Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Jim Ragsdale's Roswell Tale

Periodically questions are asked about certain witnesses and certain testimony because it seems there are several versions of that testimony out there. Sometimes it is the researcher who hears things wrong or gets something wrong but more often it is the alleged witness who has radically altered his or her tale. Some alteration is expected because no one actually tells a story the same way twice unless it has been memorized as opposed to having been lived. Major alteration is an indication that the story is probably not being accurately reported by the witness and the fault lies at the feet of the witness rather than with those reporting it.

Ah, the value of audio tape.

Brian Bell, apparently annoyed that I have suggested in the past that some of the witness testimony was unreliable, asked, “Ragsdale and Truelove testimony - He said they were in a car - you changed their story to say they were in a WW2 jeep and also changed it into a ‘wild night with lightning and thunder; a 30 to 40 mile an hour wind driving dust and dirt.’ You changed the facts and the details of a witness's testimony.”

Well, I would have ignored this because at the time I was working on another project and didn’t want to delve into this. But, coincidently, that project required information on Ragsdale, so I found myself rereading some of that testimony and looking at other, later testimony provided by Ragsdale. Here’s what I learned.

According to the taped interview of Ragsdale (please note that it is on tape) conducted by Don Schmitt on January 26, 1993, it was clear that Ragsdale said he was in a jeep. Ragsdale said, at one point, “…we got into a damned jeep to take off.”

He also said, during that January 26 interview, “We had the windshield down on the jeep…” This is a nice little detail that underscores the claim that he was in a jeep.

So, it was Ragsdale who said jeep, although he didn’t say a thing about it being a WW2 jeep, and I don’t believe he ever said anything about a car. Of course suggesting it was a WW2 jeep is a logical deduction, given the timing.

I did notice, however, that Ragsdale later claimed it was a pickup truck. In an affidavit which was not properly executed, Ragsdale said, “My friend and I had a pickup truck on this weekend.” So, I didn’t change anything, Ragsdale did. I have been unable to find any reference to a car.

As to the weather that night, I don’t believe I said, “Wild,” but did write, “The night was anything but quiet, as lightning flashed and thunder boomed. A wind, blowing at thirty or forty miles an hour, whipped across the bleak desert landscape.” This information came from an April 24, 1993 interview with Ragsdale at his house in Roswell.

In his 1995 affidavit, Ragsdale claimed, “The weather was perfect, and we were looking up at the stars. A storm was in the west, with lightning, but far away enough we couldn’t hear the thunder.”

Of course, in his 1993 affidavit, which was properly executed, Ragsdale claimed, he was out there “…during a severe lightning storm.”

Again, I didn’t change the testimony but it was changed later, as Ragsdale changed his story. For another example, take the location of the crash, according to what Ragsdale claimed. In his January 26 interview, he kept making reference to the Foster ranch and said, of the location of the crash, “… it’s a good thirty to forty miles.”

In his 1995 affidavit, he said, “A sign post on the Pine Lodge Road indicates ‘53 miles to Roswell’. Near this sign is a road going south toward Pine Lodge… and the turn off to Arabella leads east and south.”

But using a map with Don Schmitt in 1993, he pointed to the El Paso Natural Gas Pipeline north of Roswell and while the pipeline didn’t exist in 1947, in 1993, he used it as a reference point and it was nowhere near the Pine Lodge or Boy Scout Mountain as claimed by Ragsdale.

And finally because I have been accused of not following up on information that might lead away from the extraterrestrial, or in this case, impeaching a witness, Ragsdale claimed that he and his friend, identified as Trudy Truelove, had picked up bits of the metallic debris that exhibited strange qualities. But Ragsdale said that the debris was stolen.

In a very confusing statement, his wife claimed, “Well I had this fiddle that had been passed down for well, I proved that it was passed down for five generations, and I worked with it and it was a Stradivarius. It was very old and very expensive…”

They had been talking about a break-in at the house and the story continued. “Anyway the subject came up and my husband told them about having, you know the box in the house and he made the remark, well where do you keep stuff [the metallic debris] like that? …All they did was riddled the closet…. They went strictly to that closet and anything of value in that closet they took.”

Or, as we understand it, the house was burgled. The burglars went through a closet where the debris was kept and took it. These crooks, according to the Ragsdales, avoided other areas of the house and didn’t touch a coin collection that was in plain sight.

I did contact the Roswell Police asking if there had been any reports of the burglary but they could find no record of it. They did make it clear that the records were somewhat spotty so that crime report might have been destroyed as they purged files.

But even the burglary story has changed. In the 1996 affidavit, Ragsdale said, “My truck and trailer was stolen from my home. Again with material in the truck, never to be heard from anywhere. My home was broken into, completely ransacked and all that was taken was the material, a gun and very little else of value.”

I was also concerned about this claim of a Stradivarius, but have learned that there are some very cheap copies out there, marked with the Stradivarius name, so it didn’t seem impossible for Ragsdale to have one with the Stradivarius name in it. Of course, it wasn’t the expensive one because, had it been, I would have found a police report among other documentation such as a newspaper article.

The point here is that I hadn’t changed the testimony as claimed, but the witness had changed his story and I believe that was under the influence of Max Littell. It became a much better story, filling in the gaps that were in the original such as Ragsdale never getting down, close to the crash but seeing it in the distance the next morning. In the new version he was walking the scene and looking into the wrecked spaceship. My favorite part is his claiming to see a jewel-encrusted throne in the ship… A throne? In a spaceship?

Today I don’t think there are many who believe that Ragsdale saw anything. His testimony is tainted by too many major alterations. In 1997, there was a push to condemn me for what I had written about the tale, but then, I did have the original tape. Statements were taken from others to suggest that they believed Ragsdale’s new story, or showing how I had gotten the original details wrong. Apparently they didn’t bother to review the record. It is easy to sling allegations and difficult to verify facts. Here, the tape proves that I had reported what Ragsdale had said originally, until he decided to make the story better. The fault lies, not at my feet but at Ragsdale’s.


55 comments:

Anonymous said...

After researching and digesting all the Info on UFOs I have determined "Ufology" is bogus. A collective of swindling assholes that love separating the naive from their hard-earned cash. Friedman says skeptics refuse to look at the data, absurd as there is no data, just bullshit claims by pathetic individuals that want the attention or to seem important and "in the know". From Betty and Barney Hill to the "Roswell Slides", %100 utter bullshit.

cda said...

Derek:

I wouldn't go as far as that. However, I would agree with your last sentence. The Hills probably have far fewer adherents than Roswell does. Despite this I can see both cases going, or have gone, down in history as two of the 'classics'. I.e. they are here to stay, whatever happens to Ufology in the future.

