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OXFORD BOOKWORMS 2
Helen Brooke
O xford Bookworm s
Factfiles
O x f o r d U n iv e r s it y P r e ss
OXFORD
U N IV E R S IT Y P R E SS
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oxford a n d o x f o r d En g l is h OXFORD BOOKWORMS
are trade marks of Oxford University Press For a full list of titles in all the Oxford Bookworms
ISBN 0 19 423203 4 series, please refer to the Oxford English catalogue.
© Oxford University Press
Oxford Bookworms Starters
First published 1999 Original fiction for students starting to read in
Third impression 2001 English. Stories are carefully graded and supported
by clear, high-quality illustrations.
No unauthorized photocopying
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be The Oxford Bookworms Library
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, A wide range of original and adapted stories, both
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, classic and modern, which take learners from
photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior elementary to advanced level through six carefully
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out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior
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Printed in Hong Kong Fiction by well-known classic and modern authors.
Texts are not abridged or simplified in any way.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The publishers would like to thank the following for permission to reproduce photographs:
Aquarius Picture Library p 18 (Independence Day/Twentieth Century Fox); Fortean Picture Library pp 5 (Hub Corn crash
site/Dennis Stacy), 8 (Socorro, New Mexico/Peregrine Mendoza), 9 (Roswell Army Air Field/Dennis Stacy), 13 (Heber,
Arizona/Peregrine Mendoza, Travis Walton/Dennis Stacey), 16 (Hoax UFO, Albuquerque UFO/Paul Villa); The Kobal
Collection pp 17 (Close Encounters of the Third Kind), 19 (Alien); Mary Evans Picture Library p 12 (Flying
Saucer/Michael Buhler); The Moviestore Collection pp 17 (E.T.), 18 (The X-Files); Popperfoto pp 7 (Major Jesse
Marcel/AFP Photo), 10 (De Havilland jet/KPS), 11 (radar operator), 15 (UFO with landing spheres), 16 (lights flying in
formation); Science Photo Library pp 1 (Sombrero Galaxy/NOAO), 2 (Tunguska damage/Novosti Press Agency),
3 (Meteor Strike/Victor Habbick), 4 (William W. Brazel and his wife/Peter Menzel), 6 (Roswell Incident/David Hardy),
9 (replica of an alien/Peter Menzel), 15 (Roswell aliens/Peter Menzel); Topham Picturepoint pp 9 (security
guard/Mulvehill, The Image Works), 15 (B-2 Stealth bomber).
1 UFOs and aliens
In 1897, something very strange
happened in the town of Aurora,
Texas. Children playing in a field
saw a strange ‘ship’ fly over and
then crash into a farm building.
Men ran to the crash and found
just one alien in the ship - dead.
They put the alien under the
ground - and, if the story is true,
he is still there, somewhere under
Aurora.
1
•%.
2
weather balloon. The army sent night, but he woke up his wife and
these balloons very high up into son. Tie wanted to show them the
the air to look at wind and debris. His son, Jesse Junior, was
temperature, and they sometimes eleven at the time. He still
crashed near Roswell. But after a remembers the strange pieces of
few minutes, Marcel was sure that metal and the ‘picture w riting’.
this was not a balloon. ‘This came The American government had a
to Earth, but it did not come from ‘Foreign Technology Division’, in
Earth,’ he said. Dayton, Ohio. The scientists here
The three men put some of the looked at planes from other
debris into M arcel’s car and countries and tried to learn about
Cavitt’s Jeep, and the army men them. During the Second World War
returned to Roswell. Marcel the planes were often German or
stopped at home on the way to the Japanese. In 1947 they were usually
base. It was the middle of the Russian. For the people at Roswell,
Truman saw them, and they, and ears, and no teeth. They had no
their strange spaceship, then went hair, short legs and four fingers on
to Dayton. Certainly a number of each hand.
people who worked at the ‘H angar If the story is true, both the
18’ building at Dayton say that aliens and their spaceship are now
they saw the spaceship there. They at the secret ‘Area 51’ in Nevada.
also saw dead aliens. Some
people saw two, some
as many as thirty.
They were small
(about one metre
thirty centimetres
tall), thin, with
large heads and
large round eyes,
small mouths and
An artist's model
o f one o f the aliens
10
The road
outside Heber: About midnight on 10
when Walton November (five days later) the
returned he
phoned home
telephone rang in Grant Neff’s
from here house. Grant was W alton’s
brother-in-law.
