Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And welcome back to Coast to Coast George Norriy with you.
Speaker 2: Jason Offedback with Us has been a journalist since nineteen
Speaker 2: eighty seven, teachers journalism at Northwest Missouri State University. Prior
Speaker 2: to that, he was the managing editor for the Kansas
Speaker 2: City entertainment magazine called The X and a humor columnist
Speaker 2: for The Examiner Newspapers in Jackson County, Missouri. He's got
Speaker 2: a Master's of Arts degree in communication from Central Missouri
Speaker 2: State University in Warrensburg. And Jason, welcome back to your
Speaker 2: latest book. I hear is called The Girl in the
Speaker 2: Corn That sounds scary, Well yeah.
Speaker 3: It just won a won an award. It's the won
Speaker 3: the Benjamin Franklin Gold Award from the Independent Book Publishers
Speaker 3: Association and was one of the finalists for the Silver
Speaker 3: Falcon Falcon Award from the Killer Nashville Book Award. Content
Speaker 3: Good for you with it?
Speaker 2: Is there a possible movie here?
Speaker 3: You know what? I got the fingers crossed. But I've
Speaker 3: had some dealings with uh with folks out in Hollywood
Speaker 3: before and if there is this sort of thing takes
Speaker 3: a long time, and you.
Speaker 2: Have another novel I'll called How to Build a Time Machine?
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah.
Speaker 3: I like humor and and I try to keep it
Speaker 3: out of my try to keep it out of my
Speaker 3: horror for obviously, but I really cut loose with How
Speaker 3: to Build a Time Machine. It's a it's a humorous
Speaker 3: sci fi and it got a lot of great reviews.
Speaker 2: Good for you. How have you been lately, Jason Man, You.
Speaker 3: Know, George, I've been. I've been great. I've did the
Speaker 3: weather's weather in northwest Missouri has finally started turning cold,
Speaker 3: so I'm happy it's coming this way.
Speaker 2: I'm in Saint Louis right now, and uh, we're going
Speaker 2: to get it pretty soon.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's coming.
Speaker 2: How did you get involved in paranormal writing?
Speaker 3: Well, I had always wanted to write. It's one of
Speaker 3: those one of those dreams as a little kid that
Speaker 3: I told my parents I wanted to write books when
Speaker 3: I grew up, and they patted the top of my
Speaker 3: head and then sent me along to play. But I've
Speaker 3: been interested in monsters ever since the early seventies. I've
Speaker 3: always been avacious, voracious reader, even when I was pretty young.
Speaker 3: And I'd look at the newspaper and back in nineteen
Speaker 3: seventy three there were stories in the Kansas City newspaper
Speaker 3: about Bigfoot sightings out in Louisiana, Missouri, and thinking, my gosh,
Speaker 3: there's monsters in my home state. Amazing. So that got me, Momo,
Speaker 3: got me fascinated in monsters.
Speaker 2: And you've wrote a book four years ago called Chasing
Speaker 2: American Monsters. They're all over the place, aren't they, right, Yes,
Speaker 2: they are.
Speaker 3: And what I tried to do with Chasing American Monsters
Speaker 3: is go state by state and show what monsters are
Speaker 3: in each state, because yes, whether legendary or real, they're
Speaker 3: all out there, out there everywhere.
Speaker 2: What kind of monsters are we talking about here, Jayce, Well.
Speaker 3: We're talking everything from of course, Bigfoot. It's Uh. It's
Speaker 3: the one monster that is in forty nine has been
Speaker 3: encountered in forty nine states. The only one it hasn't
Speaker 3: been in is Hawaii. I guess it doesn't like Uh
Speaker 3: doesn't like POI for some reason. I don't know, but
Speaker 3: it's it's been seen everywhere. I mean, everything from Bigfoot
Speaker 3: to extreme monsters like the like the hodag or or
Speaker 3: up in Wisconsin. Or the uh oh the show. It's
Speaker 3: not ringing a bell right now, Hold all for a
Speaker 3: second and I'll get it. But it's it's a it's
Speaker 3: a monster that is uh that cries all the time.
Speaker 3: It looks like a giant wrinkled pig in it. Uh
Speaker 3: and and and it's just really depressed. So anything from
Speaker 3: stuff that can be real to the you know, legendary
Speaker 3: stories that are just kind of fun.
Speaker 2: Is that the White Screamer.
Speaker 3: No, no, the White Screamer is out of uh, out
Speaker 3: of Tennessee. It A man encountered it back in the
Speaker 3: back in the eighteen hundred. He and his family kept
Speaker 3: hearing screaming from from outside the house, and eventually he
Speaker 3: got tired of it and got his gun one night
Speaker 3: and went looking for it, and he followed the screams
Speaker 3: throughout the forest, and eventually the screams led him back
Speaker 3: around to his house and what was actually screaming we're
Speaker 3: members of his family who were all slaughtered by by
Speaker 3: something that he saw running away that was that was
Speaker 3: a white beast.
