Photo Bios

Date: Thu, 01 Mar 2007 18:24:32 -0600, updated 30 December 2012
Subject: The WHO WAS Series
is written and sponsored by the NICAP Website

The starting point for this work was the unpublished manuscript of Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, and many times Ruppelt is quoted in the report below, except where historical records show the information was incorrect. Many new bios have been added.

Fran Ridge
Updated: 23 April 2013

Ackerman, Brig. Gen. John B.
In a June 1952 reorganization, Ackerman became Deputy Director for Collection & Dissemination of AF Intelligence, AFOIN-1. He had no direct connection with Project Blue Book but was very much interested, according to Ruppelt, and used to stop in and visit. According to Ruppelt, he had definite ideas as to what Blue Book had and what they should be doing. "He would tend to get all excited about individual sightings. He got copies of the UFO reports and several times he was on the phone wanting to know what we planned to do even before he had time to digest what was in the report." Ackerman had a "direct channel" to the top, to the Secretary of the Air Force and people in the Department of Defense. Detailed bio

Adams, Col. William A.

Col. Adams was the Chief of the Topical Intelligence Division of AF Intelligence, AFOIN-2A, after the reorg of June 1952, and Col. Smith and Major Dewey Fournet worked for him. According to Ruppelt, Adams was pretty much sold on the UFO. Ruppelt thought that Dewey Fournet influenced Adams' thinking to a great extent and said, "he pushed Fournet's study of the motions of the UFO's and he is the one who used to be the most vocal in briefings and at meetings in regard to Blue Book's taking a 'negative' attitude." Adams was the person who became irked in one briefing (June 1952) and asked Ruppelt if it wasn't true that "if we made a few positive assumptions we could prove that the UFO's were real". (In a 1979 interview with Brad Sparks, Col. Adams said that in Jan 1953 he had signed and approved Fournet's study concluding that UFO's were extraterrestrial and sent it up the chain of command, to the Deputy Director for Estimates, Col. Jack Morrow, who also signed and approved the study and sent it to the D/I, Maj. Gen. John A. Samford.)

Alvarez, Luis Dr.

Luis Alvarez was a physics professor from the University of California in Berkeley, developer of MEW (Microwave Early Warning) radar at MIT at the beginning of World War II. Alvarez developed the detonators for the high-explosive shaped charges in the plutonium implosion bombs, and after the war, returned to Berkeley to work on high-energy particle physics. He sat on the CIA Robertson panel that met in Washington in January 1953. According to Ruppelt's notes, "Alvarez was only lukewarm to the idea that UFOs might be real." Alvarez won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1968.

Boggs, Major Aaron J. (Jere)

"Jere" Boggs was a Major in the USAF working in the Pentagon in 1948-1950, when he played an important role in the USAF Intelligence response to the early post-War UFO phenomenon. Major Boggs worked on the "analysis" side of the intelligence community rather than the "collection" side, which initially had the job of handling UFO reports. When the focus of looking at UFOs shifted to Wright-Patterson AFB and Project SIGN, and once the Pentagon began getting feedback from SIGN that they felt that the UFO phenomenon was real and, ultimately, that it might be extraterrestrial, Boggs got assigned the job as the Pentagon focus point for what was going on, and what, if anything, should be the USAF response. Being on the "Defensive Air" side of Air Force intelligence analysis, and this being a possible enemy weapon and even a violation of US airspace, giving this job to someone in "Defensive Air" probably made sense. We should always remember, though, that all these Pentagon offices could work together on any problem; the location of their "desk" only fixes a "chain of command". When the SIGN project began hinting at a possible extraterrestrial "estimate" on UFOs, many in the Pentagon apparently thought that was unwise (to put it mildly), and Boggs was assigned (with consultancy from US Naval intelligence) to write an opposing estimate. [ AIR 100-203-79.]. When the SIGN extraterrestrial estimate formally reached Director of Intelligence General Charles Cabell's office, there was a document to challenge it. This occasioned an actual intelligence "shoot-out" of sorts between the two camps held in November 1948 at the National Bureau of Standards with Boggs defending his side against SIGN. SIGN lost that battle, and the idea that the USAF would proceed with the hypothesis that UFOs were extraterrestrial never was the leading theory again ( This includes the "glory days" of 1952, when although some persons in USAF intelligence thought that UFOs might well be ET, the organization certainly did not broadcast that as a primary hypothesis on any wider scale, as it would have been within the military if the SIGN estimate had prevailed ) . Post this meeting, it was generally Boggs' job to write Pentagon responses to things as they emerged in the now-negative Grudge era. Keyhoe documents some of this in his Flying Saucers are Real. Ultimately Boggs moved on and this desk became the location of a much more UFO-friendly Dewey Fournet [after brief occupancy by a station-keeper].

Bryan

Burgess, Brig. Gen. Woodbury M.

General Burgess was Deputy for Intelligence, Air Defense Command under General Chidlaw. Gen. Burgess, not a believer in UFOs, was firmly convinced that the Air Force should make every effort to find out what they were, even if they were all explainable. Ruppelt said that Burgess "bent over backwards to give Blue Book all the cooperation that they needed." Ruppelt also said that Gen. Burgess' ideas reflected those of General Chidlaw. Gen Burgess later became Deputy Director for Production of the NSA.

Cabell, Major General Charles P.

General Cabell was the Director of Intelligence for the Air Force from May 15, 1948 to October 31, 1951. According to Ruppelt's private papers, Cabell was pretty much a "believer" in UFOs. Cabell became Director of the Joint Staff of the JCS on Nov. 1, 1951, and became the no. 2 man in the CIA, the DDCI (Deputy Director of Central Intelligence) on April 23, 1953, and held the post until Jan. 31, 1962, when he was fired for the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Cabell held the dramatic meeting in the Pentagon on October 2, 1951, when Project Grudge chief Lt. Jerry Cummings and his boss Lt. Col. Nathan Rosengarten gave the briefing on their Ft. Monmouth radar case investigation, which Cabell had ordered on Sept. 28. According to Ruppelt's papers Cabell got angry at the anti-UFO answers he was getting from the debunkers (Watson cronies) at the briefing and said "I've been lied to, lied to, lied to. I want it to stop." Afterward Cabell ordered Project Grudge reorganized, in mid-October 1951. General Samford replaced Cabell as D/I on Nov. 1, 1951.

Chapman, James
According to Ruppelt, this man was in charge of one of the photo labs at Wright Air Development Center and did all of the work on UFO photos for Project Blue Book. Although a firm "believer", Ruppelt said Chapman did do a good job of making unbiased analyses of Blue Book's photos. During the Colorado Project, Robert Low and Mary Lou Armstrong interviewed Chapman, who was then determined to be a former NAV-PIC staff member who was there when the Utah Film analyses were done. Chapman told them that he helped in the analysis and gave them his memories.

Chop, Albert M. (1916-2006)
As Press Chief for the U.S. Air Force in 1952, Albert M. Chop was a direct participant in the famous July 1952 radar-visual UFO sightings around Washington, D.C. Chop attended the University of Dayton for two years, and was a newsman for the Dayton Daily News and the Associated Press from 1937-1943. During World War II he served as a combat correspondent with the U.S. Marine Corps (which might account for his cooperative relationship with Maj. Donald E. Keyhoe, USMC Ret.) After several years in public relations and advertising copywriting, Chop became Press Chief for the Air Materiel Command in Dayton, Ohio, in 1951. He was transferred to the Department of Defense in Washington, D.C. in 1952 where he served as Press Chief and was public spokesman for the Air Force UFO project. From 1953 to 1962 he was a public relations representative for Douglas Aircraft Company. He then became Deputy of Public Affairs for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) from 1962 until 1975. For two years after that he was employed by the Atomic Energy Commission in a management position. Chop was involved in providing information and writing for the 1956 Greene-Rouse Productions documentary film UFO, which included the 1950 Montana film taken by Nick Mariana and the 1952 Utah film by Delbert C. Newhouse. The documentary also recreated the Washington sightings and other important cases, providing new, inside information to the public. Chop gave an oral history to the Sign Historical Group in November 1999 in which he talks about his relationship with Donald Keyhoe, whose dedicated and persistent interest resulted in his obtaining the good information that he did on Air Force cases. He (Chop) also describes being present at Washington National Airport on the night in July 1952 watching on radar and hearing the communications when an Air Force F-94 pilot reported being surrounded by UFOs. (This incident is reconstructed in the movie UFO.) He quotes the pilot as saying, "They're closing in on me! What shall I do?" Chop: "There was dead silence in the radar room; no one knew what to say. I don't mind telling you this, it scared me! It was frightening! And I think everybody in the room was very apprehensive. They had to be intelligently controlled." His experience that night convinced him that UFOs probably were from another planet.

