"We tell it as it is"

Number 81

SKYLOOKThe UFO Monthly August, 1974

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF MUTUAL UFO NETWORK, INC.

Jka> u> an e.n&vige.d copy orf one. of, thn.e.e. photo* je.ct. A none, complete, account orf the. iiicMejit be.-o& a UFO atte.ge.diy photogtia.phe.d -en Cotibica on Feb. g-cni on page. 4.12, 7 9 7 7 . Tkfie.e. yiUneAAeA atte.ge.dly 4aw the. ob-

In This IssueMUFON Director's report 3Corsica photos discussed 4Do UFO's practice deception? 7Possible huraanoid in Pennsylvania 9Near landing, possible humanoid in Virginia 10Behind the Iron Curtain 12In Others' Words 14Carlyle picnic photos 15Astronaut, congressman, authors discuss UFO's--16UFO's created in the laboratory '•--' 19Recapping and commenting :— 20

SKYLOOK has been designated the official publication of theMutual UFO Network; however, membership in MUFON is notrequired to subscribe to Skylook, and membership in MUFONdoes not automatically include a subscription to Skylook. Mem-bership in MUFON, which is $2.00 per year and by invitation, ishandled through the MUFON office, 40 Christopher Court,Quincy, 111. 62301.

Advertising is available in Skylook at 10? per word, $1.25 perdisplay line, or $5 per display inch ( IxSVz) . Minimum charge $5.Advertisements subject to approval of editor.

Skylook, the .UFO Monthly, is published monthly by DwightConnelly, 26 Edgewood Drive, Quincy, Illinois 62301. Subscription rates: UnitedStates and Canada, $5.00 per year; foreign, $6.00 per year; 50 cents per copy.

Second class postage paid at Quincy, IL. 62301

Joseph M. Brill

Lucius Parish

Mark Herbstritt

Ted Phillips

David A. Schroth

SkylookThe UFO Monthly

26 Edgewood DriveQuincy, IL. 62301

Dwight ConnellyEditor-Publisher

Mrs. Carolyn ConnellyBusiness Manager

1 Staff:

Norma E. Short

John F. Schuessler

Bob Kirkpatrick

Rosetta Holmes

Walter H. Andrus

Dr. Barry Downing

Marjorie Fish

Ted Bloecher

Stan Gordon

Director's MessageBy Walt Andrus

It is with extreme pride that MUFON announcesthe appointment of James M. McCampbell as .a con-sultant in Research Planning. An engineeringconsultant by profession, Jim is the author ofthe outstanding book titled "UFOLOGY--NEW. IN-SIGHTS FROM SCIENCE AND COMMON SENSE" publishedin 1973, discussing technical concepts of UFO's.He resides at 12 Bryce Court, Belmont, Calif.94002 and is a close friend of Dr. JacquesVallee. Men of Mr. McCampbell's stature in thefield of engineering, now devoting their personaltime and talents to the UFO phenomenon, is a tra-mendous asset to the scientific study.

It is with regret that we announce the resig-nation of John F. Schuessler as State Directorfor Missouri, due to his job transfer by McDon-nell-Douglas Astronautics from St. Louis, Mo., tothe Johnson Space Center at Houston, Texas. Hisleadership and motivation to the UFO Study Groupof Greater St. Louis will be sadly missed. John,of course, continues to fill the important post

-of Deputy Director of the Mutual UFO Network, andas a consultant to MUFON in astronautics.' Hewill soon be accepting MUFON responsibility forthe Houston area. John is already becoming ac-quainted with the news media personnel in Houstonas part of MUFON public relations.

Projects in, process or being contemplated by'MUFON as a result of the annual corporate meetingin Akron, Ohio, on June 23, 1974, consist of thefollowing: (1) Publishing of the revised secondedition of "The Field Investigators Manual" underthe guidance of Ron Westrum, MUFON consultant insociology from Ann Arbor, Michigan; (2) Filingfor I.R.S. tax exempt status, and (3) Revision of.MUFON by-laws and constitution. Election of MUFONcorporate officers for 1974-1975 include the fol-lowing gentlemen: Director, Walter H. Andrus",Jr., Quincy, 111.; Deputy Director, John F.Schuessler, Houston, Texas; Corporate Secretary,Ted Phillips, Sedalia, Mo.; and Corporate Treas-urer, Fields F. Freeman, Quincy, 111.

It is a pleasure to announce that N. JosephGurney has accepted the newly created staff po-sition to MUFON as director of publications. Hewill be responsible for the coordination, direc-tion, and publishing of all MUFON publications(except for Skylook, which is being ably handledby Editor and Publisher Dwight Connelly and Bus-.iness Manager Mrs. Carolyn Connelly, as a finan-cially separate publication). Joe will have astaff of artists, photographers, typists, andprinters to properly support this important func-tion. He has had wide experience in this field,not only as one of the co-editors of our MUFONUFO Symposium Proceedings, but professionallywith the McDonnell-Douglas Corporation. A new

director of public relations will be selected in. the near future to fill the vacancy created byJoe's new responsibilities.

Due to the growth of MUFON, expanded member-ship services, and coordination of UFO scientificendeavors, the administrative offices of MUFONhave been relocated into larger and more appro-priate facilities at 40 Christopher Court,Quincy, Illinois. .

Humanoid Study Group meets.By Dave Webb

Along with other activities at the recentMUFON Symposium, the first meeting of the MUFONHumanoid Study Group was very successful. Thisgroup was first mentioned in the June issue ofSkylook on p. 13. At least 25 people managed tomiss most of their lunch to- attend the meeting onSaturday, June 22. Ted Bloecher and I led alively discussion on the need for establishing acentral depository for humanoid reports, for in-creasing the reporting of "hidden" cases, formaking this file computer-compatible for use withsuch computer files as UFOCAT, and of methodsthat might be used in analyzing the data.

About ten persons at the meeting indicatedthat they had large files of humanoid reports andwould be willing to contribute cases.to the StudyGroup's file. The scope of the group's work was

, discussed; for the moment work will be limited todeveloping as complete a file as possible of allhumanoid cases. All humanoid reports are to beincluded initially, whether involving UFOs ornot, so as not to prejudice the sample. Howeverthe "creature" reports, involving anthropoid-likebeings, will be included only if UFO activity isinvolved. Stan Gordon will continue to coverthis aspect of the phenomenon. Ted and I willcontact several of the European sources known tohave extensive humanoid files.

The. Humanoid. Study Group is one of severalMUFON groups specializing in various aspects ofUFOs. Ted Phillips is Specialization Coordina-•tor; he offered us much good advice, at the Sym-posium and we will work closely with him in thefuture. Walt. Andrus was also very helpful andagreed to. channel. MUFON's humanoid reports to us.

Humanoid or- - occupant reports are solicitedfrom Skylook readers. If you have reports notpreviously published, or if you are interested inworking with the Study Group, contact either TedBloecher or myself. Our addresses were listed inrecent issues of Skylook. Ted and I will be con-tr.ibuting. to. a monthly section in Skylook on theHumanoid. Study Group's activities and these re-ports in general to keep you informed.

-06 the. f^-Lut 0f$ a bnniu o£ thsite. photo*:o££egeci£i/ -taken oft a UFO -in Co.t4.tca -in 1971. The.

photo* wesie. aoion tnan&pasie.ncA.eA.

1971 Corsica photosBy Joe Brill

International Coordinator

The photos .appearing in conjunction with thisarticle seem to be among the genuine UFO photoswhich have come to the attention of ufologists.Originally shot on transparency (slide) film,some loss of quality was of course experienced inprinting the shots onto color paper. Furtherloss of quality occurred as the color prints arepublished in Skylook in black and white. Never-theless, the series of three photos, accompaniedby the testimony of multiple witnesses, is im-pressive, even in black and white printing.

As to how these three photographs were taken,the circumstance was as follows: A family fromGrenoble, France, had a second residence in Cor-sica.- They had just adjusted their camera on atripod in order to take some photographs of theirnew house when they spotted a strange obj ect inthe sky. They were able to take three color shots

of it before it moved off. The date of thissighting was Feb. 12, 1971.....Perhaps the most detailed evaluation of thephotos to date appeared in the French magazine"Phenomenes Inconnus." Through the work of MUFONtranslator Linda Galloway, the :French articlefollows:

AN EXCEPTIONAL PHOTOGRAPHIC DOCUMENTATIONBy Phillippe Tournier

Electrical Engineer andScientific Consultant to OURANOS

. (French UFO organization)

Location: On the .road from -'Olmo.in Corsica,about twenty kilometers from Bastia.

Date and time: Feb. 12, 1971 at 7 p.m. (sun"low on the horizon")

Background of the photographer and:the witnes-ses; three witnesses, all of whom were previously

Pko-to number. Z.

known.by our (OURANOS) vice-president, PierreDeval. They already had some interest in the UFOphenomena. . .

