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OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE SAUCER & UNEXPLAINED CELESTIAL EVENTS RESEARCH SOCIETY

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EDITOR AND STILL SUPREME COMMANDER: James W. Moseley CONTRIBUTING EDITOR: Karl T. Pflock

NON-SCHEDULED NEWSLETTER Volume 49, No. 4 May 5th, 2002

MAILING ADDRESS: P. 0. Box 1709 Key West, FL 33041

• YOUR "SMEAR" EDITOR FLIES ACROSS THE "POND" AGAIN TO ATTEND ANOTHER "UNCONVENTION" SPONSORED BY "FORTEAN TIMES" MACAZINE
• MORE ABOUT MOTHMAN AND THE MYSTERIOUS JOHN KEEL
• TIDBITS OF TRASH (formerly NEWS BRIEFIES)
• BRIEF BIASED BOOK REVIEWS - GEORGE ADAMSKI RIDES AGAIN!
• Pflock Ptalk - "EL INDIO?..." - STAN FRIEDMAN, 09 FEBRUARY, 2002
• VAMPIRE PRODUCER PUMPS FRESH BLOOD INTO ROSWELL
• LETTERS TO YE OLDE EDITOR

Need we tell you that our main purpose in being there was to push our book "Shockingly Close to the Truth!". Karl Pflock, our esteemed co-author, had been given this task, but when Personal Problems beset him, we accepted the challenge to go to London in his place. We did attempt to present his views, even on a couple of matters about which we differ; but the British have little stomach for 3-D ufology. On the second and last day of the UnCon., we were placed on a panel of seven or eight "experts", all but one of whom seemed to be into one version or another of the "4-D" fuzzy thinking which we are in tune with, and which has long caused Americans such as Jerry Clark to throw up their hands in despair!

Our talk, mainly on 1950s ufoology (see our book), went over very well, as we must admit in all due modesty. Shamefully, we spent most of our time thereafter peddling advance orders for the book in the vendors' section, rather than listening to the other speakers, of whom there were more than twenty. We did listen to Doug Skinner, a fellow American, give a sanitized version of John's life & works; and we also heard Britain's Peter Brooksmith give an interesting run-down on the famed case of Betty & Barney Hill. We wish we had taken time out to hear Colin Bennett speak on "Skepticism as Mystique" - whatever that means. He is quite a character, and is the author of a brand new book about George Adamski, reviewed further along in this issue.

In our lecture we made a reference to "Flying Saucer from Mars", a book published in England in 1954 by one Cedric Allingham. There was always a question as to whether Allingham ever existed, and strong rumors to the effect that it was a spoof of "Flying Saucers Have Landed", secretly authored by Patrick Moore - who was and still is a scientific fixture in England - much like Carl Sagan used to be here. Moore, now in his 80s, still has his own TV program in London. Someone in the lecture audience informed us that Moore continues to claim he did not write that book, and that he has threatened to sue anyone who says otherwise! Thus we must clearly state that whatever alleged remarks we may possibly have made to the contrary have surely been misinterpreted, as we in no way intended to state or even imply that Patrick Moore would stoop to doing such a dastardly thing. Amen!

UnConvention topics always include all matters that could remotely be considered Fortean. Among the subjects discussed this year were dragons, the paranormal, Noah's Ark, "Lost Kingdoms of the Ice Age", "The Magical Cattle Sheds of Ireland", underwater cities, the Sumatran Yeti, and vampires.

Following the panel discussion, which was the last event on the UnCon program, there was a brief but hilarious interlude regarding the results of a Remote Viewing contest. Sadly, no one came even close to guessing the contents of the box, so at least we know there was no cheating!

We were happy to finally meet Andy Roberts, a legendary zine editor whose rag is said to be even more scandalous than "Smear". Others whom we met in 1997 were not present, such as Hillary Evans and "smear" Overseas Correspondent Christopher Allan. We did have the chance to renew our friendship with Paul Fuller, a crop circle expert who is becoming more & more disillusioned with the whole UFO scene (as are many).

Our thanks to Bob Rickard (pictured above) and Paul Sieveking, co-editors of "Fortean Times" for their kind invitation to cross the Pond for their UnConvention. And speciai thanks to Tracy Francis, the "Event Organizer", who helped us out in many ways, large and small .......

This was our fourth and probably final short visit to England over the past 49 years. Each time we are impressed with the quaintness, dignity, and old-fashioned human values which seem to persist there, though sadly lacking in America. (Your editor is of English descent, so forgive these ravings.)