Clingerman, Col. William

Colonel Clingerman's position at Wright-Pat was chief of Intelligence Analysis for Air Materiel Command (MCIA), and as such was in the executive command chain over Project SIGN, just beneath McCoy. He was a fine engineer and intelligence officer who personally investigated what was perhaps the first instance where Wright-Patterson was ordered by the Pentagon to send personnel to the site of a UFO case, at Harmon Field, Newfoundland. Clingerman wasn't a "believer": "If such craft actually have been sighted, it is believed more likely that they represent the effort of a foreign nation, rather than a product from beyond the Earth."

Coleman, Colonel William T.

Colonel William T. Coleman is a retired Air Force bomber pilot, former Public Information Officer for Project Blue Book, and Air Force's Chief Public Relations Officer during the early 1970s. He was also the Producer of a series called "Project UFO" that ran on NBC for two seasons. (1978-79) In June of 1978, while promoting his new TV show on the Merv Griffin show, Coleman spoke about a UFO sighting he had experienced while a bomber pilot in 1955. The plane closed to within an eighth of a mile of the disc-shaped object. "It was about 60 feet in diameter and 10 or 11 feet thick through the center," he said. "It had what looked like a titanium-type finish". (silver gray). See report.

Condon, Edward U.

Chief Project Scientist of the Colorado grant. World famous atomic scientist, worked on the Manhattan Project. Also former head of the National Bureau of Standards. Despite being a friend of Donald Menzel and Howard P. Robertson, he had no interest in the subject of UFOs. He accepted the Air Force grant as a grudging favor to them and his colleague at the High-Altitude Observatory (Walter Orr Roberts), and because it was a particularly tough time for grant monies. Condon had a physicist's conservative view of what comprised "proof" of anything in science, and was convinced before the project began that no such proof for UFOs could be found. He began the project with the notion that UFOs were a harmless nonsense subject, and that his administrative assistant, Robert Low, would do whatever work was necessary. He and Low were informed, early in the project, that the Air Force was not interested in a scientific analysis of the phenomenon, but rather wanted a report recommending that they end their Project Blue Book and divest themselves from the burden of investigating UFO reports. This latter ended up being the exact recommendation Condon ultimately made. (Comments: UFOs & Government, 2012)

Cook, Dr. Stuart

Dr. Stuart Cook was the head of the psychology department at the University of Colorado, when the Air Force contract was accepted. The exact state and orientation of his interest in the UFO phenomenon is unknown. It must have been a sincere interest however as he was one of those who immediately volunteered to help. Dr. Cook seems to have been a rare benign presence in this story. He did what he could in the earliest days to support the initial organizational work, but fairly soon settled back into a quiet non-combative role, which lessened over time to even non-attendance in the project meetings. Perhaps the main thing that he was concerned with (as a good department chair) was that his three faculty member volunteers were getting themselves into something worthwhile and not misbehaving on a nationally-funded contract. It is also possible that his presence helped relax university officials about housing the project at Colorado; they could always back away from UFOs to an analysis of the witnesses of UFOs instead. THAT approach would be relatively non-controversial academically.(Michael Swords)

Craig, Dr. Roy

Dr. Roy Craig was a professor of chemistry at the University of Colorado when the Air Force contract was signed. He did not initially volunteer for the team, and it is unclear why he did so a few months later in the spring of 1967. Dr. Craig was an outdoorsman and didn't want to do anything "academic" about this, but rather volunteered to go out on field work investigations, which he apparently enjoyed. It may be that this getting away from academe was the main attraction as Craig was extremely skeptical of UFOs from his first investigation to his retirement days years later. Craig's general modus operandi on the project was to attend meetings, get field assignments, and then report back to Ed Condon rather than the working team, at least initially. He was far and away the most "loyal" team member to Condon of all. Craig's skepticism is in stark contrast to Norman Levine's "romanticism" as they would occasionally both be on the same investigation, and give precisely opposite opinions. When the project staff fell apart in late 1967, Condon pressed Craig to take over most of the write-up of the important sections, as it was only Craig he trusted to do this. Those write-ups have been found to be often severely slanted from the facts that historians can read in the actual project files. Craig's prejudices seem to have been ingrained and subconscious, rather than deliberate, as he maintained a happy outlook on how well he'd done till the day he passed on. (Michael Swords)

Dr. Leon Davidson
He was a member of the Manhatten Project, the US atomic bomb development program. After an assignment at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee he moved his family to Los Alamos, New Mexico, where he eventually became an engineering design supervisor for one of the atomic weapons then under development. He then accepted assignments at the Atomic Energy Commisssion (AEC) and The Pentagon in Washington before moving into the private sector. In the mid-1950s, he joined the Nuclear Development Corporation of America in White Plains, New York, entering the emerging field of computer technology and development. Following stints in management at several large technology companies including Union Carbide, Teleregister, Western Union, General Precision Laboratories, and IBM where he was Manager of Advanced Applications Development, he became an independent consultant, working for both government clients including Oak Ridge National Laboratories and commercial clients including Mini-Computer Systems of Elkmsford, NY. In the mid-to-late 1950s, Leon volunteered at the Civil Defense Filter Center in White Plains, helping track and identify aircraft flying over the NY metro area. He devoted much of his free time to the study of UFOs. He convinced a Congressional Committee to force the Air Force to permit him to publish and distribute, in its entirety, the Air Force's Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14, the primary source book on the Air Force's findings related to UFO's.

Deyarmond, Col. Albert B.
Albert Deyarmond was an "old hand" with the UFO's, in on the first of Project Sign. From the old memos signed by him it could be determined that he was once a firm believer, along with Alfred Loedding, John "Red" Honaker and the rest of the veterans or Project Sign. But by the time Ruppelt got into the picture Deyarmond, at least on the surface, was lined up with the scoffers. Ruppelt had said that, "once, when I began to knock the UFO's, he raised the devil and chewed me out for not keeping an 'open mind'." Ruppelt had called him a "scoffer" because he was a "disciple" of Col. Watson's. Deyarmond later became chief of structures at Ryan Aircraft Company.

Durant, Frederick C.
Frederick Durant was originally a chemical engineer with an interest in rocketry. Early on he joined the CIA and became an operative in their Office of Scientific Intelligence, where he worked for Philip G. Strong who worked with then chief of OSI, Marshall Chadwell. UFO students know Durant from his work on the famous Robertson Panel, where he was the recording secretary, and wrote the final report. He did much of the pre-work for Chadwell in intelligence gathering at the Pentagon and Wright-Patterson. Durant was listed to the outside world as an officer in a public chemical company, Arthur D. Little Corp, which made rocket fuel among other products, but this was a cover for his real CIA work. As an example of the latter, Durant would join organizations such as international astronomical unions and then volunteer for serving in office, ultimately becoming a big wheel in such things and hob-knobbing with scientists and technologists from all over the world, few if any would know that he was CIA. Upon "retirement", Durant got into the Smithsonian Institution and ended his employment as the director of the Air & Space Museum. Doubtless, it was a reward for fine earlier service. He wrote this interesting comment about Captain Edward Ruppelt: "His investigations, as his writings indicate, were thorough, unbiased and competent. I can think of no one better qualified to write on the Air Force activities in this regard. His book is a splendid account of this work, readable and enjoyable. It should be of wide interest to both the professional and the layman."

