Gray Barker's Book of Bunk Mothman, Saucers, and MIB
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Gray Barker's Book of Bunk Mothman, Saucers, and MIB Those who seek the elusive truth behind the "Men in Black" and "Mothman" myths should know that material touched by Gray Barker's enterprising hand is tainted by self-serving deceit. He launched hoaxes, joined others' deceptions, and manipulated people's belief. "And I," says our author, "was one of those who helped. " JOHN C. SHERWOOD n the film of The Mothman Prophecies, a phone rings and I Richard Gere cringes. So does the informed moviegoer. Pseudohistory from the 1960s is twisted into fiction for the new millennium, and a questionable account of bizarre events is reshaped into fantasy. I say so because I have a good idea who's making that phone call. I accuse Gray Barker. Only naive audiences believe film dramas show history accurately. Fortunately, the mixed reviews for Sony Pictures' Mothman suggest few moviegoers or critics take its eerie SKEPTICAL INQUIRER May/June 2002 39 story seriously. Still, someone might trust the movie promot- Albert K. Bender's International Flying Saucer Bureau. ers' hints that truth exists out there. If they go searching they'll In 1953 Bender dissolved the fast-growing group, blaming find only more questions. unidentified commands. The puzzled Barker sifted through The curious will find a new mass-market paperback edition Bender's story and similar talcs, producing one of UFOIogy's of John A. Keel's The Mothman Prophecies, labeled by UFO classics, They Knew Too Much About Flying Saucers (Barker writer Jacques Vallee as "significant" and "intriguing" (Hynek 1956). Barker's prose gave Bender's story sufficient credibility and Vallee 1975) and cited by Colin Wilson in Alien Dawn to sustain an urban legend: Strange aircraft are observed, but, (Wilson 1998). In its pages: after black-clad men step from their huge auto, the witnesses • There's no sign of Gere's character, the fictional tor- clam up. In the 1980s Lowell Cunningham turned the tales mented widower "John Klein" invented by screenwriter into comic-book fiction, thus inspiring the Men in Black Richard Hatem. Instead, the real-life Keel relates a series of movies (Westcott 1993). weird anecdotal accounts sustained gleefully ever since by My involvement in all this began in early 1967 when I sent monster-hunters, UFO cultists, and West Virginia's tourism to Barker's Saucerian Publications my juvenile chronicle of industry (Rife 1995). Michigan's 1966 UFO flurry, which Barker gave the fanciful • The mind-reading entity Indrid Cold evaporates into a yet saleable title Flying Saucers Are Watching You. As it was fog of hearsay. printed, the Michigan "flap" seeped across Ohio into West • The researcher played by Alan Bates morphs into Gray Virginia, where began an eighteen-month series of reports of a Barker, whose influence on Keel's book flying creature popularly dubbed was palpably self-serving—and docu- "Mothman." mentable. Then came tragedy. The 700-foot Barker sure is having a great year. Silver Bridge at Point Pleasant, West Columbia Pictures' sequel to its 1 9 9 7 Virginia, collapsed during rush hour movie Men in Black—stepchild of December 15, 1967 (the film of The Barker's 1956 book They Knew Too Mothman Prophecies moves the event to Much About Flying Saucers—will treat Christmas Eve in the present day). moviegoers again to Barker's alien Some area residents saw a link between spawn. But those who seek the elusive the catastrophe, which took forty-five truth behind the Men in Black and lives, and the apparitions. It was a Mothman myths should be reminded notion Barker would borrow and Keel that material touched by Barker's enter- would reiterate. prising hand is tainted by deceit. Soon after, I committed my only journalistic crime. Encouraged by Gray Barker Barker, I wrote two articles for Barker's Barker was a theatrical film booker and Saucer News "exposing" time-traveling educational-materials distributor based UFOnauts, using the pseudonym Dr. in Clarksburg, West Virginia. For three Gray Baker in one o f his favored poses, from the 1950s. Richard H. Pratt. When Barker Reproduced with permission from Clarksburg-Harrison decades his sideline as a UFO Public Library. reprinted the hoax in 1983, I remained writer/publisher generated extra income silent. On Barker's death I considered and self-satisfaction. The U.S. Government's bibliography of the joke over, but guilt revived a decade later with Men in UFO publications reflected Barker's high status among the fly- Black's release. ing-saucer faithful, as he's among the handful of authors cited I exorcised this personal demon by writing "Gray Barker: more than a dozen times (Catoe 1969). My Friend, the Myth-Maker" for the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER