The End of Project Mogul

 

In Understanding Roswell, I looked again, at the Air Force’s ultimate answer for the UFO crash, which had written off as a balloon array from the “highly classified” Project Mogul. The Air Force, in their investigation, had eliminated all possible terrestrial answers, as civilian UFO researchers had done in the years before the Air Force entered the arena. We knew, based on our research, that there had been no aircraft accidents, civilian, military or experimental. There were no stray rockets or missiles from the White Sands Proving Ground and nothing associated with the 509^th Bomb Group that would account for the debris. There was no sort of nuclear accident that would have accounted for the high level of security testified to by the witnesses, both military and civilian. Had there been some sort of highly classified project in play, that would have explained the security, but since all that happened seventy-five years ago, there would be no legitimate reason for the secret to be kept in today’s environment.

This means that all of us, military, civilian, interested and uninterested, reached the same basic conclusion about what had fallen near tiny Corona, New Mexico, in July 1947. We all agreed that something had fallen. It was the identify of object that had left the debris scattered over about three quarters of a mile of pasture land in the high desert that was the question.

The lone exception to this was the classified balloon project code named “Mogul.” According to the Air Force investigation, this program, designed to place a constant level balloon in the upper atmosphere allowing American scientists and intelligence officers to listen for atomic detonations in the Soviet Union, left the debris. This was the reason for the high-level of security because no one in Washington, D.C., or the Pentagon for that matter, wanted the Soviets to know that we were listening for their atomic bomb testing.

While this would explain the classification of the ultimate purpose, that did not cover the experiments in Alamogordo, New Mexico, that began in June, 1947. The activities there, known to those who participated in them as the New York University balloon project, were not classified, and, in fact, information about those activities was printed in newspapers around the United States on July 10, 1947. This negates the claim of high security in New Mexico and the reason for the secrecy there.

Phyllis McGuire

There are other aspects to this. According to the testimony of Phyllis McGuire, the teenaged daughter of Chaves County, New Mexico, Sheriff George Wilcox, when rancher Mack Brazel appeared in the Roswell office, she was there. The Wilcox family lived above the sheriff’s office. She reported that Brazel told the sheriff about the strange metal debris that he had found in one of the fields on the ranch he managed. More importantly, she mentioned that Brazel had brought samples of the debris with him.

While there are those who would suggest that the teenaged daughter revealing this decades later might not be the most reliable of sources, there is corroboration for this. General Thomas DuBose, the Chief of Staff for the Eighth Air Force in Fort Worth in 1947, interview by Don Schmitt and others, said that strange metallic debris discovered by Brazel, was sent by special flight to Fort Worth.

According to DuBose, the debris was taken to Fort Worth “two or three days earlier,” meaning, of course two or three days prior to the July 8 announcement that a “flying saucer” had been captured. It was DuBose who had alerted those in Washington that something had been found and it was DuBose who received orders from Major General Clements McMullen to bring a sample of that debris to Washington, sometime on Sunday, July 6.

BG Thomas Dubose

In a recorded interview, DuBose said, “He [McMullen] called me and said that I was, there was some talk of some elements that had been found on the ground outside Roswell, New Mexico. That the debris or elements were to be placed in a suitable container, and Blanchard was to see that they were delivered… and [Colonel] Al Clark… would pick them up and hand deliver them to McMullen in Washington. Nobody, and I must stress this, no one was to discuss it with their wives, me with Ramey, with anyone.”

DuBose then called Blanchard and relayed the instructions to him. At that moment, the samples of the debris that Brazel had taken to the Chaves County Sheriff’s Office, and mentioned by Phyllis McGuire, were taken, under orders from Blanchard to the Roswell Army Air Field and eventually on to Fort Worth.

All this suggests that the officers at the Roswell Army Air Field were unable to identify the material as the remains of a weather balloon and a rawin radar target. There was nothing special about the weather balloon that would have fooled anyone who had seen it.

Wilcox thought enough of Brazel’s tale that he dispatched two deputies to the area of the crash. Brazel gave them directions, but given the nature of the terrain, and the distance from Roswell, the deputies failed to find the field, though they did find a large, circular burned area to the north of town.

Wilcox, who was unable to identify the debris, then called out to the Roswell Army Air Field to report what the rancher had found. The call eventually reached Major Jesse A. Marcel, Sr., the Air Intelligence Officer. He drove from the base to the sheriff’s office where he met with Brazel and was shown the debris that Brazel had brought with him.

Apparently, Marcel was unable to identify the material and thought it strange enough that he should investigate further. In consultation with the base commander, Colonel William Blanchard, it was decided that Marcel should accompany Brazel back to the ranch. Blanchard mentioned the base had just acquired a counterintelligence office. He thought Marcel should take Captain Sheridan Cavitt, the officer in charge of that office, out to the ranch.

Marcel, had returned to the base, picked up Cavitt and then drove to the sheriff’s office. With Brazel leading the way, the small convoy, Brazel in his pickup, Marcel in his Buick, and Cavitt in a Jeep Carryall, arrived too late in the day to do much. They spent the night in a small house, and according to Marcel, had a later supper of beans.

The next morning, Brazel, Marcel and Cavitt made their way to the Debris Field. Marcel said that it was about three-quarters of a mile long, and two to three hundred yards wide. Cavitt would tell Air Force investigator, Colonel Richard Weaver in 1994, that it was much smaller, no bigger than a large room in a house. More importantly, Cavitt would tell Weaver that the moment he saw the material, he recognized it as the remains of balloons. Weaver didn’t ask, and Cavitt didn’t explain, why he had not told Marcel this, nor why he didn’t mention to Blanchard when he returned to the base.

The misleadingly captioned claim that this array, including the rawin radar targets was launched by New
York University scientists on June 4, 1947. This was actually Flight No. 2, flown on the east coast.
The arrays launched in New Mexico were a third shorter and carried no rawin targets.

The actual make up of the array trains flown in New Mexico. Flight No. 4 had been cancelled, but 

Flight No. 5, designated as the first successful flight, was launched on June 5, 1947. There is no 

evidence that any rawin targets were used on it or most subsequent flights.

There is the other, important problem. Cavitt didn’t explain why he had been fooled by the debris in Roswell, but recognized it once he arrived on the ranch. Had the debris been part of Project Mogul, which was made up of off-the-shelf weather balloons and rawin radar targets, there is no reason for it to have fooled Brazel, Wilcox, and Marcel. Had it been part of Project Mogul, and recognized as balloon debris, there is no reason for the trip to the ranch and clean up wouldn’t have been all that difficult.

