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Welcome Too Fearful, the podcast that takes you on.
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A thrilling journey through the world of mysteries, paranormal phenomena,
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and all things terrifying. We will explore eerie tales of
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haunted places, unsolved crime, inexplicable events, and supernatural encounters. So
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embrace the fear and unravel the mysteries that lie beyond.
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My name is Jacko, and this is Fearful. The streets
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of Van Meter, Iowa lay silent beneath the weight of
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early autumn. It was just past one am when U. G. Griffith,
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a traveling salesman, pulled his coat tighter against the creeping chill.
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The town's business district was empty. Every storefront was dark,
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that is, except for one. A strange glow flickered atop
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the Mather and Gregg building. Griffith slowed down, puzzled at first,
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there had never been a lantern up there before. He
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stepped into the road and called out. But before his
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voice even faded, the light sprang from the rooftop, soaring
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unnaturally through the air and landing atop another building.
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Griffith rose. The lantern, if that's what it was, moved again,
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this time vaulting over the street, trailing a brightness too
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clean for firelight. Then it rose straight into the sky
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and vanished alone in the middle of the street. Griffith
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stood in stun silence, no footsteps, no wind, just the
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fading echo of his own heartbeat in a lingering question
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burning in his mind. He hurried home after that, unsure
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what he had seen, but certain of one thing. Something
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unnatural was in pan meter. By morning, word of Griffith's
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sighting had spread like smoke through a dry town. People
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whispered of prowlers and branksters, but there was unease beneath
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the surface, an itch they could not scratch. You see,
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Griffith was no fool. He was no drinker, no man
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prone to tall tales. If he said he saw a
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light fly across rooftops, then something had done just so.
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They checked the roofs, expecting signs of a prank. But
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there was nothing. No lanterns, no wires of footprints, just
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the same cold tiles and shingles as always. That night,
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the town held its breath beneath shuttered windows, the streets emptied.
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Early children were told stories to keep them inside, and
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still the darkness came unbroken and heavy. Then, just past midnight,
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the light returned once more. This time it wasn't a
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salesman who saw it. It was the town's physician, doctor Alcott,
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who lay half asleep in the back of his office
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when the room exploded with light. It poured through his
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window like liquid fire. Unwelcomed and invasive. Doctor Alcott rose
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pistol in hand and burst through his office door, the
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chill of night air slapping him in his face. But
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what he saw froze the breath in his lungs. Immediately.
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Clinging to the outer wall just above his window was
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a grotesque silhouette. Its body was vaguely human, but far
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too tall. Wings stretched unnaturally behind it, leathery in vast,
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like those of some ancient bat. From its elongated face
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jutted a horn, thick, blunt and pulsing with light, that
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same eerie glow that had poured into his room moments before,
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and now it turned toward him. Doctor Alcott raised his
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pistol and fired once. The thing did not flinch, its
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stared eyes black and dead, and the horn's light flared
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once again, blinding him. He fired again, two, three, four
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more shots, but the creature only shrieked, a sound like
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twisting metal and human agony, and it launched into the
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air with a single beat of its monstrous wings. The
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doctor now stood alone in the dark, hand trembling pistol
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still warm around him. The night was quiet again, but
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in that silence something changed. The town was no longer
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just sleeping. It was being watched. The next night, the
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bank teller Clarence, volunteered to stay behind, armed with a shotgun.
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He wasn't about to let some prowler or whatever this
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thing was, threaten his town. He locked the doors, turned
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down gas lamps, and waited in the dim dark. The
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silence stretched thin. Midnight passed, and then a sound, wet, gasping, unnatural,
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bubbled up from outside the window. Done crept forward, weapon raised,
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the clock struck one, and that is when the light came.
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It wasn't like firelight or lantern glow. It was harsh, piercing.
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It seared through the window and slammed into Dun's face
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like a blow. Staggering back, he caught a glimpse, but
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just a glimpse, of something behind the beam, a snout,
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perhaps filled with teeth, eyes that did not blink, skin
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stretched wrong across something far too large. Instinct took over
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and he fired. Glass shattered, The room echoed with the
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thunder of shotgun blasts, and when he looked again, the
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light was gone. Outside, strange footprints were found the next day,
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three toes deep impressions in the dirt. By now the
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town was on edge. Doors were bolted, curtains drawn, but
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the visitor was unfinished, at least not yet. Next O. V. White,
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the local hardware merchant, was jolted awake by a harsh,
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rasping cry that echoed through main street like a dying breath.
