Me! On Culture of Contact

For some reason, Jeremy Vaeni thought it'd be a good idea to interview me for a Culture of Contact podcast. Well, I know the reason -- he wants to out me as an abductee. You can find out if I admit it or not by listening to the interview, which should be available Tuesday or Thursday. I'll give an update when I know more.

I will say it was great fun, Jeremy is a great host/interviewer and I felt very comfortable. No doubt I came off like a bozo, but that's okay. I had fun.

Signal to Noise: Contactees Reconsidered Part 4

Daniel has offered his second response in the second round of Signal to Noise.
As with Round I, I’m afraid it isn’t much of a smack down; we seem to agree more than we disagree. (Now, take Daniel’s very well thought out and well presented idea for a UFO oversight committee; we could get into some strong disagreements there; he’s all for it, I’m agin’ it.)

So, for those of you who like nasty sneering sarcastic fights between pundits of esoterica, you won’t find it here.

I will get a bit nit picky though, just to show I’m on the job.

Daniel wrote, about “clowns” etc. in UFOlogy:

The charlatans and egomaniacs, and also the authentically disturbed (which are not unique to any field) have nothing to contribute to the study of UFOs. Assuming Truman Bethurum, for example, was sincere and had an actual experience, then his story may be helpful. If he was a liar, his story doesn’t add any illumination to this murky subject — in fact, it does just the opposite. The charlatans need to be weeded out of any study so that whatever data is gleaned has validity. This is just common sense.

We’ll never know if people like Truman Bethrum were telling the truth or not. So we can’t “weed “ him out, since we don’t know what’s true, if anything, and what isn’t. Many have already weeded him out, and others like him, since they’ve decided that by definition they are charlatans. But no one knows that for a fact, and what if the Truman Bethrums of the world are telling the truth? (that doesn’t mean it happened the way they say it did; remember in Round I I said I believe the Contactees, I just didn't take them literally.)

And I can’t let go of the flap of individuals who arose suddenly to announce to the world that they had experienced some extraordinary things in context of the Contactee realm. Something was happening in the world. It wasn’t just one, or two, people who decided they were visited by Venusian. It was a whole lot of people. A whole lot of people believed these things happened to them. They believed they happened either because they all were crazy or liars, or, they were telling the truth. (as they saw it.) That in itself merits investigation.

Aliens. Given the reality of the solar system as we know it today, if these were extraterrestrial beings, they could not be from the places they claimed. All manner of arguments could be served up to justify this, but it seems highly unlikely that beings from elsewhere in the universe would even look like us, let alone communicate with us in English, let alone want to lie about their point of origin. Given the assumption these are real experiences, this seems to me to be the least likely possibility.

Because an entity says hits from Venus, doesn't mean it is from Venus. It could be from Mars, the CIA spook-basement of weird things, inner earth, or who knows. If it is from Mars, (or the Moon) it could get here in no time at all. How do we know what an obviously technological superior species of beings are capable of?

As to knowing the English language; either via telepathy or some other technological means, that isn’t so hard to understand. The entities either were literally speaking English, or they had some way of communicating (telepathy, mind control, hypnosis, etc..) that had the Contactees believing they were communicating in the same language.

Mind Control / “Theater.” We’ve all heard the suggestion that there were “assets” placed in the early UFO research community to some end, be it disinformation or manipulation of the course the community was taking. Some have suggested the contactees themselves may have been these kind of assets. Staging an event for the “benefit” of a witness bypasses the issue of creating sincerity, though the resources to accomplish this on the scale described by the contactees does not seem remotely plausible. Truman Bethurum experience of witnessing a 300 foot wide flying saucer hovering for an extended period a few feet over the desert floor and then flying off at enormous speed is a feat that would be difficult to achieve today — even given existing special effects optical trickery or (publicly disclosed) aviation technology. This doesn’t seem particularly likely to me, either.

Truman Bethrum may have thought he’d seen a craft that large. Holographic projection, hallucinations induced by drugs or hypnosis, could be reasons why the Contactees thought they saw what they saw, and visited places like Venus. Suggestion combined with the right props and stage dressing can make anyone believe anything, when done right.

And if the craft were operated by extraterrestrials, it wouldn't be at all difficult.