There is still another, important aspect to all this. The Project Mogul balloons were launched from Alamogordo Army Air Field. Dr. Albert Crary, the man in charge of the experiments in New Mexico, kept records of the launches, and that record of his field notes, diary entries and final report are all available both online and in the massive Air Force report on the Roswell case. Based on all that data, we know that all Mogul flights prior to July 6, which is the date that Brazel drove into Roswell, were accounted for with the exception of Flight No. 4, which had been scheduled for launch on June 3, but postponed until June 4. Another attempt was made on the following morning. Crary's entry for this attempt said:

June 4 Wed

Out to Tularosa Range and fired charges between 00 and 06 this am. No balloon flight again on account of clouds. Flew regular sonobuoy mike up in cluster of balloons and had good luck on receiver on ground but poor on plane. Out with Thompson pm. Shot charges 1800 to 2400.

This provided the timing of the events in Alamogordo, and because of the regulations under which they operated, they were forced to cancel the flight. There is nothing ambiguous in the documentation. Flight No. 4 was cancelled. Later that morning, they flew a cluster of balloons with a sonobuoy, but this wasn’t a full Mogul array and no evidence that the balloon cluster ever left the Alamogordo area.

To take this one step further, an examination of the documentation available in Crary’s notes, showed they weren’t using the rawin radar targets at this stage of their research. Flight No. 5, which flew the next day, June 5, did not have any radar targets on it, according to the illustrations available in the final reports. If there were no rawin targets attached to the flight, then where did the rawin originate that was displayed in General Ramey’s office. And, if there were no rawin targets, then isn’t that photograph taken in Ramey’s office evidence of a coverup?

There are pictures of an array being prepared that do show the rawin radar targets as part of the assembly but that photograph was taken on July 22, 1948, more than a year after the crash in Roswell. Another photograph, published on July 10, 1947, shows the launch of the two balloons, with but a single rawin target attached.

Here is where we are. The June 4, 1947, launch of Flight No. 4, was cancelled according to the documentation. Later in the day, there was the launch of a cluster of balloons, but this was not a full array. It was made up of the already inflated balloons and a sonobuoy to test the radio reception. There is no evidence that it left the Alamogordo area and no evidence that it contained a rawin radar target. Without Flight No. 4, the explanation of a Mogul balloon array accounting for the debris found by Mack Brazel, fails.

An alleged Mogul array being prepared for flight. This one was launched more than a year after the
cancelled June 4, Mogul Flight No. 4.

The date the photograph was taken, July 22, 1948.

The documentation, provided in the various field notes, diary entries, and other evidence, shows that rawin targets were not part of the arrays being launched in New Mexico, and if there were no such targets, then the balloon explanation fails at that point as well.

Although the Air Force claimed that Project Mogul was highly classified and that would account for those in Roswell being unable to identify the balloon is misleading. The ultimate purpose was classified, but the work being done in New Mexico was not. The newspaper articles published on July 10, 1947, proves this claim to be false.

With the elimination of the Mogul explanation, based on the overwhelming evidence that Flight No. 4 was cancelled, there is no terrestrial explanation for what fell on the Brazel managed ranch. Remember, the Air Force eliminated all other mundane explanations before settling on Mogul. There could be, somewhere, a super-secret project that would account for the debris, but no one has identified it yet, and it is difficult to believe that revelation of such a program would adversely affect national security in the world today. Had there been such an explanation, the Air Force would have used it years ago and the Roswell case would have been solved.

Until and unless, such a program or project is revealed and it can be shown to have scattered the debris in New Mexico, the only conclusion to be drawn is that whatever fell that day is unknown. To many, that leads directly to the extraterrestrial. The lack of evidence for the terrestrial does suggest something alien. Is sufficient to prove the case? That’s left up to the individual but it the most logical explanation at the moment.

'X' Zone Broadcast Network - Greg Lawson and His Roswell Book

Greg Lawson was the guest today. He is a former police officer, former soldier, former airman and former sailor. He has been studying the paranormal for decades, and

Greg Lawson

has a special interest in the Roswell UFO case. His book, Roswell: The After Action Report is different from the other books in that he attacks the question as a police investigator rather than as a UFO researcher. It means that he comes at the case from, well, a different perspective. You can listen to the show here:

https://www.spreaker.com/episode/47299923

He did surprise me by suggesting that Thomas DuBose, the Chief of Staff for the 8^th Eighth Air Force in Fort Worth in 1947 was a major witness, and maybe the most important of the witnesses. He thought that because DuBose was on both ends of the coverup, whatever the cause of the coverup was, he would have a special insight. Others who fit into that category such as General Ramey and Colonel Blanchard had died prior to the renewed interest in the case. DuBose left some video evidence about what he had seen and done.

We also talked about Jesse Marcel, Sr. and his involvement in the case. I’d just gone through the interview with Bob Pratt done in 1979. You can see Pratt’s notes and transcript of that interview here:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2013/09/jesse-marcel-sr-bob-pratt-and-interview.html

The pages of the interview are at the end of the posting. You can see Marcel’s words, and the way the notes were taken. That provides some insight into this aspect of the case.

Having gone through that interview again, I was a little disturbed by some of the claims Marcel had made about his military service and his educational background. These have been reported on in the past, including Marcel’s claim about shooting down five enemy aircraft. No record of his claim exists, and as I learned, records of this sort of activity do exist. The Air Force (okay, the Army Air Forces) kept track of that during the war. One sergeant flying as a gunner in a bomber is recorded as having shot down 17 enemy planes. The list begins with those having downed a single enemy craft but Marcel’s name does not appear on the list anywhere.

That and other embellishments would be devastating to the Roswell case if there were not other witnesses to the crash. That means, simply, that if Marcel was stand alone, his testimony about the crash could be dismissed, but there are, literally, dozens of other witnesses to some aspects of the case. That includes the majority of Blanchard’s primary staff, to other officers and enlisted soldiers who participated in some aspect of the recovery and civilians who found debris or witnessed some other aspects of the case. In other words, Marcel’s tale of the UFO crash and the look of the debris is corroborated independently by others.

We eventually got around to Mogul and the Air Force offer of the balloon arrays as the culprit in the recovery. Here, I probably should mention, again, that everyone agrees that something fell near Roswell. It’s the identify that is in question. I’m not going to report the list of reasons that Mogul doesn’t work here again. Those interested can pick up a copy of Roswell in the 21^st Century for a detailed analysis, or just type Mogul into the search engine on this blog and you’ll have more than enough information.

