Arkansas | Live Pterosaur

December 20, 2018

Modern Pterosaurs in Arkansas

By the investigative journalist Jonathan Whitcomb

Report a Sighting

If you have seen any flying creature that brings to mind one or more of the following words or phrases, please contact me. Also feel free to get in touch with me if you know of any friend or relative or neighbor who may have seen such an animal. This applies whether or not the sighting was in Arkansas. Thank you.

Pterodactyl
Flying dinosaur
pterosaur
Dinosaur bird
Dragon
Prehistoric bird

Sighting of a Modern Pterosaur in Sherwood, Arkansas

I got the first email from this eyewitness on November 12, 2018. I asked permission for publishing the person’s name and received it: Chancey Carter:

I saw what looked to be a flying dinosaur this morning. It flew above my vehicle and I was too late to take a picture. It had long wings and a long neck. I was in Sherwood, Arkansas when I saw this creature.

My Reply:

Thank you very much for telling me about this. About what time was it? Thanks. Jonathan Whitcomb

Second email from Chancey Carter:

It was right around 7:15 am, it’s raining and cold here so the sun is not out.

My Reply:

Thank you. I just want to be sure that I understand. Was your sighting this morning, Monday, Nov 12th?

Third email:

Yes . . .

My Reply:

Thank you. I see Sherwood on a map now. Is it just a few miles from Little Rock? In what area of Sherwood was the sighting?

Fourth email from Chancey:

It’s a few miles from Little Rock, Arkansas. It flew from the direction of Sherwood police department. If you could find that on the map, it flew towards a wooded area with . . . trees. I wish I could’ve caught a picture but I was so shocked to see something I [had never seen before].

Another Sighting in Arkansas, Early in 2018

Earlier in the same year, I got an email from an eyewitness who told me about a sighting a few weeks earlier. James Smith and his mother Melba Smith saw a “pterodactyl” in Camden, Arkansas, at 11:45 a.m. (It was overcast that day.)

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Dinosaur Book for Children and Teens

Why would the new book The Girl who saw a Flying Dinosaur be the best Christmas or birthday gift for many kids and teenagers? It invites them into a new world of adventure in cryptozoology: true stories of encounters with modern living pterosaurs.

Modern pterosaurs and extinction

From fossils, we know that some pterosaurs had wingspans over 20 feet. Should such an animal live near humans, it would be feasible for it to carry off a child or small adult. A report of such an incident may resemble a fable to Westerners, yet natives in a remote jungle see no problem except the danger from that animal.

Pterodactyl in Arkansas

“My father and I saw a huge, featherless bird in Arkansas . . . when I was sixteen . . . We were sitting on big rocks at a cliff about 300 foot above the river when it flew out just under us and we watched it all the way down toward the river till it passed the tree lines. . . .”

Yes, the Ropen is Real

In 1897, an eight year old girl, Virginia O’Hanlon, wrote a letter to the editor of a big newspaper in New York, asking if Santa Claus was real. The response has since become the most famous editorial of all time: “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.” I now apply that kind of positive journalistic response to what some persons have asked me over the past fifteen years. The question is in this general form: “Did I see a pterosaur?”

Dinosaur book for LDS children and teens

My new nonfiction is for middle-grade children and many (but not all) teenagers: The Girl who saw a Flying Dinosaur. This is a short cryptozoology book, not about religion but about eyewitness sightings of apparent living pterosaurs. It invites you to seek the truth behind what people around the world report observing. . . . my new book . . . really is for English-speaking people of all faiths.

Flying-dinosaur adventure book

I wrote the nonfiction book The Girl who saw a Flying Dinosaur for several purposes. As a gift giver for a child or teenager, you need to know what benefits it can give to the young reader. I recommend it for readers between about the ages of eight and fourteen; for some ten-year-olds (and eleven and twelve) it will be exceptionally delightful: easy to understand yet stimulating.

Cryptozoology book for children and teenagers

It’s about eyewitness testimonies about strange flying creatures that appeared unlike any bird or bat. The scientifically correct name for what some people call a “dinosaur bird” or a “flying dinosaur” is pterosaur. Please now consider how a young reader may be better off because of reading this short book (for readers about 8-14 years old).

[This is about the book “The Girl who saw a Flying Dinosaur.”]

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A new nonfiction book for children and teenagers:

Nonfiction book for young readers: Non-extinct ‘dinosaurs’

March 16, 2013December 30, 2013

Pterosaur Sighting in Central Arkansas

Three images showing the flight path of the creature observed by Laura Dean in central Arkansas in the spring of 2012

Last month I received the first email from Laura . . ., who encountered a huge flying creature in Central Arkansas in the spring of 2012. I have since received many emails from her, with many details about the extraordinary creature she had observed. Here is a beginning (with some editing of the English):

I saw a pre-historic bird here in central Arkansas back this past spring. As I was driving over a small bridge with a creek underneath, it flew up from under the bridge beside my truck and flew up above my truck and out and over a field. I watched it from the side and the underneath. It had no feathers and it was grey skinned with pink undertones. It had three sections to its huge wings and a crown behind its head. It was so huge and heavy that it had trouble flying up high enough to get up over the top of the bridge. I watched as each section of its wings worked. . . .

