Available now is my new book, The Pyramids and the Pentagon: The Government’s Top Secret Pursuit of Mystical Relics, Ancient Astronauts, and Lost Civilizations, which focuses on what the official world knows – or suspects – about a whole range of mysteries of the fog-shrouded past. They are mysteries that cover such issues as the construction of the Pyramids of Egypt, the Atlantis-related beliefs of Edgar Cayce, the nature of Noah’s Ark, a possible Face on Mars-Egypt connection, and much more of a so-called “ancient astronauts” nature. And there’s another, equally weird saga I cover in my book…

In terms of key and integral world events, 1947 was a year of profoundly deep and significant proportions. United States President Harry S. Truman signed the National Security Act, which paved the way for the creation of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The first, priceless collection of what have famously become known as the Dead Sea Scrolls was found in caves at Qumran, an ancient and historic site on the West Bank. At the White Sands Proving Ground, New Mexico, a collection of fruit-flies made history when they became the first living creatures to reach the fringes of space, after being blasted into the skies above aboard a captured German World War Two-era V-2 rocket.

The age of the Flying Saucer was famously ushered in, after an American pilot – Kenneth Arnold – witnessed nine strange-looking aircraft flying close to Mount Rainier, Washington State. And, many UFO researchers believe, an alien spacecraft crashed on harsh, remote desert land outside of the small New Mexican town of Roswell. Singular, unconnected events in a world constantly in a state of change, development, and wonder, or integral parts of a greater, and very old, puzzle guided by the mysterious hands of destiny, fate and grand design?

Most people would probably say the former. But, sometimes, the majority are wrong, devastatingly so, even.

Close to 1,000 in number the Dead Sea Scrolls – as they have become popularly and famously known – represent a veritable treasure-trove of early written material from almost every book of the Old Testament, chiefly dating from around 150 BC to 70 BC. Their amazing discovery dates back to February 1947, when, along with his young cousin, a certain Muhammad edh-Dhib, then only a teenager, stumbled across a series of caves at Qumran, on the northwest side of the Dead Sea – which borders Jordan to the East, and Israel to the West. Upon exploring one particular cave, edh-Dhib was amazed to find within it a number of ancient texts, carefully and faithfully recorded on aged parchment.

edh-Dhib excitedly scooped up the items and, with his cousin in-tow, raced back home to his family’s Bedouin camp to show them his discovery. It didn’t take long before word got around that something unusual had been unearthed. In fact, matters began to spiral with extraordinary speed when talk of the scrolls began to heat up in and around Bethlehem – particularly so when yet more scrolls were found in the area, collectively at no less than eleven caves, and throughout a period of time that extended right up until to 1956.

Those immediate times after edh-Dhib’s discovery were distinctly wild and turbulent ones. The Syrian Orthodox Church expressed its firm interest in seeing the scrolls, as did representatives of the American Schools of Oriental Research. Interested parties in the Vatican secretly negotiated to buy up some of the scrolls, others – in the field of biblical archaeology – scrambled to see them and examine them, and some scholars called for the scrolls to be placed under official control and oversight – lest they might be spread far and wide, possibly even becoming catastrophically lost or destroyed. Fortunately, this latter scenario did not happen.

What did happen, due to circumstances provoked by the turbulent Arab-Israeli War of 1948, was that the scrolls were hastily transported to Lebanon for safe-keeping. Six years later, they were up for sale – and were ultimately sold for $250,000 and transferred to the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem. Then, after the Six Day War of 1967, the scrolls ended up at the Shrine of the Brook – an arm of the Jerusalem-based Israel Museum – where they continue to reside to this very day. There is, however, yet another story of the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is one filled with, and fueled by, dark conspiracy and involves none other than the CIA.

While extraordinary findings were being made at Qumran, historic events were unfolding in the United States. Back in late 1944, one William J. Donovan – who was the founder of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), arguably the earliest incarnation of what eventually became the CIA – mused upon the idea of establishing the ultimate intelligence-gathering agency.

It was designed to act as the nation’s focal point for securing and analyzing data relevant and vital to U.S. national security and the defense of the nation. The ambitious idea was of great interest to the president of the day, Franklin D. Roosevelt. With the battle still on to defeat the hordes of Adolf Hitler, Italy, and Japan, however, survival was the primary name of the game.

The result, it was not until July 26, 1947, two years after world peace had been restored that this ultimate secret agency finally came into being, when Roosevelt’s successor in the White House, Harry S. Truman, passed the National Security Act. The Central Intelligence Agency was duly born.

The very idea that the newly-created CIA might have played an integral, albeit deeply clandestine, role in the saga of the Dead Sea Scrolls sounds manifestly bizarre in the extreme. But, in this particular case, the old adage about truth being far stranger than fiction really does apply, as my book, The Pyramids and the Pentagon makes very clear…

I first heard of the Missouri Mystery Mound at least ten to fifteen years ago on a now-defunct website. The website claimed the Mound was the Hall of Records, although it didn’t specifically say whose hall of records. The Atlanteans? The great mound building cultures of North America? Egyptian? Mayan? Or some race of peoples lost to time? I’m from Missouri, and if an ancient civilization’s hall of records sat under the soil of my state, I needed to know. Trouble is, I couldn’t find the man who said he had discovered it.

Until now.

I tracked down and interviewed Charles Teague, and found the answers to my questions were stranger than I’d ever hoped.

Teague grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, and always had an interest in North American archeology; but it wasn’t until one night in the early 1990s listening to radio host Art Bell interview an American Indian shaman, that this interest became almost an obsession.

“(The shaman) was telling this story about how this Indian who had come to him while he was doing some exploring,” Teague said. “This Indian took him to this place back in the back woods to a hall of records under a mountain.”

The shaman told Bell this Indian guide showed him temples and 10,000-year-old artifacts under that mountain, but he didn’t know the location.

“They blindfolded him until they got there, then when he left so he couldn’t get back to it,” Teague said. “But he knew approximately where it was.”

At the time Teague was enrolled in a course on reverse speech technology and recorded this program to see if he could use reverse speech to find this hall of records. He was amazed at what he found.

“It’s just too weird for normal people to understand,” Teague said. “I recorded it, and said hell if this S.O.B. really went to a hall of records in Middle America, in reverse his mind was going to tell me where he went.”

After three hours of listening to that part of the program over and over in reverse, he pulled out words, some intriguing, others curious.

“He said ‘near the fault in America in the forest in the mountains’,” Teague said. “I said it was in the New Madrid fault. It couldn’t be anywhere else.” The New Madrid fault line runs through Mark Twain National Forest, which overlaps the Ozark Mountain range.

Then he caught words like “cactus,” “lake,” and “lizard,” which didn’t mean much. “I said, ‘Jesus, what’s the damn lizard?’ It didn’t make sense,” he said. “Most of it didn’t make sense. But here I was, 100 to 200 miles from it.”

Teague looked over maps, but got only headaches. “I was screwed, so I left it alone for a while.”

It wasn’t until he attended a presentation on historical American peacemakers that the Mound crept back into his thoughts. One peacemaker in particular caught his attention. Colonel George Morgan, who brokered a peace agreement between the revolutionaries and the American Indians during the War for Independence.

“After the Revolutionary War, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson gave him the job of mapping out the Spanish territories from the Mississippi River and Ohio Valley and all that,” Teague said. “He went to southeast Missouri and founded the city of New Madrid. Then he went back to New Jersey, built a fabulous estate, and lived like a millionaire the rest of his life.”

Something about that story bothered Teague, so he read a biography on Morgan. It only offered more questions. “He was a land speculator,” Teague said. “How did he become a millionaire? He didn’t get it from his family. He didn’t get it from the Continental Congress. I figured he must have gotten from the Indians.”

