D I S T I N C T L Y M O N T A N A M A G A Z I N E • F A L L 2 0 2 2
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THE 1970S WERE STRANGE DAYS IN AMERICA.
Montana, though exceptional then as it is now, was
no exception.
It may be necessary to set the scene for those who
don't remember the Me Decade: pant legs flared out
to dangerous and previously unthinkable widths, gas
shortages put the hurt on the average driver even as
the cars grew to the size of covered wagons, all while
a wearied nation tried to forget its considerable woes
with episodes of Dallas and Fantasy Island and the
spoken word albums of William Shatner.
And yet, if you can believe it, things got much,
much stranger than that.
From September of 1975 to May of 1976, five coun-
ties in North Central Montana were rocked with bi-
zarre accounts that included reports of cattle muti-
lations, "hotel-sized" UFOs, giant hairy humanoids,
and a veritable fleet of black helicopters. In the lore of
the fringe, it is what is known as a "flap," a ferocious
but relatively brief period of paranormal or otherwise
unexplained phenomena.
Along with Washington D.C.'s famous summer of
the saucer sightings in 1952 and Point Pleasant, West
Virginia's hallucinatory year spent in the shadow of
Mothman in 1966-1967, whatever really happened in
Montana during its sustained "flap" constitutes one
of the strangest episodes in the history of America's
long, intimate dance with the just-plain weird.
Mutilation Mutilation
Mystery! Mystery!
montana's montana's
Mutilation Mutilation
Mystery! Mystery!
montana's montana's
by SHERMAN CAHILL
