John Keel

John A. Keel
Born	March 25, 1930(1930-03-25)
Died	July 3, 2009(2009-07-03) (aged 79) New York, New York, USA
Occupation	journalist parapsychologist, ufologist

John Alva Keel, born Alva John Kiehle (March 25, 1930 – July 3, 2009) was an American journalist and influential UFOlogist best known as author of The Mothman Prophecies.

Biography

Keel was born in Hornell, New York, and had his first story published in a magicians' magazine at age 12. He later worked as a freelance contributor to newspapers, scriptwriter for local radio and television outlets, and author of pulp articles such as "Are You A Repressed Sex Fiend?". He served in the US Army during the Korean War on the staff of the American Forces Network at Frankfurt, Germany. After leaving the military he worked as a foreign radio correspondent in Paris, Berlin, Rome and Egypt. In 1957, he published Jadoo, a book describing his time in Egypt and India investigating the Indian rope trick and the legendary yeti. In 1966 he produced the "spy and superhero" spoof novel The Fickle Finger of Fate. Influenced by writers such as Charles Fort, he began contributing articles to Flying Saucer Review and took up investigating UFOs and assorted Forteana as a full time pursuit. Keel analyzed what he called "windows" and "waves" of reported UFO events, concluding that a disproportionate number occurred on Wednesdays. A member of the Screenwriters Guild, Keel reportedly wrote scripts for Get Smart, The Monkees, and Lost In Space.

In 1967, Keel coined the term "Men In Black" in an article for the men's adventure magazine Saga, entitled "UFO Agents of Terror". According to Keel, he initially sought to explain UFOs as extraterrestrial visitations, but later abandoned this hypothesis. His third book, UFOs: Operation Trojan Horse published in 1970, linked UFOs to supernatural concepts such as monsters, ghosts and demons. In Our Haunted Planet published in 1971, Keel coined the term "ultraterrestrials" to describe UFO occupants he believed to be shape-changing, non-human entities.

His 1975 book, The Mothman Prophecies was Keel's account of his investigation into alleged sightings in West Virginia of a huge, winged creature called the "Mothman." The book combines Keel's account of receiving strange phone calls with reports of mutilated pets and culminates with the December 15, 1967, collapse of the Silver Bridge across the Ohio River. The book was widely popularized as the basis of a 2002 film of the same name starring Richard Gere.

Prolific and imaginative, Keel was considered a significant influence within the UFO and Fortean genre.

He died on July 3, 2009 in New York City, at the age of 79.

Bibliography

• Jadoo (1957)
• The Fickle Finger of Fate (Fawcett, 1966)
• UFOs: Operation Trojan Horse (1970)
• Strange Creatures From Time and Space (1970)
• Our Haunted Planet (1971)
• The Flying Saucer Subculture (1973)
• The Mothman Prophecies (1975)
• The Eighth Tower (1975)
• The Cosmic Question (1978)
• Disneyland of the Gods (1988)
• The Complete Guide to Mysterious Beings (1994) (revised version of Strange Creatures from Time and Space)
• The Best of John Keel (Paperback 2006) (Collection of Keel's Fate Magazine articles)

External links

• John Keel - Daily Telegraph obituary
• Fortean Times interview http://www.forteantimes.com/features/interviews/2053/john_keel_rip.html
• John Keel magazine articles http://www.philsp.com/homeville/FMI/s1171.htm#A43298
• Mothman Central
• SciFi Online Interview with Keel
• The Great UFO Wave of '73: Interview with John A. Keel
• FortFest tapes
• Ultraterrestrials: Do they walk among us?, article by Ken Korczak at Unexplained Mysteries, 26 March 2006
• John Keel website with bibliography and biographical details