PART THREE

Marks and “Footprints”

The following series of oddities is perhaps the most conclusive of all. Because I wish to develop “The Devil’s Footprints” fully, I shall not go into detail about the innumerable marks and depressions in stone. However, after the footprints study, and a mention of the stone depressions and what they are, I believe the case for the UFO’s will be clearly in your mind. What other source but something from space could account for these erratics?

The story of “The Devil’s Footprints” is classic. It was told as follows, by Frank W. Lane, In Fate, April-May, 1952 – The material being largely the product of research by Rupert Gould as printed in Stargazer Folks and elsewhere:

On the night of Thursday, February 7, 1855, there was a fall of snow over South Devon, in southwest England. The next morning, as men and women went about their business, they discovered, imprinted in the virgin snow, a series of tracks unlike any seen before. At first glance they looked like the impression made by a donkey’s hoof, measuring four by two and three-quarter inches. But there, all resemblance between the imprints on the snow and the sort of tracks left by a workaday donkey, ends. And the real mystery begins.

It was found that the hoof marks ran in a single line, and also that the distance between one impression and the next, as carefully measured, was undeviatingly eight and one-half inches. to appreciate properly the imprints in the snow that greeted the incredulous eyes of the Devonians, that Friday morning, you must try to imagine a line of marks such as would be made by a creature with only one leg, terminating a hoof, which proceeded by a series of jumps, always mathematically eight and one-half inches apart.

This was only the beginning of the puzzles associated with this mystery written in the snow. As word of the strange markings spread and men began to look more closely at them, and to trace their path across the whitened landscape, they discovered further inexplicable details.

Whereas the tracks of cats, dogs, horses, rabbits, birds and so forth, looked much as tracks always do in the snow – some clearly defined, others smudged, some cutting the snow deeply, others merely leaving a light imprint – these mystery markings were everywhere utterly clear and distinct. One investigator-on–the-spot said: “This particular mark removed the snow wherever it appeared, clear, as if cut with a diamond, or branded with a hot iron – so closely, even, that the raising in the centre of the frog of each print could be plainly seen.” Some witnesses claimed to have seen traces of toe or claw marks at the edges of the impressions.

The tracks were not confined to the ground. Two men following the tracks for three and half-hours (“under gooseberry bushes and espaliered fruit trees”) suddenly lost all trace of it. They cast around and eventually picked up the tracks in the last place they thought of looking for them: on the roofs of some houses!

The witnesses already quoted said that the marks could be traced “in some instances, over the roofs of houses, and hayricks, and very high walls (one fourteen feet high), without displacing the snow on either side, or altering the distance between the feet; and passing on as if the wall had not been an impediment. The gardens with high fences or walls and gates locked, were equally visited as those open and unprotected.”

Another investigator said that he traced the prints across a field up to a hayrick. The surface of the rick was wholly free from the marks but on the opposite side, in a direction corresponding exactly with the track already traced, they began again. A similar occurrence was noted when a wall intervened in the path of the track.

As high walls, hayricks, and houses were no obstacle to the onward march of these tracks, so neither was a great stretch of water. The hoof marks were traced to the bank of the estuary of the river Exe, and then picked up again on the opposite bank – across two miles of salt water.

The meanderings of the track ranged from Bicton in the east to Totnes in the west, a distance of about twenty miles as the crow flies. But the actual mileage covered by the track, as measured by the distance between hamlets, villages, towns and so forth, where the marks were seen was very much more. As one Devonian who was greatly interested in the occurrence wrote:

“When we consider the distance that must have been gone over to have left these marks – I may say in almost every garden, on doorsteps, through extensive woods of Luscombe, upon commons, in enclosures and farms – the actual progress must have exceeded one hundred miles.”

This the best illustration I know of the “Devil’s Hoofmarks.”

It did not take long for these markings in the snow to become the talk of all Devon. It was not so difficult to step in those days for a village rustic, pondering the inexplicable nature of the markings and their apparent ability to go wherever they would, and remembering their shape, to wonder fearfully if perhaps the Devil himself had been abroad in the land.

This fear was mentioned in a letter from the Reverend G.M. Musgrave, a local clergyman who was keenly interested in the whole matter, and who wrote of

“the state of the public mind of the villagers, the laborers, their wives and children, and old crones, and the trembling old men, dreading to stir out after sunset, or to go half a mile into lanes or byways on a call or message, under the conviction that this was the Devil’s walk, and no other, and that it was wicked to trifle with such a manifest proof of the Great Enemy’s presence…”

What of the explanation of these prints in the snow? First, review what has to be explained; an exceptionally clearly defined single line of equally spaced marks, which was found on the tops of houses, walls and in enclosed gardens, on both sides of an estuary two miles wide and at places twenty miles distant and which, at a conservative estimate, had a total length (allowing for doubling and meandering) of a hundred miles.

All sorts of well-known creatures were suggested as the makers of the tracks: swans, cranes, bustards, otters, rats, hare, and badgers. It is hardly necessary to add that none of these creatures provide even a plausible explanation. Birds do not leave hoof marks, nor make tracks that remove snow as clearly as if “branded with a hot iron”. If a mammal is chosen as the track maker, then how are we to explain the imprints across the roofs of houses and on tops of high walls, let alone the line of single, exactly spaced imprints?

One ingenious correspondent suggested that a hopping toad was the mischief-maker! The hopping would explain the single track, and the imprint of the toad’s belly and claws the mark…

There is one single argument against all explanations of the tracks being made by any common animal or bird. The tracks left by such creatures were perfectly familiar to the inhabitants of Devon and if such tracks had been anything like those made by well-known animals nobody would have thought twice about it.

Two unfamiliar species of animals were suggested as possible makers of the tracks: Two kangaroos and a raccoon, these allegedly having escaped from near-by captivity. But simple arithmetic is fatal to the hypothesis that one or even two animals could have made all the tracks. To make a line of marks eight and one-half inches apart and one hundred miles long, the two kangaroos would have had to make an average of six steps a second for some twelve hours nonstop, and the raccoon over a dozen steps.

