Showing posts with label Captured Flying Saucers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Captured Flying Saucers. Show all posts

Thursday, June 22, 2023

The UFO Crash-Retrieval Story Returns

(Avrocar standing in for a captured spaceship.)

Flying Saucer crashes started making the news in the summer of 1947. Most were small discs thrown by pranksters or pieces of equipment launched by the military. Later, stories of the U.S. military recovering alien bodies from flying saucers surfaced, and they refuse to go away. Here’s a look at the top examples and how history was made.

Roswell, New Mexico, 1947

The headline on the Roswell Daily Record, July 8, 1497, stated: “RAAF Captures Flying Saucer On Ranch in Roswell Region.” The terminology “Unidentified Flying Object” had yet to be established, so flying disc or saucer was commonly used, no matter the shape involved. The article contained no description of the object, as “no details of the saucer's construction or its appearance had been revealed.” Later accounts described the recovered object to be “remnants of a tinfoil covered box kite and a rubber balloon.” At the time, there was no discussion of alien bodies recovered in connection to Roswell. That changed with the involvement of imaginative ufologists in 1978.

1949: The Story of a Saucer Crash in Aztec, New Mexico, 1948

Frank Scully was a Hollywood gossip columnist, with "Scully's Scrapbook" dishing up Tinseltown gab for Variety magazine. Scully was also a reviewer of literature and wrote a few books of his own. His October 8, 1949, column, and a follow-up on November 23, 1949, described on the discovery of flying saucers and the bodies of the sixteen little men inside, “these Saucerians are from three to three and a half feet tall,” charred black due to a fatal atmosphere leak. The presumed Venusians were identical to humans except in stature.

Silas Newton, Frank Scully, and the book they made.

In Scully’s subsequent bestselling 1950 book, Behind the Flying Saucers, he revealed his primary source to be Silas M. Newton and quoted “the scientist I have called Dr. Gee,” who told him, “We took the little bodies out, and laid them on the ground… examined them and their clothing… They were normal from every standpoint… [not] ‘midgets’…’perfectly normal in their development.” Silas Newton’s story spread by word of mouth, and by early 1950 there were several versions of the story circulating, as seen in this Associated Press story from March 10, 1950. Ray Dimmick said the saucer pilot’s tiny body was “embalmed for scientific study.”

Associated Press story from March 10, 1950

This was the original crash-retrieval story, establishing all the classic elements: a saucer with small alien bodies captured by the US military, the scientific examination of the spaceship's exotic light metal, advanced technology, and the deceased crew it contained. Just as importantly, it introduced the US government as the villain in the story, with their policy of denial and cover-ups of UFO evidence.

 From EC Comics' Weird Science-Fantasy #25, "Flying Saucer Report"

The Silas Newton flying saucer story has been continually retold since its inception, with some details added or subtracted and names and locations altered to fit the storyteller's purpose. Concerned citizens who heard the tales contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation, who had agents collect information on Silas Newton the stories he originated. Skipping ahead a few decades, the resulting FBI files were later mistakenly or falsely presented as substantiation of the crash stories. A sensational FBI memo from 1950 was discovered by ufologists in 1977. It stated:

“An investigator for the Air Forces stated that three so-called flying saucers had been recovered in New Mexico.”

The fuss was over nothing. The Guy Hottel memo was an FBI agent’s report on a rumor repeated by an informant. The material itself was just a variation of Silas Newton’s hoaxed flying saucer crash story. But getting back to the 1950s…

Flying Saucer Hardware

Around 1952, “The Wright Field story” was a tale circulating among UFO researchers that a captured flying was held in secret in Dayton, Ohio, at what is known today as Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. The story turned out to be another imitation of the Aztec yarn, but along the way it was taken seriously by Bill Nash, a commercial pilot who became a prominent UFO activist. Based on the rumors, during a lecture, Nash told the audience, "the Air Force has collected hardware from outer space." When a reporter in the audience published Nash’s speculative remarks, it became headline news.

The Pentagon denied having any such thing. Confronted with demands to substantiate his claim, Nash admitted he had no tangible evidence, saying that it was only “my opinion… there must be some vestige of truth in the oft repeated rumor that the Air Force has a saucer or parts thereof in their possession.” 

