Saturday, June 09, 2012

Aztec, Karl Pflock and Scott Ramsey

In his book, The Aztec Incident, Scott Ramsey is quite annoyed with Karl Pflock over Karl’s claim that he’d seen a diary reportedly kept by Silas Newton, one of the original Aztec crash proponents. Karl’s report, in which he claims that Newton wrote that the Aztec crash was a hoax, seems to prove that there was no Aztec crash... but to be fair, can we trust that assessment?



Karl Pflock
A moment to recap, if necessary. Karl told me, as he peddled Roswell in Perspective, that editors at Prometheus had said that his book wasn’t skeptical enough. I would have thought the criterion would be for evidence to support the skepticism rather than skepticism for the sake of skepticism, but that is an argument for another time.

In the past I have noted two points where Karl printed his skeptical arguments that were flawed, but no one from that side of the fence questioned these claims. In one, he took Don Schmitt and me to task for suggesting that Corporal E. L. Pyles had seen an airborne object that might have been the thing that crashed. He said that Pyles could not remember the date, but a paragraph or so later, mentioned that Pyles noted that when he read the newspaper report about the flying saucer "capture" he thought that might have been what he had seen. In other words, Karl seemed to corroborate our claim that the incident took place in the first week of July, 1947. (Well, we put a precise date on it based on other information and I hope to get to the bottom of that during our investigation.)

The second was his dismissal of the Frankie Rowe story that her father had been to the crash site. Karl mentioned three firefighters he had interviewed, but when I interviewed one of them, the story was slightly altered. No, the stuff Karl published was accurate, it just wasn’t everything that the man knew about the situation. Karl, to give him the benefit of the doubt, cut his interview short after he had the information he wanted rather than all the information available.

I mention this because another story has developed and it has to do with one aspect of the Aztec crash, or rather one of the original and primary, though second-hand witnesses to the Aztec crash. Silas Newton was the original source for the story that Frank Scully published about the UFO crash at Aztec in his Behind the Flying Saucers.

According to what Karl wrote in Anomalist 8, Spring 2000, pages 137 to 161, he had learned from an unnamed source that Silas Newton had left, not really a diary, but a memoir of sorts, that talked about the Aztec crash. Karl said that after the Albuquerque Journal ran a story about the Aztec crash on May 17, 1998, he received a telephone call from a "source" who said he had a document written by Newton. Karl asked for a copy and was told, "Absolutely not," but that he could see it if he wanted to. On July 11, 1998, according to Karl, he met with the source for the first time.

Over about the next year, he met with the source and talked with him on the telephone a number of times. Although he got to see the document, he wasn’t allowed to photograph it or to have any other sort of photo copy. He was allowed to read it, take notes and even copy what he wanted in his own hand, but nothing more. He just wasn’t allowed do anything that would prove the document existed.

Karl did say that he didn’t know what Newton’s handwriting looked like, but was able to obtain, through William Moore, a holographic copy of Newton’s will, which is, of course, a handwritten copy. To his admittedly untrained eye, the writing on both documents looked the same. So, for Karl, this was a sort of corroboration.

The main point here is that, according to Karl in what he copied from the Newton diary, "The Aztec saucer tale, including all of the associated landing claims was a hoax. Newton invented the tale to give his "doodlebug" [which is a device that allegedly find oil or other minerals with a machine] pitch – in his words – ... a big secret feel."

Karl also wrote, "Now we come to what, if true, may be a significant new development in this wild affair. After the Denver Post revealed he was Scientist X, [which refers to a lecture at the University of Denver in 1950 where Newton laid out the Aztec crash tale as well as other flying saucer information] Newton received two visitors at his Newton Oil Company office in Denver. These men claimed to be with a highly secret U.S. government entity, which they refused to name. Newton writes [again according to Karl] ‘They grilled me, tried to poke holes in my story. Had no trouble doing it and laughed in my face about the scientific mistakes I made. They never said so, but I could tell they were trying to find out if I really knew anything about flying saucers.’

"Newton’s visitors told him they knew he was pulling a scam and then gave him what may have been the surprise of his life. ‘Those fellows said they wanted me to keep it up, keep telling the flying saucer story and the people they worked for would look out for me and for Leo...’"

What Karl had done, was not only expose Aztec as a hoax, but also hinted that there was a governmental agency in the background who wanted this hoax story to be repeated. They had something they were hiding, though Karl didn’t speculate about what that secret might be.

This is devastating information for those who accept the Aztec crash story as real. The man who claimed responsibility, Newton, had written down that he made up the story to lend credibility to his "doodlebug" and that the government knew it. They just didn’t care.

