1942 'Battle Of Los Angeles'

Radio newscast of the 1942 UFO battle.

Marvin The Martian - Duck Dogers

From the blurb on YouTube:"Duck Dodgers in the 24½th (twenty-fourth and a half) Century is a Merrie Melodies cartoon created in 1952 and released on July 25, 1953, starring Daffy Duck as space hero Duck Dodgers, Porky Pig as his assistant, and Marvin the Martian as his opponent. Marvin the Martian had been introduced as a villain then named Commander X2 in Haredevil Hare (1948) playing opposite Bugs Bunny, but this cartoon was the first of many appearances of Duck Dodgers.

Marvin was never named in the original shorts (he was called Commander X-2 in The Hasty Hare in 1952), but decades later when the character attracted merchandising interest he obviously needed a name, so the current one was selected. Marvin wears a Roman soldier's uniform (a reference to Mars being the Roman god of war)"--
go here to read more:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
DTDQHSI2c10
I loved Marvin the Martain; I remember watching not only this but all the great cartoons from Warner Brothers.

EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS - CARL STALLING REMIX

From the blurb on YouTube:
"What if this film had been scored by the great Carl Stalling? Maybe this..."
I really like this one!

Carpenters - Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft

From the blurb on YouTube:
"Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" is a song by Klaatu, originally released in 1976. The following year, The Carpenters covered the song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=gB51ehx1q9w

Dickie Goodman - Flying Saucer The Second (1957)

UFO from the 1950s

Cartoon Characters and Flying Saucers

As I commented in the earlier post on cartoon characters in the comics and flying saucers, I don't usually like the combination of the two. I do like this Felix cover though. I always liked Felix and his Magic Bag of Tricks.


This Mighty Mouse one cracks me up; it has everything! Dinosaurs and spaceships! And on the Moon, too!








Here's one for those interested in the ghost/alien connection.

Contactee Ida Kannenberg

Ida Kannenberg lives (or lived) in Oregon. Ida is author of UFOs and the Psychic Factor and Project Earth, and is a Contactee. What’s interesting is that, like many Contactees, her experiences began in the California desert in 1940. (I believe she was 87 in 2001.)

You can Goolge Ida Kannenberg, or look on the following places for more information. UFOexperiences.

UFOs and the Psychic Factor

Vintage PB find

I've been cleaning out our bookcases; all four hundred of them (not really, just seems like it. We have a lot of books!) and found this vintage paperback: Regan's Planet. Of course, Regan in this case is a man. The story is by Robert Silverberg.

U.F.O.s in TV

This little spaceship tv is so cute! Speaking of TV's:

I Dream of Jeannie

When I was a kid, I liked this show, but eventually realized the whole “yes Master” thing was so wrong. The show didn’t have anything to do with UFOs or aliens, but one episode did have a UFO in it.

It aired in 1968, season 4. Titled U.F.Oh Jeannie. From the Internet Movie Database:

Landing in a flying saucer spacecraft, Tony and Roger are captured by hillbillies who think that they are martians.

I don’t remember that one. It’s not clear if the flying saucer spacecraft was a real flying saucer spacecraft, as in reverse engineering, which I highly doubt, or a man made U.F.O., as in an experimental craft, which is probably the plot.


A show that I loved when it was on, (and still love to watch in reruns) was the Dick Van Dyke show. One episode, aired in 1965, titled Uhny Uftz, dealt with Rob’s (Van Dyke’s character, Rob Petrie) working late at night in the office, and thinking he’s witnessing a UFO. Turns out it isn’t a flying saucer from Mars, but a toy the inventor the office down the hall was working on. (Richelle Hawks wrote an in-depth piece on UFOs in television, and she mentions this episode, among others.)

Review of Richard Dolan's UFO's and The National Security State

There's a review of Richard Dolan's UFO's and The National Security State: Chronology of a Cover-up 1941-1973, by UFO Digest contributor Timothy Borgman.

The Great Gazoo in the Comics

Here's some more Great Gazoo stuff from the Flintstones. Gazoo and Fred were on comics for awhile in the 1970s.






Outer space flying saucer stuff meets the holidays is a common theme, but it's not one I ever liked. Just seems so tacky. Anyway, here Gazoo and Fred meet up with a witch for Halloween.




In this one, it looks like they were trying for a different look with Gazoo. He appears slimmer, a bit more stylized. I don't like this version.
The ridiculous beatnik/hippie motif; all too common back then. Yeah man, like it's cool, daddy-o!

UFO Fest: McMinnville, Oregon

I'll be attending the UFO Fest in McMinnville, Oregon this May. Dates are May 16 and 17th.

The UFO Fest at McMinnville is an homage to the Paul and Evelyn Trent UFO sighting in 1950. The Trents saw a UFO fly over their farm in McMinnville; Paul Trent took two photos that made both national and international news.

This year Richard Dolan (author of UFOs and the National Security State: Chronology of a Cover-Up--1941-1973)will be the main speaker, which is fantastic.

We'll be staying at the Hotel Oregon. I'd love to meet anyone who plans to be there, so let me know!

I'll be a true UFO geek: my Binnall of America UFOs Are Real Get Over It sweatshirt, you name it.

For more information on the festival in Oregon see here.

More Trent Stuff

My recent on UFO Digest.

“Swamp Gas” being of course the infamous explanation for UFOs seen in the skies back in the day. This is a piece I wrote for American Chronicle in 2006, and thought it’d be interesting to repost it here.