In Search of… Pickled Aliens

The frequent repetition of the Aztec story and variant rumors prompted Ed Sullivan to write the article, “To the Man with the Pickle Jar” in the Civilian Saucer Investigation Quarterly Review, Sept. 1952.

“CSI has received hundreds of letters from people seeking the facts behind reports of crashed flying saucers, unknown metals… and the little man from outer space preserved in a pickle jar. … We ask you to beware of the man who tells you that his friend knows the man with the pickle jar. There is good reason why he effects an air of mystery, why he ‘has been sworn to secrecy’ – because he can't produce the friend – or the pickle jar.”


Crashed Saucers Fly Again

The 1960s were a particularly active time for UFO stories but during the lulls, ufologists found something exciting by digging into the past.

Aurora, Texas 1897

In the mid-1960s, ufologists latched onto one of the forgotten newspaper tales of airships during the 1890s. The Dallas Morning News, April 19, 1897, p. 5, featured “A Windmill Demolishes It" written by S. E. Haydon, a sketchy account of how a metallic “airship” crashed into a windmill and exploded. The pilot’s disfigured remains were recovered, thought to be "a native of the planet Mars.” The story was journalistic fiction, common in those days. Jerome Clark wrote the UFO section in Encyclopedia of Hoaxes (Gordon Stein, 1993), summarizing the Aurora tale among the other “hoaxes and jokes about extraterrestrial aeronauts [that] continued into the 1897 phase of the airship saga.”

MUFON’s Newspaper clippings on the 1970s Aurora investigation

The Martian crash story received widespread publicity again in 1973 when ufologists wanted to exhume the non-existent alien body for examination. The hype over Aurora tale rehabilitated the topic of crashed UFOs and set the stage for a revival.

The Saucers in Hangar 18

Ex-science fiction writer Robert Spencer Carr lived in Clearwater, Florida, taught a university writing class, and had been a member of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP) since the 1950s. He became more active in ufology in the 1960s, and in the 1970s he began reviving the Aztec tale of captured saucers and alien bodies.

The Tampa Tribune, Oct. 16, 1974

When the press finally noticed, newspapers mistakenly thought these were new claims. The Tampa Tribune, Jan. 16, 1974, reported:

“One of the best-kept secrets of the United States Government is that in Hangar 18 at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, there are two flying saucers of unknown origin, a University of South Florida instructor said yesterday.” 

Carr’s revival of Aztec inspired Leonard Stringfield to become a specialist in pursuing UFO crash-retrieval stories. An article on Stringfield‘s public library lecture promoting his 1977 book, Situation Red.

“…Stringfield, a thin, goateed man with glasses… used to debunk reports of encounters with "humanoids," but no longer. About 1600 reports, some from ‘top military people in high positions,’ made him think otherwise. There is strength in numbers. ‘I now believe that they have had humanoids, little creatures three to four feet tall, in an underground research facility at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. I have seen the autopsy reports.’"

The Cincinnati Enquirer, Nov. 20, 1977


Stringfield published UFO crash stories by the dozen, but none of them caught until…

 

Roswell Reborn

Thanks to the influence of Carr and Stringfield, Stanton T. Friedman was drawn into the UFO crash business. On Feb. 20, 1978, Friedman was on his UFO lecture tour in Louisiana, when he was told about a man in the area who said he’d once found pieces of a flying saucer. Friedman called Jesse Marcel the next day, to hear the Roswell story most of us have come to know. Unfortunately, Marcel couldn’t remember the date or some of the people’s names, and he provided no documentation. Friedman listened with interest, but in his line of work, you hear a lot of stories, so it went nowhere.

Things got interesting on Oct. 24, 1978, in Bemidji, Minnesota, when Friedman heard a second-hand story that provided the dead aliens for the Roswell story. From Dava Sobel, 'The Truth About Roswell', Omni, Fall 1995:

“The crashed saucer and its alien crew were the gifts of Vern and Jean Maltais, who attended a Friedman lecture, and stayed late to tell him a flying saucer story related by their late friend, Grady ("Barney") Barnett. …The Maltais couple couldn't remember what year the crash might have taken place, and Barney was long dead [1969], so there was no way to find out. …That was enough for Friedman to go on...”