There were many other things that I wanted to explore, but we just ran out of time. The conversation was interesting, at least for me and that’s what counts (well, it’s really the audience interest that counts. My interest is a gauge of that). I’ll have Greg back on the program in the future so that we can hit some of the other points.

Next up is the long-promised interview with Stan Gordon. We’ll get his take on the Kecksburg UFO crash. And the following week, I’ll talk with Dr. Peter Strassburg about his book, When Einstein Went to Roswell. 

X-Zone Broadcast Network - Colonel Richard Weaver and the Roswell Report

For years Colonel Richard Weaver has been seen as the villain in the Roswell UFO crash tale. He was the man in charge of the Air Force investigation that culminated in that huge report that contained so much information. He was the guest on the latest edition of the A Different Perspective radio show/podcast. You can listen to both hours here:

https://www.spreaker.com/episode/41931979

https://www.spreaker.com/episode/41932179

Colonel Richard Weaver... Incognito.

We began with a discussion of the process that ended up with his assignment for the Air Force, and then in the details of how the investigation was conducted. For those interested in the way this manipulated by those working through Congressman Schiff, it is eye opening. You can read the details in his book found at:

https://www.amazon.com/Backstory-Roswell-Exclusive-Disclosures-Inquiry-ebook/dp/B08GY9WXCL/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=Colonel+Richard+Weaver+Backstory&qid=1605299084&sr=8-2

Although we did discuss the role that Karl Pflock played in getting Schiff to request the GAO investigation, it wasn’t the most important part of the show. Pflock, at least according to Rich, was maneuvering behind the scenes, attempting to improve his status and interest a publisher in a book deal. In fact, according to a letter that Pflock had sent to retired AFOSI agent Sheridan Cavitt, he was looking to make some money out of the deal.

We did analyze the role that Jesse Marcel played in the whole Roswell case. There are some points in Marcel’s claims, not about Roswell but about his military career, that are worrisome. Part of the trouble, I suspect, came from the notes of Bob Pratt’s 1978 interview with Marcel and the way that Pratt transcribed the tape. You can read that interview here:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2013/09/jesse-marcel-sr-bob-pratt-and-interview.html

We touched on the claim that Marcel had shot down five enemy aircraft during WWII. Rich pointed out that there were records of soldiers who were gunners in aircraft who had shot down enough enemy to become “aces,” but Marcel wasn’t among them. I thought the claim might have been confused by Marcel’s claim of five Air Medals… I, and Rich, could only document two.

Captain Jesse Marcel (at the map board) briefing flight crews in the
South Pacific during the Second World War.

We also looked at the press conference held in General Ramey’s office once Marcel had brought material from Roswell to Fort Worth. I had interview Irving Newton in 1990 about his role in explaining the debris. Clearly, what is seen in the photographs is debris from a weather balloon and a rawin radar reflector. But I didn’t mention the interview that Don Schmitt had with retired Brigadier General Thomas DuBose who was also in the office. He said that the debris on the floor was not the same as the debris that had been brought from Roswell. You can read about it here:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2018/07/thomas-dubose-and-switched-roswell.html

This, of course, lead, indirectly to a discussion of Project Mogul. Rich believes that it is a viable explanation for the debris found by rancher Mack Brazel. I do not. I’ve covered the reasons several times and you can read them here:

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2018/07/thomas-dubose-and-switched-roswell.html

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2007/02/national-geographics-and-ufos.html

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-project-mogul-double-standard.html

http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2013/08/a-few-facts-about-project-mogul.html

And, since it is fun to show both sides of a tale, I will note that Tim Printy, at his website had this to say about Mogul:

http://www.astronomyufo.com/UFO/flight4.htm

And, it wouldn’t have been a well rounded two hours had we not discussed MJ-12. Here we both are on the same page. Rich provided the Air Force reasons for not accepting MJ-12 as a legitimate set of documents and I explained what I believe is the fatal flaw in the documents. You can read more about that here:

These are some of the highlights of the shows. There is much more about the Roswell case and the Air Force investigation into those events. I keep thinking of things to add. For example, we discussed the Ramey Memo, and the fact that the high-powered lab used by the Air Force to attempt to read anything on it failed, when a kid with a magnifying glass can pick out five or six words. There is a great deal of inside information in those shows and anyone interested in Roswell, regardless of which came in which they reside, will find something of interest.

Next up is William Puckett who hosts a website that publishes current UFO sightings as well as dealing with other aspects of the UFO phenomena. 

Thomas DuBose and the Switched Roswell Debris

Let’s chase a footnote or two, something we haven’t done for a while. I was reading a paper that was discussing the debris displayed on the floor in Brigadier General Roger Ramey’s office. Photographs of the debris were found decades ago and some of the

Brigadier General Roger Ramey and
Thomas DuBose (seated) looking at
the material on the floor in
Ramey's office.

negatives are housed in the Special Collections in the library at the University of Texas at Arlington. It is clear in the uncropped photographs that the material on the floor of Ramey’s office is a weather balloon and the torn-up remnants of a rawin reflector. The discussion was that the material shown there had been switched from the real debris that Major Jesse Marcel had brought from Roswell. In this latest analysis, it was said that the debris had not been switched, which, of course, means that a weather balloon had been brought from Roswell by Marcel. You can read about this here:

An Extraterrestrial Flying Disk Crashed Near Roswell in 1947: Not a UFO

The specific quote in that paper concerning all this is, “Decades later, during an interview, DuBose was asked if the original debris in General Ramey’s office had been switched with the remnants of a weather balloon [as Marcel had claimed]. DuBose answered that the material was never switched.”

Footnotes in that article, lead us to Kal Korff. That specific quote is in the middle of information that was attributed to Korff in an article that appeared in The Skeptical Inquirer Volume 21.4, found at:

https://www.csicop.org/si/show/what_really_happened_at_roswell

Specifically, the quote is this:

Q. There are two researchers ([Don] Schmitt and Randle) [parenthetical statement in the original] who are presently saying that the debris in General Ramey’s office had been switched and that you men had a weather balloon there in its place.

