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This is section 1 of FBI headquarters file 62-HQ-83894 on flying discs, compiled in July and August 1947. It collects press clippings, including a report of a disc found by a priest in Grafton, Wisconsin, that a Milwaukee memo treats as a prank involving a circular saw. It also holds a Milwaukee report on a disc found near Black River Falls, a Portland teletype about a pilot's sighting over Myrtle Creek, Oregon, citizen letters, and Hoover's correspondence forwarding material to the War Department.
“Gray”3 pages
Sten1n 36 State • • SEEN IN 86 STATE::s.s,--- Flrst sighted June 25 and • First, published reports of the Pbenon 1 ■ 111 occurred-June '25. Jet Fighters Alerted SAN FRANCISCO, July 6-UPI - Milltary aircraft hunted the es over Pacific Coast states ay for sight of the mysterious ] ylng saucers" that for 12 days ve puzzled the entire country. Early reports of results were negative. Five P-51s of the Oregon Na• tlonal Guard cruised over the Cascade Mountains oC Washing• ton-the area where the strange objects first were reported sight ed. A sixth circled over Portland, In constant rad.Jo contact with the other five. All carried photo• graphic equipment. Col. G. R. Dodson, command• Ing, described their flight as & "routine patrol," but said they had been Instructed to watch !or the flying discs. gt Manhattan Beach, Calif., A. McKelvey took a Mustanl ter plane up above Van Nuys two hours he cruised at 35• feet, but "didn't i.ee a thing: Gen. <'arl Spaatz, commandan of the Army Air Forces, was on a Pacific Northwest fishing trip. He denied knowing anything about the flying discs - or ot plans to use AAF planes to look for them. JET 1''IGHTER SET "I've been out of touch with things for four or five days," he said. Louis E. Starr, national com mander-In-chief ol the Veterans of Foreign Wars, yesterday In Co lumbus, 0., said he understood Spaatz had a "group out right now" looking for discs. At Muroc Army Air Field In California a P-80 jet fighter stood ready to take off the moment any flying saucers are sighted Jn that area. A cautious attitude marked both official and scientific co! - • ments, but Capt. Tom Brown t t~Alr Forces Public Relatlo s st ff In Washington ackno - ed ed the Air Forces had decided "t re's something to t his" and ha been checking up on It for 10 days. greeted generally with scornful laughs, the objects have been re ported every day since by observ ers In 36 states. Most of the ob jects were reported seen July 4. A few were reported yesterday. Such competent observers as airline pilots said they had seen the totally unexplained discs or saucers, larger than aircraft and 1 :fii!'i:as i-, "loose formation" at high speed. David Lilienthal, chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, Sllld they had nothing to do with atom!<. experiments, and Army and Navy officials also entered posltlv& disclaimers. Newspaper stories quoting an unidentlfied California Institute of Technology scientist as saying the phenomena mlgh~ have some thing to do with experiments in "transmutation of atomJc energy" fused a brief sensation late yes rday. The institute quickly de ed the report. Reports generally agreed that the flying objects were round or oval. Estimates of their speed ranged from about 300 to 1,200 miles an hour. They were de scribed as flying with an undu lating motion at heights of 10,000 feet and less. Some described them as glowing, or luminous. 'PROPELLER IN CENTER' Nova Hart, Sl Louis mechanic who was trained during service in the war to spot all types of aircraft, said he saw one of the rang objects near Pattonville esterday. It was flying at 300 et, he said. He described it as circular, with~a Tibbed framework and silver gray In color. Hart said it ap peared to have a motor with a propeller attached In the center and It kept turning like an air plane doing a slow roll. Kenneth Arnold, Boise, Ida., businessman pilot, told of seeing nine of the discs flying In forma tion at 1,200 miles an hour over the Cascade Mountains In Wash ington, SEEN Bl' 200 Arnold's account was taken lightly. Various explanations were offered- "reflections," "per islstent vision," "snow blindness.'' Soon afterward other individ uals-In New Me:x:ico, Missouri, California and other !.tales-re ported they also had seen the flying objects. Then on Independence Day 200 persons in one group •and 60 In another saw them In Idaho. Hun dreds of others In Oregon, Wash ington and other western sites reported seeing them. July 4 also brought firs re ports of the flying discs om east of the Mississippi. nee l • then they have been reported seen n widely separated sections of he country-in 33 states In all. 'Must Be Insane• LONDON, July 6-UP)-Don't mention those flying saucers on • this side of the Atlantic unless you're prepared for an argument about your sanity. Maybe they have been seen by sober citizens over a vast area of the United States, but Europe won't believe in them until some body lassoes one and has It photo graphed by Frank Sinatra, the British ambassador and five Supreme Court justices. "America's reply to the ~och ss monster," chortled today's nday dispatch, referring 10 italn's hoariest tall story- t e rpent that is "seen" romping n ~ otland's Loch Ness every ti e the tourist trade needs a shot n the arm. MILWAUKEE S£NTtNn MILWAUKEE, WIS·':ONSIN o OCl ~
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