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Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of Cryptic Cocktail Party, a show where we

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have a few drinks, share a few laughs, take a dive into the unknown. I'm your host Dave,

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and today I'm joined by second best co-host, Colby Clark. How's it going, bud?

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Hello. I'm good. How are you?

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I'm doing alright. I hope that poll didn't hurt your feelings.

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Hurt my feelings? It gave me a will to live for like a couple days.

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It gave you something to strive for, to become the number one second best co-host?

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Absolutely.

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Gotcha.

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I mean, you know, Nick has an interest. Not that I'm not interested in your story, sorry.

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Nick has a general interest in cryptids, you know?

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That's true.

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Proceeding, being a guest. So I mean, it makes sense.

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I guess, yeah. But I feel like your reactions.

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Nick, just know I'm coming for you.

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Your reactions are more genuine, I feel like. Because he, even if he doesn't know the story,

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some things you can kind of expect. You have no fucking idea what is going on.

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I try to know the least going into it that I possibly can.

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Yeah. That's why I did not want to tell you, because this is the topic of today's episode.

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You know. You have to. There's no way you don't know it. But I didn't tell you what

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it is, right? You're going to go blind with this?

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You have not. I am. I'm all over the ice over here.

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Alright. Well, Kobe, the other reason I wanted to have you on, not just because you're my

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friend and you got to start making a name for yourself against Nick, is that one year

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ago this week, you helped me launch this show by being a guest on the first two episodes,

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Flatwood Monster and I believe the Dover Demon.

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Oh, that's fantastic. Yeah. Those are great.

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I didn't want to do this series with anyone else, because I feel like it's only fitting

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that even if you're not a guest consistently, I feel like the milestones, the major ones

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you have to be here for, because if it wasn't for you, this show would not have started.

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Because I feel like you were the only one who had time to do it. And you did it.

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Well, I'm so proud to be a part of this. It's fantastic. This is a really great thing that

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you did. Yeah.

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Yeah. We know we're one year in, almost 50 episodes in, hours of content. So I just want

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to say thank you, Kobe, for helping me get this off the ground. Thanks to everyone listening.

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You guys are fucking awesome for sharing and commenting and liking and following and all

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that stuff. So I really appreciate it. Yeah. Do you want to dive right in, Kobe?

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Thank you for creating this. You know, we just thank each other for a while. Show highlights

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of thank yous. I mean, we could. Fuck it. This is just a thank you episode. This is

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what it is. No, no, no. I'm ready for it. Freaking give it to me.

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All right, Kobe. So we record these on Riverside and you can name the studio. And I kind of

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gave you a hint of the area that we're going to be talking about today. Can you tell people

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at what I named the studio? Doing cocaine with John Denver on a boat.

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Just kidding. Take me home, country cold. All right. So can you guess where we're going

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to be talking about today? Colorado. Pretty much. Pretty much. So

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Denver would be more accurate. Yeah. No, we're going to be talking about Appalachia. Appalachia.

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It's pronounced either way. And OK, from top to bottom, Appalachia, Appalachia, however

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you want to pronounce it, is no stranger to the weird, the unusual, straight up fucking

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terrifying. The Appalachian mountain range is fucking 480 million years old. So it's

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had some time to kind of brew up a few of its own iterations on like eldritch horror.

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There's there's a lot of things going on here. And there's been dating back on what? What

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was it? The Appalachian mountain range? No, the elderly tour. What was it? Eldritch Horror,

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Colby. Eldritch. I haven't heard of that. That's why I'm asking. You know, it's like

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I think like Lovecraftian. No. OK. You're not. Yeah, you look like you know, you're

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shaking your head like, you know, but I feel your face is saying something different. Lovecraft.