A picture of the Morgan coat of arms in the biography gave him a clue. “I looked at it and said, ‘damn, this ain’t right.’ I noticed in the lower left hand corner there was one box that didn’t make any damn sense. It was offset squares with Xs with something going through the middle. I started looking at it and thought, ‘son of a bitch. This was a grid map.’”

He saw hills, and a river. “I thought, ‘if this was a grid map, this was for one reason and one reason only – for his family. The only thing this could be is the location to where he got his fortune.’ I figured this must be the Hall of Records.”

After spending days pouring over topographical maps at the University of Memphis, he found a spot in hilly region of Mark Twain National Forest near a lake. Forest, fault, mountain, lake. But the hard part of his journey was just beginning.

“Finding something on a grid map and going into the forest and trying to find something are totally different,” he said.

Teague, his wife, and daughter drove to from Tennessee to Missouri and searched a small section of Mark Twain National Forest. “In 100 degrees we went into the backwoods and walked around to find it. We spent most of the day going back in the swamps and we found nothing.” After one fruitless day, they went home. But Teague wasn’t finished.

“I got my brother and a friend of mine and we made another trip up there.”

It took two more trips with his brother and local American Indians, but Teague believes he found it.

“We found a circular path, and as we were walking back along this long gulley, and my brother said, ‘hey look up at that rock formation, it looks like a lizard.’ Damn. That’s what I was looking for. A lizard.”

The ascended the hill and found caves – caves with ancient carvings, one Teague calls The Wall. He was certain he found the location of the Hall of Records. “The main thing was the Wall with the giant skull carved into it,” Teague said. “It has all the esoteric carving in it. An ancient god, (the planet) Saturn. There was an entrance there too, but we didn’t open it, or we’d be dead. Whoever’s watching it was there.”

As the group walked back to their vehicle, two truckloads of men cut them off from the front, and rear. “Everybody was carrying all kinds of guns,” Teague said. “They stopped and looked at us and wanted to know what we were doing. We said we had a Cherokee.” The men allowed Teague’s group to leave, but he got an impression as to who they were. “It’s meth labs and drugs. What else could it be? I don’t think they’re smart enough to know what’s going on back there.”

They didn’t scare off Teague. Much later, after attending a UFO convention in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, he detoured into the Mark Twain National Forest to take a friend to the Mound. “I took him there and showed him around,” he said. “He wouldn’t go now.”

As Teague showed his friend some of the anomalous stone works of the Mound, two men appeared from nowhere and invited them to follow them to explore a nearby cave. Teague agreed, but when the men left, Teague and his friend walked to their vehicle and drove away. He knew if he went to that cave, they would have killed him. “The thing about the Wall. I thought something was important about it. Whatever the Wall is they protect it for some reason. I think that’s where the entrance is.”

Teague says carved depictions of an ape, an elephant, and lion show an African influence at the site, but a carving of a humanoid reptilian points to something from other stars. “It’s a reptilian god. It’s the god they worship,” he said. “You’ve got lions, apes, dragons, aliens, you can’t make heads or tails of this place.”

But the reptilian isn’t the only extraterrestrial carving Teague found. He claims an aerial photograph of the Mound shows a gray alien pointing to a star is carved into the landscape. “That was a cave entrance,” he said. “If you go into that cave you’ll find out the secret of the star where (he) came from. The Corps of Engineers built a new road and the cave is no longer there. I think the other entrance is at the Shaft.”

The Shaft is a vertical stone well shrouded by trees. Once Teague went down into the Shaft fifteen feet, but it was blocked with debris. Unfortunately, the Shaft is no longer accessible. “The next time we went up, they’d built a block over it. Somebody knew we were back there.”

Fearing for his safety, he hasn’t been back. “Before my last trip I’d sent an email to the Army Corps of Engineers and told them of the giant skull and Wall and asked what they knew about it,” Teague said. The man he contacted seemed interested in Teague’s news – too interested. “He said, ‘this thing’s great. Get your family and all your friends and take us up through the forest and take us to this Wall. I said, ‘sure.’ I’ll never go back there again. I know exactly what was planned. I could see the headline now. ‘UFO cult comes into the backwoods of Missouri and commits suicide.’ You could see where that was going.”

Although Teague believes the man he contacted at the Army Corps of Engineers knows of the site, he stops short of claiming it is a government cover up. “Hell, if I know about it, somebody knows about it. I don’t think it’s the government,” he said. “I think the people in the backwoods have been protecting this place since people have been there. I think it may be a pagan cult from long ago.”

That cult may have ancient Christian roots. Teague has found symbols of an elephant, owl, a ram, and a man, in aerial photographs. “There’s a bearded man inside the ram’s head, like a king. It has to do with a lamb and a king and it would make him a shepherd king. The owl is the sign of wisdom,” he said.

Teague is convinced the bearded man is King David. “David, the shepherd king, allowed the Arc of the Covenant to be taken to Ethiopia. In ancient times they took it on a boat in Ethiopia, around the Gulf of Mexico to the Mississippi River, and buried it in the Hall of Records in the Missouri Mystery Mound. “I believe the Arc of the Covenant is buried at the Missouri Mystery Mound. That’s my theory. In antiquity someone carved out the mounds because that’s where the Arc of the Covenant was to be taken.”

But who carved the Mound? Teague thinks the identity is carved into the landscape of the Mound itself, the gray alien pointing to a star. “Not only did they built it and carve it 20,000 years ago, they go back and re-carve it over and over again,” he said. “Carve mountains and valleys? We couldn’t do that. It’s not natural; it’s alien formed. I’m convinced at that.”

However, the photographs of the Wall, depictions of peoples, animals, and beings carved into the stone of the Mound modern archeology would say are impossible, haven’t attracted the attention of academics.

“To me this is the most sacred mythological site in America that nobody knows about. There’s some sort of energy there that keeps it quiet,” he said. “You’d think there’d be archeologists all over the damn country wanting to investigate the place, but nobody wants to go up there and look at it.”

And they probably never will, even if they ask Teague. He doesn’t plan to go back. “This place is so fantastic, and I am not even seeing anything but the McDonald’s sign. We’re not even seeing the inside of McDonald’s, the inside of the mountain. Good lord. But if I went back in there, I’d be killed,” Teague said. “If you go up there you’d better go with a big-assed guns. You’d better be armed.”

This bizarre, allegedly self propelled, seamless metallic orb was discovered by members of the Betz family in 1974, and rapidly became the object of fascination, controversy and alarm for scientists, military officials, ufologists and the general public as the story of this mystery sphere spread like wildfire through the international media.

On May 26, 1974, Terry Mathew Betz, a 21 year-old pre-med student, along his mother Gerri and his marine engineer father, Antoine, were inspecting the damage caused by a brush fire that had raged across an 88-acre swathe of woodland that they had recently acquired on marshy Fort George Island, which is nestled just east of Jacksonville, Florida.

At first the trio found nothing out of the ordinary, but before their expedition was over they stumbled across a peculiar highly polished, metal orb that was just under 8-inches in diameter. The only delineating mark that the three could find on the eerily unblemished object was an elongated triangular shape stamped into its surface.

Stunned, Terry and his parents wondered whether or not they might have stumbled across some kind of downed NASA or maybe even Soviet satellite.

Perhaps they even speculated that the friction induced heat of this object plummeting from its orbit might have had something to do with the fire that had ravaged the property, but none of them could find any signs of an impact crater or any indication of collision or heat damage on the gleaming metal globe.

The trio then surmised that it might be an “old fashioned canon ball, which someone had silver plated,” as a souvenir. Intrigued by this extraordinary find, Terry decided to heft the 22 lbs., bowling ball sized sphere into their car and take it back to their castle-like home, where he showed the unusual object to a 12 year-old relative named Wayne. He was just as perplexed by the mystery object as the rest of the family had been.

