Pendleton, Oregon East Oregonian -
June 28, 1947
Experts Reach Deep Into Bag
To Explain 'Flying Discs'
By BILL BEQUETTE
Several "explanations" were
advanced today for the so-called "flying discs"
reported seen in several widespread eastern areas.
Lt. Col. Harold E. Turner, commandant
of the White Sands proving ground in New Mexico, was quoted as
saying the heated circular exhaust pipes of jet airplanes,
when hot, might give an illusion of the discs.
Kenneth Arnold, Boise, Ida., businessman
pilot who first reported in the East Oregonian
of seeing the strange objects whizzing over the Cascade
mountains in southwestern Washington at an estimated speed of
approximately 1300 miles of an hour could only guess at what he
had seen.
He suggested the high speed mirror-bright
"planes" might have been guided missiles being tested
by the army.
But if the army knew anything about such
activities it wasn't admitting it. Official spokesmen
continued to pooh-pooh the idea, disclaiming any knowledge
of such activities in that area.
Meanwhile, reports of similar objects were
received from Washington, Idaho, Oklahoma and New Mexico.
Another "explanation" was advanced
by Howard W. Blakeslee, Associated Press science editor.
He said the mysterious objects flashing across the sky roughly
agreed with the way light occasionally was reflected from a
distant airplane.
He couldn't account for the speed, however.
He said in a clear air the flash of sunlight
from a plane could easily be seen 50 miles. This flash
would be round, the shape of the sun, he said adding that any other
reflection at a great distance likely would be round since it
came only from a small area on the plane.
Blakeslee said reports of unusual objects
in the sky had been numerous since the war. Atomic bombs
and rocket rumors have accounted for most of them, he said,
and concluded that for this reason any unusual sights in the
sky likely would appear to be exaggerated.
There were other attempts to explain the
mystery. They ranged from "illusions" and mirages
to whisperings of secret Russian weapons.
But while none were wholly satisfactory,
one thing at least was certain: Mr. Arnold – and perhaps
others – saw something strange and almost unbelievable.
What it was perhaps only time will tell.
Boise, Idaho Statesman -
June 28, 1947
'Flying Saucer' Observer Says
No One Can Change His Mind
Kenneth Arnold, businessman-pilot who made the
headlines with his story of sighting strange disc-like flying missiles
in southern Washington, was back in his home town of Boise today --
and his story hasn't changed a bit.
"I saw what I saw," he said.
"No one can change my mind."
"I'll match my judgment, position and
everything on what I saw with my own eyes. I never suffered
from snow-blindness, spots before my eyes or hallucinations.
Physically, I'm 100 per cent. I'll submit to any kind
of test. I only reported what any pilot would report.
I certainly have nothing to gain in a business way with all
this hullabaloo."
Arnold resides on a ranch near Boise.
He uses a hayfield for an airport. He sells fire-control
equipment.
Arnold said he saw strange "flying
saucers" -- nine of them -- near Mount Rainier while flying to
Yakima Wash., this week.
He said he is more concerned with the fact that
neither the FBI nor the army appear interested in his story.
"If I was running the country," he
said, "and someone reported something unusual, I'd certainly
want to know more about it."
Pendleton, Oregon East Oregonian
- June 28, 1947
If the planes or guided missiles seen by
Kenneth Arnold were operated by the army or for the army the
military should say so but not divulge details. People
would soon forget it but if the affair remains a mystery
they won't.
San Francisco Examiner - June 29,
1947
'Flying Saucers'
Seen in Oregon
SEASIDE (Ore.), June 28 -- (AP) -- The
latest report on the "flying saucers" came today
from a Seaside woman who said she saw one of them winging
soundlessly south at 8:05 p.m. She was Mrs. Sidney B.
Smith, wife of a Seaside policeman, who with her 8 year old
daughter, Joanne, said she watched the "round"
object for nearly three minutes.
Mrs. Smith added that it was flying high,
east of the city, but she believed it was close enough for
her to have heard regular engines. She said she could
hear nothing.
Portland, Oregon Daily Journal
- July 2, 1947
Rankin Report Adds Credence to 'Disks'
The report of a long-time West Coast man was
added today to the growing account of "flying saucers"
over the west.
Richard Rankin, veteran of more than 7000
hours in the air, said he saw the much-debated mystery disks high
over Bakersfield, Cal., and going "maybe 300 or 400 miles an
hour."
There were 10 in formation flying north, he
told the reporter, but when "they returned on the reverse
course, headed south, there were only seven.