Quality of the photographs: The best copystudied was the one measuring 125 millimetersby 85 millimeters, printed on paper and in color,which Pierre Deval showed to me.

We attempted, to the best of our ability, tothink of all the indications which could provethat they were fake. The photographs as suchwere of very good quality and the original trans-parencies (three in number) were of an exception-

Photo 3.

al .-quality/ The "object in question seems to becompletely finished from our limited point ofview. The background of the sky-is the blue' of abeautiful 'evening, and the object certainly seemsto be in front of some small' white clouds presentin the photograph. The copy studied was printedfrom the second transparency, which shows the ob-ject most clearly. (See photo No. 2)

For a good study of possible faking,, it wouldbe necessary to know 'the effects' of air density,which would -give "a more' precise- measure of ' thedistance from the photographer to the object. If

it is a fake, what kind of ordinary object or ob-ject adapted, to the occasion, could have beenused: Furthermore, since between the second andthird photographs the object has turned slightlywhile maintaining the same angle, a very numerous(and therefore expensive in film) series of shotsof manual launchings of an object would not havesuch a coherency of movement in successive shots.Only an object suspended by an invisible threadfrom a support outside of the field of view couldhave permitted such a convincing fake. I thinkwe must study these photographs with the ideathat their authenticity is certain.

The two slits resembling portholes have beenwidely studied since the biginning, so I will notdwell on them at all. The first question which Iasked myself concerned the large shiny spot onthe lower front rim, in the middle of the disc.Because of the effect of the shadows, this spot(or bump) gives the impression of a hollow on therim of the disc to its right. Could it be a bumpor protuberance on the rim of the disc, indicat-ing a possible observation apparatus (see thecase of Mendoza, Argentina May 24, 1971), or,could it be an interior dome underneath the discof which we see only the lowest part, the restbeing hid by the rim of the disc, or could it bea question of two structures at the same time?The glare is too bright and the photographs ofthe object too small for us to be able to draw aconclusion.

The second question (perhaps the most import-ant) is the unquestionable presence of a certainnumber of very clear, radial, seemingly whitestripes starting at the .edge of the disc andstopping approximately halfway between the edgeand the foot of the upper dome. In order to lo-cate the stripes I shall use the method of direc-tion given by the hands of a watch by assuming ashadow, on the object, whose axis corresponds tothat of the "saucer" seen from underneath, noonbeing turned to the right towards the bottom ofthe picture. The first visible stripe is locatedat about 2:00. The second stripe, even more vis-ible, is located .at about 3:30. These first-two"white" stripes are located in the shaded part,to the right of the photograph and are quite vis-ible. A third stripe, less visible because"it isin the lighted front part, appears at about' 5:00.

(End of "Phenomenes;inconnus" article)* "

In examining these three photographs myself, Ihave, found that the very obvious cloud seen inphoto No. 2 is also seen clearly in;the other two.photos. This would seem to make it obvious thatthese three photographs were taken in rapid suc-cession as the cloud appears exactly the same inall three pictures. Also it's position in re-lation to the tree is the same in all . threephotos, which would point out that the objectchanged it's location while being photographed.Another interesting item is the position of the

sun while these photos were taken. According to

oft photo -nwnb&i. 3.

the given report from France it was "low.on thehorizon." It can easily be seen that on photo No.1 the sun is shining off the leaves of the treein the .bottom left hand portion of the photo.The object at this time is tipped- -at an anglewhere the sun is striking it so -that only a verysmall section of it has a shadow. I believe thesun is "low on the horizon" as.stated and thatthe tree and the UFO bear that fact out.

My last comment on these three UFO photos isthat in each of the photos there appears the topportion of apparently dead branches of this tree.By overlaying these photos you can see the move-ment which was made by the object while it wasphotographed. Also, I believe the camera wasturned by the photographer as the ; first shot ismore the way I would expect the camera to be setup on a tripod for photographing a house and thesurrounding area. These photographs appear to begenuine photographs of a strange flying disc. Ipresent the photos and the written facts for yourinspection.

1974 MUFON Symposium Proceedings

. The 1974 MUFON Symposium proceedings,featuring 162 pages of articles and drawingsfrom the 1974 Symposium in Akron,..Ohio, is•available from MUFON, 40 Christopher Court,Quincy, 111., 62301. The. price is $3.25 inthe U.S. and Canada, and $4.00 elsewhere.Included are "UFOs—An Issue Whose Time HasAlmost Come" by Ralph Blum; "Religion andUFO's: The Extrasensory Problem," by Barry H.Downing; ."UFO Trace-Landing Cases" by TedPhillips; "Journey Into the Hill Star Map" byMarjorie E. Fish; "Saucers, PSI and Psychi-atry" by Berthold E.,Schwarz; "Flying Saucersand Physics" by Stanton T. Friedman; "UFOs inRelation 'to Creature Sightings in Pennsyl-vania" by Stan Gordon; and "Magnetic Expla-nation of UFOs" by Eugene H. Burt..

Question of deceptionby UFO's a possibility

By Ron Westrum; . Sociology Department . •

Eastern Michigan University.

When Albert Einstein said that "God is subtle,but he is not dowright mean"! he was referringto the kinds of difficulties scientists have ininterpreting nature. As an expression of the at-titude which a. scientist might take when studyingnature, this orientation, is apt. But is it theattitude one .should take when studying UFOs?Since we have so often turned to scientists fortheir opinions on Unidentified Flying Objects, itmay be useful to remind ourselves that the scien-tist views nature as perhaps difficult to de-cipher; he does not view it as deliberately try-ing to deceive .him. However,, when we are dealingwith the possibility of another race (or species)of intelligent beings acting as the pilots, oper-ators, or originators of UFOs, the question ofdeception is very germane..•..

Jacques Vallee arid John Keel have dealt withthe problem of deception . in two recent books.2Both show how the details of UFO sightings andtheir surrounding events suggest that the sight-ings or contacts were either deceptions - them-selves or were designed .to deliberately misleadthe sighters. But regardless,, of the .nature ofspecific incidents, which in any case are open toa varietyjOf interpretations, we must.not forgetthe general point that the beings responsible forUFOs may have interests which differ from ours.

It is important to focus on the question of"interests" rather than benevolence versus hos-tility, because, as any child knows, benevolencecan be very painful ("This is going to hurt youmore than it hurts me."). Hence, specific inci-dents of contact may be pleasant or unpleasantto the observers without this at all being a re-liable indicator as to the ultimate intentions of.the "beings" involved. Beings with an overallhostile intent may act like perfect-angels untilthe moment when the trigger is pulled. Similarly,interplanetary religious missionaries might wellbe responsible for accidental deaths without de-siring them in the least.

The basic point about looking at the UFOenigma from the point of view of conflictinginterests, however, is that one must adopt a"strategic" as opposed, to a "scientific" per-spective. We have spent an enormous amount oftime trying to show that UFOs are real and thatscientists ought to pay attention to them; infact these attempts continue. But it is obviousthat the rate of conversion of the scientificcommunity by these attempts is -low, although per-haps not negligible. Yet sometimes one also hasthe feeling that the -marshalling of .evidence hasas a less explicit aim to fortify the confidence

.of the writer himself. If one really believesthat UFOs exist, further marshalling of evidenceis unnecessary as far as the researchers them-selves are concerned. The real questions thenbecome: What is the nature of UFOs? and Whatare their aims?

For. the person who . specializes in the studyof social conflicts, there is a basic questionwhose answer affects how one might go about an-swering the other two: What steps is the opponenttaking to decieve me? If one looks at the processby which we find out about UFOs, 'then it is.ob-vious that there 'are .many opportunities for de-ception and disinformation. For the strategist,the issue is not: What do I know? but rather,How do I know it?- Because the strategist isused to thinking, not in terms of the gradual ac-cumulation of facts, but in terms of move andcountermove.3 It may be that scientists in gen-eral are hot used to thinking in the latter setof terms^ except in wartime. In any case, what Iwish to suggest here is that thinking in suchterms, rather than in. "scientific" patterns ofthought, may be very useful for understanding UFOoccupant behavior.