Regarding the topic in question, here is the footnote on the very first page of the 2nd Randle/Schmitt book "THE TRUTH ABOUT THE UFO CRASH AT ROSWELL":

"The story told by Jim Ragsdale has been well corroborated by various family members.... [5 names follow]"

Note the phrase "well corroborated".

So Kevin, were these family
members all liars or not? If five members of a family all corroborate someone's testimony you expect to take this testimony as the truth, don't you?

The 'truth' is that in ufology there is no truth.

But I still would not put it quite as Derek Fraser did.

KRandle said...

CDA -

It means that Ragsdale had told them a similar tale through the years. After the Ragsdales got divorced, in the months after our interviews, the wife was somewhat less supportive. i think this had to do with the changes made to the base story after Max Littell got involved. Later still one of the relatives told me that the helmets had been made of gold. I can think of a metal that would be more useless than gold.

So, yes, we had talked to family members who said that the story was something Jim Ragsdale had been telling for a number of years.

No, Derek was a little too profane but then, the world changes and what was once taboo is now common place.

Capt Steve said...

I wouldn't take it to the same extreme as Derek.

I'd say (and this is just my opinion) that there's some sort of phenomena that at the very least causes people to believe that they've seen UFOs. I say "at the very least" because some of the radar/visual cases seem interesting...

...but the core data set isn't as large as some would lead you to believe, it may not be as solid as some would lead you to believe, and the data probably hasn't been properly analyzed.

[I say 'probably' to that last one as it's likely but not certain that someone somewhere, be they government entities or private citizens, HAVE analyzed the data but haven't shared their findings.]

Are UFOs and UFOlogy 100% bullshit? No, but whatever truth there is has been obscured by bullshit for a very long time.

Glenn said...

Derek, I doubt you have "researched and digested" anything at all, other than reading Skeptical Enquirer. I'm afraid that doesn't count.

James Fielding said...

A good point...the witness story continued to change over the years, verifiable thru taped interviews. You will find this same phenomenon in statements videotaped over the years, of American politico's....where they change unpopular statements to politically correct statements when an election rolls around, and claim they NEVER made that statement, until the videotape rolls. It seems that many "witnesses" and "participants" became thus AFTER, years after, the popularity of the incident unfolded after the late 70's. It is too bad these sorts dilute the investigation of facts surrounding this case.

Unknown said...

Kevin -

Do you have a favourite witness and that you believe 100%? When something really grabs me I get what I can only describe as goosebumps and a buzz. Is there a witness that has made you feel a similar way?

Nitram said...

Capt Steve wrote:

"Are UFOs and UFOlogy 100% bullshit? No, but whatever truth there is has been obscured by bullshit for a very long time".

Nearly right, but should read

Are UFOs and UFOlogy 100% bullshit? MAYBE, but whatever truth there is has POSSIBLY been obscured by bullshit for a very long time.

Anthony Mugan said...

This is a good example of why it is sadly necessary to be extremely sceptical about witness testimony. Even if examples like Ragsdale are towards the extreme end of the spectrum there are so many times where witnesses have honestly reported what they think they saw, but for this testimony to turn out to be a misinterpretation, or to have become distorted over time, that witness testimony alone struggles to be convincing. There will no doubt be exceptional circumstances occasionally around witness testimony but it reinforces to me the need to not accept any case unless there is overwhelming evidence that requires it.
Whilst to a close approximation this eliminates almost 100% of cases and it is easy to see why many people are so dismissive of the poor standards of evidence widely accepted in ufology I think Capt. Steve describes it correctly. A few dozen cases over 70 yrs plus survive the cull and present a primae facie case. Almost all of it is nonsense, but within all that noise there does seem to be something of interest.

cda said...

It also depends on what is meant by 'corroboration'. The five family members are said to have 'well corroborated' Ragsdale's testimony.

But if they had witnessed the event themselves, preferably independently, and THEN corroborated Ragsdale's story, this would be quite different, and far stronger, supporting evidence than merely telling investigators what Ragsdale told them (the family) possibly years earlier. Obviously the former is first-hand evidence, the latter second-hand.

Capt Steve said...

CDA brings up a very valid point. Just because Person B corroborates what person A said that does not make Person A's statement correct. It doesn't rule out the possibility that the truth is being told, but it also doesn't confirm it.

Nitram: I stand by my original statement. Something is causing people to believe that they've seen UFOs. That's definitive. It's the explanation that falls into the realms of possibility, and my hunch is that there are a whole bunch of causes behind UFOs (I lean towards Karl Pflock's idea that some of the earlier 'good' cases might be explainable by ET visitors who have since left the area. This clearly doesn't explain everything that's going on).

David Rudiak said...

cda wrote:
But if they had witnessed the event themselves, preferably independently, and THEN corroborated Ragsdale's story, this would be quite different, and far stronger, supporting evidence than merely telling investigators what Ragsdale told them (the family) possibly years earlier. Obviously the former is first-hand evidence, the latter second-hand.

Yes, but it does tell us whether the person was telling the story way back in the past long before anything of significance came out on Roswell, or whether the story was first told more in the present day. (The latter doesn't mean the witness is necessarily making it up. They could have witnessed something and simply waited a long time before speaking about it.)

As an example, mortician Glenn Dennis is regularly dismissed as a "liar" because he gave a made-up name for the nurse he said he knew that had witnessed an alien autopsy. However, various parts of his story do have corroboration from others, including their statements that he was speaking of these things a very long time ago. E.g., former Roswell police chief L.M. Hall in his affidavit, said Dennis was speaking to him immediately after the event (in July 1947) of getting a call from the base for small caskets with which to ship or bury the aliens. Hall said that at the time he thought Dennis was joking and didn't think anything of it.

Three more people who said Dennis told them at the time about the call for child-size caskets were Rex Alcorn, Clifford Butts, and William Burkstaller. Roswell attorney Richard L. Bean said he heard about the saucer crash within days, but it was another year before Dennis told him about the casket call. Sgt. Milton Sprouse said he heard the story from Dennis several years later during the funeral of a friend.

Unknown said...

But what about "Don Schmitt's Roswell Tale", sir? :

"I fell into
the same trap, writing a glowing, positive letter about my good friend Don
Schmitt who had told me that he didn't work at the post office as alleged,
that he did have the degrees he claimed, that he did work as a medical
illustrator who had contributed to a 600 page medical textbook, that he was
in the witness protection program and who worked with local authorities to
stop drugs flowing into the community.....
...I could go on, but there really is no point. We have Don Schmitt engaged in
activities that are not honest. We have caught him in lies about his
employment and background. I could document more but believe this is really
enough. Now, let's look at the charges leveled by Don's assistant, Brad
Radcliffe."

http://www.ufomind.com/area51/list/1997/nov/a04-003.shtml

Help us to understand which version of your Dream Team partner to believe, ok?

