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WENDY CONNORS writes: "'Shockingly Close to the Truth! Confessions of a Grave-Robbing Ufologist' is a yawn-filled romp through the askewed ego of Ufoologist James W. Moseley and his Klass successor wannabee, Karl T. Pflock. Within this mish-mash of drool are some excellent passages .... Insights into Moseley's love affair with publishing a cheap dime store news rag abound, along with his propensity to sleeze to any level for a buck...But, like the proverbial brain damaged dog, he continues unabated as the decades click onward and good trees are sacrificed to put out a bad product..." And, UFO historian JEROME CLARK, writing in the Jan.10, 1989 "Saucer Smear", states: "Though you have nothing of consequence to say about the UFO phenomenon as such anymore (if you ever did, after you exposed Adamski), you are still the Greatest Living Authority on the history of saucer fandom and the funniest writer around.."

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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. 6 August 10, 2002

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

We welcome your correspondence, pro or con, well-reasoned or otherwise, but please keep in mind that while Saucer Smear is on the Dreaded Internet, your humble editor is NOT! So, if you wish to receive a personal reply to your letter, or wish to have any chance of seeing it printed on Our Glorious Pages, please print it out, put it in an envelope, affix a stamp thereto, and SNAIL mail it to: James W. Moseley P.O. Box 1709 Key West, FL 33041 It's simple and loads of fun! Ask your grandma if you don't remember how to do it! We thank you!

• NEWS BRIEFIES
• ROSWELL DOES IT AGAIN!
• ERRATA
• PFLOCK PTALK - COBWEBS AND RUST SPOTS
• LETTERS TO YE OLDE EDITOR

• Veteran UFO researcher Start Gordon will bo holding a one-day display of all sorts of UFO-related items, on August 24th, at the Westmoreland Mall, Route 30 East, Greensburg, Pa. This exhibit features photos, books, magazines, government UFO documents, etc. It has attracted thousands of people in past years, according to Start ....

• The famed mentalist named Kreskin made a complete fool of himself in an incident involving a Las Vegas hotel back in early Juno. Basically, he predicted a UFO sighting which never took place, and which he didn't even expect to take place, except "mentally". Ho has since been barred from the Art Bell Show as well as others ....

• Legendary ufological evangelist Dr. Frank Stranges is seriously ill following delicate heart surgery this past June. He is now recovering at home. Those wishing to send encouragement should write to his wife, Julie Stranges, at 9101 Topanga Canyon Blvd., #209, Chatsworth, California 91311-5763...

• Gloom & Doom Dept: This year's MUFON convention clashed time-wise with the annual Roswell Festival, but this can't account for the pitifully small crowd at Rochester, N.Y., where one f the scheduled speakers, Antonio Huneeus, semi-mysteriously failed to show up. And at FUFOR (Fund for UFO Research), the tiny office staff has practically gone into a state of suspended animation, due to an almost complete lack of ufological events to keep them busy...

• On a more positive note, a three-day convention is planned in West Virginia in mid-September, featuring unnamed "special events, special guests, free museum displays". This event coincides with the 50th anniversary of the Flatwoods Monster sighting, way back in 1952. Both Gray Barker and Ivan Sanderson did personal on-site investigations, separately, of this unique ufological phenomenon...

• And, approximately on the 50th anniversary of the famous 1952 radar UFO flap over Washington, D.C., a resident of nearby Maryland reported seeing a military jet chasing a "light-blue object, traveling at a phenomenal rate of speed". Military officials said they don't know what their jets were chasing, because whatever it was, it simply disappeared!...

• Bob Girard's diatribe in his latest Arcturus Books catalogue (# 2002-8) is a real winner! Says he, among many other things: "...Flying saucer books? You no longer need them. They are only the guttered scraps of a dead addiction. Anyway, you stopped buying them some years ago, thus turning my rapidly approaching golden years to crap..."

  Let's give ole Bob a Break, and buy something from him! His address is: 1443 S.E. Port St. Lucie Blvd., Port St. Lucie, Florida 34952. Tell him OISEAU sent you!...

• The semi-mysterious entity who calls himself "Boxholder" points out that the prestigious New York Times has been selling a famous 1952 saucer photo for $195 per ll by 14 inch print, when a more normal price would be about $15. The photo in question, taken by a (then) young Coast Guard photographer, is in the public domain, and is very familiar to ufological historians...