Scott Ramsey, however, suggests in his book, The Aztec Incident, that he quizzed Karl on these points and others sometime later, in 2002, during one of the Aztec UFO conventions. According to Scott, he asked if Karl had compared any known samples of Newton’s handwriting to the diary. Karl told him, "...he could not find any comparisons to do such a thing. Karl could see that I was becoming amused at how he ignored his former Intelligence training in allowing such unsupported or unverified statements, so he backed down to telling me that the source was Silas Newton’s nephew..."

Scott wrote, "My conclusion remains that no diary exists and the false Newton story was either fabricated or Karl himself was the victim of a hoax."

Karl did, according to what he published two years earlier, however, have samples of Newton’s handwriting, and it looked to be the same as the diary. In fact, according to what I was told, Karl had been able to locate several samples of Newtons’ handwriting.

But Scott is right about one thing. If a proponent of a crashed saucer story came out with this sort of unsupported information, we would all be right in suspecting it. Without the diary, without the name of the source, without some sort of independent corroboration, we would reject it out of hand... knowing that it is up to those telling the story to prove it true.

Given some of the things that have appeared in the past such as Karl’s claim that Corporal Pyles couldn’t remember the month of his "sighting" ,but then saying a paragraph later that after he saw the story in the Roswell Daily Record if what he saw was tied to the UFO crash, and his partial interview with one of the Roswell firemen, you have to wonder about the value of his Aztec revelations. You have to wonder if Karl wasn’t a little too enthusiastic about the "Newton diary," which, of course, does not make the Aztec crash reality.

There is one other point, though I’m not sure of the relevance. Back in the 1970s, just as the cattle mutilation phenomenon was gaining some national attention, two fellows, Daniel Kagan and Ian Summers convinced a publisher to allow them to investigate the case. While in Colorado Springs, at the home of a private detective, they met a fellow who claimed his name was Kurt Peters... Kurt with a "K". They later identified that fellow as Karl Pflock. Karl himself admitted as much decades later in the pages of UFO when he tried to make light of the little deception, writing, "I was a Ufologist for the CIA...".

It was, of course, all tongue-in-cheek. It was meant to suggest that these stories of his spying on the UFO field for the CIA were nothing more than mere rumors that seemed to circulate throughout the UFO field. You know that you have made it when people begin to accuse you of working for the FBI, the CIA, AFOSI or a number of other agencies.

Karl explained "Kurt Peters" this way. "Erianne [the Colorado Springs private detective who was interested in cattle mutilations] needed a writer to collaborate on a book. I needed a money-maker, and this seemed just the ticket. I could have saved myself well-deserved embarrassment if I had not allowed my critical judgment to be shouldered aside by visions of fame and fortune."

Karl continued, "Not long after our book proposal began making the rounds of publishers, Erianne was contacted by Kagan and Summers, who said they were working on a book about the mutilations mystery. Rivals!... I suggested it might be useful for me to be at the meeting. However, there was a chance that Kagan and Summers might recognize me by name as a writer and put two and two together. Erianne suggested I use a pseudonym and say I was a researcher who sometimes helped him on cases. Thus the misbegotten ‘Kurt Peters’ was born."

Of course, this whole thing sounds somewhat bogus. Kagan and Summers wouldn’t care that Karl was working on a book about the mutilations because they had already sold theirs. And there really was very little chance that they would have recognized Karl’s name since he hadn’t published much, though he had worked as an editor at a small publisher at one time.

This little episode allows us a glimpse of some of Karl’s thought processes. In the end, it might mean nothing, other than he was attempting to protect his book project (which never saw the light of day) but then, it was a calculated deception.

While Karl’s tale of Newton’s diary is suspect, if for no other reason than Karl never revealed his source, he didn’t have a copy of the diary other than the notes he had taken, and no one else has seen the diary, it doesn’t mean that the Aztec crash is real. It only means that Karl’s revelations, while extraordinary if true, are simply unsubstantiated hearsay. There is no way to verify any of those revelations unless the source reveals the information to another.

The Aztec case remains with no real evidence to support its reality and a provenance that seems to return to Silas Newton, who told it to Frank Scully. Newton was charged with fraud and other crimes on several occasions dating as far back to 1928 and as recently as 1972, just prior to this death. As a witness, as a source, Newton leaves a great deal to be desired.

So, here’s where we are on this. I can’t give much weight to Karl’s claims of a Newton diary simply because none of the evidence has been seen by anyone other than Karl. If the situation were reversed, that is, a witness came forth with some documentation to prove Aztec real but the source was not revealed and the documentation was not revealed, we’d all be quick to condemn it. (Think of Virgil Riggs here... the former Air Force enlisted man who met with Donald Bass who said it was real, but no one has heard from Bass in decades.)

