My Latest Outrage - Bielek, Allende and Several Other Things

I’m outraged… outraged, I say. In the last couple of days, I have been bombarded with nonsense in books, on the Internet and on television. Just when I think we have heard the last of some of the nonsense out there, someone feels the obligation to resurrect it with another half-baked, ignorant theory.

Let’s start with the book. I had ordered, through Kindle, a book on conspiracies, not that I’m enamored with them, but because the book was free and it touched on a couple of topics I find interesting. So, I plowed through the Kennedy assassination stuff, some of it, in fact, informative, but then I came to two things that I know something about and that I knew were wrong.

First, I was treated to the idea the William Cooper had been assassinated by Arizona deputies because he knew too much about UFOs and the secret studies. Cooper, who claimed that he knew all about MJ-12 because of his position in the Navy, was considered dangerous, according to the theory. He had some sort of gig as a briefing officer on highly classified material, or something like that. MJ-12 was part of it, or was something that he had seen. However, if MJ-12 is a hoax, and the smart money is on that, not to mention that the best evidence shows that, then Cooper’s claims were also a hoax.

There would be no reason for government assassins, in the guise of Arizona deputies, to gun him down. Of course, had he not fired at them first, the outcome might have been different. The point, however, is that the information about Cooper was badly flawed.

Second, in that same book, there was a short mention of the McMartin Preschool scandal of the 1980s. The McMartins were accused of dozens of crimes including child abuse, engaging in Satanic rituals, child porn (I think), and a host of other crimes involving dozens of children. In the end, the vast majority of the charges were dismissed and the case ended in a colossal boondoggle.

Children, for example, had claimed they were flown out of state for the rituals, taken to locations in which Satanists abused them, sexual abuse in a super market, blood sacrifices and other crimes. But investigation showed that most of the crimes and abuse could not have been committed as described because of timing or in the locations mentioned. In fact, most claims of the Satanic abuse faded at the end of the 1980s for the lack of any concrete evidence that there was a national, Satanic cabal that was protected at the highest levels of the government.

To prove the case, however, the book suggested that the children told of underground tunnels below the school. Once it was demolished, there was some sort of old dumping ground found. This was proof of the tunnels, or so it was claimed. The children had been right. The problem was that so many of the tales told by the children were impossible and no evidence in the form of pictures, which the children claimed had been taken, were ever found. That was the sort of thing that the author relied on… a short reference with a suggestion of proof that had been debunked long ago.

In keeping with my chasing footnotes hobby, I chased a number of footnotes in the book and they lead to a right-wing publication and no further. I didn’t find the source material particularly persuasive, and if the source is flawed, then the information is flawed. In these cases, I knew the source was flawed. Given that, I didn’t find much else in the book that was of use.

AOL, once again, treated us to the story of Al Bielek. I don’t know how many times they have recycled this story. It’s always the same one, provides no real analysis, and suggests that Bielek is a real time traveler who knows, or knew, what the future holds. I’m astonished that Bielek didn’t make himself rich with this future knowledge like Marty McFly attempted when he traveled from 1985 to

A young Brad Steiger

2015. A simple check of sports outcomes or trends in the stock market or commodities, should yield millions. Bielek didn’t have any of that information. Hell, a wager on the outcome of the 2016 election, information about the president surely available in the future, would have done the trick, but no, Bielek missed that bet.

I don’t suppose I have to mention that Bielek’s tale is based on the Philadelphia Experiment, the Navy’s alleged attempt to teleport a ship. Of course, that tale is untrue and first surfaced as part of the Allende Letters, another hoax, revealed as such by Robert Goerman. All this has been explored on this blog in the past. I think the best of those articles can be read here:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2016/08/chasing-sources-philadelphia-experiment.html

One other thing about all this. My late friend, Brad Steiger had befriended Bielek in the past. Bielek stayed at his house on a

The late Carlos Allende aka
Carl Allen.

number of occasions and Brad told me that he found Bielek to be a likable chap. Brad said that he was deeply saddened when he realized that Bielek was not telling the truth. Bielek’s story is a hoax… but AOL keeps alerting us to it without telling us that it is a hoax.