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Love it. The guy, the author man, the author man. Yes. Now I got it. I'm right there. These

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things have been dating back for centuries. Even the indigenous peoples of the region

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have had stories and folklore of things that go bump in the night in this area. Things

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like the Wampus cat, which the Cherokee viewed as a protective spirit, the Wendigo, which

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if you're listening, you probably know what his deal is. And we covered it. You were the

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guest on that episode. He is definitely not a protective spirit. Probably the opposite

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of. OK. You also got the moon eyed people. They were short, pale skinned, little nocturnal

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guys with large bright eyes that weren't really considered spirits or cryptids, but just like

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a straight up different race of person. Kind of like you. I feel like I just described

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you perfectly. Big time. And then you got my personal favorite. And I should probably

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do a whole episode on this. This is this spirit creature, whatever it calls, called the spear

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finger. And according to legend, the spear finger is a shape shifting stone skinned witch

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with totally normal hands. She definitely does not have a wildly sharp and long knife

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in place of one of her fingers. Did she write this? Yeah, she wrote that. Did she? Yeah,

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she wrote her own biographies like a biograph on the back of a book like the jacket. Yeah.

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She's like, I totally have normal hands. Not just taped it on. She just wrote it on a regular

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piece of paper from the witch. So it said that she would take the form of an old woman

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and convince the children in the village that she was their grandmother. And then when the

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kids would fall asleep, she would straight up murder them and then steal their livers.

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So I feel like this is just another reason why I don't trust old people. They're already

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creepy. They're already. Are you OK? I mean, you you cross the line when you impersonate

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my grandparent. All right. And then excuse me. And then to murder me. I didn't put this

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in there, but it said that she would lull the children to sleep by brushing their hair.

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Now I need to know, is she doing that with like the knife hands or is this like just,

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you know? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Slips it in there. Yeah. It's like a comb knife and comb

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knife. And then you got like shit like the Brown Mountain Lights, the Bell Witch, Big

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Foot, things like that. But there's one state in the Appalachian Mountain range that above

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all others has had more strange and weird creatures and folklore pop up than any other.

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And that state is West Virginia. And in this statement, we got the classics. You got everyone's

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favorite, the Flatwoods Monster. You got the Snallygaster Sasquatch, Sheep Squatch, Bat

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Squatch. There's also the Grafton Monster, the Snarly Yow, Devil Dogs. The Jersey Devil

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was seen there somehow. I don't know. But there's one cryptid that trumps all of those.

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One whose very presence kind of gives off like an air of evil, tragedy and pink eye

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to those who have seen it. One who has been called a harbinger of doom and destruction.

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Well others are convinced it was simply a messenger trying to convey a warning. This

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specific cryptid even has had a Richard Gere movie made about it. And that entity is known

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as the Mothman. Julia Roberts. No, Colby's the Mothman. We're going to be doing the Mothman

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and I'm very excited. Right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right. That makes

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sense. Yeah, no. That's not what I said. The movie was not Pretty Woman, if that's what

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the movie was thinking of. Right, right, right, right, right. Yeah. Yeah. Now Colby, you're

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familiar with the Mothman, correct? Yeah. Yeah. I've heard some samples from it. Some

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sample? Yeah. Oh yeah. We kind of released that song. Absolute banger. For those of you

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who may somehow be unfamiliar, the Mothman is a five to eight foot tall humanoid creature

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with bright red, almost hypnotic glowing eyes that will for sure give you pink eye. It has

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a massive wingspan of roughly 10 feet that from what some witnesses say, they don't flap.

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He just kind of like unfurls them and then just lifts off the ground. Just like, yeah,

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not ideal. Right. Just an all around unpleasant thing to come across when you're driving down

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the road at night, I would say. Sure. Yeah. Sightings of the Mothman's. Get out of there.

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Okay. Sightings of the Mothman started on November 15th, 1966 in the small town of Point

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Pleasant, West Virginia and ended on December 15th, 1967 with the tragic collapse of the

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Silver Bridge, which claimed the lives of 46 people, two of which their bodies were

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never found. So it's kind of rough. It's not like the happiest Christmas that year in Point

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Pleasant, I would assume. Yeah. But before we get into the nitty gritty of the Mothman

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sightings, the UFOs, the men in black and the weirdest dude in the world known as injured

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cold, I think it's important to take a little bit and talk about Point Pleasant, its history

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and for you to learn about a centuries old curse that was put upon the region that may

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be the cause for all the strange occurrences and the many incidents and tragedies that have

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plagued Point Pleasant and the surrounding area since that curse was spoken. Are you

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ready for this Colby? Are you ready? I'm definitely ready. Yeah. Yep. Let's go. How do you feel

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so far? I feel good. Yeah. I feel like I'm retaining information. I'm a little on my

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on the edge of the seat, you know, and I want to know. I want to know more about Point Pleasant.