Now I would be happy to escalate this possibility if it can be shown the ability to brainwash an individual into believing an experience of this sort could be done at that time seamlessly enough to escape detection.

Oh, I think so. I have no doubt.

Which still leaves us with pretty much two choices: real aliens really came from Venus or the Moon or even outside the solar system, or some sort of human based cabal of mind control evil doers. Both sound pretty nutty, I admit. But we know elements within governments,including the U.S., have a long history of committing mind control and other experimental crimes against civilians. (Of course that doesn’t explain some of the Contactee encounters in other countries.) And I’ll just come and say it: aliens exist. Well, I don’t know that for a fact of course, but I’m of the vehemently strong opinion they do, and they’ve been around here for a long time. Along with all kind of other entities not necessarily from outer space but not human either.
There. I said it.

I don’t know if the Contactees were literally contacted by extraterrestrials, and in fact, I think it’s the least likely, though not at all impossible.

There’s a third possibility; for thousands of years humankind has experienced the liminal, the strange travels from the mundane to what some of us call the sacred, others the supernatural. I suspect that that’s what the Contactees experienced; a sort of time/dimensional flap of Contactees and “Venusian” that encountered each other.

There seems to be a force, an energy, some kind of entity that manifests itself in different ways at different times that's a part of the UFOlogical picture. If we ignore this characteristic (Trickster or call it what you like) or dismiss it as just goofball stuff, we do ourselves a disservice. We can maybe understand more about the UFO phenomenon if we remain open to these types of UFO encounters.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! Be safe, be happy!

[Glitterfy.com - *Glitter Photos*]

Darkness in the Desert

Nick Redfern has another new blog: Darkness in the Desert, which has to do with research concerning his thesis in his book Body Snatchers in the Desert:The Horrible Truth at the Heart of the Roswell Story.

DEDICATED TO REVEALING THE LATEST NEWS, VIEWS AND FINDINGS CONCERNING NICK REDFERN'S CONTROVERSIAL BOOK "BODY SNATCHERS IN THE DESERT: THE HORRIBLE TRUTH AT THE HEART OF THE ROSWELL STORY."

Saucer Gossip: A Bit of Silliness. . .

My recent item on: Saucer Gossip: A Bit of History and Silliness About the Trent Case

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/494571/saucer_gossip_a_bit_of_history_and.html

Vintage Soviet Xmas Cards

While looking for vintage holiday images, I found this site that has a great collection of vintage Christmas cards from Soviet Russia days blending wishes for a happy holiday season with images of space exploration. Propaganda meets tradition. This doesn't have anything to do with UFOs or flying saucers directly, but given the context of the Cold War era and the Space Race combined with the always present flying saucer stories, I thought it was appropriate to share here.


Link to more images:
http://www.mazaika.com/postcard/aerospace0.htm

Contactee Dana Howard: From Venus or Mary?

My recent item on female Contactee Dana Howard for UFO Digest: The Mystical Contactee Encounters of Dana Howard:Parallels to Marian Apparitions? Howard had her first contact in 1939, having them again in the 1950s.

A new book by authors Joe Oesterle and Tim Cridland: “ Weird Las Vegas and Nevada, Your Alternative Travel Guide to Sin City and the Silver State, seems like it’s going to be a good juicy Fortean read.

Among other things, the book addresses a purported UFO crash in Ely, Nevada in 1952, complete with dead alien bodies and cover-ups, etc.

http://www.elynews.com/articles/2007/12/12/lifestyle/life02.txt

Contactees: “We Met The Space People”

1959. Sisters Helen and Betty Mitchell met humanoid type beings in Missouri. They wrote a book about their encounter. You can download the book for free at the site. Can't wait to read it!

This is an odd bit of synchronicity: I was just working with Richelle Hawks about this whole Contactee thing, and had included in my answer to her that few, if any, women were Contactees; they seem to have all been male. But I wasn't sure of that, so I deleted it and didn't include that in my final reply to Richelle.

Then, while searching the web for something, the first thing I came across was this. Nifty!

cut and paste if link doesn't work: http://www.boingboing.net/2006/11/06/1959-ufo-contactee-b.html

Fire in the Sky (Travis Walton)

Billy Booth has a piece on the Walton case:The Walton Abduction.

