Mad Gasser

Mad Gasser

The Mad Gasser of Mattoon (also known as the "Anesthetic Prowler", the "Mad Anesthetist", the "Phantom Anesthetist", the "Mad Gasser of Roanoke", or simply the "Mad Gasser") was the name given to the person or people believed to be responsible for a series of apparent gas attacks that occurred in Botetourt County, Virginia, during the early 1930s, and in Mattoon, Illinois, during the mid-1940s.

Whether the attacks were anything more than a case of mass hysteria, if the individual reports were connected, and the ultimate explanation for the events all remain debated.