The Masturbating Ghost Chimp of Athelhampton

 The Masturbating Ghost Chimp of Athelhampton

By Cole Herrold

Before I even start diving into this case, yes, you read that correctly. In the stately Athelhampton Manor, there is indeed, allegedly, the ghost of a chimpanzee that even after death is subject to self-indulgence although most sources tend to euphemize or totally ignore this behavior. Athelhampton Hall located in Dorchester, Dorset, England was built in 1485 by Sir William Martyn and has had a rich history which ultimately led it to being one of the most haunted locations in England and some would argue the world at least as far as homes go. The home housed the Martyn family for four generations until 1891 when it was sold to Alfred Cart de Lafontaine and then sold in 1957 to Robert Victor Cooke whose family had owned the property until 2019 when it changed hands to Giles Keating who made the grounds open to the public.

Now back to the Ape. The Ape which would appear on Martyn’s Crest sitting on a tree stump, and included in his  estate’s motto which was ‘He who looks at Martyn’s ape, Martyn’s ape will look at him’ was a creature kept as a family pet. The animal was allowed to wander freely through the halls, and it was this freeness which ultimately ended his life. This however gets into the more folkloric aspect of the tale. The Martyns were Catholic during the Tudor times which led into a religious turning of hands and in so to be faithfully Catholic led to a variety of problems. During this time one of their daughters in love with someone outside the catholic faith and wanting to marry this individual and seeing the denial from her family as this was forbidden proceeded to hide in a secret room behind some paneling in the Great Chamber however in her haste she did not notice the silent slinking form of the ape also entering the room. This is where the story enters two versions in one version this disheartened daughter proceeded to slit her throat in front of the started ape in the other she merely waited for a period of time still not seeing the ape in the hidden room and leaving the room with the ape behind ultimately trapping it. Another legend states that the Martyn Ape had entered the room accidentally when the house was under construction of the room and that the oblivious construction crew proceeded to in Edgar Allan Poe’s Cask of Amontillado fashion, wall the ape up. The outcome however in either version is the same the poor animal became trapped inside the secret room and became trapped therein to suffer the slow and terrible death by starvation. The family had heard the strange sound of scratching on the walls for some time, but none could place the sound and they soon stopped and then the smell came. They tracked the smell to the area of the secret chamber and upon opening it found the rotting mummy-like remains of the animal.

While this tragic end to the animal seemed to be just that to Martyn and his family it would not be the case. Soon reports of the apparition would arise and it would both mimic the estate motto and re-enact its final moments with a sexual twist. The ghost of the animal is said to do a variety of actions the most active of which is when it is claimed to swing from the Great Chambers rafters where it masturbates or “scratches itself” as it moves. Its also said to occasionally stay still and masturbate in front of any who enter the chamber whereupon it fulfills the motto specifically about it looking at whoever looks at him. Yet most of experience the ape when stationary state that it does make eye-to-eye contact as it indulges itself. Outside of this the ghost at night seems to return the hidden room that ended its life and proceeds to instead of “scratching” itself scratches the paneling as a constant reminder of the past.

This story was picked up by the Sun in 2015 and ran an article on the case entitled “the Ghost of a Masturbating Ape Haunts the Hallways of a Grand Country Estate in Dorset” the article on the site is now defunct yet the Express has since reprinted the article and with it the thoughts on one would-be ghost hunter to the location who said the following “One tourist who visited recently, 41-year-old dad-of-three John Morrison, of Derby, said "We heard that the monkey which haunts the house loves to scratch his privates while swinging around…"We didn't see him, which is a shame, because it would have been a real sight. Apparently he's not terrifying - quite friendly is what we heard" added John, a printer, who visited with wife Helene, 38, and their children while on their summer holidays in Dorset”.

Now it is important to note that Athelhampton Hall is not just the haunt of this Ghost ape but also that of a pair of spectral duelists, a grey lady, a phantom black monk, and a phantom cooper so paranormal phenomenon is not subjected to one specific type or form. Its all of these various apparitions that have led the house to being considered one of the most haunted homes in England as well as the veracity of the sightings. Typically, in haunted locations, there is this mass collection of apparitions reported and usually what we see is that one of the entities amongst the group is an animal of some sort. In many locations spectral horses are reported with riders, ghost pigs are fairly common, yet the most famous types typically tend to be ghost dogs, cats, or horses ridden or otherwise. The existence therefore of reported ghost ape or ghost monkey as some reports state are not impossible or even uncommon as Elliott O’Donnell described a case involving a ghost baboon and cat in a haunted location. However, he was quick to also hypothesize that this may have been the ghost of a human and horse as in ghost lore there is a ton of cases of ghost animals which witnesses and folklorists claim are the souls of transmogrified humans. Some famous examples being the Fiery Turkey of Kampa, The Roaring Bull of Bagbury, and The Leper Tiger.

Tying Cryptozoology to cases that seem to be entirely spectral in origin seem to be an impossibility yet interestingly in Nick Redfern’s book Three Men Seeking Monsters he does just that. The ghost Chimp of Athelhampton as well as the Ghost Ape of Marwood yet another ape ghost from England are all stories generated to explain sightings of a bigfoot-like cryptid known as the Man-Monkey said to roam in England. Redfern states that these shadowy ape-like figures were easier to explain away as ghosts than some flesh and blood local fauna or some supernaturally empowered mixed between the two, however, and while I do not want to outright dismiss this possibility with such cases as the Marwood ape. A bigfoot-like creature that regularly masturbates inside the Grand Chamber of an estate is a stretch unless it is some spectral or egregoric entity which again is a whole new animal and not the simple deluge into the hypothesis that is proposed in his book.  The same goes for if this is some interdimensional or spectral version of a sasquatch to what point would this creature need to masturbate or even appear in a building when in most cases these entities are the alternatives of what humans are/ are interested in. There are those cases of Sasquatch peering in cabins/ trailers or even entering in, but those cases end with them either wrecking the cabin or leaving prompted or unprompted. None of which typically vanish or decide to masturbate. Plus, I think there’s something off-putting in general to explain every phenomenon or every seemingly ape or human-like phenomena into a bigfoot-like camp and not its own unique phenomenon. 

Alternative explanations to the masturbating chimp seems to be an impossibility. Outside that is of either a hoax or a legend. I’ve never come across a first-person account of someone saying they seen the ape as opposed to say the Highgate ghost Chicken or other animal ghost cases reported by Elliott O’Donnell. It's from this that it's hard to garner a rating on this phenomenon. People do want and expect to witness this entity yet so far no one has seemingly in the modern century come forward and claimed a sighting. To me, this would garner an immediate place into the urban legend category but as with all legends perhaps there is something to it or that there’s something to animal ghosts that causes them to manifest less than other types of ghosts. Its come to my attention while researching the phenomenon that animal ghosts usually have a few major documented accounts and then suddenly they drop off the earth as though that was enough for them to manifest or that their mission was completed or whatever else would cause an apparition to appear. Experts or those familiar with ghost animal lore seemingly have no effect in manifestation rate and so further sightings if they occur are rare and seemingly not an example of the Egregoric creation something commonly associated with hauntings.

Its from this that if reports of the ghost chimp are accurate that I am led to believe that what was seen was a genuine ghost and that due to environmental constraints or that its mission was achieved that it now either no longer haunts the location or has no need to appear as common as it did previously. The legend of this apparition lives on as many classic British ghosts which have been rehashed over the years and like them we have no new sightings and while I do not dismiss Egregores or Tulpas its safe to say that the Athelhampton Ghost is not one of those especially since it shines above the other apparitions said to haunt the location. Yet all of this has yet to be tested perhaps the ghost will return and some brighter minds will decipher whether we are seeing some specter from the past or some manifestation created from seemingly the most intelligent forces on this planet. All of which is currently to be debated and if so one has to wonder if this is the result who has the dirtier mind.