• We have two articles about recent UFO activity in South America. One tells us that an area around San Jose de Maipo is the UFO capital of Chile, with countless sightings reported over a long period of time. The mayor, who is a saucer sighter himself, is all in favor of encouraging tourism from this angle. The Southern Lights (like the Northern Lights) are very visible down there, and this no doubt accounts for many of the sightings.

  The other story, from Chilca, Peru, concerns muck-filled lagoons that supposedly cure many types of human ailments; and their amazing healing powers come from space aliens! As in Chile, many sightings have taken place in this area, which is on the south coast of Peru and is one of the many little towns your editor passed through in our long ago grave-robbing days. But we saw nothing there. (Our thanks to Scott Kupferman for this item. )

One thing we like about the Museum is that every speaker has a full house. This is because they only put out as many chairs as there are bodies to fill them. But we must admit that ole Stan Friedman's full house was fuller than ours.

Before the Festival began, there was a great deal of discussion and confusion regarding just who would be speaking and at what time. A formal debate about the validity of the Roswell Incident was considered, with Friedman and Don Schmitt defending it as an interplanetary event, vs. Pflock and Moseley pushing the unpopular Mogul Balloon solution. This format dissolved when Pflock decided to skip the Festival altogether. It would have been a terrible debate in any case, as the written rules required that "personal attacks on each other, the Museum, or the Roswell witnesses will not be permitted". How do you have a real debate without attacking someone???

Regarding Mogul, there is a "sacreligious" pro-Mogul display on one wall of the Museum, giving credit to Miller Johnson, Karl Pflock, Prof. Charles Moore and Kent Jeffrey, among others. The text reads in part: "Was it part of one of these flight trains which rancher W.W. ('Mac') Brazel found and reported to authorities? Many researchers believe it was, and many others do not. Study this exhibit carefully and draw your own conclusions." Fair enough!

The pictures below give a partial history of our weekend at Roswell. As much as we enjoyed it, we were sorry to miss the MUFON convention which was stupidly scheduled for the same time period, in New York state. Legendary abductee Betty Hill came out of retirement to speak there, and we would have liked very much to hear her, as well as some of the others. MUFON conventions need all the help they can get, these days!

Our thanks to Roswell Museum volunteer Dave Swink for much help and encouragement regarding our lecture, and of course our thanks go out to Museum Director Julie Shuster (daughter of co-founder Walter Haut) for putting us on the program in spite of our known heretical views about the Roswell Incident. We spoke mainly about our Book, however, and managed to sell quite a few copies to the panting fans.

Our most memorable moment came just after we finished talking, when a lady came up and said, "I enjoyed your talk. Have you ever thought of becoming a stand-up comic?" Without hesitation we replied, "Lady, I really take that as a sincere compliment. Frankly, I'm not good enough to ever be a stand-up comic. But Stanton Friedman is good enough, and he will be speaking here tomorrow night. I really wish you would ask him the same question!"

Next year we are booked at the rival Aztec, New Mexico convention, which takes place near the end of March. This annual gathering commemorates a complex non-event from the year 1948 - one year after the Roswell Incident. Karl Pflock has also been invited. We are looking forward to it in spite of the frigid temperatures in New Mexico at that time of year....

EXPLANATIONS OF PHOTOS ABOVE: All except the top right photo were taken by Miller Johnson and Jim Moseley at the International UFO Museum in Roswell, N.M. during the recent annual UFO Festival there. (The top right photo shows ace UFO investigator Karl Pflock at an Undisclosed Location. It was taken by 0ISEAU.)

At the top left, we see your humble "Smear" editor raving with a Fan. Just below that, we see the fascinating Founders list, on one wall of the Museum. This is a group of 100 people who sent in a hundred bucks each, circa 1994 when the Museum was begun. Look at the picture very carefully and you will see that one name plate is missing at the bottom of the middle row. This came about because of the resignation of Karl P flock.

On the bottom row we have (left) Don Schmitt, part-time saucer researcher affiliated with the Museum, and part-time postman in another state. At the bottom right, in a rare group picture, we see the two surviving real founders of the Museum - legendary Roswell witnesses Glenn Dennis and Walter Haut.

The tall thin alien at the center of the page is a statue that greets the tourists as they leave the Museum's gift shop where, alas, our book "Shockingly.. "is not allowed to be sold (For the explanation, see Page 320 of said book.)

Winning non-subscribers will get their names printed in "Smear" IN CAPITAL LETTERS.