In 1975, Travis Walton and a few of his co-workers encountered a UFO. Walton went missing, he was found five days later, the rest is UFO history.

A movie; Fire in the Sky, was made in 1993 about Walton’s experiences. (Robert Patrick co-starred; Patrick was the actor who replaced David Duchovny in The X-Files.)

Naturally, the debunkers, particularly the late Philip Klass, did their best to rip Walton apart. Travis Walton and the other witnesses still stick to their story, to this day, no one’s managed to reveal anything, show any compelling evidence, that proves they’re lying. As Booth says:

Personally, I believe that the Walton abduction really occurred, and those who disagree with me cannot offer any evidence to support their negative position.

There’s a link he provides to a video about the case from the Weird Travels program.

cut and paste if link doesn’t work: http://ufos.about.com/b/2007/12/17/the-walton-abduction.htm

Signal to Noise: The Contactees: My Response

Daniel Brenton’s first Signal to Noise on the Contactees.

I Believe Them, I Just Don’t Take Them Literally
To Daniel Brenton’s credit, he acknowledges that, in spite of his opinions on the Contactees, the subject should be studied with both a seriousness and openness:

It is fair to say that my inclination toward Adamski’s story is that he was a charlatan, which can’t help but invalidate his story, but I am open to discuss any compelling evidence that suggests the picture may be more complex.

We need to take them seriously, not just reject them for being quaint kooks. Daniel writes that the Contactees, like George Adamski, couldn’t possibly have made the outer space journeys to Venus and the like, because it’s just impossible, given the physics involved. Also, their reports of what it was like on these planets were clearly fantastical, not meshing in any way with what we know. I don’t take them literally, but I believe them. I don’t believe them in this sense: I don’t believe they literally went to Venus, or Mars, or any other planet. In fact, I don't think they ever left the desert. However, I believe they thought they left the desert. But this doesn’t mean the Contactees were lying.something happened to these Contactees that was profound. Yes, their experiences were off the edge, but much of both UFO and anomalous phenomena is off the the edge as well as nonsensical.

The nonsensical aspect to encounters shouldn’t, as it too often does, be a means to dismiss them completely. We can learn from these so-called “nonsensical” behaviors of “them.” Whoever “they” are.

“They” whether they be aliens from space, entities here on earth, military/government spooks, inner earth dwelling nazis, or a combination, have been playing games with us for a very long time. They change the props and sets, but continue on with us, manifesting before us with abandon. We choose to either watch and listen and maybe learn, or deny, ignore, and debunk.

I suppose it’s a matter of perspective. If one remains stuck in the opinion the UFO phenomena is pretty much just nuts and bolts -- literal ETs from a literal planet -- we’re not going to get anywhere. And that goes for understanding the Contactees as well.

We Need the Circus
We can’t separate ourselves from the phenomena. We’re more participants than some of us might think. As Colin Bennett said in his book on Adamski Looking for Orthon, we need the so-called circus like aspect of the weird, including UFOs:
"

Odd folk trouble Authority if only because it doesn’t understand them. Weird views are not directly criminal, yet they subvert society in a much more subtle way.

. .
Adamski and the other Contactees were certainly “odd folk.” But Bennett insists we need their presence:

“We need him (Adamski) if only because his views are quite wonderfully absurd.

”

It doesn't matter if what they experienced “really” happened as they say it did, or if some of it did, and some of it didn’t. Each time something surreal, absurd and fantastic happens -- something Fortean and anomalous -- we can choose to really look at it, or, do our best to deflate it.

Our reactions to the Contactees is as much a part of the phenomena as anything. In fact, the “odd folk” are the jesters we need. We need them to jar us out of complacency and assumption of the mundane as the only paradigm. We need them to make us go “What the . . .?!” There are dozens of reasons why we need the Contactees, and other “odd folk.” The minute we tell ourselves they’re nothing more than worthless frauds or kooks and get rid of them, we lose a lot of ground in ever understanding the UFO phenomena.