The problem was that there was no documentation, just what the couple thought they remembered Barnett saying. Secondly, the Barnett story hadn’t surfaced until after Silas Newton’s Aztec saucer hoax had been widely publicized. Nevertheless, Friedman passed it to Charles Berlitz and William Moore for their 1980 book, The Roswell Incident:

“In February 1950… Barnett told his friends an extraordinary story. …Barnett claimed to have personally witnessed a flying-saucer crash in the Socorro area — that he had seen it and seen dead bodies that were not human beings. Then the area was quickly sealed off and the bodies and wreckage removed by the military.”

Finally, some documentation emerged. The opposite really. Barney Barnett's wife Ruth kept a detailed diary of the couple's doings in 1947.

The Plains of San Agustin Controversy, July 1947: Gerald Anderson, Barney Barnett, and the Archaeologists (June 1992).
There was nothing whatsoever about the crash of a flying saucer, or of him sharing such a story with friends or family. With the Barney Barnett story discredited, it was eliminated from the Roswell lore. Without alien bodies, there would have been no book to ignite the Roswell legend. Rather than scrap the aliens from the story, ufologists replaced it with other anecdotes that surfaced after the publication and promotion of the Roswell book.

Regardless of the frequent rewriting of the Roswell story, it picked up steam and eventually became not only the most famous saucer crash story, but the legend that to dominate the entire UFO franchise.   

Crashed Saucers and Pickled Aliens

George Earley was an aircraft engineer, a writer, a lecturer, a Fortean, and a prominent member of NICAP. As a strong advocate for the scientific study of UFOs, Earley felt the resurgence of the crashed saucer tales was a distraction from genuine research of the subject.

(reprinted in Cambridge UFO Research Group, June 1981)

His two-part article, “Crashed Saucers and Pickled Aliens” in Fate magazine, March and April 1981, examined the accounts, where they fell short, and the physical impossibility of some of the claims. The reported saucers were too large to be carried by plane or train, secretly or otherwise. What about trucks?

“Such saucers, assuming they were truck-mounted, would have required the removal of every roadside tree and telephone pole, plus many houses, stores and other buildings. After all, it wasn't until we built the interstate highways that our major traffic arteries stopped going directly through the heart of every city, town and hamlet. And don't forget those many one-lane country bridges.”

Earley consulted a former Navy physician who had extensive contacts throughout the medical fraternity, both civilian and military. The doctor was “unaware of any alien autopsy activity. When we consider the number of persons who would be involved in such activity, it seems improbable that a secret of this magnitude could be kept for as long as 30 years.” Based on his analysis of the shortcomings of the evidence and the impractical elements involved, Earley concluded the UFO crash-retrieval stories were bunk:

“I hold this negative view despite my firm conviction that the interplanetary-origin theory of UFOs deserves a far better hearing than it has received to date. But we do that theory a disservice if we base it on flimsy evidence and credulous acceptance of every attractive tale that comes along. ... As an investigator you are called upon to collect verifiable evidence.”

Instead, we keep getting spins on the same old saucer story.

. . .

 

For a look at other historic captured UFO Crash-Retrieval tales, see:

Captured UFOs and Building Hangar 18: A Chronology



Thursday, December 3, 2020

Pennsylvania’s UFO Crash of 1949

 

The 1949 Pennsylvania Crashed Disc, part of our series on Captured Flying Saucers

A flying saucer was seen crashing by multiple witnesses in Laporte, Pennsylvania, in the summer of 1949. Somehow it was kept out of the papers until the disc was turned over to the Army. What’s so strange is that the saucer was left where it crashed for over two months. 

Laporte is a borough and township in Pennsylvania the county seat of Sullivan County in the USA.

Moths before the sighting, Major George D. Stephens was transferred to the Army’s Susquehanna Sub-Depot of Letterkenny Ordnance Depot in late spring 1949. Chances are, he never expected to be in charge of a UFO investigation.

The News-Chronicle, Shippennsburg, PA, June 7, 1949

On August 5, 1949, an unidentified flying object crashed in Laporte at about 10 P.M., in a park near the county courthouse. The county supervisor, M. R. Stepp lived nearby and was a witness himself. Stepp was responsible for relaying much of the witnesses’ testimony, but it’s unclear how much he experienced for himself. About 50 people claimed to have heard multiple explosions connected with the crash and saw the object in flames on the ground, and a smaller number of people claimed to have seen the saucer burning in flight beforehand. The disc lay on the scorched grass where it landed in the park, and the next day about 500 people came around to see it.