Finally, I saw another of the seemingly endless documentaries on alien abduction, telling us the same tired stories with almost no evidence of anything extraordinary happening. I was going to pussyfoot around this topic somewhat, but really, why?

We were told that many of the abductees “remember” some of the event without the use of hypnosis. We learn that Betty and Barney Hill had conscious memories of the event before they were hypnotized by Dr. Benjamin Simon. But what we weren’t told was that there had been no memories until they surfaced in Betty Hill’s dreams. These she shared with researchers such as Walter Webb and, of course, her

The late Budd Hopkins, a leader
in abduction research.

husband. That the memories first surfaced in dreams is, I think, an important part of the case.

And, when we begin to talk of memories prior to hypnosis, we find that many of them are from hypnopompic and hypnagogic hallucinations. These are sometimes terrifyingly real dreams upon waking or going to sleep. These accompany sleep paralysis and are often associated with a belief that some sort of entity is in the room. It is often only after hypnosis that the details begin to mimic those of alien abduction. Rather than go into this at length here, I’ll just point those of you who are interested to the following:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/search?q=Budd+Hopkins

The real problem here, or at least part of the problem, is that those offering some opinion in passing, or creating a documentary, have some sort of agenda. The producers might wish to advance the idea that aliens are abducting people so they stay away from information that might challenge that idea. People writing about Bielek, are convinced that there was a Philadelphia Experiment, and he is confirming their belief. Doesn’t make it true, but they believe because they want to rather than because the evidence supports the belief. And those believe Bill Cooper about MJ-12 for the same reasons.

In our world today, there is so much misinformation available it is a full-time job to keep just a tiny segment of it straight. There is spin to underscore a belief, but spin doesn’t really advance knowledge. In our world we have to fight to keep everything straight. That is why, after several years, we read on various news sites that those who created the alien autopsy have “finally” copped to the truth, as another example from a recent story.

Really?

I have known this for years and published information about it in books that are now several years old and Philip Mantel had devoted an entire book to it… but the “news” is provided for us today. Let’s just keep the debate alive rather than acknowledge the truth and move on.

Anyway, we must remain vigilant to the heavily biased information presented as if it is the absolute truth. We must attempt to correct this false and faked information with facts, figures and other information rather than just ignore it. Having ranted long enough, I now return to the football game.

X-Zone Broadcast Network - Brad Steiger (Yes, that Brad Steiger).

Brad Steiger

This week, after months of frustrating attempts to coordinate our schedules, Brad Steiger and I were finally able to talk about UFOs and the Paranormal. After Brad said some very complimentary things about me, we launched into the interview. I had thought we would talk about some of the strangest of the UFO landing reports including bizarre looking aliens. We began, however, with a short description of the Socorro landing described by Lonnie Zamora and what he said that he had seen in 1964. I did surprise Brad by mentioning that there were additional witnesses to the case, as documented by a report made on the night of the sighting, though that evidence is somewhat thin. All that is laid out in detail in Encounter in the Desert which is, of course, my book about the Socorro landing. You can listen to the

interview here:

https://youtu.be/lYHkNcFMM0E

Our conversation, which seemed to be way too short for me, delved into some aspects of the UFO, but as Brad pointed out, there are alternative explanations for many sightings that don’t involve alien visitation. Brad suggested there might be some interdimensional contacts as well as alien visitation.

We also noted that descriptions of the aliens were not uniform, meaning that those in other countries didn’t see the same sort of aliens that we, here in the US, did. Some of those descriptions seemed to come from science fiction films such as Earth vs. the Flying Saucers. A photograph of one of those aliens from the movie, as described in a sighting from Argentina is seen at the left. We talked about the evolution of those descriptions from aliens who seemed to be wearing spacesuits (environmental suits?) complete with breathing apparatus, to the aliens of today who might be wearing flight suits but are breathing our atmosphere.

The other thing that would be of interest is the discussion of the publishing industry and how it was back forty or fifty years ago. I said that I had read his book, Strangers from the Skies in a high school study hall which dated both of us. Some of that discussion showed how things have evolved and proved this was a wide-ranging discussion.