Ericksen, Col. John G.
Col Ericksen was head of the Policy and Management Group of the Directorate of Intelligence and in some way got in on all of the UFO business. (Sparks: Ericksen had previously been Fournet's boss as Chief of the Technical Capabilities Branch, Evaluation Division of AF Intelligence before the June 1952 reorganization.) Ruppelt said that Ericksen was "sort of power behind the throne on what the official policy would be." Ruppelt gave him quite a few briefings and he seemed to be a "lone wolf" in that he wanted to get the picture for himself. Ruppelt: "He got a little hacked at Fournet quite often, because he thought that Fournet was pushing his ideas, that the UFO's were real, too hard. I think that Ericksen tended to put a lot of faith in the UFO's but he was one of those who was afraid to stick his neck out." Col. Ericksen was commander of the Air Technical Intelligence Center from July to December of 1958.

Exon, Brigadier General Arthur E.
General Exon is a pilot with 135 combat missions and over 300 hours of combat flight time during World War II. His aircraft was severely damaged by an exploding ammunition dump and he was forced to bail out over enemy territory. Captured, he spent just over a year in German prisoner of war camps. He was liberated in April, 1945. After the war he completed an industrial administration course at the Air Force Institute of Technology and was then assigned to the Air Materiel Command (AMC) Headquarters at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. (It should be noted that General Nathan F. Twining was the commander of the Air Materiel Command which controlled various intelligence functions. Twining's letter of September 23, 1947 has been quoted by many. It was Twining's conclusion then that flying discs were real.) Over the next several years he held a variety of positions finally arriving at the Pentagon as a full colonel in 1955. In 1960 he became Chief of Ballistic Missiles and was responsible for establishing the Jupiter Ballistic Missile system for NATO in Italy and Turkey. In July, 1963, he left Europe for an assignment at Olmsted Air Force Base in Pennsylvania. In August, 1964, he was assigned as commander, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. On August 20, 1965, he was promoted to brigadier general. General Exon has had a most impressive military career. Officers are not promoted to flag rank (general officer) without having proven themselves as competent. Those who make it while on active duty, who are not rewarded with the promotion on retirement, are in a small minority. Only the top officers achieve the privilege of wearing stars. General Exon, as a lieutenant colonel, was assigned to Wright Field in July of 1947. He was there when the wreckage from the Roswell crash came in and was aware of the recovery in New Mexico. He knew that it was brought in and knew where it was sent. A few of his colleagues performed the tests on the metal, trying to determine what it was. And he learned from other colleagues that the bodies had arrived on the base. All in July, 1947. Official military bio

Fahrney, Rear Admiral Delmer S.
Rear Admiral Fahrney was "the foremost Navy pioneer for the development of guided missiles. His vision of future weaponry, technical excellence and tireless advocacy formed the basis for the post-World War II Navy missile programs."...... "Admiral Fahrney's early work in guided missiles and his foresight in planning for future generations of missiles earned for him recognition by many peers as 'the father of naval air guided missiles.'" (circa 1956). On Jan 16, 1957, Admiral Fahrney held a press conference for NICAP. "Reliable reports indicate there are objects coming into our atmosphere at very high speeds. The way they change position would indicate their motion is directed." (New York Times article) Fahrney was chairman of NICAP's Board of Governors for one week, and then, for personal reasons, had to resign. (Washington Daily News). His replacement was the first CIA Director and DCI, Roscoe Hillenkoetter, who was recruited in April or May 1957, and this must have infuriated the CIA.. (Richard Hall: Fahrney was a NICAP member for a long time, visited the office when I was there after early 1958, and later exchanged a lot of information with Jim McDonald. Throughout, he kept funnelling good Navy pilot and missile officer cases to us.)

Fournet, Maj. Dewey J., USAF
Fournet served in the Technical Capabilities Branch of AF Intelligence until transfer to the new Current Intelligence Branch in the June 1952 reorganization. Fournet took over UFO duties in the TCB (liaison officer between Project Grudge/Blue Book and the Pentagon) from Lt. Col. Milton D. Willis in Feb 1952. (Ruppelt: Dewey got hot on the subject right away and helped us a great deal in getting things straightened out in the Pentagon. His job was just supposed to be part time, but within a matter of months he was working on it full time) Fournet was the most confirmed believer Ruppelt had run into in the Pentagon. He had access to all of their reports, read them all over very carefully, and was absolutely convinced. His most notable effort was the famous "motion study" that "proved" the UFOs operated under intelligent control. (In 1979 interviews with Brad Sparks, Col. William A. Adams and Col. Weldon H. Smith said that in Jan 1953 Smith signed Fournet's study and sent it to Adams who also signed and approved Fournet's study concluding that UFO's were extraterrestrial. Col. Adams said he sent the study up the chain of command, to the Deputy Director for Estimates, Col. Jack Morrow, who also signed and approved the study and sent it to the D/I, Maj. Gen. John A. Samford.) This study was presented to the Robertson Panel in January of 1953 and was rejected. After being released from active duty from the Air Force, Fournet became a member of NICAP's original Board of Governors.

Garland, Brig Gen, William. M.

General Garland was Ruppelt's boss at ATIC from Sept 1952 until Ruppelt left, and was a moderately confirmed believer, according to Ruppelt's unpublished papers. He was Gen. Samford's Assistant for Production in the Pentagon, the no. 2 man in AF Intelligence, then transferred to ATIC as Commander in September 1952. He was the inspiration behind the Life article by Robert Ginna. (Ruppelt: He gave Ginna his ideas and prompted Life to stick their necks out.) After he got out of the Air Force in September 1953, Gen. Garland became a consultant to Rand.

Gittings, Homer T.
Homer Gittings was Ruppelt's contact in Los Alamos. He was a charter member of the group that was trying to correlate recorded radiation from an unknown source with UFO reports. Ruppelt: "He worked closely with a Ph.D. but I've forgotten the Ph.D.'s name (Dr. William Baker). Gittings, the Ph.D. and several other scientists would fly down to Albuquerque and we'd meet with Col. Matheny at 34th Air Division Headquarters. If I remember correctly, Gittings had an MS degree in Physics and was an instrumentation specialist." Joel Carpenter provided the 30 Nov. 49 DOE Green Fireball doc: "A group of scientists and technicians from the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory have become extremely interested in the observations of the aerial phenomena observed at various times in this vicinity, on which reports have been rendered periodically. This group is headed by Richard Taschek and is composed of the following additional personnel: Homer T. Gittings, Jr. George A. Jarvis, J. Fred Kalbach, Stan H. Simmons, Jud Nicholas, Harold Agnew, W. J. Masilun, Howard Parsons, Robert Potter. All of the foregoing have been appropriately cleared under the provisions of the Atomic Energy Act and therefore would have access to any and all information on this subject which might be developed by the National Military Establishment, principally the U. S. Air Forces."

Goll, Lt. Col. Miles E.

Lt. Colonel Miles E. Goll was an intelligence specialist at Air Materiel Command under Colonel Mack McCoy during WW2. After the war he remained in the service briefly, but then retired, staying on to work as a civilian in the T-2 intelligence group. Goll could be considered the third ranking officer (under McCoy [MCI] and William Clingerman [MCIA]) during the SIGN era, acting as chief of the Analysis Section [MCIAT] and often signing for Clingerman. Goll entered UFO legend as he was a contact officer for the famous Battelle Memorial study during the Ruppelt years, and was the recipient of the famous [infamous?] memorandum to Battelle, called by some as the "Pentacle_Memorandum", and interpreted very controversially as indicating something deeply conspiratorial going on at Wright-Patterson AFB as regards UFO information.