That is the situation we have here. Nothing to support Karl’s claims, and so, until we see more evidence, until the source talks to someone else, the tales of Newton’s diary are simply unsubstantiated hearsay and that’s really all they are.

44 comments:

Kandinsky said...

Did you find out if Silas' nephew was a genuine relative?

I only ask because the circumstances sound very similar to Bill Moore's tales of being approached and allowed to copy text of documents, but not actual copies. Moulton-Howe's early 80s encounters with similar folk included the same procedure.

Both of these cases are notoriously murky. Would Karl's eagerness to confirm the hoax have left him less than meticulous in checking the source?

Wade said...

This same approach times three is interesting. I guess one conclusion is that these are all separate scams, but this usually implies an attempt at financial gain, which doesn't appear to be the case here.

But this could also be disinformation. You can hand copy this to get our message out, but you can't photo copy or take away in case we've slipped up on document preparation.

Probably stating the obvious. Did the other two instances you mention involve money?

Wade said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Nick Redfern said...

Hey Kevin:

http://nickredfernfortean.blogspot.com/2012/06/ever-controversial-aztec-ufo.html

Cheers,
Nick

Don said...

In the absence of evidence regarding the Aztec event, I have a few fun facts to share:

Did you know that the modern era of energy exploration in the region began with an underground thermonuclear detonation in 1967, or that gas from leaks could collect in depressions and BLAM! explode if autos were driving through the low points in the roads where gas had collected?

Let's not forget that Farmington is just down the road. One of 1950's more spectacular sightings occured there in March that year.

Regards,

Don

TheNurse said...

Mr. Randel,

Not to be too 'Orwellian' about it, but as a younger girl a long time ago (in '1984') during the MUFON Conference in San Antonio I recall talking in the bar to other attendees, as we all watched J. Allen Hynek dance with some redhead....

That was where I heard a story about how during the middle 1970s you were sent by APRO to 'visit' the Center for UFO Studies, with an assigned mission to dig up dirt on N.U. Professor J. Allen Hynek for smear publication in some then current UFO pulp rag.

So Mr. Randel, HOW can YOU justify your sneering attack on the honorable ex-Marine Karl Pflock for misrepresentation???

KRandle said...

Well, TheNurse -

You have your facts wrong. I was sent a copy of an article written by another to edit. I did the editorial work for Bernard O'Connor, who was the editor of Official UFO. APRO had nothing to do with it and all I did was edit the article. I didn't write it. I didn't research it. I fixed the grammar. I made sure the words were spelled correctly. And, I made sure that the sentences made sense. It was the author who put my name on that article, which, again, I didn't write.

This wasn't an attack on Karl Pflock, who I did know, and if you look back into the International UFO Reporter, you'll see that he and I wrote an article about Barney Barnett together.

You might ask yourself, how Karl could attack an ex-Army helicopter pilot from Vietnam the way he did in his Roswell book.

I am only obligated to tell the truth, not sugarcoat it. I quoted Karl in what he wrote about the Kurt Peters episode (in UFO), and point out a couple of errors in his book.

So, your outrage is misplaced. Maybe you should ask yourself if we should believe Karl's tale of an anonymous source who provided nothing that could be verified. I have grave doubts about this... which is not to say that Karl invented the tale, only that he was too enthusiastic about it.

KRandle said...

Kandinsky -

According to Scott Ramsey, Newton didn't have a nephew... and, accoring to others, Karl didn't identify the source in any way. All we have is Scott's reporting on the situation, and his claim that some of it appears on tape from the Aztec symposium.

I believe that Karl's enthusiasm might have made him a little less careful that he might have been. It would be nice if we had him around to ask... though I did talk to Jim Moseley (one of Karl's UFO friends) about it.

Steve Sawyer said...

Now, just why do I get the creepy feeling that "Kurt Peters" is "TheNurse," among other recent pseuds elsewhere?

Troll much?

That game get old fast, "KP."

Don't be such a boor and a bore, OK?

Paul Kimball said...

I think it's time that Kevin start moderating the comments sections on these posts.

PK

Lance said...

Hi Kevin and Paul (and everybody!)

I (in your last Aztec post) referred to some excellent work that Paul had done on the supposed witness, Fred Reed.

As you may know, In 1999 Reed wrote a letter to the editor of an Aztec publication (which I have established as the Talon, a community newspaper) telling a (somewhat silly) story about his involvement with the "crash".

Very shortly after writing the letter, when Ramsey interviewed him, Reed's story changed drastically. Now suddenly it was much more in line with the narrative that Ramsey supported!

