Professional Documents
Culture Documents
It was July 1947, the day started out just like any other day.
People
of Roswell were going off to work, going downtown shopping, and the
little ones
were at playgrounds with their mothers. Day in and day out
townspeople would
drive by the military without giving it much thought. However, this
day, in
Roswell, New Mexico would change the course of history, and how the
public
thinks of themselves, God and the outer limits of space!
Roswell New Mexico was in the middle of the desert. Here was a
vast
open land where one could see miles around. On this afternoon
something very
strange was about to happen. In the clear skies of Roswell a very
large craft
ended its flight. Was this a weather balloon or an Unidentified Flying
Object?
Happenings in 1947
The next day, July, 8, 1947, in the morning, Marcel and Cavitt
arrived
back at Roswell AAF with two carloads of wreckage. Marcel accompanied
this
wreckage, or most of it, on a flight to Fort Worth AAF.
The Civilians
"I think within that year, he had moved off the ranch and moved to
Alamagordo or to Tularosa and he put something in a locker there. That
was
before people had home freezers, and it was a large refrigerator
building. You
would buy beef and cut it up and put it into those lockers and you had
a key to
it and you could get your beef out when you wanted it. I think it
would have
been pretty expensive, and kind of wonder how he could pay on rancher's
wages.”
Marian Strickland (Interview held in 1990)
“Mac made it plain he was not supposed to tell that there was
any
excitement about the material he found on the ranch. He was a man who
had
integrity. He definitely felt insulted and mis-used, disrespected. He
was
worse than annoyed. He was definitely under some stress, and felt that
he had
been kicked around. He was threatened that if he opened his mouth he
may get
thrown into the back side of the jail. He gave that impression,
definitely,”
Strickland insisted.
William Brazel Jr. is Mac Brazels son. Here is his description of the
wreckage
from the crash site.
His dad found this thing and he told him a little bit about it,
but not
too much, because the Air Force asked him to take an oath that he would
not
tell anybody in detail about it. He went to his grave and he never told
anybody.”
At the time of the crash, William Brazel Jr. had been living and
working
in Albuquerque, but returned when his father was taken into custody to
run the
ranch.
Glenn Dennis
When he went to the AAF there were two MPs standing right there
and
started to go in. He would have gotten as far as he did if he didn't
park in
the handicap parking space. He saw all the wreckage. He didn't know
what it
was, but he knew there was something going on. “It looked like
stainless steel
when it is put on heat,” he said.
He hollered at the MPs and they came running over and grabbed
him by the
arms and carried him clear outside. And they told him to get my butt
out of
there. (They followed him back to the funeral home.)
About three hours later they called me and said, “if you open
your mouth
you'll be so far back in the jug they'll have to shoot pinto beans into
you with
a bean shooter.” He just laughed and said, “Go to heck.”
The nurse told Dennis the next day that there were three little
bodies,
two of them were dead, and the third was in pretty good condition.
The Police
They called her grandfather and someone came to the house and
told him
about the incident. He went out to the site and he saw a large burned
area
with lots of debris and three small bodies of space beings. Their
heads were
large and wore silk like suits. One of the little space beings were
still alive.
After the death threat she never talked about the incident to anybody
ever.
The Press
Frank Joyce- worked at the radio station KGFL. He got a phone call
from Mac
Brazel, who reported the wreckage on his ranch.
The next thing he found out was that PIO, Walter Haut, came into
the
station some time after he got the call. He handed him a news release
printed
on onionskin stationary and left immediately. He called him back at
the base
and said, “I suggest that you not release this type of story that says
you have
a flying disk or flying saucer.” He said, "No it's OK."
He sent the release to the Western Union wire to the United
press
bureau. After he returned to the station, there was a flash on the
wire with
the story: “The U.S. Army Air Corps says it has a flying disk.” They
typed a
paragraph or two, and then other people got the wire and asked for more
information. Then the phones started going berserk, He referred them
to the
airfield
The wire just stopped and just hummed. Then a phone call came in
for him
and \ the caller identified himself as an officer at the Pentagon, this
man said
some very bad things about what would happen to him. He was really
pretty
nasty. Finally, Frank got through to him. Frank said, “You're talking
about a
release from the U.S. Army Air Corps [UFO.Com].” Bang, the phone went
dead,
and the man from the Pentagon was gone.
The next significant thing that happened in the evening was that
he got
a call from Mac Brazel. He said, “we haven't got the story right.”
Frank
invited him down to the radio station. Mac arrived not long after
sunset. He
was not alone, but he had a feeling that they were being watched. He
said
something about a weather balloon. Frank said “Look, this is completely
different than what you told me on the phone the other day about little
green
men,” and that's when Mac said “No, they weren't green.” Frank had a
feeling
that Mac was under a lot of pressure. Mac Brazel said, “Our lives will
never be
the same again. [Sightings]”
“Mr. Tucker (the station owner) called for Lyndia and said “I
have a
huge story for you, I will send it via teletype.” But right after he
started
sending, it got disconnected and intercepted. The message read, “This
is the
FBI, you will cease transmitting.” She knew whatever it was, it was a
huge
story. She was upset and didn't get all the way through transmission.
The Military
Jesse Marcel- Major Jesse Marcel was one of the first two military
people to
visit the Corona crash site. The other was Sheridan Cavitt, who to
this day
has refused to even acknowledge that he was there on the ranch with
Marcel.
Jesse Marcel died in 1982.