Another point Bennett makes about the Contactees and these weird experiences, is what it shows us about imagination, creativity, and our active presence in the phenomena. Trips to Venus didn’t happen, okay. That’s not the end of things, however:

"Adamski certainly made seemingly nonsensical statements, such as saying Venus is inhabited by human-like forms. though this might indeed appear to be nonsense, it certainly brings the picture of such an absurdity into a mind, though momentarily. Though the mind may reject immediately such rubbish, nevertheless, for a fleeting instant, it has created a picture o fan inhabited Venus, if only to reject the image immediately. This fleeting act of imagination is the very first minute building block of a possible universe in which Venus might indeed be populated in the manner describes by Adamski."(Bennett: pp141-142)

Daniel cites Curtis Peebles:

In the late 1980s I ran across the Curtis Peebles commentary from his Watch the Skies! A Chronicle of the Flying Saucer Myth that followers of Adamski reported. During Prohibition Adamski had founded a monastery in Laguna Beach and acquired a license to make wine for religious purposes. He claimed he had made “enough wine for all of Southern California” and cursed Roosevelt for the repeal of Prohibition. If not for that, he said “I wouldn’t had to get into this saucer crap.”

That’s pretty damning.

Peebles is an avowed skeptic:
"

I am a skeptic. I believe flying saucer reports are misinterpretations of conventional objects, phenomena, and experiences. I do not believe the evidence indicates the Earth is under massive surveillance by disk-shaped alien spaceships."

His view of the Contactees is certainly colored by his beliefs. (To be fair, he does tell readers to “make up their own minds,” regarding UFOs.)
As to Adamski’s statement about getting” into this saucer crap,” (if true) it’s a moot point, given the context of the Contactee phenomena. (Again, this isn't to say Adamski could have been full of crap, or deny that he said this. One interpretation could be he meant that this "flying saucer crap" was something he wouldn't wish on anyone.)


The Nonsensical
Daniel discusses another Contactee, Truman Bethurum, author of The Flying Saucers Have Landed.:

A few things did jump out at me:

* The location of the planet Captain Rhanes and crew came from — “Clarion” — was explicitly “behind the Moon.” Up until that point, most the references I had read about Bethurum said “behind the Sun.”

Not to go on at length, but it is possible for a small object (say, the size of a minor asteroid or less) to “hang” in a position about 30,000 miles over the far side of the Moon. (This has to do with mathematician Joseph Louis Lagrange’s solution to “three-body problem” in celestial mechanics.) However, this so-called “Lagrange point” isn’t particularly stable, anything placed in it will eventually drift out, anything the size of a planet would upset the balance of that kind of relationship, and the Moon wouldn’t obscure it, to boot.

Okay. But this isn’t the point; something happened in these deserts (and the fact they happen in deserts, mostly, is interesting in itself) that caused these Contactees to spend the rest of their lives insisting they were telling the truth.



Daniel cites a few more things from the book, such as the female entity Aura Rhanes drinking orange juice in a diner and disappearing when Bethurum followed her. Bethurum said he had eleven encounters, and Daniel writes that eleven is a “mystical number.” This reminds Daniel of the famous pancake story:

I was made aware of a very odd story through Jacques Vallee’s book Dimensions, which was apparently referenced in his earlier Passport to Magonia. On April 18, 1961, Joe Simonton of Eagle River, Wisconsin, had a 30 foot wide flying disk land near his house, and three short human-appearing occupants wearing uniforms with turtleneck shirts requested a jug of water from Simonton. In return they gave him three small crispy pancakes.

These pancakes were in fact analyzed and found to be perfectly ordinary.

Assuming the witness was truthful (he was found to be credible, even though his story wasn’t) then the event was real but nonsensical.

Perhaps Bethurum was in the same boat. Maybe Adamski was as well, even though it seems clear he is an unreliable source. It is a fairly common suggestion that some contactees may have started with a genuine experience, and, having nothing else to tell, made the choice to fabricate material to keep the audience interested.

I really don’t think that’s it. Although it’s true that some glitch happens in these kinds of encounters; Adamski clearly getting swept up by his world wide tour, where he presented his experiences to eager audiences, including celebrities and royalty, or Contactee Daniel Fry, who admitted lying about an encounter, these Contactees carried on with a sincere insistence about their experiences.