Goudsmit, Samuel Abraham
Captain Ruppelt says in his private notes about Goudsmit, "This man, from AEC’s Brookhaven Lab on Long Island, sat on the CIA/Robertson Panel that met in Washington in January 1953. Goudsmit was probably the most violent anti-saucer man at the panel meeting. Everything was a big joke to him which brought down the wrath of the other panel members on numerous occasions." (Sparks: This was actually Page who made the UFO jokes, whom Ruppelt confused with Goudsmit). Goudsmit discovered electron spin in 1925. In 1944 he led the Alsos scientific intelligence mission to investigate and exploit German technological developments including atomic weapons research.

Hall, Richard

Richard (Dick) Hall was the assistant administrator of NICAP during the Colorado Project era. He was not formally a project team member but could justifiably be called such. He and Don Keyhoe had come to Colorado early in the project, by invitation, to give the staff a briefing from NICAPs point of view. The staff, even Condon, was VERY impressed by Dick. This led to a request that he stay on for a few weeks to help organize project thinking, methods, information-organizing et al. He sat in on all the team meetings in those early 1967 days. Dick did let his bias get to him one key time, however. In one meeting, Condon et al were fussing about the apparent impossibility in getting field teams to the actual site of an occurrence (really a set of incidents or a localized flap) before the phenomenon just went away. Dick said that they (NICAP) were able to do that maybe several times a year --- which on later reflection, he admitted to others was a stressed baloney response. Nevertheless, Condon said that he was relieved to hear that, and everyone felt better about preparing for getting out into the field chasing UFOs. (Swords)

Hardin, Capt. Charles
In January 1954, Captain Charles Hardin was appointed the head of Project Blue Book, and he was replaced by Captain George T. Gregory in 1956. However, most UFO investigations were conducted by the 4602nd Air Intelligence Service Squadron (AISS). Ruppelt wrote that Hardin "thinks that anyone who is even interested (in UFOs) is crazy. They bore him." (Clark, 468). Ruppelt also wrote: "He has been the one big bottleneck in my getting anything from the Air Force because he is afraid that my book will stir things up too much." Jan Aldrich: Ruppelt, Olsson, and Futch were all gone long before Jan 1954....Jan 1954 is significant, because according to the Columbus OH newspaper, reporters were banned from ATIC on the topic of UFOs. O'Mara was acting chief at ATIC during part of this time and raised hell by bluntly talking out of turn to (Leonard) Stringfield, revealing things he had to later to retract in letters he was forced to write to Stringfield or Keyhoe. Did the O'Mara flap make Hardin causious or more causious? The return of Watson had to have effects....Hardin did stop the investigation into an interesting CE2 case in PA by the 4602d. He just ordered it terminated as of no furhter interest and as explained by reflections in a window. He probably was indeed uninterested in UFOs and was just serving out his time to retirement.

Hausman, Lt. Col. J. J.

The only photo we have at this time is the one "alleged" to be Lt. Col. Hausman at left. The photo was cropped from the T-2 staff_meeting picture and Wendy Connors identifies this officer to the left of McCoy (center of staff picture) as J. J. Hausman. Not sure if anyone knows any more about him.

Hartmann, William
William Hartmann was a young assistant professor in the Lunar and Planetary laboratory at the University of Arizona when the USAF contract to Colorado was announced. Somehow he was interested in UFOs enough (Jim McDonald??) that he volunteered to be a team member. Unlike Norm Levine, Hartmann did not leave Tucson but did his work from there. That work was photographic analysis of alleged UFO still and moving picture materials. Hartmann was a tough analyst to convince, but did not have a closed mind either consciously (like Condon) or unconsciously (like Craig). Several of his analyses stood the test of his skepticism and are some of the admitted unknowns in the final report. What almost no one knows about Hartmann is that he wrote his draft chapter for the final report recommending further serious study of the UFO phenomenon. Condon read that draft and wrote "Good God!!!" over the page and scrawled that paragraph out.

Heyden, Father Francis J.

According to Ruppelt: "Father Hayden was head of the astronomy department at Georgetown University. I never met him but Dr. Steve Possony was always going to him with our UFO problems. Father Hayden seemed to be very much interested in our problems and couldn't at all be classed as a scoffer." Ruppelt has misspelled the last name, which is Heyden. Father Heyden (1907-1991) came to Georgetown in 1945 from the Manila Observatory in the Philippines and was awarded for outstanding accomplishments and contributions to the popularization or advancement of the science of astronomy there. In 1948 he assumed directorship of the Georgetown Observatory. He was awarded as a Regular Member of the Society for Imaging Science and Technology for outstanding achievement in imaging science or engineering in 1967. Besides his keen interest in UFOs, he also studied the famous Piri Reis ancient maps. He knew astronomer Clyde W. Tombaugh and his famous UFO observation.

Hillenkoetter, Vice-Admiral Roscoe

Brad Sparks: "Admiral Hillenkoetter served as the third Director of Central Intelligence (DCI), in which position he also wore the hat of directorship of the CIG (Central Intelligence Group), beginning May 1, 1947, then as the first director of the CIA, as of Sept. 18, 1947. That is when CIG became CIA as a result of the passage of the National Security Act of 1947. Under that Act the DCI served as principal intelligence advisor to the President and the newly created National Security Council (NSC)." Hillenkoetter believed that while the stated role of the CIA was to coordinate intelligence activities, realistically the Agency lacked the bureaucratic muscle to effect such a lofty goal. As a result of this decision Hillenkoetter urged the Agency into the area of current intelligence production. Hillenkoetter served on the board of governors of NICAP and is on record as stating: "Unknown objects are operating under intelligent control. It is imperative that we learn where UFOs come from and what their purpose is." He resigned from the NICAP Board in Feb 1962 and was replaced by Col. Joseph Bryan III.

Hooven, Frederick
Frederick Hooven was a senior automotive engineer at Ford Motor Company during the time of the Colorado project. He and his colleague, David Moyer, volunteered to consult with the project on matters related to UFO effects on automobile engines. They worked on one case which was reported in the final report, one case which essentially was not, and were not employed to do other work on cases even though Hooven volunteered to do so. Hooven continued to be interested in the phenomenon after the Project's end and believed that it deserved good study. Roy Craig's own handling of a vehicle interference case from California is an embarrassment to science when the file is read, rather than only Craig's summary in the text. And yet, Colorado had a fully qualified expert willing to do analyses for them, who was ignored. (Swords)

Hynek, Dr. J. Allen
Dr. Hynek had been the consultant astronomer to Projects SIGN, GRUDGE and BLUE BOOK. Ruppelt said that Hynek was "darn interested" and had devoted a great deal of his valuable time to the project. Ruppelt stated Hynek had read almost every UFO report in the Air Force files, which simply couldn't have been true. Brad Sparks: "Hynek also suspected he never got to see certain sensitive reports. Sometimes BB used the excuse that Hynek was only to analyze astronomical aspects of cases to explain them away in order to deny Hynek knowledge of or access to spectacular Unknowns.". (Hynek's Project Henry carefully cataloged each BB case sent to Hynek for review from January to December 1953 and these seem to be only about 1/2 of the total number of BB cases for 1953; also see Jennie Zeidman's IUR article on Project Henry). On Oct. 11, 1952 he presented papers with Menzel at the American Optical Society meeting in Boston. All papers were re-written and published in the journal. Since Menzel debunked everything, and since Hynek at the time wondered if some of these cases could be a new natural phenomenon that he named "nocturnal meandering lights", one could say that they disagreed. The real importance of this situation is that it shows that Ruppelt was enthusiastically anti-Menzel and thought that there was a lot to the UFO phenomenon. Hynek sat as an associate Member on the CIA Robertson Panel in Washington in January 1953 and was cautiously pro-UFO. Hynek was Head of the Ohio State Univ. Astronomy Department, Director of the Perkins Observatory and Assistant Dean of the USU Graduate School. Hynek headed up Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory's Moonwatch project from 1956 to 1960 (He was assistant director of Moonwatch to Fred Whipple of Harvard) then went to Northwestern University where he was Director of the Dearborn Observatory and the Lindheimer Astronomical Research Center, until his retirement from Northwestern in June 1978. Two of his most enduring efforts are the close encounters scale, a new classification system of sightings from which the term "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" became famous, and the creation in 1973 of the Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS).