The young medical student then placed his strange prize on a window seat in his bedroom, and there the anomalous object remained, virtually forgotten, until approximately two weeks later when Terry decided to entertain his friend, Theresa Fraser, with an impromptu guitar recital in his room, eliciting some decidedly unusual reactions from this enigmatic orb.

THE MYSTERY SPHERE AWAKENS

According to Terry’s report, moments after he began strumming his guitar the metallic ball started to “vibrate like a tuning fork,” and began emitting a curious throbbing sound in response to certain notes. This sound was accompanied by what seemed to be an inaudible — at least to human ears — resonance that deeply disturbed the Betz family’s dog.

Days later, in the April 15, 1974, edition of the Palm Beach Post, Gerri Betz was quoted as saying: “There must be high frequency waves from it. When we put our poodle beside the ball, she whimpers and puts her paws over her ears.”

In the days that followed this strange performance, the Betz family began to notice some of the sphere’s other peculiar attributes. They observed that when the orb was pushed across the floor it would stop, vibrate for a moment, change direction (often more than once) and invariably return to whoever first rolled it. In one unprecedented circumstance it rolled for 12-minutes straight without a single pause!

As if this weren’t astounding enough, Terry and his family soon realized that the sphere — in defiance of all logic — appeared to be responsive to weather conditions; becoming noticeably more active on bright days as opposed to overcast ones, as if it were being directly affected by the solar energy. Although it was clearly influenced by sunlight, the sphere did not register any obvious changes when exposed to direct heat or infrared light.

The steel globe would also sporadically vibrate at a low frequency as if “a motor were running inside” and, just as intriguingly, had just one, relatively small, intensely magnetic spot on its surface.

Terry — displaying the kind of inquisitive instincts that all science students should — began to conduct a series of homespun experiments on the object.

His initial efforts were rudimentary and consisted of tapping the orb gently with a hammer, which resulted in a distinctly bell-like “ringing” sound, but it wouldn’t be until Terry placed the object on the flat, glass surface of his mother’s coffee table in order to display his unique find that things would get really interesting.

In one attempt after another, the smooth sphere would consistently roll right to the precipice of the glass surface, pause and then reverse its direction; only to stop again at the opposite edge and repeat the maneuver.

The Betz family began considering the possibility that this object was equipped with a sophisticated guidance system or was perhaps being intelligently controlled either from within or by some enigmatic external force. The family decided that the sphere almost certainly appeared to be striving to get safely to the ground without falling.

An even more bizarre event occurred when one of the family members decided to slant the table at an upwards angle and the orb began to spin up the incline utilizing its own momentum. This seemingly impossible defiance of the laws of Newtonian gravity left the Betz tribe thoroughly baffled.

While there’s no overt connection between the cases, it’s worth noting that during the summer of 1972, a similar (though not spherical) anomalous object plagued a group of teens who repeatedly managed to capture and lose a small, self propelled, evidently intelligently guided device over a vexing 4-weeks period in the Kera area of Kōchi City, Japan. The strange device came to be known as the Kera UFO. This object’s movements also defied logic and appeared to be motivated by self preservation “instincts.”

As if to further indicate that the sphere may have been harboring something (or possibly someone) sensitive within, it seemed to resist all attempts at being shaken by its human handlers. In the April 16, 1974, edition of Lodi, California’s News Sentinel, Gerri stated:

“If you shake the ball vigorously and then place it on the ground it feels just like a huge Mexican jumping bean, which is trying to get away from you.”

The Betz family became so concerned about the sphere’s clear ability to independently navigate its way around their home that they took to placing it in a sealed bag at night so that the object couldn’t escape. After days of watching the sphere perform these incredible feats, the Betz family decided that it was time to go to the public and try to find out just what it was that they actually had in their possession.

THE MEDIA FRENZY BEGINS

The first call that Gerri Betz made was to the local Jacksonville Journal. The Journal was intrigued by their story — 1976 was, after all, near the peak of the halcyon days of paranormal research — and they sent out a seasoned photographer, Lon Enger, to get the story and snap a few pictures. The skeptical Enger dutifully accepted the assignment, but secretly feared he might be stepping into a den of crackpots… he would abandon that theory soon enough.

When Enger arrived at the Betz home he was eagerly greeted by Gerri who wasted no time in presenting him with the sphere. Enger described the moment for the April 12, 1974, edition of the St. Petersburg Times: “I’m leery of this kind of thing. When I got there, Mrs. Betz said, ‘you won’t believe this if you don’t see it.’”

That was when the matriarch of the Betz clan instructed the still dubious Enger to give the ball a little shove across the floor. Here’s the event in Enger’s own words:

“She told me to put it on the floor and give it a push. It rolled a ways and stopped. So what? She said, ‘just wait a minute.’ It turned by itself and rolled to the tight about four feet. It stopped. Then it turned again and rolled to the left about eight feet, made a big arc and came back right to my feet.”

Enger examined the steel ball intently and, like the Betz family before him, could find no seams and no indication of a manufacturer on the surface; save for the inscrutable triangular symbol stamped on its side. As soon as the now converted photographer relayed his fantastic story to his editor, the paper wasted no time in publishing his account and within days a worldwide media firestorm was ignited.

Reporters from such prestigious publications as the New York Times, the London Daily and dozens of other papers from as far away as Japan called or traveled down to St. George Island to see this mystery sphere with their own eyes, but it wasn’t just journalists whose curiosity was piqued by this strange case. The scientific and military communities were also clamoring for a good look at this unusual object.

Representatives of the both the U.S. Marine Corps and NASA contacted the Betz family, as did UFO investigators representing the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO). The visitors often arrived skeptical, but almost universally left both impressed and perplexed by the sphere’s bizarre abilities.

A U.S. Marine spokesman even went so far as to admit on television that the ball had behaved strangely in his presence and conceded that he was unable to explain its origin. An official press release issued by Marines publicly stated that the ball was not the property of the United States government.

By this point Antoine had been forced to return to the sea on a freighter and Gerri and her children were swept up in a media maelstrom from which there seemed to be no reprieve.

The family, who had intentionally chosen an isolated place to live, had become overwhelmed by the press feeding frenzy and in the April 14, 1974 edition of the Palm Beach Post, Gerri was quoted as saying:

“We came to Fort George Island to get away to a serene atmosphere. Now I can’t get away from the telephone. It means nothing to people in the West that it’s midnight here. And when they quit calling those on the East wake up and start.”

DR. HYNEK AND THE SPHERE

At the peak of this frenzy, renowned astronomer and ufologist, Dr. J. Allen Hynek, requested that the Betz family send the sphere to his office at Northwestern University in Chicago so he could personally inspect it, but Gerri refused because she was warned that the one of a kind object might be seized or misplaced.

According to 1980’s, extraterrestrial omnibus, “The Encyclopedia of UFOs” by Ronald D. Story: “After notices appeared in the press Dr. J. Allen Hynek, of Northwestern University, requested that the ball be sent to him for examination. Subsequent callers, however, suggested to Mrs. Betz that trusting it to a public carrier would break the continuity and allow for interception, substitution, or ‘loss.’”

Evidently this was an assessment that Dr, Hynek — who notably served as a consultant for, and had a cameo in, Steven Spielberg’s influential “Close Encounters of the 3^rd Kind” — agreed with. According to a report published in the April 16, 1974, edition of News Sentinel:

“She [Gerri Betz] said that experts she has talked to at Northwestern University decides it would be ‘too much risk’ to fly the sphere to Chicago for examination.”