Species/Potential Species: Ghost Primate/Paranormal Entity

Location: Athelhampton Hall, Dorset, England, United Kingdom

Sighted: Unspecified/Modern Times

Works Cited:

A Ghost Hunter's Handbook By Peter Underwood

Three Men Seeking Monsters: Six Weeks in Pursuit of Werewolves, Lake Monsters, Giant Cats, Ghostly Devil Dogs, and Ape-Men By Nick Redfern

Haunted Pet Stories: Tales Of Ghostly Cats, Spooky Dogs, And Demonic Bunnies By Mary Beth Crain

“The Ghosts of Athelhampton” Athelhampton. https://www.athelhampton.com/copy-of-history. Accessed 2/25/2023.

“THE GHOSTS OF ATHELHAMPTON HOUSE” Haunted Rooms. https://www.hauntedrooms.co.uk/athelhampton-house Accessed 2/25/2023

“SPANK the Monkey Does Just That While Haunting English Estate” 95.7 The Hog Rocks. July 23, 2019. https://www.957thehog.com/spank-the-monkey-does-just-that-while-haunting-english-estate/. Accessed 2/25/2023

“Ghost of rude masterbating monkey shocks visitors to stately home in Dorset” Express. August 5, 2016. https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/696974/Ghost-rude-monkey-shocks-visitors-stately-home-Dorset. Accessed 2/25/2023. 

Antarctic Godzilla

 Antarctic Godzilla

By Cole Herrold

In the Wake of the article, I did on Kabagon I stumbled across this other giant aquatic cryptid reported by another Japanese vessel. Japan seemingly is the master at chronicling the strange colossal cryptids that exist on our planets from the Pinniped like Kabagon to the humanoid like Ningen they seem to be ahead when it comes to chronicling unique marine cryptids. Specifically, those that seem to be mammals as in this case which might be the oldest of the mammalian marine monsters. The cryptid here in question was not imaginatively named but it does get the point across that what the crew certainly saw was huge.

During the ships second Antarctic expedition at 7 o’clock pm on February 13, 1958, The Antarctic Research ship Soya was out near Barton Island when they noticed a large form in the open icy Antarctica waters. The ships captain Matsumoto and at least 4 other individuals who were aboard the vessel noticed a large form bobbing in the open water. This object was about 500 meters from Barton Island and 300 meters from the Soya and extremely large so it drew the attention of several members of the ship namely the chief navigator, chief engineer, the officer on duty, and the helmsman all of who were on the bridge at the time. One of the members of the crew was unimpressed by this thinking that what they were seeing was a barrel that had come from Barton Peninsula. Yet Matsumoto dismissed such a claim as whatever this object was it clearly was living as if this was a barrel or can how could it stay upright in the water when the wind was blowing so severely. Yet Matsumoto was surprised for if this was an animal it seemed much too big to be simply that. As the Soya approached the creature or vice versa all those aboard noticed that the object began to turn and as it did so there appeared a giant face staring back at them. This is when they knew for sure that what they were looking at was some sort of colossal unknown animal. The officer aboard the vessel lifted his binoculars and stared at the being and confirmed that indeed this object had large eyes and a noticeable face as well as two large ears. An exact size of the creature was never precisely specified, and some sources claim the creature to be 70-80ft long. The creature though while size was unspecified was clearly something mammalian in form it had features similar to a cow from the front, but the top of the head was round and reminded the crew of that of a monkey’s. The creature was covered in dark brown hair which seemed to cover the full body. The crew could also see that the creature had large noticeable shoulders that reached out from the form indicating that whatever this creature was it was definitely strong. Outside of these shoulders, the creature had a set of large, serrated fins on its back. During the time of the creature’s frolic into the sea, the chief engineer remembered he had a camera in his cabin and ran to go grab it as a way of documenting the strange animal they bore witness to. The rest of the crew watched as the creature approached the ship and looked as the creature began to submerge under the ship much to the chagrin of the engineer who returned camera in hand. After the creature vanished from sight the crew proceeded to run to the man who they felt would certainly know the answer to what they bore witness to, a biologist by the name of Dr. Yoshii. Upon telling the story the doctor was skeptical of just what the crew was telling him but at the same time wished he was up there at the time to see the marvel but clearly had no idea as to what his fellow crewmembers had seen. Yet he did have one pull away that the crew shared and that was whatever this creature was based on its morphology it appeared to be as ridiculous as it sounded terrestrial in origin. The account of this creature stayed among the crew until Captain Matsumoto released his book Antarctic Transportation wherein he coined the beast uncreatively Antarctic Godzilla. Matsumoto obviously named the creature after the classic Kaiju which was released on the world some four years prior yet it bore only some similarities in appearance.  Since then, the creature has appeared in a multitude of books in Japan as well as been made into a toy/statue that depicted the creature in more of a classic Godzilla/Baragon style as opposed to just what the witnesses reported.

Now with all this said what are we to do with this case. Instinctively I want to call this whole case a joke or some fish story and there’s no reason to totally dismiss this. The fact that we have a colossal creature called Antarctic Godzilla seems to point towards some sort of tongue-in-cheek reference to begin with it would be to me like calling saying the Pensacola Sea Serpent the Pensacola Jason Voorhees. It immediately draws the attention of away from the encounter and to this pop icon that were all familiar with. Now, this added with the few details of the creature one could imagine a colossal kaiju that’s more realistic than whatever they say or however ambiguous.  Now with that said while this could straight away being a hoax my problem with this much like many ambiguous cryptid sightings is why not go all out or describe it more realistic or wackier. This case has the right amount of ambiguity with the description that seems to imply that they were seeing something but just what they were unsure of.

Now with the possibility of a hoax being unlikely perhaps what the crew was seeing was some sort of misidentification. As experienced Seamen, it seems unlikely that they would misidentify say a whale yet a whale in a state of decomposition could appear monstrous. This hypothesis was used to explain away the hair reported on the Trunko carcass which was merely collagen or other tissues that gave the appearance of hair. Perhaps this is what the crew was seeing some whale carcasses badly deteriorated either blue or grey whales that due to decomposition gave off the appearance of having hair or were so mangled that it seemed to have ears. Now for a skeptic, this might seem like a nail in the coffin yet there are obvious problems with this. For one thing, this creature was seemingly intact it was not mangled or led to interpretation like a globster or the Zuiyo Maru Carcass plus there were obvious signs of intelligence with its ability to submerge and turn seemingly on its own accord.

The next option even though it seems both incredible and impossible is that what was reported was in fact a colossal unknown animal. Now the largest animals on this planet are blue whales which can reach up to 110 ft and over 190 tons. These colossal marine animals are larger than even the dinosaurs yet for the most part this can be debated as some of the largest dinosaurs can reach 90-100 feet like Argentinosaurus or Patagotitan. These prehistoric species most of which were related or are members to the sauropod group of dinosaurs are again much different to what was seen in Antarctica so for those hoping for a living relict this is not the case. Now the largest land mammal ever was Paraceratherium which bears some features similar to the Antarctic Godzilla namely its large ears and this creature was something around 21 ft in height with a length of about 25 ft. This creature had an extended muzzle which could be considered cow-like and large ears and eyes. However, there are several noticeable problems. The biggest problem is that this creature if it was a living Paraceratherium is the location. Most of these animals lived in Mongolia and China which is a far cry from the cold and southern Antarctic waters. Another problem is that Paraceratherium is believed to be built more like the rhinos which it is related to and therefore not covered in hair or semi-aquatic nature. While evolution seeks for organisms to fill and seek out every niche there is no evidence to indicate that Paraceratherium has entered or evolved to be semi-aquatic. Plus it can be said that no fossil evidence can indicate that the species entered this route so its from this that we are to indicate that Antarctic Godzilla is unique in its evolutionary history. Yet that’s a tricky subject as there are tons of new discoveries being made on the earth as well as in general how difficult it is to become a fossil an organism has to be in an ideal location at the right time.

