TheMUFONUFO JOURNAL

NUMBER 123 FEBRUARY 1978

Founded 1967 $1.00I OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF MUTUAL UFO NETWORK, INC. I

HUMANOIDS AT MONTVALE, NJ, JANUARY 31, 1978 (See story, p. 4)

AIR FORCE UFO SPOKESMAN DESCRIBES PERSONAL SIGHTINGHYPNOTISM AND ABDUCTION CASESUFO INFORMATION FROM FBI FILESPLUS OTHER REPORTS & FEATURES

MUFON UFO SYMPOSIUM, JULY 29 & 30,1978DAYTON, OHIO

The MUFONUFO JOURNAL

103 Oldtowne Rd.Seguin, Texas 78155

RICHARD HALLEditor

ANN DRUFFELAssociate Editor

LEN STRINGFIELDAssociate Editor

WALTER H. ANDRUSDirector of MUFON

PAUL CERNYPromotion/Publicity

REV. BARRY DOWNINGReligion and UFOs

LUCIUS PARISHBooks/Periodicals/History

MARJORIE FISHExtraterrestrial Life

MARK HERBSTRITTAstronomy

ROSETTA HOLMESPromotion/Publicity

TED PHILLIPSLanding Trace Cases

DAVID A. SCHROTHSt. Louis/Mass Media

JOHN F. SCHUESSLERUFO Propulsion

NORMA E. SHORTDWIGHT CONNELLY

Editor/Publishers Emeritus

The MUFON UFO JOURNAL ispublished by the Mutual UFONetwork, Inc., Seguin, Texas.Subscription rates: $8.00 per yearin the U.S.A.; $9.00 per yearforeign. Copyright 1978 by theMutual UFO Network. Secondclass postage paid at Seguin,Texas. Publication identificationnumber is 2970. POSTMASTER:Send form 3579 to advise change ofaddress to The MUFON UFOJOURNAL, 103 Oldtowne Rd.,Seguin, Texas 78155.

FROM THE EDITORHumanoid and abduction reports (or Close Encounters of

the Third and Fourth Kind, as they are being called) currentlydominate UFO research — whether rightly or wrongly. There is noquestion but that these reports are central to an understanding ofUFO phenomena. Either hundreds of people world-wide aresuffering from very similar hallucinations or delusions, in which casethe origin of such widespread pathology needs to be studiedurgently, or something extraordinary and with sweepingimplications for mankind is occurring. A major policy of theJOURNAL will be to seek articles that help to sort out fact fromfiction in these important areas. However, we advise caution ininterpreting the bewildering array of sensational reports now comingto light. As a general principle, the more sensational the content of aUFO report is, the closer critical scrutiny it should receive. Thehuman mind is a marvelous instrument, apparently with yetuntapped abilities, but it also is susceptible to errors of judgmentand, particularly, to self-delusion. CE-III and CE-IV cases need to beinvestigated with utmost care. We should neither reject them out ofhand, nor believe them uncritically.

In this issue

AIR FORCE UFO SPOKESMAN DESCRIBES PERSONAL SIGHTING (Transcript) .3By Don Berliner

CE-III REPORT FROM MONTVALE, NJ: PRELIMINARY REPORT 4By Ted Bloecher

UPDATE ON 1978 MUFON UFO SYMPOSIUM 7By Walt Andrus

HYPNOTISM AND ABDUCTION CASES 8By Richard Hall

UFO RELATED INFORMATION FROM FBI FILES 10By Bruce S. Maccabee

"CALIFORNIA REPORT' - Other Encounters of All Different Kinds 15By Ann Druffel

HUMANOID STUDY GROUP REPORT: ABDUCTION CASES 18By Dave Webb

IN OTHERS' WORDS 19By Lucius Parish

DIRECTOR'S MESSAGE 20By Walt Andrus

The contents of the MUFON UFO JOURNAL aredetermined by the editor, and do not necessarilyrepresent the official position of MUFON. Opinions ofcontributors are (heir own, and do not necessarily reflectthose of the editor, the staff, or MUFON. Articles may beforwarded directly to MUFON.

Permission is hereby granted to quote from this issueprovided not more than 200 words are quoted from anyone article, the author of the article is given credit, andthe statement "Copyright 1978 by the MUFON UFOJOURNAL, 103 Oldtowne Rd., Seguin, Texas" isincluded.

AIR FORCE UFO SPOKESMAN DESCRIBESPERSONAL SIGHTING

(The following is a transcript of a taperecording made during the Merv GriffinTV show on April 10, 1978, in which

: former Project Blue Book spokesman,Air Force Lt. Col. (Retired) William

: Cbleman, describes a personal UFO; sighting of about 1954, which he told

Don Berliner was listed by Blue Book as"unexplained" but which had vanished

/ from the files.)

William Coleman: I'd flown anattack bomber into Miami — we had anoverhaul depot there — an old one tobe overhauled, and picked up a freshlyoverhauled one, with a very sharp crew.It had a copilot, flight engineer, and twotechnical representatives from twowell-known aircraft companies, theLockheed Aircraft Co. and the AllisonJet Engine Division of the GeneralMotors Corporation. We filed a flightplan, came up airways throughMariana, Fla., to file direct, then, forMeridian, Miss., airways and forpenetration to Greenville AFB, Miss.

Well, this Sunday afternoon —2, 3 o'clock in the afternoon — and

: tremendous visibility — not a cloud inthe sky. I had "punched up" my copilot,

| which we normally do, reached overand said, "Hey, take it," and he takes

'i over control of the aircraft. We'ret r a c k i n g ou tbound Mar ianaOmnirange, and I reach down andunlatch my seat, slide back and I'm

; talkin" with the two technicalrepresentatives. I commanded a jetsquadron at that time, and they wererepresenting the aircraft which we were— "Shooting Stars" — flying at thattime. And we were just talking business.And I...all us old fighter pilots, you learnto move this all the time (demonstratesby swivelling his head).

And I noticed a bright silverobject at about 30,000 feet, and I

watched it for a moment. And then I"punched up" my copilot and said,"Check at 2 o'clock high. Estimatealtitude roughly 30,000 feet." He said,"Probably that's just a craze on thewindow." I said, "No, I don't think so. I'lltake it." I pulled the seat up, took overthe aircraft and said, "If it's a craze, it'lldisappear as I start to turn. If it's anaircraft, it'll slide over to the left, won'tchange." I made the turn, came back: Itwas an aircraft...we thought at the time.

Then it started a very rapiddescent. I resumed my course, wewatched...it came across my altitude,roughly six miles in front. And I said,"Than's the oddest lookin' think I'veever seen in my life. You agree?""Agree!" "Flight Engineer, go up intothe bombardier's compartment, I wantanother angle, another point of view...put your ears on, so I can talk with you."Then I called the two tech reps up and Isaid, "Do you see the object?" "Yes." Isaid, "We're gonna stay with it. I'mgonna break off flight plan here." So Istarted a very rapid descent. I went tomaximum military cruise power and wecontinued to drop and I kept tryin' toget underneath it. I wanted to see what Icould see, because there were nodiscernible marks on top of the saucer:no metal joint lines, no rivet lines, nolights or anything like that.

It was your average, run-of-the-mill flying saucer.

Well, to make a long story short,this chase lasted 11 minutes. We closedto within an eighth of a mile. And I said,"I'm overtakin' this thing at about ahundred feet per second, and I can't getbelow it — we're right on the deck." So Isaid, " I w a n t the v i s i b i l i t yadvantage...I'm gonna make a violentturn right here, right on the treetops,and I wanna come in 'up sun'. I want thevisibility advantage. I want the sun

behind me." So I whipped over (this wasabout a 4 second turn an^ a lot of G's)anH then we rolledout...w 'ere out ofs.'ght, or in this position (note: usedhands to show he. was behind theUFO). I rolled out...it wasn't there.

Now, just before this happened,I want to call your attention to the factthat I...everybody's xxxxxxx "Cool it,guys, I want you to look for details. Iwant size, I want xxxxx, everything.And pay particular attention to theshadow on the ground," which was anabsolute circle.

So then, when we lost it, goingback after the violent turn, I zoomed upto 2,000 feet and I said; "OK, get theeyeballs outside the cockpit and let'sfind it." Well, in about 7 or 8 seconds, Ispotted it two miles in front of me. Now,it moved from where we were to 2 miles,in roughly 7 seconds (note: more than1,000 mph). I said, "There it is. It's goingacross a large plowed field"...about 400acres...and it was very, very low andvery, very slow and the vortex off thevehicle was leaving a dust trail....a verystrong dust trail.

So I dove for the treetops andran an interception course. About thepoint I figured I'd be intercepting (Istayed out of sight....didn't want him tosee me 'till I was ready), then I whippedup in a turn, pulled up between axxxxx...gone! I then went into a sharpbank and as I looked back at the field,there was this dust cloud....

Rita Moreno: In back?

Coleman: Behind us. But wedidn't see the vehicle. It was now goneagain, and I set up a search pattern...wenever saw it again. I'm neither a scepticnor a believer. In the military, we're ahighly disciplined organization....

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CE-III Report from Montvale, N.J.: Preliminary Report

By Ted Bloecher

Location: Memorial School playing field, Montvale (Bergen Co.), N.J.Date: Tuesday, January 31, and Wednesday, February 1, 1978Time: About 6:15 PM on both eveningsDuration: Less than 15 minutes on both occasions.Witnesses: John (10), Eddy (8), Michael (10), and

attendant witness, Hilton (12).

BackgroundOn February 1,1978, about 8:30

PM, I got a telephone call from RobertGribble, veteran UFO researcher fromSeattle, reporting a CE-III that hadoccurred on the previous night(January 31) at Montvale, N.J., thatinvolved four boys. The mother of twoof them, Mrs , had called Gribbleearlier that day to report the incident,having obtained his number from theFAA at Neward Airport. Her two boys,John (10) and Hilton (12), and theirfriends Eddy (8) and Michael (10)were all in a state of great excitementwhen Mrs returned fromshopping at about 6:30 PM or shortlythereafter. They had seen, they said, atleast one UFO on several flybys, as wellas a number of strange figures, from theschool playground a half a block northof the back yard.

Gribble gave me Mrstelephone number and I called her rightaway. She provided additional detailsbased on her understanding of thestories she had obtained from each ofthe four children whom, sheemphasized, had been extremely upsetby what reportedly had occurred. (Thetwo boys, in fact, were afraid togo the short distance home along, andhad to be accompanied by Mrsand her children.) Mrs was veryhelpful and she agreed to a meeting withthe children, arranged for Sundayafternoon, February 5. She wiselysuggested that if I had some associatesthat could come along, we might savetime and obtain independent accountsby interviewing the children on a one-to-one basis.

