.
You had other people seeing it in their front yard.
NARRATOR: For the people of Point Pleasant,
the mystery of the Mothman persists to this day.
Where did this monster come from?
Why did it suddenly appear in this small town?
And perhaps most curious of all, why
were the first Mothman sightings followed by a visit
from the "men in black?"
MIKE BARA: Some people think he was a being from another world.
The supporting evidence of that is the fact
that multiple witnesses who saw the Mothman were
actually intimidated by what can now
be described as men in black.
Men in black typically are only associated with UFO cases.
People describe men in black as looking like cadavers.
They looked like pale face zombies dressed in black suits
with black fedoras.
RICHARD DOLAN: I interviewed Mothman witnesses who did
have men in black experiences.
This was 40 years after the fact at the time,
and they were still clearly traumatized by the event.
I had no reason to disbelieve these people, none whatsoever.
NARRATOR: One resident who claimed to have been visited
by the men in black was Mary Hyre, a local journalist who
reported on the Mothman sightings
for "The Point Pleasant Register"
and "The Athens Messenger."
Mary Hyre was just a normal, legitimate journalist
investigating your average stories around town.
And then she was suddenly plunged into this issue
involving the Mothman.
NARRATOR: Mary Hyre had begun investigating
the mysterious incidents in and around Point Pleasant
with a New York-based UFO researcher named John Keel.
John Keel heard about the Mothman story and decided,
I'm going to go up there, I'm going to see what's going on.
And when he did so, he hooked up with Mary Hyre.
And the two of them sort of became
like the Mulder and Scully of that era
and secured a great deal of information,
interviewed a lot of people.
NARRATOR: These investigations would eventually
lead to the popular book, and later Hollywood
film, "The Mothman Prophecies."
But not everyone was pleased with the information
Mary Hyre and John Keel were gleaning from the public
about the Mothman.
Mary Hyre was visited by men in black,
who told her to stop writing about the Mothman and all
these strange encounters.
Stop writing about this.
You don't want to be involved in this.
This is a classic example of the men in black not just
terrorizing and threatening UFO witnesses,
but also journalists as well.