Documents / FOIA release
This is part five of the FBI's UFO file, a set of Bureau memoranda and reports from 1947 to 1949. Most of it covers the FBI's inquiry into the Maury Island flying disc story in Tacoma, which concluded that the disc fragments were ordinary rock formations and that the story was a hoax. It also examines the fatal crash of a B-25 at Kelso and finds no sign of sabotage. The file includes other items: the Rhodes disc photographs, a proposed flying saucer convention in Alexandria, Louisiana, and ash from a fire near Scranton that someone suggested came from a flying saucer.
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cation and should be in no way, carried as a news story and refused to furnish any information regarding these reports. He further stated that he advised the Boise Statesman shortly before, or at the time left Boise to come to Tacoma to check on the flying disc stories with that should not come as the entire story was a hoax. The following information was obtained from Tacoma, Washington, It was the Tacoma Times paper which first issued a story on August 2 and subsequent stories intimating that the B-25 which crashed at Kelso, Washington on the early morning of August 1, had been sabotaged or shot down because of the fact that it carried flying disc fragments. stated that on Thursday, July 31, at approximately 11:30 A.M. he received an anonymous phone call in which the caller stated that and Army Intelligence officers were meeting in room 502 of the Winthrop Hotel to check on the flying disc story from which fragments were obtained on Maury Island. stated he turned around to speak to his editor and when he picked up the phone again the line was dead. He stated that the caller asked for called at room 502 in the Winthrop Hotel and was advised by that he could furnish no information as he was there on a Government mission. He stated that on Friday, August 1, between 11:00 A.M. and noon, he received another phone call for information in which the anonymous caller stated that he might have some information for him. He asked the caller if he was not the same party that had called the previous date and he said yes. The caller then related that at that moment there was a big meeting in progress in room 502, in the Winthrop Hotel; that the B-25 which crashed that morning in Kelso was carrying flying disc fragments from California and that McChord Field officials had stated the plane was sabotaged or shot down. The caller then hung up after making some statement to the effect that he was a switchboard operator. He stated that he went to the Winthrop Hotel on Friday about noon and found that there was no male operator on duty. He stated he then went to room 502 and answered the door and that Captain United Airlines pilot, was on the phone. He stated that he heard make a statement to the effect that the information must be very strictly confidential. He stated that there were one or two others in the room besides but that he could not identify them. He stated that told him he could make no statement and that he had attempted to check the story with various people on Maury Island with negative results. He stated that about 3:30 P.M., Friday, he wrote a story regarding the mysterious informant and called at his hotel room, stating that he had written this story and that had better check it. He stated that he talked to the United Press Wireman, Tacoma, who advised that the story sounded fantastic. He stated that about 5:30 P.M., Friday, August 1, an anonymous caller called the
FOIA release, from the fbi-vault collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 74 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.