I called Budd Hopkins, Pat

Huyghe, and Jerry Stoehrer to find outif they could assist in the investigation.Hopkins and Huyghe agreed, butStoehrer had a work and school conflictwhich prohibited his participation. Wemet at the home in Montvale at2 PM as planned, and Mrsarranged with the to haveboth Eddy and Michael present for theinterviews. The three of us chose oneboy apiece. I interviewed John ,and the following narrative is basedessentially on the story I obtained fromhim. I also spoke to his brother Hilton,regarding his part in the January 31incident. Pat Huyghe questionedMichael and has submitted his ownreport based on Michael's account; andBudd Hopkins spoke with Eddy, as wellas the other boys. In addition, the

(continued on next page)

(Air Force Spokesman, continued)

Meru Griffin: But you're in showbusiness....

Coleman: That's right, I'm inshow business. A year ago I couldn'tspell producer, and now I are one. Ihave to know exactly what it is.Discipline, you know, it gets ingrained.So we are rigidly disciplined, and forvery good reason....

Griffin: Could it have been anearthly machine?

Coleman: No, we did not havethis kind of technology at that time. As amatter of fact, we didn't run intoit....(the rest was lost in backgroundnoise).

Griffin: The last time GordonCooper was here, he talked about whenhe was an Air Force pilot and wasstationed, I dunno, with the NATO

forces in Europe, or it might have beenWorld War II, I don't recall. But he saidoftentimes they were sent out to chasethe darn things. Then he said, on his lastappearance here, that in the VietnamWar, whenever there were bombings inHanoi, they caused our pilotsunbelievable trouble. There was a namefor them, like foo-foos.

Coleman: Poo-fighters, fromWorld War II where they originated.

Griffin: And they were hovering,way up above. They would turn outthings on their planes. They would turnoff switches, they would turn off dials,they would turn out electrical lights inHanoi, down below. They were doingeverything they could to mess up thatwar.

Coleman: Well, foo-fighters, Idon't recall anything in the historyabout World War I, but in World War Dwe did see them, both in the EuropeanTheater and in the Pacific, where I flew.

Moreno: In World War II, thatfar back?

Coleman: Yes, foo-fighters:large, luminous-like discs that...theywere not defined at all, more luminous,there was no definition to them. They'dfly right along with you. You'd turn .intothem and they'd turn away. You'd turnoff and they'd come back. They werebothersome things, but we never, everdecided...no one's ever decided whatwe were seeing.

Griffin: But you're still not a truebeliever.

Coleman: No, not really.

Michael's Sketch of UFO

children took us out to the playgroundfor an on-site examination of thesighting area.

Budd Hopkins is collecting allthe various bits of information we haveobtained, not only at the February 5thinquiry, but in subsequent telephoneconversations with all parties sincethen. Using all these sources ofinformation, he will prepare a finalcomprehensive report on the incident.

NarrativeJohn and his friends,

Eddy and Michael , were "boot-skating" on the frozen ice of theMontvale Memorial Elementary Schoolplaying field, situated about a blocknorth of the back yard of thehome. It was shortly after 6 PM and thelast traces of twilight had disappeared.The playing fields were illuminated byfloodlights that line the perimeter of thefields.

The first incident in a series ofincreasingly strange events was thepassage overhead of a "plane-like"object that came from the south andmoved toward the west in a straightline. It was noticed chiefly by theyoungest member of the trio, Eddy, andby John ; own description, heseemed to have paid little attention to it.Shortly after this (within minutes at themost) there appeared a second objectwhich they all saw and describedsimilarly. The directions given by eachboy seem to be contradictory, and I

view John's testimony as beingprobably the most reliable. He said itappeared from the "direction of thepark(?) lake" or to the east of the schooland playing field; it came directly overthe. field, apparently circled andhovered briefly, and then moved southtoward Park Ridge, disappearing intothe distance. Their descriptions anddrawings are quite in agreement withone another; It was a square object withlarge yellow lights on each side (or ateach corner), with a slight dome on top.and a red light underneath, whichemitted a red beam of light that playeddownward toward the ground butstopped short of it. John estimated itsaltitude at between 500 and 1,000 feet.

In an attempt to get an idea of theobject's angular size, I had John hold apencil at arm's length and measure offthe diameter of the object as it mightappear in the sky. John measured offnearly two inches from the end of thepencil. Then I asked him to comparethe object's apparent size to that of thefull moon, and he said the object wasnot quite as large. The two estimatesare, of course, contradictory, and Iwould suspect that his comparison to afull moon is the more accurate.

The appearance of the objectcaused some exci tement andapprehension among the three boys. Atsome point during the observation,

which John said lasted 5 minutes, theymoved across the field toward a shedon the north side of the field. The openfront of the shed (a ball team's dugout)faces generally toward the west. Thefinal portion of .this part of theirexperience took place from the vicinityof the shed. Almost immediately afterthe object's disappearance, theirattention was attracted to first one —then a group — of strange figures, seenmoving about, on Memorial Drive,which runs generally north-south onthe eastern perimeter of the playingfields. The figures were to the north ofthe Public Works Garage, on the eastside of the road, and they weregenerally moving south along MemorialDrive toward the garage.

There was a lot of movement toand fro, and the figure walked "stiffly,"and they seemed "stunned." They wereall similar: about 5' 7" tall, bald, anddressed in bright yellow outfits. Theyseemed to have on boots and gloves.There was one who appeared slightlydifferent, with a larger head, creaseddown the middle and looking somethinglike a "hawk's head." .He wore a browncoat or cape over his yellow suit. Innumber there were from six or seven toten or eleven. They were in constantmotion and it was difficult to tell exactlyhow many there were. During this partof the experience there was a peculiar

(Continued on next page) r

(CE-III, continued)silence all around them. The boyssmelled an unpleasant odor, like"sulphur." The figures were seenmostly in profile and seemed to ignorethe youngsters, who were at least 300feet away.

The boys then left the relativesecurity of the shed and approachedabout 50 to 100 feet, and then thestrangest part of their experienceoccurred. They saw another figure, thisone a woman, in the parking area on theeast side of Memorial Drive, fronting onHuffs Park. She had medium-longbrown hair and wore a dark suit with ablue fur around her shoulders. Shewalked slowly, as if in slow motion, andsat down on the low cedar fence thatlines the road and parking area. Thenshe raised her arm and pointed to thesky (still in slow motion); the boyslooked up to see the same or a similarlysquare-shaped object overhead. Noone had seen it arrive above theplayground.

By this time the rest of thefigures had disappeared, having"walked off' in the direction of thegarage. The boys were so intent onwatching the woman they did not seewhere the others went. She got up andbegan walking south toward the PublicWorks garage herself. At the sametime, a police car drove north fromGrand Avenue, headed for the PoliceStation on Memorial Drive. As the carapproached, the woman disappearedabruptly from view. When the car hadgone by, she reappeared and continuedto walk toward the garage. Then,nearing the building, the boys saw thatparts of her body were vanishing, thistime gradually, beginning with her legs.By the time she reached the garage shewas visible only from the waist up. Thenshe walked into the north side of thebuilding, disappearing into the wall.There is no door on that side of thebuilding. At this, the boys'tumed andran back to the home in a stateof high excitement.

Hilton , John's 12-year-old brother, was vacuuming his roomabout this time. Leaving the vacuum

running momentarily, he went to hiswindow (on the third floor of the house,facing east) and saw the three boysrunning toward the house. Above theirheads, at about a 45-degree angle, wasan oval object several times the size of afull moon, with four yellow lights aroundthe edge and a red light in the middle.He was uncertain as to whether theobject was moving. Opening thewindow, Hilton leaned out and called tothe boys; then, leaving the windowopen and the vacuum running, he raceddownstairs to meet them at the backdoor. The family dog, who had beenwith Hilton, was very excited (Hiltonsaid the dog had been acting peculiarbefore he saw the boys coming acrossthe field). As the boys came into thehouse the siren at the firehouse, a blockto the east along Grand Avenue, wassounded. The time was exactly 6:22PM.

Because of their excitement, theboys thought the siren was connectedto their UFO sighting, and that theobject had perhaps started a firesomewhere. Hilton called the FireDepartment (the same dispatchertakes calls for both the Fire and PoliceDepartments), and was told that he wasthe f i f t h one to call. Hilton,misunderstanding the statement,believed his was the fifth phone callregarding the UFO; his call actuallyfollowed four other calls relating to thefire alarm. The UFO report was passedon to the Police Department and PoliceOfficer Pelsang drove the squad cararound the school playground about 10minutes later, but found nothing out ofthe ordinary. (Officer Pelsang could notbe certain if the police car that hadappeared earlier on Memorial Drivewas one driven by him; he was out in thesquad car at the time but was not sureexactly where he was at about 6:15

Mrs. Emily came backfrom shopping at 6:39 PM, just as thesiren sounded a second time. She foundthe four boys in a highly excited state.She questioned them carefully, hadthem make drawings, and even calledNewark Airport, hoping to obtain radarconfirmation of the UFO sighting. Ittook several hours for the children to

calm down, and even then Mrshad to accompany the boys totheir home a few doors away. Thereports of the children that they sawother objects on subsequent eveningshas not yet been carefully checked out.The temptation is strong, of course, todismiss such claims as the result ofexcess imagination. That may be amistake.

CommentaryThe accuracy of children's

testimony regarding UFO reports is adifficult thing to determine. On the onehand, children can often exhibit anexhilarating candor and lack of guile indescribing something; but they alsohave rich imaginations that areunconstrained by their limitedknowledge and experience with the"real" world. One may hesitatinglyconclude (at the risk of appearing to bean adult chauvinist) that UFO reportsby children have considerably lessprobative value than reports by adults.This is not to say that children's reportsshould be ignored or thown away.

Much depends, of course, uponthe children themselves and, likeadults, some are more credible thanothers. In the case at hand, I have theimpression that the one subject I spentthe most time interviewing, John

is an unusually dependablewitness. His story was clear and quitestraightforward, and he introducedvery little irrelevant detail. There is nointernal evidence that suggests he ismaking the story up or elaboratingextensively on what he says he saw —despite the rather bizarre contents ofhis story. Regardless of other intrusiveand extraneous details ("bullet holes" inthe school windows, "blood" on thedoor, "purple clouds" at sunset, and"odd people" l iv ing in theneighborhood), the stories of all fourboys contain sufficient comple-mentary overlapping detail to suggestthat they saw something quite definite;that what was seen has been describedsimilarly and accurately to the best ofeach boy's abilities; and that whateverit was that they saw, it had anunmistakable effect upon them.

