Roswell, 1947 – – creation of a modern myth, how it all started

by Norio Hayakawa, from Albuquerque, New Mexico:

Nothing extraterrestrial crashed in New Mexico in July of 1947.

But something did crash around June 14 of 1947, about 35 miles northwest of Roswell and it wasnt’ a flying saucer.

Here is the TIMELINE of the events that took place:

June 14  (Saturday):

(10 days before the world had ever heard of “flying saucers” or “flying disks”), a rancher by the name of W.W. (Mac) Brazel  (pictured below) and his 8-year old son, Vernon, were about 7 or 8 miles from the ranch house of the J. B. Foster ranch, which he operates, when they came upon a large area of bright wreckage made up of rubber strips, tinfoil, a rather tough paper and sticks.

There was no sign of any metal in the area which might have been used for an engine and no sign of any propellers of any kind, although at least one paper fin had been glued onto some of the tinfoil.

There were no words to be found anywhere on the instrument, although there were letters on some of the parts.  Considerable scotch tape and some tape with flowers printed upon it had been used in the construction.

(J.B. Foster Ranch was located about 30 miles southeast of Corona, NM – – the ranch was located about 35 miles northwest of Roswell).

At the time Brazel was in a hurry to get his round made and he did not pay much attention to it.

June 24  (Tuesday):

The famous Kenneth Arnold incident in Washington state.  This was the beginning of the modern era of worldwide sighting reports of “flying saucers”, later called “UFOs”:

 

July 4  (Friday):

Brazel, his wife, Vernon and a daughter, Betty, age 14, went back to the spot and gathered up quite a bit of the debris.

July 5  (Saturday):

It was on July 5 that Brazel first heard about the flying disks, and he wondered if what he had found  (3 weeks before)  might be the remnants of one of these.

July 7  (Monday):

Brazel came to Roswell to sell some wool and while here he went to see sheriff George Wilcox and “whispered kinda confidential like” that he might have found a flying disk.

Wilcox got in touch with the Roswell Army Air Field and Maj. Jesse A. Marcel:

Marcel’s commander, Colonel William Blanchard  (pictured below) ordered Marcel and counterintelligence officer Sheridan Cavitt out to Brazel’s ranch.

Marcel and counterintelligence officer accompanied him home, where they picked up the rest of the pieces of the “disk” and went to his home to try to reconstruct it.

On viewing the wreckage, Cavitt immediately thought it probably came from a weather balloon, but Marcel had other ideas.  Marcel had a pre-conceived notion that it must have been part of the flying disk that he had heard about.

July 8  (Tuesday) :

The public information office at the base made the announcement that they had recovered a flying disk (approved by Col. Blanchard).  This created newspaper headlines – – it was a sensation!:

However, at the intervention of Brigadier General Roger Ramey  (pictured below)  who had also inspected the wreckage, a press conference was soon held that included Marcel.  The army rather simplistically  (and inadequately)  announced that the fuss was over nothing more than a weather balloon, pieces of which were duly paraded for public display.  (It should be noted that it wasn’t just a “weather balloon“.   It was a slightly modified, newer type of high-altitude reconnaissance balloon made to detect reverberations from Russian nuclear tests.) 

Prior to the press conference, a weather officer by the name of Irving Newton (pictured below) remembered seeing pieces of what he recognized as a weather balloon laid out in Ramey’s office:

In 1994, Newton told investigators:

“I remember Major Marcel chased me all around that room…..He kept saying things like ‘Look how tough that metal is….look at the strange markings on it’….While I was examining the debris, Marcel was picking up pieces of the radar target sticks and trying to convince me that some notations on the sticks were alien writings.  But I was adamant that it was a weather balloon with a RAWIN (radar) target.  I think he was embarrassed as crazy and he would like to do anything to make that turn into a flying saucer” – – from Mysteries, Myths, Mayhem and Money chapter of Gary Bates’ ALIEN INTRUSION.