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Yeah, there's going to be a, this is a information heavy episode. You're going to get a lot of

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info here. That's good. Not a lot of Mothman in this one, but I think this is, I guess

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this time before we're recording, I think this is important to learn about this before we go into

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what the Mothman and the sightings and all that stuff were. All right. So, right, right. Point

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Pleasant is a small town in West Virginia that sits on the confluence of the Ohio and the

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Kanawha rivers. Confluence, I learned means like when two or more water sources join up to make

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like one channel of water. So you learn something today. OK. It supposedly got its name when George

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Washington was like surveying the area and offhandedly was just like, huh, this is a

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pleasant point in reference to like where the Ohio River and the Kanawha River met. I don't know

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how real that is because according to the official Wikipedia page, it said that Colonel Lewis set up

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a camp there called Camp Point Pleasant, and it was named after that. So I don't know. I like to

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believe the George Washington story just because I'm a big fan of lazily named things. Yeah, like

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Blueberry. Yeah, that's blue. Blueberry. But the boys and Barry. Oh, well, why you look so flustered

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about that? The boys and Barry. Good Lord. Yes, it rhymes with poison. OK.

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Who's naming this ship? It was officially established on December 19th, 1794,

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but was already occupied by settlers. Oh, my God, was already occupied by settlers well before then

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and not just by us white folks, as I'm sure everyone will have assumed. It was originally

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a Shawnee village up until 1749. But this area wasn't just home to Shawnee people.

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Several tribes of indigenous people lived in the area and with the whole manifest destiny thing

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going on that we were taught in school for some reason was a good thing to cold rush. No. Do you

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not do you not remember manifest destiny from school? It was all around the same time, I think.

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Now, I mean, maybe, but not really. No. I mean, you know, social studies.

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Man, well, if you don't know what manifest destiny is, go look it up. But we were taught

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it. That was when we were in England. We were like, yeah, we should have land. We should we

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should have America. It's our destiny to. Yeah, basically conquer all. Yeah, basically, God,

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God said that we should just keep going west. Mm hmm. Some of those native. So

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now I feel like I got to start over. But with the whole manifest destiny thing going on that

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we were taught in schools, some of those native tribes banded together to sort of put the kibosh

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on that shit like real quick. And one of those tribes was the Shawnee. Now, from what I have learned,

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the Shawnee were the strongest of these tribes, whether or not that's true. I don't really know,

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but I'm not going to argue with it. But what I do know is that the Shawnee chieftain was well

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respected and widely feared, not just amongst like other native tribes, but the white settlers as

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well. His name was and I really hope I'm pronouncing this right. Hoka Laskwa, which translated from the

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native Shawnee to English means blade of corn or corn stock. Now, not much is known about Chief

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Cornstock's early life, and he doesn't really appear in any historical records up until about

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1764. We know that he may have been born in 1720 in the area of what is now modern day Pennsylvania

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along the Susquehanna River. And he relocated to the area of Point Pleasant sometime around 1758

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during the French and Indian War, because the Shawnee were trying to like stay neutral in that

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conflict. So they decided just like, get the hell out of there. Okay. All right. Yeah. Are you

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retaining any of this? Absolutely. Okay. Chief, Chief Big Corn, Cornstock, Big Cornstock was a

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badass dude revered by all, even the whites. You're scaring the whites. Yeah. Yeah. Doing a good. Yeah.

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You mean your name for yourself. Yeah. Fuck yeah. Uh, whites. So yeah. So they were, so they were,

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so the Shawnee was trying to remain neutral. That is until the British Royal Proclamation of 1763

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that was meant to create a border between the colonies and the native lands. This worked well

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as it could, I guess, for a while. But then of course, us whites got greedy, who would have guessed?

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And that's what the Treaty of Fort Stanwyck in 1768, where Sir William Johnson negotiated a new

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border with the Iroquois, which gave the British a huge chunk of land south of the Ohio River,

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which included, you guessed it, present day West Virginia. Now the reason this was a problem for

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corn stock in the Shawnees was because they used that land as their hunting grounds. So they weren't

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and they weren't at the negotiations for this treaty. So they were pretty pissed off about it.