It is at once obvious that these hoof-prints could not have been caused by an animal. The single prints, in straight line, exactly in front of each other, confute this idea without the necessity of further data or analysis. But there is further data. The tracks extended a hundred miles or more crossed an inlet of the sea without deviation or interruption, passed over and on buildings and walls. Yet, we are asked, by explainers, most of whom were nowhere near the site, to believe that this was done by a badger or a kangaroo?

In the descriptions there are two or three notations which are very significant. First, let’s take the rectilinear nature of the line of tracks: no animal walks in such a manner, nor for such a distance, nor over housetops. So – something passed over the country in the air, making contact with the ground as it went. No animal walks by putting one foot directly in front of the other, so these holes in the snow were made with mechanical precision by something mechanical. Therefore let’s make the broad conclusion that something, mechanical passed over Devon in the air.

Some acute observers noted that the prints did not look like normal hoof marks, wherein the snow is packed into the bottom of the track, but that it looked as if the snow had been removed. Also, someone noticed that the tracks looked more as if they had been burned into the snow. Again, it “F” could not be an animal. So – lets’s broaden our conclusion to include, not only something mechanical passing over Devonshire, but also, that it reached out in some way and made surface contact at regular intervals.

Something reached, projected or emanated from this contrivance at regular times, and because the contraption was moving with uniform velocity this instrumentality of contact made regularly spaced marks.

Now we note that this thing did not pack snow into the tracks, but perhaps removed it instead, so it was not pressure, and therefore, not a mechanical contact. On the other hand, it appears to have been hot, or warm, or at the very least to have conveyed energy convertible into heat. “F” Whatever the method or manner, it conveyed enough energy to melt or remove part of the snow, almost instantaneously. What have we left to consider? Anything besides a ray of some sort? It doesn’t seem too likely.

We have advocated levitation as an explanation before; thus the levitation of a few snow crystals in trivial as compared to the kicking, squirming body of Oliver Lerch, or the 1,200-ton blocks at Baalbek.

So we have, by elimination, a mechanical device passing through the air, emitting some sort of ray of heat or energy, at regular intervals of time and distance. What sort of device, and why the rays?

I suggest that this ray was something in the nature of radar, and that it either adjusted the distance of the machine from the ground or acted as a repulsion medium to sustain the machine in flight. The slight pressure in the prints could hardly account for the latter, so let’s guess that the rays were for guidance or navigational purposes to maintain the ship at a uniform distance from the ground or prevent too close an approach to the surface.

And from the London Times, March 14, 1840, fifteen years before the event of the “Devil’s Footprints.” Among the high mountains of the elevated district where Glenorchy, Glenlyon, and Glenochay are contiguous, there have been found several times, upon the snow, the tracks of an animal seemingly unknown at present, in Scotland. The prints in every respect resemble that of a foal of considerable size, although perhaps the sole seems a little stronger and not so round.

No one has obtained a glimpse of this creature, only, it is remarked that, from the depth to which the feet sank in the snow, it must be a beast of considerable size. It has been observed also that its walk is not like that of the generality of quadrupeds, but more like the bounding or leaping of a horse when scared or pursued. It is not only in one locality that the tracks have been met with, but through a range of at least twelve miles.

Here, once again, is the element of localization which we can associate with intelligence.

“Cup Marks” are strings of cuplike impressions in rocks. Sometimes there are rings around them and sometimes they have only semicircles. They have been found in America, Great Britain, France, Algeria, Palestine, almost everywhere except the far north. In China, cliffs are dotted with them, and in Italy, Spain, and India they occur in enormous numbers.

There are twenty-four cups, varying from one and a half to three inches in diameter, arranged approximately in straight lines, on the Witches’ Stone near Ratho, Scotland. It is explained locally that these are tracks of a dog’s feet (in stone?). In Inverness-shire the marks are called “Fairies’ Footmarks.” In Norway and other places they are said to be horses’ hoof prints. The rocks of Clare, in Ireland, have prints supposed to have been left by a mythical cow.

On U.S. 40, between Dayton, Ohio, and Richmond, Indiana, there is a popular roadside stop where tourists pull over to look at the footprints in a large stone by the side of the road.

Now, in Devonshire, our space-navigating device seemed to be cruising around, probably slowly and silently, using a weak ray, maybe a sort of beamed radar, to maintain its elevation above the ground. But, where the cup marks appear in stone we get the impression that a more powerful ray was used, capable of disintegrating, or fusing, rocks; and that the flying gimmick was hovering over a small area. This hovering would account for the cupmarks appearing in clusters within which there were rows of cup marks in straight lines, since the hovering machine would be certain to drift back and forth, due to air currents and other disturbances while using its powerful ray to maintain position over a certain area or object.

I am reminded, here, of the pigs somewhere in the French-Canadian wilderness which were killed by circular burned spots of totally unexplained origin.

Some hints might be gained by studying all of the places where cup marks are found, and determining whether these locales have any prominent features in common, such as might attract a space flyer, either for a particular interest, or merely for anchoring. For levitating stone, perhaps.

So, we premise that the cupmarks, like the Devil’s footprints, the prints of Glenorchy, and those in the Chinese Palace-compound, and who knows, perhaps those of the legendary “abominable snow man” of the Himalayas, were all made by somewhat similar types of rays from space navigating contrivances.

It would appear that any resemblance to Morse Codes, or codes in general, or any other form of communication is purely coincidental, and is merely personal interpretation of the obviously mechanical nature of the distribution of the marks, be they cups in stone or depressions in snow. It is the establishment of the mechanical nature of these manifestations and their consequent subordination to intelligent control, which is our first concern. The whys and wherefores must be secondary issues.

Have you heard of the vitrified forts of Scotland, Ireland, Brittany and Bohemia? There are a number of very ancient forts, many on hilltops, which are scattered through those areas. They are unique, because a part of the stone work is vitrified. It isn’t clear as to just what enemies caused the building of the forts—whether they were built by invaders or defenders, or already in place prior to an invasion. These forts seem almost to surround England, and since some are in Brittany and Bohemia, one wonders if England at that time was connected with the mainland of Europe.