Your editor even loves the monarchy, with all its flaws, though it would never work here. The Bush dynasty - father, son, and baby brother Jeb, is a very poor substitute! But remember that America has more money and better bombs than anyone else, and that's all that seems to really matter these days. Pity!

In addition to the very recent book by cryptozoologist Loren Coleman, there is another new book out called "Mothman - The Facts Behind the Legend". This is a handsome 165-page softcover tome written and self-published by two of the guys from "Criminal Records", 330 Main St., Point Pleasant, W.Va. 25550. We hope to have a full review ready for our next issue. Please note the fascinating letter from researcher Harry Lime, near the beginning of our Letters to the Editor section.

• While in London we contacted Denis Plunkett, founder and chairman of the British Flying Saucer Bureau (BFSB) since 1953. Interestingly, BFSB is a surviving branch of the International Flying Saucer Bureau (IFSB) that was founded in the U.S.A. in 1952 by Albert K. Bender, who then was closed down the following year supposedly by Three Men in Black, or whoever. There has been a recent rumor that the BFSB was finally about to shut down also, but Plunkett vigorously denies it.

  The unfortunate thing here is that the BFSB appears to have been founded one year before the Saucer and Unexplained Celestial Events Research Society (S.A.U.C.E.R.S.), which of course is the parent body of "Saucer Smear". Could it be that we are not the oldest UFO organization on this planet after all?? Egads, say not so!...

• Add McMinnville, Oregon to the growing list of otherwise mundane communities that have cashed in on the UFO craze, and are holding annual festivals. Back in 1950 a couple named Paul & Evelyn Trent, now long deceased, took pictures of an odd-shaped flying saucer in broad daylight over their yard, and these photos have remained among the very few which are considered provably genuine in all probability. The Trents never profited from their experience, nor did they have any follow-up celestial adventures. Nevertheless, the Third Annual McMinnville UFO Feet will take place on the weekend of May 10th and llth. Your editor does not plan to attend (but we'll be at the Roswell Festival on July 4th weekend).

  Photo expert Dr. Bruce Maccabee is among those who strongly believe the Trent photos to be genuine; but then again, he also endorses Ed Walters' Gulf Breeze photos!...

• Michael Hesemann, who along with Erik Beckjord & a few others is at the bottom of our list of reliable researchers, has come up with a really Sick yarn this time, which he shared with the audience at the most recent International UFO Convention in Laughlin, Nevada. In June of 1996, an elderly woman in the Republic of Georgia came upon an alleged interplanetary baby in the middle of the road. She took it home and fed it, but the creature died a few weeks later. The news reporter describing the photo of the creature shown by Hesemann says that "it looked a bit like a homemade prop for a Halloween costume"....

  This may not be of utterly Cosmic importance, but our readers should be informed that Karl T. Pflock, Contributing Editor for this magazine, has resigned his high position in MUFON, which was New Mexico state section director for Bernalillo and Sandoval counties. Karl was unhappy with one of the new people chosen in a recent reorganization of the New Mexico MUFON hierarchy. Karl has thus sunk to the same embarrassingly low level in MUFON that your "Smear" editor has endured for the past several years - J.S. (Journal Subscriber). Way to go, Karl!

First a Confidential MAJIC Flash-Plus message to Robert Shaeffer (MJ-12/3.73): You used your real name. MJ-1 is most upset about this lapse. You know what that means.

Speaking of MJ-12, in February I was in New York City taping the pilot for a hoped-for new Science Fiction Channel series hosted by actor, comedian, author, and conspiracy buff Richard "Munch" Belzer. "The Belzer Connection" will feature face-offs between two alleged experts on a well-known (does not = "true" or "real") conspiracy before a panel of "judges", with discussion moderated by Belzer. The conspiracy chosen for the pilot? MJ-12 and Roswell. The experts? Stanton T. Friedman and Yours Truly. The panel?: Rapper-turned-actor Ice T, comedienne Jeannine Garafolo, "Saturday Night Live" creator Al Franken, and ace conspiratorialist Jim Mars. (I'm NOT making this up!)

You'll have to wait till the show airs to find out which expert won the hearts and minds of the Panelists, but I will now share something perhaps even more interesting and revealing. Following the taping, Stan Friedman and I had dinner together. In the course of conversation, MJ-12 came up (surprise!), and I mentioned the second saucer crash referred to in the MJ-12 Eisenhower Briefing Document: "On 06 December, 1950, a second object, probably of similar origin, impacted the earth...in the El Indio - Guerrero area of the Texas - Mexican boder (sic)..." I asked Stan how he could continue to argue for the authenticity of the EBD and the reality of MJ-12 with this little clinker in the mix.