The saucer was about 4 feet in diameter, weighed about 25 pounds. It appeared to be manmade, perhaps a military device. An alpha numeric project number was stenciled on its surface, something like XK-5360. According to Stepp, he UFO had  been decked out with a jet tube, condensers, relays, transformers and some other equipment, until curious children step stripped it down for souvenirs. The saucer sat there as a conversation piece for over two months until Samuel W. Nichols was there on business from nearby Williamsport and heard about the crash. He spread the word and set things in motion, and that's how Major Stephens and the US military became involved. The next week, the story hit the press in the 
Williamsport Sun-Gazette, Oct. 15, 1949.


Williamsport Sun-Gazette, Oct. 15, 1949
 

The saucer story was reported nationally by the United Press. The next day, even though the investigation was not complete, Major Stephens was quoted by the Associated Press as saying the saucer was a hoax. “It was somebody’s joke.”


The Evening Star, Washington, DC, October 16, 1949, Page A-36

Sheriff C. Raymond Kschinka of Sullivan County revealed how the saucer had gone unreported to the U.S. military for two months, and why he had let the saucer lie in the park. “It was something for people to look at.”


The Evening Sun, Hanover, Pennsylvania, October 17, 1949

The Official Investigation

The Project Blue Book file on the investigation is only five pages long. On  Oct, 14 the disc was brought to the Susquehanna Army Sub-Depot where Major George Stephens had it examined. Project Grudge had a file card and a 4-page report and photograph by the Army's Col. Frederick R. Pitts and Col. R. W. Daniels from Oct. and Nov. 1949. Unfortunately, it’s mostly illegible due to the poor quality reproduction. 

Negative image of the photo from the PBB saucer file.

Project Grudge: 5 Aug 1949, La Porte, Penna The file card's short summary:

“Obj. rptd descended at low alt (50’) with evidence of minor explosions & light. Obj. recovered and made of thin sheet iron or steel. Donut shaped. The entire obj. weighing 20 pounds, was painted a dull black.” Evaluation: “Hoax”

There’s little doubt the Air Force got this one right. But…

What about the multiple witnesses who reported seeing the flaming saucer in flight? 

. . .

  

The Crashed Saucers of 1947

For STTF readers who enjoy captured saucer cases, we have a recommendation. An excellent article in English appeared in the Italian magazine, CIELO INSOLITO #6, March 2018, “Here they are! Early crashes of flying saucers: a short visual history” by Maurizio Verga. It’s a superb collection of newspaper photographs of captured UFOs from 1947, with a focus mainly on hoaxed saucers, but also includes a section on the publicity stunts that exploited the saucer fever of the time.




 



 

Thursday, May 21, 2020

The Texas UFO Crash Debris Photo from July 1947

A Robertson Panel of another sort, the Texas UFO mystery metal of 1947.



Leonard Robertson of Perryton, Texas, witnessed a UFO explode in late July 1947, and afterwards he was able to recover a large fragment of it. The incident occurred shortly after the flying disc story in Corona and Roswell, New Mexico, only about 250 miles away. The Texas news appeared on the front page of the Amarillo Daily News on August 6, 1947:


Perryton Man Displays Proof of Saucer Story

PERRYTON, Aug. 5 - Leonard Robertson, former Perryton city marshal and now with O. A. Schuster of the Perryton Gas Company, has proof that he really saw something flying through the air recently.

Robertson just realized today that he might be in possession of a flying disk or something odd that flew through the air with the greatest of ease - until it exploded almost in his face. He took his find to Mr. Schuster and Sheriff W. H. Lance, but they haven't been able to help him.

Here's Mr. Robertson's story:

"I was riding my motorcycle south into Dumas - I believe it was July 25 - when something bright in the sky to my left attracted my attention. I pulled off the road and saw a strange object floating over a field about a mile away. It was kind of oval and looked to be about 15 or 20 feet in circumference. It looked something like a big bubble.

