Symposium on unidentified flying objects: hearings before the Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. House of Representatives, Ninetieth Congress, second session, July 29, 1968.

230
Nevertheless,
the
single
most
striking
thing
about
these
pictures—far
from
being
any
general uniformity
in
their
appearance—is
their
largely
irreconcilable
diversity.
Whether
or
not
this
diversity
is
interpreted
as
detracting
from
their
value
as
evidence,
it
surely
cannot
be taken
as
contributing to
that
value. It
does,
however,
serve
our
immediate,
rather
different
purpose
of
providing
an
initial
sample
from
which
to
extrapolate
and
interpolate
an
eventual
graded
array
of the
sort
that
we
seek
for purposes
of
testing
witnesses.
Some
Incidental
Comments
on
the
Status
of
Photographs
of
Alleged
UFOs
as
a
Source
of
Evidence Themselves
Befor
leaving
the photographs
themselves,
however,
it
should
be
noted
that
there
are
a
few
instances
of
rather
suggestive
similarities
between
these
photo-
graphs.
A
frequently
cited
case
is
the
striking
resemblance
between
E6,
re-
portedly
taken
by
a
farmer,
Paul
Trent,
as he
was
returning
home
with
his
wife
near
McMinville,
Oregon
in
June
1950,
and E7,
allegedly
taken
by
a
French
military
pilot
near
Rouen,
France
in
March
1954.
Another example,
involving several
different sightings, is
shown
in
the
upper
right.
(II,
G2,
and
G3
present three
successive
views of the
same
object
pur-•
portedly
taken
by
a
photographer,
Ed
Keffel,
of
the
Brazilian
publication
"0
Cruziero" while
he
was accompanied
by
a
journalist,
Joao
Martins,
near
Rio
de
Janeiro
in
May,
1952.
The
edge
-on
view,
Gl,
is
almost
indistinguishable
from
another photograph,
represented
in
Fl,
allegedly
taken
from an
Argentine
pur-suit
plane
in
late
1954.
The
"tap"
view,
G2,
seemingly resembles
F2
(the
left
edge
of
which
was
cut
off
by
the
boundary
of the
orginal
photograph),
which
a15
-year
-old
boy, Michael Savage,
claims
to
have
taken near
San
Bernardino,
California
in
July, 1956.
It
also
somewhat
resembles
the
lighted object,
F3,
allegedly
appearing
in
a
color
photograph taken
by
Joseph
Sigel
near
Waikiki,
Hawaii
in
June,
1959.
And,
finally,
the
"bottom"
view,
G3,
presents
the
same
general
sort
of
configuration
as
that
shown
in
G4,
which
is
based
upon
a
photo-
graph
purportedly
taken
by Yukuse
Matsumura
outside his residence
in
Yoko-
hama,
Japan
in
January 1957 (although
the
relative
dimension's
of the
features
appear
slightly
different
in these
last
two
photographs).
There
are
several
other instances
in
which
photographs taken
by
apparentlyunrelated
individuals
might
be
of
the
same
object.
Another
view
(not
includedin
the
figure)
showing
more
of
the
"bottom"
of the
object displayed
in
E4
re-
sembles the
object
shown
in
G5
and, even
more
closely,
an
object
apparently
hovering
over
a
seaplane
in
still
another photograph
(also
not
included) of un-
known
origin.
In
a
number
of
instances
(e.g.,
F5,
6,
and
7
or
D6,
7,
and
8)
the
degree
of
correspondence
is
more
difficult
to
assess
owing
to the
relatively
poorer
definition
of
the images.
Of
course
even
very
close similarities
do
not
in themselves guarantee authen-
ticity.
Consider,
for
example,
02
and
03
which
are
strikingly
similar
dispite
the
fact
that the
object in
02
appears
over
a
mountain near
Riverside, California
in
the
original
photograph
reportedly
taken
by
a
21
-year
-old
man
and
two
friendsIn
1951,
whereas
the
object in
C3
appears over
a
flock
of grazing
sheep
in the
photograph submitted
by
an
Australian
rancher
in 1954.
But,
since
the
object
in
02
has
subsequently been admitted to
be none
other
than
a
1967
'Ford
hubcap,the
object in
03
is
presumably the same. (Another
photograph
later
confessedto
be
fraudulent
is represented in
B6, and somewhat
suspicious
circumstances
also
surround
several
other photographs,
including those represented in
A9,
Bl,B8, B9,01,and
G8.)
Perhaps
the
safest attitude to
adopt
is
that
recommended by
the National
Investigations
Committee
on
Aerial
Phenomena
(cf.,
Hall, 1964,
p.
86)
;
namely,