"I couldn't make out the number or
location of their propellers and couldn't distinguish any wings or
tail. They appeared almost round," he said.
Rankin said he saw them June 23, but
hesitated to describe what he saw until he noted others were
reporting the same thing.
At first, he continued, he assumed he had
seen the XF5U-1, the experimental navy "Flying
Flapjack." The navy since has announced it has only one
XF5U-1, and it has not left Connecticut.
Rankin, ex-Portlander who now lives in Palm
Springs, Cal., and is brother of late John G. "Tex"
Rankin, pioneer stunt flyer, said he observed the
"planes" from the ground.
New reports meanwhile came in from 3 Oregon
cities, Astoria, Madras, and Portland.
At least 10 or 12 of the mystery craft
tipped noiselessly from side to side as they moved along the
course of the Columbia river Tuesday noon to convince two
Portland skeptics that Kenneth "Saucer" Arnold of
Boise was telling the truth when he first reported the disks
a week ago.
"We didn't believe the story when we saw
it in the papers but we definitely saw the flying objects at
11:45 a.m. Tuesday," reported Mrs. Herbert Baillet, who with
her husband is building a house near NE 74th Ave. and Prescott St.
"I first saw three of them as we sat
down to lunch and called my husband's attention to them.
Later there were 10 or 12 of them, flying low below the
foothills and apparently over the Columbia river or just on
the Washington side. There was no noise and they did not
appear to be flying fast."
Manitou Mountain, Colorado -
May 19, 1947
Official Report to USAF, July 2, 1947
Richland, Washington Villager -
July 3, 1947
"FLYING DISKS" ARE SEEN HERE
First Noticed by Leo Bernier
A Richland chapter was added last week to the
mystery of the 'flying discs' or 'saucers' puzzling the western
states when a village resident, Leo Bernier of 1213 Stevens Drive,
reported having seen several of them high in the sky last Tuesday
afternoon.
"They were going west by southwest
around 2 or 2:30," Bernier said, "and were rather
silvery and shaped as though a saucer were seen edgewise."
Bernier didn't say much about them
until he read in the paper that they had been seen
elsewhere. "I was worried that people might just
laugh," he said.
The disks were extremely far away, near the
horizon, but high in the sky, he stated, and even at that distance
were traveling as fast as a P-38 might seem to be going if it were
just 600 feet high.
"They appeared something like a
reflection from a plane, but were going too fast for any kind
of plane," Bernier said.
Various theories have been offered for
the phenomum [sic], which has been sighted in at least
five areas besides Richland, west of the Mississippi.
In clear air, the flash of sunlight
from a plane can easily be seen 50 miles. The flash is
round, the shape of the sun. Any other reflection from a
great distance is apt to be round too.
Most puzzling factor in the mystery are
the great speeds, although it is difficult for the
eye to make a correct estimate of speeds, and jet planes travel
much faster then regular planes.
Reports of unusual objects in the sky have
been numerous since the war. Atomic bomb and rocket rumors
have accounted for most of them.
Bernier has his own explanation as good as any.
"I believe it may be a visitor from
another planet, more developed than ours," he says.
"in my opinion we're just beginning to see things
this world never dreamed of."
Seen Sunday by Neighborhood
Just to prove that there was something in the
sky, a whole neighborhood reported late this week that they had
seen the famed 'discs' last Sunday afternoon above Richland.
A disc was first spotted by James Harbor, 10,
of 1417 Johnston, earlier in the week, but he was having difficulty
in getting anyone to believe him, when he saw another one Sunday
afternoon, "about 3," while playing with some friends.
Jimmy immediately called his mother and
several neighbors to view it and prove his story.
"When I first came out," reports
his mother, Mrs. Thomas Harbour, "the disc seemed straight
above, right over the village. It seemed to be
hovering. It wavered, then started back and all of a
sudden, reversed itself and shot off toward the northeast."
The disc was bright, but very high in the
air, according to Mrs. Harbour. It was round, with a
shimmering edge, as though that moved separately from the center.
It was silvery, as reported elsewhere, but
to Mrs. Harbour seemed to have a tail or a stream of smoke
clinging to it.
"I couldn't judge how high it was,
but I'm sure it was a terrific size," she stated.
"The whole neighborhood saw it."
"Others who saw the disc, according to
her, were Walter and Donald Schaeffer, neighbor boys, Mrs. Carl
Gibons of 1413 Johnston and Mrs. E. D. Ferguson of 1418 Johnston.
Said Mrs. Gibson, "It was real bright
and seemed to go fast, but every once in a while it looked like it
was turning or something because it twinkled like a star."
