In Popular Astronomy, January 27, 1012, a Dr. F. B. Harris described an intensely black object that he saw crossing the moon. As nearly as he could tell, it was gigantic in size--though again there was no way to be sure of its distance from him or the moon. With careful understatement, Dr. Harris said, "I think a very interesting and curious phenomenon happened that night."

A strange shadow was noted on the clouds at Fort Worth, Texas, on April 8, 19, 3. It appeared to be caused by some large body hovering motionless above the clouds. As the cloud layer moved, the shadow remained in the same position. Then it changed size, diminishing, and quickly disappeared, as if it had risen vertically. A report on this was given in the Weather Bureau Review of that year, Number 4-599

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By 1919, dirigibles were of course well known to most of the world.

When a dirigible-shaped object appeared over Huntington, West Virginia, in July of that year, there was no great alarm. It was believed to be an American blimp, though the darkness--it was eleven at night--prevented observers from being sure. But a later check-up proved it was not an American ship, nor was it from any country possessing such craft.

For some time after this, there were few authentic reports. Then in 1934, Nicholas Roerich, head of the American-Roerich expedition into Tibet, had a remarkable experience that bears on the saucer riddle.

On pages 361 and 362 of his book Altai Himalaya, Roerich describes the incident. The expedition party was in the wilds of Tibet one morning when a porter noticed the peculiar actions of a buzzard overhead. He called Roerich's attention to it; then they all saw something high in the sky, moving at great speed from north to south. Watching it through binoculars, Roerich saw it was oval-shaped, obviously of huge size, and reflecting the sun's rays like brightly polished metal.

While he trailed it with his gla.s.ses, the object suddenly changed direction, from south to southwest. It was gone in a few moments.

This was the last sighting listed before World War II.

When I had finished, I stared out the plane window, curiously disturbed. Like most people, I had grown up believing the earth was the center of everything--life, intelligence, and religion. Now, for the first time in my life, that belief was shaken.

It was a curious thing. I could accept the idea that we would eventually explore s.p.a.ce, land on the moon, and go on to distant planets. I had read of the plans, and I knew our engineers and scientists would somehow find a way. It did not disturb my belief in our superiority.

But faced with this evidence of a superior race in the universe, my mind rebelled. For years, I had been accustomed to thinking in comic-strip terms of any possible s.p.a.cemen--Buck Rogers stuff, with weird-looking s.p.a.ce ships and green-faced Martians.

But now, if these sightings were true, the shoe was on the other foot.

We would be faced with a race of beings

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at least two hundred years ahead of our civilization--perhaps thousands. In their eyes, we might look like primitives.

My conjectures before the take-off had just been idle thinking; I had not really believed this could be the answer. But now the question came back sharply. How would we react to a sudden appearance of s.p.a.ce ships, bringing that higher race to the earth? If we were fully prepared, educated to this tremendous adventure, it might come off without trouble. Unprepared, we would be thrown into panic.

The lights of Philadelphia showed up ahead, and a thought struck me.

What would Philadelphians of 1776 have thought to see this DC-6 flying across their city at three hundred miles an hour? What would the sentries at Valley Forge have done, a year later, if this lighted airliner had streaked over their heads?

Madness. Stampede. Those were the plain answers.

But there was a difference now. We had had modern miracles, radio, television, supersonic planes, and the promise of still more miracles.

We could be educated, or at least partly prepared, to accept s.p.a.ce visitors.

In fifty years we had learned to fly. In fifty years more, we would be exploring s.p.a.ce. Why should we believe such creative intelligence was limited to the earth? It would be incredible if the earth, out of all the millions of planets, proved the only inhabited spot in the whole universe.

But, instinctively, I still fought against believing that the flying saucers were s.p.a.ce ships. Eventually, we would make contact with races on other planets; they undoubtedly would someday visit the earth. But if it could be put off . . . a problem for later generations to handle . . .

If the disks proved American guided missiles, it would be an easier answer.

Looking through the Project "Saucer" report DuBarry had loaned me, I read the s.p.a.ce-travel items, hoping to find some hint that this was a smoke screen. On page 18, in a discussion on Mars, I found this comment:

"Reports of strange objects seen in the skies have been handed down through the generations. However, scientists believe that if Martians were now visiting the earth

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without establishing contact, it could be a.s.sumed that they have just recently succeeded in s.p.a.ce travel, and that their civilization would be practically abreast of ours. This because they find it hard to believe that any technically established race would come here, flaunt its ability in mysterious ways over the years, but each time simply go way without ever establishing contact."

