KEY FACTS
- Date: 15 November 1966
- Location: Point Pleasant, Mason County, West Virginia, USA
- Witnesses: Roger and Linda Scarberry; Steve and Mary Mallette
- Setting: the abandoned West Virginia Ordnance Works—the TNT Area
- Initial record: a local newspaper account the following morning
- Category: Cryptids & Strange Creatures
On a November night in 1966, four people drove out of an abandoned wartime complex convinced that something had followed their car. They went to the police. By morning, their account was in print—but none of them could say with certainty what they had seen.
Roger and Linda Scarberry and Steve and Mary Mallette had taken Roger’s Chevrolet into the former West Virginia Ordnance Works, north of Point Pleasant. The plant had closed years earlier. Its roads still ran between woods, wetlands and the remains of buildings made for another purpose entirely.
Near one of those buildings, something made the four turn back towards town. Their descriptions did not settle what it was. Even the newspaper that first reported the encounter seemed unsure what to call it.
It might have remained a curious local incident. Instead, other accounts followed—and the thing no one could name began to take on a life of its own.
What happened on that first night, before anyone knew the story they were entering?
THE MOTHMAN QUESTION
What followed the Scarberry–Mallette car—and how much of the story that followed can the original record bear?
Related Reports — Cryptids & Strange Creatures
THE INVESTIGATION CONTINUES
What did the four witnesses actually report?
Follow the earliest accounts into the investigation. The full dossier examines what can be traced to the first witnesses, what changed as the reports spread, and the questions the surviving evidence still cannot settle. Members can also open the Archive Vault to examine the record trail for themselves.
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