Next week’s guest: Robert Powell

Topic: SCU (Yes, you’ll have to tune in to learn that that is.)

Chasing Footnotes -The Socorro Case

As anyone who visits here regularly, you know that I chase footnotes. I sometimes try to find specific instances to make the case, but when I search without a known destination, it seems to be an impossible task. Instead, I find the bad footnotes by accident. This is just something that cannot be forced.

Lonnie Zamora

As you all also know, I have been looking into the symbol that Lonnie Zamora reported seeing on the side of the landed UFO. That research has bled into other areas, including the idea that other members of the Socorro Police Department or the New Mexico State Police saw the same object as Zamora. In the Unidentified Flying Objects Briefing Document: The Best Available Evidence compiled by Don Berliner, Marie Galbraith and Antonio Huneeus and “presented” by CUFOS, FUFOR and MUFON, in December, 1995, I read the short segment on the Socorro case. They wrote, “At this time, Zamora was joined by a police sergeant [Chavez] who watched the craft fly away into the distance.”

This is an argument, that Chavez saw the object, that has been made here by David Rudiak and one that Ray Stanford as well as Ben Moss and Tony Angiola shared during the interviews on my X-Zone Broadcast Network radio show. The links can be found in the postings for those programs. It is not this argument, that Chavez saw the object, which I’m concerned with here, but with the footnote about where this information was found or where it could be verified. According to Berliner, Galbraith and Hunees, this was a “Written statement by Lonnie Zamora to Project Blue Book, 1964; reprinted in Steiger, Brad, ed. Project Blue Book, ibid.”

In the last weeks I have been through the Blue Book files several times. I have discussed this idea of other police witnesses, both privately with a number of people and publicly on this blog. I have a copy of Steiger’s book and a complete copy of the Blue Book file on the case. Nowhere in the statement by Zamora does it suggest that the police sergeant arrived in time to see the UFO as it disappeared in the distance. In fact, Zamora in that statement said:

As I was calling Nep [a police radio operator], I could still see the object. The object seemed to lift up slowly, and to “get small” in the distance very fast. It seemed to just clear Box Canyon or Six Mile Canyon mountain. It disappeared as it went over the mountains. It had no flame whatsoever as it was traveling over the ground and made no smoke or noise…

Zamora said that he then went down to where the craft had landed and saw that one of the bushes was still smoking. He then said:

Gave directions to Nep Lopez at radio and to Sgt. M.S. Chavez to get there. Went down to where the object was (had been), and I noted the bush was burning in several places. At that time, I heard Sgt. Chavez calling me on radio for my location, and I returned to my car, told him he was looking at me. Then Sgt. Chavez came up and asked me what the trouble was, because I was sweating and he told me I was white, very pale. I asked the Sergeant to see what I saw, and that was the burning bush. Then Sgt. Chavez and I went to the spot, and Sgt. Chavez pointed out the tracks.

It is clear from Zamora’s statement in the Blue Book files and in Steiger’s book, that Chavez didn’t arrive until after the UFO had disappeared in the distance. Now we really don’t have to go through the arguments again about how Chavez did arrive in time to see it in the sky. What I’m saying here is that the sources quoted for the information do not support that idea. We can argue about other sources, but in this very limited case, those additional sources are irrelevant because they weren’t cited. The sources quoted do not support the statement, and that is all that is relevant here.

Brad Steiger and Real Visitors, Voices from Beyond and Parallel Dimensions

Back more years than I care to admit, I read a book, Allende Letters: New UFO Breakthrough (the title seems to be part of the advertising on the cover) written by Brad Steiger and Joan Whritenour. It was much more than just the story of the Allende Letters but it did spark an interest in me. It also raised some questions about all this sort of thing.