Witnesses
But then there are other things that throw more wrenches into the phenomena. Adamski wasn’t the sole witness to his flying saucers, there were other witnesses. Lou Zinsstag, in the book about Adamski: Their Man On Earth,talks about her own sightings and encounters with these beings. Daniel Fry appeared to be sincerely moved by what he experienced, and spent the rest of his life writing on spiritual matters; he had a newsletter and “followers’ although he made it clear the was not a leader of anything of any kind. George Van Tassel spent many years in the desert, building his Integratron. Van Tassel was convinced of the benefits of his machine like building -- inspiration courtesy of the aliens. The Contactee phenomena, like all of Fortean/UFOlogical events, has its share of synchronicities and odd juxtapositions; for example, Lou Zinsstag, Adamski’s Swiss liaison, was related to Carl Jung.

Adamski was visited on more than one occasion by military personnel; he was even asked to photograph the saucers for them! This reeks of some kind of mind control head game scenario, along the lines of what was done to Paul Bennewitz.

The photo below of Van Tassel's Integratron was taken in 1967 by a Richard T. Sandberg of Pomona, Calif. Sandberg insisted a "gleaming object loomed up" as he was taking the photo.



In an interview with Van Tassel, Long John Nebel (famous radio talk show host in the 1960s who interviewed many UFO researchers and witnesses) asked him about one of the entities called Solgando that had visited him in the desert:

I reminded George Van Tassel: that was three years ago and you mentioned that Solgando said he would be back to see you again. Has he ever contacted you since that time?

George's answer was elegantly simple: "No."

Van Tassel could have lied; and said that he was visited many times over. Why didn't he? Maybe because he was being truthful. (Interesting the name of the entity was Solgado -- Sol means sun in Spanish.)

There are other Contactees in this strange story. Howard Menger,in 1956, had his own experiences in New Jersey, not the desert. But his descriptions and photographs of craft are similar to the other Contactees, including Adamski's:



The Desert Stage
The desert is a perfect stage for these types of events. Remote, empty wide open spaces. A perfect setting for the aliens or other entities to do their performances. Underground (literally) nazis manipulating their UFOs and playing with us land dwellers. (I’m not serious about that one.) Contactee George Van Tassel claimed to use the coordinates of the Great Pyramid and Giant Rock as part of his plans, and insisted that the desert was a crucial element in ensuring the Integratron would successful. Or, the perfect setting for some kind of staged event by the military. Something about the whole quirky Contactee experience just smacks of the beginnings of the MILAB theory. (Military Abductions.) The Contactees experiences could have been pure liminal events, or a combination of these things. But the point is, there is much to learn from the Contactee Era, and it’s time we looked at anew with fresh approaches.

Parallels to Abduction and Other UFO Accounts
Van Tassel reports that he woke up one night to find someone standing at the foot of his bed. Sleeping out in the desert -- literally outside, due to the heat -- he awoke to find someone standing at the foot of their bed:

"I tried to waken the wife and she seemed to be under some spell.

Following Solgado to the UFO, Van Tassel began to feel ill:

"As I approached this ship with this man, I became very nauseated. And this feeling became greater as I got closer to the ship.

(The name Solgado -- "sol" meaning sun -- is one more Fortean grin of synchronicity in the Contactee play.)

The reports of telepathy, being moved against one's will, other potential witnesses unaware or in a deep sleep, the overall bizarreness of the phenomena parallel abduction and other UFO accounts. Were these Contactee experiences preludes to the abduction phenomena, caused either by non-human entities -- or humans, as in military ops?

Putting The Fortean Back In UFOlogy
Daniel concludes:

Looking at the question of the contactees, we have a segment of a the UFO mystery that begs for dismissal yet raises more questions. If we wish to categorize the overall phenomenon as “other people’s spaceships” we are forced, in a sense, to ignore the stories of these individuals, and with them an number of other aspects of the subject. In reality, for integrity’s sake we have to look at the entire picture — including the nonsensical parts — to reach a complete understanding.

Agreed.

Well, that wasn’t much of a smackdown, was it? We seem to agree more than not. I cannot stress how crucial it is for researchers to acknowledge what Daniel wrote:

“In reality, for integrity’s sake we have to look at the entire picture — including the nonsensical parts — to reach a complete understanding."

We need to expand our thinking, acknowledge our own involvement in this continuing performance, and not always take things literally or in such concrete, either or, black and white terms.

