Posted by: Loren Coleman on July 6th, 2009

John Alva Keel, 79, a friend, Fortean, fierce fighter for his theories, professionally a writer and journalist, has died. A fellow admirer of Mothman and the anomalies all around us, such as the "name game," is gone............

........Keel was an early admirer of Charles Fort (1874-1932), and while still doing the mainstream writing, began authoring articles for England's Flying Saucer Review (FSR) and a long series of columns for Saga.

Further influenced by Fortean Ivan T. Sanderson and ufologist Aimé Michel, in early 1966, John Keel commenced a full-time investigation of monster, aerial and paranormal phenomena. Over a four-year period, Keel interviewed thousands of people in over twenty U.S. states, especially in the Ohio River Valley of the United States. More than 2,000 books were reviewed in the course of his investigation, in addition to thousands of magazines, newsletters, and newspapers. Keel also subscribed to several newspaper-clipping services, which often generated up to 150 clippings for a single day during the 1966 and 1967 UFO "wave.".........

Much more here:

http://www.cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/keel-obit/

John Keel, who died on July 3 aged 79, was a prominent American ufologist (an observer and chronicler of UFOs unidentified flying objects) and the author of The Mothman Prophecies (1975), a book about paranormal phenomena which was made into a successful film starring Richard Gere.

Published: 6:36PM BST 10 Jul 2009

One of ufology's most widely-read and influential authors, Keel became an original and controversial researcher, and is credited with coining the term MIB (Men In Black), sinister and threatening entities who assume human form to confront ufologists and UFO witnesses.

Of particular importance was Keel's analysis of patterns. His work on "windows" (specific hot spots of combined phenomenal appearances), "waves" (cyclic appearances of the phenomena) and the "Wednesday phenomenon" (the theory that a disproportionate number of UFO events occur on that day of the week) influenced scholars and followers of the genre alike.

In his much-acclaimed second book, UFOs: Operation Trojan Horse (1970), Keel suggested that many aspects of modern UFO reports, including humanoid encounters, often paralleled ancient folklore and religious visions, and directly linked UFOs with elemental phenomena.............

Complete obituary here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/science-obituaries/5797746/John-Keel.html