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Grabbing for his rifle, he crept to the window where
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he spotted it perched at a nearby telegraph pole. It
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didn't move like a bird. It didn't belong in the sky.
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Its wings twitched, as if waking from a long sleep.
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As White took aim, the thing turned. Then came the stench.
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A wave of foul chemical rod rolled over him, so
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strong it dropped him to his knees, gagging. Blinded by
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the odor, he missed his chance. As the creature spread
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its wings, leapt into the air and swooped low across rooftops.
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A second witness that night Sidney Gregg burst from his
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shop just in time to see a land clumsily on
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the street. It used a beak like appendage to steady itself,
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like a parrot scaling a perch. And then there it
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stood tall, taller than any man, eight feet perhaps more.
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Then it hopped like a kangaroo towards the edge of town,
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towards an abandoned mine. The coal mine had been sealed
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for years, choked with gas and water, left to rot
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on the outskirts of van meter. No one went near it,
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not anymore. But after that night whispers started. Factory workers
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near the mine reported hearing things, clattering stones, echoing shrieks,
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and the distant beating of wings. One man described it
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as the Devil's regiment marching of war. The noise it
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always seemed to come after midnight. J. L. Platter, Junior,
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the factories operation manager, stayed late that Saturday. Around one
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a m. The air changed, came heavy, charged, and then
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came the light. He saw it pouring from the mouth
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of the mind like liquid gold. From the darkness then
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emerged the creature. But then from behind it came another,
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one smaller but just as grotesque. Two pairs of wings,
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two sets of eyes that never blinked. Both gave off
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the same unnatural glow from this horn upon their head,
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beacons if you will in the dark. Platt fled back to town,
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his mind reeling. If there had been any doubt before,
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it was now gone. This wasn't a lone monster. It
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was breeding. It was a species of something, and van
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Meter had just confirmed its den. By dawn, the town
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had made its decision. If the creature had a nest
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in that mine, then that mine would become their tomb.
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A posse formed shopkeepers, factory men, farmers, all armed and
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trembling beneath the weight of what they were about to face.
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They gathered near the brickyard, eyes fixed on the yawning
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mouth of the mine. For hours, they waited, cold, silent, intense,
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and eventually came the light. First one, then two, The
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creatures rose from the shaft like wraiths, their glowing horns
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casting twisted shadows across the ground. The townsmen didn't hesitate.
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A deafening volley of gunfire, erupted bullets buckshots every round
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they had. They unleashed, the air filled with shrieks in
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human and furious, but the creatures did not fall. They circled,
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they hissed, and then they retreated, not from injury nor
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from fear, just tired of playing, and they vanished back
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into the shaft of the mine below. With dawn bleeding
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across the sky, the men then made their final move.
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Dynamite was packed, fuses were lit, and the mouth of
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that mine collapsed with a thunderous explosion, burying whatever had
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taken root inside, as rocks tumbled and settled into place,
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sealing it shut. After that day, van Meter would never
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see the creatures again. And the story of this visitor, well,
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it did not die with the mind collapsing, It only
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grew strange in its absence. Some believe this was mass hysteria,
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a town feeding on its own fear until imagination became memory.
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But how do you explain the shell casings, the broken windows,
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the matching stories from men who had been known to
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never tell a lie. Others whispered of a hoax, perhaps
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a prank taken too far. Yet no culprit ever came forward,
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and no motive was ever uncovered. Eventually came wilder theories,
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a surviving pterosaur, perhaps a misidentified bird, or even a
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secret government experiment, but some even called it alien, an
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early visitor from the stars, misread through the lens of
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the year nineteen o one. Still others insist it was demonic,
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crawling and pulling itself from Hell itself to the cracks
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of the mine. More recently, a fictional species was imagined
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to explain it, something someone called luminox leucatops, a glowing
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cave dwelling bat that evolved in the dark and fed
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on anything it could catch. But no such species has
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ever been found nor proven, not in van Meter, not anywhere.
