How the whip-poor-will became an iconic bird of American horror

Lovecraft’s and King’s fictional whip-poor-wills draw on widespread Indigenous, European, and American beliefs about the species.

In one of the most haunting scenes of Stephen King’s 1975 novel Salem’s Lot, a gravedigger named Mike Ryerson races to bury the coffin of a local boy named Danny Glick. As night approaches, a troubling thought overtakes Mike: Danny has been buried with his eyes open. Worse, Mike senses that Danny is looking through the closed coffin back at him.