Serious students of the UFO problem, however,wish to avoid this style of thinking, since it isassociated with the paranoid fringe (or is it themajority?) of UFO "buffs." But a little consider-ation will show that, just as this style ofthought is well adapted to certain situations ininternational relations, it also has applicationsin inter-species affairs. Even a benevolent groupof beings might wish to, say, decieve us as to.who they are for our own good, of course.Hence, one must consider, if the hypothesis ofnon-identical interests is taken seriously, justwhat a clever opponent might do if he wished todeceive us as to his nature and capabilities.Let me suggest several types of deceptive prac-tices that might be used:

1) Avoidance of Detection. This is oftensuggested in those accounts which do not necces-sarily see UFO behavior as hostile. Thus, UFOsland in night-time hours, they tend to pickrural landing places, occupants are likely todescend still later at night, and so forth.5 Insome treatments of. the UFO problem whose generalaim is to debunk UFOs as real, the non-announce-ment of themselves"by UFO occupants to members ofCongress and the scientific community is used asevidence that the phenomenon is spurious.6 Thisargument might possess some merit if it could beassumed that there was no conflict of interestbetween humans and UFO beings', and that thelatter would adopt a strategy of immediate con^,tact with little preliminary reconnaissance. Ifterrestrial history, is any guide, however'-, con-tacts between technically superior and inferiorpeoples do not always take place on such astraight-forward., basis. Would humans take astraight-forward approach? I doubt it. And fin-ally .-there is the argument that benevolent extra-,

"terrestrials (whatever benevolent." might mean in

this context) might wish to minimize the harmfulconsequences of interplanetary (or whatever) con-tact by first seeking to understand terrestrialculture.

2) The Use of "Noise." The aim of thisstrategy would be to hide actual landings or re-connaissances in a "noise" blanket, so that aliencraft would be confused with natural phenomenaand hallucinations. Whereas the first strategywould seek concealment through avoidance, thesecond would seek concealment through camouflage.A great number of events which seem to be in thesame class as UFOs would then turn out to behoaxes, misidentifications, or would possess in-ternally contradictory characteristics adverse totheir credibility. Both Keel and Vallee haveconsidered use of this strategy. The net resultwould be that UFOs would be linked in the publicmind (and also the mind of elite decision-makers)with hoaxes, psychosis, misidentifications, andso forth. A variation of this strategy is toprovide, through human stooges, "reasonable" ex-planations of unreasonable events. This variantmay have been employed in the "airship" sightingsin the late 1890's in the United States.7

A natural extension of this sort of strategywould be to mask increases in the tempo of UFOreconnaissance through a series of false alarms——e.g. the flaps. There would gradually be aperceptual adaption to a higher and higherlevel of UFO activity; which would mask real.changes in the nature of , UFO activities them-selves. Hence, the later outside "experts" enterthe field of UFO studies, the greater theirshock, because of the escalation of the scale ofactivities which is often not apparent tolongtime students of UFOs. Here I speculate onthe basis of subjective impressions.

3) Infiltration. Here the objective would bethe disruption and neutralization of the oppon-ent's intelligence organs from within. This mightbe done either by appearing in human form orthrough the use of human agents who would thencarry out the suggestions of the aliens. Suchagents would seek to enter both official agenciesand voluntary organizations interested in UFOs.They might then act in a variety of ways: as in-formers, sources of internal quarrels, suppliersof false information, and agent provocateurs. Thesuspicion of the presence of such persons wouldbe inimical to group solidarity. More important,such persons might reinforce group interest incourses of action which would lead to dead ends,or cause public ridicule.

4) Destruction of Evidence. This would takeplace in two ways, each of which has been al-leged. On one hand, we have the propensity of"injured" UFOs to blow themselves up, land inbodies of water, or be helped by other craft ofthe same kind. On the other hand, the silencingof witnesses might be carried out in the samestyle as that used by criminal syndicates. Thesilencing of witnesses by the ubiquitous "men inblack" has now become one of the standard (and

most sought-after) features of UFO lore. Onemight note that, f_ aliens indeed have done this,that they have added some touches of their own:impersonation of military officers, disappearingtransportation, etc.8

This is not an exhaustive catalogue of UFObehavior which might have deceptive aims; and Ihave avoided mentioning specific cases, as thosewho can appreciate these arguments can easilyfind examples in the literature. This brief ex^cursis is only to give the strategic point ofview some airing, and to rescue its reputation,which has suffered by association with certainindividuals and groups. I am trying to make thereader consider what a rational opponent mightdo, not to argue that in fact any one of thesemethods has been used. We ought to give thestrategic abilities of the aliens some credit.We can at least assume that they are capable ofthe sort of mischief which terrestrials routinelypractice on each other in international affairs.

For every measure there is a countermeasure.Hence, for any strategy adopted by someone elsethere is an optimal counter-strategy. If thereis sufficient interest, I might discuss in alater article what some counter-measure strate-gies might be.

Footnotes

1. I am indebted to Albert Wohlstetter forthis quotation.

2. Jacques Vallee, Passport to Magonia. Chi-cago: Henry Regnery, 1969. John Keel, UFOs: Oper-ation Trojan Horse. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons,1970. See also: Jerome Clark, J'Why UFOs AreHostile," Flying Saucer Review, I3_ #6, Nov./Dec.1967, pp. 18-20

3. For a brilliant discussion of this perspec-tive, see Albert Wohlstetter, "Analysis and De-sign of Conflict Systems," in E.S. Quade, editor,Analysis for Military Decisions; Chicago: RandMcNally, 1967.

4. One can speculate that this might havesomething to do with scientists' personalities.That scientists dislike the expression of aggres-sive impulses is suggested in David McClelland's"On the Dynamics of Creative Physical Scien- .tists", in Liam Hudson, editor, The Ecology ofIntelligence. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1970.

Challenge to Science:Henry Regnery, 1966,

5. See Jacques Vallee,The UFO Engima. Chicago:chapter 9.

6. See William Markowitz, "The Physics andMetaphysics of Unidentified Flying Objects,"Science, 157, 15 September 1967, pp. 1274-1279

7. See Keel, op cit, ch. 5

8. On this issue, see John Keel, This HauntedPlanet. Greenwich: Fawcett Publications, 1971,ch. 9. See also Gordon Creighton, "On Disappear-ing UFO Photographs," in FSR, 16_ #2', March/April1970, pp. 21-22.

Possible humanoid reportedBy Stan Gordon

On May 23, 1974, at 6 p.m. a 16-year-old boyreportedly had his first confrontation with theunknown. The young man, who wishes to remainanonymous, was motorcycling after school in hisfavorite spot just southeast of his home, nearSewickley, Pa. The area consists of a 1,000-acrearea of woods and hilly terrain. After riding ontop of a hill for awhile, the fellow proceededdown an old trail to the foot of the hill. Atthat time his motorcycle wasn't making, much noiseas he was coasting most of the way.

At the foot of the hill he turned left ontoanother road which happened to be in a turn. Ashe rounded the ,turn, still coasting, he looked upto the far end of the road. About 250 yards away,a figure was observed standing sideways facinguphill. At that point the.witness reved up hiscycle several times and shifted gears, whichseemed to have attracted the creature's atten-tion.

The creature changed from a side position to afrontal position and half squatted at the sametime. He remained in this position for a fewseconds and then turned to the uphill directionand with three large steps vanished into thewoods.

The creature was described as being humanlikein form, ' and 7 feet or taller in height. Thecreature was -described as completely covered in ashiny stainless steel colored suit, which waswrinkled all over except for the head area. Thehead was described as being football, shaped and"skin tight."

Westmoreland County UFO Study Group investi-gators who searched the area, .found some, possible

AstronomyNotes

By Mark HerbstrittAUGUST SKY

Mercury—is too close to the sun for observa-tion except for the first few "days of the month-.

Venus--is a morning star rising in the northeast about two hours before the sun.

Mars—is Tow in the west at sunset and will bedifficult to locate.

Jupiter—rises an hour or two after sunset andis visible the rest of the night.

Saturn—is in Gemini. It rises about fourhours before the sun.- The Perseid meteor shower occurs from the 10thto the 14th. •

footprints of the creature. In the same spotwhere it was seen climbing up the hill into thewoods, three impressions were found that were duginto the terrain and went straight up. Mosthumans climbing such a hilly area would angletheir feet to obtain a better balance. More datais being gathered on the footprints at this timeand anything of significance will be related inthe near future. No UFO was seen in the area atthe time the creature was seen.

Sketch byWCUFOaK(st ainvestigator

-William HCuh{.<

Near landing,humanoid

reported

Sketch \>y

In the Blue Ridge Mountains lies the peacefuland picturesque farming community of Vesta, Va.

.It will never be the same again, for on the clearnight of March 1, 1974, at 8 p.m. a UFO visitedthe area.

Several residents had noticed a round red fly-ing object that circled the community at low al-titude weeks before, but kept it to themselvesfor fear of ridicule. But March 1 was to be a"different story."

"It was like a science fiction story cometrue," one of the witnesses, Jane Clifton '(27),stated.

"It made a shrill penetrating sound," exclaim-ed Mrs. Noah Cassell and her daughter Freda. "Wewere afraid to go outside to see what was causingall the commotion on John Plasters's farm," theyadded. The Cassell's home was located closer towhere the mysterious activity was taking place.

"I saw something, but I don't know what it was,and I've never seen anything like it before orsince," Jane's husband, Richard N. Clifton (35),said.

