| EDITOR AND STILL SUPREME COMMANDER: James W. Moseley
CONTRIBUTING EDITOR:
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NON-SCHEDULED NEWSLETTER Volume 51, No. 6 June 15th, 2004 (Whole Number 371) OUR FIFTIETH YEAR! |
MAILING ADDRESS: P. 0. Box 1709 Key West, FL 33041 |
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MEXICO AIR FORCE VIDEO CREATES UFO STIR
The objects in the night sky were invisible to the eye, but
were seen on radar and were photographed with an infrared surveillance camera.
At one point they seemed "intelligent", in that
they changed direction and surrounded the plane that was chasing
them. In the video, the objects appear as blobs of light that
hover or dart about, sometimes moving into a cloud. These weird
events apparently went on for quite awhile, as the video released by the
Mexican Air Force is about fifteen minutes long, including commentary.
Unnamed scientists are trying to solve the case as being "gasses in the atmosphere". No details are provided. At the very least, this is obviously an exceedingly rare type of atmospheric phenomenon! Or, it could well have been a squadron of new stealth strike aircraft operating from the U.S.A.
Our only problem with this sighting is that the man promoting it is Jaime Maussan, a Mexican journalist and UFO enthusiast who has lectured many times in the United States. (He was recently booked at Pat Marcattilio's last convention, but couldn't make it.) Maussan appears to be a "true believer", and in the past several years he has been linked to many UFO videos from Mexico - some of which were of very dubious validity. But since he was only involved in the publicity for the present sighting, not the making or analysis of the video, we will assume that the case is authentic.
"This is historic news," said Maussan. "Hundreds of UFO videos exist, but none have had the backing of the armed forces of any country. The armed forces don't participate in frauds." (Credit: Denis Corey, Gene Steinberg, and others.)...
We appreciate the compliment, even if sarcastic, but the truth is that James W. Moseley and Karl Pflock are not complete skeptics on the UFO subject. Shermer, who is the publisher of "Skeptic" Magazine, and retired ufologist Phil Klass are complete skeptics (= debunkers.)
As Kottmeyer points out in his letter to us, the worst, most horrible error in the Birnes book is his belief, expressed on Page 152, that the U.S.'s first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, who died in 1804, is the same Alexander Hamilton credited with a sensational saucer sighting in 1897, during the famous "airship" flap. The 1897 sighting was correctly exposed as a hoax by Jerome Clark in recent years. But back in 1966, Frank Edwards' best-selling book called "Flying Saucers - Serious Business", took the 1897 story very seriously (before it was exposed), and your humble "Smear" editor used it many times in his lectures to college audiences. However, never did we go so far afield as to think this was the same man as the historical Hamilton. Birnes needs not just a proof-reader but a psychiatrist!
We should add that among the sincere skeptics who should be acknowledged is Martin Kottmeyer himself!...
The incident in question occurred in the tiny town of Flatwoods, West Virginia, near the birthplace of the late Gray Barker. It involved a "monster" seen briefly one evening on a rural hillside. Barker began his long career in the UFO field by writing the story up for FATE Magazine, and Ivan Sanderson, who was another offbeat investigator of that era, also did his own separate investigation. Little ceramic dolls are still available, showing the supposed creature in vivid colors, but in spite of a recent festival in Flatwoods, the sighting never reached anywhere near the stature of Roswell. Some of the witnesses are still alive, and participated in the festival.
In his Web posting about the Flatwoods book, Friedman modestly adds that he was inducted into the "PRG Hall of Fame" at the recent X-Conference near Washington, D.C. Also inducted, among others, were the late Dr. J. Allan Hynek and the late Lt. Col. Philip Corso. The reasons for this particular trio being chosen are not clear, but Friedman can bask in the fact that in 1980 and again in 1987, he received the Ufologist of the Year award from the National UFO Conference, of which your editor is Permanent Chairman. This does not mean that his research is beyond reproach (far from it!), but merely that he has been a leading figure in the field for a long time...
The primary event being studied therein is not really a monster case at all, as it involves "conventional" little humanoids which appeared at a farmhouse near Kelly, Kentucky in the year 1955. The event occurred on August 21st of that year, when several residents of the farmhouse saw the glow of a landed spaceship on their property, and then battled for hours with several "little green men", perhaps called green in later versions because of the Irish name Kelly. Actually, the creatures they shot at were not originally said to be green at all, and there were not 12 of them, as reported in the current Net version. The residents of the house never knew how many there were, as they would keep appearing outside the house one by one over a long period of time, and were duly blasted with shotguns. When so blasted, they would fall down and leave, but apparently they were never hurt. No physical evidence of their visit was ever found.