A. [DuBose] Oh Bull! That material was never switched!

Q. So what you’re saying is that the material in General Ramey’s office was the actual debris brought from Roswell?

A. That’s absolutely right.

Later, to reinforce this idea, Korff in that same article wrote:

Q. Did you get a chance to read the material and look at the pictures?

A. Yes, and I studied the pictures very carefully.

Q. Do you recognize that material?

A. Oh yes. That’s the material that Marcel brought into Fort Worth from Roswell.

Given the way the article is structured and the information provided, that would be the end of the trail. Korff provided no footnotes or references for the quoted material, only that DuBose denied the material had been switched. It leaves the impression that Korff might have conducted the interview, though that is not said anywhere in the article. We just have DuBose quoted as the source with no information on how those quotes were gathered.

That might have been a problem for someone not immersed in the Roswell minutia who wished to chase footnotes. I know, however, where the quotes come from originally. They appeared in Korff’s less than accurate account of his alleged investigation into the Roswell case. He wrote on page 129 of the hardback edition of his crummy book:

In a revealing interview he granted to UFO researcher and television producer Jamie Shandera, DuBose put to rest the “mystery” of the so-called substituted wreckage and has exposed it for what it is – another Major Marcel myth! The initials “JHS” stand for Jaime Shandera and the initials “GTD” denote Gen. Thomas DuBose.

In this version, which now gives us more information about who conducted the interview (including the initials of the participants rather than a “Q” and “A”), Korff wrote:

JHS. There are two researchers (Schmitt and Randle) [parenthetical statement in the original] who are presently saying that the debris in General Ramey’s office had been switched and that you men had a weather balloon there in its place.

GTD. Oh Bull! That material was never switched!

JHS. So what you’re saying is that the material in General Ramey’s office was the actual debris brought from Roswell?

GTD. That’s absolutely right.

JHS: Could General Ramey or someone else have ordered a switch without you knowing it?

GTD: I have dame good eyesight – well, it was better back then than it is now – and I was there, and I had charge of the material, and it was never switched. [Emphasis added] [by Korff in the original].

You’ll note that this is the same interview that appeared in The Skeptical Inquirer. The footnotes in the book take us to Focus, Volume 5, (New Series) dated June 30, 1990. It was also published in the MUFON UFO Journal, No. 273, in January 1991. The quotes are the same in all these various locations, so that we have traced the original back to interviews conducted by Shandera.

Here’s what we learn about those interviews. “…Gen. DuBose was recently interviewed first by telephone and later at his home by Fair Witness Project [Bill Moore’s organization to investigate UFOs] Board member Jaime Shandera.”

We now know who gathered the information, when it was gathered (meaning late 1990 and early 1991), and what it is claimed to have been said. But, unlike many of these chasing footnotes articles, there is more to the story. I have a great deal of other information that affects how this all plays out and it was information available to anyone who looked for more than just their confirming evidence...

First, according to both General and Mrs. DuBose, Shandera neither recorded the conversation held at the DuBose home, nor did he take notes. We’re left with only Shandera’s claims of what was said, and the information in quotation marks is more likely a paraphrase than actual quotes. There is no way to verify the accuracy of the quotes.

Although Shandera has been asked, he apparently did not record the telephone conversation either. He has never suggested that he took any notes during that conversation, so, once again, we have no way to verify the veracity of his claims.

On the other hand, DuBose was interviewed in Florida by Don Schmitt and Stan Friedman on August 10, 1991. That interview was recorded on video tape so that a record of DuBose’s exact words is available for review. In that interview, DuBose was asked pointedly if he had ever seen the Roswell debris and he responded, "NEVER!" That means, quite clearly, that the debris in Ramey’s office was not what had been brought from Roswell.

After the Shandera interview was published, DuBose was again interviewed and asked if he had ever seen the real debris and again he answered, "NO!" And, again, that refutes the information that is traced back to a single source, which is Shandera.

This could be construed as just another debate between two factions with no way to resolve it. However, DuBose spoke to others when asked about this particular point. Billy Cox, at the time a writer for Florida Today interviewed DuBose for an article he wrote for the November 24, 1991, edition of the newspaper. Cox reported that DuBose told him essentially the same story that he told the others except Shandera. Here was a disinterested third-party reporting on the same set of circumstances, but he didn't get Shandera's version of the events.

In a letter Cox send me dated September 30, 1991:

I was aware of the recent controversy generated by an interview he (DuBose) had with Jaime Shandera, during which he stated that the display debris at Fort Worth was genuine UFO wreckage and not a weather balloon, as he had previously stated. But I chose not to complicate matters by asking him to illuminate what he had told Shandera; instead, I simply asked him, without pressure, to recall events as he remembered them...he seemed especially adamant about his role in the Roswell case. While he stated that he didn't think the debris was extraterrestrial in nature (though he had no facts to support his opinion), he was insistent that the material that Ramey displayed for the press was in fact a weather balloon, and that he had personally transferred the real stuff in a lead-lined mail pouch to a courier going to Washington ...I can only conclude that the Shandera interview was the end result of the confusion that might occur when someone attempts to press a narrow point of view upon a 90-year-old man. I had no ambiguity in my mind that Mr. DuBose was telling me the truth.

Cox isn't the only one to hear that version of events from DuBose. Kris Palmer, a former researcher with NBC's Unsolved Mysteries reported much the same thing in 1991. When she spoke with DuBose, he told her that the real debris had gone on to Washington in a sealed pouch and that a weather balloon had been on the floor in General Ramey's office.

Don Ecker

But the most enlightening of the interviews comes from Don Ecker formerly of UFO magazine and now the host of Dark Matters Radio on KGRA digital radio. Shandera had called Ecker, telling him that he would arrange for Ecker to interview DuBose about this issue. Ecker, however, didn't wait and called DuBose on his own. DuBose then offered the weather balloon/switch version of events. When Ecker reported that to Shandera, Shandera said for him to wait. He'd talk to DuBose.

After Shandera talked to DuBose, he called Ecker and said, "Now call him." DuBose then said that the debris on the floor hadn't been switched and that it was the stuff that Marcel had brought from Roswell. It should be pointed out here that Palmer called DuBose after all this took place. Without Shandera there to prime the pump, DuBose told weather balloon/switch version of events. It was only after close questioning by Shandera could that version be heard. It is not unlike a skillful attorney badgering a witness in a volatile trial. Under the stress of the interview and the close questioning, the witness can be confused for a period of time. Left alone to sort out the details, the correct version of events bubbles to the surface.

The point here is that sometimes following the footnotes to their source isn’t enough. You have to explore other avenues of information to ensure that the footnotes are accurate. In this case, because I’m immersed in the minutia of Roswell, I knew where to look for the additional information and that additional information paints a different picture than that found if you only followed the footnotes to Korff.