Please be aware that she initially reported to me her conclusion that she may have observed a Pelagornis, based on the overall shape, especially the wings. (The Pelagornis is thought to be an extinct bird, probably closely related to storks and pelicans. It had a wingpspan of 15-20 feet.) In our communications, she repeated her assertion that the creature had no feathers and said, “This bird seemed to be almost as big as my small pickup truck. This is not a prank…I have a life and no time for pranks.”

Flight path: from lower to middle to upper image [Please note that the eyewitness has made a comment recently: “. . . the flying creature did have some type of (cone-like) head crest . . . even though I did not draw that . . .”]

Her sketches confirmed to me the strangeness of the wing shape. It’s more common, in sightings of modern pterosaurs, to see sharper wing tips, rather than the squares ones observed by Laura. Nevertheless, she reports a lack of feathers, in addition to a size too large to have been from a classified bird (even if feathers were present but not noticed).

Pterosaur Sighting or Ropen-Pterodactyl

Youtube video of an interview of Duane Hodgkinson (American World War II veteran) by Garth Guessman (video edited and uploaded by Jonathan Whitcomb)

Pterosaur Sighting Report Credibility

To be sure, very few Rhamphorhynchoid fossils include a head crest, but that structure in not entirely unknown on “basal” long-tailed pterosaurs. Many modern pterosaurs, according to many eyewitnesses worldwide, have both horn-like (or cone-like) head crests and long tails, in spite of fossils.

Addendum:

Laura Dean called in during the Monster X Radio talk show interview, on August 18, 2013, in which Shane Corson and “Johnny Bigfoot” were the hosts. Laura gave details about her sighting experience and the strange pterosaur she had observed.

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Live Pterosaurs in America (3rd edition) by J. D. Whitcomb

This book is one of the best books that I have ever read! It reminds us to have an open mind and that the things we have all been taught as fact ….may not be fact at all. This is a very interesting and educational book and may change the way you see the world around you.

February 29, 2012March 8, 2012

“Pterodactyls” in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Texas

Many eyewitnesses have called the flying creatures “pterodactyls,” although the correct name for the large non-bat featherless flyer is “pterosaur.” Let’s examine some of what has been reported on sightings in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Texas.

Texarkana, Arkansa, Sighting, About 1982

I received an email from this eyewitness many years ago.

We saw the creature for approximately 20 seconds. We did not see any signs of feathers just sharp edged wings, the sharp pointed beak, and the sharp pointed crest on its head. We did not see any tail. I have looked at my dinosuar book and the picture of the pteranodon looked like what we saw.

Woodward, Oklahoma, Pterosaur Sighting

From page 33 of my book Live Pterosaurs in America (third edition):

About [1985] . . . in Woodward, Oklahoma, near a small river, at about noon, a fourteen-year-old became terrified at the sight of a pterosaur-like creature.

“I was walking to the small river where I usually caught carp fish. . . . a large animal took off into the air. At first I thought it was an eagle. Then I noticed it was a dinosaur. . . . I was afraid it would eat me. I stared at the back part of the head because it was exactly like the ones depicted in books. . . . had a long neck and wide wings just like in the movies or in books. It had no feathers and it was flying around and looking downwards into the fields.

“I was really afraid. . . . I never told anyone about this until now. People think you’re crazy when you tell them about something like this. The creature [looked] like it was dark brown. I was really close to it.”

“Pterodactyl” in Southern States

. . . a huge, featherless bird in Arkansas . . . We were sitting on big rocks at a cliff about 300 foot above the river when it flew out just under us and we watched it all the way down toward the river till it passed the tree lines. It was an awesome experience, indeed.

Pterosaur in South Carolina

“Susan Wooten was driving east on Highway 20 . . . on a clear mid-afternoon in the fall of about 1989 . . . [She] saw something flying from her left, then passing in front of her . . . ‘It swooped down over the highway and back up gracefully over the pines,’ . . . ‘It looked as big as any car . . . NO feathers, not like a huge crane or egret, but like a humongous bat.’”

April 13, 2010December 8, 2011

American ghost lights — what are they?

The Gurdon Light (Arkansas), the Chapel Hill Light (Tennessee), the Cohoke Light (Virginia), the Gonzales Light (Louisiana), the Hornet Light (Missouri)–Each has a legend of a headless ghost with a lantern; other places have similar lights with similar legends. What are these strange lights? Let’s find out with a fictional court interrogation of Mr. Gurdon Light (GL) (but the mystery lights themselves are nonfiction).