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UPDATE ON 1978 MUFON UFO SYMPOSIUMBy Walt Andrus

The Ninth Annual MUFONUFO Symposium will be held Saturdayand Sunday, July 29 and 30,1978, at theDayton Convention Center, Fifth andMain Streets, Dayton, Ohio 45402. Thespeaking program is composed ofveteran UFOlpgists, each with over 25years of experience in the field. This isthe first time that this prestigious grouphas ever appeared on the sameplatform.

The theme for this year'ssymposium is "UFOs: An HistoricalPerspective on Close Encounters".This provides a clue to the material thatwill be presented. Richard H. Hall,Editor of MUFON UFO JOURNALand former Assistant Director ofNICAP, has titled his paper "1967: TheOverlooked UFO Wave and theColorado Project". Leonard H.Stringfield, MUFON Director of PublicRelations, promises to drop a "realbomb shell" with his speech "Retrievalsof the Third Kind — A Case Study ofAlleged UFOs and Occupants inMilitary Custody". Ted Bloecher, Co-Chairman of MUFON's HumanoidStudy group, has selected one yearfrom his and David Webb's HUMCAT(Humanoid Catalog) to present, titlinghis talk "A Survey of 1977 CE-fflReports".

If this roster of speakers has not"whet your appetite," Major Donald E.Keyhoe, author and former Director ofNICAP, will share addit ionaldisclosures with his speech "Behind theUFO Secrecy". Dr. J. Allen Hynek,

(CE-III, continued)The question remains: what did

they see? Was it something ordinarythat, in their excitement, they mistookfor something remarkable? I cannotanswer this with any certainty. Withoutthe independent testimony of otherwitnesses, I must view the report asinconclusive.

Director of the Center for UFO Studiesand former scientific consultant to theU.S. Air Force on unidentified flyingobjects, will take this opportunity topresent further insight into Project BlueBook from an insider's viewpoint. It isunique that we will be meeting close toWright-Patterson AFB, home of theAerospace Technical IntelligenceCenter and formerly Project BlueBook. Dr. Hynek will not confine hislecture to this one aspect. More detailswill be forthcoming in the March issueof the JOURNAL.

Sunday morning from 9 to 12noon, MUFON will conduct its annualcorporate meeting, which will be opento members only. The Sundayafternoon session from 2:00 to 4:30 PMpromises some pleasant surprises.Workshop Sessions on specific fields ofinterest are scheduled Saturdayafternoon from 4:00 to 5:00 PM. Therewill not be a Saturday evening banquetthis year, however, a private dinner isset up for the speakers and the hostorganization. The individual ticket costof each of the four sessions, Saturdaymorning, afternoon, evening, andSunday afternoon will be $3.50; thepackage price for all four is $12.00.Advance reservations may be securedby making a check payable to OUFOILand mailing it to the SymposiumTreasurer, Mr. George Pelizzari, P.O.Box 544, Forest Park Branch, Dayton,Ohio 45405.

There are several fine hotels andmotels in downtown Dayton, Ohio.However, rooms are being "blocked" atStouffer's Dayton Plaza Hotel at 5thand Jefferson Streets. For conveniencethe Hotel has enclosed passagewaysconnecting it to the Dayton ConventionCenter. Hotel rates at Stouffer's are$26.00 for a single and $33.00 for adouble per night. Please make yourroom reservations directly with thehotel of your choice.

The host organization for the

1978 MUFON UFO Symposium will beThe Ohio UFO Investigators League,Inc. (OUFOIL), with Richard L.Hoffman serving as master ofceremonies for the speaking program.It is anticipated that this will beMUFON's finest symposium, basedupon the prestigious speakers, currentinterest in the UFO phenomenon, andadvance interest displayed by membersand the public at large. Plan yourvacation to take advantage of the manysightseeing attractions at the hub ofaviation with it's noted aviationmuseums in Dayton, Ohio, when youcome to the symposium. We will belooking forward to seeing many of youin Dayton.

********** * * * * * * * * * *

Postal Exchange

Contributions of cancelled foreignstamps are used by MUFON toexchange with a collector for currentU.S. postage, which helps to offset thehigh cost of foreign correspondence.We would like to acknowledge recentcontributions from Mr. Ted Bloecher,Mrs. Eric Bluhm, Mr. Harry Cohen, andMrs. Barbara Mathey.

HYPNOTISM AND ABDUCTION CASESBy Richard Hall

An article in the WashingtonPost, Sunday, March 26th, entitled"Catching Criminals ThroughHypnosis" raised a number of pointsrelevant to the use of hypnosis inalleged "abduction" cases, whichtypically surface only after a UFOwitness undergoes hypnotic regressionin an attempt to retrieve more details ofa UFO encounter.

The article was excerpted froma longer one by R.W. Dellingerpublished in Human Behaviormagazine, and describes the work ofpsychologist Martin Reiser with the LosAngeles police department. His use ofhypnotic regression — and that of histrainees — has proved to be highlysuccessful in surfacing valuable cluesfrom the subconscious minds ofwitnesses in criminal cases, oftenleading to successful prosecutions.Retrievals have included suchinformation as the license number of afleeing suspect's car and detailedphysical descriptions of suspects at thescene of a crime

Detractors of Reiser's methods,notably Martin Orne (president of theInternational Society of Hypnosis),have argued that the use of hypnosis incriminal investigations should be tightlycontrolled — if not severely curbed —on the grounds that the information"recalled" under hypnosis may becompletely inaccurate, and that "...awitness who is uncertain about hisrecall of a particular set of events can,with hypnosis, be helped to haveabsolute subjective conviction aboutwhat had happened — though thecertainty can as easily relate to aconfabulation as to an actual memory."In other words, a hypnotist can —accidentally or deliberately — lead asubject to come up with a false story.

Ernest Hilgard, director ofStanford University's Laboratory of

&

Hypnosis Research, put it more bluntly:"It is well known that hypnotists mayimplant memories, so that thehypnotized person accepts them as hisown."

Reiser had a simple andpersuasive response: The informationobtained under hypnosis in his work isused only as leads or clues and, he says,"...in 80 to 90 percent of our cases weare able to get subsequent[independent] corroboration...." Healso pointed out that the witnesses heworks with are all volunteers who arehighly motivated to help discover thetruth, not criminal suspects or peopleunder any form of coercion. Theycontrol the recall, and are not lead inany particular direction. There is nomotivation to fabricate stories. Whatemerges from the hypnotic regressionis not automatically considered to befact — only possible fact, to be verifiedindependently.

Application to UFO CasesIt seems to me that both sides in

this debate are "right," in a limitedsense. The evidence seems clear thatvalid and extremely useful informationcan be retrieved, but also that — insome circumstances — the risk ofobtaining false information is very real.What we need to know in far greaterdetail is the circumstances under whichan abduction story emerging underhypnosis would or would not becredible. Obviously, we should be waryabout accepting at face value —without the independent corroborationoften available in criminal cases — UFOabduction stories that first come to lightunder hypnosis.

On the other hand, thewitnesses in criminal cases generallyhave repressed part of what they haveseen under highly emotionalconditions, and do retrieve more validdetails under hypnosis. Therefore, it isnot inconceivable that a UFO witnesswho produces an abduction story

under hypnosis is relating a true story.Unfortunately, the idea of abductionsby UFO beings is widely known, andthis tends to contaminate theinterpretation of abduction stories — ifthe witness is familiar with UFOliterature or has heard of some of themore famous reports. In such a case,the raw material is there tounconsciously fabricate an "abduction"after having experienced a frightening

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ARKANSAS GAZETTE,Little Rock, AR

March 9, 1978

Suit Says CIA HasUFOData

NEW YORK (UPI) - A re-search organization has filed raitin federal court at Brooklynagainst the Central IntelligenceAgency and its director, AdmiralStansfield Turner, charging theyare withholding proof of the exis-tence of UFO's.

The organization, Ground Sau-cer Watch, Inc., is seeking underthe federal Freedom of Informa-tion Act to enjoin the CIA fromwithholding certain reports andphotos allegedly involving UFO"!

Judge Jacob Mtabfer ha setMarch 17 for a bearing on toefederal government's request thatthe case be dismissed on thegrowd that the court lacks Juris-diction. U the case is not dis-missed, the government has askedthat it be transferred to federalcourt at Washington.

In court papers, GroundWatch's director, Harvey Brody,said his organization has 600members nationwide of whommore than 40 are scientific con-sultants affiliated with major not-v e r s i t i e s or aerospacecorporations.

Brody said Ground Watch is anindependent, nonprofit outfit or-ganized under the laws of Arizonafor purpose of investigating, re-searcUag, analyzing aad dissemi-nating data on unidentified aerial,phenomena.

(Hypnotism & Abduction cont.)

or startling encounter with a UFO.

The point is that there is nosimplistic answer to abduction reports;it is a complex and difficult subject bestanalyzed by professionals, whoseassistance is badly needed.Theoretically, the ideal case wouldinvolve "a naive witness who neverheard of UFOs (if such a person exists),with no coercion to make up a story,and with a sophisticated hypnotist whoc a r e f u l l y avoided sugges t ivequestioning or "leading" the witness, sothat an abduction story turning upspontaneously would be difficult tointerpret as an unconscious fabrication.We seldom are privileged to have suchideal conditions, so we must make thebest of what we have.

Since unconscious fabricationmay result either from inappropriatetechniques applied by the hypnotist(implanting ideas) or from a witnessmotivated in some way to "fill in thegaps," it is important to realize thatstories resulting from hypnoticregression carry no guarantee of truth.Only sophisticated analysis may leadtoward truth, taking into account (a)the witness' personali ty andpreknowledge of UFOs, (b) theappropriateness and skill of thehypnotist's techniques, and (c) theentire circumstances of the allegeds igh t i ng / abduc t i on and whatindependent corroboration may befound.

The Journal invites commentsor articles for publication by scientificpractitioners of hypnosis, on thisimportant — indeed, vital — issue.Development of a carefully thought outoperating procedure for hypnosis ofUFO witnesses would be a valuablecontribution to research.

(Editor's Note: Mrs. Idabel Eppersonforwarded a copy of this article to Dr.Reiser for his critique. His replyfollows.)