KRandle said...

CDA and Capt Steve -

At the time, the early 1990s, we were asking members of the family is they had heard the story prior to the publication of The Roswell Incident. Our thinking was that few were thinking in terms of spaceship crashes prior to then though some had been reported. These five people all said that they had heard the tale told by Ragsdale on other occasions suggesting that it was not something recently made up.

Later, as the family dynamic changed, and the site of the crash changed, some of those people decided that the tale was bogus, especially in the latest incarnation.

In other cases, when we interviewed family members, if they hadn't heard the story before, they told us. We had no reason to believe that so many would conspire to lie about something that had no real reward for them... unless Ragsdale was offering some compensation, but I never found any evidence of that.

Today, it is clear that Ragsdale made up the story which is sad, because, for a time, it provided a really nice opening for a lecture. Now, it is just a sad little tale of someone lying about something for no real reason.

Tony Stark (are you related to Ned and Sansa and the King of the North?) -

You quote from a letter that is more than twenty years old and allow for no one to mature... which is, of course, your privilege. I will note that I am not a member of the Dream Team and have not been for almost two years.

However, for this posting, it matters not what Don might have done in the past or what he said in the past because the interview is on tape. I tried to make that clear... The Air Force published part of it... and this is not to mention that I interviewed Ragsdale myself and listened to him tell the same tale again... so here it doesn't rest on Don's shoulders, but on the audio tape of Ragsdale and my follow up interviews.

Or, to be clear, you don't have to believe anything Don said because it is on tape... which, I believe I said at the time... if there is corroboration in the form to tapes, or if others had interviewed the witness and got the same story, then the information could be trusted as accurately represented... and so we don't go off on another tangent, what that means is that the information I reported is an accurate representation of what the witness said and doesn't mean that the witness wasn't lying about it.

cda said...

Interesting what Kevin says about the five family members. They all claimed to have heard Ragsdale's story before 1980 (when THE ROSWELL INCIDENT was published). The question arises as to whether Ragsdale told them all at about the same time, but that it was not before 1980 but far more likely during or shortly after 1980.

Exactly the same can be applied to Melvin Brown and his two daughters. Brown's 'tale' is known ONLY through what his daughters said c.1987 to Timothy Good in London (after Tim's own book ABOVE TOP SECRET came out) and later repeated to Brad Radcliffe a few years later.

And how did these daughters get the story? From Brown himself, sometime after the Apollo landings, according to Beverley Bean, one of the daughters who was only a child when Brown told them the story. At the time she 'giggled' at it when he told her!

Unfortunately Brown was long dead by the time Kevin and others could interview him, so again we have only a second-hand tale that his kids never took seriously until one of them happened to read Tim Good's book.

KRandle said...

CDA -

You understand that I am not suggesting that there is any validity to the Ragsdale tale don't you. I am saying that the family members seemed to confirm it but as things changed, so did the tale. It is not true.

Unknown said...

I confess I find it interesting that Phil Klass was spot on two decades ago about Ragsdale, Kaufmann, and Dennis:

"Thus, Randle and Schmitt (and others) should recognize that their star "crashed-saucer” witnesses—such as Frank J. Kaufmann, Jim Ragsdale, Ms. Frankie Rowe and former mortician Glenn Dennis—may be fundamentally honest folks who, like Schmitt, may occasionally be motivated to spin a tall tale."

http://www.csicop.org/specialarticles/show/klass_files_volume_33/

Nitram said...

David Rudiak wrote:

"However, various parts of his story do have corroboration from others, including their statements that he was speaking of these things a very long time ago."

Ok, maybe, perhaps. But if you're gonna tell a story, which is quite incredibly hard to believe, you would make sure that you haven't made anything up, like giving a false name for example.

Apart from the ridiculous waste of time spent by the researchers looking for the name of a person who didn't exist, you tend to lose a bit of credibility to put it mildly.

By the way David - is GD still around? If not what was the latest name he told his daughter to give people after his death?

CDA is right - anything about Roswell and off topic we go...

Nitram said...

Tony Stark wrote

"I confess I find it interesting that Phil Klass was spot on two decades ago about Ragsdale, Kaufmann, and Dennis"

Really - not sure what this proves.
Kevin Randle was spot on about two of them at least 15 years ago also.

Unknown said...

"Really - not sure what this proves.
Kevin Randle was spot on about two of them at least 15 years ago also."

http://www.cufos.org/frankkaufmannexposed.pdf

Please correct your work to read "about 12 years ago"

'Math - A Difficult Concept' (for the True Believer)

Nitram said...

Tony

I trust this is clear enough for you...

Kevin Randle was spot on about TWO of them at least 15 years ago also.

Kevin Randle was spot on about all THREE of them about 12 years ago.

Again Tony - what does this prove exactly?

'Comprehension - A Difficult Concept' (for the True Debunker)

KRandle said...

Tony Stark -

Here's the difference. Phil Klass knew there was no alien visitation. Therefore anything that suggested they was came from liars. He labeled the people liars with no evidence other than his personal opinion and although I know this will cause some grief, Klass did make up stuff to "prove" some of his theories.

If you take a look at the history, you'll see that it was those of us on this side of the fence that proved these people weren't telling the truth. I pointed this out in my book, The Randle Report in 1997, which suggested that the Ragsdale story be rejected because the changes in it. In that same book, I suggested that Glenn Dennis could no longer be trusted. The copyright date is 1997 or 18 years ago.

With Kaufmann, it was after 2000 that the evidence he had invented his tale came from Mark Rodeghier, Don Schmitt and Mark Chesney found the evidence that Kaufmann had invented his tale. As soon as I learned the truth I insisted that we publish it.

Frankie Rowe's testimony has not been successfully challenged. Karl Pflock's suggestion that the Roswell Fire Department couldn't verify her story turned out to be in error when one of the fire fighters confirmed that her father had gone to the site... which, of course, didn't mean Rowe's father's story was true but that she was relating the truth as she knew it. I wrote about this a while back on this blog.

So, Klass was right about some of this for the wrong reasons but we, on our side of the fence, proved the point.

KRandle said...

Tony -

Okay, I'll make it easy on you. The Frankie Rowe tale is here:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2008/09/corroboration-for-frankie-rowe.html

cda said...

Kevin:

I agree that you have exposed Ragsdale as a tall story teller.