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Prosecution: Mr. GL, do you live in Gurdon, Arkansas?

GL: In that neighborhood, yeah.

Prosecution: Have you ever been around Chapel Hill, Tennessee?

GL: No, sir. But I have relatives there.

Prosecution: Have you ever been in Gonzales, Louisiana, or in Missouri, or in Virginia?

GL: No, sir. Funny thing you should ask; I have relatives in them places, too.

Prosecution: To get to the point, some time ago you scared some people in Gurdon.

GL: Sorry, sir. I meant no harm.

Prosecution: Did you know that they thought they’d seen a ghost?

GL: Heck, I aint no ghost. I didn’t even see ’em ’til they started a-hollerin’.

Prosecution: But just one night earlier, in that same neighborhood, near the railroad tracks, you were involved in a killing weren’t you?

Defense Attorney: Objection: irrevelant.

Judge: Sustained.

Prosecution: You heard the previous testimony, about how you rushed at these people?

GL: It was an accident. I didn’t see ’em.

Prosecution: What exactly do you do for a living?

GL: Every night I look for food.

Prosecution: Why at night?

GL: It’s what my family’s always done. It’s all we know.

Prosecution: But not always totally in the dark, is it?

GL: No, sir. Sometimes I glow. It runs in the family.

Prosecution: Just how do you make yourself glow?

GL: Heck, I don’t know. It happens sometimes when I’m a-huntin’.

Prosecution: And what it is you hunt?

GL: Whatever I can catch. Sometimes I’m lucky to find a rat.

Prosecution: Did you know that your family is in some biology textbooks?

GL: I don’t read. I don’t know nothin’ about tax books. But my lawyer told me about one book.

Prosecution: What book was that?

GL: A Mr. Silcock in Australia wrote a book. It’s about my relatives there. They can glow, too . . .

Prosecution: But my question is about textbooks. Are you aware of any textbook that has anything about any member of your family glowing?

GL: No, sir. I don’t know nothin’ exceptin’ that one book in Australia.

Prosecution: Did you know that some of your relatives are behind bars?

GL: I heard about ’em, yeah. But it weren’t from the killin’s.

Prosecution: Thank you.

GL: In the killin’s, no people were hurt.

Prosecution: So all of your relatives are innocent?

GL: Yes, sir. Just huntin’.

Prosecution: Did you know that not one of your relatives has ever been seen to glow while behind bars?

GL: Funny thing you should ask. We often glow when we’re hungry. Behind bars, vittles are handy. So I was a-thinkin’ maybe they don’t glow ’cause they’re a-feedin’ good.

Prosecution: But are you aware that no scientist has ever said anything about you or your relatives glowing?

GL: Exceptin’ Mr. Silcock.

Prosecution: Getting back to the point, you flew at these poor terrified people, did you not?

GL: Flyin’s how we get around. I meant no harm.

Prosecution: One more thing: Did we get your name for the record, your official name?

GL: Tyto. Tyto Alba.

Prosecution: Do you have a nickname?

GL: Barney. Some folk call me “barn owl.”

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According to the Australian author Fred Silcock, some barn owls glow, sometimes. The strange bobbing lights are often called Min Min lights. It appears to be an intrinsic bioluminescence that may be triggered by hunger. At any rate, not all barn owls glow and those that do glow do so only sometimes. Some observations in Australia reveal one cause for the glow: Hungry owls can catch insects when rodents are scarce. Bioluminescence in some barn owls appears to be the cause of the whiteness of the underside feathers: More light passes through white feathers.

The Gurdon Light, Chapel Hill Light, Cohoke Light, Gonzales Light, and Hornet Light (and others) resemble the movement of a lantern being carried by someone who is searching for something. The light bobs up and down a bit and flies back and forth because a barn owl is searching for food. It may be rare enough that rodents have not developed any fear of it; insects are attracted to it.

How do glowing barn owls relate to modern living pterosaurs? When a strange light behaves like a hunting barn owl, it may be just that. But when it flies too fast and glows too brightly, it may be related to the ropen light of Papua New Guinea: It may be a bioluminescent pterosaur.

The Marfa Lights, of Texas, appear so different from many “ghost lights” that a ropen-light interpretation has been suggested, for they sometimes coordinate their glowing flights in what seems to be a complex hunting technique. And they flash too brightly and fly too fast to be barn owls. They do not suggest a headless ghost looking for its head, but a shrewd predator looking for bats: perhaps a predator with a head for hunting the Big Brown Bat, common in that part of Texas.

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book cover of Live Pterosaurs in America - second edition Did you know that living pterosaurs have been reported in North America, even in the United States? Read the many eyewitness sighting reports by purchasing a nonfiction book on Amazon or from the publisher—Live Pterosaurs in America.

This cryptozoology book has now been published in its third edition, greatly expanded from the original.