The third topic dealt with in this film is the Point Pleasant, West Virginia Mothman syndrome, which occurred back in 1966-67, and has received a lot of attention in very recent years. Is John Keel the perpetrator of the Mothman scenario or merely its best-known chronicler? In any case, we look forward to this documentary, which will probably air ss a two-hour special on the Sci-Fi Channel around Halloween of this year...
Again the lead article in the May 2004 MUFON UFO Jourhal is from the respected BLT Research Team, for which Nancy
Talbott, pictured left, is the spokesperson. The article is quite technical, but the tentative conclusion, based on
precise scientific studies, is that "some sort of atmospheric plasma system might be involved...The fact (is) that plants
and soils at crop circle sites have been shown to exhibit abnormalities consistent with their exposure to brief bursts of
intense heat...Plasmas are known to emit micro-waves when they spiral, and this could be a possible sourceof the heat."
The object was spherical in shape, about 20 meters in diameter. As the light came closer, he saw what looked like a misty "white fog" above the red light, which appeared to be a solid craft. It was directly in front of his windows, at very close range. As the object descended to about 20 meters above the ground, he began to feel a "pressure" on his body, but he was not hurt or frightened. When it touched down there were brilliant flashes, like lightning; and, as it landed, multiple "arms" suddenly extended out from the center of the object, slowly bending down toward the ground.
The witness reported that the UFO sat touching the ground for at least one minute, with sparks flying, and giving off an intense light. Thereafter the protruding arms retracted and the object rose a few meters into the air, and then descended into the field again, a short distance away. Finally, after sitting on the ground this second time for about a minute, the arms again retracted and the "red shell closed in again around the white center" so that all he could see was the original red ball of light, which slowly drifted away across the fields and disappeared in the distance. The whole thing took about seven minutes.
The next morning a neighbor informed him that a peculiar marking - a pictogram-style crop circle - was flattened into the wheat in the precise location where the amazing object had landed the night before. It looked "something like a cross", and was thus shaped very similarly to the strange object itself when it had its "arms" extended. A second circle, about 20 meters in diameter, was found at the place where the object landed for the second time.
Other people came forward as having seen the UFO while it was in the air, but apparently Mr. Szpulecki was the only one who saw the amazing (if true) details described above.
We should add that there are also much larger & more complex crop circles, especially in England, and these are probably manmade ....
Now we have a somewhat similar creature, in Argentina (also Spanish-speaking), but this fellow has a different name - "El Unudo", meaning "the clawed one". He has been described variously as "large with a mask and horns; small and apelike; black or brown; with a nude upper torso and covered with tattoos; walking upright or on four legs; leaving goat-shaped hoofprints; climbing trees, pipelines or metal silos; jumping over wire fences and large lagoons; swift and elusive". Strange indeed! (Credit: Lucius Farish).
As the police officer turned a corner, a large black object fell from a tree. It stopped falling before it hit the ground, then slowly turned around to face the patrol car. What he saw was a woman dressed in black - not standing on the ground, but floating several feet above it. She then softly floated to the ground and stood there looking at him. She was almost "witch-like", with a cloak and a cape. The scene turned ugly when this creature suddenly jumped onto the hood of the car and tried to grab the officer right through the windshield with her claw-like hands. He put his car in reverse and raced backwards to the end of the street, where he covered his eyes and fainted!
Minutes later, backup patrol cars arrived with an ambulance, but Officer Samaniego was not injured. An extensive search for clues was made in the area, without results...
Girard thanks one unnamed customer for having bought loyally from him over the years, and about all the others he says: "Your deepening neglect of the non-material aspects of life has not only made perfectly clear your apathy toward spiritual growth...but you have also managed to completely collapse the market for UFO literature." Girard is bitter, but he has a point here. Though he hates the Net (as we do!), he will apparently be on it exclusively from now on.
Girard can be reached at Arcturus Books, 1443 S.E. Port St. Lucie Blvd., Port St. Lucie, Florida 34952. (Our thanks to K.P. for this one.)...
Plunkett's group was originally merely a branch of the International Flying Saucer Bureau, founded in 1952 by Albert K. Bender of Bridgeport, Connecticut. When Bender claimed to have been visited and frightened out of his wits by "Three Men in Black", he folded his group in 1953 - but the British branch of it kept right on going. To this day, in spite of various books and endless speculation, no one knows for sure just what got into Bender back in those early days. When last heard of, he was still alive, living in the Los Angeles area, but he refuses to discuss the flying saucer topic with anyone. A strange man indeed, and a strange case in the history of ufodom!
We have never believed this to be the case. In the early 1950s, the government fretted that UFOs might be a threat to national security, and once they determined this was probably not the case, they tended to lose interest. The media attitude toward the subject is not because of government censorship, but because superficially, UFOs lend themselves to ridicule; because there is never any final proof; and because more urgent things are always going on!