To the chagrin of scores of scientists and military officers the sphere remained firmly entrenched in the Betz’ home, and that is where the unusual object remained until a bizarre series of unexplainable events forced the family to wonder whether or not this outwardly innocuous orb was capable of channeling — and perhaps unleashing — supernatural forces.

THE HAUNTED SPHERE

Just when the almost unbearably hectic scene that surrounded the Betz house started to become almost routine for the harried family, things suddenly took a decided turn for the weird… or weirder, as the case may be.

Gerri Betz reported that she and her family began to hear strange organ-like music wafting through their cavernous abode in the dead of night, even though there was no such instrument in their home. As if that weren’t creepy enough, doors began slamming, seemingly of their own volition, at all hours of the day and night.

While the Betz family claimed that they weren’t afraid of the poltergeist-like forces that seemed to have invaded their home, this new development did cause concern for Antoine and Gerri who decided that it was high time they got to the bottom of this mystery. To help them achieve that goal they contacted…

THE UNITED STATES NAVY

Following a series of frightening nighttime disturbances, the Betz family finally relinquished the sphere to the scientists posted at the Jacksonville Naval Air Station. The initial efforts of the Navy metallurgists were met with dead ends as their X-ray machines were not strong enough to penetrate the orb. According to Navy spokesperson, CPO Chris Berninger:

“Our first X-ray attempts got us nowhere. We’re going to use a more powerful machine on it and also run spectograph tests to determine what metal it’s made of… There’s certainly something odd about it.”

Eventually the scientists at the station were able to determine that the exact size of the sphere was 7.96 inches in diameter and that it weighed precisely 21.34 pounds. They also concluded that the shell of the orb was approximately one half inch thick — which, according to the report, could withstand a pressure of 120,000 pounds per square inch — and made of stainless steel, specifically magnetic ferrous alloy #431. This alloy is a magnetic, Nickel bearing stainless steel designed for heat treatment to the highest mechanical properties and corrosion resistance.

The Navy team’s powerful 300 KV X-ray also discovered two round objects inside the sphere surrounded by a “halo” made of a material with an unusual density. They also noted that the sphere displayed four different magnetic poles, two positive and two negative, which were not concentric.

The Navy also concluded that while the orb was intensely magnetic, it did not show signs of radioactivity and did not appear to be an explosive. At this point the Navy scientists wanted to cut into the object to get a better look, but Gerri Betz steadfastly refused; stating to the press:

“I told them we expect a comprehensive report in two weeks, and if it can’t be identified as government property it is to be returned to us.”

The Navy made good on their promise and returned the sphere, but lingering questions remained as to the origin and identity of the odd object. At this point the Betz family began to seriously consider the possibility that they were in possession of genuine extraterrestrial technology or an “alien bugging device” as the some of their neighbors dubbed it. According to Gerri:

“If no other explanation can be found that’s as logical as any… Who could say what’s on another planet, even speculations have been proven wrong. The Navy says what it isn’t. They say it isn’t an explosive. So we still want to know what it is.”

Berninger, of course, was hesitant to even entertain the extraterrestrial origin hypothesis, stating in April 15, 1974, edition of the Palm Beach Post: “I don’t know who manufactured it, but I say it came from Earth. We do know that it’s not explosive and presents no hazard.”

As assured as Berninger’s words seemed to be, this opinion regarding the supposed safety as well as the terrestrial origin of the sphere would not be shared by other scientists who tested the anomalous steel ball. The first of these men of science would represent the frankly insidious sounding…

OMEGA MINUS ONE INSTITUTE

On April 13, 1974, Dr. Carl Willson — representing a Louisiana research firm known as the Omega Minus One Institute in Baton Rouge, Louisiana — showed up on the scene. Dr. Willson examined the sphere for over 6-hours and discovered what Ottawa’s, The Citizen newspaper described as: “Radio waves coming from it and a magnetic field around it.”

Dr. Willson confirmed the Navy’s discovery of multiple poles within the sphere and claimed that this phenomenon was a “mind bender,” as the flux density of the field appeared to fluctuate in potency based on an as yet unidentified pattern. This, he claimed, defied the known laws of physics.

The good doctor evidently went on to suggest that the metal that made up the shell of the orb, while comparable to stainless steel, contained an unknown element making it slightly different from steel.

Dr. Willson also apparently witnessed the sphere’s ability to propel itself across surfaces and abruptly change directions, but “was unable to determine a pattern in the movement” or explain how that was even possible. One of the theories posited was that it might be a damaged extraterrestrial probe or perhaps even some sort of an anti-gravitational device.

In the end, the Omega Minus One Institute’s findings regarding the identity of the mystery sphere were just as inconclusive as the Navy’s, and the Betz family were no closer to the truth. It was be then that members of the APRO managed to convince the family that they might be in possession of evidence of the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence and as such were legitimately eligible to win the National Enquirer’s then $50,000 reward for…

PROOF POSITIVE OF UFOS

In the early 1970s, the editorial staff of the National Enquirer — and most other popular publications, for that matter — took a serious interest (at least in terms of profit margins) in subjects like cryptozoology, ufology and the supernatural.

On March 12, 1972, the publication offered an award of $10,000 for the “best scientific evidence of the reality of UFOs” and $50,000 to: “the first person who can prove that an Unidentified Flying Object (UFO) came from outer space and is not a natural phenomenon.” This already bountiful sum was raised to $1,000,000 by 1976.

While the Enquirer was considered by most to be little more than a supermarket tabloid, the publication took great pains to assemble what they referred to as a “Blue Ribbon Panel,” which consisted of noted scientists including Dr. J. Allen Hynek, Dr. James Albert Harder, Dr. R. Leo Sprinkle — who in 1974, was involved in the investigation of the infamous Carl Higdon abduction case — biologist Frank B. Salisbury and State University of New York professor of philosophy, Dr Robert F Creegan.

Besides the Ph.D holders, the panel was rounded out by such esteemed members as a former Supreme Court Justice, a former Attorney General of the United States and a former New York Court of Appeals Judge. The heads of the APRO, MUFON (Mutual UFO Network) and NICAP (National Investigations Committee On Aerial Phenomena) were also on hand to form a sort of “mini panel,” that was in charge of deciding which cases would go before the primary panel.

The team came together once a year and was charged with the daunting task of designating the most legitimate cases of UFO encounters reported in the past year, as well as examining any physical evidence of said encounters.

It would be at the panel’s discretion to decide if any of this evidence represented incontrovertible proof of alien life and thus award its presenter the prize money. Up until this point the only winner was Durel Johnson and family who were involved in the renowned Delphos, Kansas UFO encounter, resulting in an intriguing series of photos, which won them $5,000 for “scientifically valuable evidence  on UFOs.”

TERRY AND THE SPHERE HEAD OUT

In 1974 the panel convened in New Orleans and the Betz family decided to send the mystery sphere to the event. While they no doubt hoped to become the recipients of the substantial reward, the family’s primary objective was to expose the sphere to these esteemed scientists who might be able to suggest what further analysis might be performed to identify the anomalous orb.

Terry was designated as the personal courier of the object and was sent to New Orleans with the sphere in tow. Needless to say, the mystery sphere became the center of attention and between April 20 and 21, 1974, the device was subjected to yet another battery of tests.

While the panel confirmed much of what the Omega Minus One Institute and the Navy’s researchers had already revealed — including the fact that that the object acted like an audio transponder — it could not discern the origin of the orb, but, as intrigued as the panel members were by the object, the fact that it had no direct connection to any UFO sighting negated any possibility of the Betz’s winning the $50,000 reward.

In the end, Hynek surmised that the object was likely man-made, although he conceded that he had no idea what it was or where it came from, but the orb also caught the attention of one of his Blue Ribbon Panel colleagues and this noted scientist’s investigation into the object would take a potentially terrifying turn, forcing him to ask:

IS THE SPHERE A DOOMSDAY DEVICE?