The Roswell Time Line - July 8, 1947

(Blogger’s Note: We have engaged in a lot of discussion that surround the events described below. It shows the extent of research into the news coverage, which one asked about, it provides documentation about the events of July 8, and it tries for sort out the story of the press release as it has been told and retold. It doesn’t prove that what fell outside Roswell was an alien spacecraft but it does show, to some extent, who was doing what and where. I think it answers some of the questions that have been raised. As an aside, I see that the footnotes reset after a certain point. I was unable to get them to run properly in sequence, so be aware of that as you scroll through the article.)

At about 9:30 that on July 8, 1947, Colonel William Blanchard called First Lieutenant Walter Haut in his office and dictated the “Flying Saucer” press release to him.[1] He was told to deliver the press release to the four media outlets in Roswell, that is, the two radio stations and the two daily newspapers. In what would become a discrepancy in Haut’s memory of the event, Haut would suggest at one time that he drove the release into town, and later say that he used the telephone to dictate it.[2] Either way, the press release went out to the press, and then was put on the news wire either by Frank Joyce[3] or George Walsh[4] or by both of them.

Walsh remembered that Haut had telephoned the press release to him “about mid-day.”[5] He said he copied the press release exactly, as Haut read it to him over the phone. Walsh, in turn called it into the Associated Press in Albuquerque. From there the release was put on the AP wire and that story was published in a number of newspapers.[6]

Art McQuiddy, who was the editor of the Roswell Morning Dispatch said, “I can remember quite a bit about what happened that day. It was about noon and Walter brought in a press release. He’d already been to one of the radio stations, and I raised hell with him about playing favorites.”[7]

Unfortunately for McQuiddy, the Dispatch was a morning newspaper, so there wasn’t much for him to do with the story. He said, “By the time Haut got to me, it hadn’t been ten minutes[8] and the phone started ringing. I didn’t get off the phone until late afternoon… The story died, literally, as fast as it started.”[9]

 

At 2:30 p.m. (MST), Blanchard announced that he was going on leave (which, of course, makes no real sense). He would not be available to take telephone calls about the flying saucer and would be out of touch for four days.[10]

There is a document, created in 1947, that provides the exact times for some of this. According The Daily Illini, the first of the stories on the Associated Press wire appeared at 4:26 p.m. on the east coast.[11] That would mean that the stories went out from Albuquerque, sometime prior to 2:26 p.m.[12]

 

The Associated Press version, as it appeared in a number of west coast newspapers said:

The many rumors regarding the flying disc became a reality yesterday when the intelligence office of the 509^th Bomb Group of the Eighth Air Force, Roswell Army Air Field, was fortunate enough to gain possession of a disc through the cooperation of one of the local ranchers and the sheriff’s office of Chavez County.

The flying object landed on a ranch near Roswell sometime last week. Not having phone facilities, the rancher stored the disc until such time as he was able to contact the sheriff’s office, who in turn notified Major Jesse A. Marcel of the 509^th Bomb Group Intelligence Office.

Action was immediately taken and the disc was picked up at the rancher’s home. It was inspected at the Roswell Army Air Field and subsequently loaned by Major Marcel to higher headquarters.[13]  

At 4:30 p.m. (EST), there is the first “add” to the AP story, which mentioned “Lt. Warren Haught [Walter Haut],” who was described as the public information officer at the “Roswell Field.” This new information suggested that the object had been found “last week” and that the object had been sent onto “higher headquarters.”

The original United Press bulletin, which went out fifteen minutes later, at 4:41 p.m. (EST), according to newspaper sources, said:

 

Roswell, N.M. – The army air forces here today announced a flying disc had been found on a ranch near Roswell and is in army possession.

The Intelligence office reports that it gained possession of the ‘Dis:’ [sic] through the cooperation of a Roswell rancher and Sheriff George Wilson [sic] of Roswell.

The disc landed on a ranch near Roswell sometime last week. Not having phone facilities, the rancher, whose name has not yet been obtained, stored the disc until such time as he was able to contact the Roswell sheriff’s office.

The sheriff’s office notified a major of the 509^th Intelligence Office.

Action was taken immediately and the disc was picked up at the rancher’s home and taken to the Roswell Air Base. Following examination, the disc was flown by intelligence officers in a superfortress (B-29) to an undisclosed “Higher Headquarters.”

The air base has refused to give details of construction of the disc or its appearance.

Residents near the ranch on which the disc was found reported seeing a strange blue light several days ago about three o’clock in the morning.[14]

In Fort Worth, Texas (3:30 p.m. CST, 4:30 p.m. EST) Cullen Greene, an editor at the Fort Worth Star Telegram would have read the story as it came over the wire. J. Bond Johnson who worked at the newspaper in July 1947 said, “I don’t know the mechanics. We’d get those alerts. The bells would ring and it would be an attention thing. It would be an editor thing.”[15]

At 4:55 p.m. (EST) on the east coast 2:55 p.m. (MST) in New Mexico, the location of the discovery, that is New Mexico, is given. This bulletin, described as a “95” which is just below bulletin in importance, was repeated at 5:08 (EST) and a minute later, at 5:09,[16] there was another repeat of the story that said the information came from a radio reporter, but the identity of the reporter was not given.[17]

Johnson, who described himself as a reporter in July 1947[18] said, “…late in the afternoon, I returned to the office… My city editor… ran over and said, ‘Bond, have you got your camera?’ I said, ‘Yes, I had it out in my car.’ He said to get out to General Ramey’s office and… he said they’ve got something there… [and] get a picture… He said something crashed out there or whatever and they’re… we just got an alert on the AP wire.”[19]

At 5:10 p.m. (EST) or 3:10 p. m. (MST), there was a message that was addressed to the newspaper editors to let them know that the Associated Press had now gone to work on the story.[20]

 

According to the Daily Illini, “One minute later, at 5:11 [p. m. EST], the third add [additional information] to the bulletin announced, ‘The war department in Washington had nothing to say immediately about the reported find.’  That meant the AP was on the job investigating.”[21]

In was about 4:30 p.m. (CST, 5:30 EST) that Johnson arrived at the Fort Worth Army Air Field. He told Bill Moore and Jaime Shandera that it was about a twenty minute trip from the newspaper office out to the airfield.[22] He said that he routinely covered activities at the airfield, so when he reached the gate, he showed his press pass. He also had a Civil Air Patrol sticker on his car, which would have made it easier for him to enter the airfield. He had been told to go to Ramey’s office, though he normally would visit the Public Information Officer.[23]