Needless to say, this should have sent up a red flag about Reed. Ramsey definitely had the letter, he gave a copy of it to Paul (as I understand it) in 2005 and it is displayed (but not discussed) in Paul's Aztec documentary.

My understanding (from Jim Moseley, who read the book) that Ramsey doesn't mention this letter at all. If this is the case, then Ramsey's book is exposed as the work of another saucer zealot, ignoring obvious disconfirming evidence and pushing ahead with fantasies.

Speaking of fantasies, Kevin, can you mention how Pflock's treatment of the Newton diary differs from your treatment and the "evidence" for the nun diary?

Best,

Lance

Don said...

"Now, just why do I get the creepy feeling that "Kurt Peters" is "TheNurse," among other recent pseuds elsewhere?"

Have some sympathy for the poor troller on blogs. Back in the good old days of usenet they could crosspost. Now they have run about and comment on each blog separately. It's a lot of work. They really need multiple personalities for real, now.

I love trolls and have a nice collection from that bygone era. The master (or rather, mistress) of the art was Andrea Chen who once had the late Brian Zeiler on alt.alien.visitors half-convinced she was a CI agent.

These aren't classic 'guy' trolls, but classic 'girlie' trolls, and I want to thank Doctress Kurt for the hit of nostalgia.

Regards,

Don

Paul Kimball said...

A word about the Aztec film, which has always been the one I regretted making. It was funded solely by Scott and a group of his friends in the United States, and I piggy-backed it onto my MJ-12 film that I was doing for Canadian television because neither had a large budget (MJ-12 about CAD $95,000, the Aztec film about USD $12,500 - chump change in the world of making films). To his credit, Scott never once tried to force me to take any particular editorial stance. Still, with only so much money to spend on research and travel, we definitely ended up spending more time with him (90%) and less with anyone critical of the "case". Still, I made sure that Karl got his say, and then some, and in the end I think anyone taking an objective look at the film will see some of my own views seeping in given the way it's all presented. I also gave Scott a break, because I genuinely liked him as a person, and I believe he's sincere - one of his key "witnesses / interviews" that he had us conduct in Aztec was with a guy named Randy Barnes. Scott swore by him as a credible source, and he was sort of Scott's research assistant. When my crew and I interviewed Barnes, we found him to be charming, and also completely off his rocker. My real concerns about the Aztec story were already well in place; my concerns about Scott's overall objectivity began when he introduced me to Barnes. I realized that to put him in the film would undermine any credibility that Scott had, so I didn't. Maybe one day I'll dust off the tapes, however...

As for Karl and the diary, he was my friend, and we chatted about it at some length. He told me not to reference it in the film, because he was well aware that it was just an interesting anecdote with absolutely nothing to back it up, and therefore couldn't be relied upon by anyone other than him. For what it's worth, I believe that Karl really did see a diary, and that he himself believed it to be legitimate. Nevertheless, it's just a footnote in the Aztec scam story.

Best,
Paul

Paul Kimball said...

I should add that I haven't read Scott's book, nor do I intend to, because I'm intimately aware of the information within. Indeed, the basic story that Scott has been peddling is no different than the one that William Steinman and Wendelle Stevens resurrected in the 1980s, which was in itself no different than the one that had been resurrected in the 1970s, which in itself traced all the way back to gossip-columnist Frank Scully's tale from the early 1950s. Aztec = Ufology's Dracula.

KRandle said...

Paul -

I understand your comment about monitoring the blog, but I have always wanted it to be open to all points of view. I do delete comments that are libelous, in my opinion, overly nasty, or that have nothing to do with UFOs...

I do let some things through and I believe I know who TheNurse is, though she doesn't have the courage to sign her real name.

Lance -

You wrote, "Speaking of fantasies, Kevin, can you mention how Pflock's treatment of the Newton diary differs from your treatment and the "evidence" for the nun diary?"

Because you know that the diaries exist. We all know that the diaries exist.

I am not, however, going to be stampeded into revealing information before I am ready to reveal it. As I have told you before, and I'm sure that I'll have to tell you again, when the investigation is completed, you, and everyone else will know precisely what I learned. Until then, you'll just have to be patient, something you seem unable to be.

And for the record, I too, believe that Karl saw a diary, but without other information it is just another anecdote about Aztec.

cda said...

Kevin:
In your response to "The nurse" you were too kind. He, or she, twice spelt your name "Randle" as "Randel" yet you neglected to correct him, or her.

Perhaps, if she is a nurse, she is the missing nurse Glenn Dennis claims was his friend of decades ago. You know, the one who told him about the stinking corpses, and so on.