The first observer was Billy Wayne Plasters(27), who noticed that the whole hillside on hisfather's farm, off Route 58 near Vestal, was "alllit up." Plasters immediately drove to the homeof his twin sister and brother-in-law, Mr. andMrs. Richard N. Clifton, to alert them to whatwas taking place nearby. All three watched themysterious yellow glow through the windows of theClifton home.

The three adults were startled suddenly when areddish oval object "bigger than a Volkswagen"rose up to an approximate 300-foot altitude abovethe glowing area on the ground. It then hoveredand went through a series of right angle turnsand headed in a southern direction toward nearbyStuart. The Cliftons noticed that the UFO gaveoff "a beam of white light" from its bottom edgeas it ascended. "It looked like a huge roundplate, fat in the middle and tapered at eachend", Plasters reported.

The eyewitnesses then noticed that the hill-side light, described as "not the color of fire-light, but more like a bright yellow Colemanlantern," was still there, so they decided totake a closer look. Billy and Richard jumped in-to a truck and drove across the highway towardthe lighted area. Almost immediately they notic-ed that the farm animals, which normally comefreely to greet people in the pasture—two whitehorses, a brown steer and three black calves--were nowhere to be seen,wards the glowing light,shed. Clifton, who wasshorter in height couldn't see clearly as Plasterstarted talking.

"Who are you?""What are you doing here?""What's your name?"Suddenly Billy exclaimed, "Something is coming

at us!" Later Plasters described •what he hadseen. It looked like a "big, tall, heavy-set man"

As they advanced to-they passed a small

behind Plasters and

10

of Volkswagen CaHcoming toward them, and he was silhouetted on anearby ridge in front of the glowing light. Hear-ing no replies to the questions both men fled thearea in blind panic. -.

Mrs. Jane Clifton was still-watching from herhome vantage point on the nearby hill on thatwarm March evening. "I watched the truck stopand its lights go out. It was awfully silent,when I suddenly heard the truck door slam and themotor start up. When the men came back to thehouse they looked like they had just seen aghost."

Nevertheless, they grabbed their guns anddrove back to the, area for a second time, thistime prepared to shoot at anything that moved.When they arrived they found some burning debris,but the light, the object, and the huge figurewere gone.

They returned to the Clifton's home and noti-fied the Patrick County Sheriff's Department byphone, only to be asked, "What have you folksbeen drinking up there?" and "Are your eyes play-ing tricks on you?" Over the phone, backgroundcomments could be heard, like, "What do you know?Some of these folks in the Vestal Community havea 'flying saucer1 in their back yard!" But de-spite the frightened witnesses' voices and theirfrantic pleas for help, the sheriff's departmentdid not investigate the incident.

The reports did not fall on deaf ears else-where. Managing Editor Clayton Boaz and NewsEditor Nancy Lindsey of the Enterprise (Stuart,Va.) newspaper, together with MUFON's North Car-olina State Director George D. Fawcett and hisassistant investigator Mike Leonas, both of MountAiry, N.C., arrived days later to investigate theUFO encounter.

On the morning after the night of the event,patches of charred ground extended several hun-dred yards across the hillside and down into thewooded area. The ground, ivy or laurel bushes,pine needles, broken tree limbs, fence posts,twigs and other vegetation in the sighting areawere found charred and blackened in a somewhatrandom manner. Some parts of bushes would bebrown, while other parts of the same bushes re-mained green. Some of the wood, tree limbs andtwigs on the ground would be black on one sideand not even be burned on the other. The widelyburned ground and vegetation and bushes were notin the manner of a normal brush fire, but ratherwere "scattered in patches here and there" atrandom. A "burned smell" prevaded the whole area.

The Enterprise representatives took many photo-graphs, while Fawcett and Leonas checked for me-tallic residues with metal detection devices, butfound npne at the near-landing site.

Fawcett and Leonas also dug up soil samples,took photographs, collected burned wood and plantlife and took them to Mount Airy, N.C., where thesamples were examined by Bobby Galyean and LeeCreed of the Rescue Squad and Civil Defense. Thegeiger counters found no radiation above normalon the soil and plant samples, but it was pointedout that an- alleged landing of a space object,would probably involve gamma radiation, which isshort lived. The degree . of radiation drops offsharply after only a. few hours and may hot bemeasurable in a matter of days. The near-landingoccurred on March 1 and the radioactivity testswere run on the . samples on March 12. Betweenthese two dates one snowfall and several rainshad occurred in the Vestal Community.

The Vestal, Va., UFO encounter was "an incred-ible sighting by credible multiple eyewitnesses,"according to Fawcett. "These reports were con-sistent with those elsewhere, and identicalshapes, sizes, sounds, smells, colors, maneuvers,as well as effects on eyewitnesses, animals andsoil and plant samples, were being reported bypersons from all walks of life on a global basisduring the same period of time. The Vestal ob-servers said they hoped it wouldn't happen again.If the animals could only talk, they just mightsay-the same thing."

UFO course participantswant government study

Students completing the first formal course on"The UFO: A Scientific Approach" held at a south-eastern university want the government to re-openits investigation of Unidentified Flying Objects.

Mutual UFO Network State Director for AlabamaProf. Ed Planz taught the course held during theInterim Term (May 13-31) at the University ofAlabama. He said the student consensus stemmedfrom the fact that the Condon Report was conclud-ed five years ago and the late nationally knownexperimental physicist Edward U. Condon said ifnew data were to come up, this would warrant re-opening the UFO case.

The students feel the data presented to themby J. Allen Hynek of Northwestern University andby Pascagoula Sheriff Fred Diamond is of a com-pelling nature for the government to -continueits earlier'studies on UFO or begin anew.

Hynek said two reasons we don't yet have UFOexplanations is that we don't know enough aboutphysics or the psyche. The .class thought govern-ment sponsored research could be done in theseareas. '

Hynek said one fifth of all reported sightingsare still unidentified. The class feels uneasyabout this sort of unknown, particularly afterhearing the terror and fear that Sheriff Diamondsaid Hickson and Parker felt in their allegedkidnap-examination by humanoids.

11

UFO's Behind the Iron CurtainBy Joe Brill

I would like to thank Jeno Miklos, the MUFONRepresentative for Romania for providing andtranslating the following information regardingthe research of Alexander Sift on UFO's in Ro-mania.

"I have seen extraterrestrial vehicles with myown eyes," says the biologist Alexander Sift ofCluj. After twenty-five years of interest andresearch together with careful observations, Sifthas at last put forth his conclusions on the UFOphenomenon and made these findings available tothe editorial staff of "Flacara" (The Flame) andthey in turn published his story in the May 11,1974, edition of their publication. What followsis his account of his conclusions based on manyyears of personal investigations and experiences.

"My life's greatest experience happened whileI was in secondary school as a boy. It was aboutmid summer of 1953, while I was on one of my cus-tomary Sunday excursions. I arrived at the edgeof a grove near Cluj. The time was around noon.On this trip I was both the witness and the vic-tim of the most unusual and frightening adventurethat could possibly happen to a young schoolboy,who was timid and dreamy and who feared tellinganyone what had happened to me that Sunday after-noon." Now, recalling the episode, the biologisttold that all at once he caught sight of a bi-zarre object in the sky. It appeared to consistof a misty ball, which was milky white and some-what translucent. It was moving ahead of. him ata height of about thirty meters in a southwestdirection. Then, the strange object stopped abovethe forest and after a, few seconds it descendedslowly and disappeared behind the foliage of thetrees.

"I bore in mind the place of where it appearedto land and, armed with a staff (which I alwaysbrought with me because of fear of the shepherd'sdogs), I began to proceed in the direction of thelanding site. As I came nearer to the place inquestion I saw nothing at all. The strange fly-ing object seemed to have disappeared into no-where. I continued carefully forward in the di-rection of a particular bush (the place I thoughtthe object should have been located) and stretch-ed out the staff in order to probe around. Then,suddenly, I was astounded to see that the staffand my right arm became completely invisible.Immediately thereafter, a moist, gentle breeze, acold breath, something invisible and unexplain-able began to exert a strong pressure upon theentire surface of my body, urging or forcing meto withdraw some steps. I felt a strong warmthin my legs and then immediately became nauseatedand I vomited. I began running-home as fast as

my shaky legs would carry me. .The next day Iexperienced some unusual sensations. I had thefeeling of floating parallel to the ground andthat objects around me would become dissociated;that is, a range .of missensations which, on see-ing a doctor, turned out to be very psychic dis-orders resulting from an extreme stress temporar-ily involving the neuro-vegetative system."

• But as the years passed by,, this was put inthe past and s'o the fear also was put aside. Thestudent and then the biologist Alexander Sift re-sumed his interest and investigation of this phe-nomena, this time equipped with the knowledge ofhow to conduct scientific research, as well ashaying read and studied a great deal of litera-ture on the UFO subject. The result is what hehas presented in the following information.