April 25, 1978

Mrs. Idabel Epperson343 North Citrus AvenueLos Angeles, CA 90036

Dear Mrs. Epperson:

Thank you for forwarding the draft of Richard Hall's paper on UFO abduction cases.

In general, I think the article is proper in tone and accuracy. I don't know that I cananswer his question about abduction stories coming from people with consciousUFO encounters; my guess is that there would be a mixture of reports.

A significant difference between a subject involved in a crime case arid one reportinga UFO incident is that invariably the crime incidents are documented and hence, arereal situations. The information elicited from witnesses or victims of crimes cantherefore be corroborated later, in most cases. This of course is rarely the case withUFO sightings or reports. The basic question of whether the event was real or notstill seems to be a major issue.

That humans are capable of repressing and later recalling amazingly detailedinformation and, of course, elaborate on it extensively, was clearly evidenced in theBridey/Murphy case in both the original and later explicated forms. It appears thatthe unconscious mind, like a cybernetic system, has infinite storage capability aswell as the ability to construct, to fill in gaps, and to create. As most psychiatrists andpsychologists are aware, fantasies, wish-fulfillments, day dreams and night dreams,are all everyday evidences of our amazing capabilities in this area. Historically, it hasbeen the novelists who have beautifully captured their own fantasies and creativeimpulses in seemingly logical story form. I think that Jules Verne and Isaac Asimovare prime examples.

It is not hypnosis that is critical in any of these situations since it is merely a tool forrecovering information, but that the nature of the information recovered isessentially dependent on the motivation of the subject. This is what is critical.

Because both conscious and unconscious minds may play a part in what is reportedby an individual, I think that the investigative and evaluative approach should involvea team of experts, including a psychoanalyst trained in investigative hypnosis, aphysical scientist, and an engineering person, all of whom would be knowledgeableabout UFO's, hypnosis, repression and memory recall, as well as the pitfalls andproblems involved in these areas.

This is a very problematical area, as we know, and it will take persistent anddedicated effort to elicit answers to the many critical questions that now exist.

Best wishes,

Martin Reiser, Ed. D., ABPPDirectorBehavioral Science ServicesLos Angeles Police Department

UFO RELATED INFORMATION FROM THE FBI FILES: Part 3

"Gone but Not Forgotten"

The order by Hoover to ceaseUFO investigations was apparentlyvery effective for a year or so. In theportion of the FBI file which I obtained(presumably the "best" portion, asexplained in the first paper of thisseries) there are only four documents ofnote that were filed between October 1,1947 and September 1, 1948. One ofthese is a single witness report that waswritten as a letter to a Senator whoforwarded the letter to the FBI. TheFBI, in turn, forwarded the letter to theSecretary of the Army. The date of thesighting, which was of a silvery "streak"that left a vapor trail that apparentlytraveled along with the object, wasMarch 13, 1948. The other threedocuments were correspondencewithin the FBI concerning an Air ForceDirective from the Air DefenseCommand (ADC) in which it was stated"Investigations will be coordinated withthe FBI office concerned in accordancewith instructions contained in letter,this headquarters, D 333.3 Ex, subject,'Cooperation of FBI with AAF onInvestigation of Flying Disc Incidents', 3Sept. 1947". (The headquartersreferred to was ADC, Mitchel Air ForceBase, New York.) As a result of theinteroffice correspondence regardingthis AF directive, Special AgentReynolds of the Liaison Section of theFBI contacted Lt. Col. C. P. Martin ofthe Intelligence Division of the AirForce. Col. Martin stated that"apparently the Air Defense Commandat Mitchel Field was not aware of thefact that the Bureau was no longerconducting investigations regardingflying discs." He further stated that hewould take the necessary actions to"straighten out the Air DefenseCommand as to the present policyregarding incidents of flying discs."29

The date of the ADC directive was 4Feb. 1948.30

10

By Bruce S. MaccabeeMUFON State Director for Maryland

(Copyright Bruce S. Maccabee, 1977)

Thus by the middle of 1948, asfar as the FBI was concerned, UFO'swere "gone", though not forgotten.There is no indication in the files that Ihave that anyone in the FBI felt that theFBI should re-enter the UFO arena, sopresumably the FBI was perfectlycontent to let the Air Force handle the"flying discs". On the other hand, theAir Force had apparently forgotten thatthe FBI wished to remain uninvolved. Inthe middle of September the FBIreceived a request from the Air MaterialCommand (AMC, MCIAXO-3) toanalyze, in the FBI laboratory, a sampleof soil said to have been "taken from adepression reputed to have beencaused by a 'flying saucer' described asbeing approximately two . feet indiameter and one foot thick whichsupposedly settled gently to theground, rebounded to a height oftwenty feet and then continued on itsjourney."31 On October 7, J. E. Hooversent back a letter stating that amicroscopic analysis had failed toreveal anything unusual about thesoil.32 In neither of the abovedocuments was there any reference tothe date or location of the sightingassociated with the soil sample.

Near the end of December 1948,the main FBI office received a teletypemessage in which it was stated thatseveral people had discovered a "flyingdisc" at an airport in the MojaveDesert.33 The FBI agent subsequentlyinterviewed the people involved andproved beyond all doubt what hadalready been stated in the originalteletype, namely that the disc was a toythat had been abandoned. The onlyimportance of this report is to indicatethat, despite Hoover's order, the agentswould still investigate cases and sendthe information to the home office.

It is of interest to compare this"dry" period for the FBI (October 1947

to January 1949) with events that wereoccurring within the Air Force. For areasonably detailed overview, seeJacobs' book10, The UFO Conrrouersyin America, pp. 43-51. Although theinflux of reports diminished greatlyduring the latter part of 1947, theinterest on the part of the Air Force didnot wane. Lt. Gen. Nathan Twining wasapparently convinced that somethingreal was being seen, and recommendeda special group to study thephenomenon.36 Thus project Sign was"born" on December 30,1947 at what isnow Wright-Patterson AFB. TheMantell case, in which a pilot crashedafter chasing a "saucer", January 7,1948, gave an added impetus to the Signinvestigation, since it seemed tosuggest that the discs were still flyingaround. According to Jacobs,37 theSign investigators tried very diligentlyto discover whether or not the discswere of Soviet origin, but they failed atevery turn. (This inability to obtaininformation indicating the discs wereRussian provides a very interestingcontrast to statements made in a paperin the FBI file which will be quotedshortly.) Finally, after the Chiles-Whitted sighting of July 24, 1948 (pilot,copilot, passenger, and perhaps groundobservers saw glowing objects with"windows" speed toward and pastthem), the Sign investigatorsapparently "bit the bullet' and wrote an"Estimate of the Situation". The"Estimate" was that UFOs wereinterplanetary vehicles. The "Estimate"was passed through channels all theway up to Gen. Vandenburg, the Chiefof Staff, who bounced it back for lack ofproof. (See Jacobs, p. 47 and especiallythe reference to Ruppelt given byJacobs.) Subsequently the ETH(extraterrestrial hypothesis) lostground in favor of the "anything elsebut...." approach and from then on theSign (and later Grudge and Blue Book)investigators favored the mis-

identification, hoax, hallucinationhypotheses, although the secretweapon hypothesis was not thrownout.

Project Sign came to an end onDecember 16,1948, when its name waschanged to Project Grudge. Thischange was noted in an FBImemorandum dated March 22, 1949.This is the first indication in the Bureaufiles (at least in the portion I have) thatanything had changed as far as the AirForce investigation was concerned. Iwill refer to this memorandum again inits natural temporal sequence. But first,I wish to present a document whichmay be of profound importance inunderstanding why the Air Forcecontinued its investigation, why the firsttwo special UFO investigatory projects(Sign and Grudge) received a highsecurity rating, and why UFO relatedinformation was classified even into the1950*5. (I don't think this documentprovides a reason for classificationbeyond the early fifties; I think AFrecords on UFO investigations wereclassified during the fifties and sixties,and even to the present time despitethe end of Bluebook, because a"tradition" had been established duringthe late forties. As will be seen, thereason for the establishment of the"tradition" probably was a fear of Sovietweapons.)

On January 10, 1949, C. C.McSwain, the Special Agent in Chargein Knoxville, Tennessee, sent to theDirector a message concerning "FlyingSaucers Observed over Oak RidgeArea; Internal Security-X." Thedocument began with a report of asighting and photographs taken by aMr. Presley in July of 1947. Theexistence of the sighting andphotographs was made known to theFBI by a Mr. John(?) Rathman, ChiefInvestigator, Security Division, AtomicEnergy Commission, and by Mr. E(name cannot be determined from theavailable records since it has been wellcovered up), Resident Engineer, AirMateriel Command, United StatesArmy. Mr. E was described as the"principal" army technician at theNuclear Energy for the Propulsion ofAircraft Research Center at Oak

Ridge". The photographs mentionedwere subsequently shown by analysis atWright-Patterson AFB to have"images" which were, in fact, flaws inthe negative, M but the UFO reportcontained within the document is notimportant. What is important is theinformation passed on to the FBI, in the"utmost confidence," by Mr. E. Inreading this, the reader should keep inmind what was stated in the precedingtwo paragraphs about the way ProjectSign investigators felt about UFOreports, and the reader also shouldkeep in mind the statements by Gen.Schulgen that were made in thesummer of 1947. (parts I and II of thisseries of papers). Leaving out thesection on the UFO report of July 1947,I now present Mr. E's statement to theFBI, as copied by agent McSwain:39

"Mr. E predicated his remarksconcerning 'flying saucers' or 'mysterymissiles' by stating that he knewnothing of an official nature concerningthem, other than the fact that theywere believed by Air Force Intelligenceofficials to be man-made missiles,rather than some natural phenomenon(emphasis by present author). It was hisfurther belief that a great deal ofinformation had been compliledconcerning these missiles by Air Forceintelligence, and that research on thematter was being done extensively atWright Field, Dayton, Ohio (i.e.,Wright-Patterson AFB — note bypresent author). He also expressed theopinion that information at the disposalof the United States Army Air ForceIntelligence had, in all probability, beenmade available to the Bureau atWashington, D.C."