Kaliszewski, Joseph J.
This was one of the people that Ruppelt claimed he liked to talk to at General Mills. He was one of the members of the original Skyhook balloon launching crew. He had a BS degree in aeronautical engineering and was considered to be pretty sharp. All of the people at General Mills were convinced that the UFO’s were real, as they said they had all seen the UFO’s. The boss, Charles Moore, whom Ruppelt talked to for only a few minutes, was very put out at the way the Air Force had handled many of the UFO reports and was very indignant. In the summer of 1952, Kaliszewski was quoted in the Minneapolis paper as saying that the Air Force should put forth more effort because he was convinced that the UFO’s were real.

Kaplan, Dr. Joseph
Joseph Kaplan was a geophysics professor at UCLA. His main UFO interest was the Green Fireballs. Ruppelt implied that Kaplan put a lot of stock in Dr. LaPaz’s theory that the GFB’s were man-made (Russian), although at one time he thought that they were auroral patches. In actuality, letters in the BB / AFOSI UFO files from Kaplan basically state that he insisted that LaPaz's theory be taken seriously and investigated even though he preferred geophysical explanation(s). Dr. Kaplan originated the grid camera idea. He later headed the satellite program for the International Geophysical Year. Presentation to 1949 AF Scientific Advisory Board

Knowles, Rear Admiral H.B,, USN (Retired)

Admiral Knowles was a veteran of both World War I and World War II. He held important submarine commands and wasn a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. Wilbert B. Smith (head of the Canadian government's UFO project, Project Magnet) claimed that in 1952, a time of the great UFO wave, the U.S.A.F. had recovered a piece of a UFO that had been shot at near Washington, D.C. He said that the U.S. Air Force had loaned him a piece of the recovery. He showed it to a friend, Rear Admiral H. B. Knowles. Statement by Rear Adm. M. Herbert B. Knowles: "I shall be very glad to accept appointment as a member of the (NICAP) Board of Governors and be listed as a 'believer' in the reality of UFO's, with the understanding that I shall resign if it appears at any time that your big group is beinq used to cover up for the top brass. I know that there is a real need to break through the official Washington brush-off and get the truth home to the people. There seems to be a great fear among the powers that be that the American people will panic if told the truth. How little they know and understand their countrymen. I feel that millions of our people already believe in the reality of the UFO's."

LeMay, Curtis Emerson, General
LeMay was an Air Force General credited with designing and implementing an effective systematic strategic bombing campaign in the Pacific Theater. After the war, he organized the Strategic Air Command making it an effective means of conducting nuclear war. Some critics have characterized him as a belligerent warmonger (even nicknaming him "Bombs Away LeMay") whose aggressiveness threatened to inflame tense Cold War situations (such as the Cuban Missile Crisis) into open war between the United States and the Soviet Union. Jan Aldrich: "LeMay was at odds with Kennedy about what to do with the missiles in Cuba. He wanted more militant response to the USSR. Direct overflights of the Soviet Union was one of the things he tried. Very provocative, but also, US intel was lacking here." Brad Sparks: "He was the first AAF (Army Air Forces) Deputy Chief of Staff for R&D, appointed in Oct 1945 and serving until Oct 1947." Aldrich: "On UFOs (he was) fully informed on Ghost Rockets. His papers had briefing for Spaatz on the subject and other messages from US intel in Scandinavia. In July of 1947 AAF intel requested to know if he knew any such project. LeMay's answer no! " ......"Although LeMay told subordinates he knew nothing about "balls of light" over Japan in WWII, he did corresponded with Norstad and other generals about them." Sparks: "LeMay found he did not have direct command authority over AMC (which was under the DC/S-Materiel) and constantly clashed with AMC over R&D activities (see DeVorkin's Science With a Vengeance on postwar White Sands missile testing). LeMay knew that when the AF separated from the Army in the 'next budget cycle' that R&D would be reorganized and AMC would have to get formal R&D budget approval for a UFO project (or any project) but could slide by in the transition, under the existing Materiel budget system. LeMay left to take command of USAFE in Wiesbaden, Germany, on Oct 18, 1947, arriving Oct. 20. His de facto 'successor' as head of R&D at a demoted level, was Maj. Gen Laurence C. Craigie, Director of R&D, whereas LeMay had been a Deputy Chief of Staff for R&D....."Teller's friend and physicist George Gamow told Condon after a lecture that he (Gamow) had served on a UFO study committee with LeMay in 1952." (Just like many other agencies following the LIFE article and riding on the UFO wave). Michael Swords: "Some UFOlogists see interest and significance in Goldwater's famous story about his meeting with LeMay." The April, 25 1988 issue of The New Yorker carried an interview of Goldwater, who said he repeatedly asked his friend Gen. LeMay if there was any truth to the rumors that UFO evidence was stored in a secret room at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, and if he (Goldwater) might have access to the room. According to Goldwater, an angry LeMay gave him "holy hell" and said, "Not only can't you get into it but don't you ever mention it to me again." This room had been referred to by Goldwater as "the Blue Room", and the context of the statement most probably was referring to then inaccessable Project Blue Book files. Curtis LeMay was the vice presidential running mate of independent candidate George C. Wallace in 1968. Alldrich: "MacKinlay Kantor, LeMay's co-author of "Mission with LeMay", told LeMay and wrote in the Jan 1966 Popular Science article 'Why I Believe' that he had seen a UFO. LeMay in very emphatic terms told Kantor that the AF had unexplained UFO reports and could not find explanations."

Levine, Dr. Norman

Dr. Norman Levine was a brand new PhD in electrical engineering from the University of Arizona when the Colorado contract from the Air Force was announced. Somehow he found out about this, and taking an enormous risk with his career, he not only volunteered to serve on the team, but moved to Boulder to be on site. Why he did this is not really known, but he was very interested in the phenomenon from the day he began work on the project. In many ways Levine was a great help: he added some real technical expertise to the staff (including someone who could comment intelligently on radar cases), he added energy of youth (willing to go out on several field trips), and he gave David Saunders an ally in support of taking UFO cases seriously, including the older ones. Had Levine been a more senior man, he might have provided the leadership that David Saunders could not find in his own personality. Levine was fired by Ed Condon on the same day as was Saunders, thus depriving the final report of two of the four most involved team members. Bob Low was also removed quietly, so three of the four were gone (Craig was the fourth highly involved member on site). Levine, even with the carved down version of the report that Condon and Low envisioned late in 1967, was set to write two chapters: an assessment of the plasma theory, which the whole project, including Low, rejected as a minor marginal concept, and the vitally important radar cases analyses chapter. With his dismissal by Condon, both of these were lost.

Lipp, Dr. James
James Lipp was the Rand Corporation's guided missile expert and he was violently anti-saucer, according to Ruppelt's notes. Lipp wrote an analysis of UFO reports in December of 1948 for Project Sign to see if they could be space visitors, but concluded UFO's were probably not extraterrestrial. Ruppelt stated that early in 1952 Col. Don Bower and he tried to enlist the Rand Corporation's aid, on a contract basis, to try to develop some way of getting more positive answers but, at the recommendation of Lipp, Rand refused to touch it. “Too hot,” was their reason. Ruppelt: "I think controversial would have been a better word than 'hot'."

Loedding, Albert
Al Loedding was chief engineering consultant on SIGN and main advocate for the ETH. Went on the Chiles/Whitted case as well as Mantell and Rhodes photo. Probably wrote as much of the EOTS as did Robert Sneider [of whom, unfortunately, no picture has yet surfaced].

