A photograph exists that shows a giant, pterodactyl like bird stretched between men dressed in wild west attire. Its origin and authenticity has been sought and debated for decades. However, from all around the world reports of monstrous birds continue to originate.

The flying saucer phenomenon started in Georgia in July 1947, but that was not all that Georgians were spying in the skies. On a Sunday afternoon in early July J.C. Anderson, a resident of Spring Street in Gainesville saw an enormous bird high overhead. The creature was black and resembled "something like a buzzard," he said, but it had an estimated wingspan of 30-35 feet. When asked by a reporter if it could have been an airplane, Anderson snapped, "Did you ever see an airplane flapping its wings?"

At 6:45 p.m. on June 10, 1994, a married couple was driving along Mountville Road, between Mountville and LaGrange, when they noticed a great bird, standing three and a half feet tall, beside the road. At their intrusion the big avian jumped into the air and started flapping great, wide, but slender wings and flew low across the pavement in front of the car at an altitude so low that the wife screamed, fearing they would hit the winged monstrosity. The big black bird continued flying low and disappeared into thick woods. The wife thought it "flew like an airplane would fly over you."

After reflecting on the apparition, they decided this caped avenger had a ten to sixteen foot wingspan. At closest approach it was 100 feet distant, and in sight for several seconds.

The husband, while trapping as a boy, inadvertently caught several buzzards and was consequently familiar with the creature. Both agreed it was also not an eagle or turkey.

 

The local and long serving game warden denied knowledge of such a creature and classed it with the "black panthers" reported so frequently to him-there was no proof that they existed. LaGrange UFO researcher John Thompson reported that he believed the story about black panthers because he had received "more reports than I can count."

A third close encounter with Big Bird occurred to a hunter sitting in his tree mounted deer stand at 5:30 p.m. on November 18, 1995, near New River, west of Corinth in Heard County. Seeing a large object with straight wings overhead, he assumed it was a glider or silent airplane. Raising his binoculars, he was startled to see a giant black-brown bird with odd feathers-curly rather than straight. He estimated its size as at least "twice the size of a buzzard," the wingspan twelve feet or longer. The bird glided directly overhead, 100 feet away, then started flapping the great wings. After an observation of two minutes, it was lost to sight.

The hunter could not see the head or estimate the size of the body, but he glimpsed two feet, colored like the wings. He was also certain it was not a buzzard.

John Thompson has received reports of other Big Birds in southern Heard and northern Troup counties. One occurred a mile away from the above hunter on Charles B. Johnston Road in February, 1996. Although the bird was nearby, he could not hear any sound when the massive wings were flapping. UFOs have often been seen nearby.

Native American lore tells of a mighty creature called the Thunderbird. Perhaps it is not so mythical.

Jim Miles is the author of two Weird Georgia books and nine books about the Civil War.  See Jim's books.

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