Part 4 (2/2)

As 1947 drew to a close, the Air Force's Project Sign had outgrown its initial panic and had settled down to a routine operation Every intelligence report dealing with the Germans' World War II aeronautical research had been studied to find out if the Russians could have developed any of the late Ger saucers Aerodynaht Field's Aircraft Laboratory computed the maxins The designers of the aircraft the saucer frons?” The ansas, ”No, there was no conceivable way any aircraft could perform that would match the reported maneuvers of the UFO's” The Air Force's Aeromedical Laboratory concurred If the aircraft could be built, the human body couldn't stand the violent maneuvers that were reported The aircraft-structures people seconded this, no material known could stand the loads of the reported h speeds

Still convinced that the UFO's were real objects, the people at ATIC began to change their thinking Those ere convinced that the UFO's were of Soviet origin now began to eye outer space, not because there was any evidence that the UFO's did come from outer space but because they were convinced that UFO's existed and only soy could build such vehicles As far as the effect on the human body was concerned, why couldn't these people, whoever they e them by earthly standards? I found a n files

Project Sign ended 1947 with a new proble World War II the organization that was ATIC's forerunner, the Air Materiel Cohly effectiveout every possible bit of information about the technical aspects of enemy aircraft

ATIC knew these methods, but how could this be applied to spaceshi+ps?

The probleanized confusion

If the confusion in the anized the confusion in thethe UFO were conflicting

A widely printed newspaper release, quoting an unnaon, said:

The ”flying saucers” are one of three things:

Solar reflections on low-hanging clouds

S the rays of the sun

Icing conditions could have forlided

A follow-up, which quoted several scientists, said in essence that the unnamed Air Force official was crazy nobody even heard of crystallized e, flat hailstones, and the solar- reflection theory was absurd

_Life_, _Tiazines carried articles about the UFO's Soue in cheek, others were not All the articles mentioned the Air Force's mass- hysterical induced hallucinations But a Veterans' Administration psychiatrist publicly pooh-poohed this ”Too s,” he said

It idely suggested that all the UFO's were o astronomers queered this Dr Gerard Kuiper, director of the University of Chicago observatory, was quoted as flatly saying the UFO's couldn't be meteors ”They are probably man-made,” he told the associated Press Dr Oliver Lee, director of Northwestern University's observatory, agreed with Dr Kuiper and he threw in an additional confusion factor that had been in the back of many people's overned to the US from the first, but Dr Vannevar Bush, the world-famous scientist, and Dr

Merle Tuve, inventor of the proxiht

”Impossible,” they said

All of this ti serious interest in the UFO subject Yet every time a newspaper reporter went out to interview a person who had seen a UFO, intelligence agents had already been flown in, gotten the detailed story complete with sketches of the UFO, and sped back to their base to send the report to Project Sign Many people had supposedly been ”warned” not to talk too hty interested in hallucinations

Thus 1947 ended with various-sized questionsaucers closely the question , if you just noted the UFO story titles in the papers it was s Probably none of the people, military or civilian, who had made the public statements were at all qualified to do so but they had done it, their comments had been printed, and their comments had been read Their comments formed the question mark

CHAPTER THREE

The Classics

1948 was only one hour and twenty-five entleman from Abilene, Texas, made the first UFO report of the year What he saw, ”a fan-shaped glow” in the sky, was insignificant as far as UFO reports go, but it ushered in a year that was to bring feverish activity to Project Sign

With the Soviets practically eliminated as a UFO source, the idea of interplanetary spaceshi+ps was beco 1948 the people in ATIC were openly discussing the possibility of interplanetary visitors without others tapping their heads and looking s 1948 the novelty of UFO's had worn off for the press and every John and Jane Doe who saw one didn'thardened, only a few of the best reports got any space Only ”The Classics” rated headlines ”The Classics” were three historic reports that were the highlights of 1948 They are called ”The Classics,” a naiven them by the Project Blue Book staff, because: (1) they are classic examples of how the true facts of a UFO report can be twisted and warped by sohly publicized reports of this early era of the UFO's, and (3) they ”proved” to ATIC's intelligence specialists that UFO's were real

The apparent lack of interest in UFO reports by the press was not a true indication of the situation I later found out, fro 1948 the interest in UFO's was running high

The Air Force Press Desk in the Pentagon was continually being asked what progress was being ation The ansas, ”Give us time This job can't be done in a week” The press respected this and was giving them time But every writer worth his salt has contacts, those ”usually reliable sources” you read about, and these contacts were talking All during 1948 contacts in the Pentagon were telling how UFO reports were rolling in at the rate of several per day and how ATIC UFO investigation teaate theanization had been called in to lighten ATIC's load and allow ATIC to concentrate on the analysis of the reports

The writers knew this was true because they had crossed paths with these ents The FBI was never officially interested in UFO sightings The writers'

contacts in the airline industry told about the UFO talk froood, solid, reliable, experienced airline pilots were seeing UFO's All of this led to one conclusion: whatever the Air Force had to say, when it was ready to talk, would be neorthy But the Air Force wasn't ready to talk