Low, Robert

Robert Low was the de facto administrator of the Colorado Project in the absence of proper attention by the grantee, Edward Condon. Bob Low was not formally scientifically trained but had picked up his science "on the fly" as an administrator-manager of the High-Altitude Observatory for Walter Orr Roberts. Low ultimately moved out of that job and into the administration of the University of Colorado. When the Air Force grant was proposed, Low agreed to do the hard work in aid of nominal-chief Edward Condon, as a favor to Roberts, and as a grant getter for the University. He greatly admired Condon and was considering writing a biography of him.

In order to sell the administration on the project, Low wrote the famous "Trick" memo. This memo was worded so as to give administrators peace-of-mind about involving Colorado with a UFO grant. His salesmanship worked, but his words were used against him later by the UFO community. This was understandable, but incorrect. Bob Low proved many times during his administration of the project that he had an open-minded, even often an enthusiastic, view of the subject. Had Condon been even slightly reasonable, Low might well have held the project together to a much more palatable conclusion. As it was, he was blasted by all sides. This resulted in his removal from the writing of the final report [by Condon] and his ultimate angry striking out at the UFO subject which had smeared his career. He shortly left the University and took up a job at a small college on the west coast. (michael Swords)

Lundahl, Arthur Charles

All during WW2 he was interpreting photographs of enemy targets in the Pacific theatre. Was married in 1945. Joined NAVPIC in 1946; and was there until it changed into just PIC under the CIA in 1953 (apparently this is the year that Lundahl formally became CIA himself). The last year of NAVPIC saw the Great Falls and Tremonton films arrive at the organization. Lundahl was in the NAVPIC front office by then, so did not do any of the analysis himself. But he knew the guys, Woo and Neasham, well, and was interested in what they were doing. He remembered very clearly the request from the CIA to have personnel bring the films to a scientific panel for review. Either because of this or even previously, he had a strong interest in UFO cases especially involving film. His actual job began to emphasize interpretation of U-2 photos. Early in the 1950s. (c.1954) he became President of the American Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. (I have no idea if this presidency demanded a cover job like Fred Durant's involvements in astronomical and rocketry societies did.) He attended a large (c.100 attendee) meeting held by the ONR on UFO information in 1955. Whether this was the final review given by the USN sideline UFO study project initially ordered by Navy secretary Kimball is debated. In the later 1950s, he consistently briefed Ike on aerial reconnaissance and became an influential person in "secret Washington". He also began collecting a file drawer of unclassified UFO photos; whether he also had a drawer of classified UFO photos one may guess. It is suspected by Australian researchers that PIC received the famous Tom Drury film during the early/mid-1950s, and that Lundahl probably knew about it. As a probable irrelevant sideshow, he was briefly involved in the infamous "Mrs. Swan Psychic UFO case", which also drew in Colonel Friend for a while. (c.1959). PIC became NPIC c. 1960, and Lundahl was named director. In this context he constantly briefed both JFK and LBJ, and is considered an American hero for advice given during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. Maintained an intense interest in UFOs during the 1960s, amassing a huge library of UFO related books in his home library. Met with representatives of the Colorado Project in 1967. This meeting was general in tone, but could have served the purposes of both parties. Colorado could get the services of the best photo-analysts anywhere for free, and Lundahl would get to personally see whatever came to them first hand. Colorado stuck with Hartmann and never took him up on anything. Due to Jim McDonald bugging President Johnson about UFOs, Johnson asked VP Humphrey's space technology advisor, Frank Rand, to make a quiet in-house study of UFOs to "get McDonald off my back". Rand actually liked the assignment and one of the first people he asked to be on this team was Art Lundahl. In another irrelevancy, in about 1968, Karl Pflock went to work for Lundahl. In 1970, Lundahl went to Dick Hall's home for an evening's discussion. The other "party guest" was Jim McDonald. [ McDonald had met with Lundahl many times previous, as he was asked to brief Frank Rand's team several times, without knowing what Rand et al were doing]. During the Hall-McDonald get-together, Lundahl said that he had talked to General Charles Cabell and the ex-USAF Intelligence chief, and number two in the NSA, continued to feel that UFOs "warranted attention". During the same get-together Lundahl said that he saw no reason why advanced technology couldn't be extremely small. He wondered aloud if a UFO might not be so small that "there might be one over there in that fireplace". McDonald said that Art's gist was that the "big ones we can live with, but these little ones get me." Regardless of how whimsical Lundahl might have been at that moment, the remark betrays a mind VERY interested in the UFO phenomenon. Lundahl retired from NPIC in 1973 due to severe arthritis. To my knowledge no one ever was able to read his UFO files (either at all or with enough time) to give us any real understanding of what was in them. (Mike Swords)

Col. William A Matheny
Col Matheny was the CO of the 34th Air Defense Division in Albuquerque. He later became a Brig. General. He was firmly convinced that the UFO’s were real and that they were interplanetary space ships. He wrote up a plan, Project Pounce, that called for a special squadron of stripped down F-94C’s to chase the UFO’s. The plan went through Western Air Defense Headquarters and to Air Defense Command Headquarters but it was rejected because of the non-availability of the aircraft. It was in the 34th that the F-86 pilot claimed that he shot at the UFO, in the disturbing incident Ruppelt wrote about in the beginning of his book, which evidently occurred in september of 1952, according to Brad Sparks' research. His official bio can be found at: http://www.af.mil/bios/bio.asp?bioID=6323

McCoy

Dr. James E. McDonald

Received his Ph.D. in physics from Iowa State University in 1951, then worked there as an assistant professor in meteorology. He was a research physicist in the University of Chicago's department of meteorology (1953-54). In 1954 he joined the University of Arizona faculty, first as an associate professor (1954-56), then as a full professor in the department of meteorology (1956-71). McDonald was also a senior physicist in the University's Institute of Atmospheric Physics, and served as both associate director (1954-56) and scientific director (1956-57). He also advised numerous federal agencies, including the National Science Foundation, The Office of Naval Research, the National Academy of Sciences, and the Environmental Science Service Administration. McDonald had a personal UFO sighting near Tucson on Jan. 10, 1954, with two other Univ. of Chicago meteorologists, and this launched him on his lifelong interest in UFO's. By 1958, McDonald was investigating local UFO sightings in the Tucson area. The ONR provided cover for his early UFO activities. He was told of sonar anomalies and the Navy asked him to investigate possible similar radar phenomena at Project Blue Book, which "got him in the door". Early Hall-McD correspondence shows McD was not too keen on going public. He wanted to get other research out of the way first, but once in he was in all the way. Beginning in 1966, McDonald became intensively involved in UFO research, interviewing hundreds of UFO witnesses and lecturing widely on the subject to professional societies. His talks emphasized the need for a serious scientific study, adding that he considered the best reports to be evidence of extraterrestrial visitation. He also played an important role in Congressional UFO hearings in 1968. Privately, McDonald analyzed many Project Blue Book case files, convincing him that the Air Force had performed an entirely inadequate investigation, which appeared to have been more concerned with internal politics rather than real science. He also reviewed the cases of the Air Force's sponsored University of Colorado UFO study, and concluded that many of their explanations were not well founded either. McDonald left no book but privately published many papers based on his lecture presentations. McDonald's scientific analysis and investigation of UFOs was of the highest caliber and errors were few and far between in his work. (Swords, Sparks, Aldrich)

Moore

Page, Thornton
Thornton Page of John Hopkins' Operations Research Office, editor of the Operations Research Journal, and an astronomer, sat on the CIA Robertson Panel in Washington D.C. in January 1953. Page and Goudsmit were both anti-UFO, but it was Page who kept cracking jokes about UFOs until Robertson reprimanded him. Later his opinion changed and in 1969, after reviewing the Condon Report, he stated: "How can we logically reject this theory when we accept theories of rotating neutron stars to explain pulsars? Of course, a better theory might be devised if more data were collected and the present data examined in broader terms."