"It very definitely wasn't a plane.
I've never seen anything like it before...It was spinning,"
she added.
"Mrs. Ferguson thought of it as
spinning, too, but to her it seemed to have a "sort of a halo
or circle around it."
"It could have been smoke around it
which appeared to come from the center or top of the disc,"
Mrs. Ferguson related.
"She too agreed that it was shiny,
huge in size and very high in the sky.
"It didn't move like a plane, more like
a balloon except that balloons move smoothly and this was
jerky," Mrs. Ferguson reported. She sad [sic]
they had to be in a shadow to see it, and that the whole
neighborhood was out.
Oklahoma Norman Transcript -
July 4, 1947
MORE FLYING DISCS REPORTED
(UP)-- A flight of "flying saucers" has been reported
in eastern Canada but reaction there to the mystery missiles
reported earlier in nine states of the United States was
"they're probably leftovers from the mad hatter's tea
party minus cups, of course."
Dr. and Mrs. C.K. Gunn and two friends said
they saw strange objects "traveling at great speed high in
the sky" last Tuesday near their home at Summerside on
Prince Edward island.
Roland Phillipson, one of the four,
described the objects as shapeless, but glistening in the sunlight.
Father Burke-Gaffney, astronomer and dean of
engineering at St. Mary's college at Halifax, said the saucers
were "outside the realm of astronomy." Another
Canadian source said "It's probably a matter for witch
doctors."
Army research experts in Washington said
they can't explain the saucers reported whizzing across the
sky by persons in eight states, but they said they are
investigating.
An Albuquerque, New Mexico Chamber of
Commerce official, Max Hood, reported he saw "a disk-like
bluish object following a zig-zag path in the northwestern
sky" over New Mexico on July 01.
Other "saucers" previously
were reported seen over a Navajo Indian reservation in
northwestern New Mexico, and over Gallup, near Silver city,
Sante Fe, Elephant Butte and other points in the state.
A U.S. meteorologist, E.E. Unger of
Louisville, said he saw a circular object flying through the
air Tuesday night as he left a neighborhood theater. He
said it was moving about 100 miles an hour, and giving off
an orange light. Mrs. Louis Goldstein, wife of a deputy
sheriff at Monterey, California, reported she saw one of
the "flying saucers" or discs at 7:45 a.m. (PST) today
while looking out a window of her home by Monterey airport.
"I know people will say I'm crazy, but I saw a quite-rounded
flying object, not circular, with a red glow on one edge,"
Mrs. Goldstein said. "I saw it for 10 or 15 seconds -
then, suddenly it vanished."
Airlines reported no planes in flight in
the area at the time. The only plane at the airport was
grounded. The projectiles, variously described as "too
fast for an airplane and not fast enough for a falling star,"
"not moving at all," and "traveling at great
speed," were reported seen again Thursday night streaking
over Denver.
It was the third report of the
"saucers" this week, while persons in Idaho, Oregon,
California, New Mexico and other states reported seeing various
versions of the unexplained projectiles last week.
Mrs. L.M. Wagoner and her eight-year-old
son of Sherman, Texas reported they saw a flying disc about 7
p.m. Sunday while traveling between Dallas and Corsicana.
Mrs. Wagoner said the disc, about the size of a man's hat, was
traveling northward and disappeared in a few seconds.
A Dallas man, Tom Dean, said he and his wife
and daughter saw a disc-shaped object "going like blue blazes
from northeast to southwest at cloud level" Tuesday while
traveling between Dallas and Fort Worth. Dean said it
resembled a flattened-out balloon and was in sight for 12
or 15 seconds.
A shiny disc, traveling about 150 miles per
hour, was seen over El Paso, Texas, at 3:30 p.m. MST, Sunday,
June 22, by Dr. G. Oliver Dickson, an optometrist. He said
it was shaped a little like a blimp, coming to a point at each
end. The sun's rays were not reflected on it, he added.
Lt. Gov. Donald S. Whitehead of Idaho said
today that he saw a strange comet-like object hanging high in the
western sky on June 24. That was the day Kenneth Arnold,
Boise, Idaho, first reported seeing the projectiles over southeastern
Washington.
Their stories varied. Arnold had
estimated the projectiles speed at 1,200 miles an hour.
Whitehead said the objects he and three other witnesses saw
"didn't move, but just seemed to go below the horizon with
the rotation of the earth." At Denver Henry Martin
and Walter Harrod said they caught a brief glimpse of a group
of "bright objects" flying at about 5,000 feet Thursday
night. Martin said they looked like coffee can cups.