"Mr. E then continued with hisown ideas as to what might be thenature of these discs, which ideas hehad formulated through review of thoseknown facts and theore t ica lconjectures of himself and otherscientists concerning the nature offlying discs and methods of propulsionfor such type of aerial mechanism.According to him, flying discs have longbeen a theoretical possibility and, infact, a possibility which would indicateone of the best means by which to

break through the barriers of thesupersonic area. Scientists have, formany years, been attempting todevelop this kind of aircraft. (Presentauthor's note: see Jacobs40 for areference to the Navy's "FlyingFlapjack," a circular plane project thathad been scrapped. This may be whatMr. E was referring to.) Someexperimentation has been done even inthe United States, but insofar as isknown in the United States at thepresent time, there have never beenany practical developments. As asecond factor of consideration, Mr. Estated that insofar as is known to U.S.scientists at this time, there is nochemical fuel which would makepossible tremendous range of flightsuch as is ascribed to the reported

. "flying saucers". There is only onepossible fuel which could be utilizedwhich is in accord with present theory,and that is the utilization of atomicenergy. (Present author's note: at thispoint in the manuscript someone haswritten in the margin, "ATOMICENERGY MISSILE".) As furtherevidence of this possible means ofpropulsion, Mr. E called attention to thevapor trail and gaseous coronadescribed as a ball of fire, which hestates might give some evidence to thefact that a radioactive field is present.He explained that the corona, orexhaust, has what appears to be layersof intensity which are circular ratherthan elongated and have no tendencyto trail at the extremities, as would bethe case if a normal type of exhaustfrom a combustion engine was beingutilized in the propulsion of theseaircraft. He continued that the vaportrail left by the missile appears to be onesingle line of uniform intensity which isextremely slow in dissipating. It waspointed out by him that in the case of anormal vapor trail being left by anaircraft moving at extremely highspeeds or extremely high altitudes, thevapor trail usually will be from the wingtips and/or the exhaust of the engines,thus presenting several lines. But, inany event, even though only one linewere visible, it would be rather quick to

11(continued on next page)

(FBI Files Continued)

dissipate. This indicated to him that thevapor t r a i l r ep r e sen t s someatmospheric change along the path ofthe missile, which would not be the casewere it any presently known type ofaircraft." (Note by present author: itshould be obvious to the reader thatMr. E, who worked in a research groupthat was trying to develop atomicpowered planes, had spent aconsiderable amount of time studyingthe available information on exhausttrails from "flying saucers". Clearly Mr.E, and those who supported his work,did not ascribe to the belief that UFOreports were all hoaxes, delusions, andmisidentifications.)

"He continued that theinformation furnished by him should betreated with the upmost confidence, inthat he was not speaking officially, butas a matter of personal cooperation.(Note: this line was underlined in pencilin the original text.) He stated that thematter was being give absolutely nodissemination by the Air Force or othermilitary personnel, and that they hadnot deemed it advisable to advise him ofall information pertaining to the missile(emphasis by present author; note theimplication of the existence ofinformation that was "above topsecret"; i.e., that required a specificneed to know). He continued, however,that in his conversation withrepresentatives at Wright Field and inreading reports returned to thiscountry by foreign agents (emphasis bypresent author), he had gatheredtogether certain information whichmight be of assistance in determiningwhether or not these so-called missileswere authentic, usable, and of dangerto the United States. First, he pointedout that knowledge of such a possibleaircraft is not by any means new, ithaving been known as early as fouryears ago (emphasis by present author;the approximate date referred to is1944-45) that some type of flying discwas being experimented with by theRussians. In addition thereto, he statedthat more recent reports have been

12

received from representatives of theCentral Intelligence Agency inSouthern Europe and Southern Asia tothe effect that the Russians wereexperimenting with some type ofradical aircraft or guided missile whichcould be dispatched for great distancesout over the sea, made to turn in flightand return to the base from which itwas launched (emphasis by presentauthor; the reader should noteespecially the reported ability of this"missile" to return to its base.) This factwas extremely worthy of notice asexperiments in this country have so faronly developed to the point where weare concerned with delivering a missileto the required point of impact, and noconsideration has been given toimparting to that missile the ability toreturn. Secondly, he stated that it is aknown fact that the Russians areattempting to develop some type ofnuclear energy, that they received awealth of information concerningnuclear energy at the time of theiroccupation in Germany, and that theytoo have at their disposal the limitedsupply of the necessary fissionablematerials. He stated that insofar as anyopinion as to whether or not they havethe ability and scientific knowledge tocreate such a nuclear powered missileis strictly a matter of conjecture, andthat he would hesitate to make anydefinite statement. He pointed out,however, that the Russians have somevery capable scientists in the field ofatomic energy and that, in additionthereto, they took into their custodysome of the most advanced andcapable scientists of the GermanNation."

"He also stated that a peculiarfact concerning missiles exists fromreports he has received which is worthyof notice, and that is that from allappearances, they have usuallyapproached the United States from anortherly direction and have beenreported as returning in a northerlydirection. None have every beenknown to crash, collide or disintegrateover American soil, but it would appearthat they come to the United States,cruise around, and go back over the

North Pole. He states that insofar as isknown to him, there has never been anypiece of one recovered from any sourcewhatever in order that analytical study'of its nature could be made. Insofar aswas known to him, the only actualmaterial which would be of any value indetermining its nature are telephotophotographs which are now in thepossession of engineers at WrightField, Dayton, Ohio (emphasis by thepresent author; said empasis isunderstandable in view of the repeatedclaim that there are no photographs oftrue UFOs). How detailed and howclear these photographs are, he wasunable to state. He stated that onereport has been received concerning acollision of these missiles with anotheraircraft. This report, according to him,took place a short time prior to thereport of numerous discs over theUnited States, and the report emanatedfrom Czechoslovakia (emphasis bypresent author, in view of the claim thatall reports following Kenneth Arnold's(June 24, 1947) were either attempts tobecome famous or were the result ofsuggestibility of the American people;said empasis also is understandable inview of the early claims by scientiststhat UFOs —"flying discs"— couldn'tbe real because the only reports werefrom the USA and one would expectthem to be seen throughout the world).This report was that a Czechqslovakiantransport had collided with someunidentified missile while in mid-air overthe ocean, and that said missile and saidtransport had been completelydisintegrated without recovery of partsor survivors from either. It was thebelief of Mr. E that this undescribedmissile was perhaps the same type ofthing as the flying saucer. Anotherfactor of notice, according to Mr. E andas is portrayed by fhe photographs(emphasis by present author; this mayrefer to the previously mentionedtelephoto photographs), it wouldappear that the missiles can bemaintained at a certain altitude abovethe contour of the ground (note bypresent author: this is "reminiscent" ofour present day — 1970*3 — "cruisemissiles"). This could be done by means

of some type of radio altimeter or radiocontrol. Naturally, the path of themissile is not in exact parallel to thecontour, as its purported great speedwould create considerable lag in itsflight. Another factor worthy of note,according to Mr. E, is that it is normallyreported as being seen at tremendouslyhigh altitudes and always traveling in astraight line. (Author's note: why werethey never seen to turn in preparationfor the journey back over the NorthPole? Mr. E seems to ignore this factorin his attempt to identify "saucers" withreturnable Russian missiles.) He statedthat he himself observed, on oneoccasion, a single vapor trail comingfrom some type of aircraft atunbelievably high altitude, which vaportrail extended from horizon to horizonin a perfectly straight line. He observedthe vapor trail while it was in theprocess of formation and states that itwas completely unlike any vapor trail hehad ever observed before in all hisexperience with the Air Force. It washis judgment that whatever created thevapor trail was traveling at anunbelievably tremendous speed. This,together with reports that when closeto the ground, the missile travels atspeeds which make possible visualobservation of its actions, would reflectthat there is some ability to control thespeed of these missiles as well as thealtitude."

"Mr. E concluded that thismatter, while still purely a matter ofguesswork, is nevertheless a source ofgreat concern to the militaryestablishment of this country. Greatefforts have been expended by theservice to determine just what thenature of these missiles might be and,upon so determining, decide whetheror not an adequate defense can beestablished. He also stated that it hasgiuen impetus to the research beingdone by the Air Force in their ownprogram of nuclear engergy for thepropulsion of aircraft to develop guidedmissiles (emphasis by present author;apparently the existence of "flyingsaucers" acted as an inspiration for theAir Force). He also advised that insofaras was known to him, there was

absolutely no connection betweenthese missiles and the fact that theywere observed close to Oak Ridge,Tennessee (note: this refers to thereport associated with the photos thatMr. E and Mr. Rathman submitted tothe FBI). He stated that this wasperhaps, and probably, a matter ofcoincidence and they were seen in thisarea merely as they were seen in forty-six of the forty-eight states of the UnitedStates during the month of July whenso many reports were being received."

"This information is beingsubmitted to the Bureau for whatevervalue it may be, and no further action inthe matter is being contemplated bythis office, unless advised to thecontrary."

Apparently the informationfurnished by the Resident Engineer, Mr.E, was of some value to the FBI. Abouttwo weeks after the above was written,D. M. Ladd summarized the aboveinformation for the Director.44 Many ofthe sentences of Ladd's summary wereunderlined by hand (i.e., not by atypewriter), suggesting that thesummary was read quite closely, withspecial attention to sections concerningthe comments on nuclear-poweredmissiles and the information from theCIA. That the information made animpact on the FBI can be inferred fromthe presence of the following paragraphin a letter sent to all the Special Agentsin Charge on March 25, 1949:42

"For your c o n f i d e n t i a linformation, a reliable and confidentialsource has advised the Bureau thatflying discs are believed to be man-made missiles rather than naturalphenomenon. It has also beendetermined that for approximately thepast four years the USSR has beenengaged in experimentation on anunknown type of flying disc."

This bulletin, and the Air Forceinformation form that was attached, willbe referred to again. However, thepoint presently of interest concerns theimportance that the FBI gave to theinformation supplied by Mr. E. It would

seem that this was the first time that theFBI got any "straight dope" from the AirForce on flying discs, and even this wasunofficial. In the following years, theinformation received from the AFconcerning the official opinion of the AFon flying discs varied considerably fromthat expressed by Mr. E. However, theone thing which persisted was the clearimplication that the AF treated UFOreports, especially those from trainedobservers, very seriously, even thoughthe official opinion fluctuated from onetype of explanation or explanations toanother. To be explicit about this, I willnow present short segments of variousdocuments that present the AFimpression of "flying saucers" duringthe years for which I have informationfrom the FBI file. Many of thesedocuments will be referred to again ingreater detail as I progress through thehistory of the "FBI-UFO" connection.

Ups and Downsof UFO Explanations

I have already presented (Parts 1and 2) the information that indicatesthat the AF initially took the view that"flying discs" were either Russian-mademissiles or natural phenomena. The AFalso allowed for the possibility that atleast some of the UFO reports couldhave been generated by subversives.However, the thought that the wholeUFO business could have resulted fromRussian subversion did not last as longas the first flap in 1947. The failure tofind any indications of internalsubversion was one of the reasons theFBI got out of the UFO quagmire.