Do you ever worry that Aztec will one day (perhaps today) replace Roswell as the principal UFO crash story? Might Aztec even get a congressional enquiry and result in another USAF 900+ page report (plus an accompanying, much smaller, GAO report) to rival, or even outdo, the Roswell one?

Don said...

What would be best is if the nun's confirm the time, date, and direction of the Wilmots' sighting.

Nobody is expecting that, I figure.

Regards,

Don

Kurt Peters said...

I find it fascinating to read the posted hate from whatever 'cda' is!

Unknown said...

Hey Kevie-
"...all I did was edit the article. I didn't write it. I didn't research it...."

Elizabeth Loftus demonstrated to UFO researchers that memory can be quite unreliable. (I think she was more aiming at 'abductions', but no matter)

...perhaps, upon reflection, you'd like to modify YOUR statement?

Lance said...

Kevin,

I know the nun's diary entry exists just as well as I know the Newton diary exists. In other words, only upon the word of others.

Don,

I assume that you don't know the story of how the nun's diary entry appeared in Kevin's 2nd Roswell book.

It is cited as thought it was reviewed by the authors.

Kevin has admitted that he never saw the diary but accepted the word of "dream" researcher, Schmitt that he had seen the entry.

Starting in the early 1990's I began to ask Randle to supply the text that Schmitt had noted. He never could.

Later, Schmitt showed what a fantastic grasp of the truth he has in a spectacular meltdown (making him a perfect candidate for the "dream team") and had a falling out with Randle.

He really is a crackerjack among crackerjacks!

In a recent post Kevin seemed to admit that Schmitt also never saw the entry (which again is cited in their book in the same way that honest researchers cite source material--in UFO land, those silly old rules don't apply). I asked Kevin if Schmitt has now admitted that he never saw the entry. Kevin never replied.

Kevin gets testy when asked about this matter but (predictably) has never really admitted the impropriety of it.

Lance

KRandle said...

Chuck Finley -

Paul Kimball was right. I should just delete some of the comments. Yours would be among the first. The least you could do is be polite rather than belittling my name.

Yes, I will revise my statement. It was not Bernard O'Connor who asked for the editorial work. It was Dick Ruhl. I have a letter dated January 6, 1976, thanking me for my assistance on his article.

If you had any reading comprehension (which is my snotty comment to you), you would have seen that the material attributed to me is in quotation marks, which means they were my words from an interview he had conducted with me. I did not write that section of the article, any more than Karl wrote sections of the my posting here. I quoted him, and put his words into quotation marks.

If you have anything relevant to this posting, I would be interested in hearing it. If not, keep your thoughts to yourself.

Lance -

Did you are did you not trace the nun's diaries to Oklahoma yourself? Did you or did you not talk to the people there who, at one time, had the diaries in their possession? That is certainly the impression you left with me.

And again, I am working to get the whole story of the nun's diaries and I will publish that information on my schedule and not yours. If you don't like it, well, tough.

You say you have been after this since the early-1990s. If we had any communications then, I don't remember them. Can you enlighten me?

And to both of you... if you can't tone down the rhetoric, I will delete your comments as quickly as I see them. I grow tire of this nonsense.

Lance said...

Kevin,

I had one of the nuns tell me that she thought the records may have long before been sent to Oklahoma. Surely you understand that does not make the statement true?

I tried to further track them down but (using only long distance) ran into a dead end.

None of this has anything to do with whether or not Schmidtt saw the diary entires. Are you saying that he tells you now that he did or did not see the entries?

Do I have any of the following wrong:

1. You cited the diaries as though you reviewed them?
2. You later admitted that you had never seen them but that Don had told you about them? The fact that you only paraphrased the entry in your booked tipped me off way back then that something was fishy.
3. In a recent post you seemed to admit that Don never saw the diary either but that you hope to track it down.

In short, is the citation you made completely bogus and do you now disavow it?

If you do, then I am willing to accept that you used poor judgement and that the nun story has not been proven. That would not be dishonorable...we all make mistakes.

Talking about research you are doing now is all well and good but it has nothing to do with the unproven story and bogus citation you made back then. I am sure you understand that even if you do now find the diary (and I hope you do) that has nothing to do with what I am outlining above.

Best,

Lance

Lance said...

P.S. my communications with you in the1990's were through Pat Packard, who said he relayed my questions to you and then told me your responses.

Best,

Lance

Don said...

Lance wrote: "Don,

I assume that you don't know the story of how the nun's diary entry appeared in Kevin's 2nd Roswell book."

Sure, I do. A couple of nuns thought they saw a plane in trouble and made a note of the moment in a diary or log.

"It is cited as thought it was reviewed by the authors."

In the book? I don't recall that. They didn't offer a citation. I don't know where they got the information.