Speaker 2: Clearly people are seeing things, aren't they.
Speaker 3: There are way too many sightings for them not to be,
Speaker 3: especially when it comes to something like Bigfoot. There are
Speaker 3: so many credible sightings. There is so much evidence out
Speaker 3: there that if this were a murder trial, somebody just
Speaker 3: from that evidence.
Speaker 1: Could be put away.
Speaker 2: A couple of nights ago, I was talking to Lawn
Speaker 2: Strickler about flying humanoids near Chicago and winged creatures. I mean, unbelievable.
Speaker 2: Did you ever come across any of those?
Speaker 3: Well, I only came across one ring winged at your lawns.
Speaker 3: Great by the way, he has done some done some
Speaker 3: tremendous work through the years, and I followed his work through, uh,
Speaker 3: you know, through the winged wing creatures in Chicago, and
Speaker 3: it's fascinating. Uh. There was one win wing creature that
Speaker 3: I covered, and it wasn't necessarily the person I interviewed
Speaker 3: didn't necessarily call it a creature. He called it a man. Uh.
Speaker 3: He and his family were walking home from from church
Speaker 3: in the small town of Camden, Missouri, and he saw
Speaker 3: he was about ten years old. He saw up in
Speaker 3: a tree a man standing there with wings and it
Speaker 3: saw him see see it, and he told his parents,
Speaker 3: I mean, look, there's a guy in the tree and
Speaker 3: the thing just sprang into the air and flew off.
Speaker 3: They never did see it again, but there were a
Speaker 3: couple of people, he said, from his childhood who reported
Speaker 3: it in the area throughout the next couple of years.
Speaker 2: What are some of the most unusual creatures is that
Speaker 2: you have investigated or come across.
Speaker 3: Well, there are a lot of a lot of different
Speaker 3: different bizarre creatures. One of them is the demon Leaper
Speaker 3: from Louisville, Kentucky. It's it was spotted in the in
Speaker 3: the late eighteen hundreds. There was an article in the
Speaker 3: New York Times about it. It was a large bat
Speaker 3: like creature, you know, big leathery wing Allen's pointed ears,
Speaker 3: you know, pointed teeth and basically what what the description
Speaker 3: was was a gargoyle. A gargoyle sitting on top of
Speaker 3: a building, and you know we see those in old
Speaker 3: architecture all the time, took off into the air and
Speaker 3: it was seen specifically, I had my window open. I'm
Speaker 3: sorry that was the cat. Was not encrypted.
Speaker 2: Monster cat coming in to get you.
Speaker 3: Exactly if the if the phone goes dead, that's it
Speaker 3: at the monster cat. But yeah, I think just the
Speaker 3: fact that we found a you know, people reported seeing
Speaker 3: a gargoyle flying through the air in Louisville, Kentucky. I
Speaker 3: think it is absolutely fascinating.
Speaker 2: I mean, what else could they be looking at to
Speaker 2: make that kind of report.
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't know that sort of thing. I mean,
Speaker 3: it could be could be mistaken. I mean I don't
Speaker 3: There aren't any extraordinarily large, you know bats in the
Speaker 3: United States, not like, uh, what's the one in Australia,
Speaker 3: the fox fox based bat. Those things are enormous. But
Speaker 3: what else? What else could it be? I mean the
Speaker 3: wings could be could be pterodactyl wings, which which those
Speaker 3: things have been seen in a number of places in
Speaker 3: the United States over the.
Speaker 2: Over the years, prehistoric birds, So you think they could
Speaker 2: still be around.
Speaker 3: You know, if any, if anything could be I think
Speaker 3: I think it could be the birds. There have been
Speaker 3: a lot of you know, a lot of discussion, if
Speaker 3: you know, from Central America and Mexico to the American
Speaker 3: southwest of you know of dinosaurs, of of birds especially
Speaker 3: there was back in nineteen seventy seven a group of
Speaker 3: teachers were driving through Texas, West Texas from they were
Speaker 3: coming home from a conference and they saw a pterodactyl
Speaker 3: in the sky. Now these were four not just teachers,
Speaker 3: but science teachers. You think, for science teachers would know
Speaker 3: what a pterodactyl looked like, and so, yeah, I think
Speaker 3: they very well could. Something I think might be a
Speaker 3: little bit a little bit more realistic would be the
Speaker 3: thunderbirds from Native American Low.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: The description of those are basically the description of a
Speaker 3: territory and a bird that lived back in the ice age.
Speaker 3: Those very well still could be around.
