The Falkville Metal Man: Police Chief Jeff Greenhaw's Polaroids of a Silver Figure

October 1973. Six days earlier, on October 11, Hickson and Parker had reported their abduction at Pascagoula. The country was at the peak of an autumn wave of humanoid reports. David F. Webb later counted 36 US humanoid cases that month.

Falkville sat in south Morgan County, Alabama, about 60 miles north of Birmingham off Interstate 65. Its chief of police was Jeff Greenhaw. He had been hired in January 1973.

Wednesday, October 17. Approximately 10:00 p.m. A woman called in, nearly hysterical. A spaceship had landed, she said, in a pasture owned by Bobby Summerford. She spoke of blinking lights. Greenhaw took the department's Polaroid camera and drove out. He searched. There was no craft.

Then, on a narrow gravel road near the field, something stood in his way. "He was standing there in the middle of the road. I got out of my patrol car and said, 'Howdy, stranger,' but he didn't say a word."

The figure was slightly taller than 6 feet. A skinny antenna rose from the top of its head. The suit had no visible seams. "It looked like his head and neck were kind of made together," Greenhaw said. It was "real bright, something like rubbing mercury on nickel, but just as smooth as glass." He did not believe it was aluminum foil.

He took four Polaroids. The figure stood still, then began to walk toward him. Greenhaw switched on his emergency lights. It fled. "It wasn't moving like you or I would move. It's like it had springs on its feet or something." He compared it to the robot from Lost in Space. He gave chase at 35 mph or more. "He was running faster than any human I ever saw." Greenhaw spun off the road. The figure disappeared into the darkness.

The photos went out on the wire and made front pages across the nation. The Decatur Daily ran Tommy Stevenson's story on October 18: "Howdy Says Policeman to UFO Creature." Then came the ridicule. Threatening phone calls. His car engine blew up. On November 9 his trailer home burned. His wife left him. On November 15, 1973, he resigned at the mayor's request. He never took back his account. "I came close to losing my sanity, but my wife and God kept me from losing my sanity."

Project Blue Book had closed in 1969. No Air Force or federal investigation has been found. NICAP investigator Marion Webb looked into whether the figure was a person in a reflective protective suit. NICAP's analysis read: "the garment of the alleged creature is a hot suit, manufactured from fire retardant materials, then coated with aluminum covering." The published verdict, in October 1974, was "unconfirmed." Ground Saucer Watch concluded the photos "represent a humorous attempt at hoaxing a space creature."

In private letters in 1977, NICAP president John L. Acuff wrote that a 17-year-old was involved. "The boy is the one who dressed as a humanoid." In 2007, Francis Ridge of NICAP called the case "assuredly a hoax", probably not by Greenhaw himself, but one played "on any passerby." Local rumour blames a prankster in costume. Yet no suit was ever found, and no confession was ever made.

V.-J. Ballester Olmos and Luis Ruiz Noguez linked the case to the heavy Pascagoula coverage just days before. Believers answer with the figure's speed and with Greenhaw's losses. He never made money from the story. In 1983 he reported a burglary in which the photos were taken. Decades later he sat for a filmed interview with Red Water Filmworks. "My initial thoughts were maybe aluminum foil but there were no pieces around there after it was all over." Four Polaroids. One witness. The argument has never ended.