Dr. James Albert Harder — a professor emeritus of civil and hydraulic engineering at the University of California at Berkeley — became increasingly intrigued by the reports he was reading regarding the Betz sphere as was no doubt delighted by his opportunity to examine the object first hand.

Following the National Enquirer competition, the Betz’s allowed him to examine the globe, the results of which were disconcerting to say the least. Below is an excerpt from “The Encyclopedia of UFOs” that helps to illustrate the scene:

“Dr. James A. Harder, the APRO’s consultant in civil engineering, commented that an X-ray of the sphere should result in a donut shaped presentation. However, the Navy X-ray showed two internal spheres after the 300 KV X-ray bombardment rendered the shell invisible. This indicates that the internal material is more dense than the stainless steel shell. Thus, a substantial portion of the weight in the internal material, and the shell could be much thinner than half an inch.”

If all of the above seems a little anticlimactic, then all one needs to do is read the final conclusions that Dr. Harder came to regarding the nature of the sphere and its internal contents. In an announcement made at the International UFO Congress in Chicago on June 24, 1977, Dr. Harder presented his truly astonishing, and utterly terrifying, findings regarding the Betz sphere. According to Story:

“He [Dr. Harder] asserted, based on his X-ray studies, that the two internal spheres are made of elements far heavier than anything known to science. While the heaviest element yet produced in any atomic reactor here on Earth has an atomic number of 105, and the heaviest element occurring naturally on Earth is uranium, with an atomic number of 92, Harder claims to have determined that the Betz sphere has atomic numbers higher than 140. If one were to drill into the sphere, he asserted, ‘perhaps the masses would go critical’ and explode like an atomic bomb.”

As if this weren’t potentially dire enough, Harder went on to warn the assembled audience of scientists and UFO investigators that any attempt to discern the contents of the sphere might unintentionally set it off… or, worse yet, offend it’s ostensibly extraterrestrial creators:

“Because of this danger, and because the object is still presumably under surveillance by its supposed alien makers, Harder warned the audience against any attempt to go to Florida to investigate the Betz sphere.”

It went unreported whether or not the Betz family concurred with Dr. Harding’s potentially apocalyptic conclusions, but it is difficult to believe that they were not at least a little anxious about the potentially devastating effects tampering with their family’s favorite “toy” might cause.

It is at about this time that the stories surrounding the mystery sphere (not to mention the object itself) seemed to vanish without a trace — at least from the public eye. This is baffling considering the fact that it was at just this moment that the tale became truly fascinating, not to mention possibly dangerous. As the years have slipped into decades, two primary questions have haunted investigators. The first unanswered query is …

WHAT THE HELL WAS IT?

The million dollar question is, of course: “Did Terry Betz and his parents actually stumble across an alien artifact that spring day or is there a more prosaic explanation for the whole affair?”

Some of the more mundane hypotheses proposed have ranged from the sphere beings an extra large ball bearing, to a paper mill valve, to a cryogenic storage device known as a Dewer flask, to a check valve used in a phosphate-pumping line, but it seems likely that any of the number of scientists and engineers who examined the sphere were likely to have ruled out any commonplace industrial tool.

Nevertheless, there is one mechanism that numerous researchers have glommed onto as the true identity of the orb; and that is that the sphere was nothing more than a…

SEA BOTTOM MARKER:

The fact both the Marines and the Navy denied ownership of the device is noteworthy; especially in light of the fact that in the years that would follow there would be numerous investigators — including UFO author, Roland D. Story — who would suggest that the object might have been a sea bottom marker, which was used to assist missile launching submarines by giving them stable points of reference for ballistic calculations.

According to Story: “The Navy’s failure to identify [the sphere] could be due to ‘need to know’ restrictions related to classified devices.” The inherent flaw in this theory resides In the fact that even if Berninger and his team did not have “top secret” clearance, the hoopla surrounding the discovery of this sphere, not to mention the reams of paperwork that would have been necessary to conduct these experiments with Navy personnel, would have surely set off some kind of alarm, even in clandestine circles.

The Betz family had already agreed to give up the device if it proved to be military property and it would have taken very little effort on the Navy’s — or the Marines before them, for that matter — part to keep the sphere in their possession if the technology were that sensitive, even if they wanted to keep the device’s purpose a secret. The flip side of this coin is that the Betz sphere might have been a piece of top secret (or maybe even extraterrestrial) technology and that the Navy replaced with with and exact replica, but that is pure speculation.

One should also consider the fact that Antoine Betz was a marine engineer. While he was not likely to be an expert on military tech, it would seem improbable that he would not have at least recognized the device’s maritime origin. So, assuming that this was not a ballistic reference marker, perhaps we ought to consider the possibility that the Betz family came across a…

STOLEN STEEL BALLS:

According to the April 23, 1974 edition of the Ocala Star-Banner, a sculptor by the name of James Durling-Jones claimed to have lost the orb when a cluster of them fell off the luggage rack of his Volkswagen bus while he was driving through the Jacksonville area near Easter of 1971 on his way home to Taos, New Mexico.

Durling-Jones asserted that he had gotten the industrial valve spheres from an anonymous friend who had procured the objects illegally. He further asserted that the rattling that the Betz’s claimed to hear within the sphere was due to the fact that the company that manufactured it had drilled holes into the object allowing metal chips to fall inside, before re-welding them shut.

This seems to fly in the face of the fact that none of the experts who examined the orb noticed any weld marks and that the X-rays seemed to reveal distinct structures within the object. His testimony is further cast into doubt due to the fact that the artist — ostensibly in an effort to protect his friend and his illicit activities — refused to name the company that manufactured his spheres, which might have put the whole business to rest once and for all.

While it seems as if the industrial angle may rest on shaky ground, there’s the distinct possibility that the sphere was another kind of artificial object, which may have plummeted from the loftiest of heights to the Earth below in the form of a…

DOWNED SATELLITE:

It’s difficult to claim that the Betz mystery sphere does not resemble a Sputnik style Soviet satellite with its antennas ripped off, or perhaps even a simplified version of China’s Shijian-1 experimental satellite, which was launched in 1971.

As tempting as it is to suppose that the sphere was a man-made byproduct of the space race, the fact remains that that there was absolutely no indication of a crash on the Betz property (save the brush fire) and no sign of any reentry burns on the object itself. These two facts alone would seem to entirely disqualify the notion that the mystery sphere was a terrestrially constructed, orbiting object.

So leaving behind both industrial and satellite theories let’s look at some less ordinary options, including the fact that the orb seemed to have an eerie resemblance to the oft report World War II aerial marauders known as…

FOO FIGHTERS:

Beginning in November of 1944, WWII Allied aircraft pilots began to describe frightening encounters with small, glowing, silver colored spheres in the skies over Germany and, eventually, the Pacific Theater.

These strange airborne anomalies appeared to follow the Allied planes individually and in clusters. They were able to maneuver around the planes at tremendous rates of speed and displayed astonishing dexterity.

Even stranger was the fact that these peculiar “machines” seemed to toy with the crew of these aircraft, causing a great deal of consternation among those aboard, but exhibit few (if any) overtly hostile actions.

These sightings were taken very seriously by the military brass, who assumed that these “foo fighters” were yet another new weapon conceived by Nazi scientists to turn the tide of the war, but soon it became evident that these bizarre aerial acrobats were also accosting Axis pilots. According to UFO researcher and professor of natural sciences at Western Michigan University, Michael D. Swords:

“During WWII, the foo fighter experiences of [Allied] pilots were taken very seriously. Accounts of these cases were presented to heavyweight scientists, such as David Griggs, Luis Alvarez and H.P. Robertson. The phenomenon was never explained. Most of the information about the issue has never been released by military intelligence.”