But you seem to still accept the tale of Melvin Brown, based purely on what one of his daughters told Tim Good and another investigator, both many years afterwards.

True, Brown did provide evidence that he was at Roswell at the time. However, his 'tale' also changed (as told by Beverley Bean) with the telling and his two daughters disagreed on the number of 'beings' Brown supposedly saw under the tarpaulin. The other thing that changed was the date when Brown first related his story to his daughters.

Let's face it, both Ragsdale and Brown have VERY dodgy stories indeed. As far as I am concerned both are equally worthless.

OK, so I am off-topic (again).

KRandle said...

CDA -

I do not rely solely on the information from Good. I have a video taped interview from 1990 in which both daughters and the widow are interviewed. I would expect there to be differences of opinion on what their father and husband said and do not see these as significant.

The more important point is that Brown was not interviewed by anyone about this. The information is second hand which allows for all sorts of errors and interpretations that might not have come from the main source. So, with all that in mind, I find the information interesting but not significant and certainly not completely worthless.

David Rudiak said...

Nitram" wrote:
"By the way David - is GD still around?"

Last I heard, Dennis is still around but in a nursing home in poor health.

"If not what was the latest name he told his daughter to give people after his death?"

Don't know, since what he told me in 2001 (as best as I remember) was that he had given the name to all three of his daughters, not to be released until after his death. He is not dead yet and it would still be up to his daughters to release the name. He told me that one of the names in "Naomi Marie Selff" was nearly correct.

I would speculate maybe "Mary", as in Mary Crowley Lowe, a still-living base nurse in Roswell when Schmitt/Carey learned of her from a friend. The friend said Lowe had told her she had been a nurse at the base in 1947 when they brought in the aliens from the UFO crash.

Wendy Connors interviewed Lowe, who denied being at the base in 1947, saying she was an Army nurse stationed in Scotland at the time. (Similar to Dennis' story of "Nurse X" being sent to England afterward.) However, her Army records said she was discharged in 1946 for marrying a civilian.

When asked if she had been at the base in July 1947, Lowe asked Connors if Glenn Dennis had been her informant.

When Schmitt/Carey the next day asked Dennis about “Mary”, Dennis responded, "Oh, Mary Lowe. Yeah, she knows everything." Evidently, Lowe and Dennis knew one another.

Dennis quickly retracted his statement: "About yesterday, forget what I said about Mary Lowe. I was mistaken. She doesn't know anything!"

Now I know the skeptics will not accept this, but consider that a still-living nurse was in town that Dennis knew. IF she did "know everything,” there might be a good reason for Dennis to give out a false name, not because he is some nefarious "liar", as he is usually represented, but because he was protecting the identity of a friend in town with highly sensitive information she didn't want associated with her.

Is this much different from journalists not giving out the names of sensitive sources, or using aliases like "Deep Throat"? The main difference is that Dennis didn't make it clear that the name he gave out was an alias, and led researchers like Kevin on a wild goose chase. Kevin is understandably miffed at the waste of time and money on his part.

Dennis clearly lied about the name, but it doesn't prove that Dennis actually lied about the existence of such a nurse, or about other parts of his story (such as the child casket call from the base). Just about every other facet of his story has corroboration from other sources (examples below).

Another name similar to "Mary" is "Miriam Bush", the secretary of the hospital administrator, Lt. Col. Harold Warne. According to family members, Bush came home in a state of shock after Warne took her to see the alien bodies being worked on by doctors not from the base. One was still alive

Victor Golubic, who had lived in Roswell and done the most work on the medical personnel there, thought it possible Dennis made "Nurse X" a composite of various medical personnel, which might also include Adeline Fanton, another young, pretty nurse with black hair and associated with Dennis.

Another witness to speak of a nurse fitting the description was Pete Anaya, who said he knew her and saw her outside the base hangar when he and his brother Ruben came to the base to pick up N.M. Lt. Gov. Joseph Montoya after he gave them a call. Pete Anaya said she resembled his young, pretty, black-haired wife Mary. The nurse and maybe another came out of the hangar and told them the bodies were not from this world. In one interview, Ruben said he saw two bodies from a distance, one of them moving. The Anayas also said a badly shook-up Montoya later also told them about the four space beings, one of them still alive.

David Rudiak said...

Further regarding Glenn Dennis, I met him once in 2001 when I was visiting the Roswell museum. While I was in the library there, Dennis came up and struck up a conversation. We probably spoke about an hour.

As town mortician in a small town, Dennis probably knew most of the families in town and rancher's in the surrounding area. I remember distinctly him describing Jim Ragsdale as a "raging alcoholic," suggesting, I think, that he thought he wasn't credible.

Instead he told me the rancher's were the ones to approach, as they knew what went down.

Brian B said...

On Rowe and Dwyer her father:

Agree - In dire circumstances it is reasonable to assume a fire department might go beyond its designated jurisdiction to aid or prevent a larger disaster. How often? Probably not very often. To aid Army Air Corp crashes? Maybe - but only in dire circumstances.

Agree - Dwyer and fire team were told not to "go out there"? Sure - especially since RAAF personnel were attempting to handle it themselves - whatever it was - and particularly if officers above them knew it was a top secret project. Doesn't mean it was "alien".

Agree - Rowe has tried to be truthful in her recollections - yes probably, but much of what she has stated is inconsistent with other "witness" testimony and appears "sensationalized" or "embellished".

Disagree - Dwyer drove out there on his own - seems pretty odd given that there was a strict "cordon" that he would have been allowed to even get close, much less "talk" to an alien the way Rowe says he did.

Disagree - Rowe's sister has corroborated her story about being threatened - all she has corroborated is that she vaguely recalls her sister claiming such a thing happened - not proof of anything really.

Disagree - Rowe's testimony has not been challenged - really? Let's see: 1) She restated in 1994 that a state trooper showed her debris material that was "quicksilver" and liquid as well as solid and could be folded into "almost nothing". This part is inconsistent with other witness testimony - it resembles perhaps more what special effects conveyed in the 1994 Roswell movie - and that is a problem. 2) She claims MP's came to her house to threaten her soon after - and that they described "shooting her", "sending her east" for adoption, or sending her to a WWII POW camp or Japanese internment camp - really? Those camps were not even in operation in 1947. 3) She claims her dad saw three dead aliens and one living - including a painting contractor who saw one walking into RAAF hospital. Odd that no one has been able to establish how many aliens there were, and despite such threats a painter was able to see an alien in broad daylight on a military base on a holiday weekend?