 

Johnson said, “I posed General Ramey with this debris piled in the middle of his rather large and plush office. It seemed incongruous to have this smelly garbage piled up on the floor… spread out on the floor of this rather plush, big office… I posed General Ramey with this debris. At that time, I was briefed on the idea that it was not a flying saucer but in fact was a weather balloon that had crashed.”[24]

Johnson, according to what he said, didn’t stay long in Ramey’s office because generals were busy. He said, “As I remember, I probably wasn’t there more than twenty minutes, which was not unusual.” He took the photographs, gathered some information and left.[25]

 

He said, “It was entirely possible that I was briefed by the PIO.”[26]

This last quote could be important. The story that Johnson wrote to accompany the pictures, contained no direct quotes from Ramey, DuBose or Marcel, but did quote Irving Newton, the weather officer called in to identify the debris.[27] But the timing seems to suggest that Johnson had arrived before Newton had been called Ramey’s office so it is puzzling. Why is Newton quoted directly, but none of the others are?

At 5:53 p.m. (EST), 4:53 p.m. (CST), there was another bulletin which had a Washington dateline but was a statement by Ramey, which had to originate in Fort Worth, which said the disk had been sent to Wright Field.[28] What is critical here is the use of the past tense. The story didn’t say it would be forwarded, but that it had already been sent.

At 6:02 p.m. (EST, 5:02 p.m. CST), the AP put together the whole story and started the transmission of the “First Lead Disk.” This story, datelined Albuquerque said, “The army air forces has gained possession of a flying disk, Lt. Warren Haught [Walter Haut], public information officer at Roswell army airfield announced today.” That new lead was to be integrated into the stories that had already been transmitted.[29]

 

Dallas Morning News reporters called out to the Fort Worth Army Air Field, according to them, at 5:30 p.m. (CST, 6:30 EST) and interviewed Major E. M. Kirton, an intelligence officer at Eighth Air Force Headquarters. He told reporters that “there is nothing to it… It was a rawin high altitude sounding device.” Kirton said that the identification was final and there was no reason to send it on to Wright Field for confirmation. He confirmed that the material had been flown to Fort Worth on a B-29.[30]

Warrant Officer Irving Newton said that he was alone in the weather office and when he received a call ordering him to General Ramey’s office. Newton said that he was the only one there and couldn’t leave. General Ramey then called and told him to “get your ass over here now. Use a car and if you have to, take the first one with the keys in it.”[31]

 

When Newton arrived, around 6:00 p.m. (CST, 7:00 EST), a colonel or a lieutenant colonel stopped him and briefed him. Newton didn’t remember who it was, only that he was told that “These officers from Roswell think they found a flying saucer, but the general thinks it’s a weather balloon. He wants you to take a look at it.”[32]

Newton, in his signed statement for the Air Force said, “Several people were in the room when I went in, among them General Ramey, a couple of press people, a Major, I learned later to be Major Marcel and some other folks. Someone introduced Major Marcel as the person who found this material… While I was examining the debris, Major Marcel was picking up pieces of the target sticks and trying to convince me that some notations on the sticks were alien writings. There were figures on the sticks lavender or pink in color, appeared to be weather faded markings with no rhyme or reason. He did not convince me these were alien writings.”[33]

 

At 7:03 p.m. (EST, 6:03 CST), there was another “first lead” story from Washington, but this one hinted that there was nothing spectacular about the disc. It was now being identified as some sort of a meteorological device, or in other words, a weather balloon.[1]

Twelve minutes later, at 7:15 p.m. (EST, 6:15 CST), there was a bulletin that said General Ramey would make a statement on national radio. WBAP, a Dallas radio station, had arranged for the national hook up for Ramey[2]over the NBC radio network.

The FBI entered the picture just two minutes later, at 6:17 p.m. (CST, 7:17 EST). The FBI office in Dallas sent a message to the FBI office in Cincinnati, about the story. The message was sent to the director, J. Edgar Hoover, and to the SAC (Special Agent in Charge) and was titled, “Flying Disc, Information Concerning.” The text said:
 

Major Curtan [sic, Edwin Kirton], Headquarters Eighth Air Force, telephonically advised this office that an object purporting to be a flying disc was recovered near Roswell, New Mexico, this date [July 8, 1947]. The disc was hexagonal in shape and was suspended from a balloon by cable, which baloon [sic] was approximately twenty feet in diameter. Major Curtan further advised that the object found resembles a high altitude weather balloon with a radar reflector, but that telephonic conversation between their office and Wright Field had not borne out this belief. Disc and balloon being transported to Wright Field by special plane for examin [sic]. Information provided this office because of national interest in case and fact that National Broadcasting Company, Associated Press, and others attempting to break the story of location of the disc today. Major Curtan advised would request Wright Field to advise Cincinnati office results of examination. No further investigation being conducted.[3]

Then, at 7:29 p.m. EST (6:29 p.m. CST), came another new lead for the story. It said, “Procede [sic] Washington. Lead All Disk.” This meant, simply, that the lead on the story that had been transmitted prior to this would be changed and the new lead substituted.

This was broken with another bulletin almost immediately. It said, “Fort Worth – Roswell’s celebrated ‘flying disk’ was rudely stripped of its glamor by a Fort Worth army airfield weather officer who late today identified the object as a ‘weather balloon.’”[4]

At the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Johnson had developed the pictures quickly and on orders from Greene, he brought out a wet print. There were others waiting for him, including technicians from Dallas who had brought in a portable wire photo machine so that they could get the pictures out over the AP wire immediately.[5]

He would say that he wrote the first story about the recovery that appeared in an early edition of the newspaper. The last line of that story became important because it said, “After his first look, Ramey declared all it was was a weather balloon. The weather officer verified his view.[6]

Johnson had been given the solution, apparently before Newton arrived to provide the final, conclusive word. But that solution had been handed to the reporter for the Dallas Morning News, not by Ramey or Newton, but by Kirton, who was the intelligence officer. This would suggest that Newton was called in to provide some drama for the other reporters who did drive out to the airfield.

DuBose’s suggestion of a cover up seems to confirm the suspicions that had arisen given the timing of various press stories. The timing of statements, such as that given by Kirton to the Dallas Morning News, suggest that the weather balloon identification had been made before Newton arrived at Ramey’s office.