While foo fighter run-ins continued to be reported by pilots following WWII, reports had dwindled down in the latter half of the 20^th Century, still it’s hard to turn a blind eye to the fact that the Betz sphere, at least on the surface, seem to be very similar to eyewitness descriptions of foo fighters. But if these round, glowing hummingbird-like objects are not to blame, then might this be some kind of…

ALIEN ATOMIC BOMB:

In his influential 1969, book “Chariots of the Gods?” author Erich von Däniken introduced the world at large to Robert Charroux’s theory that it might have been extraterrestrial atomic weapons that were responsible for the total destruction of the biblical cities of Sodom and Gomorrah as well as other ancient disasters. According to von Däniken:

“Let us imagine for a moment that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed according to plan, i.e. deliberately, by a nuclear explosion.”

Supporters of the alien atomic bomb theory maintain that in the ancient past extraterrestrials — or, possibly, a lost civilization such as Atlantis — managed to detonate nuclear weapons on Earth. The venerated Hindu epic known as the Mahabharata even describes a “single projectile charged with all the power of the universe. An incandescent column of smoke and flame as bright as ten thousand suns rose in all its splendor.”

This, one must admit, sounds suspiciously like an atomic explosion and its resultant mushroom cloud. The Mahabharata also refers to great battles were fought with in the ancient past with airships and beam weapons, which resemble some modern reports of UFO technology.

Needless to say, mainstream academics dismiss this theory out of hand, but if (for the sake of argument) we entertain the notion that aliens were visiting Earth in the ancient past and occasionally waging war with our ancestors, then is it not possible that the potential doomsday device described by Dr. Harding might not be a more modern alien weapon that accidentally (or intentionally) fell into the hands of human beings? The premise is admittedly thin, but still intriguing in a science fiction sort of way.

The truth is that we may never know what the Betz mystery sphere was, but one sure fire way to try and end this enigma is to solve the second biggest mystery surrounding this device; and that is…

WHERE THE HELL IS IT?

When all the routine theories and wild speculations are put finally aside, the single biggest mystery that remains is — whatever happened to the Betz mystery sphere? In the years that have followed this strange series of events numerous other unfathomable orbs have plummeted to the Earth in such diverse places as Russia, Australia, Iraq and Alabama, but none have ever managed to capture the world’s attention quite like the Betz sphere.

Is Terry Betz, or one of his relatives, still in possession of the orb? Have its allegedly alien creators reclaimed it or has it long since been confiscated by the United States military? The latter would make sense if Dr. Harding’s warning about the object’s destructive potential proved to be true.

Sadly, following Dr. Harding’s dire forewarning in 1974, there’s been very little mention of the sphere in the media. Like many flash-in-the-pan curiosity stories, this one likely ran its course and the public’s interest was captured by some other passing fad before wrapping this puzzle up in any satisfying fashion.

Of course, there’s a chance that in the years following these bizarre events some accredited scientific institution inspected the mystery sphere and made a formal announcement regarding its origin, thus solving this enigma once and for all, but if that’s the case than there’s no public record of it anywhere that I’ve found.

In the end there’s a good chance that we will never know definitive origin of the mystery sphere, but There is the (frankly minute) chance that as you read these words, the irrefutable proof of the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence might be sitting in a cardboard box, collecting dust someone’s dingy basement just waiting for a curious child to discover its enthralling (and potentially apocalyptic) secrets.

If, as my Body Snatchers in the Desert book suggests, certain key events in the summer of 1947 – of a perceived flying saucer nature – had far less to do with the actions of aliens and far more to do with matters of a classified, military nature, then it would be reasonable to assume that discussion of such a possibility would have been flying around Washington and the government, and people would have been secretly digging at an official level to try and determine if this was indeed the case.

Although many have said that the government’s worries and concerns about UFOs in ’47 were provoked by fear of them having definitive alien or Soviet origins, we have prime evidence in our hands that demonstrates the domestic “Secret Weapon” angle was one most definitely discussed – and even accepted – at an official level, as we shall now see…

In early July 1947, Brigadier General George F. Schulgen, Chief of the Requirements Intelligence Branch of Army Air Corps Intelligence, met with Special Agent S.W. Reynolds of the FBI with a view to determining if the Army Air Force could solicit the assistance of the Bureau on a regular basis in its investigation of the flying saucer mystery.

General Schulgen advised Reynolds that, “every effort must be undertaken in order to run down and ascertain whether or not the flying discs are a fact and, if so, to learn all about them.”

The foremost thought on General Schulgen’s mind was that the saucers were man-made in origin. He confided in Special Agent Reynolds that, “the first reported sightings might have been by individuals of Communist sympathies with the view to causing hysteria and fear of a secret weapon.” It was for this reason that the Army Air Force sought the FBI’s assistance.

General Schulgen guaranteed the FBI “all the facilities of [my] office as to results obtained,” and outlined a plan that would involve the FBI in both locating and questioning witnesses to UFO sightings to ascertain whether they were sincere in their statements that they had seen flying saucers, or whether their statements were prompted by personal desire for publicity or political reasons.

According to declassified FBI files, Schulgen was careful to advise Reynolds too that: “It has been established that the flying discs are not the result of any Army or Navy experiment.”

Following the meeting between Schulgen and Reynolds, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover instructed his agents to begin investigations into flying saucer sightings in the manner suggested by General Schulgen. As a result of these investigations, on 15 August 1947 the FBI learned of the distinct possibility that the military’s involvement in the flying saucer subject possibly extended beyond that of mere observer.

In a memorandum to Edward A. Tamm, the FBI Assistant Director, D.M. Ladd of the Bureau’s Domestic Intelligence Division wrote the following:

“The Director advised on August 14, 1947, that the Los Angeles papers were carrying headlines indicating that Soviet espionage agents had been instructed to determine the facts relative to the flying discs. The article carried a Washington date line and indicated that Red espionage agents had been ordered to solve the question of the flying discs, the Russians being of the opinion that this might be some new form of defense perfected by the American military. The article further recalled that during the recent war pieces of tin foil had been dropped in the air for the purpose of off-setting the value of radar being used by the enemy forces and that these aluminum discs might be a new development along this line. The Director inquired as to whether the Bureau had any such information.”

Suspecting that, if the Russians were snooping around, the saucers had to be American in origin, Special Agent Reynolds of the FBI’s Liaison Section was directed by J. Edgar Hoover to make further inquiries with the Air Force.

On 19 August, 1947, Reynolds met with a Lieutenant Colonel George D. Garrett and the entire secret weapon issue was discussed frankly, as were the possible consequences should the Bureau uncover details of a top-secret, domestic research-and development program.

Following their candid discussion, a remarkable memorandum captioned Flying Discs was prepared by Reynolds for the attention of Hoover. It is this document perhaps more than any other that indicates that the American military was testing flying saucer-type aircraft in the summer of 1947.

“Special Agent S. W. Reynolds of the Liaison Section, while discussing the above captioned phenomena with Lieutenant Colonel Garrett of the Air Forces Intelligence, expressed the possibility that flying discs were, in fact, a very highly classified experiment of the Army or Navy. Mr. Reynolds was very much surprised when Colonel Garrett not only agreed that this was a possibility, but confidentially stated it was his personal opinion that such was a probability. Colonel Garrett indicated that a Mr. [Deleted], who is a scientist attached to the Air Forces Intelligence, was of the same opinion.