Pflock asked her about the tonsils since they were a minor part of her story - she couldn't produce any medical records and no hospitals or MDs in the area could either. Supposedly she claimed KR told her that the government "was thorough" in eliminating evidence. So now we have government agents taking people's unimportant and really unrelated medical records?

KRandle said...

David -

Had the only lie he told been the nurse's name, and given his claim that he promised he wouldn't tell anyone who she was, I'd be willing to overlook this. But that isn't the situation.

He said that she had been transferred from the base within days of the events. While we know that there was a lot of that going on, there is nothing to suggest there were medical staff involved.

He said that she was killed in an aircraft accident that killed five other nurses, but a search of the New York Times index from July 1947 to the end of 1955 revealed no military aircraft accidents that killed five nurses. Don Berliner searched the Stars & Stripes, a military newspaper published overseas for members of the military, and no such story was found. This would be Dennis' second lie.

He said after it was revealed that no nurse by the name given could be found that he told us originally he would give us a name but it wouldn't be the right name. That was another lie.

After he was told that no nurse existed by the name he gave, he said that her last name was Sipes. That would be another lie.

He said originally that he had some sort of relation with this nurse, but at the time he was married and his wife was pregnant. While it certainly could be true that he was having an affair, he described the nurse as a "good Catholic girl" which would suggest that she wouldn't get involved... so this is either a lie or doesn't speak well of Dennis' credibility.

While I was talking to him about another matter, he asked me why we couldn't find his nurse. He had given us the name. I said that we'd found four women with the right name but none were the right woman. But here's the point, he was reinforcing that he had given us the correct name, not some made up name that he warned us was made up.

I suspect he didn't think we'd be able to prove that no one by the name he gave us had been an Army nurse. When he was confronted by this, he retreated and blamed us for not listening to what he had to say.

I could also point out that his descriptions of the alien creature, as told to him by this imaginary nurse, actually matched matched the Martians from the 1953 version of War of the Worlds (speaking here of the arm and the hands... although he said hands with four fingers that ended in suction cups and those in the movie had three but the arm anatomy was the same) and the head matches that published in the Roswell Daily Record in 1988 suggests he was drawing on those sources.

The point is that it goes beyond just making up the name of the nurse. And now, with his health as bad as it is, there is no way to learn more from him... and giving a name to his daughters to be revealed after his death is just another dodge to keep the story alive (and yes I see the irony in that statement).

KRandle said...

Brian –

I would have thought that you might offer an apology for claiming that I had changed testimony when it was demonstrated that the witness had…

You wrote:
“On Rowe and Dwyer her father:

“Agree - In dire circumstances it is reasonable to assume a fire department might go beyond its designated jurisdiction to aid or prevent a larger disaster. How often? Probably not very often. To aid Army Air Corp crashes? Maybe - but only in dire circumstances”.

I have posted to this blog the fire records showing runs outside the city limits in 1947. They made the runs, period.

“Agree - Dwyer and fire team were told not to "go out there"? Sure - especially since RAAF personnel were attempting to handle it themselves - whatever it was - and particularly if officers above them knew it was a top secret project. Doesn't mean it was "alien".”

Didn’t say that it meant that… Dwyer, without a fire team went to the site, as per the testimony of one of the fire fighters there in 1947. He was interviewed by Pflock and told me the same thing until I asked if he knew Dan Dwyer. He said yes and that Dwyer had gone out there… all of which was reported here. I wonder why Pflock didn’t get that information… or did he and just failed to report it.

“Agree - Rowe has tried to be truthful in her recollections - yes probably, but much of what she has stated is inconsistent with other "witness" testimony and appears "sensationalized" or "embellished".”

In your opinion it is “embellished,” but you have no evidence of that, other than your opinion that what fell was not alien and therefore anything that suggests otherwise must be “sensationalized” or “embellished.”

“Disagree - Dwyer drove out there on his own - seems pretty odd given that there was a strict "cordon" that he would have been allowed to even get close, much less "talk" to an alien the way Rowe says he did.”

Disagree all you want but that is what Frankie said and it was corroborated by one of the fire fighters whom Pflock interviewed… funny that Pflock didn’t mention this… and before you get your panties in a bunch, I merely mean that another person, independently of Frankie said that Dwyer had gone out there and yes, I have the fire fighter’s interview on tape and yes, Pflock cites him in a footnote.

KRandle said...

Part II -

“Disagree - Rowe's sister has corroborated her story about being threatened - all she has corroborated is that she vaguely recalls her sister claiming such a thing happened - not proof of anything really.”

Wrong again… From the affidavit signed by Cahill…

During a visit from my parents in 1948, my father told me that something very important had happened but the was not able to tell me. He said that he was concerned about the safety of the family if he told… my mother confirmed that something had happened and that my father wished he could tell me about it but he was afraid for the family. My mother said that my father was afraid that someone would come out and kill me if they thought he had told me anything.

“Disagree - Rowe's testimony has not been challenged - really? Let's see: 1) She restated in 1994 that a state trooper showed her debris material that was "quicksilver" and liquid as well as solid and could be folded into "almost nothing". This part is inconsistent with other witness testimony - it resembles perhaps more what special effects conveyed in the 1994 Roswell movie - and that is a problem.”

Oh, and I didn’t say her testimony hadn’t been challenged, said that it had not been successfully challenged, which is, of course, a matter of opinion and a slightly different matter. And the movie was made in 1994, long after Frankie offered her descriptions… and of course, all witness testimonies must agree because it is impossible that she saw something that others did not.

“ 2) She claims MP's came to her house to threaten her soon after - and that they described "shooting her", "sending her east" for adoption, or sending her to a WWII POW camp or Japanese internment camp - really? Those camps were not even in operation in 1947.”

No, but everyone in New Mexico knew about Orchard Park so your point is irrelevant… She even mentioned that they had been POW camps during the war so she knew the difference.

“ 3) She claims her dad saw three dead aliens and one living - including a painting contractor who saw one walking into RAAF hospital. Odd that no one has been able to establish how many aliens there were, and despite such threats a painter was able to see an alien in broad daylight on a military base on a holiday weekend?”

Odd that you seem to think that everyone would see the same thing in an operation that was spread over so much area and so many days. It didn’t occur to you that someone might have only seen three and someone else might have seen four which doesn’t negate the first witness, only that the second saw more. A truly useless point to make.

“Pflock asked her about the tonsils since they were a minor part of her story - she couldn't produce any medical records and no hospitals or MDs in the area could either. Supposedly she claimed KR told her that the government "was thorough" in eliminating evidence.
So now we have government agents taking people's unimportant and really unrelated medical records?”