I don’t recall who said this some time ago (and if anyone knows, please tell me)- don’t know if it was Bennett or whom) but it was about the need to put the Fortean back into UFOlogy. Or, the other way around. The Fortean anomalous world has something at its core: the tension between the Trickster (cosmic joker, prankster, the Fool) and the Infrastructure. We have to understand that if we hope to get even a glimmer of understanding in these kinds of experiences.


Context
Out in the deserts, several people had similar Contactees experiences. Why? Were they all simply deluded? Easy answer, but also the cheap way out. No, something more than just kooky victims of heat stroke occurred during that time, and we need to take a serious look at their experiences. Whatever happened; aliens, military mind games, or some sort of terrestrial entity, we'll never know if we simply brush the Contactees off as kooky hucksters.

Just the Surface
Obviously, a lot more can be said of all this; no doubt a weighty book or two. I've barely touched on any of this. I know I've only begun to research the Contactees; I have a lot to learn. I acknowledge I vacilate between the Contactee experience as being a true paranormal/Fortean experience, or a military/government mind game scenario (the abduction scenario being the sequel.) Either way, we owe it to UFOlogy to find out. Whatever the answer, ever since I first heard of the Contactees, I wondered, not "what the hell is wrong with these kooks?" but, "What has really happened to these people?"

Notes

Colin Bennett: Looking for Orthon

John Nebel: Contactees I Have Known
http://www.mimufon.org/1960%20articles/ContacteesIHaveKnown.htm

Daniel Brenton's Signal to Noise
http://www.danielbrenton.com/2007/12/10/signal-to-noise-adamski-and-the-contactees-reconsidered-part-1/

Wikipedia: Curtis Peebles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Peebles

Item on Trent/McMinville UFO Case

Over on AC, a new place I've signed up for. This article has to do with the 1950s UFO case in McMinnville, Oregon. Please take a look! Richell Hawks is also over there, and lots of other good things.

Ed Wood

Edward D. Wood, Jr.: Why if I had half a chance, I could make an entire movie using this stock footage. The story opens on these mysterious explosions. Nobody knows what's causing them, but it's upsetting all the buffalo. So, the military are called in to solve the mystery.
Editor on Studio Lot: You forgot the octopus.
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: No, no, I'm saving that for my big underwater climax.
~ from the movie Ed Wood

I have the habit of listening to music as I cook dinner. Tonight I was listening to the score from the movie Ed Wood (1994) starring Johnny Depp as Ed Wood and directed by Tim Burton. (I’m a fan of both Depp and Burton.) Both Depp and Burton did a great job, as always -- the movie was great, as well as the music.

Bunny Breckinridge: What about glitter? When I was a headliner in Paris, audiences always liked it when I sparkled.
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: No!
Bunny Breckinridge: Cat's Eyes.
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: No!
Bunny Breckinridge: Well, I'm going to need some antennae.
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: No! You're the ruler of the galaxy! Show a little taste! ~ Ed Wood, the movie

I had either forgotten or never looked, but assumed, as I was listening to the CD tonight, the music was composed by Danny Elfman, who composes most of Tim Burton’s work. I was surprised to see Elfman didn’t compose the scored to Ed Wood; it was Howard Shore.

Paula Trent: ...A flying saucer? You mean the kind from up there?
Jeff Trent: Yeah, either that or its counterpart. ~ Plan 9 From Outer Space

(I don’t know where my brain has been, but it’s only recently that I noticed the two character’s have the last name of Trent; a reference to Paul and Evelyn Trent of McMinnville, Oregon?)

Paula Trent: Now, don't you worry. The saucers are up there. The graveyard is out there. But I'll be locked up safely in there.

One of Ed Wood’s films was the horrible/delightfully charming/mess of a movie, Plan 9 From Outer Space. (1959) I can’t help myself, I watch it everytime it comes on. Plan 9 makes no sense, and has the corniest, cheesiest dialogue in flying saucer movie history. That’s what makes it so great to watch.