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So it begs the question what was it? Was it
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a monster, a myth, or just a mistake. Decades have
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passed since then, the town of van Meter grew quieter,
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grew more ordinary. Yet amongst the yellowed newspaper clippings and
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the whispers of old timers, the legend endours passed down
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like a ghost store glory, too strange to forget. Then,
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in the early two thousands, the tale stood once more.
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Paranormal researchers Chad Lewis, alongside Noah VARs and Kevin Lee Nelson.
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They unearthed the original accounts, piecing together their testimony of
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that terrifying week back in nineteen o three, their book
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The Van Meter Visitor breathe new life into the legend,
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reigniting interest in what had won stoked Iowa's streets. Today,
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the town embraces the mystery each September van meter Hosa
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Festival in the creature's honour, complete with costumes, lectures, walking tours,
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ones that trace the path of the visitor through the town.
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Its part celebration, part remembrance, and part warning. To many,
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the Van Meter Visitor now stands alongside America's most iconic cryptids,
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such as the Mothman, the Jersey Devil, and the thunderbird.
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But unlike them, this creature was never seen again. No
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trail of sightings, no blurry photos. Just one week in
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nineteen o three, then nothing. There was no body, no blood,
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no feathers or wings left behind, just stories, shaking hands
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and roof tops scorched by a memory no one can
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quite explain. The mine still remain sealed, its tunnels swallowed
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by time. Locals still talk, especially when the nights are
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long and the wind howls through the trees. The Van
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Meter Visitor was never proven real, and yet it never
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truly went away because in the silence left behind. Something
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lingers a question. What kind of creature could emit light
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from its own skull? What kind of thing survives gunfire,
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leaves no trace and disappears without a sound. Maybe it
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was really mass hysteria, a trick of the mind. Maybe
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it was a lie, or maybe just maybe it was
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something else, something that came from below the earth. In
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one day, it may rise again
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Welcome Too Fearful, the podcast that takes you on.
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00:00:17.039 --> 00:00:23.000
A thrilling journey through the world of mysteries, paranormal phenomena,
3
00:00:23.760 --> 00:00:31.760
and all things terrifying. We will explore eerie tales of
4
00:00:31.879 --> 00:00:41.079
haunted places, unsolved crime, inexplicable events, and supernatural encounters. So
5
00:00:41.280 --> 00:00:47.759
embrace the fear and unravel the mysteries that lie beyond.
6
00:00:51.039 --> 00:01:11.079
My name is Jacko, and this is Fearful. The streets
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of Van Meter, Iowa lay silent beneath the weight of
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early autumn. It was just past one am when U. G. Griffith,
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a traveling salesman, pulled his coat tighter against the creeping chill.
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The town's business district was empty. Every storefront was dark,
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that is, except for one. A strange glow flickered atop
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the Mather and Gregg building. Griffith slowed down, puzzled at first,
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there had never been a lantern up there before. He
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stepped into the road and called out. But before his
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voice even faded, the light sprang from the rooftop, soaring
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unnaturally through the air and landing atop another building.
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Griffith rose. The lantern, if that's what it was, moved again,
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this time vaulting over the street, trailing a brightness too
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clean for firelight. Then it rose straight into the sky
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and vanished alone in the middle of the street. Griffith
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stood in stun silence, no footsteps, no wind, just the
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fading echo of his own heartbeat in a lingering question
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burning in his mind. He hurried home after that, unsure
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what he had seen, but certain of one thing. Something
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unnatural was in pan meter. By morning, word of Griffith's
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sighting had spread like smoke through a dry town. People
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whispered of prowlers and branksters, but there was unease beneath
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the surface, an itch they could not scratch. You see,
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Griffith was no fool. He was no drinker, no man
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prone to tall tales. If he said he saw a
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light fly across rooftops, then something had done just so.
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They checked the roofs, expecting signs of a prank. But
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there was nothing. No lanterns, no wires of footprints, just
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the same cold tiles and shingles as always. That night,
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the town held its breath beneath shuttered windows, the streets emptied.