The worst mistake in our last issue: Robert Bigelow was called John Bigelow, on Page 3.

Our publisher, Prometheus Books (shudder!) sent a review copy of "Shockingly Close to the Truth!" to Neil Barton, now former nonfiction book review editor of the "SF (Science Fiction) Research Association Review". Barton concluded that "Shockingly... '." was "well outside our scope" and therefore wouldn't be reviewed in his august journal'. (Sigh...) However, this gentleman, the editor of four editions of "Anatomy of Wonder", the standard critical guide to science fiction (4th ed., 1995, still in print from Greenwood Press), did pass along a very interesting story about an encounter he, as an 18 year old, had with George Adamski:

"Sometime during the summer of 1992, probably early July, Bob, a friend of mine (who became an astronomer and taught physics and astronomy before his death a few years ago) and I drove from Pasadena to San Diego to attend Southwestercon, an SF convention. We made a side trip to visit the fairly new Hale telescope on Mt. Palomar.

"On the way up the highway, we stopped at Palomar Gardens for lunch. We ordered, and noticed a handful of people who appeared expectant. I asked why, and they said Professor George Adamski was going to tell them about his trip in a Venusian flying saucer. I looked at Bob and he looked at me, and we said nothing.

"Soon Adamski came out and told his tales to his acolytes, then asked for questions. Either Bob or I asked if he'd been recently observing the saucers with his telescope, which was in an enclosure on the edge of the restaurant parking lot. The answer was a predictable 'Yes'.

"What we didn't tell him is that we'd looked in the enclosure and saw the reflecting mirror, covered with cobwebs and rust spots. The telescope hadn't been used in months, if not longer.

"Adamski's loyal followers resented our skeptical tone. We concluded that we'd been dissing Santa Claus and continued on our trip."

Students of the Adamski saga will have immediately recognized something curious and important here, apart from the telescopic gotcha (but maybe Adamski meant his other telescope when he answered). If Barron's recollections of what was said that day are accurate, then the "Professor" was claiming to have ridden in a Venusian scout ship months before his alleged November 20th, 1952, meeting with Orthon of Venus - which he always said was his first encounter with a Space Brother. My, my... Of course it's very possible that, like those recalling saucer encounters many years after the fact, Barton has unwittingly incorporated things he later heard and read into his memories of this amusing afternoon fifty years ago. Still...

• On Page 329 of "Shockingly", we offer a free lifetime (our lifetime, not yours!) non-subscription to "Saucer Smear" to the first reader who provides a clear & entertaining explanation of The Fact. The Fact is, of course, the true Secret of the Saucers.

  ED GRABOWSKI, quoted in part below, is our winner:

  "First of all, I have just read 'Shockingly Close to the Truth'.' and must say that it is the most entertaining book on flying saucers that I have ever read. I mm not exaggerating. It may well be the best book ever written on the subject. In today's environment, it certainly is a 'must read' volume. I thoroughly enjoyed its comprehensive history of the UFO movement in America, from the early days through the present...

  "The belief systems involved in The Field interest me more than any particular theory and/or event. I disbelieve everything aside from some of the '4-D' aspects of UFOs that you mention. As a matter of fact, I feel the best writers in The Field are John Keel and Jacques Vallee, not only stylistically, but in their interpretation of the phenomena as well.

  "Excuse this very long-winded preamble to what caused me to sit down and write this missive in the first place: The Fact. The Epilogue of your book encourages your readers to identify The Fact, the Secret of the Saucers, contained in your book. You state that 'The Fact is not in his epilogue. A vital Clue is.' At first I thought the 'Clue' was Ray Palmer, as he is mentioned in your Epilogue and has long been called 'The Man Who Invented Flying Saucers' by those who consider the whole subject a hoax, or a long series of hoaxes. Then I realized the 'Clue' must be the quote from William James that opens your Epilogue: '...your belief will help create the fact.' In other words, the belief of each individual observer, believer, experiencer, researcher, or whatever term one wishes to use, is the Secret of the Saucers. Belief is the fuel that has powered the engines of the saucers for these past 55 years... There is, finally, no objective reality outside of any person's belief system..."

• Famed skeptic/debunker ROBERT SHEAFFER writes:

  "Here's an interesting note concerning your comment about Jimmy Carter's UFO sighting, in the April Fool's Day issue of 'Smear': 'While Carter was governor of Georgia, he actually saw a flying saucer and officially reported the sighting to NICAP, which was Major Keyhoe's long-defunct UFO research organization in Washington, D.C.'