Even with the questions that should have been asked about how an experienced intelligence officer could mistake the remains of a flimsy weather balloon and an aluminum foil radar reflector for a flying saucer or why no one at Roswell could identify the wreckage for what it was, the cover story was accepted. According to one story, “Brigadier General Donald M. Yates, chief of the AAF weather service, said only a very few of them are used daily, at points were some specific project requires highly accurate wind information from extreme altitudes.”[7]

Newton, on the other hand, wasn’t saying the rawins were quite so rare. The Star-Telegram reported, “Newton said there are some 80 weather stations in the United States using this type of gadget, and it could have come from any of them.”[8]

That wasn’t the only point on which the stories disagreed. In earlier editions of the newspaper, it mentioned that “The disc landed on a ranch near Roswell sometime last week.”[9] Later is was reported, “Brazell [sic], whose ranch is 30 miles from the nearest telephone and has no radio, knew nothing about the flying discs when he found the remains of the weather device scattered over a square mile of his property three weeks ago.”[10]

That same day, in the Albuquerque Journal, Jason Kellahin reported, “Scattered with the materials over an area about 200 years across were pieces of grey rubber. All pieces were small.”[11]

Interestingly, that is not the only fact that Kellahin reported that disagreed with the official story line. He wrote, “On July 4, after hearing about ‘flying discs,’ he took the find to Sheriff George Wilcox at Roswell who referred the discovery to intelligence officers at the Roswell field.”[12]

This is an interesting statement because it is in conflict with almost all newspaper accounts that suggest Brazel had gone into Roswell on July 7. Marcel, in describing his activities, suggesting that they remained overnight on the Brazel ranch and went out the next morning, suggests a time line that put Brazel into Roswell on Sunday, July 6. After spending all day in the field, Marcel returned, arriving in Roswell, late on the evening or early in the morning of July 8, and then briefing Blanchard quite earlier.

By 10:00 p.m. (CST, 11:00 p.m. EST), the story was virtually over. Ramey had not appeared on NBC, but at 10:00 he was quoted on ABC’s “Headline Edition,” and the weather balloon story entered the public consciousness. The newspapers were reporting the error on the part of the officers in Roswell. The Las Vegas Review Journal reported:

The excitement ran through this cycle:

1. Lieutenant Warren Haught [Walter Haut], public relations officer at the Roswell base, released a statement in the name of Colonel William Blanchard, base commander. It said that an object described as a “flying disk” was found on the nearby Foster ranch three weeks ago by W. W. Brazel and had been sent to “higher officials” for examination.

2. Brigadier General Roger B. Ramey, commander of the 8^th air force, said at Fort Worth that he believed the object was the “remnant of a weather balloon and radar reflector,” and was “nothing to be excited about.” He allowed photographers to take a picture of it. It was announced that the object would be sent to Wright Field, Dayton, Ohio, for examination by experts.

3. Later, Warrant Officer Irving Newton, Stessonville, Wisconsin, weather officer at Fort Worth, examined the object and said definitely that it was nothing but a badly smashed target used to determine the direction and velocity of high altitude winds.

4. Lieutenant Haught reportedly told reporters that he had been “shut up by two blistering phone calls from Washington.”[13]

5. Efforts to contact Colonel Blanchard brought the information that “he is now on leave.”[14]

6. Major Jesse A. Marcel, intelligence officer of the 509^th bombardment group, reportedly told Brazel, the finder of the object, that it “has nothing to do with army or navy so far as I can tell.”

7. Brazel told reporters that he had found weather balloon equipment before but had seen nothing that resembled his latest find.

Those who saw the object said it had a flowered paper tape around it bearing the initials “D. P.”[15]

 

While this story was winding down, with the principals unavailable for comment, that is Brazel being held by the military[16], Marcel either in Fort Worth or enroute back to Roswell, and with Blanchard on leave, reporters were unable to gather any additional information. Sheriff Wilcox would say little. It was reported, “Wilcox said he did not see the object but was told by Brazell [sic] it was ‘about three feet across.’ The sheriff declined to elaborate. ‘I’m working with those fellows at the base,’ he said.”[17]

This then, gives an outline of the events of July 8 based on the available documentation including newspaper reports, interviews conducted with the principals in the story, and a timeline that was reconstructed more than a half century after the incident. I think that you all can draw your own conclusions about what it means, but the information here is the latest available.

I will note that as I went through this I did find a couple of places where the footnotes were inaccurate. In one instance, I sourced the Albuquerque Journal when it was the Albuquerque Tribune. I have tried to make sure that everything is accurate but some questions still might arise. Those will be dealt with as they appear.

---

[1] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” Daily Illini, July 9, 1947, p. 5.

 

[2] Ibid.

 

[3] FBI Telex, July 8, 1947.

 

[4] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” July 9, 1947, p. 5. 

 

[5] Johnson, personal interview with Randle, March 24, 1989.

 

[6] Johnson, claimed authorship of “’Disk-overy’ Near Roswell Identified as Weather Balloon by FWAAF Officer,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 9, 1947. He would later deny that he had written the article.

 

[7] “AAF Finds ‘Saucer’, But Wishes it Hadn’t,” The Boston Herald, July 9, 1947, pp. 1 – 2.

 

[8] “New Mexico Rancher’s ‘Flying Disk’ Proves to Be Weather Balloon-Kite,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 9, 1947, p. 1. This is from a later edition of the July 9, 1947, newspaper and adds details that were not reported in the earlier edition.

 

[9] This is from the United Press teletypes provided by Frank Joyce.

 

[10] “New Mexico Rancher’s ‘Flying Disk’ Proves to Be Weather Balloon-Kite,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 9, 1947, p. 1.

 

[11] Jason Kellahin, “NM Rancher Sorry He Said Anything About ‘Disc Find,’” Albuquerque Tribune, July 9, 1947, p. 2.

 

[12] Ibid.

[13] Haut, in a personal interview with Randle on April 20, 1989, said that he had received no calls from Washington, D.C. He said, “Well, I think that had I really gotten any calls from Washington, a first lieutenant getting calls from the big boys, I’d remember it.” On the other hand, in an interview with Randle on December 5, 1990, George Walsh said, “He [Haut] said the just got a call from the War Department and [they] told him in two words, ‘Shut up.’”

 

[14] As noted earlier, it was about 2:30 p. m. (MST) that Blanchard announced his leave. It seems to be a strange time to begin a leave, especially when it is about the same time that all the interest developed, based on the time lines published in 1947.