Archaeologists postulate that these incredibly ancient people built vast fires to vitrify the stone forts and cement them together by melting them externally. Even where there was not a good supply of wood to burn; but then, that was a long time ago and there might, then, have been wood, coal, oil, or something. But a Miss Russel, in the Journal of the B.A.A., has pointed out that single stones, much less long walls, are not vitrified when large houses are burned to the ground, or where the stones are otherwise cooked by so-called natural means.

But the singular fact of these vitrified forts is that the stones are vitrified in streaks, as if special blasts had struck or played upon them Lightning? At any rate, once (or more) upon a time something melted, in streaks, the stones of forts on the hills of Scotland, Ireland, Brittany and Bohemia. Whoever, or whatever did it, they, or it, had some handy way of getting around. Lightning has a way of hitting things prominently displayed on hilltops. But some of the vitrified forts are inconspicuously located and yet didn’t escape; their walls, too, are vitrified in streaks. But, on hills and mountains all over the rest of the world are remains of forts which have not been vitrified. I have in mind Sacsahuaman, on top of the Andes at Cuzco.

In this instance of forts partially vitrified, in streaks, we have one of the most outstanding examples of selection and segregation –attributed to intelligence. Not only do we have forts of a certain circumscribed area picked out for attention, but we have such a high degree of concentration and direction that only streaks in certain forts are vitrified.

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Disappearing Planes

We shall not devote too much time to disappearing planes as it is a modern phenomenon, by definition, and we are building our Case for the UFOs from a wealth of historical information. However, inasmuch as these disappearances relate, directly, to our thesis of intelligence in space, space contrivances which kidnap human beings, either for study, food, or experiments of a nature beyond our ability to grasp, they bear mention.

I should like to suggest, first, that a continuous flow of conversation, via a special frequency, be recorded automatically from all large craft in the air. There could be a series of Air Force and Civil Aeronautics Administrations base stations which could record this conversation. It becomes increasingly unthinkable that so many aircraft are falling from the air without time for a single crewmember to shout something, however brief, into the microphone so that we shall know what is happening to them. If we could establish this system of running conversation we might get some clues as to the destroyers of these ships and the captors of their crews and passengers.

Also, I believe in all fairness that we must admit the ease with which one can overemphasize mysterious disappearances of planes over water. Whereas I, personally, will not accept, categorically, mechanical failure which makes it impossible for the crew to report, and which means the ship is lost forever, its last moments with it, I will admit we cannot afford to draw too many conclusions from these incidents.

But, contrast the sea disappearances with the C-46 with thirty-two marines aboard. The wreckage was found – but never any bodies!

Also, at half past ten o’clock on the morning of March 7, 1922, Flying Officer B. Holding set out from an aerodrome near Chester, England, on what was intended to be a short flight in Wales, turning back and heading in the direction of Chester. He was never seen again. Holding disappeared far from the sea, and he disappeared over a densely populated land of highly civilized people!

The unexplained and unannounced crashes of planes over land are numbered in dozens, but these are crashes – not disappearances. Nevertheless there is a strong element of mystery in many of them. It is the rule, and not the exception that the major catastrophes come without warning. Whatever causes the crash seems to cut off communication simultaneously, for seldom is there any warning from the radio: only routine reports, and then – silence, until the wreckage is found with no survivors, and in at least one case, no bodies!

We cannot, with reasonable certainty, say that aircraft are attacked wantonly, promiscuously, or indiscriminately by a malicious enemy, for if that was true, the attacks would almost certainly be more universal, and we believe, more selective. Yet, it is most difficult to overlook the possibility that some sort of intelligence, coupled with the necessary forces, has destroyed some of our aircraft while simultaneously muting the occupants thereof.

It is one thing for a solitary plane to vanish, from above the sea, without trace, and without signals being heard. It is quite another thing for five military planes, flying as a group, all with full crew and radio, to pass silently and irrevocably from human ken.

There were fourteen men aboard those bombers. As the hours passed, anxious buddies back at the base and in other aircraft out on patrol listened hopefully on the radio channels. But no word came to tell of the whereabouts of the missing flyers.

The last routine message, received at 5:25 that gusty afternoon, had given the position of the flight as seventy-five miles northeast of Banana River (Florida) Naval Station, or about two hundred miles northeast of Miami.

The hands of the clock crawled around to the point where the bombers’ fuel supply would be exhausted. Still no word. The Navy swung into action. Search planes and ships were ordered out to cover the entire area from Key West northward to Jacksonville and two hundred and fifty miles out to sea.

For the benefit of the public the Navy pointed out tersely that the Avenger bomber was noted for its buoyancy. In similar emergencies such planes had always remained afloat long enough for the crews to launch the life rafts, often “without getting their feet wet.”

One of the first rescue craft to roar off the water in search of the missing fliers was a Navy PBM, a huge Martin Mariner bomber with a crew of thirteen that had been trained for just such work.

This plane, too, disappeared without trace!

Interest in the disappearances now reached the stage where it dominated discussion in the streets. How could five bombers, each with its own crew and radio facilities, disappear from the face of the earth without even flashing a single message of explanation? It was hardly logical to assume that the planes had collided in mid-air, killing all the crewmembers simultaneously.

And, even were such a weird explanation acceptable, how about the PBM?

In July 1952, a strange silvery object was seen high in the sky over San Anselmo, California, and five minutes later there was an unexplained crash of a quite airworthy plane, five miles away, and the Navy has been unable to account for it.

In March 1952, a case-hardened British fighter pilot, Wing Commander J. Baldwin, was flying a jet plane for meteorological and reconnaissance purposes over Korea. He flew into a cloud – and didn’t come out again. The mystery was never solved. (About this time, a U.S. Carrier in Korean waters had sighted a strange object in the skies.)

On June 9, 1952, British Air Vice-Marshal Aitcherly set out in an amply fueled meteor jet from Suez to Cyprus, three hundred miles away. A radio signal was received from him three minutes arter take-off. Nothing more has been seen or heard of him. “Without a trace.”

February 2, 1953: A York transport aircraft, with thirty-three passengers and crew of six, vanished over the Atlantic, on a trooping flight to Jamaica. No explanation. “Cause unascertainable.” (And this, again, in the eerie region of the Gulf and the Caribbean.)