  "This is what NICAP wanted people to believe, but it isn't true. What actually happened was that Hayden Hewes, who ran the tiny International UFO Bureau in Oklahoma, sent Governor Carter a UFO sighting report form from his organization. Carter actually filled it out in his own handwriting, and mailed it back. Hewes seems to have lost the original, but still retained a photographic copy of it, which he was kind enough to share with me. I made several more copies.

  "When I published my investigation revealing that Carter had actually seen Venus (Carter didn't remember the exact date of the incident, and guessed incorrectly on the report form), I was contacted by Jack Acuff, then-president of NICAP, who I'd met when I went to look over some NICAP files. Could I please send him the information I had on this case? Sure, I said, and I mailed him one of the copies of Hewes' form. Acuff promptly had it re-typed under a NICAP letterhead and published on the front page of his bulletin, as if Carter had reported the case to them!..."

  Very interesting! Another underhanded trick by NICAP is thus revealed, at this late date! - Editor

• PROFESSOR CHARLES B. MOORE of Mogul Balloon fame ~rites as follows:

  "Your shocking opus arrived here while I was on an extended field trip. This and the time it has taken for me to enjoy your account of the UFO follies are the causes of my slowness in thanking you for sending your chronicle to me. So, thank you! And best wishes on the sequel."

  Our thanks for the above, and for Charles Moore's unsolicited check for $26.78! - Editor.

• Aging debunker PHIL KLASS writes, regarding the classic Socorro, N.M. UFO landing case: (Klass has unnecessarily underlined almost everything in his letter, and we have omitted this underlining.)

  "Dear Capt. Jim:

  "This is in response to your complaint of June 10th. I suggest that you re-read Chapter 12 of my book 'UFOs Explained' - IF YOU EVER READ SAME. You would know that during my first visit to Socorro in late 1966, I initially suspected that Zamora might have seen a 'plasma-UFO'. After all, Socorro had very intense and frequent lightning storms. That is why I spent an hour interviewing a member of the atmospheric physics staff at New Mexico's tech institute in Socorro...

  "When I asked him if he had visited the 'UFO landing site' - which was only a 5-minute drive away - and seemingly a historic spot - HE REPLIED HE HAD NEVER VISITED THE SPOT BECAUSE HE DOUBTED ZAMORA'S TALE. He suggested that I 'nose around a bit'...

  "Before I departed Socorro, I talked by phone with a man whose house was only a couple hundred yards away from the 'UFO site' and who said he had been working outside in his garden at the time. He told me that he did NOT hear the loud roar that Zamora reported, nor did he see any UFO. He told me that the next morning he went to the site to inspect same. As a retired welder, he inspected the bush - allegedly set on fire by the UFO'S engine, and said the insignificant burning 'could have been created by a Zippo cigarette lighter'. HE TOLD ME THAT HE DID NOT BELIEVE ZAMORA'S TALE.

  "I could go on, but these are a few of the facts that prompt me to label the incident a hoax. I WOULD HAVE MUCH PREFERRED TO EXPLAIN IT AS A 'PLASMA UFO'....

  "The foregoing difference of opinion PROVES YOU ARE NOT A 'KLASS KLONE'..."

• Researcher (??) MICHAEL HESEMANN writes, via the Internet: (This letter has been cut but not edited.)

  "Dear Mr. Moseley,

  "May I feel honored that you added me to the bottom of your list of reliable researchers? Well, unfortunately you got the facts wrong re my recent lecture at the International UFO Congress in Laughlin this March.

  "I did not show any 'photo' of an alleged interplanetary baby, retrieved in 'the republic of Georgia'. What I did show to my audience was an official film (not a photo) taken by officers of the Department of Interior Affairs of Russia when they entered the house of an old lady, which at that time was hospitalized and mentioned a strange creature in her custody. This incident took place in 1996 (at last you got the year right) in Kalinov, a village near Kystym in the Ural (NOT Georgia in the Kaukasus). The film was OFFICIALLY released by the Kystym Police to the Russian and Japanese TV and an Italian researcher. I showed interviews with Captain Vladimir Bendlin of the Dept. of Interior Affairs, Commander of the responsible police station...who examined the body and stated that it was 'a mummified corpse, similar to a baby, but definitely not a human baby'.

