History & local legend
In July 2001, Robin Swope was mowing the grounds of Erie County Memorial Gardens when a large bird rose from the grass about twenty-five yards away. Swope, a clergyman who also worked at the cemetery, described a dark gray or black animal with a pointed beak, little visible neck and a long tail ending in a triangular shape.
The nearby electrical transmission tower gave him something against which to judge its size. After his shift, he measured the distance to a crosspiece and used that comparison to estimate a wingspan of fifteen to seventeen feet. That was an estimate made from the encounter, not a measurement of the bird itself.
Swope published his recollection in 2008 under the heading of Pennsylvania “thunderbirds,” the name commonly given to reports of unusually large, unidentified birds. He said he continued looking for the creature during the following five years of work at the cemetery but never saw it again.
Sources
- Robin Swope, Thunderbirds over Western Pennsylvania, his firsthand account and drawing
- Stan Gordon, sighting archive, Craig Heinselman’s reference to Swope’s July 6, 2001 letter and comparable Greenville report
- Brugger Funeral Homes, 2025 chapel service confirms the address of Erie County Memorial Gardens