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They didn't even show up. They weren't invited. Their invites were lost in the mail.

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Pony Express back then was literally a pony express. Right. And they couldn't travel very

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far. They're ponies. Now this treaty, this led to clashes between the British and Native American

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tribes. And this is about the time when the Shawnees started organizing other tribes to help defend

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their hunting grounds. All in all, seven Native American nations formed an alliance known as,

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and I'm sorry for how this is worded. This is just how it is. And it's the Indian Confederacy

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to protect the lands and defend against any further white dudes just encroaching on their lands.

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Spoiler alert. Okay. It kind of happened anyways. Sorry. Right. Right. Those nations that were part

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of this Confederacy were the Delaware, Weanda, Mingo, Ottawa, Illinois, Miami, and of course,

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the Shawnee. These squirmishes weren't like a full fledged issue until 1774 when at least 10 Mingo

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Indians were murdered by white settlers in what is now known as the Yellow Creek Massacre. This

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led to the Mingoes retaliating against the settlers. And it seemed as though pretty much at this point,

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like a straight up war was going to come any day now. You know, like the fog of war hung low across

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the region, if you will. You look, you look bored as fuck. I told you this is an information heavy

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episode. I am not bored whatsoever. I'm intrigued. Now, Cornstalk and the Shawnees weren't looking

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for a war. They just wanted their hunting grounds to not be ravaged by white dudes,

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which is understandable. So far, it kind of seems like the Shawnees are super chill. Like they're

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like the one friend that you have that's like super chill, cool with everyone, doesn't want any

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problems with anyone, never starts any shit. But if they need to, they will fucking just like straight

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up murky you, no questions asked kind of vibe. That's what I'm getting from them. Yeah. You never

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met my buddy Jordan, but that's Jordan. Jordan, you think he's not a real human being, right?

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I don't think Jordan's real. You've gone over John Cena. Pretty much. So Cornstalk, he did what he

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could to kind of just keep the peace, even going as far as sending his brother Silverheels to escort

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traitors from Shawnee villages to the safety at Fort Pitt. Well, one day while Silverheers was

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escorting someone to Fort Pitt, and while he was at the fort, local militiamen shot and seriously

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wounded him. And this was the inciting incident that kicked off Lord Dunmore's war and brought

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us to the Battle of Point Pleasant. Are you already learning about the Battle of Point Pleasant? How

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you feeling so far? I'm feeling good. I'm feeling like the white strike again, you know?

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I think that's where all of our problems came. Pretty much. I think we are the cause

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of a lot of our own problems. Us and us from the future. I don't know what that means. You will in

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15 days and 34 seconds.

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So the Battle of Point Pleasant took place on October 10th, where Cornstalk and a small army

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of only roughly 300 Shawnee, Delaware, Wyndett and Mingo warriors, they stood up against

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Lord Dunmore's 1300 men. The battle lasted nearly the whole day with Cornstalk and his men actually

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having the upper hand until reinforcements arrived and he was forced to retreat back across the Ohio

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River. And eventually he ended up signing a peace treaty called the Treaty of Camp Charlotte,

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which basically made it official that Cornstalk was to give up all the Shawnee land rights south

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of the Ohio River. Kind of a bummer, but you know, right. It seems like Cornstalk's just like,

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I don't want more people to die. So just wait is what it is. Stop making me sign documents.

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Now we're going to yada yada yada a bit here and fast forward to 1775. At this point, the

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American Revolution is kicking off. And just like with all other conflicts, Cornstalk and the Shawnee

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wanted to remain neutral in this war. Now this is the part in the story where things get a bit murky

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as to what happened next. Some sources I read in the story that I'm going to go with, because it's

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a way better story and adds a bunch more to the legend, is what I'm going to go with. So please

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Colby listeners, after this point, take everything I say with a grain of salt. Could be true, could

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be legend, could be completely made up. The story is that in November 1777, Cornstalk went to Fort

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Rudolph, which is a fort that was built on the site of the Battle of Point Pleasant and is now

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present day Point Pleasant. He went along with another Native American chief named Red Hawk

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and an unnamed native man. There's your unnamed man. To tell the Americans that while they don't

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want war with the Americans or the British, the British are bringing more and more tribes from

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their Confederacy to the side of the British. And that if Cornstalk's men wanted to fight with the

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British, he would allow it and would have no choice but to join in with them. Because if

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Cornstalk is anything, he's a man with principles and loyalty. If his fighters want to fight with

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the British, he's going to do it. You know, if you're part of a Confederacy, I feel like you have to

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like be with, you know, does that make sense? Yeah. I mean, what? Yeah. What? It's for the people,

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you know, that's what the people want to do. We're doing it. He's a man of the people. That's right.