"While I was watching it, the durned thing exploded. I saw pieces falling in all directions. I decided to see if I could find some of the pieces so I rode down a side road and walked into the field where I thought the thing fell. This is what I found."

Mr. Robertson displayed a piece of what looked like aluminum, but was much lighter. It was about 30 inches long and 24 inches wide and slightly curved. There were two small holes in it and the center appeared to have been burned. Two of the edges showed where they had overlapped another piece.

There was neither number nor name of any kind on the piece of material.

Mr. Robertson plans to go back and see if he can find more evidence to back his saucer story.


Amarillo Daily News, Aug. 6, 1947

A photograph of the UFO debris taken by Sheriff W. H. Lance appeared in the follow up story on page 5 of the Aug. 9th paper:


Salvage From Mystery Blast

What is it? Leonard Robertson of Perryton discovered this strange object in a field near Dumas recently. He says it is part of a strange object he watched explode near where he was riding his motorcycle. The material is lighter than aluminum and it has two small holes and a burned spot in it. Mr Robertson said the object appeared to be globe-shaped. He couldn't find any other pieces. 


Amarillo Daily News, Aug. 9, 1947

We could wish for a more detailed description of the fragment. "Lighter than aluminum," but rectangular and "slightly curved," does not sound like foil from a rawin target, or part of a balloon. Like Mac Brazel before him, Robertson didn't put much significance on the debris until he, "realized today that he might be in possession of a flying disk or something odd..." 

While it's possible that the report might have been a joke or a hoax, it seems unlikely that Robertson would target his employer and the local sheriff. Robertson’s report apparently went no farther than the local sheriff, and there is no mention of the incident in Project Blue Book files. There was no subsequent press on the UFO incident, and the debris truly can be said to have come from a saucer that time forgot. 

If there are any readers in the Amarillo area, we ask you to make inquiries to find out what became of this physical evidence.

Friday, April 26, 2019

Captured Flying Saucers: Saybrook, IL, July 26, 1947



In Captured Flying Saucers: July 7, 1947, The Disk that Slipped by the FBI, we looked at how J. Edgar Hoover was upset that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was cut out of a UFO investigation. Along with previous disappointments dealing with the military, that caused the FBI to want nothing to do with flying saucers. Later the same month, the policy, if not the attitude, changed.

(Document on the FBI site: BUREAU BULLETIN No. 42)
The Bureau, at the request of the Army Air Forces Intelligence, has agreed to cooperate in the investigation of flying discs...
7-30-47
BUREAU BULLETIN No. 42
Series 1947
You should investigate each instance which is brought to your attention of a sighting of a flying disc in order to ascertain whether or not it is a bona fide sighting, an imaginary one or a prank. You should also bear in mind that individuals might report seeing flying discs for various reasons. It is conceivable that an individual might be desirous of seeking personal publicity, causing hysteria, or playing a prank.
The Bureau should be notified immediately by teletype of all reported sightings and the results of your inquiries. In instances where the report appears to have merit, the teletype should be followed by a letter to the Bureau containing in detail the results of your inquiries. The Army Air Forces have assured the Bureau complete cooperating in these matters and in any instances where they fail to make information available to you or make the recovered discs available for your examination, it should promptly be brought to the attention of the Bureau.
Any information you develop in connection with these discs should be promptly brought to the attention of the Army through your usual liaison channels.
They also noted that there was the potential for UFO hoaxes to be used to breed fear:
"The Army Air Forces Intelligence has also indicated some concern that the reported sightings might have been made by subversive individuals for the purpose of creating a mass hysteria."

The Springfield FBI Memo

One of the USA's greatest concerns about flying saucers were that they were a new weapon of some sort by the Soviet Union, therefore, investigating UFOs was a matter of national security. As a result, saucer sightings were taken seriously, and many FBI agents' reports were written in grave tones, though few cases were of genuine importance.

Shortly after the FBI saucer directive, a report came in from Illinois. Someone had recovered a small disc. The memorandum to headquarters for FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover:

TO: Director, FBI DATE: August 20, 1947

FROM: SAC, Springfield

SUBJECT: FLYING DISC 

Reference is made to Bureau Bulletin No. 42, Series 1947, dated 
July 30, 1947 re the above. 