Although only one chapter actually discussed the Allende Letters in detail, it did

Brad and Sherry Hansen Steiger

mention that a researcher, Steve Yankee, who written to the Chief of Naval Operations in an attempt to learn more about them. Part of the Allende Letters case was a copy of Morris K. Jessup’s The Case for the UFO, filled with annotations apparently made by three individuals. Yankee apparently received a copy of that book with the notations from the Navy. I figured if Yankee could get a copy, I should have one as well and wrote to the Navy. They told me to contact a fellow at Varo Manufacturing in or near Fort Worth, Texas. Since I was living in Mineral Wells, Texas, near Fort Worth at the time, I made the contact and eventually received a copy of the annotated book as well, which I mention here for no other reason except to point out that I have a copy of the book and interviewed one of the Navy officers who was responsible for having the annotated book reproduced.

Given all that, given what I knew about the case from the Navy end of it and having read quite a bit about it, I concluded that the Philadelphia Experiment, which was the underlying force behind the Allende Letters, was a hoax. I knew that Brad had been involved in some research into them but didn’t know how deeply all that went until I received a copy of Real Visitors, Voices from Beyond and Parallel Dimensions.

I had written off Al Bielek, who had made a career out of the Philadelphia Experiment as just one more of those people who claim extraordinary adventures but have nothing to prove their tales. I learned that Bielek had been a friend of Brad and Sherry Steiger. As they worked on a book in 1990, Brad wrote, “We had to admit that Bielek was so convincing in his details that even experienced researchers such as we found ourselves entertaining thoughts of an alternative reality, of other dimensions of time and space overlapping.”

It seemed that Brad and Sherry were giving some credence to this whole idea especially since they knew Bielek. They were laying out the information that made it seem that Bielek was credible and that some aspects of the Philadelphia Experiment, as described by Carlos Allende were true. They even wrote, “On August 22, 1986, The News of Greeley published his ‘deathbed statement,’ in which Carlos insisted that everything that he had claimed in his annotations in The Case for the UFO were true. He also suggested that he had been Dr. Jessup’s uncredited coauthor,” which also seemed to underscore the validity of the Philadelphia Experiment.

But then they mentioned the work of Robert A. Goerman, the work he had done tracking down Allende, who as I have pointed out elsewhere was Carl Allen. The Steigers tell more of that story and then conclude, “It was all a hoax, a fantasy, molded by a former sailor who loved to read about UFOs and strange, unsolved mysteries so much that he created one that may live forever.”

This is, of course, a sad commentary on the critical thinking skills of many, and the inability to comprehend what they read. It is clear that the whole Allende Letters mystery was created by Carl M. Allen, that others jumped on the bandwagon and added detail by plugging themselves into the story, but when all was said and done, there isn’t a shred of evidence that any of this took place. Brad, who you might say contributed to the mystery in the 1960s before we had all the information we now possess, has done his part to eliminate this from our consciousness. To read his whole story about it, take a look at Real Visitors, Voices from Beyond and Parallel Dimensions. It solves a few other mysteries as well and clears up the misconceptions about others.

Arguing Over Trivia

Rather than chase footnotes, I thought I would chase some trivia because that’s what we seem to be doing here lately. I had thought that once the body in the slides was identified as an unfortunate child from hundreds of years ago, we could be done with that discussion. What more could be said? Arguments about the number of ribs or the other deformities, which could be the result of a “natural” mummification, seem to be useless. It really doesn’t matter at this point because the mummy has been identified, its location has been identified, and what happened to it has been identified. It was returned to it ancestor’s as federal law required (Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 for those who wish to know). All that seems to be a matter of record so that we could move onto other discussions, but we’re caught up in the trivia of number of ribs and other obscure deformities.

CAP Officer Robert Willingham

And I hear that there are still discussions about the typeface used on the MJ-12 documents or more specifically, the Truman memo which was attached to the Eisenhower Briefing Document. It would seem that once the fatal flaw had been uncovered there that we could move away from the nonsense of attempting to determine who had what typewriter in the White House more than half a century ago. It matters little what typeface that typewriter used when the tale of the UFO crash in the El Indio area has been found to be a hoax told by a man who was never a fighter pilot nor an Air Force officer. It would seem that the shifting nature of his tale, from the number of UFOs involved, to the date of the incident and the area of the crash would be enough to sink his tale which is reported in the EBD. If that story is a hoax that wasn’t invented until the 1960s, or that the crash that is now claimed to have taken place two or three years after the EBD was written, that would be enough. But no, we’re still caught up in arguing over the trivia of typeface and other unimportant factors because these other things simply can’t be explained.

