As a teenager, Ron played in a garage band in Atlanta with Mark David Chapman, the man who killed John Lennon. As Sam Rountree said at Ron's funeral, Ron would have been as rich as Bill Gates, except his timing sucked. Ron re-published John Keel's 1975 book The Mothman Prophecies, and then sold the movie rights. The film, starring Richard Gere, was released in 2002. The true story tells about the collapse of the Silver Bridge over the Ohio River on December 15, 1967 that killed 46 people, and of the "Mothman" that was seen by many people prior to that event, apparently as a warning about the impending bridge collapse. A Mothman Prophecies death-list shows that many people associated with the movie have since died, many mysteriously. Ron is #55 on the list (which includes the 46 original deaths) He passed away on April 8, 2001, at age 48, dying a painful death caused by food poisoning contracted at a local Atlanta restaurant. |