Speaker 2: I think that's real. There's a historical story of the
Speaker 2: pious bird, which is a thunderbird in Alton, Illinois and
Speaker 2: on the cliffs of the banks of the Mississippi. There's
Speaker 2: a huge depiction of this bird that they talk about,
Speaker 2: and they talk about how some of the Native Americans
Speaker 2: fought it because it came back with its talons and
Speaker 2: tried to pick up Native Americans and fly off with them.
Speaker 2: It was incredible. Did you ever hear of that the
Speaker 2: pious a bird?
Speaker 3: I I sure did, And I know exactly what painting
Speaker 3: you're talking about. I have seen it. It's it's fascinating
Speaker 3: because those type of birds have been seen not just
Speaker 3: in ancient times, but you know in the last one
Speaker 3: hundred hundred and fifty years. There was a story I
Speaker 3: think it might have been out of Pennsylvania back in
Speaker 3: the early nineteen hundreds where a twelve year old child
Speaker 3: was picked up by a bird of large size and
Speaker 3: if it wasn't for the fact that his parents came
Speaker 3: out screaming and throw things at it, it would have
Speaker 3: whisked him away.
Speaker 2: Truly remarkable. Jason often with us. We're talking about his
Speaker 2: works and Chasing American Monsters as a book he wrote
Speaker 2: four years ago. His website is linked up at Coast
Speaker 2: tocoastdam dot com. You got to tell me about this title,
Speaker 2: The Girl in the Corn That sounds like a horror book.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, it definitely is a horror book. I've you know,
Speaker 3: I've investigated. Uh, I've just done a lot of fun research, reading,
Speaker 3: reading for fun on all sorts, of all sorts of
Speaker 3: paranormal and mythological beings. And one that has always fascinated
Speaker 3: me is the little People the fame because these things
Speaker 3: are all over the world. You know, when you think
Speaker 3: of fairies, you think of European lore, uh, and specifically
Speaker 3: you know Irish leprechauns, but you know elves and cobolds, trolls,
Speaker 3: the tom tarr from from Sweden, the Norse mythology had
Speaker 3: their little people uh all throughout Asia South America. That
Speaker 3: there there are lots of of of stories of magical
Speaker 3: little people throughout throughout North America. Whenever a similar tale
Speaker 3: is told world world round, that has been before the
Speaker 3: time when supposedly our our cultures were talking to each other.
Speaker 3: There's got to be some truth to it, I think.
Speaker 3: And I was with my daughter when she was a
Speaker 3: little younger. She was watching the Disney Channel and and
Speaker 3: and uh, a faery movie was on, and I was like,
Speaker 3: you know, fairies aren't like that. They're not like that
Speaker 3: Disney you know, they're They're not like the Disney faery
Speaker 3: at all. So that was the germ of the Girl
Speaker 3: in the Corn I wanted. Uh. I grew up on
Speaker 3: a farm, so I based it on a on a farm.
Speaker 3: But it's about a boy who sees a faery in
Speaker 3: in the corn uh in in the garden, and it
Speaker 3: terrorizes him his whole life.
Speaker 2: I was first I was first introduced to leper cons
Speaker 2: with a Disney movie called Darby O'Gill and the Little People.
Speaker 3: That was Sean Connery.
Speaker 2: If I don't way back take it. Yes, it was
Speaker 2: a classic. And I went fascinated with the story of
Speaker 2: lepercauns and stuff. Got a little disappointed when they came
Speaker 2: out with a movie of that leper Kahn being evil.
Speaker 3: Well a bit cheesy. Yes, I believe that was Jennifer
Speaker 3: Anniston's first first movie role. Yeah. Well, one of the
Speaker 3: things about the little people that really it made me
Speaker 3: happy when this when this was discovered was back in
Speaker 3: oh my gosh, the early two thousands or maybe the
Speaker 3: mid two thousands, in in the on the island of
Speaker 3: Flores the locals down down around Indonesia. The locals had
Speaker 3: talked about the ebu go goo uh. That was part
Speaker 3: of their local folklore. It was the little people who
Speaker 3: would come and steal food and sometimes steal babies to
Speaker 3: eat from from the tribesmen. Oh and they had this
Speaker 3: this story and and of course Western Western science, you know,
Speaker 3: completely disregarded as his mythology, until the scientists found in
Speaker 3: a cave system that the locals told him is where
Speaker 3: these ebu gogo were. They found up to three foot
Speaker 3: tall skeletons of fully grown humans and it turned out
Speaker 3: to be a new off or a different offshoot of humanity,
Speaker 3: and it was called homoflorensis and and they were dubbed
Speaker 3: the hobbits because they only grew to be about three
Speaker 3: or four foot tall. But that really confirmed what the
Speaker 3: locals had been talking about all that time.