Actually, according to Pflock Stan Friedman attempted to get her medical records and didn’t do it. No one seems to question why a medical facility would hand over the records to someone who wasn’t a relative and had no reason to see those records…

Before you begin to challenge me about only looking for evidence that leads to the alien, how about you look at some of the evidence that leads away from your narrow point of view. Had you looked at some of the postings on this blog, you would have seen evidence that Pflock was wrong on several points as the evidence showed. For example, he claimed that a former city councilman told him that the fire department didn’t make runs outside the city. That councilman was Max Littell and he didn’t serve until the 1950s. The fire department records prove this was in error.

cda said...

Kevin:

In the above you refer to statements made by Rowe and Dwyer. Elsewhere we have had other similar claims about certain threats supposedly made by AF officials against civilians if they 'talked too much' about what they saw or heard about Roswell.

I have never served in the USAF or in any other branch of the US military, but I am willing to state that certain of these threats are fictitious - either they were made up by the 'witnesses' or by their relatives many years after the event.

The reason they are fictitious is that I am positive the USAF do NOT, and never have, made threats to either kill children, or kidnap them, or put them in a childrens' home or "send them for adoption" or any other preposterous notion. Anyone saying that such threats were made is talking twaddle, and you ought to say so.

I put the question directly to you: Do you believe such threats against children, or even their parents, were ever made? I refuse to accept that any such death threats or implied kidnap threats were (or are now) made by members of the US armed forces to civilians at any time.

David Rudiak said...

Kevin felt there were a number of reasons Glenn Dennis' story wasn’t to be believed, besides leading them astray with false names for the nurse he said he knew who told him of an alien autopsy.

KEVIN: “He said that she had been transferred from the base within days of the events. While we know that there was a lot of that going on, there is nothing to suggest there were medical staff involved.”

“Nothing to suggest” I’m guessing means you and others were unable to find documented evidence to that effect. But there are at least two other witnesses I know of speaking of disappearing medical personnel, including the nurse fitting Dennis’ description.

Pete Anaya in Tim Shawcross’ “Roswell Files” said he ran into the nurse outside the hangar when he and brother Ruben went to pick up Lt. Gov. Montoya. He had known her from before from a base dance when he danced with her. After that meeting at the hangar, he said he never saw her again.

Sgt. Milton Sprouse spoke of a staff sergeant medical tech in his barracks he knew who told him of an alien autopsy involving two doctors and two nurses that he witnessed. The next day, he said, the man was transferred from the base.

“We never heard from him again. We asked and (they said), 'Oh, we don't know nothing about it.' ... I heard later that both nurses and both doctors were shipped different directions and nobody ever knew where they went.”

http://roswellproof.homestead.com/Sprouse.html

As for not finding records to that effect, you yourself have written that base records were altered to cover up anything unusual happening, e.g. citing Blanchard’s adjutant Patrick Saunders writing in the jacket of one of your books:

“Files were altered. So were personal records, along with assignments and various codings and code words. Changing serial numbers ensured that those searching later would not be able to locate those who were involved in the recovery. ...If the men didn’t know one another, or were separated after the event, they would be unable to compare notes and that would make the secret easier to keep.”

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2009/03/roswell-ufo-crash-and-patrick-saunders.html

His daughter also wrote you: "At one point... [he] bragged to me about how well he had covered the ‘paper trail’ associated with the clean up!"

We certainly know of other people claiming to have been quickly transferred because they had seen too much, so why wouldn’t the same be true medical personnel? One such example was Lt. Robert Shirkey, assistant operations officer, who saw the loading of the B-29 with boxes of unusual metallic debris, being told it was from a flying saucer. Shirkey said shortly after that he was transferred to the Phillipines to an assignment that didn’t exist when he got there. He can’t document this either, since he has been unable to find the paperwork indicating the transfer took place.

A better documented example of this is how the CIA hid the identities of men working at Area 51 so that no one would know they worked for the CIA, worked at Area 51, or what they did. Various men who worked out there have said they were paid with checks from companies they never worked for, such as Pan Am. Test pilots had records placing them at other bases doing other assignments while they were actually flying the planes. These people mention they can’t produce any paperwork showing they ever worked there. They have only each other to corroborate their “tales”.

There are other parallels, such as security personnel saying that when an A-12 secret spy plane crashed near Wendover, Utah in 1963, witnesses to the crash (a deputy and a family on vacation who took photos) were threatened with dire consequences, and also bribed with cash to silence them. Naturally, the film was also confiscated. “You scared them,” said one. (Of course, CDA knows with his usual absolute certainty that no agency of the government would ever threaten an actual family, like the Dwyers in Roswell, so it couldn’t have happened with the A-12 crash either.)

David Rudiak said...

More on Glenn Dennis:

KEVIN: “He said that she was killed in an aircraft accident that killed five other nurses, but a search of the New York Times index from July 1947 to the end of 1955 revealed no military aircraft accidents that killed five nurses. Don Berliner searched the Stars & Stripes, a military newspaper published overseas for members of the military, and no such story was found. This would be Dennis' second lie.”

Dennis never stated this as a fact. What he said is that he tried to write her and got the letter returned marked “Return to Sender--Deceased.” Later, according to his affidavit “one of the nurses at the base said the RUMOR was that she and five other nurses had been on a training mission and had been killed in a plane crash.”

Dennis affidavit (see #14):
http://roswellproof.homestead.com/dennis.html#anchor_3374

Thus I think it a gross overstatement to label this a proven LIE. Instead what you and Don Berliner found is that you couldn’t verify such a plane crash took place. But Dennis never said it was anything but a rumor. For all we know, this could be the absolute truth. He received back a letter marked “Deceased” and there was a story going around he was told that she and other nurses died in a plane crash. There is no way to prove that he actually made up this part of the story, only that you couldn’t verify it as fact.

KEVIN: “He said originally that he had some sort of relation with this nurse, but at the time he was married and his wife was pregnant. While it certainly could be true that he was having an affair, he described the nurse as a "good Catholic girl" which would suggest that she wouldn't get involved... so this is either a lie or doesn't speak well of Dennis' credibility.”

I find this an exceptionally weak argument that he was lying about the nurse existing or that any of this has anything to do with his credibility. Even “good Catholic girls” have affairs or lesser romantic daliances. Happens all the time.

KEVIN: “I could also point out that his descriptions of the alien creature, as told to him by this imaginary nurse, actually matched the Martians from the 1953 version of War of the Worlds (speaking here of the arm and the hands... although he said hands with four fingers that ended in suction cups and those in the movie had three but the arm anatomy was the same) and the head matches that published in the Roswell Daily Record in 1988 suggests he was drawing on those sources.