The media attitude reflects the public's attitude. Most people do have a mild interest in flying saucers, but especially in this country, our thinking is dominated by career and other monetary considerations. Since there seems to be no urgency about it, the UFO subject is relegated to an intellectual pursuit - only important to a handful of intellectuals and to the relatively few people who have had personal experiences. There is, in general, no motive to pursue the subject vigorously.
Especially since 9-ll, our focus is on survival. Just a few weeks ago, when a UFO appeared on radar near Washington, D.C., the government took it very seriously for a short time; but once it became clear that there was no threat, the matter was forgotten!
We of "Smear" strongly believe there is a genuine scientific mystery here, probably not involving visitors in 3-D interplanetary spaceships. What it does involve, we do not know; but science is advancing so rapidly that someday - maybe as soon as the next few years - an objective solution will emerge. In the meanwhile, the subject will remain irrelevant to everyday life for most people.
Perhaps "Smear" too has become increasingly irrelevant, but we intend to press on!
The author of "UFO Warning" is John Stuart of New Zealand, who once headed a group called Flying Saucer Investigators. The original publisher of the book is our late, great friend Gray Barker of Saucerian Books, Clarksburg, West Virginia. Though the events described are from the early 1950s, this volume - now reprinted by Tim Beckley of Global Communications - did not see the light of day until 1963.
Says Barker in his introduction, "If the struggle with Satan were easy, the muscles of the angels would be flabby"; This sets the scientific tone!
Beckley's contribution is only on the back cover, where he proclaims in huge type, "FORCED INT0 SEX ABOARD A FLYING
SAUCER". This is not accurate, however, as the heroine of the narrative, named Barbara Turner, was actually forced into
Sex while alone in her bedroom. There were thirteen invisible creatures involved, though only three of them participated
in the rape, we are told.
John Stuart joined the New Zealand Flying Saucer Investigation Society in 1953, intrigued by several of his own UFO sightings in his earlier years, but within six months he was "expelled in disgrace" for misusing the organization's stationery. He then formed his own group, which consisted only of himself and Barbara - though (GASP!) John was married at the time and living with his wife! This research group - or relationship - lasted till December, 1954, at which time they dramatically CLOSED their Files!
But, for awhile there, John and Barbara were getting together almost every night, discussing flying saucer sightings and theories into the wee hours. (Sure!) There were "Warnings" that Barbara might be in physical danger from "Them", but this valiant couple pressed on.
Then one evening they saw a "loathsome, hideous, evil, disgusting, horrifying" creature about eight feet tall. Barbara seemed ready to succumb willingly to its sexual advances (see illustration), but for some reason the monster abruptly departed. Another night, some time later, it (and twelve other Beings) apparently returned for the rape scene already described. Barbara ended up with scratches on her lovely body!
Nowhere is it explained what kind of work John and Barbara do, if any. The only thing mentioned is that John was once in the military, and we suspect that this must have had some adverse effect on his Nerves!
Illustrations, such as the one on this page, are by Barker's friend Gene Duplantier, who is alive and still living in eastern Canada.
There is much MORE to this story, but it's better if you find out for yourself! BUY this RARE collector's item, at a special price to "Smear" readers of only $25. Send to Global Communications, Box 753, New Brunswick, New Jersey 08903. And keep your EYE out for invisible monsters! (Shudder, gasp, etc!)
Greg Long's book "The Making of Bigfoot" (Prometheus, 476 PP., $25), all but demolishes the credibility of the iconic 1967 Roger Patterson film of a loping female Bigfoot. In the process, the leading Bigfooters who swear by the flickering frames take major credibility hits (or should).
Long establishes beyond any doubt that Patterson was an utterly unreliable character. By itself, this doesn't make his film a hoax. But link it with the clear evidence that, rather than being a less than credible guy who just happened to innocently get lucky, Patterson had been attempting for some time and in various ways - including shooting film for a "documentary" - to make his mark and fortune as a Bigfoot hunter-investigator. Now the odds of a hoax are sky high. A hoax isn't proven, but darn close.
The smoking Bigfoot (Bigfoot hotfoot?) that would finish off the Patterson film would be answers to four questions: Who wore the monkey suit? Where is the suit now, or how was it disposed of? Where did it come from? Can Patterson's footage be recreated, or shockingly close to it, using materials, equipment, and skills available to Patterson?
Long fairly credibly gives us "who" with the claims of Bob Heironimus, a Patterson associate who says he played Mrs. Bigfoot for a promised but never paid $1,000. (Note: Heironimus is only the latest, albeit the most credible of a number of men who have "confessed" to being Patterson's lady Bigfoot.) As for where the suit is now or what became of it, oddly, Long did not pursue this with any vigor and offers no answers.