Aquatic cryptids while not backed up by the fossil record are overly abundant. There are several cryptids are seemingly large whales or dolphins such as the 59ft Giglioli's Whale or even the Rhinoceros Dolphin. Yet one must acknowledge that such a cyrtid is more akin to what we have seen currently in our world and not some strange evolutionary fluke that one might point to as an offshoot of evolution. Yet evolution is a fickle mistress who chooses her own descendants so perhaps the creature was some species yet uncatalogued in the fossil record or some species so new so species was preserved.

Perhaps Antarctic Godzilla was a unique species. Evolution’s test to create a more terrestrial whale. Giving it more mammalian features to get the benefits of both a land-living organism and an aquatic one while still maintaining its colossal size. This could explain the seemingly more terrestrial build to a creature that could now only be at home in the water. There’s nothing truly like it and the fact that no one else has seen anything exactly like it seems to indicate to me that this natural experiment did not work and that the species that was Antarctic Godzilla is more than likely extinct or is the ancestor to the Ningen or other strange marine mammals reported that appear in the 70s and 80s.

I doubt that there is a Ufological connection to the creature, yet perhaps there might be a multidimensional one. Perhaps Antarctic Godzilla entered our world through a portal. Now many dismiss such possibilities especially when there is nothing to indicate that as in this case. One must wonder if the crew were accurate in their descriptions and that evolution did not spawn such a creature in our world then perhaps it did so on another plane of existence. Which be this another dimension or some unthinkable realm we have no scientific name for this creature somehow managed to make its way from its home to here. This could entirely explain just how it does not match with the fauna of our world. Yet again with theories like this, they are the cheap answer they require no deep thought as to what was reported for in the multiverse everything exists and it's just a matter of us finding our place.

Cryptids like Antarctic Godzilla really pull in a few ways either people declare them a hoax, a misidentification, a new species, or some entity beyond comprehension. There is truly no other possibility. Colossal Ufonauts for example while impossible make little to no sense so it literally leads to only a few outcomes. With Antarctic Godzilla, I’m at a loss the description of the creature is ambiguous enough for me to say that a hoax is unlikely yet just what they were seeing does not match any known or cryptid animal. It's from this that I tend to lean towards an evolutionary fluke.  A cryptid for certain but one that was a stepping stone to another one that either was not able to survive in its state or was related to the Ningen or Kabagon and proven to be inefficient. Yet perhaps I’m wrong and what was witnessed was some colossal cryptid creature completely unique to anything we’ve seen prior. It survived in small populations so elusive we rarely see it or perhaps mistake it for others. Time will only tell, and we can only wait and see if something similar might arise from the deep in the waters around Antarctica.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species:  Mammal

Location: Pacific Ocean, Barton Peninsula, Antarctica

Sighted: February 13, 1958

Works Cited:

“Godzilla in Antarctica” http://www2.plala.or.jp/daisinjitu/UMA/godzilla.html

“Strange Creatures Wriggling in Antarctica” NKD Scientific Research. http://ifs.nog.cc/nsrex.hp.infoseek.co.jp/documents/antarctic.html

“Large Antarctic Sea Mammal” Cryptid Wiki. https://cryptidz.fandom.com/wiki/Large_Antarctic_Sea_Mammal

Antarctic Transportation by Mitsuji Matsumoto

Kabagon

 Kabagon

By Cole Herrold

The oceans while beautiful are frankly a terrifying place. Since the dawn of time, there have been rumors of all sorts of colossal critters and haunting entities that have allegedly made their home in the dark depths. These entities range in description from the colossal multi-tentacled ship destroyer the Kraken to the long tadpole-like Hook Island Sea Serpent. Yet of all the entities reported in the ocean perhaps one of the eeriest is the ones that bear a strong resemblance to humans or mammals such as the Ningen. On July 18, 1971, the Mainichi Daily News would report a similar eerie humanoid or mammalian-type entity that would peer out from the water.

It was on August 28, 1971, that Captain Miyagi Kimura and 25 other crew members of the 28^th Konpira Maru, a 235-ton tuna long-line fishing boat from Onagawa, in the Miyagi prefecture were sailing in the Pacific Ocean near the South Island of New Zealand casting their lines into the ocean. Their exact position based on the ship’s logbook was 44.15 degrees South Latitude and 173.34 East Longitude, 25 miles SE of Lyttelton. The water they traversed reached a depth of about 40 meters. It was 12 o clock, and the day was bright, and the conditions were fine as a sweet northern breeze blew and the water was seemingly placid that was until their attention was drawn to a strange disturbance in the water near them. The crew watched in awe and confusion as a brownish-gray figure started to emerge from the deep. The figure a large mound of folded flesh some 5 ft tall was fitted with a pair of large eyes each about six inches in diameter and two large nostrils (or as some of the other art depictions show another set of eyes) located just below it. They noted that this ball of flesh was clearly the semi-submerged skull of some colossal creature and decided to attempt to capture the creature. The crew stopped their fishing adventures and began to man the harpoons. Some of the crew including the captain continued to stare at the creature which to them seemed very similar to a deformed hippopotamus particularly in the area of the nose yet they knew that this creature could not be one of those since they tend to dwell mostly in fresh water and live exclusively in Africa. The captain proceeded to draw the creature and even decided to coin the beast Kabagon after the Japanese word for hippo ‘Kaba’. The creature however, later on, would also be called the Bug-Eyed Monster or BEM They then altered the course of the boat and as they got within 30 meters of the creature it suddenly possibly sensing the danger it was in proceeded to disappear into the briny deep. The crew was left speechless and disappointed at the elusiveness of their quarry and kept the story to themselves until they returned home to Yaizu Port, Shizuoka prefecture where the crew proceeded to tell their account. However, before the crew returned to tell about their encounter a weekly magazine in New Zealand released that on the Lyttelton Peninsula that a strange series of footprints were found. The Mainichi Daily News would propose that these footprints were caused by the strange creature.

As with almost all Fortean cases, one needs to entertain that there is the chance of hoaxing. Outside of just making up a story, there’s not much to point in this direction. Yet there is an interesting parallel that could point to this being the case. Horror, Sci-Fi, and other Exploitation film fans might be quick to notice that Kabagon bears a strong resemblance outside of just its name to Japanese Kaiju films. The overall appearance of the creature is almost identical to Hedorah the giant smog monster that appeared in Godzilla Vs. Hedorah or as titled here in the US Godzilla Vs. The Smog Monster. To add to this the film was theatrically released on July 24, 1971. Four days after the sighting was reported however trailers for the film was certainly released before that day. It is very possible that members of the crew had seen the trailer and proceeded to create an encounter resolving around a beast similar in appearance to Hedorah. Yet this is all speculation.

Another possibility is that this creature could have been misidentified the eyewitness sketch does bear some resemblance to known animals even though it may seem goofy. The closest animal to the Kabagon in appearance would be a female walrus and even the original Pursuit breakdown of the case quickly pointed to this as a possibility. However, the article also says that this would be highly unlikely as walruses in general are found in the arctic and subarctic areas of the planet and not in the warm waters of New Zealand. Another problem is that the creature’s head was 5ft alone and the crew had no way of measuring the rest of the creature which clearly would have been at least 3x bigger than that, so an estimate of about say 20-30 ft, which would be bigger than any currently living walrus or pinniped. As walruses tend to have a max size of about 12 ½ ft and even then the females; which Kabagon is more similar in appearance to, are much smaller. Another thing is if the tracks found on the beach of the peninsula were caused by the creature and it was indeed a kind of pinniped it would not be so much as classic tracks as we would associate with a primate or cervine but that there would also be body drag marks or almost semi-destroyed tracks from the movement of the creature. It's from this that it would seem unlikely that what was seen by the crew was a known pinniped or pinniped at all.