The opinion expressed by Mr. Ein the previously presented interviewprobably represented the general AFopinion as of 1949. However, as I havementioned, during 1948 the ProjectSign team apparently went through an"extraterrestrial period". Whether ornot this possibility was ever imparted tothe FBI cannot be determined from thepapers I have. As I have pointed out, the"cupboard is bare" during 1948.

(continued on next page) 13

(FBI Files, continued)

However , the possibi l i ty ofextraterrestrial intelligence havingsomething to do with UFOs wasmentioned several years later, as I willpresently demonstrate.

In late 1948 and early 1949"green fireballs" were observed overseveral military installations in theWestern U.S. I will discuss the greenfireball information obtained by the FBIlater. However, suffice it to say at thispoint that the appearance of thesephenomena at the beginning of ProjectGrudge gave the AF an added impetusto investigate UFO reports. No onedenied the existence of the greenfireballs, a fact which is in contrast tothe repeated denials that actual disc-like objects were the cause of flyingsaucer reports. A famous meteoricistwho studied the initial green fireballreports, and who saw one himself (Dr.Lincoln LaPaz), argued quite stronglyin his communications with the AF(specifically with Lt. Col. Doyle Rees,Commander of the 17th District of theOSI) that the green fireballs were notnatural meteors, and that theircharacteristics were what might beexpected of Russian missiles (wherehave we heard that before?). Thusduring 1949 and into 1950 the AF had anacceptably real phenomenon on theirhands which might have been related tomilitary developments of the Russians.Now. it is important to note thatgrouped with the fireball reports werealso reports of a "disc-like variation".Thus one might expect that the AFwould continue to attribute discs to theRussians. However, just a year later, inresponse to a request from Hoover tofind out "Just what are the facts re'flying saucers'?", an agent intervieweda Major —- and Lt. Col. -— on March 28,1950.« The agent was told that the AFdiscontinued its intelligence project andannounced the discontinuance of thepress in December 1949 (referring tothe demise of Grudge) because "aftertwo years of investigation over three-fourths of the incidents regarding flyingsaucers proved to be misidentifications

14

of a wide variety of conventional itemssuch as lighted weather balloons andother air-borne objects." Col. —- alsostated that the AF was no longeractively investigating saucers. Thus, inearly 1950, the FBI was to believe thatthere was nothing to flying saucerreports.

On the other hand, in May 1950the FBI received a copy of an AFbriefing in which the ETH was notspecifically thrown out, but merelystated to be unprovable. In the samebriefing, the continuance of reports wasspecifically attributed to mass hysteriaand to suggestibility of the population.44

In August 1950 the OSI informedthe FBI that the continued appearanceof "green fireballs, discs, and meteors"(emphasis by the present author)caused them great concern.45

On October 9,1950 the FBI wasinformed by the OSI that their"investigation of these phenomena failsto indicate that the sightings involvedspace ships or missiles from any otherplanet or country".4* (Note that the OSIcontinued the investigations of discreports after Grudge ended, during theperiod when the AF officially had nospecial project for such studies.)

The portion of the FBI file whichI obtained contains nc interofficememoranda (and only one UFO report)for 1951. Skipping then to 1952, on July29 the FBI was informed that47 "the AirForce has failed to arrive at anysatisfactory conclusion in its researchregarding numerous reports of flyingsaucers and flying discs sightedthroughout the United States". (Notethat was the period of the 1952 flap. In1952 the AF logged more reports —1501— than for any other year.) On theother hand, this particular documentadvised that "it is not entirelyimpossible that the objects sighted maypossibly be ships from another planetsuch as Mars."47

On October 10, 1952, the FBIreceived a copy of a news release fromProject Blue Book (specifically fromAlbert Chop) in which it is stated that

approximately 20% of the sightings"cannot be associated with thesefamiliar things."48

On October 27, 1952, adocument was filed that indicates thatthe film taken by Delbert Newhousehad a tremendous impact on the AirIntelligence. After ruling out mundaneexplanations "completely", AirTechnical Intelligence Center was "at acomplete loss to explain this mostrecent creditable (sic) sighting." In thesame document is the statement "Col. ---advised that Air Intelligence still feelsthat the so-called flying discs are eitheroptical illusions or atmosphericphenomena. He pointed out, however,that some military officials are seriouslyconsidering the possibility ofinterplanetary ships."49

The last document in mypossession that gives any indication ofthe AF attitude toward flying saucerswas written in November 1957.50

(There is a complete lack of interofficememoranda from October 27, 1952 toNovember 12, 1957, and there wereonly 5 good reports and 3 poor reportsfrom November 1952 throughDcember 1957 in the portion of the filethat I have received.) The November1957 memorandum mentions theUFOs seen during the "Sputnik Flap"and states that, "In view of the numberof these reports...(an agent determinedfrom the AF)...that all the casesmentioned above have for all practicalpurposes been resolved as beingnonauthentic or there was no basis forthe sightings. Although this statementis not an explicit statement of opinion, itis consistent with the standard publicAF attitude that there was nothing toUFO reports.

It appears from the informationin the FBI file that the AF attitudechanged considerably during the firstfive or six years of the phenomenon.However, from other sources21,22,51 weknow that after the Robertson Panelrecommendations of January 1953, theofficial AF attitude toward UFO reportscrystalized around the "nothing to it"attitude. Any reports left unidentified

(Continued on next page)

By Ann Druffcl

Other Encounters

of All Different Kinds

Close Encounters of the ThirdKind dominate the conversation ofufologists nowadays. I refer to both thestunning movie of the same name andto the numerous well-documentedreports from reliable witnessesworldwide.

However, I have noted the past 9months that other types of encountersof ufological interest are occurring onthe sidelines. It is possible that theseencounters should be given equalweight in trying to determine what isreally important in the UFO subject.

One August day last summer, Itook two of my daughters and theirfriends to Newport Beach, expecting abright Southern California day, withwarm waves and sunny air. On thatmorning, however, just as we walkedonto the sands, the tail end of aMexican hurricane was battering thePacific off-shore. As we watched

dismayed, the clouds thickened, and itbegan to drizzle.

As we huddled in our beachtowels, hoping that the sky would clear,we noticed a group of young Japanesetourists striking up conversations withnearby clusters of soggy people. Soon itwas our turn, and we found ourselveschatting in Basic English with severaluniversity students from Japan. Theywanted to use their English, theyexplained with open, charming smiles.

While some of them chattedwith my daughters and their friends,two others asked me curiously why theweather was so bad. After listeningintently to my halting answer, theybegan searching for other subjects ofconversation. On an impulse, Iventured the question of UFOs.

Eagerly they answered. Yes,indeed, the subject was of great interest

(FBI Files, Continued)

were explained away as hot havingsufficient information, even though thatwas, at best, a weak explanation inmany unidentified cases. As far as theFBI is concerned, there is no documentin the portion of the file that I havewhich expresses an opinion on thereality or nature of the "flying discs",other than the September 25, 1947,document containing the conclusionthat none of the disc reports wasrelated to subversion.25

This section of this series on theFBI UFO documents has presentedinformation obtained from the AFregarding official and unofficial opinionsas to the nature of the UFOphenomenon. In the next section I willpresent some of the interesting detailsof the information supplied by the AFand a listing of reports in the FBI files upthrough 1950.

(Part 4 will appear in the next issue)

REFERENCES29. FBI document dated 3/1/4830. ADC document dated 2/4/4831. AMC letter dated 9/9/4832. FBI document dated 10/7/4833. FBI teletype dated 12/12/4834. FBI documents dated 12/28/4835. Formal report dated 3/30/4936. Jacobs, op. ciY., pg. 4437. ibid. pg. 4538. Letter to Rathman from Col: Gasser dated10 Feb. 1949 and included in the FBI file39. FBI document written 1/10/4940. Jacobs, op. at., pg. 4341. FBI document written 1/24/4942. FBI bulletin dated 3/25/4943. FBI document dated 3/28/5044. AF document filed 6/15/5045. FBI document written 7/23/5046. FBI document written 10/9/5047. FBI document written 7/29/52.48. AF document received 10/6/5249. FBI document written 10/27/5250. FBI document written 11/12/5751. B. Maccabee, "Scientific Study of UnidentifiedFlying Objects" (a detailed analysis of SpecialReport #14), unpublished, Nov. 1976

in Japan and in the university wherethey studied. When I inquired what theythought UFOs were, they proceeded tosay that they were —UFOs were—tachyon. Did I understand them?

I reached into my store oftechnical terms and replied that it wasan atomic particle that traveled fasterthan light. Delighted, their grins grewbroader, their speech became fasterand less understandable. I had hit uponsomething very important to them.

As the drizzle turned into rainand our clothes, towels, and hairbecame drenched, we sat therediscussing their theory! UFOs, theybelieved, were propelled in such a way

(continued on next page)

I Mark R. Herbstritt

stronomyNotes

THE SKY FOR APRIL 1978

Mercury — It is still visible very low inthe west after sunset, but by April llthit is in inferior conjunction.

Venus — It is well up in the west atsunset and sets about 2 hours later.

Mars — In Cancer, it is on the meridianat sunset and sets shortly aftermidnight.

Jupiter — Moving from Taurus intoGemini.it is high in the southwest atsunset and sets about 5 hours later.

Saturn — In Leo, it is high in thesoutheast at sunset and sets about 2%hours before sunrise. On the 25th it isstationary and resumes direct motionwith respect to the background stars.

15

(California Report, Continued).

that permitted them faster-than-lighttravel or, indeed, were "tachyons"themselves, emitting light whilejourneying at faster-than-light speed.

This "encounter" shows thatinterest in UFOs is everywhere. Youhave only to look for it.

In November, Close Encountersof the Third Kind made its premiere atthe Cineramadome in Hollywood.Realizing I needed to be well-informedabout the picture in order to judge itspossible effect on raw data reports, Itook my 13-year-old daughter the veryfirst week on a Tuesday noon.

The crowds were not quite asbad as we expected. We purchased ourtickets and got into a line which wasalready forming for the 2:30 showing.Realizing that we had a wait of morethan 2 hours ahead of us, we sat on thecold terrazzo floor of the outer lobby,munching a hastily bought lunch.