The lists of disasters to jet planes is long. The list of explanations is short. Pilots surviving crashes of whole squadrons have been silenced. When four British jets, all without collision, crash-landed at the same time in foggy flying weather, it was “explained” that all four ran out of fuel at one time.

Your own reading for the past ten years will tell you of a number of unexplained disappearances and accidents to planes. The Constellation over Brazil. The DC-3 in Lake Michigan, apparently torn a part and its blankets, etc., shredded mysteriously.

On August 2, 1947, the British South American Airways plane, Lancastrian Star Dust, mysteriously vanished on a flight over the Andes. It would not have been so surprising if the craft had disappeared in the high peaks of the Andes, but – she was due to land at the airport at Santiago, Chile, at 5:45 PM, she sent out a signal stating her time of arrival. That is just four minutes from the airport, almost within sight of the control tower. At the end of the message came a word “Stendec,” loud and clear and given out very fast.

The Chilean Air Force operator, at Santiago, queried the word which he did not understand. He heard it twice repeated by the plane. No explanation of the word has ever been found. Nothing further was heard from the plane although calls were sent out. The plane never arrived, and from that day to this the mystery has never been solved. Searchers were made by ski troops and planes and by skilled mountaineers and automobiles over an area of 250 square miles, in vain. That plane carried a crew of five men and there were six passengers.

The pilot, Captain R. J. Cook, had crossed the Andes eight times as second pilot. Four minutes from the landing strip – what happened?

In 1947, an American Superfortress bomber strangely vanished when 100 miles off Bermuda – the area of Missing planes. In March, 1950, a U.S. Globemaster disappeared while flying from North America to Ireland, without warning, without trace.
The Pan-American Airways liner, a Constellation with forty people aboard, was on her way from South Africa to New York, on June 20, 1951. The ship left Accra, West Africa, for Monrovia, Liberia, and at 3:00 AM the crew radioed that she was due at Roberts Field airport, Monrovia, at 3:15 AM. This plane was never seen nor heard of again. Fifteen minutes out, with no trouble to report, and anticipating an eventless landing, this giant craft disappeared – without a trace of a record, no outcry from its radio.

I submit that these disappearances are in greater number than those of the past – disappearances of people, etc. – because our air age is proving of great interest to our space neighbors. Also, we are infinitely more aware of such disappearances. (The same reasoning, of course, applies to the increase of UFO’s sighted since the advent of the air age and use of radar.)

I suggest, further, that these disappearances are but more kidnappings, by the space contrivances. Are there any other explanations which satisfy all the questions?

We close the strange accounts of disappearing planes with an account, published in Coronet, March, 1951, which is as startling as any yet encountered.

On a calm, but overcast Sunday in August, 1942, two experienced Naval Officers, Lieutenant Cody, and Ensign Adams, in fine spirits took off on an antisubmarine patrol in the U.S. Navy blimp, L-8, from a small base on Treasure Island, California. Adams, after fifteen years’ service, had just been made Ensign, and this was his first flight as a commissioned officer; so the flight was a bit more than merely routine, as they flew low to look for submarines.

Not far from San Francisco they saw an oil slick, which might denote a submarine. The blimp circled and came over it. There were several patrol craft and many fishermen about, and everyone was interested in whether a depth charge would be dropped.

To the surprise of everyone the airship neither circled nor bombed. Instead, she shot upwards and disappeared into the clouds. The ship was not seen again by the watchers in the patrol and fishing boats – and her happy crew was not heard of again, by anybody.

The L-8 rose to 2,500 feet and drifted for two and one-half hours, and then came down on a California beach, almost striking two fishermen, who grabbed her towing lines and tried to hold her. They looked inside the gondola and found it empty. The craft tore out of their hands and drifted against a cliff, until one of her depth charges loosened and dropped, after which she soared over the cliff and later made a perfect landing in a street of Daly City, a suburb of San Francisco. Inspecting officers found everything in the gondola in perfect order, except – Cody and Adams were missing.

The last word from Lieutenant Cody, commanding, was at 7:50 AM when he radioed, “Am investigating oil slick.” There should have been a follow-up report and, at 8:00 AM, a routine position report. There was nothing.

Nothing has ever been found out about the disappearance of these men. They must have left the blimp at the instant when it shop into the clouds, for there is no other suspected cause for it to rise, and the loss of their weight would certainly cause it to do so. Many patrols and fishermen were watching the maneuvers of the aircraft over the suspected area; everyone was standing by, to avoid a possible depth charge; dozens of eyes were on the blimp. Nobody say Cody and Adams jump, fall, or otherwise leave the gondola – no sign of trouble or struggle. The craft merely shop upward into the overcast. Cody and Adams just disappeared – for keeps, with at least a dozen or two interested observers watching every move of their airship.

Why? And where to?

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Fireballs and Lights

Followers of flying saucers are well acquainted with the “Foo Fighters” reported so extensively during World War II. Because they are modern, and because their presence is so undeniably established and their activities so well catalogued, we shall do nothing with them other than this brief mention in the general category of lights and fireballs.

The “Foo Fighters” seem, however, to be of a slightly different genre from the usual UFO lights. “Foos” are usually reddish or yellowish, soft and diffuse, unattached to any tangible object and extremely mobile. UFO’s, on the other hand, have hard, bluish-white lights and are brilliant, functional, and flickering.

With that distinction in mind, let us suppose that the “Foos” either have intelligence or are remotely directed by intelligence. It is only another short step to say that they are intelligence. That they are a manifestation of some intelligent activity seems the most logical compromise.

The references throughout history to strange lights in the sky, and burning objects fleeing through the air, are common knowledge. There are myriad cases where lights, balls of fire, luminous points and areas, and ball lightning which do not seem to be attached to or emanate from any solid object, have been observed. Two recent sightings will serve to establish our basis of judgement.

The following letter, to the editor of Fate, March 1951 bears careful scrutiny. I ask that you recall the rays we suggested in “Marks and Footprints.”

“My husband and I live alone in a little hidden hollow in Nye County, Nevada, known as the Old Burns Ranch. It is almost completely surrounded by bleak gray hills, and is located a crooked mile back from the paved highway that runs to the little town of Beatty, eight miles distant.