Eyewitness Sketch of Kabagon as it appeared in Pursuit

A possibility most people like to go with when discussing this creature is the cryptid possibility. Obviously, there are animals slightly similar in appearance to the creature except that the form seems to be more pinniped or humanoid-like, yet none are an exact match. In cryptozoological circles, there are several entities and theories that could explain what we are seeing or are very similar to what was reported. Unsurprisingly most of these creatures were reported by Japanese sailors. The most famous of which would be the Ningen a colossal humanoid type creature that is human-like in its face and arms, but the rest of its form is like a white whale. Now a lot of the reports and images of this creature are hoaxes so there is some debate if this is a real cryptid or if this is some creepypasta-style creation. The other similar creature is a colossal critter reportedly seen in Antarctica and dubbed by the ship's captain Matsumoto in 1958 as “Antarctic Godzilla”. The creature appeared in his book Antarctic Transportation and was described as again a hippopotamus-type creature but again with other features as it was described as having a cow-like face, monkey-like head, large ears, large shoulders, dark brown hair, and a noticeable dorsal fin. The creature was noticeably colossal in size and originally was mistaken for a large barrel by some of the crew before they noticed its face. So large mammalian sea cryptids are not exactly unheard of and could be the same type or similar type of creatures.

A popular theory and one that I personally subscribe to in some reports is the Seal Serpent Hypothesis. This is a theory put out there as a more plausible answer to reports of cryptids that seem to be living plesiosaurs. In the theory, it is proposed that over time a group of seals developed a longer neck to basically fill in the niche that was left open after the plesiosaurs went extinct and therefore through convergent evolution developed a similar form. It’s from this I propose that Kabagon may have been some variation of this built for the warmer waters. It would have the hairless build of say a sea lion or elephant seal and could still have the large eyes and nostrils one would expect from a marine mammal but would simply be colossal in build. There are countless photos of seals and sea lions doing similar behavior as Kabagon and we can extend this as well to members of Sirenia like manatees and dugongs. Of course, this theory has never been proven and is more of a kind of thought experiment and therefore speculation.

Something that is not discussed usually with this case is the idea that this creature bears some resemblance to a particular Yokai the Umibozu. These entities are described as the spirits or ghosts of drowned Buddhist monks or manifestations of the ocean itself they often manifest as giant heads either human-like or monstrous most of the time bald or with some hair to the side, yet other forms and sizes are reported. Most of the depictions of them in art are of a giant dark-colored form with large eyes. This is almost exactly what the crew was witnessing. I am not here to claim that all Umibozu are actually misidentified Kabagon however I offer the counterargument. When immigrants from other countries enter a new location we often see in a short period of time that the faeries and creatures from their native countries start appearing in the countries where they now reside. The Trolls of Sorenson’s Woods are a prime example and the same goes for family banshees now seen in West Virginia or the Tommyknockers of Pennsylvania. Perhaps there’s something about these entities that will cause them to follow people to other countries and manifest only to them or there’s something about the people themselves and their beliefs that can result in these entities appearing whether any of the crew were Shinto believers is however unconfirmed and again this is all speculation.

Another possibility for this creature could be that it is an Undine or some other aquatic fae the image of the Kabagon is also very similar to a painting of the Nokken an aquatic faerie and aggressive water spirit from Scandinavia. The world has countless areas known for such spirit-like beings or paranormal entities that perhaps what the crew was seeing was not something from their own country or something that followed them but instead something that was an elemental for that specific area. Whether the area of New Zealand has folklore of something similar to Kabagon however or tales of something lurking in the area, however, I currently am unaware of any.

Just what Kabagon is we can only guess as currently, no one else has reported a sighting similar or in the area since 71’. Yet that does not mean that this is the last of it. Our ocean’s are colossal and are filled with tons of places to hide and are full of creatures we know we haven’t discovered yet. We are certain that there are more undiscovered creatures in our oceans than what are on land. Most will certainly be small and strange, yet some will be colossal, and perhaps if Kabagon is real, even stranger.

Quick Facts:

Species/Potential Species: Mammalian Sea creature (probably a Pinniped or member of Sirenia)

Location: Pacific Ocean, 44.15 degrees South Latitude and 173.34 East Longitude, 25 miles SE Lyttelton, South Island, New Zealand

Sighted: April 28, 1971

Works Cited Page:

Pursuit No. 18 April 1972

“A Bug Eyed Monster Off New Zealand” Malcolm’s Cryptid Blogspot. malcolmscryptids.blogspot.com/2022/10/a-bug-eyed-monster-off-new-zealand.html. Accessed 2/12/2023

 

Jennings Frederick: The Unsung Fortean Legend

 Jennings Frederick: The Unsung Fortean Legend

By Cole Herrold

There are many stories that make up the collective whole of Forteana. Some of these have made a major impact on the culture of the world and the believers and skeptics that dot the shores and surf the waters of the subject. Some of these stories at the time were nothing more than flukes of fancy. Encounters were so strange and surreal that there was much debate about whether the entities or accounts even occurred. Added to this there were many hoaxers and jokesters who would create stories for their own profit or glory. Yet still, these stories hold weight and affect the future generations of those wishing to uncover the mysteries or spread the stories. One such account was the infamous Vegetable Man this entity was featured as a brief blurb in the old paperbacks of Brad Steiger or an even briefer mention in the Time-Life Mysteries of the Unknown book series. Yet the story has now captured the imagination of the Fortean community both the researchers and the fans. Toys and short films, podcasts, and children’s books have now been made depicting the vegetable varmint the creature has become a sudden celebrity in a world where Bigfoot and Nessie have become old hat. Yet while this creature has garnered the world’s attention what about; as my friend and host of Tracing Owls Podcast Vuk titled in the episode we did on the subject, the man behind the vegetable? It was while analyzing the Vegetable Man case and finding out that Jennings Frederick was indeed a real person and finding that he had more encounters and experiences. This was all added to when one of the hosts of the Mothboys Podcast Mike Strayer, who is also the author of a children's book on the Vegetable Man, while doing his own incredible independent research at the Gray Barker Archive found and proceeded to send me a stack of letters, artwork, newspaper clippings, cards, and documents that were sent from Jennings Frederick and in them was a literal gold mine of information that showed how important and underappreciated Jennings Frederick truly is.

Drawing of Space Devil by Gene Duplantier for Gray Barker's Newsletter No. 5 March 1976