(Please read officer Irving Newton’s complete official statement that he made on July 21,1994 at the bottom of this page)

 

July 9  (Wednesday):

Ramey’s statement appears on ROSWELL DAILY RECORD newspaper:

July 9  (Wednesday):

W.W. (Mac) Brazel’s statement of regret appears on ROSWELL DAILY RECORD newspaper:

(ABOVE ARTICLE:

W.W. Brazel, 48, Lincoln county rancher living 30 miles south of Corona, today told his story of finding what the army at first described as a flying disk, but the publicity which attended his find caused him to add that if he ever found anything else short of a bomb, he sure wasn’t going to say anything about it.

Brazel was brought here late yesterday by W. E. Whitmore, of radio station KGFL, had his picture taken and gave an interview to the Record and Jason Kellahin, sent here from the Albuquerque bureau of the Associated Press to cover the story.  The picture he posed for was sent out over AP telephoto wire sending machine specially set up in the Record office by R. D. Adair, AP wire chief sent here from Albuquerque for the sole purpose of getting out his picture and that of sheriff George Wilcox, to whom Brazel originally gave the information of his find.

Brazel related that on June 14 he and an 8-year old son, Vernon, were about 7 or 8 miles from the ranch house of the J. B. Foster ranch, which he operates, when they came upon a large area of bright wreckage made up on rubber strips, tinfoil, a rather tough paper and sticks.

At the time Brazel was in a hurry to get his round made and he did not pay much attention to it.  But he did remark about what he had seen and on July 4 he, his wife, Vernon and a daughter, Betty, age 14, went back to the spot and gathered up quite a bit of the debris.

The next day he first heard about the flying disks, and he wondered if what he had found might be the remnants of one of these.

Monday he came to town to sell some wool and while here he went to see sheriff George Wilcox and “whispered kinda confidential like” that he might have found a flying disk.

Wilcox got in touch with the Roswell Army Air Field and Maj. Jesse A. Marcel and a man in plain clothes accompanied him home, where they picked up the rest of the pieces of the “disk” and went to his home to try to reconstruct it.

According to Brazel they simply could not reconstruct it at all.  They tried to make a kite out of it, but could not do that and could not find any way to put it back together so that it could fit.

Then Major Marcel brought it to Roswell and that was the last he heard of it until the story broke that he had found a flying disk.

Brazel said that he did not see it fall from the sky and did not see it before it was torn up, so he did not know the size or shape it might have been, but he thought it might have been about as large as a table top.  The balloon which held it up, if that was how it worked, must have been about 12 feet long, he felt, measuring the distance by the size of the room in which he sat.  The rubber was smoky gray in color and scattered over an area about 200 yards in diameter.

When the debris was gathered up the tinfoil, paper, tape, and sticks made a bundle about three feet long and 7 or 8 inches thick, while the rubber made a bundle about 18 or 20 inches long and about 8 inches thick.  In all, he estimated, the entire lot would have weighed maybe five pounds.

There was no sign of any metal in the area which might have been used for an engine and no sign of any propellers of any kind, although at least one paper fin had been glued onto some of the tinfoil.

There were no words to be found anywhere on the instrument, although there were letters on some of the parts. Considerable scotch tape and some tape with flowers printed upon it had been used in the construction.

No strings or wire were to be found but there were some eyelets in the paper to indicate that some sort of attachment may have been used.

Brazel said that he had previously found two weather observation balloons on the ranch, but that what he found this time did not in any way resemble either of these.

“I am sure that what I found was not any weather observation balloon,” he said.  “But if I find anything else besides a bomb they are going to have a hard time getting me to say anything about it.”)

 

Marcel didn’t agree with this conclusion, probably because this was unlike any weather balloon he had ever seen.