There could be several answers to that. The Martians might not be able to live in our atmosphere, except in their sealed s.p.a.ce ships. They, or some other planet race, could have observed us periodically to check on our slow progress. Until we began to approach their level of civilization, or in some way caused them concern, they would probably see no reason for trying to make contact. But somehow I found a vague comfort in the argument, full of holes though it was.

Searching further, I found other s.p.a.ce-travel comments. On one page, the Air Force admitted it was almost a certainty that s.p.a.ce travelers would be operating from planets outside the solar system. But on the following page, I discovered this sentence: "Thus, although visits from outer s.p.a.ce are believed to be possible, they are thought to be highly improbable."

What was the answer? Was this just a wandering discussion of possibilities, badly put together, or was it a hint of the truth? it could be the first step in preparing America for a revelation. It could also be a carefully thought-out trick.

This whole report might be designed to conceal a secret weapon. If the Air Force or the Navy did have a secret missile, what better way to distract attention? The old sighting reports could have been seized on as a buildup for s.p.a.ce travel hints.

Then suddenly it hit me.

Even if it were a smoke screen, what of those old reports?

They still remained to be answered. There was only one possible explanation, unless you discarded the sightings as lies. That meant discrediting many reliable witnesses--naval officers, merchant shipmasters, explorers, astronomers, ministers, and responsible public officials. {p. 65} Besides all these, there had been thousands of other witnesses, where large groups had seen the objects.

The answer seemed inevitable, but I held it off. I didn't want to believe it, with all the changes it might bring, the unpredictable effect upon our civilization.

If I kept on checking I might find evidence that would bring a different explanation for the present saucers.

DuBarry had put another group of reports in the envelope; this series covered the World War II phase and on up to the outbreak of the saucer scare in the United States. Some of it, about the foo fighters, I already knew. This was tied in with the mystery rockets reported over Sweden. The first Swedish sightings had occurred during the early part of the war. Most of the so-called "ghost rockets" were seen at night, moving at tremendous speed. Since they came from the direction of Germany, most Swedes believed that guided rockets were the answer.

During the summer of 1946, after the Russians had taken over Peenemunde, the n.a.z.i missile test base, ghost rockets again were reported flying over Sweden. Some were said to double back and fly into Soviet areas. Practically all were seen at night, and therefore none had been described as a flying disk. Instead, they were said to be colored lights, red, green, blue, and orange, often blurred from their high speed.

But there was a puzzling complication. Mystery lights, and sometimes flying disks, were simultaneously reported over Greece, Portugal, Turkey, Spain, and even French Morocco. Either there were two answers, or some nation had developed missiles with an incredibly long range.

By January 1947, ghost-rocket sightings in Europe had diminished to less than one a month. Oddly enough, the first disk report admitted by Project "Saucer" was in this same month. The first '47 case detailed by Project "Saucer" occurred at Richmond, Virginia. It was about the middle of April. A Richmond weather observer had released a balloon and was tracking it with a theodolite when a strange object crossed his field of vision. He swung the theodolite and managed to track the thing, despite its high speed. (The actual speed and alt.i.tude--the latter determined by a comparison of the balloon's height at

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various times--have never been released. Nor has the Air Force released this observer's report on the object's size, which Project "Saucer" admitted was more accurate than most witnesses' estimates.)

About the seventeenth of May 1947, a huge oval-shaped saucer ten times longer than its diameter was sighted by Byron Savage, an Oklahoma City pilot. Two days later, another fast-flying saucer was reported at Manitou Springs, Colorado. In the short time it was observed, it was seen to change direction twice, maneuvering at an unbelievable speed.

Then on June 24 came Kenneth Arnold's famous report, which set off the saucer scare. The rest of the story I now knew almost by heart.

When the DC-6 landed at Washington, I had made one decision. Since it was impossible to check up on most of the old sightings, I would concentrate on certain recent reports--cases in which the objects had been described as s.p.a.ce ships.

As I waited for a taxi, I looked up at the sky. It was a clear summer night, without a single cloud. Beyond the low hill to the west I could see the stars.

I can still remember thinking, If it's true, then the stars will never again seem the same.

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CHAPTER VIII

NEXT MORNING, in the broad light of day, the idea of s.p.a.ce visitors somehow had lost its menace. If the disks were s.p.a.ce ships, at least they had shown no sign of hostility, so far as I knew. Of course, there was Mantell; but if he had been downed by some weapon on the disk, it could have been self-defense. In most cases, the saucers retreated at the first sign of pursuit.