Parrish, Lt. Glen D.
This was the Director of Intelligence at the 34th Air Division, Air Defense Command at Albuquerque where Col. Matheny was the CO. Ruppelt: "Parrish sent in some of the best reports that we had and he is the man who showed me the report on the pilot who shot at the UFO." (summer of 1952, possibly Sept. 1952) According to Ruppelt, with all of the good reports that Parrish had submitted, he wasn’t a confirmed believer. But he did think that the reports were important enough to warrant careful investigations. In addition to the above, Parrish was the middle man for the reports from the people who were doing the radiation work in Los Alamos.

Porter, Col Edward H.
Ruppelt: "Col Porter was the Deputy Director for Estimates of the D/I. He was violently anti-UFO. He was Fournet’s boss (until Porter went to the JCS in Aug 1952). At every briefing or meeting he always got his two cents worth in and he minced no words. But he never had a decent argument; he didn’t know what was being reported nor did he care. He just didn’t believe that there was anything to it. General Cabell is reported to have climbed all over him and Col Harold Watson for conspiring to get rid of the UFO project in 1950." af.mil/information

Possony, Dr. Stefan T.
Ruppelt: "Steven Possony was the acting chief of the Directorate of Intelligence Special Studies Group and he had a direct channel to (Gen.) Samford." Possony was apparently pretty much sold on the UFO and did a lot of investigating on his own "book", and had Father Hayden, the astronomer, as his special consultant. Ruppelt: "Steve and his crew used to cruise all over the U.S. and Europe, and during these travels they picked up a lot of UFO data. Steve was behind Fournet 100% and tended to push him. He was smart enough to know that the UFO situation was hot so he used Fournet, who was a reserve and didn’t plan to stay in the Air Force any longer than he had to, to try out his ideas. Possony didn’t much care what he said, however, and he used to go to battle with any or all of the more vocal skeptics. He really got teed off at Menzell and went to all ends to find out everything about the man. It turned out to be very interesting. Possony had a good reputation in the Air Force. Besides being a fairly sharp intelligence man, he is a professor at Georgetown University and he has written quite a bit on the strategy and concepts of airpower. He is considered one the of the world’s experts on this subject."

Roach, Dr. Franklin

Dr. Franklin Roach was a veteran respected astronomy researcher at Colorado when the contract was signed. He was a good friend of J. Allen Hynek and genuinely interested in UFOs, holding a "soft" conviction that UFOs were more likely to be extraterrestrial technology than any of the other hypotheses. Roach, along with Saunders, comprised the "sympathetic UFOlogy camp" among the first team members. Both of them wanted the project to place a strong emphasis on the analysis of early unsolved cases, using Blue Book, NICAP, and Hynek's own case files. This placed Roach in direct opposition to Condon. As the accidents of history went, Roach received an opportunity to pursue a grant to do research on his area of expertise in Hawaii and couldn't turn it down. He abruptly left the project, abandoning Saunders to more or less stand alone as a senior member sympathetic to the physical reality of the phenomenon. Roach was one of the few persons who could have championed the development of the "Case Book" of outstanding past cases, and his absence contributed mightily to the tragic loss of that major ingredient of the final report. As it turned out, all Roach contributed was some superficial fluff on alleged astronaut sightings.

Robertson, Howard Percy

Robertson later became chief scientific advisor to the Commander-in-Chief of NATO. Ruppelt: "He first came out to ATIC in November 1952 with a group of other scientists to review our UFO material. He and his party stayed two days and then went back to Washington and suggested to the National Security Council that a group of top scientists get together to look over the reports." The team that Captain Ruppelt was referring to apparently consisted of Robertson, Frederick Durant (currently employed by the CIA), and Marshall Chadwell (CIA chief of their scientific investigation office , OSI).

Rosenzweig, Leslie
Ruppelt: Les Rosenzweig worked for Possony [on the AF Directorate of Intelligence (AFOIN) Special Studies Group (SSG)]. He was sort of a dull tool and whenever Possony said or did anything Les took it as the gospel. When it came to UFO’s there was no difference. Les made quite a few studies on how the UFO’s could be powered, how they could be contacted, etc. He pushed the idea of using a huge horizontal movie screen to flash messages to the UFO’s. He, or possibly it was Possony himself, made a lot of contacts with Willy Ley. They dropped him fast however, when good old commercial Willy began to try to push himself into the act a little too fast. It is interesting to note that those people in the U.S. who are actually considered to be tops in the fields of interplanetary travel have no use for Willy Ley or Von Braun.

Ruppelt, Capt. Edward J.
Edward Ruppelt was a United States Air Force officer probably best-known for his involvement in Project Blue Book, a formal governmental study of unidentified flying objects. He is generally credited with coining the term "unidentified flying object", to replace the terms "flying saucer" and "flying disk", which had become widely known. But Ruppelt, though not actually inventing the term, established its prominence in both military and public arenas. He was the director of Project Grudge from late 1951 until it became Project Blue Book in March 1952 and remained with Blue Book until late 1953. Due to the generally sympathetic handling of the UFO phenomenon during his tenure on the Project, most UFOlogists have seen those years similarly to UFO historian Jerry Clark, when he writes, "Most observers of Blue Book agree that the Ruppelt years comprised the project's golden age, when investigations were most capably directed and conducted." Even after Ruppelt published his famous and influential book, Robertson Panel member, Frederick Durant wrote: "His investigations, as his writings indicate, were thorough, unbiased and competent. I can think of no one better qualified to write on the Air Force activities in this regard. His book is a splendid account of this work, readable and enjoyable. It should be of wide interest to both the professional and the layman."

Samford, Major General John
General Samford was Director of Intelligence, USAF, and was neutral on the subject of UFO’s, and always very much interested and gave Ruppelt the utmost in cooperation. He took comments and suggestions at meetings but never agreed or disagreed with anyone. Ruppelt: "The only time that I ever heard him say anything was when Col Porter got real nasty about the whole thing one day and began to knock ATIC, UFO’s, me and everything associated with the project. Then the General said something to the effect that as far as he could see, I was the first person in the history of the Air Force’s investigation that had taken a serious approach to the investigation and that he didn’t see how anyone could decide until I’d collected more data." General Samford felt like he got “burned” real bad on the press conference in July 1952. According to Ruppelt, Samford's statements were twisted around and newsreel shots of him were “cut and pieced” and quoted him out of context. (Sparks: "Gen. Samford became Director of the NSA in 1956 and held that position until 1960.")

Saunders, David
David Saunders was a professor of psychology at the University of Colorado when the Air Force grant was proposed, He was extremely interested in the UFO subject and immediately volunteered to be part of the project team. Saunders was probably somewhat in violation of one of the criteria for project members in that none were supposed to be actively involved with UFO organizations. He was a member of NICAP. Saunders was an expert in statistical analysis and naturally wished to explore mass numbers of cases to see if meaningful patterns would emerge. He viewed such work as the only likely route to getting clear indications that there was intelligence behind the phenomenon, and was therefore a creative way to get around the need for lab-bench quality evidence such as Condon would demand. This approach required bringing in masses of "old cases" which was an element that Condon (and the Air Force) were precisely opposed to. His entire time on the project was therefore a stressor between what he wanted to do, and the attitude of the chief scientist. With hindsight, one could say that Saunders let the UFO community down in one significant way. It was his responsibility primarily to champion the "Case Book" of great old cases, which Bob Low had happily agreed to despite Condon not liking it. This would have produced many anchor points in the final report difficult to deny by nay-sayers. Instead, Saunders focussed himself almost entirely on statistical analysis and no one did the Case Book at all. Thus the final report was severely impoverished. Saunders himself got fired by Condon and his own statistical ideas never made the report either. (Michael Swords)

Seashore, Malcolm, Lt. Col.