It was not just a “weather balloon”.  It was a top-secret program called Project Mogul, which was finally and officially revealed in 1994:

(Other high altitude reconnaissance balloon projects from the era included Project Skyhook, Project Grandson, Project Genetrix and Projct Moby Dick, pictured above)

END OF THE WHOLE STORY

Yes, that was the end of the whole story. 

“Roswell” became a non-issue……until more than 30 years later when a partially disinformative book entitled THE ROSWELL INCIDENT was published, and gullible folks  (as well as the so-called UFO “Industry” and the UFO Museum in Roswell)  played a role in propagating the story all over again.

Yes.  Tall tales about Roswell  (aliens, pilots, bodies, a nurse, hangar in Roswell, etc., etc., ad nauseum)  started to circulate around 30 years or more after this incident, including unreliable second-hand, third-hand and fourth-hand “witnesses” who jumped into the bandwagon of “fame” after this popular but misinformative book came out in 1980 written by a known, self-claimed disinformation agent by the name of William L. Moore.

(More than 30 years after the incident, a few die-hard believers in the ‘alien saucer myth’ started questioning again the explanation that it was a “weather balloon”.   And they were right.  It was not just a “weather balloon”.  It was a top-secret program called Project Mogul, which was finally and officially revealed in 1994).

That’s right.  The partially disinformative book entitled THE ROSWELL INCIDENT came out in 1980, co-authored by Charles Berlitz and William L. Moore  (who later on identified himself as a disinformation agent).  It became a best-seller:

(Above – – William L. Moore, self-claimed disinformation agent)

By the way, it was also in 1980  (the very same year of the publication of THE ROSWELL INCIDENT) that William L. Moore visited Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico to collaborate on another “project” with  Richard C. Doty who was working as an AFOSI officer at the base.

In order to write this book, the authors (William L. Moore , and Charles Berlitz) claimed they interviewed some of the so-called “witnesses” to this incident.  They also delegated a few researchers to search for any other “witnesses” in the Roswell area.  Also, independent from them were a few other researchers (such as Stanton Friedman, pictured below) who, on their own, attempted to look for witnesses:

The big problem was that they interviewed folks more than 30 years after the incident took place.  And many of the so-called “witnesses” were nothing more than second-hand and third-hand “witnesses”.  Many of them were willing to be interviewed for the chance to be in the “spotlight”, so to speak.

There were also some late-comer “witnesses” to this circus, such as Glenn Dennis  (pictured below)  who, in 1989, began to claim that he was working as a mortician the day the “saucer” wreckage arrived and that he knew a nurse who supposedly assisted at the “alien” autopsies, but her name has never appeared on any records.  (Glenn Dennis became the founder of the UFO Museum at Roswell):

The total accuracy of the so-called “witnesses” (more than 30 years after the incident) was highly questionable, particularly Jesse Marcel who was a believer from the get-go and whose unfounded beliefs had been properly over-ridden and dismissed by his superiors.

Despite Marcel’s  frequently changing his testimony about the Roswell debris throughout the Roswell fiasco, in August, 1948, he was transferred to the Strategic Air Command, where he was eventually put in charge of a Pentagon briefing room for the Air Force of Atomic Energy (AFOT-1).

In July, 1950 he returned to Houma, Louisiana and opened a small-town TV repair shop.

When he was released from active duty, his commission (as a Lieutenant Colonel) was transferred to the Air Force Reserves.

He eventually received his full discharge in 1958.

(In 1978 Stanton Friedman found Jesse Marcel in Houma, Louisiana where he had retired and was still running the radio-TV repair shop)

The bottom line:

It was the town of Roswell that eventually benefited from the 1947 “Alien saucer crash” myth.
(And those who continued to propagate the ‘alien saucer crash’ story, i.e., the so-called UFO INDUSTRY)

ROSWELL HEROES OR MYTHMAKERS?

Jesse Marcel, Walter Haut, Frank Kaufmann and Glenn Dennis.

Walter Haut vouched for these two men, who were later determined to be telling tall tales and lies about their involvement.