Speaker 2: Why do you think mainstream science, Jason really doesn't dive
Speaker 2: into these stories because they're truly remarkable stories.
Speaker 3: They are a lot of mainstream science. And I have
Speaker 3: all the respect in the world for mainstream science, but
Speaker 3: a lot of it has to do with grant money.
Speaker 3: And if they start if they start investigating, you know,
Speaker 3: paranormal or just strange, there's no strange topics, they're not
Speaker 3: going to get that grant money. So so they don't
Speaker 3: don't they don't want to hurt their reputation. There's another example.
Speaker 3: In nineteen ninety eight, there was a an ape that
Speaker 3: was discovered called the Billy eight b I l I
Speaker 3: in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where a lot
Speaker 3: of a lot of crypto zoological sightings are there. But
Speaker 3: the locals said that it was a giant chimpanzee that
Speaker 3: that howled at the moon and you know, would kill
Speaker 3: leopards and eat them. They walked up right, but they
Speaker 3: would make you know, make beds like gorillas, and you know,
Speaker 3: science considered that a fanciful tale until in nineteen ninety
Speaker 3: eight they discovered that these ill tribesmen were one hundred
Speaker 3: percent right. This thing existed. So yes, why don't we
Speaker 3: listened listened to the local folklore because those stories came
Speaker 3: about for a reason.
Speaker 2: It's a little like some pilots who refuse to report
Speaker 2: UFO sightings that they see, right, But I mean.
Speaker 3: I understand that it's it's it's either you know, talk
Speaker 3: about the UFO that they saw, or maybe.
Speaker 2: Lose their job exactly. That's what it comes down to, right,
Speaker 2: What would you say is the most ludicrous monster story
Speaker 2: you've ever heard?
Speaker 3: Oh? There are there, there are quite a few. I
Speaker 3: think the uh, the Bolt Rock Slider from Colorado is
Speaker 3: is pretty silly. This this goes back to the days
Speaker 3: of gold and silver mining back in the eighteen forties,
Speaker 3: and it supposedly was a whale, a land uh you know,
Speaker 3: a land based whale with a big hook on its tail,
Speaker 3: and it would put the hook on the top of
Speaker 3: a mountain and just lay there and wait for prey
Speaker 3: to walk beneath it, and then it would ununleashed hook
Speaker 3: and slide down and swallow up whoever was below it.
Speaker 3: It was probably this. This was probably come up with
Speaker 3: by by miners who didn't, you know, wanted to scare
Speaker 3: away claim jumpers. But that that was pretty silly. But
Speaker 3: also if you think about it, if that was real,
Speaker 3: my god, how how terrifying would that be?
Speaker 2: And there have been some terrifying stories too, haven't there?
Speaker 3: Oh, there there have been. I really think there are definitely,
Speaker 3: And I didn't I didn't just write this for fun,
Speaker 3: although I had a lot of fun writing that book.
Speaker 3: There are a lot of creatures out there that are
Speaker 3: that are scary. There are dangerous creatures. The Lawton were
Speaker 3: Wolf in Lawton, Oklahoma. They there were a number of
Speaker 3: sightings from credible people of a were wolf over a
Speaker 3: short period of time. And and you know, considering all
Speaker 3: the dog man sightings that we've had over the years,
Speaker 3: so you know, Michigan and the Beast of you know,
Speaker 3: Bray Road. That combined with the Lugaroo stories, which are
Speaker 3: werewolves in Louisiana, you know, again, it's one of those
Speaker 3: one of those tales that has got to have some
Speaker 3: truth behind it.
Speaker 2: I think a group of people who are on a
Speaker 2: train in Colorado, we've got this on our coastacostam dot
Speaker 2: com website in the highlight reel Jason and they have
Speaker 2: a cell phone video of what looks like a Bigfoot
Speaker 2: out there in the hinterlands. And if it's a guy,
Speaker 2: he's out there by the mountains and things, all by himself,
Speaker 2: dressed up like Bigfoot, which is kind of crazy to
Speaker 2: do because someone's going to take a shot at you.
Speaker 3: I know, all these all these people that come out, well,
Speaker 3: it's just a guy in a suit. I don't know
Speaker 3: who's crazy enough to dress in a Bigfoot suit. I
Speaker 3: had I had read When they were filming Return to
Speaker 3: the Jedi, they were using the Pacific Northwest, specifically Up
Speaker 3: and Up in Washington as the planet Moon indoor, and
Speaker 3: they had people guarding Peter Mayhew, who dressed as Chewbacca,
Speaker 3: because they were afraid some hunter was gonna shoot him
Speaker 3: for a big Foot.
Speaker 2: That's crazy.
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