‘It’s me, Travis. Can you come
and get me? I’m at the Exxon gas
looked through the trees for some station in Heber.’
time, but Walton was not there so Grant, and W alton’s brother
they decided to go to the police. Duane drove to the gas station
The police, of course, did not and found Walton. He was tired
believe them. At first they thought and hungry - and he didn’t know
that Walton was dead, and that that it was five days later.
the six men were his killers. W alton’s story is a strange one,
Finally, the six men had to have but he, too, had a polygraph test.
a lie detector or polygraph test, After the green light hit him,
to see if their story was true. Walton went to sleep. He woke up
The polygraph said that it was. on a bed. For a minute he thought
The police looked in the forest that he was in hospital. Then he
for days, but they found nothing. saw that the walls were metal, and
UFOs
that the people around him were his head. W alton ran up to him,
not human. They were small talking and asking questions. The
(about 1.60 metres), with large man did not answer, but smiled
heads and no hair. He was not in a and took W alton’s hand. Then he
hospital but on a spaceship! took Walton back into the
Walton jumped off the bed; he passage. A door opened in front of
wanted to escape. He pushed into them and they walked outside.
one of the aliens - it felt very soft They were inside a very big
- and picked up a long piece of building. The man took Walton
metal. To his surprise, the aliens past two or three more flying
ran out of the room. saucers, and into a small room.
Carefully, Walton pushed open Here, there were two more human
the door and looked out of the men and a wom an, with the same
room. There was a long passage clothes and helmets. Again W alton
outside. He walked quietly along asked questions, and again nobody
the passage, looking for a door. answered. Instead they put him in
The first door went into a a chair. W alton was now very
circular room, about five metres frightened again, and he was more
across, with a high, round, ceiling. frightened when the woman
In the centre of the room was a picked up a black mask and put it
chair, and when Walton moved over his face.
towards it, the room got darker. When he woke up again he was
Now, on the walls and ceiling lying on the road outside Heber.
Walton could see tiny lights - like He could see the lights of the
stars. Perhaps this was a map of flying saucer as it disappeared into
the stars. the sky.
Suddenly there was a noise We can be sure, from the
behind him. He turned, and saw a polygraph, that Walton and his
tall human wearing blue clothes, friends believe their stories are
with a glass or plastic helmet over true. Can they really be?
UFOs
hoaxes. Certainly
there have been There are also
some very clever photographs of aliens.
hoaxes in the last A hoax photograph M any of these are
fifty years. o f aliens probably hoaxes
It’s easy to make a as well.
photograph of a UFO. You need a Sometimes people see strange
small model of a spaceship. You things in the sky, and they think
photograph this once, and then that they are UFOs. When experts
take another photograph of the look carefully at them they
place where you w ant people to sometimes discover that they are
see the UFO. There are many aeroplanes, balloons or even
photographs of UFOs taken by a meteors.
man called George Adamski. In the 1980s, the American
M any people now believe that government was building a secret
these are hoaxes. plane - the Stealth Bomber. They
16
Is it real?
UFOs - or a reflection
in the lens o f the camera?
Exercises
A Checking your understanding
Glossary
alien a ‘person’ who is not from hoax something which is not true
Earth insect a small animal with six legs
balloon a ball filled with gas invisible if something is invisible
which can fly you cannot see it
base a place where soldiers live lens the front, glass, part of a
and work camera
ceiling the top of a room lie detector a machine that says if
cliff a very steep hill of rock a person is telling the truth
debris damaged pieces that are mask something you put over
left after an accident your nose and mouth
disappear go out of sight operator the person who uses a
dream you dream stories when machine
you are asleep passage a long room
escape a prisoner escapes when he radar radar can ‘see’ things a long
gets out of prison way away
expert a person who knows a lot ranch a very big farm
about something reflection light which comes off
explosion a very big ‘bang’ like a something like a mirror
bomb screen the front part of a
felt past tense of ‘feel’ television or computer
found past tense of ‘find’ space-suits clothes to wear in
frightened afraid spaceships
gas station where you buy gas or temperature heat or cold
petrol for a car thunder the noise made by
helmet a strong hat to protect lightning in a storm
your head truck a small lorry
UFOs
The night is dark. Suddenly, a light
appears, m oving across the sky. Then
another. And another. They are
travelling quickly. Very quickly. Are they
aeroplan es, or m eteors, or are they
som ething very strange? H ave these
unidentified flying objects come from
another planet?
9780194232036