  "If you consider the creature on the film 'a homemade prop for a Halloween costume', that's fine, but please explain me why both, the Kystym Police and a medical doctor were deceived by such an obvious forgery. And maybe check the facts first, before you call a lecture you obviously never listened to 'a really Sick yarn'".

  Our version was taken from the Internet. - Editor.

• Under the title "MOTHMAN, PRIME SUSPECT AT WEBBERS FALLS, OKLAHOMA!", researcher MILLER JOHNSON writes as follows:

  "The following investigative report was compiled after our last telephone conversation regarding the Webbers Falls bridge collapse on May 26th. Could the comparisons be mo~e than coincidental??

  "The bridge collapse on Sunday May 26, 2002, at Webbers Falls over the Arkansas River in Oklahoma, brings back memories of another bridge disaster. Advocates of numerology might well suspect a tie-in of the Webbers Falls incident with another bridge disaster 35 years ago. I refer to the Point Pleasant, West Virginia Silver Bridge collapse that occurred on Dec. 15th, 1967.

  "Some will remember this incident as part of the finale in the recent movie, 'Mothman Prophecies', based on John Keel's book by the same name. Could there be a Mothman connection here? Probably not, but then again, connecting some of the obvious dots give reasons for some serious investigative speculation.

  "Some interesting numerical parallels between the two above-mentioned bridge disasters are drawn here. They are as follows:

  "The number 35 is the number of years between the two disasters as well as the Ohio Highway #35 that approaches Point Pleasant from the west. After crossing the Ohio River into West Virginia, it becomes Highway #62. When reversed, 62 becomes 26, which is the year the Silver Bridge was constructed in '1926' over the Ohio River. Another somewhat interesting parallel between the two incidents is the year 1967. This is the year that included both the death of the Point Pleasant Silver Bridge and the birth of the Webbers Falls Bridge over the Arkansas River in Oklahoma.

  "It makes you wonder - has Mothman returned? Could he have been on board the barge causing the destructive consequences and loss of life to both man and beast? Was he responsible for the barge captain's reported blackout or seizure, leaving no one to pilot the craft safely under the bridge??

  "Sightings of Mothman since the 1966-67 flap have been nonexistent, but when all the dots are connected, will there be another Mothman flap??"

• Parapsychologist GEORGE HANSEN writes:

  "Congratulations on 'Shockingly Close to the Truth!' - a marvelously fun read. I am pleased to see that Jerry Clark's support of the Linda Napolitano case is immortalized in the pages of your fine volume!...

  "You hypocrite! In 'Smear' you lambasted the style of promoting the 'Roswell? Yes' video, saying that it 'deliberately cheapened an excellent presentation...by the ridiculous ploy of issuing a T-shirt and cap!

  "Gee, since when are you concerned about 'cheapening' ufoology!? Roswell needs all the help it an get! We can only surmise that your dig was simply a sop thrown to your esteemed co-author Harry Lime (aka Kow Pflop).

  "Actually, other promotions were considered. In fact, some market research was undertaken for 'Roswell? Yes' panty hose. There are also plans for convention appearances by Debbie D The Ultimate Fantasy Queen! (Yes, that's her name. Check her out at www. debbied.net). She will probably dress as an alien in a bikini!

  "But if prudes and fuddy-duddies like you keep complaining about 'cheapening' the field, good work will sink into oblivion. Maybe that's your goal??"

• MARY MARTINEK, Spousal Associate of Our Esteemed Contributing Editor writes:

  "Concerning Tim Brigham's letter in the June 10th 'Smear' - WHAT??!!?"

• And, our ESTEEMED CONTRIBUTING EDITOR speculates:

  "Presumably, Tim Brigham's comment about 'the lifestyle' refers to that of the rich and famous (if only it were true, Tim!) As for Ed Komarek, I doubt even he knows what he meant. In fact, knowing Mr. Ed, Jr., am I do, I'm sure of it!..."

• Researcher ED MITCHEL writes:

  "I assume you already have stacks of letters praising your book. Let me add mine to the heap. Congratulations on producing a very entertaining, unique look at my favorite phenomenon..."

• Our olde pal DICK FREEMAN writes:

  "...I am printing this on my computer which I use to hack into Wright Patterson Air Force Base's infamous hangers - though all I've been able to find hanging on them are uniforms... Your book continues to be surprisingly close to excellent..."

***** 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!

Saucer Smear Index

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