Project Blue Book case file: Levelland, November 2-3, 1957 (81 pages)

Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.

# THING

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came real bright, like the sun, then f an angle to the ground and out."

The second sighting was made at 8 p.m. Sunday by S.P.3 Forest R. Oakes and an S.P.3 Barlow. They saw a bright light at an estimated height of 50 feet over the old a-bomb bunker. Oates said the "light" took off at a 45-degree angle; went up into the sky and started blinking on and off. Then it disappeared.

Oakes said his patrol was about two or three miles west of the light, which was "200 or 300 feet long."

Lid ant Penney said he had accompanied some of the MP's to the site Monday in an effort to find some trace of the object's visit, but that there was none. Neither patrol reported motor trouble with their jeeps, and in that respect their accounts differed from those of the persons in the Levelland area, who said their car engines stalled when the light came near.

From several other points in the United States Monday came belated reports of "things" in the sky.

Mrs. Robert Moudy said that on Oct. 15 a flat, oval-shaped object, about 200 feet long with what appeared to be a ball of fire in the center, zoomed over a farm near Foster, Ind. She said her husband told her of seeing the object, but that they did not mention it to anyone for fear of ridicule.

She said her husband related the engine of his combine stalled when the object passed overhead, making a screaming noise "like an auto tire squealing on a fast take-off."

In Tucson, Ariz., a city fireman, Wencie E. Higuera, said he saw a bright ball with "a tail something like a rocket" over Davis-Monthan AFB, on the southeast corner of Tucson. Sunday night. It made no noise, he said, and disappeared in the Northwest after about 10 seconds.

Mrs. David L. Patrick, wife of a University of Arizona vice president, said the object had a poin nose and a glowing "slender y." She said it seemed to travel too slow to be a meteor.

In Chicago's suburban Elmwood Park, three policemen and a fireman said they saw a peculiar round glowing thing in the early morning sky Monday. They said their car lights appeared to dim as kept the prowl car spotlight focused on the thing.

At Martinsville, Va., Mrs. Ruby Hairston said she and her family saw a strange red glare Sunday night while driving on the Virginia-North Carolina border.

And at Brenham, Texas, it was reported by Newspaperman Tom Whitehead of the Banner Press

tellof seeing a glowing bright object in the western sky. It was larger in the center than on the ends, they said, and did not appear to be moving.

According to the United Press. the Fiji government, in a report received Monday at Honolulu, Hawaii, said a Seventh Day Adventist church official, R. O. Aveling, and four natives had sighted a dazzling object in the South Pacific skies.

The report. issued Oct. 23 in Suva. capital of the island group, said three separate sightings of the strange flying object were reported the preceding week.

All the witnesses there described what they had seen as a "strange object, white in color and circular in shape." They said it gave off a blinding light "and made them feel weak."

But it was the Levelland incident that apparently set off the wave of reports, and a Texan experienced in tracking flying saucers was certain that the object seen there was a visitor from outer space.

"Whatever this thing was it had a definite mission and a plan of operation," James A. Lee of Abilene told The News. Lee, who owns and operates a surgical supply store and a household ware store in Abilene, said he has been interested in space mysteries for a decade or more. He rushed to Levelland Sunday to tape-record interviews with the several persons who said they had seen the huge, brightly lighted object, either on the ground or in the air. "It's an arrrzing, fantastic story," he said. "Those people out there saw something—there's no question about it. It was literally something out of this world." Lee said he interviewed the witnesses separately and their stories all added up.

"The sheriff (Weir Clem of Levelland) told me personally that he had interviewed these people as they came in and none of them knew what the others had said. They all told the same story."

The story, as related by Sheriff Clem, was that the brilliant object, egg-shaped and about 200 feet long, settled down on highways at points around Levelland. As it did so, the witnesses claimed, their automobile engines went dead and their headlights dimmed out. When the object rose swiftly into the air, the car lights came back on, and the drivers were able to restart their engines.

Some witnesses reported the object made a deafening noise, like a clap of thunder, as it landed and then arose.

Lee said he considered the story told by Newell Wright Jr., a Texas Tech student, the "most important and authentic of all."

Wright told Lee that he was en route from Lubbock to Levelland when. unaccountably, his car

Finding nothing wrong, he closed the hood. As he did so he caught sight of the object, glowing with an eerie fire.

Wright reported he made a frightened dash to get back in the car. As he did so, the flying fireball took off. Immediately, the student told Lee, he was able to start his car again.

The dead engine angle particularly impressed Donald E. Keyhoe of Washington, a former Marine Corps major who has written several books attempting to prove that flying saucers are, too, real. Keyhoe is also director of a group called the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena.

"That's just the way an electromagnetic force field would operate," he said in regard to the engines dying. "This isn't the first time we've heard of such things happening."

Texan Lee said he had talked during the day with Keyhoe, who wanted to get a first-hand report on the matter. Lee is a member of Keyhoe's committee and is also a director of Interplanetary Space Patrol, which, says Lee, has members over most of Texas, plus some in Great Britain.

Lee was asked about the possibility that the mystery object might have been ball lightning, which is described by reference works as "a ball or globe of brilliant light moving slowly a short distance above the surface of the earth, as if rolling on an invisible

earth, as if rolling on an invisible support a few feet high."

Not a chance, said Lee.

"Whatever it was showed every indication of being under intelligent guidance," he said stoutly. "Its objective seemed to be to land on the highway and interrupt traffic, then immediately leave that area and fly over to another highway leading into Levelland. . . . It landed four times, and when observed it would take off to another location. In every case when a car or truck would approach it would fail to function and the lights would go out."

The possibility that engine failure might have been caused by ball lightning or static electricity was offered by Dr. Wayne Rudmose. Southern Methodist University physic professor, in an interview with The News.

"You might build up enough conductivity in the air as the result of dust to cause the ignition

spark to leak off," he said. This, he explained, would cause the spark to ground rather than follow its normal course.

But he added that the engines of today's cars are well shielded, and that it would take a terrific charge to cause them to stall.

No physical trace of the fireball's visit has been found. And Major L. J. Tacker told The News' Washington Bureau that the biggest piece of evidence against flying saucers is the complete lack of any material object which might prove that they have been about.

"On the object seen at Levelland, we will have to wait until we get reports from our investigators and the evidence is evaluated by our experts," said Tacker, who is executive officer of the public information division of the Air Force.

Tacker said that most of the strange objects that have been investigated have turned out to be balloons or aircraft. This theory was given support by Col. Barney Oldfield of the North American Air Defense (NORAD) at Colorado Springs, Colo.

"Balloons sometimes come down to earth in weather like we are now having, and when they get warm they rise again. but they certainly don't rush around with noise like thunder and are not lighted with neon lights," he commented.