Was it all about promoting the UFO Museum?

PLEASE READ THIS EXCELLENT ITEM BY TIM PRINTY:

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

Please also watch the following excellent presentation by the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.   LAYING TO REST, ONCE AND FOR ALL, THE ROSWELL  ‘ALIEN SAUCER CRASH’ STORY:

As I stated elsewhere many many times, I am a realist who believe that the UFO phenomenon itself seems to be real.   But to me, UFOs do not represent conclusive evidence of physical extraterrestrial visitations by physical extraterrestrial, biological entities in physical extraterrestrial spacecraft of any kind.  There is more to this phenomenon than the ET hypothesis.  I am also highly skeptical of the existence of authentic UFO artifacts.

……………..

Statement made by officer Irving Newton on July 21, 1994:

I was asked to provide this statement, by Lt. Col. Joseph V. Rogan who advised me, he was assisting in an investigation at the behest of the Secretary of the Air Force, for the GAO, to look into facts concerning what has become to be known as “The Roswell Incident“.

As I recall it was July 1947, I was then a Warrant Officer with seven years service.  I was the only weather forecaster on duty in the Fort Worth base weather and flight service center.  The base weather covered only the base; the flight service center covered most of the southwest states.  I received a call from some one in General Ramey’s office who asked that I go to the General’s office.  I informed him that I was the only forecaster on duty and could not leave.  Several minutes later General Ramey Himself called and said “get your ass over here.  If you don’t have a car take the first one with a key”.

I was met at the General’s office by a Lt. Col. or Col. who told me that some one had found a flying saucer in New Mexico and they had it in the General’s Office.  And that a flight had been set up to send it to Wright Patterson AFB, OH., but the General suspicioned that it might be meteorological equipment or something of that nature and wanted it examined by qualified meteorological personnel.

The Col. and I walked into the General’s office where this supposed flying saucer was lying all over the floor.  As soon as I saw it, I giggled and asked if that was the flying saucer.  I was told it was.

Several people were in the room when I went in, among them, General Ramey, a couple of press people, a Major, I learned to be Major Marcel and some other folks.  Some introduced Major Marcel as the person who found this material.

I told them that this was a balloon and a RAWIN.  I believed this because I had seen many of these before.  They were normally launched by a special crew and followed by a ground radar unit.  They provided a higher altitude winds aloft.  We did not use them at Fort Worth.  However, I was familiar with them because we used them and their products on various projects in which I was involved.  These were used mostly on special projects and overseas.  The balloon was made out of a rubber type expandable material and when launched was about six to eight feet across.  When the balloons got to altitude they expanded to twenty feet or more.  the target was used for radar reflections and I believe each leg of the target was approximately 48 inches.  It resembled a child’s Jack (like a child’s ball and jacks set) with a metallic material between the legs.  The legs were made of material appearing to be like balsa wood kite sticks but much tougher.

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.

I was convinced at the time that this was a balloon with a RAWIN target and remain convinced.

I remember hearing the General tell someone to cancel the flight, the flight to Wright Patterson.

While in the office several pictures were taken of Major Marcel, General Ramey, myself and others.

I was dismissed and went to my office to resume my normal duties.

During the ensuing years I have been interviewed by many authors, I have been quoted and misquoted.  The facts remain as indicated above.  I was not influenced during the original interview, nor today, to provide anything but what I know to be true, that is, the material I saw in General Ramey’s office as the remains of a balloon and a RAWIN target.

Signed:  Irving Newton

Witnessed by:  [Signature illegible]

Subcribed and sworn before me, a person authorized by law to administer oaths, this 21st day of July 1994

Person Administering Oath:  Joseph V. Rogan (signature)

Unit taking statement:  AFOSI Detachment 409

……………

Norio Hayakawa’s CIVILIAN INTELLIGENCE NEWS SERVICE

E-mail = noriohayakawa@gmail.com

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