UFOs: Plasma, The New Swamp Gas
May 07, 2006

I recently wrote about the items that crop up every so often about how UFOs are dead and gone. (UFOs: Not Dead Yet.) These items are cyclic in nature, insistent in their thesis: UFOs are no longer with us. These appear despite the fact that at the same time, items appear about the latest sightings, encounters, new UFO book and magazine publications, etc. The creaky debunking machine continues however, churning away, giving us the latest explanation for UFOs, reasons on why UFOs are no longer present, or the self-congratulatory, albeit very late news that a particular case was a hoax. (ie, Santelli film.)

On the heels of the most recent bits that UFOs are no longer, are these items that tell us what UFOs are. They are many things, according to these "news" pieces, but one thing is certain, as they tell us: they are not extraterrestrials from outer space. (Or, while rarely stated but certainly implied, are they beings from another dimension, entities of the earth but non-human, and so on.)

Most people, including the average person with a brief acquaintance with UFOs, knows that swamp gas is code for 'explanation for silly flying saucers.'. That?s become a running joke now in pop culture. Well, it seems that, according to the latest news, UFOs really are something as ludicrous; plasma.

Here's a sampling of a few items that have appeared in the past few days:

Scientists explain UFO sightings. Not a creative title, but to the point.

Scientists at the Defence Intelligence Staff, part of the Ministry of Defence, reportedly described how glowing "plasmas" of gas were created by charges of electricity. Air flows then sculpted the plasmas into aerodynamic shapes which appeared to fly at extraordinary speeds through the sky.

I am of the opinion that the people writing these things for their various intel agencies are snorting milk out their noses as they come up with these ideas. They go on:

As a result, people who thought they'd seen a UFO were instead suffering from "extended memory retention and repeat experiences" induced by the plasmas.

No comment. None needed.

Another one; UFO study finds no signs of aliens.

People who claim to have had a "close encounter" are often difficult to persuade that they did not really see what they thought they saw. The report offers a possible medical explanation.

The close proximity of plasma related fields can adversely affect a vehicle or person," states the report.

Local fields of this type have been medically proven to cause responses in the temporal lobes of the human brain. These result in the observer sustaining (and later describing and retaining) his or her own vivid, but mainly incorrect, description of what is experienced."

To really rub it in, they dump a whole shaker full of salt in the wound:

There are, of course, other causes of UFOs - aeroplanes with particularly bright lights, stray odd-shaped balloons and strange flocks of birds, to name but a few.

Apparently they just couldn't resist.

It's dazzling to see how quickly this official explanation has made its way to the news feeds. If you can't smell Big Bad Debunker in all this, it's because, as the saying goes, you haven't been paying attention.

UFO Updates. Anyone who sincerely swallows this explanation for UFOs -- that it's plasma -- is simply naive, stubborn, or both. And if both, that?s a dangerous combination.

Kottmeyer: An Alien Who's Who

I received a book from The Anomalist: Martin S. Kottmeyer's An Alien Who's Who. (thank you Anomalist!) The book has an intro written by Greg Bishop. It seems like fun, as well as an interesting resource. I haven't read the whole thing yet, but it's not that kind of book; it's a collection of names of aliens given to contactees. Kottmeyer's thoughts on these things is as interesting as the names, of course. (Not that I agree with Kottmeyer but I do usually appreciate his point of view, which is often fresh, challenging and needed in this field.)

We Love Mars

Mars, the red planet. (yet Martians are said to be green, as in “little green from Mars." Why is that?) It's the war planet. Mars has “The Face.” A ton of movies have been made about Mars. We’ve been thinking on life on Mars for centuries. We have a candy bar named after Mars. Aries is ruled by Mars, and the symbol for Mars is the Ram, which is Mars spelled backwards. (well, not exactly, that'd be "mar". . .okay, it's a stretch.) Mars rules iron, which is said to repel fairies and entities in folklore.

Mars is smaller than Earth, and close by. Maybe that’s why we like it. We’re also a war like people; is there something in our subconscious or cellular memory about that? Is that why we’ve named the god of war Mars?

Lots of movies about Mars. Like the 1924 film Aelita of Mars, a Russian film directed by Yakov Protazanov and a cousin of Tolstoy.

The serial Flying Disc Man From Mars (I love that one!) from 1950.

Stay tuned for more Mars stuff; much more to come!

Back to the Desert (Part I?)

Summer Days, Georgia O'Keefe, 1936

Just some thoughts on deserts as settings for unusual experiences . . . I don't know if there'll be a Part II yet . . .

In the discussions about mystical and UFO experiences in the desert; from the Contactees to Don Juan, for example, a natural question came from that: why deserts?

What is it about the desert that makes it such a perfect stage for these kinds of experiences? One obvious answer is the openness and the isolation; a large open area for these events to take place, these beings to appear, these interactions between us and "it" to unfold, without being seen. Unless you happen to be one of the ones lucky (or unlucky) to experience these things. The desert: wide open, empty, lonely. Perfect.

The desert, the world over, has been the stage for these other worldly events. Meetings with Jinns with Space Brothers and Sisters, with Mary, with deities and entities.

If you like the psy-op scenario: government military behind these outer space episodes, for example, the desert is the perfect setting for the reasons stated above. It's also convenient; bases are either in the desert, or close enough to to take a jaunt and set up Alien Abduction Shop.

It's possible these wide open areas, remote and fairly unbothered, act as portals.

A friend of mine and I were talking briefly about this topic the other day, and she said to "think about the sand." What is the sand made of? Silica. Crystals. Quartz. What are crystals? Transmitters. They hold and impart. It's not a coincidence humans have been using quartz crystals in not only technological ways but mystical ways as well. (As those who know, know, using crystals can be very powerful in meditation . . .)

Very interesting.

In that light, we can think of the desert stage as the perfect place for these encounters for all the reasons listed, including the huge power source right under the experiencer's feet.

All these things combined make for the perfect place for mystical occurrences.