Lt.Colonel Malcolm Seashore was acting chief of AMC's analysis division [MCIAT] directly under Colonel Clingerman when the UFO wave broke out in the United States in the summer of 1947. When the Pentagon decided that AMC was the correct place to create a focussed intelligence project on the flying disks, Wright-Patterson felt that one possibility for explaining this phenomenon was advanced aerotechnology development by the Soviets, or possibly some other potential enemy, maybe based upon the leading edge technologies of the Germans. Seashore and McCoy's AMC team then created an EEI [Essential Elements of Intelligence], basically a lengthy list of things for contacts and spies to look for, and Seashore himself hand-carried the EEI to Europe for clandestine distribution to embassies et al, in the fall of 1947. This was the last that Seashore was involved with UFO matters, even though he ultimately returned to Wright-Pat some time later. When Seashore left MCIAT, he was replaced as acting chief by Miles Goll.

Seitz, Dr. Frederick
Dr. Frederick Seitz was a distinguished physicist and member of the scientific establishment. He was at the time of the completion of the Colorado Project occupying the extremely prestigious position of President of the National Academy of Sciences. The USAF contract with Colorado had stated that once the Project final report was completed, it would be sent to the NAS for review and comment before being passed on to the USAF. All of that is, on the surface, logical and seemingly ideal. The hidden joker in that story, however, is that Seitz was a former favorite student of Ed Condon, and loyal to his old mentor. Although it perhaps would have made little difference had someone not so prejudicially connected to Condon had review oversight, it came as no surprise to anyone that Seitz and the NAS basically rubber-stamped approval of the report with little evidence of having given the task much time. (Swords)

Smith, Lieutenant Howard
Lieutenant Smith was low-man-on-the-totem-pole in SIGN. He was last-man-standing after the purge, and got the job of compiling the Grudge report. [Obviously a yes-man, he made General.]. He was an anti-UFO guy.

Smith, Weldon H. S. Col .
Ruppelt: "This man was Dewey Fournet’s boss. He wasn’t quite as sold on the UFO’s as Col Bill Adams but he was pretty well sold. He also 'bought' Fournet’s ideas and studies. I remember specifically the case of the burned Scoutmaster: Col Smith was 'sold' that this was the real thing. He was following the whole show from the Pentagon, through my calls to Fournet and from the wires that I was sending back. Just as soon as I got back from the first trip to Florida I went in to see him and he got quite irked when I said that something about this scoutmaster just didn’t ring true. He said that I was biased and wasn’t giving the man a chance. According to Keyhoe, he is the person from the D/I that wrote the anonymous letter that Keyhoe quotes in his book. I don’t believe it, however, I think that Fournet wrote it."Col. Smith investigated with Fournet & Ruppelt on UFO maneuvers (Haneda case) and agreed that the nature of the maneuvers indicated intelligent control.

Sneider

Thayer, Gordon
Gordon Thayer was a bachelors degree holder in physics working at a sister institution of Colorado, the Environmental Science Service Administration (ESSA). He played no role in the project until nearly the end. When Condon fired Saunders and Levine, he left his project with no one capable of writing up the vital radar case section of the final report. By the time that this dawned on Condon, Craig et al, time was short. Somehow Thayer was brought in at the eleventh hour to do the work. It was an impossible request, but Thayer did as well as he reasonably could, given his restrictions in time and information --- he had only the project case files to work with. He has taken some unjustified heat from the UFO community for his analyses in a few cases, but it would have taken a Jim McDonald to do the proper job under these conditions. With all that, Thayer's chapter gives UFOlogists their strongest argument from within the report itself for the worthiness of UFO research. Very shortly after the project ended, he made very stout statements of his support for UFO study, and published a positive case study in the AIAA journal. Thayer is another example of the misbehavior of both Ed Condon and the UFO community towards a guy trying honestly to do his job under difficult conditions.

Thompson, James
Ruppelt: "When I knew Jim Thompson he was an astronomer working for RAND in Santa Monica. He used to stop in at ATIC quite frequently and spend a day or two reading reports. Whenever I got out to California he used to arrange an unofficial bull session with a dozen or so of the 'believers' and we’d talk UFO’s."

Twining

Valley, George
Valley was an MIT physicist and once "Chief Scientist of the Air Force"- later Lincoln Labs (big wheel). He wrote the sympathetic Grudge scientific appendix, and was granted the privilege of receiving all Grudge case reports for a while after the conflagration with Boggs et al.

Watson, Col. Harold E.
Ruppelt: "Col. Watson, now a Brig Gen and once again Chief of ATIC, was chief of ATIC when I arrived. (He later went to Europe for three years.) He was violently anti-saucer but he crossed himself up too many times trying to constantly grab publicity. He was the one who made the famous remark about all UFO observers being nuts or 'fatigued airline pilots'. He continually hauled in writers who would plug him and debunk the UFO's. I've overheard him tell how he completely snowed Bob Considine." Watson's malicious remarks so outraged Nick Mariana (Montana film) that he filed a libel suit against Considine and publisher for repeating Watson's remarks in an article that slammed Mariana for his Great Falls film. Mariana didn't win. Watson and Grudge project leader, James Rodgers, were mainly responsible for the failure of Project Grudge, which enraged Cabell. (Brad Sparks: Watson took over from McCoy as head of AMC Technical Intelligence Division when Ruppelt arrived in about Jan 1951, ATIC did not exist yet (until May 21, 1951). This is Ruppelt's oversimplification of org name in which projects 'ATIC' back to 1947").

Wertheimer, Dr. Michael
Dr. Wertheimer was a professor of psychology at the University of Colorado when the Air Force contract was signed. His area of research was human perception and he saw the contract as an opportunity to test hypotheses about the accuracy of human perception and the extent of errors made. ( a second professor really wanted to press this and retired immediately from the project when the USAF gave the idea thumbs down). In this he was obviously skeptical of treating any witness testimony as being very accurate. He was one of the first professors to volunteer as a team member. His emphasis irked David Saunders and there was always antipathy between them. Wertheimer (and the second professor, a man named Scott) received a huge setback when the ideas to test the validity of human testimony by rigging phony UFO incidents and interviewing naive witnesses to them were presented in front of the Air Force project officers. Condon and the team were told flat by Colonel Robert Hippler NOT to do any such thing. That was all the Air Force needed as to bad PR, to have it get out that they were testing how people are unreliable. Wertheimer then presented a philosophical concept which purported to logically demonstrate that you could never prove anything one way or the other about UFOs so why bother? This "Wertheimer Hypothesis" stymied project progress for several weeks, causing David Saunders to strike out at Wertheimer for creating an impossible argument for scientific progress of any kind. Bob Low, never happy with Wertheimer's ideas, ultimately consigned them to the trash heap by writing a memo quoting Richard Feynman on the nature of science which reduced Wertheimer's objections to unproductive nonsense and the project continued mainly without him. (Michael Swords)

White, Gen. Thomas Dresser

Ruppelt: "I think that this man's name was White. He was from some branch of research and development in the Pentagon. He and his staff religiously attended every one of my briefings and were sold that the UFO's were real. He had Gen Samford's ear but I don't think he quite convinced Samford that the UFO's were real." General Thomas Dresser White, who is the general Ruppelt couldn't think of in his list, was assistant director of operations in the Pentagon at the time, and was the guy who transferred Blue Book from AMC to USAF Intel in the pentagon. Full bio

Zimmerman, Charles
Ruppelt: "Charley Zimmerman was the technical advisor to the chief of the Analysis Branch at ATIC. I never could figure out exactly where he stood on the subject of UFO’s but I think he was a bit of a believer. Several times I tried to put through an explanation that a UFO was a balloon or other known object and he’d argue like mad against it. Many times he’d come running into my office to show me “a new, red hot report”. This man is none other than the Charles Zimmerman who built the unique prototype of the Vought V-162 disc-winged plane for the US Navy, better known as the "Flapjack" or "Zimmer Skimmer." It is quite ironic that the builder of a plane, which has been constantly and erroneously proposed as "the explanation" for UFOs was so much interested in UFOs and obviously a "believer."

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