They were traveling in a southwesterly direction, he said.
State Highway Patrol Sgt. David Menary, of
San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge detail, reported seeing a
dozen bright metal objects "about the size of a
football" whiz over San Francisco Bay June 24 and fall
into the sea.
Dick Rankin, former Portland, Oregon flyer,
said he saw the discs high over Bakersfield, California, going
from 200 to 400 miles an hour June 23. There were ten of them in a
formation flying north, he said.
At Bath, South Carolina, Jack Reams reported
that last week he saw a disc 12 inches in diameter, giving off a small
weird light as it whizzed through the sky at a tremendous
speed.
Portland Oregonian - July 5, 1947
Air Liner Crew Confirms Flying Discs Over State
Many Seen During Day Over City
Reports of two to 20 fantastic "flying discs" over
the Portland-Vancouver area Friday were confirmed by the
crew of a westbound Boise-to-Portland United Airlines plane.
Their report, detailed enough to shake the
most incredulous, left them equally shaken.
"No object I know of could disappear
so quickly," Capt. E. J. Smith, veteran pilot of the plane,
reported in an interview at Portland.
Three Sight Objects
He, First Officer Ralph Stevens and
Stewardess Marty Morrow all saw the objects, which appeared to
be 30 or more miles away, eight minutes after take-off from Boise
at 9:04 PM, and had them -- nine in all -- under observation for
an estimated 10 to 15 minutes.
Seen from approximately the same altitude,
the UAL crew could give no clue to their shape, other than that
they were "very thin, very flat on the bottom, and appeared
to be rough or irregular on top. They are not
aircraft. They are bigger than aircraft."
Scores of persons in the Portland area
Friday reported seeing, "flying discs" or something
like them. Most observers agree the objects were moving
rapidly, apparently in formation at about 10,000 feet.
Coincidentally, the Associated Press and
army officers at Fort Lewis, Wash., announced a flight of six
bombers and 24 P-80 jet-propelled Shooting Stars were making
a holiday demonstration flight at great altitude over Portland
about the time the first "discs" were reported.
Police Cars Alerted
The first "saucers" sighted
were said to be "right over" Oaks amusement park.
Don Metcalfe, Oaks employee, told William LeRoy, park
superintendent, that he had seen them.
An "all car" alert by Portland
police radio brought reports from Patrolman Earl Patterson,
in car 13, and Patrolmen Walter Lissy and Robert Ellis, in car
82, that they had spotted them.
Patterson, an air corps veteran who was
at S. E. 82nd avenue and Foster road, said the discs came from
the west, passed under the sun and proceeded southwesterly.
They were either aluminum or eggshell white, did not flash or
reflect the sun, and were traveling fast, Patterson said.
It was his opinion they were not airplanes and would have to
be radio controlled. They were erratic in flight, wobbling and
weaving, he said.
Veterans Spy Objects
Lissy and Ellis, both veterans and civilian
pilots, said they saw three discs which remained in sight about
30 seconds. They could not judge speed or height because
the objects near Oaks park were traveling at "terrific
speed." They heard no sound but said they saw flashes
and noted erratic flight including sudden changes of direction.
Capt. K. A. Prehn of the harbor patrol,
Harbor Pilot A. T. Austed and Patrolman K. C. Hoffi, who were at
the Irving street headquarters of the harbor patrol, said they saw the
discs going south over the Globe mills at about 10,000 feet.
They seemed to oscillate, weave and turn until sometimes a
full disc, sometimes only a crescent was visible.
All three said they were undecided, whether
there were three or six discs because of the flashes.
Captain Prehn described the sight as a "wobbling hubcap."
A regular plane was in the sky at the time, but these were not
planes, they agreed.
Deputies Report Streaks
Sgt. Claude Cross reported seeing two
objects from state police headquarters, 9200 S. E. McLoughlin
boulevard. They looked like toy balloons, almost pure white
and traveled sidewise with no flashing lights, he said.
Sheriff's Deputies John Sullivan, Clarence
McKay and Fred Krives of the Clark county, Wash., sheriff's
office, reported seeing 20 streak over Vancouver in a straight
line, traveling west and south. They heard a low hum or
"drone," and described the objects as "dark,
not flashy and more like a bunch of geese."
Harry Hale, production manager of
The Oregonian, said he saw a shiny object in the sky just west
of Beaverton, while driving toward Portland Friday morning.
The object was moving swiftly in a southerly direction, but
disappeared suddenly.
