Twelve Witnesses and Four Hours of Gunfire: The Night at the Kelly Farmhouse

2026-09-21 · True Mysteries Editorial Desk · Mysterious Creatures · 7 min read

The farmhouse stood on a rise outside Kelly, a scattering of houses in Christian County, Kentucky, about twelve kilometres north of Hopkinsville. It belonged to Glennie Lankford, a widow who lived there with her three youngest children. On the evening of 21 August 1955 the house was full. Her grown sons Elmer, known to everyone as Lucky, and J.C. Sutton were there with their wives Vera and Alene. So was a family friend from Pennsylvania, Billy Ray Taylor, with his wife June. In all, eleven people were in the house that night, five adults and six children, with one more relative present at various points.

At around seven in the evening, Billy Ray Taylor went out to the well behind the house to draw water. He came back saying he had seen a bright object cross the sky, trailing colour, and settle into a gully beyond the treeline. Nobody in the house took him seriously. Lucky Sutton told him it was a shooting star. The subject was dropped.

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