Since 1960 to the present these unidentifiedflying objects have appeared with great frequencyin the same general perimeter of area. Accordingto Sift's calculations the most frequently visit-ed area is near the community of -Baciu and itamounts to approximately forty hectares (almost100 acres) of land. The UFO's usually appear tofly in an east to west direction. They have sev-eral shapes. And on many occasions the altitudethey are seen at does not exceed a few hundred,meters. At greater .velocities these observedobjects become enlarged and all the mass growsblurred--contoured--and is surrounded by a halo,appearing as an object of gelatine .(translucent)-like consistence. During their growth they have

12

a "V" shape whose top is always pointed in awesterly direction.

At times these flying objects become barelyperceptible. They remind us of atmospheric whirl-winds or of caloric turbulences, girded visibleones as seen on some summer days; however, theydo appear on photoplates even in this state prom-inently contoured, revealing their true form andcolor and suggesting the same mass of gelatine-like consistence. Their flights have also beenfollowed through polarized light filters and theobjects did not disappear.

To the question of do these "extraterrestrialvehicles" visit us alone or do they come accomp-anied by other fellows, the Cluj biologist gavethe .following observation: "In most instancesthe flying "V" appears alone, but as I told youthe unknown objects assume not only this form. Ihave observed several times and did photographobjects of spherical form, bright ones resemblingsome glowing globes or sometimes on the contrary,pale, phantom-like almost invisible objects. In1965 there appeared above the forest a pear-like-shaped object (see the photograph included). Fromthis object three other transparent globes weredetached, and then after this another seven smal-ler ones were detached from it. These smallerglobes disappeared after a few seconds."

What are the sizes of these objects? "It wasvery difficult for me to take an exact measure-ment during their flights. I have observed themfrom various distances. I did take, however,.measurements at the landing place. Yes, the ob-jects,.not all of them for sure, I have seen didland and this .point does evidently constitute amost spectacular thing. I have watched the ob-jects in the moments when they, on approachingthe ground, grew smaller, lost contours and be-came opaque. Once they were on the ground theytook on a pyramid-like shape and their positionat rest was always the same: the top directednorth and the bottom directed south. I didn'thave the courage in those moments to approachthem. I did visit the landing places the dayfollowing these observations and found in thegrass the imprints left by the unknown vehicle. Icould thus correctly assume that the objectswould have been of a triangular shape; the settl-ed and burnt grass confirmed this to me. That is,a body with the longer sides of 3.2. meters andthe smaller side (the base) of 2.4. meters. Theheight, that is the distance from the ground tothe upper surface of the object of approximately1.8 meters. Also, it is important to note thatno grass has ever grown again in that place wherethe object was resting."

Did you record radio perturbations or magneticderangements? "Never, nor did I find the presenceof any radioactivity. I did, instead, some ex-periments that force me to believe that thesestrange vehicles are propelled by nuclear energy.Several times I concealed in the landing areasphotographic undeveloped films which were put inparaffinated boxes. After a few days I returned

for these planted boxes and on the development ofthem, they presented themselves in a highly fog-ged state. I. then planted another system of"trap" boxes (again paraffinated), this time withsemens of a fir tree, knowing that these would behighly sensitive to radiation (lethal dosage of600-: 900 roentgen units). .I had the same surprisewith the semens. Part of them were severely dam-aged. But this did not impress me as much as thebranches of the trees and bushes nearby the land-,ing place that were burnt, as if someone had"gentled" them with the flame of a welding de-vice. This is not a made up tale as I invite youto see them for yourselves."

So, the next day Liviu Timbus and Nicolae Savuof the editorial staff of "Flacara" went withAlexander Sift to visit the "cosmodrou" near thecommunity of Baciu, where they observed for them-selves the strange markings and imprints left by"astronautical craft." They also examined forthemselves the trees that were burnt perhaps by aradioactive jet. It was all as biologist Sifthad said it was in his account. Strange phenomenawhich come to decipher or, conversely, to deepenthe mystery of the UFO's. For the present, thisis how it stands.

The Utah UFO Display'by Salisbury availableDr. Frank B. Salisbury's long-anticipated book,

THE UTAH UFO DISPLAY: A Biologist's Report, waspublished in July. The introduction to the bookis by Dr. J. Allen Hynek.

Salisbury, biologist from Utah State Univer-sity presently on loan to the Atomic Energy com-mission, has produced a book from the point ofview of a scientist. In his book, Salisburybuilds his observations around the recorded ac-counts of those who have witnessed UFO's in the,Uintah Mountain Basin in his own state of Utah.These observations, starting in 1967, have con-tinued to this day. They have reportedly neverbefore been published. Is it not logical, Salis-bury suggests, to assume that in a universe sovast and ageless, another planet somewhere isreaching out--and has touched Earth? Could itnot be equally argued, he asks, that after all,our earth .is but an experimental station, and we,the creatures of some great universal plan—whirling through space and stretching our tinyminds to comprehend our environment and the greatchallenges of our time? One of the book's fea-tures is a series of drawings depicting the ap-"pearance of the UFO's as described by the ordin-ary citizens of the Uintah Basin who have witt-nessed them and reported the sightings to one oftheir number, Junior Hicks, who'.has kept records.

The 224-page book is available from Skylook orfrom the publisher, Devin Adair Co., 1 park Ave.,Old Greenwich, Conn. 06870J._ The price is $7.95.

13

In Others' WordsBy Lucius

The various weekly tabloids continue to featureUFO material of widely varying worth. The EN-QUIRER remains the most reliable of the lot; itsissues for July 21 and 28 contained sighting re-ports from prison guards in Washington, theopinions of five prominent psychiatrists regard-ing contact with ET life, and (beginning in theJuly 28 issue) excerpts from Ralph § Judy Blum'sexcellent book, BEYOND EARTH.

NATIONAL TATTLER featured UFO articles in theJune 30, July 7 and July 21 issues. Reports fromCalifornia and Texas were included.

The June 30 NATIONAL INSIDER has an interviewwith Ralph fj Judy Blum which Ralph says theynever gave, but he liked it anyway!

In the "probable fiction" department, there isan article on animal mutilations and UFOs in theJune 30 issue of NATIONAL NEWS EXTRA. Oh yes,the mutilations exist and the UFOs exist, butthis "eyewitness report" sounds like somethingspecifically designed to sell papers.

The August issue of SAGA is not at hand as I .write this, but it is supposed to contain an art-icle on a possible link between "Bigfoot" andUFOs. (Editor's Note: The Saga.article includesa number of sightings investigated by Stan Gor-don, who comments that the article has "a fewerrors," but is "basically good.")The May/June issue of SOUTHERN VOICES contained

an article on the Pascagoula case, but it waslargely repetition of familiar material.

An interview with Josef Blumrich, author ofTHE SPACESHIPS OF EZEKIEL, may be found in theJuly/August issue of BEYOND REALITY, along withHayden Hewes1 regular "UFO Report" column.

The August POLICE GAZETTE has a "speculativerehash" piece on UFOs which you can easily affordto pass up.

August FATE reports on the Gallup Poll regard-ing UFOs, giving a bit of additional informationon sightings by interviewees.

Interviews with Erich von Daniken may be foundin the August issues of VERTEX and PLAYBOY. Theformer is largely rehash, but the PLAYBOY inter-view makes some interesting points and is perhapsone of the better von Daniken interviews thusfar.

The planet Mars may or may not have any rela-tionship to UFOs, but I think most readers arealso interested in astronomy, life on otherplanets, etc. Therefore, I would like to brieflymention three books on Mars which I find quiteinteresting. LIFE ON MARS? by Graham Berry is avery good introduction to "Mars-ology" for young-er readers, and the adults will also find somegood material in it. In the main, Berry's bookdeals with the mission of Mariner 9 and a goodmany of the fascinating photos from that space

Parish

probe are included in the book. The price is$4.95 from: The Ward Ritchie Press, 3044 River-side Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90039. Perhaps themost detailed of the recent books dealing withthe Red Planet is Martin Caidin's DESTINATIONMARS (Doubleday § Co., Inc., 245 Park Avenue,N.Y., N.Y. 10017, $7.95). This volume gives con-siderable background information on previous Mar-tian studies, as well as presenting more recentdata and photographs from the Mariner 6,7, and 9probes. Material on certain Martian "anomalies"(such as brilliant flares seen by. astronomers). isincluded in the Caidin book. Photographs, mapsand drawings of Mars are featured in a beautifulbook by Patrick Moore § Charles A. Cross which istitled, simply, MARS. It has some of the samematerial to be found in the Berry and Caidinbooks, but also includes considerable additionaldata. It may be obtained for $7.95 from: CrownPublishers, Inc., 419 Park Avenue South, N.Y.,N.Y. 10016.

UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS OVER THE TENNESEEVALLEY is a very interesting summary of UFOevents which have occurred in Giles County,Tenn., as well as in Northern Alabama. The bookis written by W.A. Darbro (a space scientist atthe Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville,Ala.) and Stanley L. Ingram (a newspaper colum-nist for the Pulaski Citizen). We know there arecertain areas where UFOs seem to congregate andare seen regularly by local citizens. Piedmont,Mo. is a good example. The area discussed byDarbro 5 Ingram seems to be another such site.Most of their discussions center on cases from1972-73, although a few older reports are alsodetailed. As in other locations where UFO ac-tivity is high, there are reports of UFO land-ings and occupant sightings. The authors endtheir book with a summary of nation-wide reportsfrom the autumn flap of 1973. Copies of the bookmay be obtained from Mr. Ingram at Box 377,Lewisburg, Tenn. 37091 for $2.50 each.

The theories and research of the late Dr. Wil-helm Reich have always been the subject of muchcontroversy. One of the more active and voci-ferous spokesmen for "Reichian" topics is JeromeEden. In a previous book, ORGONE ENERGY, Edenbriefly mentioned Reich's experiments involvingUFOs. Now, in his new book, PLANET IN TROUBLE(sub-titled "The UFO Assault on Earth"), Edengoes into much more detail regarding what he andReich both deemed the ultimate threat to life onour planet. UFOs use "orgone" for their propul-sion, Eden says, as well as throwing off a deadlyexhaust of "DOR," a highly toxic radioactive. Aswith so many other "borderline" subjects, I findthe data fascinating, but I am uncertain how ser-

14

The Sixth Annuat Carityte. Lake., If.., UFO Sky-uiatch and P-Lcnic, &pom>ofLe.d by RoA&tta and V-Lck.Ho&neA o^ the. Gne.ateJi.St. LOUAA UFO'Study Gnoupand MUF0M, attnacte.d ufiolog-l&tA ^nom a. numbeA. ofaAtateA. Spe.akeAA inc£ude.d Lou Fa/uAh, C£aie.nce.0. Vangie., and Watt

Top photo: a ^toJie. and. battoon .combinationby Fnank Blown and Le.o-Wic.kJU.nl>ki

tracking at the. Cantyte. Skyuiatch. Bottom photo:Watt kndnu*, In nadio •• contact with. Vn.Mm&tswng, c.he.ckA the. bza>u.ng .ofi one.- ofa the.ie.cn> e.d ^tate.-and baiioon combtnatiom>.

iously to consider Eden's conclusions. The bookhas a definite tinge.of "fervent discipleship" toit',7-so one cannot.help wondering how objectivethe ' presentation of "evidence'" . may be. At anyrate, if you are interested " in either UFOs orReich (or both), perhaps you should read PLANETIN TROUBLE and decide for yourself. It is avail-able from Exposition Press, Inc., 50 JerichoTurnpike, 'Jericho, N.Y. 11753 for $7.50.

two chapters of Daniel Cohen's.VOODOO, DEVILSAND THE NEW INVISIBLE WORLD ,are devoted to UFOsand related subjects.' Unfortunately, Mr. Cohen'sresearch into 'these matters has been superficial,-at best. Cohen is a "professional ;skeptic" onvirtually any "controversial" topic, so it wouldbe asking a bit much for him to present his casefactually, perhaps. The remainder of the bookdeals with witchcraft, voodoo, possession, etc.The price is .$5".95. from: Dodd, Mead & Co., 79Madison Ave., N.Y., N.Y. 10016.

Washington object whinesOLYMPIA, WASH., OLYMPIAN, April 8, • 1974--.

Ladell Lund, Donna Widener, and Dorietta Widenerreported the sighting of. a UFO the night of April7 near Carpenter and . Homann roads. The girlssaid the cone-shaped, object hovered while emit-ting a high-pitched whine. The object reportedlyhad two headlights, four blue lights, and oneblinking red light on the bottom. The witnessessaid the object, which hovered over their car,was about the'-size of a small airplane, and had apointed tip.

English students report sighting'LUTON, ENGLAND, EVENING POST, April 23, 1974--

A group of sixth-form students say they sightedtwo UFOs. Michael Jackson, 16, arid a group ofschool friends reportedly were walking -along theLeagrave area of Luton .when "suddenly we saw thislight in the sky flashing green, 'red, and white.It was very low, about 50 to 100 feet, and cer-tainly not an aircraft," said Jackson. "It wentover the Caddington .area near the Ml. We wereall quite excited and ran farther down the roadwhen we saw another UFO. This one had threeblinding white lights, and it made a series ofcomplicated maneuvers before shooting off in thedirection of Warden Hill. Not many people believeus, but this was no hoax. Five of us saw theseobjects very clearly."

At Warden Hill, Luton, the youths reportedlyspotted large scorch marks on the grass. "Therewere large areas of scorched areas as thoughsomething had landed there," said Jackson. "Therewere also lumps of black, clayish material lyingaround." At Luton Airport a spokesman said,"What these youngsters could have seen was alight-aircraft flying over the area."

UFO material for trade—I have many pho-tos, slides, clippings and books on UFOsthat I will trade for similar UF.O material.Send trade list to:- Ron.Smotek, 5625 ThomasSt., Maple Hts.-,. Ohio 44137.

15

UFO s discussed by authors,astronaut, congressman

Editor's Note: This article was takenfrom the April 12, 1974, "Today" show onNBC-TV. It was prepared and submitted byDavid A. Schroth of the Greater St. LouisUFO Study Group;

SUBJECT: Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs)GUESTS: Astronaut Brigadier General James

A. McDivitt; Congressman J. Edward Roush; Ralphand Judy Blum, authors of Beyond Earth: Man'sContact with UFOs.

MODERATOR: Edwin Newman

NEWMAN: »...Mr. Blum, what happened, in 1973?.R. BLUM: I guess it started the night of

August 30th, when in 25 or 30 Georgia towns allover the state, police wires and sheriffs' linesbegan to be flooded with reports that people wereseeing things over their, houses and over theirfields. They were lights; sometimes they lookedlike objects. They were very upset, and a lot ofpeople reported them. Hunter Air Force Base inSavannah had a report of two military police whoclaimed their car was driven off the road by aswooping, low-flying "thing." Up in Tupelo, Mis-sissippi, some state troopers and forest rangerswatched something the size of a house maneuvering--so they say--over their heads. What really hap-pened was a lot of policemen all over the coun-try, particularly in the South and in the West,reported seeing things, laid their.jobs on theline. And then on the llth, I believe, of Oct-ober, two men in Pascagoula, Mississippi, claimedthay they were floated aboard a UFO while theywere fishing along the Pascagoula River one night--they just meant to go fishing. And one of them,six months later, is still under medical care.What.happened, we still don't know.

NEWMAN: One of" them was named Hickson, andthe other was named Parker. Which one is stillunder medical care, by the way?

R! BLUM: It's Parker—NEWMAN: General McDivitt, you spoke to Hick-

son? • " ' . . " . 'McDIVITT: -Yes, I did. . . .NEWMAN: How soon after this allegedly hap-

pened? ' .McDIVITT: Oh, it was probably a month, or-,sp

afterwards. But I was really convinced. I thinkCharles Hickson is telling the truth, as he knowsit. He's really not the type of guy who goes outand looks for publicity or anything.

NEWMAN: What do you mean by, "as he knows it"?McDIVITT: Well,- I don't know whether that

really happened or not, and I guess I wouldn't

Ralph and Judy Blum

know unless I were actually there. But I thinkthat what he says happened, he's convinced reallyhappened. And as far as I can tell, there'snothing to disprove the fact that it didn't.

NEWMAN: Is there anything to prove that itdid?

McDIVITT: I guess there's Charles Hickson.And I don't mean that to be facetious. Thereare a lot of indications that people see things.If I walked out on the street and saw an acci-dent', I'd be able to report it and everybodywould consider me to be a good witness. If Isaw a . UFO or a flying saucer or something—assoon as you say something like that, people nolonger really believe you. That's kind of aproblem.

NEWMAN!:. What details did he give?McDIVITT: He said he was fishing, he heard

this thing, he saw this thing—which he assumedwas a spacecraft--land. Some people come out,pick him up, float him back into the spacecraft,examine him, then take him back out again.

NEWMAN: Did they have pointed ears?McDIVITT: Well, as a matter of fact they had

two things that came out like this (illustrates)and something that came out like this. Now, theremight be some other form of communicating; like aradar system or a—you know, just because we seein the visible range of light and we hear noises--other people can communicate other ways, I'msure.- NEWMAN: Congressman Roush, did you come to anyconclusions after your congressional hearings in1968?

ROUSH: There was the inescapable conclusionthat we were experiencing a phenomenon, or wewere experiencing phenomena, which needed ex-plaining by people of scientific minds who couldconvince the American people what this was. Wedon't know what it was—I think that had to bethe conclusion of our hearings. I should pointout that we did not have a bunch of Jcooks at thishearing. We had six of the nation's outstanding

16

scientists testifying before the committee andparticipating in this symposium. :

-NEWMAN: .Now was that the end of this -as far--ROUSH: That was the end of it as far as Con-

gress was -concerned, yes. There have been noother hearings on this subject, to my knowledge,since'that time in 1968.

