Van Meter Visitor — Cryptid Encyclopedia

In the autumn of 1903, the small town of Van Meter, Iowa — population barely 1,000 — was visited by something that terrified its most respected citizens. Over several nights in late September and early October, multiple witnesses reported an enormous winged creature perching on rooftops, flying between buildings, and emitting a blinding beam of light from a horn-like protrusion on its forehead.

The first witness was U.G. Griffith, a local businessman, who saw a large winged figure perched atop a building downtown, its horn projecting a bright light that illuminated the street below. The following nights, Dr. A.C. Alcott, banker Clarence Dunn, and hardware store owner O.V. White all independently reported encounters with the creature. Each described the same being: approximately eight feet tall, with enormous bat-like wings, a beak-like mouth, and a single glowing horn.

On the final night, a group of armed citizens tracked the creature to an abandoned coal mine at the edge of town. A second, smaller creature appeared — perhaps a juvenile. Both beings descended into the mine shaft, and the townspeople reportedly sealed the entrance with debris. "The whole town was in an uproar," reported the Des Moines Daily News. "The best citizens in town saw the creature."

What makes the Van Meter Visitor remarkable is the caliber of witnesses. These were not anonymous drifters or attention-seekers — they were the town's doctor, banker, and prominent business owners, pillars of a small Iowa community with everything to lose and nothing to gain from fabricating a monster story.

The sealed mine has never been reopened. Whatever the citizens of Van Meter trapped underground in 1903 may still be there.