For the Bureau's information a Mrs. xxxxxxxxxxxxx of Saybrook,  
Illinois reported to this office the finding of a flying disc 
in her front yard at 6:00 A.M. on July 26, 1947. 

It appears from investigation conducted by an Agent of this 
office that the stability of xxxxxxxxxxxxx is questionable. How- 
ever the alleged flying disc was obtained and it is apparently 
the concoction of some of the juveniles in the area. It is an
old wooden platter, which has assembled on it a silver plate, a 
spark plug, a timer, and some old brass tubing. Photographs 
were taken of the same and there are six views enclosed herewith. 

No doubt this was someone's idea of a prank. 

The disc is presently being retained by the Springfield Office and 
will be retained pending receipt of Bureau advice relative to its
destruction. The thought in retaining it was that perhaps the 
Bureau might desire to have it transmitted to Washington for any 
novel value it might have. 

JBP:hg 
62-0-1445 
Enc. (6) 
To view the FBI file on this case: 62-0-1445: Saybrook, Illinois, July 26, 1947


On Sept. 5, 1947, FBI headquarters replied: Nah, if the military doesn't want it, get rid of it.


The FBI site has a page on their site about the “Unusual Phenomena” files collection, “The FBI and UFOs: Flying Flapjacks, Saucers, and Saw Blades.” It featured a brief recap of the Saybrook saucer case and displayed two clear pictures of it:

The FBI and UFOs: Flying Flapjacks, Saucers, and Saw Blades
The FBI report failed to mention that the flying disc carried the brand of its purported country of origin: Russia. With the "timer, and some old brass tubing," it looked a bit like a bomb. Had the "Russia" label been published in the media, it might have led to just the kind of mass hysteria the authorities feared, hoax or not.


The Saybrook citizen's report seems to have gone directly to the local FBI, and was not covered by the newspapers like so many other flying saucers stories around the same time. Since the FBI's investigation was conclusive, nothing was passed on to the Air Force, therefore this incident is not found in the files of Project Blue Book. In a sense, the case is unsolved. Once the FBI decided it was just a prank by some kids, they were done with it. We'll never know who made the phony soviet saucer or just why.

The FBI was only in the UFO business for a short while. According to their site, a July 1950 FBI statement said that “the jurisdiction and responsibility for investigating flying saucers have been assumed by the United States Air Force... the FBI does not attempt to investigate these reports..."
There were a few exceptions though, but those generally were focused on saucer swindlers, not actual reported UFO sightings.

There were many other early cases of hoaxed captured flying saucers, and the FBI was involved in several of them. See our previous STTF articles, including: Captured Flying Saucers: The North Hollywood Disc, July 10, 1947

Friday, December 1, 2017

The Day Before Roswell, July 7, 1947: Between Something and Nothing

The day before the news about a recovered flying disc in Roswell, New Mexico, the newspapers were chock full of saucer stories, and many papers featured a cover photo of Jane Campbell displaying a Rawin target, scooping Mac Brazel and Jesse Marcel.

Madison Wisconsin State Journal, July 7, 1947
May Be "'Saucers' -- Near and Afar
Jane Campbell, 17, of Chillicothe, Ohio, exhibits an unidentified mechanism which fell from a balloon and landed on her father's farm. The father, Sherman Campbell, said the vaned object, through optical illusion, may have caused some of the reports of "flying discs." 

An Estimate of the Situation

The Fort Madison Evening Democrat from July 7, is a great example of early UFO news coverage. The UP story combines wire reports of the real and unreal, in an attempt to cover the emerging phenomenon. The confused position of the newspapers seemed to echo that of the military.
"We're not dismissing the possibility that there's something to it, and we're not dismissing the possibility that it's all a hoax."- Captain Tom Brown, Army Air Force spokesman, Washington, DC. 
Carnival searchlights, Ghost Rockets, the Loch Ness Monster and much more:
Fort Madison Evening Democrat, July 7, 1947


The barrage of conflicting stories in the news kept the public interested- and confused. In the absence of facts, speculation and rumor were king, and in those days, many UFO legends were born.

Real Life Comics #55, Jan. 1951

A Lost UFO Film: Attack of the Flying Saucers

  From Fliegende Untertassen to Attack of the Flying Saucers This is a “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” story, one about flying s...