But the trivia of trivia seems to be the short and limited discussion of Brad Steiger’s real name. Seriously? Yes, he was born as Eugene Olson, and if you look at the copyright page of some of his earlier books, it lists the copyright owner as Eugene Olson. I knew that was his name in the 1970s, and I knew that he taught in Decorah, Iowa, so I called directory assistance (which is what you did in the days before online white pages and the Internet). They gave me the telephone number of Eugene Olson and we had a very nice chat.

Brad and Sherry Steiger

He wrote under the name of Brad Steiger and sometime in the late 1970s, I believe, legally changed his name to Brad Steiger. So the point being made was moot because his real, legal name was Brad Steiger. In fact, for those searching for the real names of writers, sometimes all you have to do is look to see who holds the copyright because that will often be in the writer’s real, legal name… though not always. Thinner, which we all know was written by Stephen King is copyrighted in the name of Richard Bachman. My own books, Wings Over Nam is copyrighted by Cat Branigan rather than Kevin Randle (hey, don’t blame me; I didn’t pick the pen name).

The point here is that we engage way too often in discussions of trivia rather than focusing on the more important, overriding issues. I don’t know if it is a desire to be right even if it is just one small segment of the discussion or if it is just stubbornness. Maybe it’s a way to keep a topic going or maybe it’s just to be contrary. Whatever the reason, it seems to me that we ought to let go of the trivia and confine ourselves to discussions of the more important points… and for those wondering who makes that determination… here, on this blog, it’s me. 

Plagiarism in UFO Writing

I saw, the other day, in the Skeptical Inquirer, an article by Benjamin Radford about plagiarism in paranormal writing. He was suggesting that some “writers” lift case reports from others and report as if they are their own. I know these things happen in the world of the UFO and the one instance that springs to mind is a line written by Ed Ruppelt in his The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects. In writing about the fabled Estimate of the Situation, Ruppelt said, “The situation was UFOs; the estimate they were interplanetary!” (Page 58, Ace paperback).

I have seen that very line in several other UFO books. It is a case of straight plagiarism. And while it is true that facts cannot be copyrighted, it is also true that the specific words used to describe those facts can be. You cannot copyright the telephone directory because that is an assembling of fact, but if you add any “sweat equity” to it, that is some creative way to present those facts, then that can be copyrighted.

Or, for our purpose, you can copyright your particular interpretation of facts around a specific UFO sighting, but you cannot copyright the facts themselves. Everyone is free to use the facts of the Roswell case, for example, but they cannot lift, verbatim, the specific words that I use to describe the case.

As I say, Radford’s article got me thinking about this, and what I find in the world of the UFO is not the plagiarism, but the use of case “facts” that simply are not facts. This is the real problem in writing about UFOs.

For example, many years ago, I was writing a magazine article about mysterious disappearances, and I had found the tale of Oliver Thomas who had disappeared from his home in Wales around the turn of the last century. This case sounded suspiciously like that of Oliver Lerch who allegedly disappeared from South Bend, Indiana sometime in the late 19^th century. Brad Steiger had written about Thomas and at that time, meaning long before the Internet and all the electronic sources available, I knew the secret for finding Brad Steiger. I called him to ask about the case and he said not to use it. He had since learned that it was a hoax.

And I learned a lesson with that telephone conversation. Sometimes the information published in the books is not accurate. Sometimes the writer learned, after publication, that a case was a hoax, that the information was wrong in some fashion, or that the spectacular details did not match the facts when the case was carefully examined. In the last few weeks I have published a number of cases like that. The best example is probably the report of a formation of disks seen over Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Although the case was recounted in several books, including those of respected researchers, I learned that the witness was not in Cedar Rapids and the only connection to Cedar Rapids was an article in the local newspaper actually identifying the location as another city in another state but giving all the relevant information.

The point, you ask?

Well, if I hadn’t attempted to take the case to its origins, I would have reported the errors of those other writers and researchers and people would think there was a pre-Arnold sighting in Cedar Rapids. I would have copied the original errors and added to the misinformation. We all now know the origins of this sighting and can give it the attention it deserves (which is just one more of those reported after the Arnold sighting and little else.)