Here's the dark side: Until Barker's death in 1984 at age 59, (Sherwood 1998). A former acquaintance soon reintroduced he hawked his books and magazines by embellishing stories and himself. James W Moseley, Barker's friend since 1954 and encouraging others to fabricate more. He launched hoaxes, Saucer News' first publisher, said Barker's death had unlocked joined odiers' deceptions, and manipulated people's beliefs. his own lips: "The public has die right to know how many And I was one of those who helped. UFO hoaxes there are, how easy they are to perpetrate, and Barker's UFO fame began in 1952 witJi reports of a space- what this shows about die gullibility of die UFO field" ship-riding creature at Flatwoods, West Virginia. Barker's inter- (Moseley 2001). In early 1985, Moseley had begun a series of views with witnesses, written in faux objective style, appeared revelations about Barker in a newsletter, Saucer Smear. (A book in Fate (Barker 1953). He soon became chief investigator for by Moseley and Karl T Pflock, Shockingly Close to the Truth!, has just been published by Prometheus Books.) John C. Sherwood of Pennsylvania, a reporter and editor for Gannett "[Barker] pretty much took all of UFOlogy as a joke," Co. newspapers for twenty-eight years, has written Moseley told me. "I did also, on one level, but I always interactive mysteries and books on magic. Contact him atjesherwood believed there was something real going on, behind all the @kennett.net or MysteryVisits.com. nonsense, and I still do." 4 0 May/June 2002 SKEPTICAL INQUIRER Barker died after "the more or less simultaneous failure of Joe Nickell, SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, March/April 2002], yet it various organs, due most probably to AIDS (though it was can be shown that Barker's cavalier influence undermined not diagnosed as such in those days)" (Moseley 1998). The Keel's account. What's disturbing is how poised Keel appears suspicion is restated in filmmaker Ralph Coon's documen- to have been for the deceptive antics of Barker and others tary about Barker, Whispers from Space. The film depicts interested in perpetuating a mythology of weirdness. Barker as a closeted gay man who adored movies and fan- In The Mothman Prophecies, Keel painted Barker in guard- tasy, dressed as monsters and spacemen to scare kids, held edly flattering terms: "The diehard fanatics who dominated fans at a distance, boozed heavily, and sold books chiefly to help his family. Barker's sister Blanch quoted him as having justified his UFO interest finan- cially: "There's good money in it," he'd told Barker hawked his books and magazines by her. Moseley said Barker actually "did not embellishing stories and encouraging others to believe in UFOs as an objective entity" but wanted "to please his audience" and tried fabricate more. He launched hoaxes, joined others' "to keep the UFO field alive during slack deceptions, and manipulated people's beliefs. periods" (Coon 1995). Surreptitiously, Moseley and Barker had obtained blank U.S. State Depart- ment stationery. After "we had a bit to drink" in 1957, they con- sauceriana during die early years cocted a message to "contactee" p OCMOTMCMT OF »T*T« were a humorless lot and Gray's George Adamski, whose book mischievous wit baffled and Flying Saucers Have Landed had v. enraged them. At times it baffled trot. George Aduskl related chats with Christ-like .itar Rout*. me, too. This towering bear of a Tallty Center extraterrestrials. Adamski thus California man was very hard to 'read.' But received an official-looking let- Kj Dear Professor t his investigations were always For the tine being. let us consider this • personal lottar ter from "R. E. Straith" aiming and rot to be construed as an official con—ml c a t i o n of the thorough and uncompromising" Department. I speak on behalf of only a part of our poople here In regard to the essstroveralal natter or the 070. bat I to "encourage your work" (Coon sl;ht *Id that ay group has been outspoken In Its crlilclsst (Keel 1975). 1995, Moseley 1998). Much of of off t e l al policy. In private, however, Keel We bsjfi also criticised the self-assueed role of our Air farce Barker's book on Adamski In usurping the role of chief Investigating sjtsney on the CTO. regarded Barker and Moseley as lour own experiences will l"ad you to too- already that the Department has done Its own research v.l has been able to arrive focused on the letter as "one of at a number of sound conclusions. It will no doubt please you inept investigators and hoaxsters, to know that tne Department has on file a jreat deal of coo- the great unsolved mysteries of rimatory evidence bearing out your own Plains, which, as both an attitude substantiated by die or us oust realise, are controversial, -nd have been dispute* the UFO field" (Barker 1967).