Ed Reynolds: Perfect? Mr. Wood, do you know anything about the art of film production?
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: Well, I like to think so.
Ed Reynolds: That cardboard headstone tipped over. This graveyard is obviously phony.
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: Nobody will ever notice that. Filmmaking is not about the tiny details. It's about the big picture.
Ed Reynolds: The big picture?
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: Yes.
Ed Reynolds: Then how 'bout when the policemen arrived in daylight, but now it's suddenly night?
Edward D. Wood, Jr.: What do you know? Haven't you heard of suspension of disbelief?

And finally, be sure you heed the following advice:

Criswell: Perhaps, on your way home, someone will pass you in the dark, and you will never know it... for they will be from outer space! ~ Plan 9 From Outer Space

New book addresses WWII UFOs

This looks like an interesting book. Sigh, yet another book to add to the list! Stange Company: Military Encounters with UFOs in World War II by Keith Chester, published by Anomalist Books.

E.T. Sex Can Be Out Of This World

Yikes, this is an odd one, (that’s not a bad thing) from Nick Redfern. All about inter species sex between aliens and humans. One classic encounter being the liaison between Antonio Villas-Boas and an alien in 1957. Writes Redfern:

One of the most celebrated cases on record occurred in October 1957. Twenty-three-year-old Antonio Villas-Boas claimed he was taken aboard a UFO from his family’s farm in Brazil late one evening, whereupon he was introduced to a short, naked space-girl who made it very clear to the startled farmer what she wanted.

There was no “take me to your leader”-type nonsense in this encounter, however. No, it was just pure sex, throughout which, Villas-Boas said in a 1962 interview, the girl “growled like a dog.” Hey, it doesn’t get much better than that.

Nick, you cheeky bastard you!

Anyway, it’s true, as I’ve written before, the UFO phenomena is all about sex. We treat the subject of UFOs as something almost dirty; it illicits giggles and an embarrassment, the same kind of reaction middle schoolers (well, some anyway) have around sex. And many adults.

We exploit sex and use it to entice, sell things and seduce, but we won’t talk about it seriously. The same with UFOs; we joke, we use alien faces to sell everything from candy to skateboards, but we’re not going to talk seriously about aliens, abductions or UFOs, are we? Why, that’s crazy!

Sex with aliens, entities, even Bigfoot and other creatures, are a major part of the esoteric, and yet, it seems we continue to distance ourselves from the fact.

This item by Redfern however leaves no doubt about the relationship between humans and aliens!

Those Triangles

I’m very interested in the Triangles. Having seen one myself I’m naturally curious about them. Just what are they, where are they from, why the decades long official silence? More questions: why are they seen all over the globe, and how does this whole restricted air space work in this context?

A recent item from Not Your Grandfather’s UFO Blog: The Triangle and Rumors, about reports from the 1970s.
http://robert-barrow.blogspot.com/2007/12/triangle-and-rumors.html

Stanton Friedman and Frank Feschino Jr. on C2C

On Coast to Coast tonight, Stanton Friedman and Frank Feschino Jr. They'll be discussing planes that have disappeared in the 1950s, in flight accidents, etc. which they attribute to UFOs or flying saucers.

We all know who the great Stanton Friedman is of course. Feschino is author of Shoot Them Down! - The Flying Saucer Air Wars Of 1952

Beware the Counterfeit

The geniune and the fake . . .

Ed Komarek has a good article on the contactees and abductees on UFO Digest: Exopolitics: Counterfeit Contactees. Komarek not only gives a lot of historical background but gives us a fresh and insightful perspective, one that was a pleasant surprise. A lot to think about.

UFO Mystic: The Bowen Manuscript

Nick Redfern on the Bowen manuscript. . .

A limited edition of An Encyclopedia of Flying Saucers from 1957 is available.
Between 1957 and 1961, Bowen worked on his Flying Saucer manuscript and did something with it that few, if indeed anyone else has ever done: namely, before submitting it to a publisher, Bowen sent an original, typed version of it to the Air Force for review, and in an effort to ensure that its contents, as they related to the Air Force, were accurate.

And that’s when the manuscript vanished.

An Encyclopedia of Flying Saucers was never published. However, in 1999, a strange thing happened: the same, original, typed version of the manuscript that Bowen sent to the Air Force all those years before, turned up in the mail-box of none other than UFO researcher Timothy Cooper
There are ties to MJ - !2 and as Redfern writes, there’s sure to be even more controversy about not only MJ-12, but Bowen’s book as well.