The Story of Jennings Frederick began on May 28,1949 in Fairmont, West Virginia. His father and mother Jennings Charles and Iva Jean Toothman Frederick had lived in the area for some time and while currently not much is known about his upbringing in the early parts of his life we know that his engagement to the strange and unusual would start early. During the 60s Project Blue Book was in full swing investigating and deliberately ruling out countless UFO cases and contact cases. Rivesville a town close to Fairmont was no stranger to such reports As UFOs were occasionally seen in the area. The Fredericks First interaction with the otherworldly occurred on April 23, 1965, at their home near Rivesville, Royal Route #2 when Jennings and his brother had already left for Rivesville High School and his mother was left to tend to the dishes from breakfast as her husband had gone off to work in the mine. It was about 8-8:30 and as she glanced out the kitchen window she saw something moving in the fields above where the house was nestled. Upon peering out she had seen what she at first thought was a small child playing unwatched and feeling motherly concern due to the fact that there was an electric cattle fence in the vicinity she ran out the door to stop the child from possibly harming itself. As Iva walked out onto the porch however she was shocked as what she had thought was a small child was not something so normal. Instead, she saw a strange creature that was approximately 3.5-4ft tall and black or dark green in color. She later however in a letter would express that perhaps the creature might have been wearing a kind of flight suit as she was looking at the creature from 200 yards away. The creature bore had three to four-finger-clawed hands and feet yet also had features that would appear to the young woman as satanic in description as it had pointed ears and a long tail. She could not make out however any mouth or other facial features, but this could have been due to the distance upon which she witnessed the entity. As she looked closer at the scene she noticed that coming down from the sky was a cream and silver colored saucer-shaped craft that hovered off the ground she watched as the craft landed that an elevator-type doorway descended and touched the ground. Iva would describe the craft as being similar to two plates on top of each other and was about 5ft tall in the center without the little shaft that extended down and about 8-10ft long. The shaft was approximately 3ft long. All of this placing the overall diameter of the craft at about 15-25 ft and about a story and a half high. The craft had both windows and a dome or “Crystal Canopy” that seemed to sparkle in the early morning light and also seemed to be illuminated on the inside of the craft as it seemed to give off a bright yellow light from those areas. The craft also made a buzzing or humming sound. As she looked at the craft she noticed a chord coming from the elevator-like shaft of the object and followed it down to where she noticed that the being was seemingly connected to this craft by its midsection. This strange chord they later estimated was about 15ft long. She watched as this entity began to hop around and make jerky motions as it proceeded to collect clumps of dirt, rock, and grass and place them in a small bag it had in its hand. The woman watched this scene for some 15 minutes until finally succumbing to fear and proceeded to run back to her bed and pulled the covers over her head wishing for the object and creature to go away. She stayed there for another 15 minutes until eventually gained enough composure and walked to the kitchen window where she saw that the craft and creature were still there. As she watched however she soon saw that the creature suddenly turned and headed back to the craft. It stepped on a small platform that extended from the step and entered the stool or mushroom stalk-like shaft. She watched and could see that inside this shaft was a ladder that extended into the disc-like craft and watched as the creature climbed into it ultimately disappearing from sight. The craft then began to spin faster, and the buzzing humming sound picked up in tone when suddenly it rose “like a feather” straight up into the sky and disappeared from sight. The woman was deeply disturbed by this and as soon as Jennings got home she told him the tale. Jennings was already deeply interested in the UFO phenomenon and proceeded to head out to the hills to investigate. Upon searching the area, he had found several pieces of evidence in regard to his mother’s experience. He had found a large depression in the ground seemingly made by the shaft/stem that the craft was resting upon. By taking measurements he was able to deduce that the craft had to of weighed more than a ton. Searching the area, he also found footprints of the creature these strange footprints were four-toed with a long heel with based on his sketches a break down the middle that possibly could have been from some sort of strap. Aside from these he also found in the area of the toes and heel brown hair some 2-3 inches in length. These prints were approximately 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch deep which helped give Jennings the approximate weight of the creature being about 30-45lbs. Luckily for Jennings when the sighting occurred the mud was still soft so the prints were clean and by the time he was able to check the area he noticed that the ground had hardened. Seeing this as the perfect opportunity to preserve the sighting Jennings ran back inside and grabbed some Plaster of Paris and proceeded to cast the footprints as well as the marking where the shaft had been and take photographs of the area. Searching for some validation and further scientific study of the evidence he proceeded to send the prints and photos to the Airforce. The Airforce however responded through a letter ultimately disregarding the evidence and calling the entire sighting a misidentification of a weather balloon, the planet Venus, or the workings of her wild imagination. Yet the Airforce never returned any of his casted footprints, marks, or his photos. This left a noticeable bad taste in his mouth and would later affect his life in other research he would conduct. While heavily involved in his mother’s sighting Jennings did not directly observe the craft or its occupant however in a few years it would seem that these visitors would seek him out instead and this sighting would merely be the seed to an increasing path into the world of the Fortean.

Sketch by Jennings Frederick of the creature's footprint with location of the hairs found

High School and College life is a difficult point in anybody’s life. For many, it is the point where we begin to become the people we are for the rest of our lives. We discover our passions or our passions reach to a crescendo. It's also an awkward time of growth and development and bizarre interactions. A liminal space between adulthood and childhood. During this hectic and stressful point in people’s lives, the last thing they would even want to think about is interactions with entities and beings from other worlds, but for Jennings, this is exactly what happened. It was in June of 1967 when an 18-year-old Jennings had just graduated from High School. Arose one night in a semi-waking state' and walked in his intimates to a field l/4 mile from his house. Upon reaching the area he woke from this strange state and saw "a huge object about the size of a football field" and about 2-2.5 stories tall and at about 300 ft altitude. The craft was white and luminous with flashing red and blue lights. Frightened Jennings proceeded to run for home, but as he did so he soon heard a voice saying that it would soon return. This voice seemed to be a telepathic transmission generated by the craft or by one of the entities aboard and as he watched the craft began to buzz loudly and moved away rapidly. The telepathic message continued to speak to Jennings and claimed that the UFO occupants "were tired, seeking peace, keeping an eye on us, and would soon communicate again." The voice also said that Jennings “would remember very little about the encounter until just before the second contact." Jennings for the longest time thought that all he saw was just a UFO and received a telepathic message and he continued to go about his life not thinking too much about it. He soon would have experiences with other strange anomalies, but he soon would remember more about what happened that night in the field.

In the latter part of 1976, Jennings "suddenly recalled the entire encounter." He had remembered being in the field and being taken aboard the UFO by being floated in and given a physical examination. Unlike other abductees, this examination was seemingly not violent or intrusive and during the experience, he had been fully clothed. Inside the UFO "everything seemed to emit light, there were no light fittings", but the floor was metallic. After this examination, he proceeded to meet the captain of the ship and entity who said that his name was "Zarcon". Zarcon was about 7-10ft tall and was white in color with a huge head, and no noticeable nose, but did have slits for nostrils, pointed ears, large “wrap around” eyes, and a slit-like mouth. Jennings would state that Zarcon had long arms that ended in four-fingered hands and wore a long robe that covered his feet. Jennings would also say that Zarcon was “fluctuating in size” and that he floated some 2ft off the floor. Zarcon communicated by telepathy and as he did so it made a mumbling kind of sound. Zarcon stated that he and his people "were not physical in the sense of -things we consider as being solid in nature." He also said that he was from a planet "in the sector of Triangus Terri Elipson", and that his people have been watching ours for 20,000 years. During their conversation, Zarcon showed off some of his abilities as he opened a window in the UFO by thought alone. Yet this was not the strangest aspect of their interaction for "At one point during our conversation his body disappeared and only his head remained, which enlarged to about the size of a washing machine or stove." Jennings was on the craft for a decent amount of time and when the time for him to leave came he was floated out of the craft and was told the final messages and that he would forget the experience. This experience would affect him later on in his personal life yet it would be less so than the next few experiences he would have.

Jennings Frederick Sketch of Zarcon UFO from Into the Unknown Book by Reader's Digest