The reason I hope they got the story wrong, is that I don't want to have to deal with the rehabilitation of
"Steve McKenzie", the support of his story being what was so important about the nuns' story back then -- or so I recall. I don't follow the vicissitudes of the Roswell incident. I'm waiting for a coherent narrative, otherwise, I have nothing to judge the worth of the investigations of the last 30 years, which is why I stick to the 1947 press stories.

At least the nuns didn't take photos, so we won't have to spend the next 30 years wondering what happened to the negatives (or Polaroid originals). That's a blessing.

Regards,

Don

Lance said...

SIgh.

Page 4 of The Truth About the UFO Crash at Roswell, first paragraph, last sentence reads:

"The entry noted the sighting was late on the night of July 4, between 11:00 and 11:30 PM."

There is then cited footnote #4.

Footnote #4 for chapter 1 (on page 217) reads:

4. Records held by the Franciscan Catholic nuns.

What I just did above was a citation.

It was a citation of a citation.

The difference between my citation and the one in the book, is that I am actually looking at the real source and can back up my claim right now (and am happy to do so, if need be).

Best,

Lance

Don said...

Seems to me, Lance, we mean the same thing, a circular citation is no citation. Your history with Kevin about it is for you two to work out.

For myself, the page 4 nun story is not an issue, no matter if it exists, is found, and reads exactly as Kevin and Don said it did. If it does, I gather its value to Kevin, and perhaps the entire dream team or some of them, is that there was an object, worth noting by two nuns, in the sky at a desired time, and date, and travelling in the desired direction.

It's why I mentioned the Wilmots' sighting...wrong time, wrong date, wrong direction.

Regards,

Don

cda said...

This nuns' entry will be quite useless even if it is eventually found. It supports nothing at all, other than that a bright light fell towards the earth (how do the nuns know it was really downwards?) at some time between 11 and 11.30pm on an unknown night. The July 4 date is most probably fiction.

Why should this sighting be the least bit remarkable? It is a perfect description of a plunging meteor, nothing else. Nobody will ever know where it struck, or what direction it was travelling, its distance from the observer or in fact anything useful at all.

So by all means locate the nuns' diary if you can, but please Kevin don't try to put it forward as evidence that an ET craft crashed on the Foster ranch.

As far as supporting Roswell, it will be a virtually worthless diary entry.

Don said...

CDA wrote: "So by all means locate the nuns' diary if you can, but please Kevin don't try to put it forward as evidence that an ET craft crashed on the Foster ranch."

I'd recommend the dream team concentrate on producing a coherent narrative because, over the decades, the rest of us have lost the track of the story.

So, Chris, as best I can tell, the nun story will support, not anything over in Lincoln county, but a Chaves county site, which I assume is Kaufman's, which I gather is now okay because of Haut's last tape. I'm guessing here.

Also, it seems there is a Lincoln county site which is on the Foster Ranch, but is not the site reported in the press in 1947, but another site. It appears to be necessary because of what Brazel might have said to Joyce. I'm guessing here.

I think it is why in Roswell discussions here we always seem to go off-topic. I think it is due to none of us knowing anymore what the topic is.

Waiting for the executive summary, Regards,

Don

Lance said...

Don''s comments are quite cogent .

As someone who has followed the "case" for a long time, I have seen it get retrofitted with alarming regularity.

For instance, The supposed false debris aspect has now become so convoluted that I admit I no longer know what the actual scenario dreamed up by the proponents.

As far as the nun story goes, where did it even come from? As I mentioned, Kevin cites only the nun diary entries, that even he admits he never saw. It may well be that these are the concoctions of someone known to unreliable and untruthful.

We currently have no evidence for the nun story at all.

Lance

cda said...

Lance:

How right you are about the nuns. It sounds every bit as bad as Stan Friedman's attempt to fix a date for the San Augustin crash by going by an approximate month and year as related to him by two second-hand witnesses 30 years afterwards! Wasn't there alleged to be a diary available, somewhere, for that too?

Still, let them find that hospital diary. Then with a bit of effort (!) the 'dream team' can start trying to show that the nuns saw an ET craft and that this craft is the same as the one that partially crashed on the Foster ranch with the rest falling on the plains of San Augustin (or on one of the other 3 Roswell sites).

Don said...

So, that's the big deal about the nun's diary. It can be used to support a crash site somewhere near enough to Roswell town for the Roswell Fire Dept to be involved so that they bring home memory metal so Frankie Rowe can see it, have it confiscated and be threatened by a ginger army officer.

And at least Kevin, being a career officer, should realize no crashed saucer or alien bodies found on the Foster Ranch would be hauled to the RAAF.