NEWMAN: Well that's the end of it so far asCongress is concerned, but if this is a matterfor scientific substantiation, Congress wouldn'tbe much involved in it anyway. Is any other partof the government doing anything?

ROUSH: You're wrong when you say that this--(laughter)

NEWMAN: Am I wrong? I may well be--it happens.I could see I was wrong when I said—

ROUSH: Yes. You see, my own thought is this:that we don't know what this is, but we shouldfind out. I don't know that we should go down toMississippi and investigate that. And I don'tknow that we should investigate the flying objectthat Governor Gilligan saw, or my friend Con-gressman Hilles saw, or that James McDivitt saw.But I do think that the Congress does have theresponsibility of funding basic scientific re-search, which might lead to an answer for thisproblem and many others. And we do that, by fund-ing the National Aeronautics and Space Adminis-tration in its basic research, and that's re-search that private people can't do. We fund theNational Science Foundation in their basic re-search, and that is very important. It's impor-tant for us to know about the atmosphere—

•NEWMAN:-. Is any research going on now into un-identified flying objects?

ROUSH: Not as such. But it seems to me thereis research which is related, and perhaps willsomeday explain this phenomenon which we are ex-periencing. It leads us to other questions, suchas extraterrestrial life. Viking is to land onMars in 1976— . ,

R. BLUM: July 4th.ROUSH: --on July 4th, yes, that's right, and

this is, of course, during our bicentennial cele-bration. And one of the purposes is to determinewhether or not there is some form of life on Mars—which, again, might lead to an explanation oflife on other planets.

NEWMAN: July 4th, 1976, may bring up a sorepoint with Mrs. Blum, who is from England, but--

(laughter)NEWMAN: --In any event, is there any research

being done in this field in England? Is there anyexperience there?

J. BLUM: I think the situation there is exac-tly the same as here. A friend of mine's grand-father, Air Marshall Borton, told me that theBritish Air Ministry's files on UFOs are quitephenomenal. But they've never disclosed anythingabout them. In fact, the only countries who'vecome right out and acknowledged that UFOs doreally exist are Brazil and France--especiallyFrance, where I think it was February of thisyear, after a . tremendous wave of sightings in

France and northern Italy—when, incidentally, Igather that two UFOs landed on Normandy beaches.

g. BLUM: (laughing) Isn't that nice?J. BLUM: The French, being the realists-they

are, have now issued forms to their gendarmes,and said, "Do not attack any of these little fel-lows." Now there may be no little fellows. Theremay be nothing we:know as real, and looking forevidence seems to be the hardest part of thegame, because I don't think we're ever going tohave any real evidence, and that's what's hard onscientists.

NEWMAN: You don't think we're ever going tohave-any real evidence?

R; BLUM: No. I've finally come to that con-clusion, Ed. I finally agree with you.

NEWMAN: Really. . .- .J. BLUM: No, I don't agree on that.R. BLUM: I think we.'11 never have (garbled)

evidence. I think what it is is beyond us.McDIVITT: I hope that someday we have the

knack of communicating with these people so that,really, we can talk to them. I hope that beforeI die I get a chance to really meet one of theseguys; •

(light laughter)J. BLUM: Me,, too. -NEWMAN: Okay", we'll be back to talk to you

about that.(commercial) . ' • - ' _ 'NEWMAN: Ralph Blum said;he thought we would

never have any contact with extraterrestriallife, people from other planets. You didn'tagree, Jim.

McDIVITT: No. I think that they're really a-round, and I hope that someday--maybe not in thisdecade, or maybe not even in this century or thenext century--but someday, I hope that we cancommunicate. We're not very smart as a group ofpeople, you know. We've only been around a fewthousand years, and earth is a few billion yearsold, so we've'got a'long ways to go.

NEWMAN: What did you.see, or what do you thinkyou ..saw, .when you were--was it Gemini 4?

McDIVITT: Yes. Well I didn't see anythingthat a--something like an upper stage of a rocketor something. It was a long, cylindrical objectwith a long pole sticking out. But it was a veryprecise object. It wasn't a—

NEWMAN: Could it have been the upper stage ofa rocket that we put up there?

McDIVITT: I thought it was when I first sawit, but it turned .out when we looked at therecords that there weren't any upper stages ofrockets anywhere near me. So, no, it could nothave been. It wasn't a Russian one. (emphati-cally) It wasn't any other country's, because weknow where they all are.

NEWMAN: Have you thought much about this--what this, could be: .1 mean, you talk about lifeon other planets.

McDIVITT: ,1 didn't much at the time, but sincethen .I've had an opportunity to philosophize a

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little more, and I really think that it would benaive for us to think that we're the only intel-ligent beings in the entire universe, when youtake time to think how big the universe reallyis. So I think there are other intelligent be-ings someplace.

NEWMAN: And from what you know of, among otherthings, the space program, - General McDivitt, doyou think, if these other forms of life exist,that we will, within any predictable period, getinto contact with them?

McDIVITT: Not predictable, but I hope thateventually we will.

NEWMAN: Congressman Roush, your hearings wereset off, to some extent, by something that hap-pened in England?

ROUSH: To some extent, yes. I had a littleproblem in getting approval for the hearings—

NEWMAN: You mean because money would be in-volved?

ROUSH: No, no. Simply because it seemedrather foolish.

(laughter)ROUSH: About that time, Sir Bernard Level1,

who runs Jodrell Bank in England—and they have alarge dish there, a tracking dish--

NEWMW: The observatory.ROUSH: --that's right. (He) began to receive

signals which seemed to have some pattern tothem, and some people interpreted this as signalsfrom some other planet, and got excited about it.Well, this was enough to excite my chairman, andhe have approval for the symposium, which wasconducted.

NEWMAN: Ralph Blum, you wanted to say some-thing.

R. BLUM: I wanted to back up and correct my-self. I didn't say, or mean, .that we'd neverhave contact. I say we may never have physicalevidence, because I think something--we're havingexperience already, we're already having contact.

NEWMAN: I wanted to ask you about that. Whydo you think we will never have physical — if youbelieve that there are such things as UFOs, uni-dentified flying objects, then you surely believethat someday they will become identified flyingobjects.

R. BLUM: No.NEWMAN: You don't believe that.R. BLUM: No, I think what happens is—I think

even the way we talk about their coming here--Imean, it's been a year now that we've been im-mersed in this subject, and we didn't want it. Wedidn't go out looking for this subject—it sortof fell on us. I think the way they travel isn'tacross space, the way Jim was travelling and theway we travel. .1 think they drop in from--theremay be a lot of other three-dimensional places a-round. I don't think there's any fourth dimen-sion,, because I think to have a universe you'vegot to have three dimensions, and that's allit'll take. And maybe something drops in fromsomewhere else—drops in across from where theycome from. And maybe they aren't physical. A man

like Leakey discovers a new skull in Africa, andby transmitting a hologram, that skull can appearin three-dimensional form in the Museum of Natur-al History in New York and be measured with cali-pers, without ever leaving Africa. We are on ourway towards physical transmission of objects.

NEWMAN: So you believe we will have contactwith them, but it won't be physical contact.

J. BLUM: I think there may be more than onekind of flying saucer. I mean, there may be whatRalph is talking about, and maybe also, if somecivilization is just 200 years ahead of us, theywould be using—what? Nuclear fission? Fusion?

McDIVITT: Sure. Fantastic types of propul-sion systems, and other things. I don't thinkwe're really smart enough in the 1970s to reallyunderstand what's going to happen in 2300, orsome other time like that, and these people couldbe way ahead of us.

ROUSH: Well, John Dewey spoke of "audaciousimagination which has led to great scientificdiscoveries." And that's what we're experiencingright now, and it's what science has to exper-ience- -this "audacious imagination." It's beenthis quality in the American people that has madeus the outstanding technological and scientificnation in the world. We are willing to suffer,and experience this audacious imagination.

NEWMAN: I'm going to give you a question andask you for a one-word answer. Has enough hap-pened since your last hearings to warrant morehearings, Congressman Roush?

ROUSH: If it costs money, no.(laughter)NEWMAN: Thank you, one and all.

Policeman, others chase UFOROCHESTER, MINN., POST-BULLETIN, FEB. 20, 1974

--A Rochester policeman and a service stationoperator were among several persons who report-edly saw a UFO Feb. 19 in northwest Rochester.

James Kuhlman, who operates a Clark Servicestation, was driving his wrecker past the Hill-crest shopping center about 11:25 p.m. when hesaw the object "flying at about 100 feet, towardsme. I was really terrified when I first saw i"t."He said he pulled his truck into the shoppingcenter and parked. Kuhlman described the UFO asbigger than a wrecker truck with a "kind of whitedome shell on top." He said it seemed to bepowered by what looked like several small after-burners flaming from the bottom. "It cruisedslowly right over my head in a northeasterly di-rection," said Kuhlman, who gave chase in histruck.