“Colonel Garrett stated that he based his assumption on the following: He pointed out that when flying objects were reported seen over Sweden, the ‘high brass’ of the War Department extended tremendous pressure on the Air Forces Intelligence to conduct research and collect information in an effort to identify these sightings. Colonel Garrett stated that, in contrast to this, we have reported sightings of unknown objects over the United States, and the ‘high brass’ appeared to be totally unconcerned. He indicated this led him to believe that they knew enough about these objects to express no concern. Colonel Garrett pointed out further that the objects in question have been seen by many individuals who are what he terms ‘trained observers’ such as airline pilots. He indicated also that several of the individuals are reliable members of the community. He stated that these individuals saw something. He stated the above has led him to the conclusion that there were objects seen which somebody in the Government knows all about.”

Special Agent Reynolds then pointed out to the colonel that if flying saucers did indeed originate with a highly classified domestic project of the military, it was wholly unreasonable for the FBI to be expected to “spend money and precious time conducting inquiries with respect to this matter.”

The colonel duly concurred with Reynolds, and indicated that it would have been extremely embarrassing to Air Force Intelligence if the saucers proved to be American in origin.

Perhaps sensing that he was getting close to uncovering the truth behind the UFO puzzle, Reynolds then made inquiries with the Intelligence Division of the War Department for an opinion on the theory that some shadow government operation was responsible for the many flying-saucer-type objects seen over North America.

The War Department, however, issued a flat denial that it was in any way implicated in the UFO issue. In a report written up later, Reynolds noted that he was given “the assurance of General Chamberlain and General Todd that the Army is conducting no experiments with anything which could possibly be mistaken for a flying disc.”

Nevertheless, the FBI continued to view the subject of flying saucers and the military’s involvement in it with suspicious eyes; and rumors continued to circulate within the higher echelons of the FBI that it was being denied access to the full and unexpurgated facts.

None of this, of course, proves that the flying saucer wave of the summer of 1947 was provoked by a highly classified military program – rather than one of ET origin – but the behind-the-scenes discussions between the likes of Reynolds and Garrett on just such a possibility are, to say the very least, highly intriguing…

“This scares me and I don’t know what it is. I have been seeing them since I was a little girl. Always outta the corner of my eye a tall black shadow. I always feel like something or someone is by me. Last night I went down to my bedroom. There it was. Standing next to my dresser. I ran upstairs crying to my mom. She went down and looked saying it was only ’cause I was overtired. But I KNOW what I saw. It was so scary. I don’t know what it is. I need all the help I can get!” – Jessica’s cry for help, 10, January 2010.

Tales of walking Shadows come from across the world. Some of these Shadow People wander through the periphery of our lives; others stay for years. People can rarely make out features of these darker-than-night, human shaped entities other than an occasional set of blazing red eyes. Shadow People often appear dressed as a Medieval monk, wearing a fedora, or bald and sexless. These entities may simply trek through our bedroom at night never to be seen again, while others may lurk in doorways, just watching, day after day. Still others attack with energy-draining fear.

What are they?

I’ve studied the Shadow People phenomena for the past decade, and have come to the conclusion the term “Shadow People” is a catchall for entities that exhibit certain characteristics – but their origins can be wildly different. Through research and personal experience, I’ve categorized these creatures by behavior.

Benign Shadows: Shadow People that seem to travel briefly through a person’s life. I saw these entities as a child. They appeared to walk with purpose through my room, never acknowledging me, and never straying from their path. I never felt an unholy fear, just the fear of watching a dark human-shaped trespasser walk past my bed.

Negative Shadows: Although these Shadow People tend to simply lurk, they are associated with a feeling of unnatural terror.

Red-Eyed Shadows: These entities are always negative, but stare at experiencers with blazing red eyes. Victims often say they feel this creature feed from their fear.

Hooded Shadows: Dressed as an ancient monk, people who encounter these Shadow People feel a deep rage bubbling behind the black cowl.

The Hat Man: This entity is the most curious. Dressed in a fedora, and sometimes appearing to wear an old-time business suit, the Hat Man appears to people in cultures across the planet.

Shadow People may be demonic entities, ghosts, inter-dimensional travelers, or other denizens of the dark realm we call the Unknown. Regardless of their label, Shadow People could very well be more than just one type of being. Brad Steiger, author of “Shadow World,” has studied the paranormal for more than 50 years and agrees – there are many possible explanations for Shadow People. “I would say that experiencers are seeing all of the above and giving them/it the name of Shadow People.”

Whatever these entities are, they’re shocking to those who see them.

A gray sheet of clouds stretched across the sky as 12-year-old Doug ran to the corner store. “It was overcast but not raining, and in the middle of the afternoon,” Doug said. The day was shadowless, and decades later he still doesn’t know what he saw on his way home from the store, arms laden with food. At first, he thought it was a friend. “As I approached the corner to turn onto my street, I saw something black sticking beyond the bushes in the front of my house,” Doug said. “I yelled, ‘Andre,’ and started running toward my driveway where the bushes are.”

The dark figure wasn’t his friend Andre. A black, man-shaped Shadow grew from behind the bushes in this quiet afternoon and began running toward Doug’s house. “After a few steps I saw the Shadow running down my driveway toward the back yard,” he said. “I ran up the driveway to the gate that leads to my back yard. I couldn’t believe my eyes.”

Doug stood at the gate as the black Shadow in the shape of a man ran across his yard and disappeared through a fence. “I was shocked,” he said. “I couldn’t stop thinking about it. This thing; what could it be? Why was it black when most stereotypical stories said that ghosts were white? Could this be demonic? Could it be like me, just a person?”

What did Doug see? A ghost? A demon? A dimensional traveler? Or was it all in his mind?

Science

“I’ve been visited by what I presume to be the same Shadow three times in my life, and the memories have haunted me ever since. When I was six, I saw it at my dad’s new house, towering over my bed. I couldn’t move, and I don’t remember what happened next. All I remember is trying to scream, but there was this horrible weight on my chest.” – Luke Purdy

Most of the Shadow People encounters I’ve collected over the years are readily explainable. The experiencer wakes to find a black, human figure standing in the doorway of their bedroom, or leaning over their bed, just watching. A tightness grips their chest like the weight of a person is upon them. They can’t breathe. Suddenly the choking eases, and the Shadow being is gone. This type of encounter is common, and psychology has a name for it – sleep paralysis.

April Haberyan, a psychology professor at Northwest Missouri State University, said most Shadow People encounters are probably the product of dreams. When people sleep and enter the REM phase, “it’s very common for them to see things,” Haberyan said. The fear, the paralysis, and the entities are normal. “There are hormones in REM sleep that paralyze the major muscle groups and it’s called paradoxical sleep,” she said. “(Although) this happens during REM, these people don’t stay asleep and the hormones are still in their bodies. It can last up to eight minutes and they feel pressure on their chest and can see people.” When the experiencer becomes fully awake, the Shadow Person encounter is over – all that’s left is the fear.

Other Shadow People encounters – as well as those of ghosts/UFOs/Bigfoot for that matter – can be attributed to the same trick of light and shadow that allows us to see faces in clouds and carpets. These sightings can also be from electrical stimulation to certain parts of the brain, or drugs. Chemist Rick Toomey said anything that throws off the chemical balance of the brain causes all sorts of problems. “All sensation is in the nervous system and it’s all chemistry,” he said. “If every neurotransmitter is chemistry, you can wreak havoc with that.”

However, many encounter Shadow People in full consciousness and full daylight, removing the logical, scientific answers, and leaving something terrible.

The Religious World

“My best friend, when he was a boy he was laying on his bed with the lights on. A shadowy figure emerged from his closet and moved towards his bedside. The Shadow being reached out a finger and touched my buddy’s leg. He screamed and the figure vanished, and his folks were there in moments. My friend’s father noticed that the closet door was open, and his parents knew he NEVER slept without it closed. The black spot on his leg remained visible for several years, but the Shadow being never returned. To this day my friend has no idea what happened, but he does know one thing – it was real.” – Paul Sycros

Although most reported Shadow People encounters involve an entity simply appearing and disappearing, many aren’t that innocent. Negative Shadows, Red-Eyed Shadows, and Hooded Shadows, all bring a feeling of horror when they step into someone’s life. These creatures are known by different names, demons, jinn, dark shadows, sgili, but their nature is the same.