The,chilly August day at thebeach flashed into my mind. Curious, Istruck up a conversation with a younguniversity student who was sitting onthe terrazzo ahead of me. The subjectof UFOs immediately brought a gleamto his eye and mileage to his tongue. Hetold me everything he knew on thesubject, which was considerable. Heknew UFOs were real, they wereimportant, and people should be awareof the truth about them.Perhaps thismovie would have a propelling effect ineducating the populace. At least wehoped so.

Before he finished, we hadcovered not only the subject of UFOs,but also the Egyptian pyramids, dolphinintelligence, and the mystery of sharks'nomadic behavior. As he showed me ahalf-toe peeking from his sandal (uponwhich a shark had nibbled several yearsbefore), I marveled at the universalappeal of UFOs to this generation ofsearching, accepting individuals.

16As we talked, the line in back of

us formed rapidly down the block,around the theater and into the parkinglot. It contained many students,tourists, parents with tiny children,retired citizens — people of all ages,sizes, shapes, and mode of dress.Clearly, whatever camaraderie hadbrought them together on a Tuesdayafternoon was of universal importance.

I skip over these encounters onbeach and lobby to return to my usualform of research — raw data collectionand correlation. Contrary to whatmight be expected, the release of CloseEncounters of the Third Kind has not,to this time of writing (January 20th)produced any startling close encounterreports. What it has produced, in thisarea at least, is a heavy increase in callsfrom the public seeking informationabout UFOs. Of course, such calls havebeen fairly constant over the years, butthe public's motives now have subtlychanged. Some ask how they can "get ajob" researching UFOs. I respond tothis by asking them the same question!Some ask to "chat" about the subject.Others call to report lights in the skywhich they think might be stars, but"you know, just in case".

An unknown type of hoaxballoon which figured prominently inthe recent Glendale, California flap hasmade its reappearance — same place,same time, and is being reported asUFOs. But now it is harder to convincethe witnesses that they are seeinglighted bags traveling with the wind.The populace seems excited,expectant, and more willing to believethan ever before.

In this area, also, peculiar night-light reports have streamed in duringthe past nine months. Similar to objectswhich have hovered and maneuveredover us in past years, they are nothingdramatic, nothing close, perhapsnothing even important. But the sheernumbers and present persistence ofthese phenomena has led me to wonderwhether the lights-in-the-sky are asurveillance of some kind — the onlytype of surveillance, perhaps, whichmight be safely feasible over our heavily

populated, sprawling Los Angelescomplex.

On April 3, 1977, a Burbankamateur astonomer called to tell methat he had noticed an "added star inthe Little Dipper", gyrating back andforth within that northern constellation.Seen only briefly through his telescope,its angular speed was too fast to track,but he was able subsequently to followits movement east, then west, throughbinoculars. The binoculars enlarged thedim point of light to about secondmagnitude. Its white color was tingedbluish-green.

On June 26th, 1977, between6:45 and 7:15 PM, an amateurphotographer and his wife watched apoint of light traveling over Van Nuys.Starlike to the unaided eye, it was notenlarged appreciably throughbinoculars. But the photographer was atenacious witness. Lugging a stepladder into his yard to use a a tripod, heobtained six photos through a powerfultelescopic lens. One of the photosshows a yellowish-white object high inthe sky near the moon.

The object, on a projected slide,measures about 3/8 inch. WaltGreenawald and Donald Wietzel, whouncovered and investigated this case,are anxious to find photo-analysissources to assist in interpretation of thisphoto.

At 9:00 PM on August 12, 1977,the SKYNET phone interrupted mybirthday dinner. Out in Northridge nearthe western edge of the Basin, twowitnesses had just viewed a brilliantlight which they at first thought was aPerseid meteor. The thing stopped andhovered for 1% minutes, took off again,and once more stopped. Its generalmotion was easterly and it was seenagainst the southern sky, decidedlyunacceptable for a Perseid meteor,even discounting its erratic movement.After about 5 minutes, the object finallydisappeared, having covered 20degrees of sky.

Shortly afterward, the witnessessaw another object which behaved likethe first. Both objects were whiter thanordinary stars and, though the

apparent size of bright stars, wereextraordinarily brilliant.

That same evening, while thebirthday cake waited to be cut, awitness from Hollywood, RichardHammand, called to report that he andhis mother had seen a brilliant whiteobject traveling southeast. From hisdescription, it seemed that they hadseen the same object as the Northridgewitnesses, but possibly after it haddisappeared from the Northridgecitizens' view. The object was seen atotal of 3 minutes, during which itstopped periodically, zigzagged tightlynumerous times and hovered for shortperiods. It eventually disappeared intothe east. It was "a really clean, brightwhite and sparkled like a diamond", theamazed witness stated. He comparedits size to the "seas on the moon whichare supposed to be its eyes".

That same night, as the icecream melted, yet another witness fromNorthridge reported a "really brightwhite light" moving east-southeasterlyin an erratic manner. It stopped,started, stopped again, each motioncovering 10-15 seconds.

The most intriguing thing aboutthe August 12th objects was that theywere almost invariably seen by personswho were trying to view the Perseidmeteor shower. Speaking later withanother researcher who had receivedsimilar reports during the Perseidmeteor period, it seemed almost as ifthe erratic moving objects were takingadvantage of Perseid watchers in orderto show themselves.

On August 20th, another youngamateur astronomer in Van Nuyscalled SKYNET. At 9:03 PM, a verybright object traveled from northwestto northeast, then turned abruptly anddisappeared into the south. Theduration of sighting was 17 minutes,and the apparent size of the object wasone-quarter full moon.

The assault over the Basincontinued. On August 23rd, SKYNET

almost tracked one of the objects whenthe August 20th witness calledMUFON investigator Vmce Uhlenkottto report another of the brilliantwandering lights. Uhlenkott rushedoutdoors to look, but from his vantagepoint several miles from the witness, hewas unable to see it. Shortly afterward,the object disappeared from the VanNuys witness' sight. This experiencemight indicate that the objects are, inreality, relatively close to the ground.

That same evening, a LosAngeles man called me to report ahuge, moon-sized fireball that hadtaken a leisurely 2-minute stroll throughthe skies. Its light was soft and self-contained, green on the outsideblending into a white center. It trailed aluminous tail in which the same colorswere evident. Though it seemed fairlyclose to the ground, there was no noiseheard as it silently exploded anddisappeared.

A refreshingly frank womanwitness called to report a 5-hoursighting that happened on September3-4, from 10:00 PM to 3:00 AM. Lookingsoutheast toward Van Nuys from herNorthridge home, she saw a brightwhite light hover motionless in the sky.As she watched, a second object with"jaggedy ends" moved out from thestationary light and stayed near itthroughout the woman's 5-hour vigil.This woman finished her verbal phonereport with the information that shemight not be too reliable as a witnessbecause she "drinks", but enjoys thestars anyway and is interested inastronomy. I accepted the report sinceit fit nicely into the plethora of reportsswarming into SKYNET files.

By late November the wave ofbrilliant starlike objects had eased offbut not vanished entirely. OnNovember 26th at 7:45 PM, MaryWatson reported that she and hergrown son, Allen, had seen a brightobject in the northern sky which they atfirst thought might be a star. Theywatched it for 5 minutes from their LaCrescenta home. Occupied withhousehold tasks, they took their eyes

momentarily away. When Allen glancedback, the object had disappeared. Thishappened on a clear, cloudless night.

Summing up these differentexperiences into a coherent whole, /wish to suggest that the importantthing in u/o/ogy might not be the highly-touted close encounter. In fact, themovie — smashing and stunning as it is— might give a very false impression ofwhat UFOs are all about. They arecertainly not all extraterrestrial, andthey all do not seem benign. The closeencounter cases which occupy so manyresearchers' time, including myself,may not be what they seem. Theseexperiences might not representphysical reality but, instead, projectionsinto witnesses' minds from an outsidesource. They might represent a quasi-reality, representing witnesses'a t t empts to make coherentinterpretation to what, in reality, is anencounter with an alien force which thehuman mind cannot interpret.

We do not know where we arewith Close Encounters. The only typeof encounters that our minds can besure of perceiving correctly areencounters among ourselves — withother humans interested in the samesubject, UFOs. It is of vital importancefor social scientists to gatherinformation on how the subject ofUFOs is affecting the human race.Perhaps they will find the UFOs areeven contributing to a stepped-uphuman evolution.

Almost equally valid areperceptions of objects far enough awayfrom witnesses that we can be fairlysure the objects are not distorting thesepersons' immediate frames ofreference. These are the only UFOswhich seem to be undeniably physicallyreal.

Grants and other funding isdesperately needed for monitoring ofour skies for. this type of UFO. The NL,(nocturnal light) and its attendantduimal counterpart, the daylight disk,are crying out for study. Let us not

(Continued on page 18) 17

HUMANOID STUDY GROUP REPORT:ABDUCTION CASES

By Dave Webb

(Eastern Regional Director of MUFON)

The Humanoid Study Group(HSG) was started in 1974 at theAkron, Ohio, MUFON Symposium byTed Bloecher and the author. At thattime Bloecher's files, the starting pointfor the HSG data, contained less than1,000 references to humanoid reports,or Close Encounters of the Third Kind(CE-IH) to use Hynek's and ColumbiaPicture's term. Now after nearly 4 yearsof intensive ferreting, the HSG's newlydeveloped HumCat computer filecontains 1,650 CE-IH reports: That is anincrease of 65 percent in only 4 years!Of course much of this increase isbecause of HSG contributors, such asJerry Clark, Lou Parish, RichardHeiden, Al Lawson, Jean-Luc Riveraand foreign contributors Alain Gamard(France), J. Delair (U.K.), KeithBasterfield (Australia), Illka Serra(Finland), and Francesco Izzo (Italy).But there also seems to have been anincrease in the frequency of CE-IIIreports in recent years.

This increase is apparent in thenumbers of high strangeness cases, andis especially reflected in the frequencyof the so-called "abduction" cases. Inthe HSG system of classifying CE-IIIreports by the relationship of an entityand the UFO craft that seems to beassociated with it, the abduction case islabeled Type G. Type G reports arethose where the percipient has an on-board experience, either apparentlyvoluntary or involuntary. The HSG filecontains 160 Type G reports, or about10 percent of the total. Of thesereports, 46 percent have occurredsince the beginning of 1970. Aboutequal numbers of Type G's appear foreach of the last 5 years. Already for lastyear we have on file 8 abductionreports , which is remarkableconsidering that this type of caseusually takes the longest time tosurface. Two years ago, in 1976, Ipresented a paper on abduction casesat the CUFOS Conference in Chicago.

At that time I was able to find referencesto only 50 Type G reports; the numberhas grown by a factor of 3 in only twoyears!

