Documents / Official release
This Federal Bureau of Investigation file section (62-HQ-83894, Section 4) collects 1947 to 1949 correspondence on flying discs. It includes Portland police officers' accounts of a silvery object over the city on September 11, 1947, an Alaska pilot's July 1947 sighting near Bethel, citizen letters answered by J. Edgar Hoover, and a 1948 Air Defense Command directive on disc investigations. The FBI replied that it was conducting no flying disc investigations. Later items concern William Albert Rhodes's disc photographs and a Los Angeles letter judged a probable prank.
From the source:Release of 2026-05-08 Incident: N/A, N/A. The FBI's 62-HQ-83894 case file includes investigative records, eyewitness testimonies, and public reports concerning Unidentified Flying Objects and flying discs documented between June 1947 and July 1968. The records include high-profile incident accounts, photographic evidence from sites like Oak Ridge, TN, and technical proposals regarding potential propulsion systems. Additional topics include convention programs, researcher accounts, and extensive media coverage from the period. This file is partially posted on FBI vault with more redactions and some pages missing. Included here is the complete case file with several newly declassified pages and only minor redactions.
“Cooper”5 pages
• 100M
Authority:
NND90986
HE~DQUARTERS
AIR MATERIEL COMMAND MCIAXD-3/FWA/awIN REPLY ADDRESS 10TH
COMMUNICATION AND EN• Wright-Patterson AF Base,,.VELOPE TO COMMANDING
GENERAL, A IR MATIERIEl l«IIJIJ(ll9 ••••••;,.-.,
COMMAND, A T T S N T I O N
FOLLOWING OFFICE SYMBOL: 9 September 1948
MCUX0..3
Director
Federal Dlresu of Investigation
Department of Justice
Washington. D. C.
A!l'l!N: FBI Laborator,y
&IBJ'RCT: Projeet "SIGN"
Gentlemen:
Accompanying this letter is a small sample of soil. This
eoilr ~s taken from a depression reputed to have been caused
by a'-.Bflying S81l.cer11 described as being approximately two feet
in diameterand. one foot thick which. supposedly settled gently
to the ground, rebounded to a height of abou.t twenty feet and
then contimed. on its journey. Al.though. the declivity was immedi
ately covered by a large washtub a heavy rain fP.1bsequently filled ~
the depression about one/third full of water before any sample of
dirt could be taken.
In an effort to approach this incident objectively to deteI"'
mine every possible clue, it bas been deemed advisable to have
this soil sample analyzed and tested. Upon inquiry, your ~n
representative stated that the FBI Laboratoey would accomplish
the required. tests. Dt.O. / .., / ! /
£CO~ h - - ,,, / '
It is the desf re of this Head.~1.arte»s-48--&seep-t,ein, in par 1-
cu.lar, if there are traces of unusualReme~ or &.loys adhering
to the surface of the particles, o~lf 91V :reJSnb!MaJ i ty in structure
exista aho~ that the soil ms su~;•~intense beat, ll"-"""
or radio-active subst?.DCes. etc. Unfor • y, in this regard,
no one thought to forward a. sample ~unding the de-
pression 80 no comparison of soils can be made at this time. ~d
the subsequent test show qthing unusual some arrangement could be
made to procure some ,of the surrounding soil 80 that a comparative
analysis could be ma.de. The aceomp~ing sample bas not been test
ed by any other agency, nor will it be.
J ~ }'J!v~
{J.t_p,,,v q f' ·~ ~
COPIES DESTPC''{;fl
27 0 NOV 1 81964
'I Official release, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 214 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.