 

[15] “Flying Disc Tales Decline As Army, Navy Crack Down,” Las Vegas Review-Journal, July 9, 1947, pp. 1 – 2; Army, Navy Open Drive To Dry Up Saucer Talk,” Phoenix Gazette, July 9, 1947, p. 4

 

[16] Major Edwin Easley, Provost Marshal at the RAAF in July 1947, in a telephone interview with Randle, February 1990.

 

[17] “Disc Mystery Is ‘Solved’ For Three Hours Until Roswell Find Collapses,” Albuquerque Journal, July 9, 1947, pp. 1 – 2.

 

---

[1] In other interviews, Haut would say that he didn’t remember if Blanchard had called him and given him the facts of the story or if he had dictated the finished release to him. He said didn’t remember if he had gone to Blanchard’s office, or received a telephone call about it. See Carey and Schmitt, Witness to Roswell, pp. 252 – 253;

Pflock, Roswell: Inconvenient Facts, p. 26; Philip Klass, Real Roswell Cover-up, pp. 31 -32; Randle and Schmitt, UFO Crash, pp. 68 -76; Walter Haut personal interview by Randle, April 1, 1990.

 

[2] In the documentation provided by Frank Joyce, there had been a query from Denver, to Santa Fe, asking for the text of the announcement. Santa Fe responded, “Army gave verbal ann[oun]c[e]ment. No text.”

 

[3] Joyce would suggest that after he received the press release, he called Haut and warned him that the wording of it was incorrect. It had to do with who was issuing the release and what it said. Joyce claimed he warned Haut that he would get into trouble based on that wording.

 

[4] Walsh worked at the other Roswell radio station, KSWS.

 

[5] George Walsh, affidavit signed September 13, 1993.

 

[6] Pflock, Roswell: Inconvenient Facts and the Will to Believe, p. 62.

 

[7] Art McQuiddy, personal interview by Randle, January 19, 1990.

 

[8] Given the sequence of events, based on time lines published in other newspapers and interviews conducted with other witnesses, the telephone calls to McQuiddy probably didn’t start for two hours. He, like others in Roswell said that he received telephone calls from all over the world, mentioning London, Rome, Paris and Hong Kong.

 

[9] McQuiddy, personal interview by Randle, January 19, 1990.

 

[10] Donald Schmitt, UFO Crash at Roswell II, The Author, 1997: p. 60

 

[11] We have no information how long the story was in Albuquerque, how it was vetted, or how long it took to type it into the news wire.

 

[12] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” July 9, 1947, p. 5. Although the Daily Illini story gives all times in relation to the Associated Press, the line quoted at the beginning for the article is actually from the United Press International.

 

[13] “Disc Solution Collapses,” San Francisco Chronicle, July 9, 1947, p. 1

[14] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” July 9, 1947, p. 5, which only published the first line of the story, and had attributed it to the Associated Press. Frank Joyce retained the teletype copy which he had sent to the United Press. He provided copies of these documents to various UFO researchers including Randle, Schmitt, Carey, and Pflock. See also, Pflock.  Roswell: Inconvenient Facts, pp. 244 – 248; Randle and Schmitt, Truth About, pp.46 - 50.

 

[15] J. Bond Johnson, personal interview by Randle, February 27, 1989, March 24, 1990; Johnson in interviews conducted by Bill Moore and Jaime Shandera would later change much of his story. For these alternative views, see, Shandera and Moore, “Three Hours that Shook the Press,” Focus, 1990, 3 – 7; Shandera and Moore, “Three Hours that Shook the Press,” MUFON UFO Journal 269, September 1990: 3 - 10; Schmitt and Randle, “What Happened in Ramey’s Office?” MUFON UFO Journal 276, April 1991: 3 – 9.

 

[16] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” Daily Illini, July 9, 1947, p. 5.

 

[17] Years later, both George Walsh and Frank Joyce would claim credit for breaking this story. It would seem that Walsh put the story on the AP wire, which did get it out nationally first. Joyce, a stringer for the United Press had to take the story to the Western Union office for transmittal to Albuquerque. Documentation suggests that the AP story hit the wires about fifteen minutes before the UP story, which gives the nod to Walsh.

 

[18] Johnson, interview by Randle, March 24, 1989.

 

[19] Ibid. For additional information see Schmitt and Randle, “Fort Worth, July 8, 1947: The Cover up Begins,” International UFO Reporter, 15,2, March/April 1990; 21 – 23; Schmitt and Randle, “The Fort Worth Press Conference: The J. Bond Johnson Connection,” International UFO Reporter, 15,6, November/December 1990: 5 – 16.

 

[20] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” Daily Illini, July 9, 1947, p. 5.

 

[21] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” Daily Illini, July 9, 1947, p. 5.

 

[22] Shandera. “Three Hours that Shook the Press,” MUFON UFO Journal 269, September 1990:  3 - 10.

 

[23]  Johnson, interview by Randle, March 24, 1989.

 

[24] Johnson, interview by Randle, March 24, 1989.

 

[25] Johnson, interview by Randle, March 24, 1989.

 

[26] Ibid. The problem is that the PIO would have been in the office. In other interviews, Irving Newton suggested he was there when all the pictures were taken, which would mean that Johnson saw him as well. Johnson’s claim that only Ramey and DuBose were there does not hold up when other information is considered.

 

[27] J. Bond Johnson, “’Disk-overy’ Near Roswell Identified As Weather Balloon by FWAAF Officer,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 9, 1947: pp. 1 – 2

 

[28] “AP Wires Burn With ‘Captured Disk’ Story,” Daily Illini, July 9, 1947, p. 5.

 

[29] Ibid

 

[30] “Suspected ‘Disk’ Only Flying Weather Vane,” Dallas Morning News, July 9, 1947.

 

[31] Irving Newton, telephone Interviews with Randle, October 20, 1989, March 24, 1990 and January 1991. See also, Weaver and McAndrew, The Roswell Report, Statement Thirty (Irving Newton). A similar account is found in Berlitz and Moore, The Roswell Incident, pp. 31 – 37.

 

[32] Newton, personal telephone with Randle, January 1991. See also, Randle and Schmitt, Truth About UFO Crash at Roswell, pp. 42 – 43. It should be noted that Newton was not sure about the time and had suggested it was just after he had come on duty at 2:00 p.m., but the documentation available suggests that Newton was called to Ramey’s office about 6:00 p.m.

 

[33] Weaver and McAndrew, The Roswell Report, Statement Thirty (Irving Newton).