So, a lot depends on whether there was something (showing distress)in the sky at the right time, day, and direction.

Regards,

Don

Steve M said...

Kevin

I'm a little disappointed that your have make accusations about an investigator who is no longer alive to answer these allegations.

Steve

cda said...

Methinks we have strayed a bit from the Aztec case.

Unless of course Kevin thinks there is some connection between Roswell and Aztec.

And no, I am not persuaded that any personnel from Roswell took part in the Aztec recovery 8 months later.

Is there any indication that the supposed ETs that crashed on the Foster ranch (or one of the other Roswell sites) were from the same star or planet as those who supposedly crashed at Aztec?

Does anyone know? The Ramseys or Stan Friedman maybe?

KRandle said...

CDA -

I am monumentally uninterested in your opinions at this point. You are rejecting an idea without knowing anything about it. The skeptics complained that no one had seen an object in the air. We located witnesses at three locations including William Woody, E. L. Pyles and the nuns. That isn’t good enough and you are already suggesting they saw a meteor, which, of course, displays your ignorance of meteors.

Lance -

You wade in hypocrisy hip deep. You alleged that you had been asking me about the nuns since the early 1990s but now say you asked Pat Packard who asked me at your request. So you didn’t bother to contact me about it and what you said originally was misleading. For that reason, I’m going to ignore your continued drumbeat about the nuns. You’ll learn everything you wanted to know about it when I am finished with the investigation and not before.

Don -

You fail to pay attention. The Roswell Fire Department was not involved as both Tony and I have reported in the past, based on better information.

And if the information came into the Roswell sheriff and he called out to the base, why wouldn’t the RAAF be involved? When did you become an expert on which military base would respond to an event in their area?

Steve -

All I have said was that if we came up with an unsourced document that no one else had seen we would be attacked... in fact, I have a sourced document that Lance KNOWS is real (we’re actually arguing over what it says) and I’m attacked.

I reported, accurately what Karl had said and done in the past. I suggested that his report on Newton’s diary should be seen in the light of this other information. If you don’t like that... tough.

Lance said...

Kevin,

Of course, I know why you are deflecting.

I did briefly bring up the nuns with you when you were here in Cincnnati (you signed my copy of your book after the lecture you gave).

At the time, I simply believed that you had seen the source and I asked if you had the text. I don't remember how you answered.

Pat Packard was in regular contact with you at that time (in the days before long distance was a trivial expense) and he told me that you were happy to answer my questions, and I gave him several. I began to focus on the nuns because your answers (as above) were so vague. It's quite telling that you use this unimportant detail to justify continued stonewalling.

Why not just admit that you made a mistake and that the nun diary citation was bogus just like all of the first hand witness testimonies?

You say that we are arguing abut what the entries say.
No we aren't. No one knows what the he entries say because you have never published the text. Indeed you admitted that you had never even seen the documents and didn't have the text.

It's like arguing in Alice's land beyond the looking glass.

Simply put, Kevin. What was the text of the nun diaries that you cited in your second book?

It's an easy question and if I was the one being asked about a citation I made, I am comfortable that I could honestly and truthfully answer.

Lance

Don said...

Kevin wrote: "Don -

You fail to pay attention. The Roswell Fire Department was not involved as both Tony and I have reported in the past, based on better information."

You're right, I don't keep up. Doesn't matter whether Rowe had a false memory in "The Truth etc". You still need a crash site close to Roswell town and the RAAF, and apparently another non-1947-reported site on the Foster Ranch.

"And if the information came into the Roswell sheriff and he called out to the base, why wouldn’t the RAAF be involved? When did you become an expert on which military base would respond to an event in their area?"

I didn't say anything about the first responders.

If there were a spaceship and alien crew on the site visited by them (or any other site nearby it), I would not expect it all to be trucked to the RAAF when there were better options.


Regards,

Don

Steve Sawyer said...

Hi, Kevin---

In regard to the current and ongoing reinvestigation and review of the Roswell incident by the "dream team," can you give us an update on when you estimate, generally, your investigatory group will be a) done with the investigation, and b) when it might be published?

Based on what I've read so far in the past several months, I'm assuming that as part of the process, a complete review of all prior witness testimony, documentation, and new data will be re-vetted and quantified/qualified as best as can be to provide the most up to date and deeply researched info possible -- is that correct?

Will the book, when published, be done by one or more authors, i.e., co-authored, or will various chapters be written by various individuals on the team, instead?

I'm also hoping it will be fully footnoted with cites and a comprehensive index, and think an associated website for the book would be a very good idea, and maybe with a blog, to provide further or new and additional data and evaluations as they occur, and a forum for discussion, as a venue to support, promote, and enhance the data in the book. Are there, as yet, any plans for an e-book version? Has a publisher been decided upon?