“The nearest human habitation is a cattle ranch a mile away by coyote trail over the hills.

“It was 1:45 AM on a night in January, 1949, just after what is known as The Big Snow. A frozen white pall lay draped over hill and desert. I had wakened from sound slumber a half-hour earlier. More sleep eluded me and I was standing at my window drinking in the beauty of the dimly moonlit landscape. Not a creature was stirring, nor a breath of wind.

“Gradually, my eyes focused upon a pale gray stain, irregularly shaped and no bigger than by two hands. It rested on the smooth crust near a corner of the grape arbor about three rods from the house and in line with the window. Almost at once this fuzzy-gray shadow that was not a shadow bloomed into a disc of clear white light approximately three feet in diameter. It lay there for fully two minutes. Then suddenly contracting into a brilliant orange-tinted stream five or six inches wide, flowed swiftly over the snow toward my window and, to all appearances, exploded soundlessly against the stone foundation of the intervening front porch.

“Several tongues of scintillating red and blue flame spurted a few inches above the two-and-a half foot high wainscoting of the porch. That was all.

“When daylight came, we searched conscientiously but found no signs, marks, or tracks of any kind that might help to explain this phenomenon.”

Sara Elizabeth Lampe
Gardnerville, Nevada

We have another interesting account of a recent visit by a fireball which warrants attention. It was reported by Gordon W. Hackbarth of Seattle, Washington, and tells of an electronics mechanic at the Puget Sound Navy Yard, Robert Burch, and his experience on Tuesday, November 6, 1951.

Returning from his evening meal, Burch stopped at the desk of the Bremerton YMCA, picked up his key, then rode the elevator to the top floor. Inside his room, he noticed that it was 7:30 PM He switched on his radio, then turned to the dresser.
Suddenly, something made him look up. The mirror reflected a ball of orange-red fire coming toward him through the open window. There was a blinding flash and a loud report. The ceiling light went out and Burch was knocked to the floor. In a daze he reached for the foot of his metal bed to haul himself upright. A searing pain shot up his arm. Later it was diagnosed that he had received second-degree burns.

In the corner of his room the contents of a wastebasket blazed furiously. Beneath the window a piece of fireproof Samsonite luggage was charred and smoking. The cabinets of two radios were burned. The sill of the window through which the fireball had entered was black and too hot to touch.

Burch’s roommate, Alex Myers, rushed in from the shower room three doors away. He had heard the loud report. A moment later, a city policeman entered. The officer, in the process of writing a traffic violation ticket three blocks away, had looked up, seen the orange-red ball flash across the sky in an arc from a southerly direction and enter the window.
In the Bremerton Naval Hospital the next day the bewildered Burch, his arm swathed in bandages, still suffered from shock.
ED: the following has no obvious reference or necessary position

“Crawling fireballs” are still another form of oddities which lend substance to our theory of intelligence in space. Most of these awesome incidents occurred in France. In Marseilles, during October 1898, an adolescent girl was seated at a table when suddenly a spherical shape of fire darted into the room, paused in the corner farthest from her and gradually moved toward her along the floor. Terror stricken, she drew back against the wall. Then, abruptly, it changed its course, circled her several times and shot toward the ceiling. It flung itself at a paper-covered stovepipe hole and burned a ring in it on its way up the chimney. Minutes later a loud crash shattered the chimney top.

A similar occurrence was reported in Paris on July 5, 1852, in the shop of a tailor on the Rue Saint Jacques, near Val De Grace. This time the fireball crawled over the windowsill into the room and came at the man in a floor-skimming action. Horrified, he retreated as the globe of blazing light climbed to the height of his face. It was too much for him. The tailor collapsed. A little later he revived to hear a tremendous explosion atop the shop which scattered bits of chimney brick over surrounding rooftops. Proof that the fireball had fled up the chimney again appeared in the form of a burnt paper cover over the stovepipe hole.

In one series of volumes published around 1898 by The Association Francaise, M. Wander, a scientist, wrote:

“A violent thunderstorm has descended upon the Commune of Beugnon. I happened to be passing through a farm in which two children of about twelve and thirteen were playing. I saw these children take refuge from the rain under the roof of a stable, in which were twenty-five oxen. In the courtyard grew a poplar. Suddenly there appeared a globe of fire, the size of an apple, near the top of the poplar. We saw it descend branch by branch, and then down the trunk. It moved along the courtyard very slowly, picking its way, and came through to the door where the two children stood. One of them touched it. Immediately a terrible crash shook the entire farm to its foundation. The children were thrown back, uninjured but eleven of the oxen were felled dead.”

In the town of Gray, on July 7, 1886, a luminous ball from thirty to forty centimeters in diameter jumped to the roof of a home and ripped off the corner. In this case, unlike so many others, the fireball didn’t disintegrate after a single act of destruction. It rebounded to the home’s outside stairs, crushing the slates. Still it retained its shape, crawled into the midst of a group of passers-by who had stopped to watch the queer sight. These persons, in a body, took off down the road. The perverse object seemed to pursue them momentarily: then it vanished without a sound.

M. Lawrence Roth, Director of the Blue Hill Observatory, in 1903, was visiting Paris on September 4, of that year. At 10:00:PM, he happened to be looking toward the Eiffel Tower from the Rond-Point of the Champs Elysees. The tower was suddenly struck by white lightning. Simultaneously he spied a flaming sphere edging downward to the second platform. Roth claimed the ball was about a yard in diameter, and that it covered some one hundred yards in a matter of seconds and then vanished completely.

Additional substantiation of the localization-selectivity factor comes from reports from Hammersly Fork. Remember the strange disappearance in that area.

A fireball at Hammersly Fork floated down through the roof and exploded in a cabin, blowing out windows and doors, at midday on December 9, 1951. Another one came down fifty yards east of the post office there and vanished just before reaching the ground on January 9, 1952. A week later, another one came down just at dusk, at Cross Fork, eight miles from Hammersly Fork and vanished just before touching the ground. On January 23, again at dusk, a fireball floated down in the woods about two hundred feet from the car of Mr. Doyle Schoonover, and vanished just before reaching the ground. Another fireball went through two inches of boards on a building, on February 1, and within seconds the whole roof was ablaze.