The large (bigger than human), red, three-fingered, WOTW movie Martian with one large suction cup at the tip of each finger, a hand with tiny wrist, tripartite eye in its chest/head, no head with neck on its shoulders, and huge bulging shoulders, only in the MOST SUPERFICIAL WAY resembles the small humanoid-looking being, with very humanoid head and neck, with a hand much more like humans (wrist, side-by-side fingers), four fingers, and TINY pads like suction cups at the ends, that he said the nurse described. Compare and see (see also Dennis’ affidavit of description):

Drawing based on Dennis description (what he remembers the nurse drawing)
http://www.roswellproof.com/files/aliens.gif

WOTW alien:
http://www.thedoctorsmodelmansion.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/SJC_0588a.jpg

That he then spliced in a humanoid head from the 1998 RDR, and came up with the small, humanoid body with four fingers ala the descriptions of medical sources of Leonard Stringfield (generally unknown outside the UFO community—I didn’t learn of Stringfield’s work until 1995) strikes me as very far-fetched speculation and an extremely weak argument against Dennis

KRandle said...

David -

I'm not going to get drawn into this argument. Dennis clearly invented the nurse, gave us a fake name, and then complained that we couldn't find her. You provide an alibi by suggesting he didn't lie about her being killed in a plane crash but blame the "rumor" on other nurses. But if she never existed, then he invented the plane crash rumor himself.

Yes, even good Catholic girls have affairs but I'm saying that if this is true, then his credibility suffers and if it isn't true, then it is just a reason to provide an excuse for him to write her once she left the Roswell area.

It really boils down to his giving us a name, and when he is told that we found no evidence of an Army nurse by that name, he said he told us he wouldn't give us the right name... which is a way of blaming us for the failure...

Sorry, I simply no longer accept the story as true. Even Tom Carey and Don Schmitt, in their book, wrote, "Dennis was found to have knowingly provided false information to investigators, and must technically stand impeached as a Roswell witness."

KRandle said...

CDA -

Given the time and given the circumstances, I can see the military officers telling witnesses there would be dire consequences for talking about this... I will note that I don't believe there was ever any possibility of those threats being carried out and will say that I can see where witnesses might have misinterpreted exactly what was said.

I will note that the military witnesses were told that the event was classified and revealing it to those not cleared to learn about it would results in criminal prosecution and files... which is fairly standard in such circumstances.

So, to answer your question, yes, I think threats were made and I think that witnesses truly believe there were death threats, though the military might not have made them quite that specific.

Paul Young said...

If Dennis did fabricate the whole nurse thing and wanted to send investigators, like KR, on a wild goose chase then I can't understand why he would have dreamt up such an unusual, and therefore easy to check out, name as Naomi Self/Selff.
I can't think that I've ever come across that surname!
Obviously he would have avoided a Smith or Jones as too obvious...but Selff!!!

KRandle said...

Paul -

In our search we found four women named Naomi Self or Selff... she was said to have a brother William Self and we found more than 200 with that name. Unusual, yes? Besides, you're just speculating on why he made up such a strange name. Who knows where he got it.

Brian B said...

Most everyone involved with interviewing Dennis have since reported that he was clearly playing one researcher against another while dodging the truth. his story evolvd as he saw fit based on how his interviews unfolded.

He was caught numerous times recanting aspects of his own testimony and then selling it again to someone else or in some public setting, or claiming he "couldn't recall what he said".

Don't forget the alleged drawings he provided were in fact drawn by another artist for him - that artist claims he was never given due credit but more importantly that Dennis stated to him "we could make a lot of money from this". Again there is your motivation.

KRandle said...

Brian -

Do you enjoy being wrong? Walter Henn is the artist and he was given credit in the update version of Don Schmitt's and my first Roswell book.

Brian B said...

Not according to Henn in a verbatim interview he gave to Pflock. Check your sources.

KRandle said...

Looked at my book, saw Henn was credited as having made the drawing... have a letter from him about this and my response to him so I don't need to look at Pflock's book... found Pflock was busy taking potshots at me and failing to hit the target every time. And yes, I already know about Kaufmann and Ragsdale so it is not necessary to mention them.

Did you read what I wrote? Do you think I would have said that if I couldn't produce a copy of the book with the credit line in it?

Brian B said...

Hate to ask it, but what publication date is the version you're looking at? Pflock and Henn claimed it wasn't so in first editions. Perhaps then it was corrected later. Just asking.

KRandle said...

Brian -

Hate to say the same thing but can you read? I said that it was in the update version of the book. The last version of the book was updated in 1997 or four years before Karl published his book. Naturally my correspondence with Henn is dated prior to that.

David Rudiak said...

Kevin,

Regarding Glenn Dennis, I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree. Clearly he lied about the name of the nurse he said he had a relationship with and who told him of an alien autopsy. I disagree completely that clearly there was no nurse nor any truth to any part of his story.

Yes, Carey and Schmitt wrote in their book that Dennis impeached himself by lying about the name of the nurse. But they have told me privately they believe there is a core truth to his story, and so do I. Let’s briefly look at the story:

1. Did Nurse X exist? You yourself have written that you believe an autopsy was conducted at the base hospital which might very well have involved a nurse or two. There is testimony from others about nurses/medical personnel knowing of the bodies (e.g., Ruben and Pete Anaya base hangar/Montoya story, giving a similar physical description of the nurse) and/or autopsy (e.g. Milton Sprouse) or seeing the bodies being worked on by doctors at the base hospital (Eleazar Benavides; family of Miriam bush) or in the base hangar (Montoya story to the Anayas), all elements of Dennis’s Nurse X story. The horrible stench of the alien bodies has also been mentioned by Benavides, Frank Joyce (what Brazel told him coming to town), and widow of Sgt. Leroy Wallace,

2. Would Dennis possibly have known Nurse X? Since he handled mortuary arrangements for the base and was frequently on the base, likely he would have known some nurses and other medical personnel, including Miriam Bush, secretary, who told family of seeing the bodies being worked on at the base hospital. More importantly, at least two witnesses mention they knew of Dennis having some involvement of one of the nurses there, specifically Eileen Fanton, who fit the physical description and Catholic background of Nurse X to a T, was transferred off the base weeks later, and served a tour of duty in England afterward, all elements of Glenn’s story. She didn’t die, as per Dennis’ story, but Dennis also said he didn’t knew for sure if she did or not. That is what he was told. Clearly Dennis did know well one of the nurses (Fanton) and at least had a friendship with her, and she very well could have assisted in an autopsy or known of the bodies (as per the Anaya story).

