Category Archives: cryptozoology

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Live “Pterodactyls” in California?

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Here’s a puzzle that may be interesting to home school children and their parents; in fact it could be fun for many kids, not just those in home school. Would you like to try your hand at solving a mystery? Try to think like Sherlock Holmes as you investigate mysterious reports of pterodactyls flying around California. What an adventure for an amateur sleuth!

Why have some persons in California reported seeing a pterosaur flying overhead? How strange can things get? Western scientists have long thought those flying creatures had all died long ago. And after all, some people do call them “flying dinosaurs.”

This is not a game of make-believe, for these persons (who report the flying creatures) are real, and some of them have given out their full names to the public. The first question is this, although we may refine it or add to it later:

Are these reports of living pterosaurs in California hoaxes?

from Lakewood, California

A lady in Lakewood, California chose this shape for the end of the tail

Introduction

This game will take more than one blog post to explain, but you can start your detective investigation now. Use whatever resources are available, including the internet, as long as you have a parent or guardian who is in charge and who gives permission or supervises. (It’s not very safe for kids to roam around the internet without any supervision. Really!)

In the next one or two posts, I’ll explain who I am and why I invite children to play this game. If a parent would like to contact me, use this link: parent-comment-or-question

This is not like a chess game, with 64 squares and a clear winner or loser. It’s more like a giant chess set with countless squares, and most of the board is out of view at first, obscured by a fog. The game may also have pieces to move around, as you explore, but those pieces are not with clearly defined rules of moving, just general ways of moving.

I’ll give suggestions instead of rules. The clues I give will not always be obvious, and I’ll not always use the word clue when I give one out. Indeed, this is far different from a game of chess, much more like a Sherlock Holmes detective investigation.

First Suggestions

  1. If kids use the internet for searching, adult supervision is essential
  2. Beware of strong opinions expressed online regarding reports of modern pterosaurs
  3. Look for a future “Contents” page on this blog: It will organize the posts (online pages)
  4. Consider using one or more of the following words for a search-engine (like Google):
  • ropen
  • modern pterosaur
  • living pterodactyl

Regarding suggestion #2 about strong opinions, some skeptics have used unfair tactics in criticizing explorers who have searched in Papua New Guinea for living pterosaurs. It is unethical to accuse explorers of being liars and frauds just because they believe in the possibility that one or more species of pterosaur may still be alive. If you find one of these unfair criticisms, see if you can find a response from one of the persons who was accused of lies or deception. Please look at both sides before making a judgment.

You can now start your investigation, or you can wait for the next post on this blog for more information and suggestions.

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Chess mistakes by two children in California

The two children competing in the following game (played in 1995 in California) had little experience with chess books. But the father of these two sisters had experience in tournament play.

Free Book on Modern Pterodactyls

You may be able to download a free book about reports of living pterosaurs, commonly called pterodactyls. The pdf book is titled Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea.

Attack on “Pterodactyl Expert”

It was just a few commentators on a cryptozoology.com forum thread who initiated the attack. But it was a rather vicious attack, with one of the assailants using the name “ape man.”

Nocturnal Ropen Appears in Daylight in Southern California

On June 19, 2012, over a storm drain in Lakewood, California, in clear daylight at about noon, a long-tailed featherless creature sat on a telephone line . . .

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Free Book on Modern “Pterodactyls”

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You may be able to download a free book about reports of living pterosaurs, commonly called pterodactyls. The pdf book is titled Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea. It is 44 pages long and can be viewed on many computers.

pdf nonfiction book on modern pterosaurs in southwest PacificFree digital cryptozoology book

It is not available as a printed book but only as a digital-download book. On the cover is a sketch of the head of the flying creature seen by Patty Carson when she was a little girl in Cuba, around 1965. She drew the picture herself, from her memory, when she was an adult. When it flew away, she saw the long tail. Patty was close enough to see that the “flying dinosaur” had no feathers.

Part of one page from the book

. . . in the 1990’s a few American Biblical creationists began intermittent light expeditions in Papua New Guinea, investigating reports of possible living pterosaurs. This led to more expeditions, from 2002 to 2007, by cryptozoologists who were better prepared and who had more success with interviews and observations.

But why Biblical creationists? For the moment, lay aside any judgment of any concept of earth-age; look only at the recent history of expeditions in Papua New Guinea. Who would be more likely to search for living pterosaurs, those who believed in a major extinction event 65 million years ago or those who believed in many pterosaurs living 6,000 years ago? How much easier to organize an expedition when the organizers are convinced of the recent existence of what is being sought!

A cryptozoology book

Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea is a cryptozoology book, with very little about religion or about the Bible. Yet it does mention the Americans who went to far away jungles to look for the ropen, Americans who believed that the ropen was a pterosaur because they believed in the Old Testament of the Bible.

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Ropen pterosaur in Papua New Guinea

Duane Hodgkinson, now a flight instructor  in Livingston, Montana, in 1944 was  stationed near Finschhafen, in what was  then called New Guinea. After he and his  buddy walked into a clearing, they were  amazed as a large creature flew up into  the air. The men soon realized that it was  no bird that started to circle the clearing. It  had a tail “at least ten to fifteen feet long.”

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Are flying dragons for real?

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Let’s make the question more precise: Does anybody believe in a large flying creature in Papua New Guinea, an animal that is much bigger than a flying fox fruit bat but which also appears to be without any feathers, an animal that has a long tail and glows brightly at night? Some persons believe that an animal called ropen lives on Umboi Island, flying at night between a mountain and the reef that surrounds the island. Some persons would call it a dragon.

A few Americans believed in the ropen enough to travel to Umboi Island in several short expeditions, beginning in 1994. My name is Jonathan Whitcomb. I led a small expedition there in 2004, and I interviewed natives who had seen the ropen. Over the past eleven years, however, I have done more than just go on a short expedition to a tropical island in the southwest Pacific.

I published the fourth edition of my first nonfiction book in October of 2014: Searching for Ropens and Finding God, about eyewitness reports of apparent living pterosaurs, what many people call “pterodactyls.” I have also written two other smaller books about these flying creatures. Some people do believe in real dragons, especially those who have seen this kind of animal themselves.

"Searching for Ropens and Finding God" by J. D. Whitcomb

Nonfiction book on modern pterosaur sightings

This is a long book, written mostly for adults. I plan on writing a book for younger readers, I hope before the end of 2015.

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The dragon called “ropen”

So if you live in the United States, how do you report your encounter with a dragon in a cave? Most important, try using the word “ropen,” rather than “dragon.”

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