When they arrived at the crash site, it was amazing to see the
vast
amount of area it covered. It was nothing that hit the ground or
exploded on
the ground. It's something that hit that must have exploded above
ground,
traveling above at a high rate of speed, they didn't know. But it
scattered
over an area of about three quarters of a mile long, he said and several
hundred feet wide. So he proceeded to pick up fragments that they
could fit in
their Jeep Carry-All. It was quite obvious to him, familiar with air
activities,
that it was not a weather balloon, nor was it a missile or an airplane.
It was
something he had never seen before. They loaded the Jeep Carry-All
but he
wasn't satisfied. He told Cavitt, “You drive this vehicle back to the
base and
I'll go back out there to pick up as much as could put in the car,”
which he
did. But he only picked up a small portion.
One thing that impressed him about the debris was that it looked
like
parchment. A lot of it had a lot of little members with symbols that
they had
to call hieroglyphics because he could not interpret them, they could
not be
read, they were just symbols, something that meant something but they
were all
not the same. The segments that this were painted on had symbols that
were
pink and purple. Actually the color was lavender. These little
segments could
not be broken, and could not be burned. He even tried to burn it, and
it
wouldn't burn.
This particular piece of metal was about two feet long and
perhaps two
feet wide. That stuff weighed nothing, so thin it wasn't any thicker
than
tinfoil from the bottom of a cigarette box. So Jesse Marcel tried to
hit it
with a 16-pound sledgehammer, and still there was not any dent on it.
He knew
much about the U.S. military materials that were used in weather
balloons and
this stuff was not even close to it. Jesse Marcel he died and still
had no
idea of what it was. So that's how it stands!
Jesse Marcel Jr.- is Major Jesse Marcel's son. major Marcel after he
collected
the debris he came back to his house to show his 11 year old son and
his wife
what he had found. Jesse Marcel Jr. is now a doctor and a reserve
helicopter
pilot who served in Vietnam.
When his dad came back to the house he had a bunch of wreckage
with him
at the time, and brought the wreckage into the house. Actually wakened
my
mother and myself out so they could view this, because it was so
unusual. This
was about two o'clock in the morning as he recalled, and he spread it
out so we
could get some basic idea what it looked like.
They were all amazed by this debris that was there, primarily
because we
didn't know what it was, you know, it was the unknown. Years after this
incident we would talk privately among themselves about what the
possibilities
of this, what this thing was. And they feel that it was not of earthly
origin.
Walter Haut- was the public information officer at Roswell AAF in 1947.
Colonial Blanchard ordered Haut to issue a press release to tell the
country
what the Army had found a flying saucer. Here is the text of Haut's
press
release [UFO.Com].
One morning his superior said, “Pack you bags and we'll have the
cameras
there, ready for you.” They didn't know where they were going.
After a few hours flight they got to Roswell and got in a staff
car with
some gear they had brought along in the trucks, and they headed out.
After
about a hour and a half we got there and there were a lot of people out
there.
They said “Set you cameras up to take a picture fifteen feet away.”
They were
telling them what to do. Shoot this shoot that.
They told them to go into the tent to take some more pictures.
What they
saw were alien bodies. All he remembered was that they had a dark
complexion
and that they were thin and had big heads. He took about thirty
pictures of
the aliens and he said, “It smelled funny in the tent [Alien.com]”
A.K. came back in a truck that was loaded with debris. On the
way back
to Washington DC the Lieutenant Commander made it clear to them that
what they
had seen in Roswell, New Mexico, they hadn't seen.
Earthly Explanations
Weather Balloon
* If what had crashed was a weather balloon, there would have been no
need of
secrecy. According to the testimony, military officers admonished
subordinates
and civilians not talk about what they saw.
* The wreckage described by Marcel and others was too voluminous, and
spread
out over too large of an area, to have been the wreckage of a weather
balloon.
* Most of the witnesses who saw or handled the wreckage would have
recognized
the remains of a crashed weather balloon.
* If what crashed was any kind of secret military apparatus, one would
expect
at least some of the pieces to have recognizable letters or numbers on
the them.
Many of the witnesses say that some of the wreckage bore a very strange
kind of
writing, but not one witness has said that any of the wreckage bore any
recognizable symbols.
* If what crashed was any kind of secret military apparatus, the Army
would
have said simply, “This is secret, and no more questions will be
answered,
period.” The Army would not have concocted the flying saucer and
weather
balloon stories. In 1947, Americans were less skeptical about the
motives of
their government, and the people of New Mexico, including journalists
and other
civilians, were dependent for their livelihood on secret military
projects.
* If what crashed was any kind of secret military apparatus, the Army
would not
have waited for a rancher to inform them of the crash before sending
military
personnel to examine the wreckage, five days after the crash.
* Rockets and airplanes that were secret in 1947 are not secret now.
If what
crashed was a secret rocket or airplane, it would have been revealed as
such
years ago. (Incredibly, the Army is sticking to its weather balloon
story, even
though nobody believes it anymore.)
* By July 1994, rockets launched from White Sands were fitted with
self-
destruct mechanisms so that an errant rocket could be destroyed before
leaving
the test range. The Corona crash site is about 75 miles from the
nearest border
of the test range.
* They did not fly secret airplanes in New Mexico in 1947. There was
plenty
of room for that in California, where all the secret airplane projects
were
carried on.
* Most of the witnesses who saw or handled the wreckage would have
recognized
the remains of a crashed rocket or airplane.