Puzzled, Stan asked what I meant. I reminded him that this alleged event was introduced to saucerdom by the long-since discredited W. Todd Zechel. I reviewed the years-long investigation by top MUFON official Tom Deuley and Dennis Stacy that had established the tale was the product of fragmentary recollections of a real event (the accidental shootdown of a Civil Air Patrol plane) and Zechel's fevered imagination and ambition, about which both Tom and Dennis had written and publicly spoken.

"El Indio?...", Stan said. "Well, I..." Then, with a worried look, he changed the subject.

It was as if he'd completely forgotten that the Texas-Mexico "boder" incident was mentioned in his favorite Cosmic Watergate evidence. I had the distinct impression that Stan had been so wrapped up for so long in touting Menzel's "secret life" and debating date formats, presidential signatures, and classification markings that he'd completely neglected this little red flag flapping in the ufological breeze.

Well, Stan??

We are delighted that Adamski is receiving new attention at this particular time, as we published a definitive expose of Adamski back in 1957. (Bennett quotes from it, very selectively!) That was the same year that we, together with the late Gray Barker, concocted the R.E. Straith letter, supposedly from the U.S. State Department, which seemed to endorse Adamski's claims. Both the expose and the Straith letter are in the appendix of our current book "Shockingly..." Thus it is clear that we agree with Bennett on at least one thing - that old George still deserves attention!

We actually read this Bennett book almost word for word, and that is a rare thing for us to do. The author calls Adamski's first book, "Flying Saucers Have Landed" (written with Desmond Leslie in 1953) "a masterpiece". Surely Bennett's admiration for the man is more than a bit excessive! Throughout the book, in endless erudite philosophical asides, he hammers home his point: That Adamski was too dumb and homespun to be a fraud; that even if he did make up some things, so what? And that old bourgeois concept of "true or false" doesn't really matter, or even apply! Adamski is valid, he says, because people are still seeing similar craft today, fifty years later, and Bennett compares old George favorably to any number of much more famous heros of the modern world. Hero worship at its worst! Bennett makes a pretty good circumstantial case to show that George Adamski was bisexual - hich we already strongly suspected. His many meetings with young, attractive "spacepersons" of the male variety, in a dingy Los Angeles hotel, seem to prove this point. Also, his "ill-concealed liking for intense relationships with young men such as (Jerrold) Baker". This was the young follower of Adamski who, after a falling-out with the Master, contributed a lot of important material to our expose.

Bennett presumably never met Adamski, but takes his background facts from several other biographies. One fascinating and truly mysterious incident that he misses out on completely is the 1953 disappearance of Karl Hunrath (a hard-core follower of Adamski) and Wilbur Wilkinson. Says Bennett: "Apparently the pair went to Mexico...and they were never seen or heard of again". True, but the real story is that these two men rented a small plane at a Los Angeles area airport, hoping to rendezvous in mid air with a flying saucer from Mars. The FBI never solved the case, but presumes the pair fled to Mexico because of personal problems. The plane was never found either!

Although Adamski lectured in Australia, New Zealand, Europe, and all over the U.S., Bennett admits that he was not a good speaker at all. The low point of his career must have been the time in Zurich, Switzerland in 1959, when an audience of some 300 rowdy students, in a pre-planned action, were seen "screaming, clapping, shouting, stamping and singing... (They) reduced the event to ruins by throwing onto the stage whatever they could lay their hands on." Most of Adamski's lectures went a lot better than that, mercifully!

Bennett admits that in his later years Adamski grew paranoid, hearing telepathic voices in his head and ranting quite seriously about the International Bankers and such. (He once called your editor "an agent of Wall Street", which was somewhat true.) He started making up space stories more blatantly than ever before, and even Bennett seems to acknowledge that this was the case. Adamski's followers, including Carol Honey who is still alive & kicking, deserted the Master one by one. Adamski died in 1965 and as a veteran, he was buried in Arlington Cemetery.

We met the Master a few times, and had no quarrel with him, except that he was a habitual liar. Bennett, on the other hand, takes the attitude that anything that should be true is true. This must be why he recently wrote an article for "Fortean Times" endorsing a purely fictional book about the late Long John Nebel's wife Candy Jones. About this, more in a future issue of "Smear". In spite of his weird philosophical quirks, Colin Bennett is an authentic British intellectual of the Old School. We told him that we intend to sell his Adamski book after reading it, but he kindly autographed it for us anyhow. Now, there's a gentleman!