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Early children were told stories to keep them inside, and
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still the darkness came unbroken and heavy. Then, just past midnight,
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the light returned once more. This time it wasn't a
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salesman who saw it. It was the town's physician, doctor Alcott,
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who lay half asleep in the back of his office
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when the room exploded with light. It poured through his
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window like liquid fire. Unwelcomed and invasive. Doctor Alcott rose
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pistol in hand and burst through his office door, the
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chill of night air slapping him in his face. But
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what he saw froze the breath in his lungs. Immediately.
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Clinging to the outer wall just above his window was
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a grotesque silhouette. Its body was vaguely human, but far
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too tall. Wings stretched unnaturally behind it, leathery in vast,
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like those of some ancient bat. From its elongated face
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jutted a horn, thick, blunt and pulsing with light, that
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same eerie glow that had poured into his room moments before,
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and now it turned toward him. Doctor Alcott raised his
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pistol and fired once. The thing did not flinch, its
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stared eyes black and dead, and the horn's light flared
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once again, blinding him. He fired again, two, three, four
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more shots, but the creature only shrieked, a sound like
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twisting metal and human agony, and it launched into the
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air with a single beat of its monstrous wings. The
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doctor now stood alone in the dark, hand trembling pistol
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still warm around him. The night was quiet again, but
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in that silence something changed. The town was no longer
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just sleeping. It was being watched. The next night, the
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bank teller Clarence, volunteered to stay behind, armed with a shotgun.
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He wasn't about to let some prowler or whatever this
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thing was, threaten his town. He locked the doors, turned
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down gas lamps, and waited in the dim dark. The
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silence stretched thin. Midnight passed, and then a sound, wet, gasping, unnatural,
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bubbled up from outside the window. Done crept forward, weapon raised,
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the clock struck one, and that is when the light came.
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It wasn't like firelight or lantern glow. It was harsh, piercing.
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It seared through the window and slammed into Dun's face
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like a blow. Staggering back, he caught a glimpse, but
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just a glimpse, of something behind the beam, a snout,
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perhaps filled with teeth, eyes that did not blink, skin
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stretched wrong across something far too large. Instinct took over
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and he fired. Glass shattered, The room echoed with the
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thunder of shotgun blasts, and when he looked again, the
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light was gone. Outside, strange footprints were found the next day,
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three toes deep impressions in the dirt. By now the
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town was on edge. Doors were bolted, curtains drawn, but
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the visitor was unfinished, at least not yet. Next O. V. White,
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the local hardware merchant, was jolted awake by a harsh,
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rasping cry that echoed through main street like a dying breath.
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Grabbing for his rifle, he crept to the window where
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he spotted it perched at a nearby telegraph pole. It
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didn't move like a bird. It didn't belong in the sky.
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Its wings twitched, as if waking from a long sleep.
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As White took aim, the thing turned. Then came the stench.
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A wave of foul chemical rod rolled over him, so
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strong it dropped him to his knees, gagging. Blinded by
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the odor, he missed his chance. As the creature spread
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its wings, leapt into the air and swooped low across rooftops.
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A second witness that night Sidney Gregg burst from his
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shop just in time to see a land clumsily on
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the street. It used a beak like appendage to steady itself,
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like a parrot scaling a perch. And then there it
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stood tall, taller than any man, eight feet perhaps more.
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Then it hopped like a kangaroo towards the edge of town,
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towards an abandoned mine. The coal mine had been sealed
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for years, choked with gas and water, left to rot
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on the outskirts of van meter. No one went near it,
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not anymore. But after that night whispers started. Factory workers
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near the mine reported hearing things, clattering stones, echoing shrieks,
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and the distant beating of wings. One man described it
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as the Devil's regiment marching of war. The noise it
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always seemed to come after midnight. J. L. Platter, Junior,
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the factories operation manager, stayed late that Saturday. Around one
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a m. The air changed, came heavy, charged, and then
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came the light. He saw it pouring from the mouth
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of the mind like liquid gold. From the darkness then
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emerged the creature. But then from behind it came another,
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one smaller but just as grotesque. Two pairs of wings,
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two sets of eyes that never blinked. Both gave off
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the same unnatural glow from this horn upon their head,
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beacons if you will in the dark. Platt fled back to town,
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his mind reeling. If there had been any doubt before,
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it was now gone. This wasn't a lone monster. It
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was breeding. It was a species of something, and van
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Meter had just confirmed its den. By dawn, the town
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had made its decision. If the creature had a nest
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in that mine, then that mine would become their tomb.