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I like him. He then stated that the reason for their visit that day was to try and negotiate

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some sort of peace deal before things escalated as the other tribes were already amassing along

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the Ohio River, just pretty much waiting to murder everyone in that fort. Now, he told all this to a

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man named Captain Arbuckle, who for some reason decided after hearing all of this, you know,

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the eminent attack, the tribes setting up camps along the Ohio, that he was just going to take

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all three men as hostages. You're mine now. I claim you. Why not? I mean, they're already

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taken everything else. Interesting choice. Yeah. Not. Yeah, it is a very interesting choice. Now,

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even though they were hostages, it said that they were treated well. They had comfortable quarters,

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food. It was even said that corn stock even helped in plotting out some of the maps

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of the Ohio River for the Americans to help out if and when the attacks happened.

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Then on November 9th, they're just kicking it, hanging out, making maps and shit. Yeah.

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He's just trying to be helpful. Like friends. Yeah. He's you know,

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then on November 9th, Eloponisco, who was corn stock son, visited the fort to see his father and

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to check on his well-being. He was also detained by the captain. So he's just making all sorts

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of great moves. It seems like this captain killing it. You're coming with me.

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The name like Arbuckle, you know, you don't play around, you know, you're serious man

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for long Arbuckle line.

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Now, the next day on the 10th, they heard shots fired from just outside the fort walls.

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Apparently, two soldiers left the fort to go do a little deer hunting, and they were ambushed by a

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group of Native Americans. One of the soldiers managed to escape, but the other one wasn't so

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lucky. He was killed and scalped. And this really did not sit well with the soldiers in the fort who

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were already on edge just kind of waiting for the natives to attack from across the river.

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So with all this rage, a group of men acting against orders burst into where the four men

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were and decided to execute all of them as revenge for their fallen comrade. It said that when the

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men burst through the door, that corn stock stood up and faced them with such bravery that the men

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momentarily paused their attack. But unfortunately, just standing up like a badass that he was wasn't

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enough to stop what happened next. The soldiers opened fire. Red Hawk was said to have tried to

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climb up the chimney, but was immediately dragged down and killed. The unknown native man said that

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he was strangled to death. Corn stock son was shot where he sat and corn stock he was shot eight

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eight times before he fell to the floor. And then there on the floor, he looked up at his murderers

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and said, quote, I was the border man's friend. Many times I have saved him and his people from

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harm. I never warred with you, but only to protect our wigwams and lands. I came to this fort as your

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friend and you murdered me. You have murdered by my side my young son. For this may the curse of

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the great spirit rest upon this land. May it be blighted by nature. May it even be blighted in

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its hopes. May the strength of its people be paralyzed by the stains of our blood. End quote.

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Damn, he said all that he was dying for a while.

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The gunshot. He got shot in the gut, right? He got shot eight times dying for the

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the enough time to write a book. Let's let's even uh apparently this was the the curse was longer.

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I truncated it down just a little bit. So he was he was talking for a minute. But what do you think

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this is a pretty that's a pretty dope curse. Damn. Yeah, absolutely. That's I mean that

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that's the right time to uh say that curse upon the white folk. Yeah, if you're ever going to

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curse anyone it's in that moment. He he played his cards well. And your death floor.

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And he kept saying floor but it's mostly is probably just ground. Yeah, I don't yeah it's

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just yeah it's just ground. Uh like hardwood. It could I mean it might I mean like a like a loft

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downtown loft. Well I mean like forts weren't just one floor. They had upper levels. Right.

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Could be stone. Could be wood. Who knows. I think we're getting a little off topic here.

