The Houston Batman

I am always and forever intrigued with seemingly Superhuman or Ultra-terrestrial beings. From Spring-heeled Jack to the Mothman. I found this oft-forgotten but not any less exciting tale of the Houston Batman at Cryptozoology Online.

If you have a(n) Superhuman, Ultra-terrestrial, Giant or Shadow people tale to relate, feel free to contact me at yufology (at) gmail (dot) com.

One of the iconic sightings of a mysterious creature in the UFO era, that of the so-called Houston Batman, was made on June 18, 1953. Hilda Walker, Judy Meyers and Howard Phillips saw a “man with wings like a bat” sitting in the branches of a nearby tree, watching them. After a few moments there was a light display and the “Batman” was gone. The story is a classic in the annals of UFO encounters and associated creature sightings, and is dealt with in full in Ken Gerhard and Nick Redfern’s Monsters of Texas, and Loren Coleman’s Mysterious America, where it is dealt with in connection to that likewise-iconic phantom attacker, the British bogeyman known as Spring-heel'd Jack.

It turns out the likening to Jack and other phantom attackers may be particularly apt. The Lubbock Evening Journal for May 22, 1953 bore the headline “’Phantom Attacker’ Strikes in Full View of Two Officers.” The article told the story of Betty Lee Jamison, a young woman who was walking on Richmond Avenue when a man lunged from a crowd, knocked her to the ground, and fled with four men in pursuit – two policemen and two men coming out of a nearby bar. The man still escaped. Frank Murray of the Houston police department told the newspapers that it was the 13th such attack in the space of a year. I could find no references to the earlier attacks; perhaps some other intrepid CFZ member could, however.

The Mexia Daily News for June 12 (only a week before the sighting of the “Batman”) reported another attack. This time a woman was pulled bodily from a car. Again, the attacker fled. And still the attacks came, even after the sighting of the man in the tree. On May 7, 1954, the Galveston Daily News reported that an attack had taken place only two days before, but this was dealt with in no more than a passing manner. Once again, I could find no references in the intervening time, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist.

You can read the rest here.