65 HS1-834228961 62-HQ-83894 Section 002

•Incident
4AF 1208 I
16 July 1 947
MEMORANDUlA FOR THE OFFICER IN CHARGE :
1. On 12 Jul y 1947, a oall was made at the newspaper office of
the " Idaho Daily Statesman", Boise, Idaho. The aviation editor of the
paper, Mr . David N. Johnson, was interviewed in regard to how well he
knew Mr. Kenneth Arnold of Boise , Idaho, and as to the credibility of
any statement made by Mr. Arnold . The purpose of this interview wa s an
attempt to verify statements made by Mr. Kenneth Arnold on 26 June 1947,
to various national news services to the effect that he , Mr . Arnol d,
had seen 9 objects flying in the air above the Cascade Mountain Range
of Washington. These objects were subsequently referre d to as f l ying
saucers or fl ying disks and will her e -in-a~er be referred to as such
in this report. Mr . Johnson stated that he had known Mr . Arno l d for
quite a period of time, having had r e l ations with Mr . Arno l d on various
occasions, due to the fact that both he, Mr. Johnson , and Mr. Arnold
wer e private f liers and frequently got together to t a l k shop . Mr . Johnson
stated that as far as he was concerned anything :,r. Arnol d said could be
taken very seriously and that he, Mr . Johnson , ac:tually believed that Mr .
Arnold had seen the afor ementioned flying disks . Mr . Johnson stated that
af'ter Mr. Arnol d repo rted having seen the flying d~sks , that the editor
of the paper had assigned him, tLr . Johnson, the ass~gnment of taking the
airpl ane be l onging to the newspaper and exhausting al l errorts to prove
or disprove the p r o·b~ h i H .t y of f l ying disks having be~n seen i n the
northwest. ar ea . The results of th1s assi gumo~t t;o ''r. Johnson and what
he subsequently sa.w is put .forth in a sworn statement; signed by Mr . Johnson
attached to this report as Exhibit~.
AGENT ' S NOTES: J:r . Johnson is a man of appr oximately 33I
to 35 years of
age . Fr om al l appoarances he is a very reserved type o.f p~r son. Mr .
Johnson has l ogged 2800 hour s of flying time in various typ~s 0£ ai r p l anes
up to and including multi-engine ai r craft . During par t of the war years,
~r . Johnson wa s the first pi l ot of a B- 29 type ai r cr aft being assigned-to
the Twentieth USA.AF and stationed on Tinian Island, in the Paci£ic. I t '
is t he per sona l opinion of t he interviewer that M'.r. Johnson actuolly saw
what he states that he saw in t he attached report . It is al so t he op i ni on
o.f t he interviewer that Mr . Johnson would have much more to l ose than gain
and would have to be very strongly convinced that he actually saw son2ething
before he woul d report such an incident and open himse l f fo r t he ridi cqle
that would accompany such a r eport .
11 B11
1 Incb Exhibit
S/A , CIC lfth AFFR.A.NJC M. BROWN,
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