It was mid-July 1968 and Jennings was about to enter the air force. Jennings decided to take the last little bit of time that he had to go bow hunting groundhogs on his father’s property in between Rivesville and Fairmount. Jennings was noticeably unsuccessful in his pursuit of the ground rodent and seeing that the day was getting long and the sun was setting he decided to head toward his home. He stopped and rested for a moment and upon doing so he removed his arrow from his 45 lb. bow and transferred both to his left arm to rest. As he did so he suddenly heard a high-pitched whining noise not too dissimilar to a record being played at an incredibly fast speed. As he listened he soon " You need not fear me. I wish to communicate. I come as a friend. We know of you all. I come in peace. I wish medical assistance. I need your help!" Jennings proceeded to reach down into his pocket for a handkerchief because during this whole excursion, he had become rather sweaty, and as he reached down, he suddenly felt a sharp pain on his hand, and as he looked over to see if his hand had been caught in a brier brush, he saw that there was a strange green form grabbing onto him by the wrist. Following the green form up, he noticed that this was not a typical brier brush but instead a colossal creature that defied explanation. There standing exceptionally close to him, was a 7ft tall creature bright green in color with features that were eerily human in its face. The most noticeable feature of this creature's face, however, was its bright, piercing yellow eyes and its long ears. As he scanned the creature's body, he noticed it was carrot-shaped but was green, almost like a plant stalk. The body had noticeable shoulders and arms, but these arms were only about as thick as a quarter. The arm's eerie thinness was not the most disturbing feature of this portion of the body; however, for, the creature's hands stretched down into three incredibly long fingers with 7" needle-like protrusions that were enveloped by a kind of suction cup. It was the right arm of this peculiar creature that had encapsulated his arm, and as he watched, the creature seemed to grip even tighter, and he noticed that through this, the creature punctured one of his blood vessels. As the creature continued to do this, he could hear a sound almost akin to sucking that instantly told him that this creature was draining his blood. Pain from this motion shot up his arm, and as he continued to stare at the creature, a peculiar thing began to occur; the creature's yellow eyes suddenly began to swirl with red creating almost a spiral-type effect and where the two colors would meet in the center orange circles appeared. This sudden change in eye color and motion had a hypnotizing effect on Jennings, and he soon realized that he no longer felt any pain from the creature's grasp as it did this. As the creature did this, it once more released its message that Jennings had heard before, but he was unsure if the creature was communicating telepathically or whether the creature was speaking it audibly. During this point, the being breathed as Jennings noticed that the creature’s sides and chest expanded and contracted but Jennings had the impression that the creature had some trouble with this as it seemed to “wheeze” like someone with some sort of respiratory problem. Jennings was unsure as to just how this creature breathed as it did not seem to do either through its nose or mouth. This otherworldly transfusion lasted at least to Frederick's for only a minute, but the drainage could very well have lasted much longer. After the creature seemed to have its fill, it suddenly released him extremely quickly. Jennings watched as the creature ran off seemingly towards where Jennings felt a craft was landed and watched as the creature took long strides and bounds which seemed effortlessly and extremely fast as though it was built for this kind of environment. The being seemingly covered some 300-350 yards in about 10 seconds and had at one point cleared a 5ft fence with three feet left to spare. and watched as the creature ran how it seemed to dematerialize before his eyes. He would describe this dematerialization almost like it was evaporating in a letter on February 13^th, 1976. The creature finally disappeared altogether as it reached the opposing woodland. as he stared in the direction of where the creature left, the pain in his arm suddenly returned, and as he stood there holding his arm in pain, he then heard a high humming and whistling sound which he instantly felt was the creature's UFO coming back to pick it back up. Jennings, after no longer hearing the sound, began to work his way home and, after washing his wound and bandaging it, decided to not speak a word about his encounter or go to a doctor for fear that no one would believe him. Jennings always felt that this entity was some sort of extraterrestrial however he did stipulate that he never saw any sort of antenna from the creature or a breathing device or even for that matter a ship however he did hear a strange whirring sound that had been associated with other high strangeness cases such as the Grafton Monster.

Original Vegetable Man Eyewitness Sketch by Jennings Frederick 

A brief note on a possible hoax. So the Veggieman story has become the most famous experience associated with Jennings. Its weird and wild and for many there are those who feel that on those terms alone it is authentic or was the creation of Gray Barker. Yet while we can confirm Jennings was a real person there is indeed at least with this story to suspect a possible hoax. About four months prior before Jennings would claim to have a run in with the Vegetable Man the hit show Lost in Space would release an episode entitled “the Great Vegetable Rebellion”. In the episode Dr. Smith goes to a planet where plants are the dominant species and they are ruled over by a colossal carrot figure known as Tybo. Dr. Smith cuts some flowers which whine and make other noises to allude that he has killed these sentient vegetation. Tybo in turn originally want to kill Dr. Smith but then changes his mind deciding to change him into a plant instead. Halfway through the episode Dr. Smith transforms into a celery man which interestingly enough looks very similar to Veggieman. There are several moments in the episode that are similar to events Jennings experienced in the woods such as how in the show Dr. Smith  being cured by being dried out cries out for water and jumps around. This could be compared to Veggieman needing blood before sprinting off. It also could explain why Jennings uses the phrase Vegetable for the creature as opposed to calling it a ghoul, goblin, elf, troll, or green man. In my previous article on Vegetable Man I entertained the hoax possibility and said that the idea of what Veggieman was described loosely matched the alien from the Thing From Another World which while Frankenstein like in form had hooks on its hands (granted the area of its knuckles) was a plant like organism according to the scientists and even called a carrot by one and fed on blood. There’s a scene where all the dogs in the base were put above the rafters in the bases’s green house so that the blood could feed the plants. The spirally hypno eyes Jennings reported could have been pulled from The Batman Tv Show which was common at the time. Now with all that said there are some problems with dismissing this as an outright hoax Jennings was very specific in how he described Veggieman’s arms and behavior and even the message theres elements to the account that seem to indicate he did have some sort of experience as well as the marks on his arms which did seem to be noticed by his mother and noted in the correspondences between Barker and Fredericks. Yet these similarities between the account and the show that occurred 4 months prior needs to be mentioned. 

Dr. Smith From the Lost in Space Episode looking very Veggie Man like 

Jennings upon joining the military chose to join the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War wherein he was a plane technician and also for a brief stint a member of the U.S. Army. Near the end of his Air Force enlistment, Jennings was assigned to a temporary job working for NASA and was given a high-end security clearance. While working for NASA he encountered evidence of a secret project that dealt with UFOs. This possibly was not intentional as he would state that those who had leaked the information were promptly sacked. He was honorably discharged shortly thereafter yet this would seemingly open the floodgates to one of the most terrifying and dangerous Fortean fallouts namely encounters with the Men in Black.

Jennings was living with his parents once more in their family home where his previous encounters had occurred. One morning sometime between one and four in the morning, he was awakened by a bright flash of red light. Jennings was able to see this as his cot was near the window. At first, he believed the source may have been caused by the gas furnace catching fire and so lifted his head up from bed and looked through the open doorway into the living room where he saw his younger brother Bill sleeping on the couch.. Yet suddenly, a small canister about the size of an apple dropped to the ground and began to bounce around the living room floor. The canister was releasing a bright red gas and Suddenly as he was watching this strange device, he felt a hand grab him as well as the prick of a needle in his left arm. Looking he saw several men enter the room through the window. As he looked he was confronted by three bizarre men wearing black ski masks, turtleneck sweaters, and slacks. Jennings felt that there may have been a fourth which was the one who had pricked him with the needle. As he laid there they began to talk amongst themselves, saying, "the dogs have been darted, and everybody gassed!" "what about this one?" "he's going out soon- he's half asleep" "don't worry about the needle; it'll make his arm sore for a day or two, that's all." Just as the canister was about to reach Jennings, the strange men proceeded to put on gas masks, and the last thing Jennings remembered seeing was that one of the men put the jumping canister into his pocket.  Jennings was groggy from the strange smoke and serum and because of this was unable to get to the gun out from under his pillow. The men then began to put something over Jennings' head and began to ask him about UFOs and exactly what they were. The men also asked what time it was and also what he had thought of the future, but after that point, Jennings remembered nothing and was sure he had passed out. As the MIB left his home he was sure one of the men let out the name “john”. Jennings remembered nothing after that and slept soundly until the next morning and no one else the following morning seemed to remember or comment on anything strange.  After his nocturnal invasion and interrogation by three men in black. Jennings would continue to be accosted and stalked by these dark-clothed deviants. He would constantly hear phone noises, buzzings, whistlings, and hummings in areas where they shouldn’t be and would see the strange men in several locations. On at least one occasion these men proved violent as they had possibly intended to kill him and a coworker/assistant researcher in aerodynamics and rocketry from Rivesville Mr. Larney D. Fry. On this occasion Fry’s Volkswagen auto lost lug bolts on the rear wheel; these bolts were just put on recently and with an automatic impact tool. This had occurred several times afterward and was clearly deliberate. On another occasion, his alternator belt was cut and on another occasion, something was put down inside Mr. Fry’s car engine. While in the air force in 74 some of his best lifelong friends were seemingly under some control of the MIB as they had tried to shoot him in the back. His last sighting of the beings was in late 74- early 75 yet there was always that dread that they would return.

