Disc Mystery Is 'Solved' For Three Hours Until Roswell Find Collapses

From the Journal Archives. Published: Wednesday Morning, July 9, 1947. Page 1

ROSWELL, N.M. July 8 (AP) -- A rancher's discovery of a strange object at first identified by an Army public information officer as a flying disc touched off a temporary flurry of excitement across the saucers-conscious nation today.

It was a good three hours after the first official announcement before an Army weather officer burst the bubble. The object, he declared, was nothing more than an Army weather balloon and its kite.

Even as his decision was given, inquiries from as far away as London still clogged the telephone circuits into this medium-sized eastern New Mexico town. Sheriff George Wilcox' line was the busiest. "The London Daily Mail called, and I've just finished talking to New York, he told a reporter late in the afternoon. "I also had calls from two other London papers -- I forgot to get their names - and there were more from every big newspaper in the United States, the radio networks and still others."

The identification, later discredited, of the mystery object, picked up in a pasture near the center of the state, came from Lieut. Walter Haupt, public information officer at the Roswell Army Air Field. "The many rumors regarding the flying disc became a reality yesterday when the intelligence office of the 309th (atomic) bomb group *** was fortunate enough to gain possession of the disc," Haupt had said in a statement. The object was flown to Fort Worth Army base in an Army B-29 and the final identification was announced there.

Sheriff Wilcox and W.W. Brazell, about 50, made the find on the Foster ranch near Corona, 85 miles northwest of Roswell. Brazell, who has his own small ranch nearby, notified the sheriffs's office yesterday and related he made the discovery some days before, Wilcox said.

The sheriff said he called Maj. Jesse A. Marcel of the 509th bomb group intelligence office at once and the officer accompanied Brazell back to the ranch to recover the object.

Wilcox said he did not see the object but was told by Brazell it was "about three feet across." The sheriff declined to elaborate. "I'm working with those fellows at the base," he said.

Army weather experts in Washington discounted any idea that weather targets might be the basis for the scores of reports of "flying discs."

Brig. Gen. Donald N. Yates, chief of the AAF weather service, said only a very few of them are used daily, at points where some specific project requires highly accurate wind information from extreme altitudes. Without field reports he would not hazard a guess on a precise number, he said.

 

'Disc Chaser' held on Speeding Charge
From the Journal Archives. Published: Wednesday Morning, July 9, 1947. Page 1.

INDIANAPOLIS, IN., July 8 (INS) - It was bound to happen. Joseph H. Kuritz of South Bend told officers who arrested him for speeding that he was chasing a "flying disc."

For the benefit of scientists seeking to solve the mystery, Kuritz' accurate observation of the phenoma was: "It was a low-flying, fiery, copper-colored disc and it was going about 200 miles an hour. I had it in sight for about 10 minutes."

 

Saucer is reported seen near Mora
From the Journal Archives. Published: Wednesday Morning, July 9, 1947. Page 1

A "flying saucer" has been reported sighted over Mora, N.M. Barney F. Cruz Jr. wrote the Journal that they saw Sunday "a strange object, saucer-shape, flying the skies from north to a southerly direction." The said they saw only one going at a rapid speed about 6 p.m.

 

Saucers 'Appear' Over Australia And South America

From the Journal Archives. Published: Wednesday Morning, July 9, 1947. Page 1

By International News Service

A "flying disc" reported found in New Mexico caused a brief nationwide flurry of excitement late today but the object was identified by Army Air Forces experts as a weather observation instrument.

Americans lost exclusive rights in the big flying saucer mystery Tuesday when persons in far-off Australia and South Africa, as well as Denmark and England, reported sighting the strange objects.

Another rash of disc reports also broke out in Portland, Ore. Three reports came in rapid-fire order from widely scattered points in and around Portland.

Paul J. Maul, a meat cutter at Kienow's food store, telephone a report he had sighted a disc.

Call others

He called three others to see the object. They reported that the discs appeared four different times as a round spot of light which wobbled, disappeared and reappeared. One of the observers said it looked like a parachute opening. Flashes from the object appeared in a couple of seconds and then dimmed out.

Five minutes later, Shirley Butts of Hillsdale reported watching an object that floated through the air, turning over with one side dark and the other bright. She said it suddenly started moving at a terrific speed and disappeared into a cloud.

R.D. Buckmaster of Vanport City called to state he had watched three objects with binoculars just before placing his call. He said they appeared brownish in color and were very thin.

Jokesters Have Fun

The White House also become involved in a negative sort of way. It was announced officially that President Truman has not seen any of the saucers, knows nothing about them, and hasn't ordered any investigation.

Jokesters continued to muddle the picture by coming up with sillier and sillier versions of flying saucers they had seen, invented and were controlling, and rewards were offered for the "capture" of one these things.

While new scientific explanations still were being offered, press agents and self-appointed humorists had a field day. The promoter of the national air races at Cleveland announced he is trying to line up 12 saucers for formation flying at the show. A navy flyer said he had heard that Milton Reynolds is planning to engage tow saucers as pacesetters for his next round-the-world flight.

Used as Ads

Rear Admiral Blandy, who commanded the Bikini atom bomb tests, joked at a news conference in New York that this was one thing that couldn't be blamed on Bikini.

An enterprising restaurant owner in Miami printed the name of his restaurant on cardboard saucers, tied them to small balloons and sent them aloft as an advertising stunt. Some of the persons who saw them reported the balloon were flying 1000 miles an hour.

On the serious side, more scientists leaned toward a spots-before-the-eyes theory, combined with mass hysteria. A New York expert, William R. Dodds explained that if a person stares at the sky long enough, the red corpuscles moving the retina of the eye will cause images very much like saucers.

An Australian professor of psychology, F.S. Cotton, agreed. Professor Cotton said he proved it by having 22 students stare at a fixed point in the sky. They saw saucers.