Mr. John P. Bessor, a very careful and reliable investigator, made a special trip of inspection to the vicinity of Brown Mountain, near Mogantown, North Carolina, and personally saw the mysterious lights reported there. He avers that they cannot be due to locomotives, cars, houselights, or whatever else the Geological Survey would like them to be. He was not able to coordinate the lights with any mineral deposits, or human activity. Nevertheless the lights were observed by him over a period of several days and nights. They appeared to move at will, to have volition.

While the innumerable reports on strange lights may be only indirectly related to space travel, it does seem obvious that some of the same forces and physical characteristics are common to both types of phenomena, and a study of one may supply insight into others. For instance, we note the common traits of maneuverability, transparency, color, and evidence of intelligent manipulation, not to mention the ability to appear and disappear at will, as did the saucers over Washington in 1952.
There is a report on a puzzling light seen in Hampshire on the night of September 14, 1908 – a light as if from an unseen moon. Strangely enough, that same night, David Packer, in Worcestershire, saw an illumination which he thought was auroral, and proceeded to photograph it. What he saw was a broad, diffuse series of cloudlike illuminations. His photograph in English Mechanic showed a large luminous disc of sphere over the auroral illuminations. This does not in any way indicate a flaw in the film or lights leaking into the camera. The only possible explanation in that case is based on the conventional knowledge that this thing, invisible to the eye, was luminous in that part of the spectrum to which the plate was sensitive, probably ultraviolet, as infra-red plates were not then available.

In Cambrian Natural Observer, 1905-32, are several accounts of lights, in the skies of Wales, which are exactly like many of those reported in the United States since 1947. Lights like “a long cluster of stars, obscured by a thin film of mist,” were reported. Later this thing is said to have taken on the shape and appearance of a vertically suspended iron bar heated to an orange-colored glow; but the initial description is that of lights in formation.

I submit that all strange lights reported, throughout history and today, are either from UFO’s themselves, or reflections of them. They may be UFO’s.

I think we can agree, further, that fireballs may be the only available indication that UFO’s have weapons – and that fireballs are their weapons. I base this upon the singular fact that the only reports of destruction or injury come from these fireballs. This is not to inscribe malicious intent to UFO’s for accidental shooting of a hunter does not condemn the sorrowed friend who fired the shop, much less the distant manufacturer. That fireballs are released at all is, again, probably sheer experimentation on the part of the UFO’s.

As an example of destruction, we shall close with this brief case.

An intelligent boy was trudging along the highway at night near Palestine, Texas. A woman was riding in the same direction, on a horse. The boy reappeared in Palestine that night, out of breath and very pale. He said he saw a ball of fire come out of the sky and strike the woman and set her ablaze. The horse ran one way and he ran back to town to tell what had happened. The people went to look for further particulars of this curious accident. They found the woman lying on the ground with all her clothing burned, but with enough life in her to tell that she had been struck in the breast by a ball of fire. The horse was found with his mane singed. The woman died the next day.

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Legends

In all these discussions, one thing seems to be outstanding as a common denominator. All of the aerial or spatial contrivances and gadgets which we have postulated appear to have one feature in common: they have their natural habitat in space, or at very least in the atmosphere. There is no sure record of an appearance on the ground, and few indications. Appearances from, or disappearances into, the sea indicate only an ability to make use of the fluid medium of seawater, when necessary or desirable. This leads to an assumption that UFO’s live naturally and easily in space; that they do not necessarily come from other stellar systems, or even from other planets.

After considering that the space structures or UFO’s spend most of their time in line between earth and the sun, it has been suggested that some of the ancient Sun worship may have originated in the condition that some god-like beings may have come from UFO’s which were said to be “in the Sun,” because of this alignment of the neutral, and that perhaps the “death boats” for celestial flight which were buried with the Egyptian kings may have been symbolic of the UFO flight XXXXXX .

Perhaps some of these traditions were fragmentary memories from the first wave of civilization. In fact there are several very ancient traditions which can be at least partially accounted for by our common denominator of life in and from space.
For emphasis, and for the establishment of present principles, we repeat that it is relatively unimportant whether we decide that civilization was brought to us from space, perhaps from the exploded planet between Mars and Jupiter, or whether it reached space from terrestrial development in a previous upsurge of civilization.

Such relics as the Great Pyramid indicate the advancement of that age, and it is perhaps a little less strain on our sensibilities to assume that space life, especially if limited to the earth-moon system, originated on earth. Our two greatest mental hazards at the moment are to overcome the blows to our racial ego, and to free ourselves from the idea that UFO’s and space life now reaching our cognizance necessarily come from a planet. Their presence in near-by space regions is improbability of lesser order and has little about it which is difficult of acceptance.

There is much to make us believe that this extraordinary thing which we call civilization today is nothing but flickering flamelets rekindled from almost extinct embers of civilization, the antiquity of which is undreamed of by modern archaeologists.

The Hawaiians claim to have known about flying saucers for 1,000 years, and even to have a name for them: Akualele, or flying spirits. They describe these flying spirits as appearing in many shapes and colors just as they are sighted today…the balls of fire. cones and saucer-shaped discs.

From this it is an easy jump to an obscure, but reliably documented case from England, A.D. 1290. It is one of the best reports on things in space that we call UFO’s.

A Mr. A.X. Chumley, a British scholar, recently found a Latin document at Byland Abbey, in Yorkshire, describing a strange aerial object that terrified the monks in A.D. 1290. The document refers to a “Round, flat, silver object called a discus which flew over the monastery exciting maximum terrorem among the brethren.”

It is the purpose of this chapter to lead you still farther back in time – to the threshold of human intelligence, in a wave of civilization covering the world before the flood. If we discover that no matter how far we push the periphery of our quest, we still find a ready-made civilization – we have to admit human intellectual antiquity of (to us) fantastic and unbelievable vastness.

Could this mean that civilization was planted here, within the species of animal selected by some superintelligence as most fit to develop culture?

Could these superfolk be space dwellers?

Could they be tending us as sheep are tended?