He was joined in the "chase by Patrolman JamesPreiss in a squad car, who had spotted the objectas he drove north on U.S. 52. "Whatever it was,"Preiss told the police dispatcher, "it was seento have flames coming from it."

The control tower at Rochester Municipal Air-port said nothing strange was seen in the sky atthe time, and nothing was tracked on radar.

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UFOs created in laboratoryEditor's Note; The following scientific

experiment may account for some "light inthe sky" sightings, thus taking its placeamong other possible explanations, such asplasma, hoaxes, space animals, meteorites,deterioration of satellites, fireballs, bal-loons, planes, swamp gas, etc. It does notappear to explain lighted portholes, radartracking, speeds of thousands of miles perhour, evasive tactics, etc. The experimentis a positive step in moving toward an ex-planation of the UFO .phenomena, however, andprovides yet another possible explanationwhich the serious UFO researcher will wantto consider in analysing a given sighting.

By Wes LeflerUniversity of North Carolina

CHAPEL HILL--The director of Morehead Plane-tarium here doesn't have to look into the nightsky for his "flying saucers." He can make themin his private laboratory.- "Ours are not UFO's,"he says, "because we-can identify ours. But ourlaboratory models may partly explain the recentflurry of UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) sight-ings." ".

You name the shape you want and he can make it....saucer, cigar, diffuse blob. And using variousgases one might^possibly custom mix the colors...red, blue, green, yellow. With a four-foot-longglass tube, gas (air) and electricity, A. F. Jen-zano can produce the "saucers" in singles or infleets. He can make them hover or.blaze out in aflash of colorful light. --. v

Jenzano came up with the laboratory "appari- •tions" when he saw a correlation between them andthe reported UFO sightings. With the same equip-ment he explains the Northern Lights. Jenzanofires a high-voltage charge through a partialvacuum inside a five-inch-diameter glass tube tocreate the "apparitions." This electrical chargeexcites particles of air (gas) inside the tubewhich glow and form in various shapes dependingon how much air and electricity is fed into thetube. "I believe something like this is what,UFOobservers are seeing rather than space ships fromanother world," Jenzano says.

He explains that static electricity may ac-cumulate in the air above the earth throughoutthe year. But he says that these particles inour air are more highly electrified during Marchand September when the earth is over the moredense sunspot region of the sun. In the earlyspring the earth, which has been warmed all dayby the sun, rapidly disperses heat into the air,often creating areas of momentary low pressure,Jenzano says. "It is in these areas of low pres-sure that apparitions might appear just prior to

This pocket of glowing gas might pass for a UFO(unidentified flying object) if it were not in-,side Morehead Planetarium's giant test tube. ' Theman at the controls can make it "hover" or he canmake it streak away. He can even fire the gaseous"flying saucers" out in fleets. He can vary,theircolors. A. F. Jenzano, director of the.Planetar-ium, came up with the idea in an attempt to ex-plain what he believes some UFO sighters are see-ing in the night skies.

being occupied by air from an adjoining highpressure area," he explains. "What we actuallysee is excited (electromagnetically charged) airthat glows because it is at low pressure in asingle, moving pocket."The degree to which this pocket of air is evac-

uated, combined wi th the amount of electricitypresent, controls the brightness of the appari-tion's glow. The color depends on, the type ofgas in the pocket like the various colors a-chieved in neon tubes. And the shape and sizedepend on the vacuum packet's shape and size._Jenzano explained that apparitions appear onlywhen a delicate balance is achieved; the condi-tion of the air, the electrical charge presentand the prevailing gas in the air at the-time hasto be "just right." "These gases 'are usuallywaste material from homes, autos, industrialplants or a combination of these," Jenzano says.

Why do some of these apparitions hover? Andwhy do some streak out of sight vat high rates ofspeed? "Based on our experiments with the tube,"Jenzar.o says, "if the air is 'static' the ap-parition (pocket of glowing gas) will hover. Vi-olent atmospheric conditions will cause it tostreak away out of sight."

Jenzano doesn't claim to have all the answers."At this jpoint our -explanation is about as scien-tifically imaginative as three-dimensional flyingsaucers are fictionally imaginative," he says.

Please check the subscription expiration date on your address label to seeif this is your last month for your current, subscription. We encourage you torenew in advance so you do not miss any issue.

If you are moving, please send us your new address by the 20th of the monthpreceding our next issue date. We must pay postage on all undelivered mag-azines, and we would rather use this money to improve Skylook.

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•\

Recapping and commentingBy Richard Hall

Some comments each month—or when space per-mits—on similarities or patterns of UFO phenom-ena over the years might give some perspectiveand suggest ideas for research.

The June SKYLOOK rang many bells. NICAP haddozens of cases similar to the Dec. 13 Bradenton,Fla., photo case with "artifacts" which high-lights continuing problems of investigation. Toplay the devil's advocate: one teenage witness,"brilliant" and bored, photo with no referencepoints clipped from the full roll, knowledgableamateur photographer. Not to prejudge, but allthe elements of a hoax are present and this hy-pothesis must be considered. Three "credential-carrying agents." Question No. 1: what did thecredentials say?

The "slag" rocks, unless they yield a strangechemistry, will provide ambiquous evidence atbest, and the film apparently cannot be analyzedmeaningfully. Certainly the alleged 2nd witnessshould be sought, and Thrush's personality in-vestigated. As I pointed out in The UFO Evidence,an unsupported photo must be considered no morevalid than the credibility of the witness, whichoften remains a question-mark.

Ted Phillips continues to do valuable scien-tific work gathering physical evidence at allegedUFO landing sites; well worthwhile even if theyprove to be duds. A few noteworthy past UFO land-ing indentation cases are: 5/5/64 near Comstock,Minn., with a 3-foot crater and small indenta-tions; 9/5/64 Glassboro, N.J., crater case (SeeU.F.O. Investigator, Vol. II No. 12); and 8/19/65Cherry Creek, N.Y. (See Strange Effects fromUFOs, p. 42-43). .

The projected beams of light (apparently) inthe Oct. 29, 1973, Austria case ("like snailfeelers") have many interesting partial paral-lels. A brief compilation of light beam cases isincluded in Appendix D of UFOs: A New Look. Notincluded there is the downward projected beam inthe famous 4/17/66 Ravenna, Ohio, case. AlthoughI can't retrieve the exact reference, I recallJim McDonald talking about a case in Australiainvolving "bent" car headlight beams in thepresence of a UFO.

The advertising plane that produced a "saucer"illusion April 9 near St. Louis reminded me of anidentical experience a few years back in Wheaton;Md. My heart jumped into my throat when, for abrief moment, I thought I was seeing a UFO des-cending to land nearby. The illusion was verystartling, but the identification shortly there-after as an ad plane was definite. NICAP used tocheck the logs of the companies flying suchplanes, usually seen enroute from a fringe air-

port to a shopping center area where the messageusually is distinct only when the plane is lowand directly overhead. The moving message lightsviewed from the side produce the "rotating UFOwindows." The small planes used often cannot beheard until nearby. Their slow motion and lackof UFO-like behavior usually is the clue. Theylook but don't act like UFOs.

The following used books are available atthis time. Some have dust jackets, some are.out of print. All have tight bindings andare in good readable condition or better.Sold first come, first served at $5.00 eachfor hard cover books, and $1.00 each forpaperbacks, postpaid. Listing of a partic-ular book does not constitute an endorse-ment or recommendation. Return any bookpostpaid for refund if not satisfield.

Hardbacks $5.00 each

FLYING SAUCERS HAVE LANDED by Leslie andAdamski, 1953

FLYING SAUCERS UNCENSORED by Harold T.Wilkins, 1955

REPORT ON UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS byEdward J. Ruppelt, 1956

FLYING SAUCERS: TOP SECRET by Donald E.Kehoe, 1960

ABOARD A FLYING SAUCER by Truman Bethurum1954

FLYING SAUCERS ON THE ATTACK by Harold T.Wilkins, 1954

INSIDE THE SPACE SHIPS by George Adamski,1955

FLYING SAUCERS FROM OUTER SPACE by DonaldE. Kehoe, 1953THE INTERRUPTED JOURNEY by John G. Fuller,

1966

Paperbacks $1.00 each

INCIDENT AT EXETER by John G. Fuller,1966STRANGERS FROM THE SKIES by Brad Steiger,

1966FLYING SAUCERS FROM OUTER SPACE by Donald

E. Kehoe, 1954FLYING SAUCERS--SERIOUS BUSINESS by Frank

Edwards, 1966FLYING SAUCERS ON THE ATTACK by Harold T.

Wilkins, 1954

SKYLOOK26 Edgewood DriveQuincy, 111. 62301

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