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Maybe. I think you're right. Now as soon as those words left his lips he succumbed to his injuries

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and passed. Or so says the legend. Uh the bodies of Kornstock's son Red Hawk and the unknown warrior

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were said to have been thrown in the river while Kornstock being the respected uh chief that he

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was. He he they the the settlers did bury him right near the fort and he remained there for some time.

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That is until 1840 when his bones were removed and placed in the grounds of the Mason County

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courthouse. Strike one. And then again in the 1950s they removed his remains which at this point I

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think they said was just like uh like one bone and a couple of teeth. Uh and they just put them in

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like an aluminum box and then buried them in Two-Endy Way Park. Uh not great. Don't move the bones.

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Yeah. Don't move the bones. Now as for the curse well a ton of bad shit has happened over the years

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that people have attributed to said curse such as and this is a pretty long list so a catastrophic

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fire that destroyed an entire city block in the 1880s on December 6th 1907 a coal mine disaster

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in Monongah West Virginia killed 310 miners. Uh there were two floods that almost completely

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took out Point Pleasant in 1913 and 1937. Uh June of 1944 a tornado ripped through the Tri-State

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area killing 150 people. In 1954 a barge exploded killing six men just before Christmas. 1968 a

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plane crash near the Conowatt airport killing 35. 1970 another airplane crash in Huntington West

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Virginia killed 75. March 2nd 1976 Harriet Sisk was in the Mason County jail in Point Pleasant for

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the murder of her infant daughter so her husband came to the jail with a briefcase full of explosives

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and then set them off killing him his wife and three cops. Holy smokes. Um yeah. Why did you do that

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Cornstock? And then in 1978 a train derailed in Point Pleasant releasing a bunch of toxic chemicals

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into the water uh making all of the wells and the drinking water in the area pretty much unusable.

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So on so forth. But one that everyone seems to remember. All because of the curse. That's what

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they're saying. It could just be all coincidence and just this area is just rife with tragedy for

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some reason. I don't know. But the one that everyone seems to remember and the one that has

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the wildest stories surrounding it is that of the collapse of the Silver Bridge on December 15th

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1967 and the entire year leading up to it filled the sightings of UFOs, men in black, alien visitors,

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and the harbinger of doom himself the Mothman. And that is where we will pick up next week for

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Mothman part two the sightings. Dang what a cliffhanger. How you feeling bud? That was a lot of

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information. Oh I'm feeling full. You know feeling like I gotta do some file sorting.

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All this information. You're gonna file? That's cool though. I need the backstory you know. It

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feels like a slow burn. It's gonna be yeah it is. Because there's a lot of weird shit like it's not

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just the Mothman like I said like there's UFOs. The men in black showed up. There was an alien

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visitor named Indrid Cold who was just consistently smiling and talked through telekinesis and fucking

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phones and shit like that. Like he talked through phones? Well I'm yeah fair. I got you. I got you.

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No it's just like everyone knows the story of the Mothman I feel like. But not a lot of people know

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the there was a bunch of weird shit happening surrounding the Mothman that all right so I'm

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gonna try and bring this up into segments. The next episode we'll do the Mothman straight up.

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We'll just do sightings and then I want to just go over the men in black and the UFOs and Indrid

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Colds. All these things happening either before during or after and I think it's gonna be really

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fun. I'm excited. It gets weird. It gets really fucking weird. All right well I'm ready. Take me

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to the cryptic commune. Okay all right. Colby thank you so much for for joining me. Do you

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have anything you want to plug? Anything you want to say? I mean yeah we just got a new drummer for

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my band Lanterns. Change our name. You'll see a new single and a demo coming out soon.

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Hell yeah. Gonna be dropping them and yeah that's about it for me. Right on and where can they find

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Lanterns? Is it Lanterns 207 on Instagram? Yeah. Yeah. Follow them. That's the one. You know follow

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them. It's good. It's a good time. Oh yeah. That's what we sound like.

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Phenomenal. If you want to follow us follow us on Instagram at Cryptic Cocktail. Follow us on TikTok

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at Cryptic Cocktail Party. We do have a Patreon. It's patreon.com slash Cryptic Cocktail Party.

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It's five dollars a month and you will get things when I get around to doing them but for the most

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part it's really just to support the show and what we do. Yeah that's it. Colby you want to say

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bye to everyone? Bye everyone.

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you