I'm just curious about the process, how the group cross-references and mutually vets data in the effort to produce a kind of "final report" on the Roswell incident that covers and revisits all prior ground, and the best guesstimate of when we all may be able to read the published findings.

Oh, and don't let the debunkers get you down. They can do their own book if they want to. I agree is best not to pre-release data that's pending or under review until you all are ready to publish the finished book.

I'm sure it won't be the last word, but it would be nice to have one source/report, or book, derived from a cooperative effort to read about the current findings and details about the entire controversy that has raged on now for over 35 years, since Friedman interviewed Marcel.

Then, if the skeptics feel the need to, they can conduct a similar effort, from their perspectives, to provide rebuttal and an alternative viewpoint of the evidence extant. I'm fairly sure Prometheus would publish it, just as a counter-point.

I'm an agnostic about Roswell myself, but am inclined to think that something definitely occurred there which still remains unknown and incomplete in all the reporting upon it, either pro or con, so far.

I also think James Carrion's recent blog article about the US government having promulgated the Arnold, Roswell, and Maury Island incidents, as part of an early Cold War psyop against the Soviets, is both unsubstantiated and more of an opinion piece than a genuine research effort, since he provided no cites, documentation, witness testimony, or other data that could be independently evaluated in making his various claims and contentions, and which is primarily why he's gotten so much static about that unscholarly and mistaken oversight--if you're going to make revisionist statements as to the basis for a series of significant, early UFO incidents being tied together in the manner he posits, ya gotta provide the underlying and foundational data to support your contentions, as I hope and assume the "dream team's" efforts will also show when eventually presented to the public for consideration.

Steve M said...

Kevin

Your problem with Mr Pflock appears to be that he took issue with you and Don Schmitt's research about a witness and on his stance on Frankie Rowe. As Brazel stated that he found the debris in June and Ms Rowe appears not to be a credible witness, Mr Pflock appears to have been correct in both instances and his premature death is a sad loss to Ufology

Steve Sawyer said...

I think I'll answer my own main question from above:

All things considered, I'm guessing there will no book publication based on the "dream team's" Roswell investigation before the 2015/2016 time frame, since I get the impression this will be a very long-term investigation.

So be it. The most important thing is that it be as comprehensive, in-depth, and thoroughly vetted as possible, since the subject deserves and requires it.

KRandle said...

Steve M -

My issue with Karl was that he attacked me personally, misrepresented my research, and didn't complete his. I have detailed elsewhere some of my complaints about his analysis of Roswell.

He rejected Frankie Rowe based on an incomplete interview and his belief that Mogul was responsible for the debris. If Mogul was the solution, then Frankie Rowe was, at best, mistaken... But Mogul simply does not adequately explain the situation.

One of the firefighters Karl interviewed told Karl that they didn't make a run outside the city and Karl was happy with that. When I asked the same man if he knew Dan Dwyer, Frankie's father, he told me that Dan had gone out to see the crash (and yes, I have the interview on tape).

Reject Frankie Rowe if you must, but you can't reject her for the reasons Karl gave. He was wrong about them.

Terry the Censor said...

> one of the original and primary, though second-hand witnesses

That does not make sense as written.

KRandle said...

Terry -

I see the confusion. Silas Newton was the primary witness in that he was the first to talk to anyone about the Aztec crash, sharing his information with Frank Scully.

But, he was a second-hand witness in that he didn't see anything himself. He talked with others who had seen the craft, the bodies, and described for him, the events near Aztec.

I suppose a clearer way would have been to note that Newton was the first to talk about Aztec, but that he had seen nothing himself. He just talked to those who did.

This proves it is quite difficult to proof read yourself. I know what I meant but failed to translate that to the posting.

Terry the Censor said...

> Silas Newton was the primary witness in that he was the first to talk to anyone...But, he was a second-hand witness

I see what you mean. He was not a primary witness to events but a primary witness to others' statements. Would it be unpalatable to call him an investigator?

> it is quite difficult to proof read yourself

As a proofreader and editor by trade, I deal with this on a daily basis. It's especially frustrating when I send a worker an error list but my own explanation has a mistake or some obtuse phrasing.

KRandle said...

Terry wrote:

Would it be unpalatable to call him an investigator?

Yes. He didn't investigate anything. He told the story... might have invented the story. He certainly contributed nothing that could be considered as an investigation.

He was a con man whose record goes back into the 1930s, maybe as early as 1928. Yes, he was apparently a Yale graduate and seems to have been a championship class golfer, but he was still a con man.