Are we actually owned?

Could the UFO’s be their abode?

Or perhaps their supervisors, shepherds?

Could it be that the saucers, in their whimsical variety, are the space dwellers – the intelligences?

In 1809 a Mr. Stavely, in London, saw many bright specks of light moving around the edge of a black cloud. The lights played around for an hour, and one of them became as large and bright as Venus, moving with great speed around the cloud; later it became stationary, lost its brilliance and finally disappeared. There was no lightning, and the altitude of the lights seemed variable.

On June 19, 1801, a great body, moonlike but larger with a dark mark across it, appeared over Hull, England, at about midnight. It devolved into five bodies, all brilliant, which faded away, leaving a very bright sphere. A bluish light was around it all the while, but when it disappeared the sky was left calm and clear. On July 14, in the early evening, something that looked like an ordinary cloud, several miles long, seemed to take fire, burning with a bluish flame, lasting fifteen minutes, and twice repeated for shorter intervals.

An elliptical sphere rose and fell over Edinburgh on June 21, 1787, and disappeared behind clouds. On December 26, 1785, Edinburg was, at nine o’clock PM, illuminated as bright as day by a sphere with a sort of cone shaped attachment. This was seen in a number of distant places.

Jacob Bee’s Diary records a “comet” that “appeared” at 4:45 PM on December 20, 1689: “first in ye forme of halfe a moone, very firie, and afterwards did change itself to a firie sword, and ran westward.”
On June 3, 1732 a storm of lights appeared in the sky having all the earmarks of an intense meteor shower.

Throughout the 19th century there are many reports of explosions, cannonading, and crashes in the sky. Holby, Kepler, and other scientists acknowledge the veracity of these reports but never offer real solutions.

Kepler reported “A burning globe appeared at sunset, on November 17, 1623, visible all over Germany and much of Austria.”
A whole series of observations of illuminated crosses, burning globes, horrid celestial clashing noises, beams of fire, discolored sun, sun dogs and mock suns is reported from 1501 through 1557. These reports include a thunderbolt that disrupted the bridal chamber of Francois Montmorency and Diane de France.

The Chronicles of Basel, AD 1478, recount “Divers kinds of crosses and fiery bowls fell to the ground from the sky leaving tokens behind.”

In the early winter of 1387, a fire in the sky was seen many times, like a burning and revolving wheel, or a round barrel of flame, emitting fire from above, and others in the shape of a long fiery beam, in the country of Leicester, England.
imploded & burning Ship-frame, some experimental were faulty and actually burned Whole “afloat.”

This weird report is dated AD 1322. In the first hour of the night of November 4, after 7:00 PM, there was seen in the sky over Uxbridge, England, a pillar of fire of the size of a small boat, pallid and livid in color. It rose from the south, crossed the sky with a slow and grave motion, and went northward. Out of the front of the pile of fervent red flame burst forth with great beams of light…many beholders saw it in collision, and there came sounds of fearful combat, and sounds of crashes.

Matthew, of Paris, says:

On July 24, AD, 1239, at the vigil of Saint James, in the dusk, but not when the stars came out, but while the air was clear, serene and shining, a great star appeared. It was like a torch, rising from the south, and flying on both sidesof it there was emitted in the height of the sky a very great light. It turned towards the north in the aery region, not quickly, nor, indeed, with speed, but exactly as if it wished to ascent to a place in the air. But when it arrived at the apparent middle of the firmament, in our northern hemisphere, it left behind it smoke with sparks.

March 20, AD 1168, “a globe of fire was seen moving to and fro in the air.”

I wonder if there is any significance to the month of March in regard to these events?

AD, 1104: Burning torches, fiery darts, flying fires were often seen in the air in this year. And there were, near stars, what looked like swarms of butterflies and little fiery worms of a strange kind. They flew in the air and took away the light of the sun as if they had been clouds.
AD, 1067: In this year people saw a fire that flamed and burned fiercely in the sky. It came near the earth, and for a little time brilliantly lit it up. Afterwards, it revolved, ascended on high, then descended into the sea. In several places it burned woods and plains, and in the country of Northumberland this fire showed itself in two seasons of the year. (From Geoffrey Gaimar’s Lestorie des Englis solum Maistre Geffrei.)
AD, 936: “In a clear sky, the sun was suddenly darkened red like blood.”
AD, 941: “The sun had a terrible appearance for some time and a stream like blood issued from it.”
AD 823: “In summer a piece of ice fell from the sky over Burgundy, France. It was sixteen feet long, seven feet broad, and two feet thick.” That was quite a hailstone!
AD 796: Roger of Wendover records that small globes were seen circling around the sun.
AD 457: “Over Brittany, France, a blazing thing like a globe was seen in the sky. Its size was immense , and on its beams hung a ball of fire like a dragon out of whose mouth proceeded two beams, one of which stretched beyond France, and the other reached towards Ireland, and ended in firelike rays.”
AD 393: “In the time of Theodosius, a sign like a hanging dove (colmba pendens) appeared in the sky. It burned for thirty days.”
170 BC: “At Lanupium, on the Appian Way, sixteen miles from Rome a remarkable spectacle of a fleet of ships was seen in the air.”
106 BC: “A bird that flew in the sky and set houses on fire, was seen over Rome.”
214 BC: “The forms of ships were seen in the sky over Rome.” And 220 BC: “A clear light shone at night in the sky at Rome.”
214 BC Probably Just plane Water boats, Human.
216 BC: “At Praeneste, sixty-five miles from Rome, burning “lamps” fell from the sky, and at Arpinium, forty-two miles east of Praeneste, a thing like a round shield was seen in the sky.”
99 BC: “When Murius and Valerius were consuls in Tarquinia, there fell in different places a thing like a flaming torch and it come suddenly from the sky. Towards sunset, a round object, like a globe, or a round circular shield took its path in the sky from west to east.” That is as good a description of a saucer as any.

Now let us consider the hieroglyphs from an Egyptian papyrus, together with a translation by Boris de Rachewiltz. De Rachewiltz says that the original is a part of the Royal Annals of the times of Thutmose III, circa 1504-1450 BC, and that the original is in bad condition. Parts were too obliterated for translation.

