Unidentified flying objects: hearing before the Committee on Armed Forces of the House of Representatives, Eighty-ninth Congress, second session, April 5, 1966 ...

6063
stifled;
and
it
matters
when
the
American
people
are
denied
the
right
to
know
what
kind
of
powers
they
may
be
up
against.
Persistence in
this
dogmatic
atti-
tude
will
only
tend
to
deteriorate
public
morale
if
not
the
public trust
in
the
Air
Force
when
irrefutable
proof
of the
existence
of
these
objects
manifests
itself.
Those
behind
this
official
"blackout" should
be
displaying
real
responsibility
to
all
of
us
by
desisting
from
the
practices
of
ridiculing
sincere
witnesses
and
belittling
sightings
that defy
explanations
and
at
least
extend
public
acknowl-
edgement
of
some
credence to the evidence that
abounds.
Instituting
a
policy
of
dealing
honestly,
for
a
change,
with the
people
would
prepare the
way
to
a
mini-
mum
of
possible
panic
(assuming
this
to
be
the
basic
reason for
the
censorship)
upon
arrival
of that
"moment
of
proof."
(Please,
excuse
the
pun.) Consider
the
contrast
of the
disrespect
shown
Americans
to
the
consideration
extended
the
citizens
of
Argentina
and
Chile.
For
example,
on
August
3,
1965,
the
radio
and
TV
stations
of
Santiago,
Chile, alerted
the populous
to
view the
three
luminous
discus
hovering over
the
city
for
some
25
minutes
before
moving
slowly
away.
With
the
hope
that
we may
yet receive
such
courtesy
instead
of
treatment
as
children,
I
respectfully
urge
that
you
consider
the undertaking of
a
hearing
intothis
despicable
situation.
Until
this
condition
is
brought out
into
the
open,
much
of
the
news
media
will
continue
to
refrain
from
giving
the
UFO's
serious
consider-
ation
they
so
justly
deserve.All
statements
made
in
this
letter
can
be
substantiated
by
the National
Investi-
gations
Committee
on
Aerial
Phenomena
(NICAP)
located
at
1536
Connecticut
Avenue
NW.,
Washington, D.C.
Documented
evidence
and
authentication
re-
quired
to
support the
assertion
that
a
censorship
does
in fact
exist
will
be put
at
the
disposal
of
your committee
by
NICAP
upon
request.
Respectfully yours,
JOHN R.
GRAY,
Huntington Beach,
Calif.
[From
Life
magazine,
Apr.
1,
1966]
A
WELL
-WITNESSED
"INVASION”—BY SOMETHING
FROM
AUSTRALIA TO
MICHIGAN, A FLURRY OF
EERIE
UFO
SIGHTINGS
Call
them
what
you
will:
flying
saucers,
unidentified flying
objects
(UFO's),
optical
illusions,
or the
first
symptoms
of
the
silly
season.
They
are
back
again—and
seen
by more
people
than
ever
before.
Some
are
greenish
and
iri-
descent,
like
the mystery
thing that
swooped
down
over Perth,
Australia. several
weeks
ago.
Others are
football
shaped
and
aglow
with
pulsating
lights.
Last
week
the
manifestations
seemed
almost
to
have
reached the
proportions
of
an
invasion.
Near
Ann
Arbor,
Mich.,
52
witnesses, including
a
dozen
policemen,
saw
5
strange
objects
hovering over
a
swamp. The
next
day
a
glowing
thing
floated
over
a
small
college
in
Hillsdale,
Mich.
and
was
sighted
by
87
students.
an
assistant
dean
and
the
local
civil
defense
director.
Whatever
the
explanation
of the
peculiar
phenomena—seen and
described
similarly
by
so
many—something
surely
was
in
the
air.
"IT
WASN'T
No
HULLABILLUSION,” SAID
THE
FARMER, AND 52
AGREED
(By
Paul
O'Neil)
DEXTER TOWNSHIP, MICH.—Frank Mannor
has
never
believed in flying
saucers.
Hasn't
any
need of
them. Wishes
he'd
never seen one.
Frank
should
have
been
born
in the
day
of Dan'l
Boone.
Since
he
wasn't,
he's
on
the unemployment.
Still,
he's
a happy man.
Or
was.
He
is
a
husky,
grizzled
fellow of
47
who
has
10
children,
a
well of
water with
an
outside
pump, a
solidly
build privy,
a
TV
set
and
a
battered refrigerator
with
the
coil
on
top.
Four
disembodied automobiles
rest beside his white, tumble-
down,
two-story
farmhouse
in
the open country
12
miles northwest of
Ann
Arbor.
They
provide parts for
his
good
car.
He
has an
ancient schoolbus for
hunting
expeditions.
He
also
has
six dogs.
The
dogs
started
it
all.
When
they
began "barkin'
and
bellerin'
"
at
8
o'clock
that
Sunday
night,
Frank ran outside—
even though he
was
wearing
his suit
pants—and
looked east into
swampland
from
the
rise
of ground on which the house
is built.
He
saw
lights
and
a
faint
red glow
"like cigarets being smoked."