It is with "Where did it come from?" that Long fumbles badly. He inexplicably attempts to lash together two utterly incompatible explanations in a sort of Unified Bigfoot Suitology Theory. Moreover, one of these is critically at odds with Heironimus's recollections of how the suit he alleges he wore was constructed, the awful smell, the number of separate sections it was comprised of, and how he donned it. One is left to wonder how Long's publisher let such a glaring and clumsy mishmash pass, especially since the suit issue is central to the author's case.
It remains to be seen if Robert Kiviat will include a believable reinactment of the Patterson mini-epic in his upcoming TV expose based on Long's work. To be convincing, it will have to exhibit all the features of body-mass movement, stride, posture, etc., that have persuaded several primatologists and others with relevant expertise that Patterson filmed a genuine cryptid. If Patterson hoaxed his flick, it should be easy enough. Time will tell.
Even if Patterson's filmic proof ultimately goes conclusively poof, there remain all those other accounts of Bigfoot sightings and encounters dating back literally for centuries and down to the present day - not to mention the many Bigfootprints, smelly hair tufts, and such. Long live Bigfoot!
The convention room rate is $119, which is less than half the normal rate. The Renaissance Hotel is located at 1755 North Highland Ave., Hollywood, California 90028. Phone: 323-856-1200. Web address: www.renaissancehollywood.com.
The mailing address for the convention is: NUFOC 2004, 1621 West 26th St., San Pedro, California 90732. Phone: 310-548-4420. E-mail: jm@nufoc.org. Web site: nufoc.org. - Details regarding speakers will be forthcoming shortly!
"I noticed in your most recent 'Smear' the mention of General Garland's memorandum for General Sanford. This has been around for almost twenty years now. It is in my UFO FBI book, published in 1999."For your amusement I have enclosed a portion of the recent paper I presented at the X-Conference. This portion includes Garland's memo and puts it into a context of the times (the beginning of 1952). There is also more information going beyond his memo. Note that Captain Ruppelt said Garland was a UFO witness!...
"I would have included more pages - like the whole 60-some page paper - but I realize that your reading attention span would be stretched by just the 15 pages I have included here. So Enjoy!"
Editor's Note: Apparently the General Garland memo discussed in our last issue has been around for a long time. Maccabee also makes the point that Garland himself was a moderate believer in the possibility of interplanetary saucers. BUT none of this changes our basic point: The fact is that, if there had been crashed UFOs with physical evidence (such as Roswell in 1947), none of this discussion would have been going on in 1952!
"I felt you might enjoy knowing you are mentioned in the new 'UFO Magazine UFO Enclycopedia' by William Birnes. Not in any of the entries, mind you, but in the acknowledgments, where they thank you, among others, for keeping them honest. My hunch is that this is insincere, since the book is filled with nonsense that any skeptic would have recommended rewriting or cutting. My favorite howler is an entry that thinks the 1897 Hamilton calf-napping yarn involved the Alexander Hamilton who wrote the Federalist papers, even though that Hamilton was shot to death by Aaron Burr in 1804! Any skeptic would also have told them that Jerry Clark wrote a famous expose of the case, providing evidence that it was a Liar's Club prank!"I was updating my prediction file this week and it reminded me that Don Johnson's prediction for a UFO flap last year was an even worse failure than I realized. He predicted the flap for what turned out to be the lightest period of saucer activity of the whole year! As you may recall, I mentioned that his theory was likely based upon Saunder's 61-month cycle theory. The original theory by Saunders would have predicted the flap would have happened in May, but that, too, flunked! The best numbers happened in September.
"You may enjoy learning that those folks who predicted there would be a poleshift cataclysm last May have reported that the pole did finally shift this past January. It first shifted to Iceland, but later moved to Mongolia. They also allege that Venus has been backing up in its orbit, though last I checked, it was exactly where it was supposed to be, according to the star chart program I consulted. I wonder if that means that the Venus transit of the Sun that is famously supposed to take place in June should not happen?"
"...Regarding the Patterson Bigfoot film, for starters there are now four different individuals claiming to be the man in the monkey suit. All have agents and are writing books, doing TV, etc. No one has produced the kind of evidence to bury the film, photos of costume, etc. As a matter of fact there are now several costume makers taking credit for the construction of the suit, although when one company was challenged to recreate it, the imitation was not even close. While I don't have a particular belief on this, I don't believe 'The Making of Bigfoot' is a legitimate book."
..I have difficulty understanding why it is so hard for science to explore the possibility of the UFO reality. In fact NOT exploring it, is not what science is about, at all!Science, by its very nature, is exploratory - looking into things that would be otherwise unknown. The only explanation for their lack of interest has to be the government telling them that the subject is 'off limits'..."
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