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FBI file 62-HQ-83894, section 5

Department of War · 209 pages · text by GLM-OCR

This section of FBI file 62-HQ-83894 collects Bureau correspondence on flying disks from 1949 and 1950. Most of it concerns a letter to Walter Winchell, passed on by Ernest Cuneo, from Peter Camerlon Jones, who said he saw a top-shaped silver object in the mountains near Los Angeles in August 1947. Los Angeles agents could not find Jones, and Hoover suggested the letter might be a prank. The file also holds a Navy intelligence report on 6 or 7 discs seen over southern Oregon on 27 May 1949, plus letters from members of the public about Chicago and Toronto.

  • p. 34 …BUREAU ADVISING OSI HEADQUARTERS TODAY OF ADDRESS J. E. CALDWELL, MANHATTAN BEACH, CALIFORNIA. YOU SHOULD ALSO…
  • p. 70 …All information on this subject this headquarters has been turned over to A-2 Fourteenth Air…
  • p. 91 …SEAGRAVES advised that he had been called by his headquarters, CIC, 3rd Army, Atlanta, Georgia, and…
  • p. 93 …Also, immediately following this conference above stated, Special Agent PRICE, OBI, called his headquarters at Maxwell…
  • p. 95 …representatives of the 14th Air Forces with headquarters at Greenville, South Caroline, had arrived in Knoxville…
  • p. 96 …WOODSIDE stated he also conversed with 14th Air Force Headquarters at Greenville, South Carolina and advised…
  • p. 165 …Director of Special Investigations Headquarters, United States Air Force Washington 25, D. C. Keay Henrich 1…
  • p. 187 …Godman Field who in turn notified flight headquarters at Wright-Patterson Field. A copy of the…
  • p. 191 …Godman said it would notify flight headquarters at Wright-Patterson Field which might send an aide…

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from various persons and organizations throughout the United States, he said.

On July 28, 1950, HIXENBAUGH telephonically communicated with the Louisville Division stating that he had been advised that a representative of one of the Army Intelligence Agencies would be in Louisville on Saturday, July 29, 1950, to view the film. He expressed fear that the persons who might be contacting him might be unauthorized individuals and asked if he could bring the film to the FBI office for clearance. HIXENBAUGH was advised that the Bureau did not clear employees of other agencies and if he had doubt as to their authenticity he should check with the agency they professed to represent. HIXENBAUGH was advised that in the event they were not representatives of the agency they professed to represent, the information should be furnished this office and appropriate action would be taken under the Impersonation Statute.

On July 29, 1950, ROBERT STEINAU, 1608 South Second Street, Louisville, staff photographer for the Courier-Journal, a newspaper of general circulation published in Louisville, Kentucky, personally called at the Louisville Office. STEINAU stated that he and WILLIAM DAVIS, who is in charge of photographers for both the Courier-Journal and Louisville Times, doubted the authenticity of the photographs taken by HIXENBAUGH and went on to state that approximately two years ago HIXENBAUGH took what he claimed was a night photograph of a "flying disk". The photograph was published at that time in the Louisville Times and showed a streak of light across the heavens. STEINAU said that he and DAVIS subsequently were advised by a friend of HIXENBAUGH that the picture was "a fraud". The friend related that HIXENBAUGH was lying on his back on the ground with his camera pointing toward the sky when the friend flipped one or more lighted matches across the focal plane of the camera.

STEINAU said that HIXENBAUGH enjoys a poor reputation among other staff photographers of the Courier-Journal and Louisville Times and he believes HIXENBAUGH perpetrated both the original hoax concerning the flying disk and this later "hoax" concerning the flying saucer to attract attention to himself. STEINAU produced a print made from three frames of the original motion picture negative submitted by HIXENBAUGH for television use. He also furnished an enlargement of one of the frames. He called attention to the fact that the trees appearing in the photograph and the airplane appearing in the center background both are out of focus and appear

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