On December 26^th, 1975, Jennings would enter the wider world of Ufology by sending a letter to West Virginia native and Ufologist Gray Barker. Jennings had just read John Keel’s Mothman Prophecies and was seeking information on the Mothman since he knew that he and Keel were friends and peers. He had talked to Linda Scarberry over the phone about a MIB sighting she had in her room two weeks before writing the letter and that he too has encountered the MIB. He had been trying to reach Gray apparently for some 2 months prior but knew about how busy he had been. In the letter, he sent he also talked about how he had been an investigator into the phenomenon now for about 15 years and had mentioned his encounter with Vegetable Man. He also had asked to join Saucers of Clarksburg and even included his telephone number for him to contact him. Yet a lot of their conversations were through letters. Barker and Jennings had engaged in a few phone calls and letters and Barker was interested in his encounters. In a letter written on January 13^th, 1976, Jennings was still on a Mothman kick but also had talked more about the effect the Veggieman encounter had on him. He would write that at times he would experience nightmares about the being but also would suddenly experience dreams of a beautiful world filled with large flowers where flying saucers were assembled on a sort of assembly line by robots. He felt that these dreams were not some fanciful dreams, but instead some actual view of another world.

On February 11^th, 1976, Jennings sent statements from his mother and a Mr. Larney D. Fry about incidents involving her sighting and sightings of the MIB and other sinister experiences Jennings and Fry had experienced. On February 9^th Mr. Fry had sent in an affidavit confirming that he worked with Jennings Frederick and that he too had experienced and seen the MIB including an experience that almost ended their lives. Iva Frederick would later send a signed affidavit confirming that everything she had written was true on February 18^th and asked only that if Barker wrote about the encounter that he would not include her name or address however he did include her name in his March 1976 Newsletter which detailed her and Jennings encounters.

Shortly after this Gray Barker decided to drive the 30 miles from his home passing Grant Town home of the infamous Grant Town Goon and looked at the frozen scenery around him until he reached Jennings's home at Route #1, Box 126, Rivesville. Barker’s first impressions of Jennings when meeting him were the following “Frederick was a young, husky, good looking man in his early 30’s. his language, precise, and clear like the notes he had sent me, hardly gave hint of his rural upbringing, never employing the localisms and brogue which often crept into my own speech. He certainly wasn’t a kook or dildate for the nuthouse—though deep beneath the surface of his calm demeanor I could sense something else, maybe a controlled urgency, or maybe pangs of suppressed terror”. Barker conducted the interview in Jennings's living room as Jennings's two-year-old daughter wandered around, cooing, playing, and searching through the files and papers, and old UFO books that Barker had brought for reference as he listened to Jennings's encounters. Barker could tell that as Jennings spoke of his encounters that he was one of only a few who he had told the tale to and knew that he would not laugh at him or ridicule him. Yet about halfway through the interview, Barker had the feeling that Frederick was interviewing him he discovered that Jennings was concerned and worried about some of the things he had in read in some of John Keel’s books and articles and from this Barker discovered that he was “getting to the controlled terror that boiled just beneath his seemingly calm exterior”. He asked Barker about his thoughts on the pattern Keel noticed between contactees and other UFO experiences. Barker confirmed upon this that there often was a continuation of the phenomenon that would occur after a UFO sighting or abduction. Yet Barker played this post-continuation of experiences down so as not to worry him. It was from here that questioned Barker about what he knew of the AVRO saucer and then got into his MIB encounter. Upon driving home to Clarksburg Barker had wondered whether Jennings was actually a member of the MIB but soon dismissed this saying that Jennings was “a man possessed, not by insanity, not by Christian Devils, but by the pattern. And he must exorcise this Fiend with a fighting spirit any mountain man carries in his brave heart. Frederick had himself become a UFO investigator. Perhaps he could prove that Keel’s pattern didn’t always come true. Perhaps all marriages didn’t break up; perhaps not all participants did not enter a mad world of unreality where hoarse voices croaked, “we are one”” Barker though forgot all of this and instead thought about visiting him again and laughed thinking about his little girl playing with his files and even thought of the next time visiting giving her a picture book. This was the start of the two having an incredibly long friendship. Over the course of several years, the two would call each other and write several letters. From these correspondences, we could tell that Jennings was very much an admirer of Barker and would constantly try to help him or convince him to join him in different lectures as well as sending him cases he had worked on.

Home Made and Illustrated Christmas Card from Jennings Frederick to Gray Barker (UNDATED)

On September 2, 1976, Jennings sent a letter to Barker knowing that he had sent his abduction experience which had yet to be published, and some of his other experiences to the True UFOs Magazine. He also discussed both the Richard Taylor situation as well as planning an interview for Gray with his mother. On September 20, 1976, Jennings Frederick wrote an article entitled “Who Builds the Flying Saucers” in it he describes how there have been attempts by countries and world leaders in constructing and creating crafts similar to UFOs. He writes about the programs that the Nazis were working on during WWII and even dips his toes into the conspiracies of Hitler and Eva Braun faking their deaths. Yet he also mentions a program he was possibly involved with or bore witness to during his time in the military this of course was the extended research based on the AVRO saucer. It's from his possible exposure to this research that he became under the MIB’s radar.

About a week before December 16, 1976, Jennings would interview a man by the name of Dominic Fan at the West Virginia University Medical Center in Morgantown. Fan took 20 Black and White photos of a UFO over Morgantown and Jennings had managed to get 17 of them from him. During the interview, his recorder did not function as it should have but he had no trouble with the device beforehand. Fan’s medical section was also interested in having someone conduct a speech on UFOs sometime after New Year's and Jennings had asked Gray if he would want to come help him out with the project.

On February 11^th, 1977 Jennings had sent Barker several xeroxed files from UFO cases he had investigated. One particular case involved a UFO that seemed to rotate and bore no sound yet unlike the classic UFOs he had investigated previously this UFO was only about the size of a coffee cup and that the witness had seen it at a mere arm’s reach. The witness claimed that he took about 20 shots of the object with a telephoto lens and at different closure rates. As Jennings spoke with the witness again he had problems with his recorder as there were portions of the interview that went unrecorded and of course, these were involving some of the most important parts of the case. Jennings would again note that he had no problems prior to the interview, and this was not the only problem Jennings was facing in his research and life. Jennings would soon discover that his mail was being opened and that this was occurring so frequently that he had to put a lock on his mailbox. After doing this the problem seemed to of been solved. During this point, he was talking to Jim Moseley and Hayden Hewes as well and Hewes was particularly interested in his Zarcon abduction. However, at this point in his life, Jennings was not divulging the story as he was currently working on a book about his own encounters which he titled “Flying Saucer Omens” and even drew a mock cover for the book featuring Zarcon, one of the MIB, Vegetable Man, the Space Devil with its UFO, and a strange hairy creature which had been mentioned by Jennings in some sources but further info not seemingly available. In the February 77' letter, he also mentions that in 76 he had sent some possible angel hair to Hayden Hewes for further analysis however he apparently never heard back from him except for when Hewes wanted more information from him.

Mock Cover Design by Jennings Frederick for unpublished book "Flying Saucer Omens" 

During the latter portion of 77’, Jennings proceeded to attend Fairmont State College and was taking courses in Electrical Engineering and was also further engaged in his Rocket Research Studies. At this time, he was living at Route 8, Box 406, in Fairmont, WV which was located on the east side of Fairmont just off the Fairmont interstate. On August 2^nd when he was writing to Barker to tell of the move he was still in the overall process of moving but also mentioned that he had experienced another encounter similar in nature to Zarcon. He wrote “I have had another alien encounter as “Zarcon” described to me when I was abducted. This sighting or encounter I must admit took me back a little when it happened! For it was like something from one of John Keel’s best sellers on the paranormal or ultra-dimensional contact. The beings I contacted were in some ways similar to “Zarcon”, but much smaller and totally peaceful in nature”. Just what Jennings exactly means or any further information on this experience unfortunately was seemingly not recorded.