The reason I can so glibly throwthese statistics at you is that at long lastthe HSG has been able to computercode the basic data for CE-III reports.This is due in large part to the ableassistance of Rick Bonenfant. The file isnow accessible through magnetic tapeand disk via a time-sharing system. Thissystem is similar to UFOCAT in thatthe file entries are randomly accessibleusing a terminal keyboard. The HSGfile will eventually be merged withUFOCAT, which is operated by theCenter for UFO Studies. The HSGsystem is still being developed, but wenow have the ability to produce listingsfor research and data exchangepurposes. Eventually this kind of listingwill be published along with caseabstracts.

(California Report, Continued)

ignore them. They may be the only typeof true UFO encounter which iscapable of being studied scientifically atthis time.

18

MUFON AMATEUR RADIO NETS (weekly)

DAY FREQUENCY NET

SAT

SAT

SUN

TIME NETC.D.S.T. CONTROLS

40 meters 7237 KHZ.

75 meters 3975 KHZ.

0700

0800

N1JS

WA9ARG

20 meters 14,284 KHZ. 1300 NIJS & WONC

Lucius Parish

In Others' Words

The January 17 issue ofNATIONAL ENQUIRER featured anarticle on a UFO sighting over theisland of Sardinia on October 27,1977.The report came from the crew of anItalian Air Force helicopter. In theJanuary 24 ENQUIRER issue, reporterBob Pratt presented material allegedlylinking UFOs with the mysteriousatmospheric blasts along the EastCoast. Five separate UFO articlesappear in the January 31 ENQUIRER,including actor Jamie Farr's account ofa UFO chasing his car in the Arizonadesert, the ENQUIRER'S $5,000 awardfor "most scientifically valuable UFOcase reported in 1977" (the 1976 Iraniancase which involved E-M effects),psychic predictions of open contactwith UFO occupants, the opinions ofaerospace experts on governmentalsecrecy, etc. UFO sightings in the townof Salisbury, England are reported inthe February 7 ENQUIRER.

A claim of an encounter withUFO occupants is featured in theJanuary 24 issue of THE STAR. Two10-foot-tall beings allegedly were seenearly on the morning of December 20,1977 at Lake Mohegan, New York. RayStanford is still talking of touching off a"UFO Watergate" with the revelationsin his book, SOCORRO SAUCER IN APENTAGON PANTRY. A short itemon this topic appears in the January 31issue of THE STAR. The February 7issue reported on the new Jack WebbTV series, "Project UFO." Thedramatized incidents will be based onthe Project Blue Book files and beginsFebruary 19 on NBC-TV.

The F e b r u a r y issue ofREADER'S DIGEST contains a lengthyexcerpt from THE FIRE CAME BY byBaxter & Atkins, a highly readableaccount of the 1908 explosion of a

mystery object over Siberia. Perhapsthis condensation will help offset thetotally inadequate UFO article byRonald Schiller in the November 1977issue of the DIGEST.

UFOs and science-fiction arediscussed in five separate articles in theFebruary issue of SCIENCE DIGEST.There is an interview with Arthur C.Clarke, plus features on "Star Wars"and "CE3K," as well as an article on theCenter for UFO Studies.

The weekly tabloid, MODERNPEOPLE, has published a "CloseEncounters" Special, largely devoted tothe film, but also presenting variousarticles on UFOs. Most such items arereprints from past issues of the tabloid.It is available on newsstands for 60C.

The March/April issue ofBEYOND REALITY is another "UFOUpdate" issue, with articles on variousaspects of the UFO subject.

A new magazine, UFOENCOUNTERS, is now available and isscheduled to be published on abimonthly basis. If we're lucky, it won'tbe! The first (April) issue is nothing buts ta f f -wr i t t en rehash, obviouslydesigned to cash in on the publicitysurrounding "CE3K." There isdefinitely a need for a high-quality,reliable newsstand magazine on theUFO subject, but this one definitelyisn't it.

Long-time Canadian Ufologist,Gene Duplantier, returns to thepublishing side of research with anexcellent "bookzine," UFOLK. As thetitle implies, it is devoted entirely tophotos and biographical data, featuringUFO researchers from around theworld. There's also a listing of UFO

organizations/publications and anindex of the researchers who are listedin the book. If this first effort is well-received, Gene may publish additionalvolumes periodically. This one iscertainly well worth the $2.00 price andmay be ordered from Gene at: 17Shetland Street, Willowdale, Ontario,Canada M2M 1X5.

Still another UFO ENCOUN-TERS is now available, but this one is asmall booklet (Purse Book) from Dell.The author, F. Richard Nolle, presentsa summary of the UFO subject andsuggests various books for additionalreading. Some errors are evident (theAlexander Hamilton airship hoax, forexample), but it's a neatly compactintroduction to UFOs (if there isanyone who hasn't been introduced tothem already!). The price is 49<f; if notavailable on newsstands, it may beordered from Dell Publishing Co., Box1000, Pinebrook, NJ 07058. Add 15<Fper book for postage and handling.

(Director's Message Continued)

showing the film "Close Encounters ofthe Third Kind." A sign advising thetelephone number of the MUFON FieldInvestigator to report all UFO sightings,past, present, or f u t u r e wasprominently displayed along with threecopies of the MUFON UFOJOURNAL and a UFO photograph inthe lobby of the theater. The theatermanager advised that approximately9,000 people viewed CE3K and therewas considerable interest in theMUFON display. Grant sent coloredphotos of the display. Good work,Grant.

19

DIRECTOR'S MESSAGE byWalt Andrus

New State Section Directorsrecently appointed consist of thefollowing ladies and gentlemen: Dr.Kathy Squadrito, Assistant Professorof Philosophy at Purdue University,2101 Coliseum Blvd. East, Fort Wayne,IN 46805 will be responsible for Allenand Whitely counties in Indiana. Ms.Eleanor V. Sanini, Box 338, Elk, Calif.95432 has been advanced to theposition of State Section Director forMendocino County. Eleanor, a teacher,attended the 1977 Symposium inScottsdale, Ariz., and has been atremendous aid to Paul Cerny, ourWestern Regional Director. Charles B.Anderson, 5914 Woodlake Drive West,Tacoma, Washington 98467 hasaccepted the post of State SectionDirector for Pierce County.

William A. Dexter, StateDirector for Texas, arranged for aninformal meeting with your Director onApril 12, 1978 at St. Luke's School ofTexas Planetarium in Dallas. StanFerguson, State Section Director, JohnO.Williams, Planetarium Director atRichland College, and students fromboth St. Mark's School and RichlandCollege a t t e n d e d the shortpresentation.

We are very appreciative of thearticle by George M. Eberhart in theFebruary 1978 edition of WilliamLibrary Bulletin t i t led "UFOs,Ufologists, and the Library," pages 489through 493. George is a serialslibrarian at the University of KansasLaw Library in Lawrence, Kansas. Hereceived his M.L.S. from the Universityof Chicago GLS. Mr. Eberhart, asubscriber to the MUFON UFOJOURNAL, recognized not only the1977 MUFON Symposium Proceed-ings and the JOURNAL in his article,but the fine work of MUFON Directors,James M. McCampbell for Ufology,Ted Phillips for Physical TracesAssociated with UFO Sightings andTed Bloecher for Report on the UFO

Wave of 1947. The Center for UFOStudies and Dr. J. Allen Hynek, alsoreceived favorable reviews in George'sarticle.

We recently received a copy of anew book writen specifically forchildren titled "Those MysteriousUFOs" — The Story of UnidentifiedFlying Objects," by David C. Knight,published by Parents' Magazine Press,New York, a Finding-Out Books series(64 pages). It discusses both IFOs andUFOs, endeavoring to distinguish thedifference for our young readers. It isg e n e r o u s l y i l l u s t r a t e d w i t hphotographs. However, a large numberof the purported UFO photos are of avery questionable nature due to theirlack of authentication. Apparently, Mr.Knight did not have access to reputablephotographs, which is disappointing,since these models, lens flares, doubleexposures, etc. will be very misleadingto the fertile minds of the youngergeneration. The suggested retail pricefor the book is $5.95. It has beenendorsed by the American Associationfor the Advancement of Science, TheBooklist, School Library Journal, and AChildren's Book of the Year - ChildStudy Association.

Lucius Parish has now replacedRod B. Dyke on the MUFON Staff asUFO News Clip Data, since becomingthe active editor of "UFO NewsclippingService," Route 1, Box 220, Plumerville,Ark. 72127. Lou's new telephonenumber is (501) 354-2558.

William H. Spaulding, MUFONState Director for Arizona, is to becommended for the featured story inthe January 1978 issue of QUALITYmagazine, a Hitchcock Publication,dedicated to better produce assuranceand reliability. Titled "Ufology and theDigital Computer," it is a 7-page articleillustrated with 14 color and B & Wphotographs describing the use of thedigital computer as a tool, applied to thePaul Trent UFO photographs taken in

McMinnville, Oregon. QUALITY iswidely read by people professionallyinvolved in quality control, qualityassurance, reliability and inspection.The cover handsomely depicts a colorenhancement of the bottom view of theobject in the Trent photos.

As Director of GSW's WesternDivision, Bill has acknowledged thatGSW has combined its talents with theMutual UFO Network (MUFON) andthe Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS)in this well written article. It is basicallyan update on Bill's 1976 MUFONSymposium paper, however, the colorreproductions make it superior. Untilthe supply is exhausted, a single copy ofthis article may be obtained by writingto QUALITY Magazine, HitchcockPublishing Company, HitchcockBui ld ing , Wheaton , IL 60187,requesting the article by name andidentifying the issue date of themagazine.

The planning committee hasselected July 6 and 7,1979 as the datesfor the 1979 MUFON UFO Symposiumto be held at the Airport Marina Hotel inSan Francisco, Calif. The symposiumcommittee, composed of JimMcCampbell, Paul Cerny, and TomGates, chairman, has submitted theirdetailed plan as of April 12, 1978, forconsideration and approval. JohnSchuessler has confirmed thatHouston, Texas, will be the site for the1980 MUFON UFO Symposium, andMrs. Idabel Epperson previouslyannounced that the SouthernCalifornia group will host the 1981symposium in the Los Angeles area.For further details on the 1978 UFOSymposium in Dayton, Ohio, on July 29and 30, please refer to the separatearticle in this issue of the JOURNAL.

Grant Callison, Field Investi-gator in Galesburg, 111., followedthrough on the suggested cooperativeprogram with the theater managers

(continued inside back cover)