In the year 22, third month of winter, sixth hour of the day (..2..)

The scribas of the House of Life found it was a circle of fire that was coming in the sky. (though) it had no head, the breath of its mouth (had) a foul odor. Its body one ‘rod’ long and one ‘rod’ large. It had no voice. Their hearts became confused through it: then they laid themselves on their bellies (..3..)

They went to the King..? to report it. His Majesty ordered (..4..) has been examined (..5..) as to all which is written in the papyrus rolls of the House of Life His Majesty was meditating upon what happened. Now, after some days had passed over those things, Lo! They were more numerous than “anything” They were shining in the sky more than the Sun to the limits of the four supports of heaven (..6..)

Powerful was the position of the fire circles. The army of the King looked on and His Majesty was in the midst of it. It was after supper. Thereupon they (the fire circles) went up higher directed to the south. Fishes and volatiles fell down from the sky. (it was ) a marvel never occurred since the foundation of this land. Caused His Majesty to brought incense to pacify the hearth (..9..) (to write?) what happened in the ook of the House of Life (..10..) (to be remembered?) for the Eternity.

To this added the following comment from the translator:

As you can see from (the translation) the “flying saucers” made their first appearance in the 22nd year of the reign of Thutmose III, about 3,500 years ago. The first lacuna of the papyrus in the end of another marvel. I think that this papyrus was part of a book preserved in the mysterious institution called House of Life (of which Sir Alan Gardner has written), that I am actually deeply investigating. In it, magic rites were performed and a special group of scribes was trained.

Two things have to be noticed: it left after a foul odor and it was not making any noise. It measures one rod, i.e. 100 cubit. As a cubit is about 20.6 inches we might judge the fire circle was large and long, about fifty meters. During their second appearance they were very numerous and shining, and fishes and volatiles fell down from the sky. And their movements through the sky, from north to south, was regular, and, more than that, powerful! Therefore the king thought that the best thing to do was to pacify the hearth of Ammon Ra, Lord of the Thrones of the Two Lands (Egypt).

This record is a part of the archives of a responsible government. The event was unusual enough to warrant inscribing in the archives, and to have the past records searched for precedent. The descriptions are concise, although the vacant places are annoying in their omissions. De Rachewiltz’s comments, supplementing his translation, indicate an interpretation similar to that which we, ourselves, might make.

However we find it difficult to resist pointing out some of the elements of this event, which are so typical of the reports in current sightings. Silence of operation for one thing. Foul odor. In size, this UFO was said to be about one hundred cubits, which is about 172 feet long. The fact that two equal dimensions were given indicating (perhaps) equal length and breadth implies disc shape. In any case it was described as a fire circle, indicating its shape, and that flames were associated with it as has so often been the case.

The exact nature of the flames is of course unknown to us; they may have been electrical discharges which would have been strange to the Egyptians of 1500 BC and would have been recorded as ordinary flames. As in our modern sightings, there was sometimes one object and sometimes a group or flock. They were shining, and by this it seems we can infer that they were luminous.

One other thing is obvious from this Egyptian record; that mechanical flight, if it had been previously known to the Egyptians, or to their progenitors, was Already a completely lost science in 1500 BC. It is in line with our thinking that the Egyptians were merely another one of the trickles through the dyke of time from the previous great wave of civilization.

The records of Tibet, however, seem to be more complete than those of Egypt, and more ancient. Perhaps it is because the mountain fastnesses of Tibet and Northern India have not been subjected to the burnings and other destructive activities of Western civilization which annihilated the libraries of the Egyptians and the Mayas.

If one may judge from his writings, Colonel James Churchward, in a lifetime of study, Learned something of the lore which is stored in the Tibetan monasteries, and supplemented this with studies throughout the world.

Churchward says that he came upon many records ranging back to at least 200,000 years. One of his most fascinating finds relates to mechanical flight, brought to India by the first settlers, and its antiquity may be anything from 15,000 to 200,000 years, with the longer term the more likely. It is Churchward’s deduction that India was settled by Nagas from Burma, who, in their turn, were descendents of the original Mayas of the “motherland,” common ancestors of the Naga and the Central American Maya. This settlement must have taken place about 70,000 years ago, and it seems most probable that mechanical flight came form the “Motherland.”

Here, by mechanical flight, we most certainly mean something different either our lighter than air or heavier than air flight mechanisms of today. That the flight of those millennia employed a type of power unknown today, “seems almost certain.” Whatever the source of that power was it did not involve power plants as we know them today, and apparently did not result in a truly mechanical or industrialized civilization such as we have. That this power source worked on some principle of levitation or gravity nullification seems logical. It may be, too, that such a force or power does not lend itself to industry.

An Hindu Manuscript of ancient origin says:

“When morning dawned, Rama, taking the celestial car which Pushpaka had sent him be Vivishand, stood ready to depart; self moving was this car; it was large and finely “painted.” It had two stories, and many chambers with windows, and was draped with flags and banners. It gave forth a melodious sound as it coursed along its airy way.”

This was written millennia ago – and this translation was made before the modern age of mechanical flight. If the translation had been made by a person with the technical training available in 1955, it would read like this:

When dawn came, Rama took the flying machine with Pushpaka had sent to him by Vivishand, and stood by to take off. This machine was self-propelled, large and finely-finished. It was a two-decker, with many compartments having windows, and was draped with flags and pennants. As the machine flew it made a humming or droning sound.

There is another Hindu manuscript dated 500 BC, which has been translated as follows:

Rawan (Ravan?), King of Ceylon, flew over the enemy’s army and dropped bombs, causing many casualties. Eventually Rawan was captured and slain, and his flying machine fell into the hands of the Hindu Chieftain, Ram Chandra (Rama), who flew it all the way back to his Capital in northern India.

Both of these manuscripts seem to have been taken from the same temple records at Ayhodia and refer to a time at least 20,000 years ago.

It is from this material that we come to the conclusion that space flight is not a new phenomenon, but rather a lost art!

Therefore, I strongly recommend that legislation be enacted to once to assign qualified researchers to the field of gravity. There, and not in atoms, shall we discover the secret of the true flight into space.

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