Jennings as a Ufologist while known to the likes of Barker and Jim Moseley was also featured in a newspaper article in which he discussed several of the famous cases at the time as well as some of the evidence. The article titled “Country Man Discusses Research into UFOs” which appeared in the Jennings Frederick file in the Gray Barker Archive was un-dated and did not include what the original newspaper source was, but it was a local paper from the Rivesville-Fairmont area as the point of the article was to talk to local experts.

Things for Jennings started to go slightly downhill when on July 19^th, 1978, he wrote what would seem to be his final letter to Barker. In it he would describe how he was forced to quit school and start a full-time job which occupied his time from 7 in the morning to 7:30 at night. He would work on Mondays thru Thursdays and then on Fridays and Saturdays would continue his rocket patent research and UFO studies most of which were interviews with witnesses. During this time his work on the book was put aside and at the time did not work on it for about 3 months. At the end of the letter, he commented that Jim Moseley was either going to pay him a visit or give him a call while he was in town and also offered to help Barker out since Barker was having some financial troubles as well. In 1979 UFO Review was selling a series of cassettes from Ufologists, contactees, and abductees and Jennings proceeded to create one that detailed his entire story. This 60-minute cassette seemed to of replaced his work on the book as it covered every aspect of his encounters from his mother’s UFO sighting up to his MIB experiences however this cassette appears to of been very rare as a search for a copy has proven to be fruitless outside of the original ad in the magazine.

UFO Review Ad for the Jennings Frederick Cassette 

After 1979 Jennings seemingly dropped off the face of the Fortean map a lot of this may have to do with the fact that Jennings was a father and with how important family is he could have put his research and experiences to the side to help raise and be more a part of his children’s and family’s lives. This seems to be the outcome as no reference of him returning to the fold of Ufology seems to have ever occurred. Another thing that may have caused him to dwindle is that Gray Barker in 1984 had passed away and based on his correspondences the two were truly very good friends. Jennings Frederick, unfortunately, passed away on Tuesday, April 10, 2012, at the age of 62 while still living in the Fairmont area. He was survived by his daughter and son and their families. He was buried at West Virginia National Cemetery at Grafton with full military honors.

Jennings Frederick was clearly not appreciated in his time on this earth for what he had accomplished and for his experiences. Even at the beginning of my research, the pull was Veggie Man and Gray Barker. For those who don’t know Gray Barker was a complicated figure in Ufology, he was a storyteller, a hoaxer, and a genuine researcher and because of this a lot of his cases are difficult to determine if they are legitimate or not. Some cases that he investigated like the Flatwoods Monster or the Grafton Monster had other researchers or a newspaper trail that proved that it was not some form of creative writing by Barker. Veggie Man was always one such case that remained in this limbo of credibility. While the Newsletter Barker put out included Jenning’s address and contact info most people who knew the story discovered it through Brad Steiger’s books where it was constantly recycled or through Rob Morphy’s article on his American Monsters Website and later his Cryptopia Website and later on his Cryptonaut Podcast with Marc Storrs and Chris Carnicelli. That’s how I first heard the story as a late elementary-early middle school student. Through Steiger, the personal information was removed but with it the validation that Jennings was a real person as later almost every Barker story and source came under scrutiny due to his hoaxing and creative writing. From this, some felt that the Veggieman story with its almost erotic-sounding communication and blood removal was a story of sexual expression by Barker or that this was his way of trying to create his own personal monster to be associated with in the same way John Keel had Mothman or McCloy and Miller had the Jersey Devil or even what we see today with Lyle Blackburn on the Fouke Monster or Dana Holyfield on the Honey Island Swamp Monster. A cryptid that he would be the “expert” on. Here this led on this expedition through obscure sources to validate the story and not only did I find that Jennings was a real person but that he was unappreciated and he could have been up there with John Keel or Ivan T. Sanderson and unfortunately his story is incomplete. Had other forteans known at the lengths Frederick was involved and how incredible his story was we could have had another book as impactful as Communion or the Andreasson Affair yet chock full of  even more high strangeness like Mothman Prophecies. His story needs to be told. It's one thing for us to focus on the entities seen in cases like these but with it, we tend to forget that they are a part of a person’s life and history and with it we slowly forget the people who experience the entities. Jennings Frederick had reached that point on more than one occasion and the point of this article is not just to chronicle the Fortean elements of his life but also to verify that he existed, he was a parent, a soldier, he was a ufologist, he wasn’t just some random hunter who encountered a tall green being in 1968 but a literal legend with countless stories to tell.

Epilogue: I want to thank everyone who had helped support me and helped in getting some of the resources with telling what I can say is perhaps the most complete version of Jennings Frederick’s Story. I also want to thank everyone who tells his story his story has become extremely personal to me and has been with me for years. Yet I feel more closer to it now that I’ve been researching him. Why am I so attached to this story? I have no clue. Do we ever really have a reason as to why something draws us in or why something from generations back drew our parents in? His story is like that and knowing and reading his letters it’s a weird feeling like talking to a pen pal. I wish I could have met him not even to talk about Veggie Man but just to talk about his life. There is still many blanks and more info about him personally that would help fill out his story outside the fortean aspects, but one can only find so much. Yet I am incredibly grateful for what I have been given and what I’ve been able to dig up. And so from the bottom of my heart a thank you and if anybody has any further Info on Jennings life or if any of his family would like to reach out definitely please get a hold of me so I can continue telling the complete story. Thank you all for reading!

This Article is Dedicated to the Memory and Legacy of Jennings H. "Skips" Frederick: A Legend Never to be Forgotten Again

May 28,1949-April 10, 2012

Works Cited:

Alien Meetings By Brad Steiger

Extraordinary Encounters By Jerome Clark

Humanoid Encounters: 1965-1969 By Albert S. Rosales

Into the Unknown By Reader’s Digest

Men in Black: The Secret Terror By Gray Barker

Monsters Among Us By Brad Steiger

The UFO Phenomenon by Time-Life books

Gray Barker’s Newsletter March 1976

OVNI Presence No. 40

UFO HUMCAT index 1967

UFO Review No. 03 April 1979

UFOCUS #2 Fall 1977

Who Builds the Flying Saucers By Jennings Frederick

Letters From Jennings Frederick to Gray Barker Dated: December 26^th 1975, January 13, 1976, February 9, 1976, February 11, 1976, February 18^th 1976, September 2, 1976, December 16^th 1976 , February 11^th 1977, August 2^nd 1977, July 19^th 1978

“Country Man Discusses Research into UFOs” Untitled Newspaper from Gray Barker Archive, Clarksburg.

Tracing Owls Podcast: Jennings Frederick: The Man Behind the Vegetable-With Cole Herrold.  October 13, 2022.

https://podcasts.google.com/u/1/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy81ODQwYjhiOC9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw/episode/ZDYwZWJhNDEtYzc3NS00NjdkLTkyODktOWRiMWIxM2MzYmNi?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahcKEwiwl8mtuY_9AhUAAAAAHQAAAAAQZg

Cryptonaut Podcast #13. Vegetable Man. March 5, 2018.

 https://podcasts.google.com/u/1/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9jcnlwdG9uYXV0LmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz/episode/Yjk0Zjc3ZTZiYmI2NjA3YzEyY2Q4ZmI2ODNlZmIxYjE?sa=X&ved=0CAUQkfYCahgKEwiwl8mtuY_9AhUAAAAAHQAAAAAQ1QE

Curious Creatures: The Vegetable Man- Children's Book By Michael Strayer

https://www.smalltownmonsters.com/shop/curious-creatures-the-vegetable-man

https://www.amazon.com/Curious-Creatures-Vegetable-Michael-Strayer/dp/B0B6XJHPNL

THE JENNINGS  FREDERICK PHOTO ARCHIVE