Brian Bethel Encounter

Brian Bethel Encounter

TYPEWitness Report / Paranormal Encounter

SUBJECTBlack-Eyed Children

REGIONAbilene, Texas, United States

DATE1996 (reported encounter); 1998 (first written account)

FIRST REPORT1998

RELATEDBlack-Eyed Children, Modern Folklore

OUTCOMENo physical evidence recovered

STATUSUnverified

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The Brian Bethel Encounter is the foundational report of the Black-Eyed Children legend. According to journalist Brian Bethel, while sitting in his car outside a movie theatre in Abilene, Texas, in 1996, two boys approached and asked for a ride home to collect money for a film; Bethel noticed their eyes were completely black and fled in fear.

Bethel did not publish the account until 1998, when he posted it to a ghost-related mailing list, alongside a second, unrelated encounter he said had been reported to him by someone else near Portland, Oregon. The account subsequently became the template nearly all later Black-Eyed Children reports have followed.

See also

• Black-Eyed Children
• Modern Folklore