• PAUL KURTZ, President of Prometheus Books, writes:

  "We are delighted to present you with ten (10) copies of your new book titled 'Shockingly Close to the Truth!', just off the press. It has been a pleasure publishing this book, and we hope it receives wonderful reviews..."

  We have ordered an additional one hundred copies, which are expected to arrive at our Headquarters momentarily. Then we will fill the advance orders that some of you have been waiting patiently for. - Editor.

• The semi-mysterious HARRY LIME writes:

  "Here are the curious exact 'disclaimer' words from the copyright page of the new edition of 'The Mothman Prophecies' (Tot Books paperback, February 2002): 'This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this work are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictionally.' This is a far cry from the usual 'any resemblance to any real person, living or dead, is purely coincidental' disclaimer'.

  "The original edition of the book published in 1975 was presented as 100% non-fiction. I don't know about the 1991 reissue you mentioned (by the way, the Tot edition carries a 1991 copyright notice). It's also worth noting that Keel's afterword written for the Tot edition and dated August 2001 includes these lines: 'I warned Sheriff Johnson and Mary Hyre that this was folklore in the making. Gray Barker did try to turn it into a celestial fairy tale, making me decide to write this book and tell the truth as it happened.' Hmmmm... 'a work of fiction' tells 'the truth'..."

• Ace UFO investigator MARTIN KOTTMEYER writes as follows:

  I'm unsure if you need to be smited for your addendum to Karl's Sacred Text, but you might need to seek penance. You wrote that over 1500 reports came to Blue Book in July I952 - "far more than in any month in history." If you re-check things I think you'll find that the over 1500 number you have refers to the total for the whole year of 1952 and the official figure for July is 536 reports.

  Karl doubtless would prefer to keep his argument in a qualitative form, for if you start talking numbers then there is a slight problem that The National UFO Reporting Center has been getting more reports per year than Blue Book did. In 2001 they received 2856 reports. In 2000 there was 2576 - in 1999 there was 2690 - in 1998 there was 1526 reports, l know you will be incredulous for there has been so little media reporting of ufo sightings in recent years, save if you count certain other sites on the Web. But numbers are numbers and 2856 is far more than 1501.

  Whether you personally regard this as an objection against the 'They Were Here' thesis, I don't know. Carl's point is surely that the most impressive ufo evidence for alien visitation remains in the Fifties and Sixties and that is not what you'd expect if methodology improves over time as happens in scientific disciplines. Even a merely stagnant program of research should have impressive cases spread more or less evenly across time. Are there impressive cases among the thousands on the NUFORC site? Probably not in the sense that Karl means...

• Parapsychologist GEORGE HANSEN writes:

  "Karl Pflock: The John Calvin of Ufology:

  "Ufology must be reformed! The time of the saucers is past! We can now study only the sacred scriptures already placed before us! Or so decrees Karl Pflock.

  "Pflock follows Protestant reformer John Calvin, who asserted that miracles ended with the apostles. Reports of later miracles were mere 'Romish superstitions' that caused no end of problems and disputes. Hence Pflock tries to purify ufology. The space gods have left; they no longer intervene in the world. Ufologists must become exegetes. The current (spurious) charismata of abductions, implants, and contactee revelations are to be expunged from 'respectable ufoology'.

  "A reformation is underway, and Kevin Randle has joined the apostasy, but nota bene: Reformation theology sowed the seeds of Enlightenment philosophy, and the denial of all miracles!

  "Secular humanists rejoice and now assist in ufology's Enlightenment (e.g., Prometheus Books' alliance with Pflock). They hope that all saucer visitations will be eventually repudiated, and literary criticism and the psycho-social perspective will reign."

• CHRIS ROTH, who may soon become our only non-subscriber in Alaska, writes:

  "...A recent flap in the British Columbian press has been over a Canadian movie that is in the works about Ogopogo, the Loch-Ness-type lake monster in Lake Okanagan in B.C. The film is about to begin shooting, not in B.C. but in New Zealand, partly because the filming season is longer there and partly because Lake Okanagan and nearby lakes are too overdeveloped for the primeval feel the director wants.

  "The New Zealand location is on a Maori reserve. The Maoris were enthusiastic about the project but then asked the filmmakers what the indigenous people back home, whose legend it is, thought about the film project. The filmmakers said they honestly didn't know and, to appease their Maori hosts, they went and asked. Big mistake!

  "The Okanagan Band is very militant and have been involved in roadblocks and other political activism as protests against development on their ancestral land. They were in no mood to give their blessing to some white man's movie about their legend, and so they issued a statement saying they don't want the movie made. They have no legal say, but the filmmakers have been embarrassed enough to change the movie into a more generic lake-monster story with no reference to the true legend. This infuriates local cryptozoologists as well as the Canadian author W.P. Kinsella, who told the press that the filmmakers should have said 'fuck you' to the Indians.