3. The base child casket call and questions about body preservation. Perhaps the best-corroborated part of the Dennis story, multiple witnesses say Dennis was talking about it in the days following or within a few years. He clearly didn’t dream it up 40+ years later after reading an article in the Roswell Daily Record. There is additional corroboration from several other witnesses found by Carey/Schmitt of the mortuary in nearby Hagerman supplying the child caskets since they had them on hand, vs. Dennis’ story of having only one and telling the base caller it would take several days to order more, a good reason for the base to go elsewhere. This is all very consistent. Dennis was also telling parts of the story to close family in the early 1980s before Stan Friedman found him in 1989 and before the big flurry of Roswell books in the 1990s.

4. Recommending ice for preservation. Testimony exists of the town being cleaned out of ice and dry ice by the military (e.g., Rogene Cordes) and the aliens being packed in ice (Pappy Henderson family, such as Sappho Henderson saying her husband told her they were packed in dry ice, Melvin Brown story). Not real strong line of evidence, but certainly consistent with Dennis’ story.

5. His father and Sheriff Wilcox being close friends, and Wilcox telling the father his son should keep his mouth shut. Consistent with others saying Wilcox warned them to stay quiet (e.g. the Anayas). Others confirm Wilcox/father were friends. Glenn Dennis’ fraternal twin Bob told friend John Price that Wilcox did indeed come to the house and warn his father. The story of what happened was told to him by his father when he came home from the service.

I would say it is far from clear that Dennis made the whole thing up.

Brian B said...

Kevin -

So nice of you to once again avoid the obvious with sarcasm as your response.

The Dennis drawings were first published in the 1991 edition of UFO Crash at Roswell where the credit was given to Dennis, not Henn, which is what Pflock accurately reported based on Fenn's complaint that the drawings were published by YOU as quote "drawings by Glenn Dennis...based on the actual drawings done...by the nurse".

You are referring to your 1997 The Truth About the UFO Crash at Roswell...and of course you have a letter from Fenn - because you or your publisher amended the attribute in the 1997 revised edition. Just because Pflock's book was published four years later doesn't mean his research was done in 2001.

His data comes from his interview with Fenn in 1995 - four years AFTER your first book was published. Nice try. No wonder Pflock subtiitled his book "inconvenient facts".,..

KRandle said...

Brian -

You begin to bore me. Yes, originally the drawings were published giving credit to Glenn Dennis... Have you bothered Stan Friedman with this trivia? He gave credit to Glenn Davis, whoever that might be.

Once Walter Henn raised the issue, I had the caption in the UFO Crash at Roswell changed to reflect Walter Henn's contribution. Henn's drawings do not appear in The Truth about the UFO Crash at Roswell. In 1991, we published what Glenn Dennis told us... that he had made the drawings... and as soon as we had the opportunity, we corrected the error.

Karl had the opportunity to talk with me about this, he could have looked at the updated version of UFO Crash at Roswell and he could have told Henn that the second book to give credit to Dennis was Friedman's.

And because his book was published four years later, he had the opportunity to get the facts right.

And now we return to the Jim Ragsdale tale, which was the subject of this post.

Brian B said...

Kevin -

The question may "bore you" but perhaps not someone new to this blog or the potentially many silent readers to these conversations.

Since you are now willing to confirm that what I originally stated was in fact true, that the first book you published had the drawings incorrectly attributed, you might've said that upfront to begin with instead of drawing attention away from it and simply using sarcasm and criticism as a way to misdirect readers' attention.

You might've simply said "....yes Pflock had it right on that episode. Originally we believed the drawings were made by Dennis himself. Unfortunately he lied, just like Ragsdale. We didn't discover that until later, so we made amends with Fenn and corrected the error".

That would have sufficed since we all know researchers in this subject area often encounter so called witnesses who exaggerate or even lie. Instead we get comments like "I have the latest edition in front of me and I don't see anything that proves what you're saying is correct".

The subject is not trivial to Roswell, because many people incorrectly believe that Dennis had personally drawn those sketches and that they depict real aliens.

There are many people who still claim that Dennis was in fact a truthful eye witness, and use those drawings as evidence for not only the defense of a fictitious nurse, but also for Dennis's "factual" account.

Those drawings are circulated as evidence that so called "witnesses", including Ragsdale, might actually be right and somehow there's a grand conspiracy on the part of the military to hide the truth about dead or living aliens.

On the subject of Ragsdale, had he even had at any point in time a real physical and psychological evaluation, which I highly doubt ever occurred, it may have born evidence that the man suffered from some sort of mental illness which precipitated a habit of extreme exaggeration. To that point, just because he told people about a crashed saucer and dead aliens long before researchers came along doesn't mean what he was saying was truthful.

He could've drawn information from many sources long before the 1970s, and not until UFO researchers came on-site did he decide to play his hand at "whooping it up" even more.

Terry the Censor said...

> But Ragsdale said that the debris was stolen.

"missing evidence" seems to be the most common kind of physical evidence for UFOs (yet I never see a "missing evidence" entry in any UFO book index).

Kevin, I really enjoy these type of posts, where you show the timeline of a witness' testimony. Too many researchers pretend that later (better!) versions where always there from the beginning.

I appreciate you trying to be an honest broker of UFO information.

09rja said...

I think (obviously) the Ragsdale story is false.....but a question I have always had is: has anyone ever confirmed this "Trudy Truelove" even existed? Wasn't this name a pseudonym assumed by Roswell authors? Even the debunker books I have read take it at face value that she existed.

KRandle said...

There is, was, a family named Truelove. Trudy was not killed in an automobile accident, that was her sister. The name was not a pseudonym, but the name supplied by Ragsdale, and the family was from Carlsbad... and I certainly don't understand the point now... so long after we've shown the Rasdale information to be bogus.

09rja said...

I'm confused. Ragsdale said it was Trudy who was killed in the car wreck (a few years after the Roswell event).....so it turns out it was her sister? So did anyone ever speak with Trudy? If so, what (if anything) did she say about Jim?

KRandle said...

It doesn't matter... Ragsdale made up the story of his involvement. He said that he was there with Trudy but she had been killed in a car wreck... There was a real family, and Trudy's sister was the one who was killed. There is no evidence that Trudy had been anywhere with Ragsdale to see a UFO crash, no evidence that Ragsdale saw one, so all this is now moot.

09rja said...

I was just curious because one book covering this subject made the claim that she "confirmed" his story. So I've always been curious if she was ever interviewed on this.

David said...

Dude, Ragsdale was a drunk trespasser with a weak flashlight, according to his early claims. He wouldn't have known a spacecraft from a Sherman tank. Ridiculous to ever consider him a significant credible witness, regardless of inconsistencies.