But this wasn’t plagiarism, or as one person suggested, “Plagiarism is using one source but research is using two…” And even with that, I would have still published the inaccurate information because none of the sources I had (five in total) had the original story right.

Here’s the real point. We all have the ability to do this. We all have the ability to take these cases back to the original sources. Too often we just don’t do it. We get the information we want… and it doesn’t matter which side of the coin you find yourself, that is debunker or proponent… and we end the search. We don’t ask that one additional question. We don’t look for that one additional fact. And we can change that.

In the world today, we need to take everything back to the source. When I found myself in Lubbock, Texas, I took the time to research the Lubbock Lights and image my surprise, in the early-1990s, to find Carl Hart, Jr. in the telephone book. Or while in Fort Worth, I went through the newspaper’s morgue, looking for information on old UFO sightings and found some interesting though obviously fake reports of the Great Airship.

If there have been some spectacular or not so spectacular sightings nearby, check them out. Talk to the witnesses. Search the original sources of the information, and let’s see if we can clean up the landscape. If nothing else, we can remove much of the clutter as we move toward some sort of an answer.

Real Aliens, Space Beings and Creatures from Other Worlds

Brad and Sherry Steiger (seen here) have turned out another winner with their Real Aliens, Space Beings and Creatures from Other Worlds. The title, I think, says it all. This is a book about aliens, though not necessarily from other planets.

“What does that mean?” you might ask.

We’ll get to that in a moment. First I should point out that I have known Brad Steiger for decades. We have talked on the telephone many times, we have emailed one another frequently, and we have appeared on radio shows that the other hosted. I knew, when I had a Saturday evening show on KTSM that I could always call Brad at the last minute if a guest canceled, and I knew that he would be an interesting interview.

The first time that I spoke to him, which I’m sure he doesn’t remember was as I was writing my first book on the paranormal. As a reference, I was using a book he had written. I was interested in the story of Oliver Thomas, a Welsh lad who had vanished in 1909 as he carried water from the family well.

I happened to know where Brad lived at the time and I was able to get his telephone number from directory assistance. I called and asked my question about the case.

“It’s a hoax,” Brad told me.

He said that he had learned that after his book was published, but he was quick to point out the truth, now that he had it. His philosophy at the time was to believe what people told him until he learned that they couldn’t be trusted. I thought it was a fine philosophy even if it let you down sometimes...

My own experience has been that too many people will lie about too much for reasons that seem to be vague. They’ll lie for the personal glory. They’ll lie for the little fame it might bring them. They’ll lie to put one over on someone else. They’ll lie just for the hell of it.

Anyway, Brad was quick to tell me the truth and I certainly appreciated that.

So now we have a new book by Brad and Sherry and it is a compendium of tales about alien creatures that might come from other planets, might be travelers from our future or might be interdimensional beings. They cover all the theories here.

They begin with the biggest of the UFO cases which is the Roswell UFO crash and wind their way through the history of alien contact whether from the contactees of the 1950s, the abductees of the 1990s or the sightings by people of strange beings throughout the centuries.

This is a book for the novice, who has just discovered the UFO field. It provides the basics to understanding where we have gone since the beginning, providing a glimpse into UFOs.

This is a book for those who have been around for a while but who have had their research diverted into one of the many subset of the UFO phenomenon. It provides the basic information so that detailed research can be designed for a long term study.

For those who wish a good primer on UFOs, and for those who wish an encyclopedia of information about the last fifty or sixty years of alien adventures, this is the book to have. It is literally everything to everyone.

If I were to complain about it, I would mention that it is not as detailed as I would like, but then the book would probably have been so big that you’d need a crane to lift it. If there is a case for which I need additional information, Real Aliens, Space Beings, and Creatures from Other Worlds provides the starting point. It gives me the clues I need for my specialized research.

This is one of those books that belongs in every UFO researchers’ library. And if you’re not one of those, a UFO researcher, then it is just a fun read. Informative, provocative, and intelligent. A valuable resource.