  "Cryptozoology meets political correctness at last! The moral is: Don't ask a question unless you're prepared for any answer..."

• Our Eternal Overseas Correspondent CHRISTOPHER ALLAN writes:

  "...Why has your book got such an absolutely dreadful title? You don't deserve to sell even one copy with a title like that. However, you will sell one (I promise) since I have just ordered one from Arcturus Books. So you can rejoice now, can't you?

  "You talk about the fiftieth anniversary of the July 1952 UFOs and all that. Another anniversary coming soon is the 50th of Adamski's (in)famous encounter at Desert Center, California. That was on November 20th. The American people, and maybe the British too, should be given a national holiday to commemorate that day! Goddammit, it was the most important date in UFO history (after Kenneth Arnold) until Roswell was thrust upon us by you know who.

  "Karl Pflock tells what the big black triangles are not. Now why cannot he be a good boy and tell us what they ARE?..."

• The esteemed DENNIS STACY writes:

  "While it doesn't behoove a begger to be choosey, I nevertheless feel compelled to point out a few things you overlooked in your erstwhile review of The Anomalist 10 in the last issue of 'Saucer Smear'.

  "For starters, at 224 pages it's the largest Anomalist ever. Moreover, it's the first to boast a color cover, which I thought you might have noticed and mentioned, unless those vicious Internet rumors about you being totally colorblind are indeed true...

  "Of course all these improvements are not without a price. Please make your check or money order for $12.95 plus $2.50 shipping & handling payable to Dennis Stacy, P.O. Box 12434, San Antonio, Texas 78212..."

• Researcher KEVIN HENDERSON writes as follows:

  "...Your news on the death of Bill Cooper, oddly enough, may have been what spurred me on to non-subscriptionhood, because for Chrissakes, I live in Arizona, and Cooper's death went almost unreported, passing like a blip on the local media screen. I first heard about it in 'Smear', all the way from Key West, which is insane.

  "I agree totally with your assessment of Cooper, but he sure was fun to listen to on the shortwave. One had to down a few drinks in order to get in anything close to a similar state of mind, but his radio show 'The Hour of the Time' was nothing if not entertaining... "

• DALE RETTIG, former teen UFO researcher from many years ago, writes:

  "...Movie Review: 'The Mothman Prophecies' was pretty bad. My heart sank at the opening scene - a computer & a touch-tone phone, which we didn't have in '66-'67. So much for authenticity. At the end of the movie I figured out why they had to put it in a contemporary setting. How could they get dozens of vintage cars from the '50s and '60s to dump off the bridge into the river? And there was no real Mothman - just a few lousy drawings & flashes of light. Why couldn't we have one good creature feature? They did manage to create a weird atmosphere in the scenes inside the motel when the protagonist receives bizarre telephone calls. Overall, only a C+.

  "I still want to get my hands on the documentary about Gray Barker, 'Whispers from Space.' I still have, somewhere around the house, one of Gray's old 'Time Warp' cassette tapes in which he is actually interviewing the original Mothman witnesses..."

• Non-subscriber SCOTT BOND writes:

  "...I don't know what your personal history is with Keel, but I recently reread 'Mothman Prophecies' and still find it a marvelously entertaining, compelling piece of work. I'm glad John got some bucks out of the movie deal, and I note that the paperback reissue, tied in with the movie release, is on the New York Times paperback best seller list!

  "Incidentally'--it's no accident that Indrid Cold turned up in the Mothman movie. Both Cold and contactee Woodrow Derenberger are prominently featured in Keel's book.... "

• Ace cartoonist MATT GRAEBER writes:

  "...All things considered, perhaps it's just as well that Robert Anton Wilson did not write the intro for 'Shockingly'. After all, the field of ufology is tainted enough as it is, and the rantings of a foul-mouthed philosopher might destroy what little bit of veracity and decorum that's left. Hopefully, 'Bob' will clean up his act a little at the next conference that has the 'balls' to invite him to speak!

***** U P D A T E *****

ON THE 39TH ANNUAL NATIONAL UFO CONFERENCE, to be held in Cincinnati, Ohio on Sept. 28th, 2002. Speakers include John Timmerman, Karl Pflock, Jim Moseley, and many others. Further info. may be obtained from Kenny Young, 3903 Hunters Glen Dr., Florence, Ky. 41042. Phone: 859-371-7955 or 513-588-4548.

DON'T MISS THIS ONE!

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