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A posse formed shopkeepers, factory men, farmers, all armed and
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trembling beneath the weight of what they were about to face.
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They gathered near the brickyard, eyes fixed on the yawning
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mouth of the mine. For hours, they waited, cold, silent, intense,
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and eventually came the light. First one, then two, The
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creatures rose from the shaft like wraiths, their glowing horns
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casting twisted shadows across the ground. The townsmen didn't hesitate.
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A deafening volley of gunfire, erupted bullets buckshots every round
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they had. They unleashed, the air filled with shrieks in
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human and furious, but the creatures did not fall. They circled,
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they hissed, and then they retreated, not from injury nor
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from fear, just tired of playing, and they vanished back
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into the shaft of the mine below. With dawn bleeding
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across the sky, the men then made their final move.
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Dynamite was packed, fuses were lit, and the mouth of
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that mine collapsed with a thunderous explosion, burying whatever had
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taken root inside, as rocks tumbled and settled into place,
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sealing it shut. After that day, van Meter would never
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see the creatures again. And the story of this visitor, well,
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it did not die with the mind collapsing, It only
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grew strange in its absence. Some believe this was mass hysteria,
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a town feeding on its own fear until imagination became memory.
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But how do you explain the shell casings, the broken windows,
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the matching stories from men who had been known to
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never tell a lie. Others whispered of a hoax, perhaps
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a prank taken too far. Yet no culprit ever came forward,
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and no motive was ever uncovered. Eventually came wilder theories,
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a surviving pterosaur, perhaps a misidentified bird, or even a
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secret government experiment, but some even called it alien, an
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early visitor from the stars, misread through the lens of
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the year nineteen o one. Still others insist it was demonic,
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crawling and pulling itself from Hell itself to the cracks
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of the mine. More recently, a fictional species was imagined
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to explain it, something someone called luminox leucatops, a glowing
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cave dwelling bat that evolved in the dark and fed
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on anything it could catch. But no such species has
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ever been found nor proven, not in van Meter, not anywhere.
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So it begs the question what was it? Was it
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a monster, a myth, or just a mistake. Decades have
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passed since then, the town of van Meter grew quieter,
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grew more ordinary. Yet amongst the yellowed newspaper clippings and
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the whispers of old timers, the legend endours passed down
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like a ghost store glory, too strange to forget. Then,
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in the early two thousands, the tale stood once more.
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Paranormal researchers Chad Lewis, alongside Noah VARs and Kevin Lee Nelson.
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They unearthed the original accounts, piecing together their testimony of
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that terrifying week back in nineteen o three, their book
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The Van Meter Visitor breathe new life into the legend,
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reigniting interest in what had won stoked Iowa's streets. Today,
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the town embraces the mystery each September van meter Hosa
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Festival in the creature's honour, complete with costumes, lectures, walking tours,
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ones that trace the path of the visitor through the town.
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Its part celebration, part remembrance, and part warning. To many,
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the Van Meter Visitor now stands alongside America's most iconic cryptids,
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such as the Mothman, the Jersey Devil, and the thunderbird.
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But unlike them, this creature was never seen again. No
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trail of sightings, no blurry photos. Just one week in
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nineteen o three, then nothing. There was no body, no blood,
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no feathers or wings left behind, just stories, shaking hands
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and roof tops scorched by a memory no one can
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quite explain. The mine still remain sealed, its tunnels swallowed
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by time. Locals still talk, especially when the nights are
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long and the wind howls through the trees. The Van
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Meter Visitor was never proven real, and yet it never
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truly went away because in the silence left behind. Something
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lingers a question. What kind of creature could emit light
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from its own skull? What kind of thing survives gunfire,
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leaves no trace and disappears without a sound. Maybe it
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was really mass hysteria, a trick of the mind. Maybe
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it was a lie, or maybe just maybe it was
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something else, something that came from below the earth. In
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one day, it may rise again
