Documents / FOIA release
This Federal Bureau of Investigation file section collects 1947 to 1949 correspondence, memoranda and newspaper clippings about flying disc reports. It includes Hoover's replies to citizens, a Maine woman's account of a drifting object judged probably a weather balloon, a Richmond memo on a cigar-shaped object seen over Radford, Virginia on May 12, 1949, clippings on the Chiles and Whitted sighting near Montgomery, a Flyin' Saucer toy promotion, and agent interviews with witnesses in Vermont and a pilot near Bethel, Alaska.
“Socorro, New Mexico”1 page
Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.
Office Memorandum . UNITED S. ATES GOVERNMENT TO : MR. D. K. LADD FROM : DATE: December 28, 1948 SUBJECT: FLYING DISCS At 10:00 a.m. today, SAC Willis, Houston, called in and stated that a business man in Houston, Texas, had furnished certain pictures taken by a friend of his, Houston, Texas, and had related that had been flying with a friend in a private plane from California to Houston and that at a point about 30 miles east of Lone Pine, California, some object lying on the ground made a very strong reflection and they made a check to determine what would cause this bright reflection. They finally landed the plane and found an object which could be described as being 8' in diameter with wings about 4' long. The object is about 1' in thickness and in the center there appears to be some type of gyroscope. The wings apparently are fitted with some type of jet propulsion. An examination was made by and his friend and they could find no identifying marks and took photographs of the object they observed. SAC Willis stated he had informed Lieutenant of the AAF, Ellington Field, and the Army representative in Houston, of this object and that would be interviewed that morning in the Houston Office with Lieutenant being present. Lieutenant wanted the statements of taken down by a stenographer and he will furnish the stenographer for that purpose. I instructed SAC Willis to furnish complete details of this matter by air mail special delivery, including a copy of the photograph. I further instructed that he furnish the same details to the proper field office because unquestionably the Bureau would want to run this thing out. After talking with you, I phoned SAC Willis back and told him to insure the presence of a Bureau Agent at the time this object was examined by the Army Air Forces and that he should make proper arrangements with the office in California to see that an Agent was present. I also told him to advise me of the developments.
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. 129 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.