Bishop James Long, pastor of St. Christopher Old Catholic Church in Louisville, Kentucky, has studied demonology for years and knows Shadow People well – to him they are something evil. “Shadow People must be taken seriously and they can be quite dangerous,” he said. “When a human spirit tries to manifest itself, its form is black, or otherwise known as Shadow. It is energy trying to manifest itself so that it can appear to have the physical characteristics it had when living on earth.” These entities can move, communicate, and attack, drawing energy from their human victim. “Certainly Shadows that attack are demonic in nature and should be avoided at all times,” Long said. “I would strongly encourage anyone who witnesses a dark Shadow to be careful.”

Cody Lilly’s family has encountered this type of Shadow for years, a black, human-shaped figure, featureless except for a wide-brimmed hat. “We called him the Cowboy because he kind of looked like the Marlboro man,” Lilly said. The Cowboy stepped into Lilly’s life his sophomore year of high school in Clarinda, Iowa, and visited almost nightly for two years, pacing about his room, waiting for something. The entity, with fiery red eyes, never spoke, and never approached him, but Lilly knew why it was there – it hungered. “It was feeding,” Lilly said, convinced the Cowboy was absorbing energy from his terror. “The first time I saw it I was completely incapacitated by how scared I was of it.”

Lilly soon went to college thirty miles south and the visits stopped until after graduation in 2011 when he moved to Nebraska. “My girlfriend that is now my fiancée is in Kansas City and I’m in Omaha. I was crashing with friends here,” he said. “My car started acting up, I’m in the process of looking for a job, finding an apartment, buying an engagement ring. I had a lot of stuff on my plate, which might have brought on what happened.” What happened was the Cowboy. “I’m sitting in my car on the phone with my mom. I don’t know much about cars, but my mom does.”

As Lilly described the car’s behavior to his mother, he noticed a movement in the corner of his right eye. Lilly turned toward the passenger side window and saw it – the Shadow Man that once tormented him in the night. The Cowboy. “It was full on. A Shadow Person in an old fedora,” Lilly said. “It was standing there. It leaned over like it’s bending to look at me.”

As Lilly stared in horror at this red-eyed Shadow Man in full daylight, the Cowboy reached out it’s arm and knocked on the car window. “It knocked two times,” Lilly said. “After it knocked it dissolved in my vision. It just showed up, knocked on my window and was gone.” Lilly wonders if the Cowboy wanted to let him know it was still around. “It’s been quite some time that I saw him,” he said. “I’m just kind of thinking he just showed up. I was feeling stressed out and I think he showed up just to feed on that.”

In Islam, the supernatural Jinn can be a companion, or a dark, Shadowy predator. “Jinns are invisible entities believed in by most all Muslims and Middle Eastern folklore,” said religion expert, Dashti Namaste. “Jinns get in and out of human spheres regularly, and it is believed that any human is able to make contact with a Jinn.” Although Jinn can be benevolent, some Jinn are wicked, appearing as dark figures that lurk in ruins and cemeteries, waiting for an unsuspecting human soul to stumble by. The wicked Jinn, much like the demons of Christianity, are deceivers and may present themselves as the ghost of a loved one to insert themselves into a human’s life.

Wahde, a Cherokee, said the nature of Shadow beings in the American Indian tradition are just as dark. “They’re humanoid shaped, but not proportionate to a normal person,” Wahde said. “Their appearance is more monstrous in nature.” These Shadow beings are the product of medicine men that have strayed from the path of healing. “There seem to be a classification of spiritual beings that are Shadow for the most part. These things can be manipulated by bad medicine or bad magic,” Wahde said. “They either take that form to attack other people, or they use some other spiritual being as a spiritual attack.” In the Cherokee language, these dark medicine people are sgili, or witch. “They’re still alive to some degree, but they’re not necessarily considered human.”

Ghosts

“I have a young boy shadow/spirit in my home. He appears as a solid black cutout-like figure. He is a prankster, too, but he’s NOT mean, or evil. He let’s us know he’s here at times by playing with the animals. Kittens, dogs, puppies, etc. PLAY, not mean. The dogs and puppies are wagging their tails. He moves my Barbies if he really wants my attention. And the other day he didn’t want the door to his room closed, so he opened it. He’s a good kid.” – Kim Tamsor

A family sees a black figure come down the stairs at the same time at night, turn into the kitchen and disappear. A dark man in an out-of-date suit walks through a child’s bedroom and down the hallway. Some Shadow People encounters – benign ones like these – could very well be disembodied spirits wandering the earth. D.H. Parsons, president of The Bliss-Parsons Institute of Metaphysics in Columbia, Missouri, has encountered many Shadow People while investigating a haunting. Although many fellow investigators consider Shadow People demonic, Parsons doesn’t necessarily agree. “My feeling is that a Shadow Person is another representation of a residual memory of a person who had such a strong personality in life, that a bit of their energy remained here in this dimension after their spirit crossed over,” Parsons said. “Most of the time the spirit beings are either friendly to us, or confused by us, or curious as to why we are there. But they have never done us any harm, not even the Shadows.”

Not so for eighteen-year-old Dave Stanfield. Stanfield didn’t expect something to be waiting for him in his room when he woke. Something was – something dark. A strange feeling pulled Stanfield from a deep sleep. As he lay in the gray room, staring at his bedroom wall, he saw it. “I woke for no reason, had no weird dreams, and I wasn’t groggy or half asleep,” he said. “My room was dark other than some stray beams coming through the blinds, and I could see a man, darker than the night like a void.”

The figure stood at the end of the bed. “I could only make out the silhouette of his head and shoulders. The rest of him just went straight to the floor,” Stanfield said. “There were no legs or feet. No red eyes, no facial features whatsoever.” Terrified, Stanfield slid low in bed, pulling the covers slowly over his face, watching the black, man-shaped figure standing over him until his blankets hid the horror from his view and Stanfield fell back to sleep.

Stanfield is now 29, and although he doesn’t know what this Shadow Being was, he knows he saw it – and it haunts him still. “Only in the past couple of years have I been able to find anything on the subject matter,” Stanfield said. “It’s almost like re-victimization when reading stories from other people that describe experiences like mine. I never knew it could be so widespread and am still dealing with the shock.”

But, as with Parsons’ encounters, this being didn’t harm Stanfield. At least not physically.

Interdimensional travelers

“Harmless. Just a watcher is all.” – Don Hall

Most Shadow People encounters are benign, a dark figure lingering in the corners of your life, watching. Could these entities simply be watching us from a realm barely removed from our own? Marie Jones, author of books exploring science and the paranormal, thinks other dimensions could be homes of Shadow People. “In my research into quantum and theoretical physics, I came across … concepts that really opened up the possibilities to me that entities from somewhere else could be coming here” Jones said.

One of these concepts is wrapped around different dimensions. “Theoretically, if these infinite other universes exist, we really should not physically be able to access them,” Jones said. “Yet even theoretical physicists entertain the thought that perhaps the laws of physics on the other side allow for some crossover.”

Clark Kent’s* grandfather died in 1977 and his grandmother moved to a small apartment leaving her old house empty. Shortly after, ten-year-old Kent’s family moved in. “My first friend in the new neighborhood was my next-door neighbor, Jim,” Kent said. “We are good friends to this day.” On a day in 1979, Kent invited Jim to his house to play Ping Pong – and it’s haunted him since.

That day after school, Kent and Jim had about two hours before Kent’s parents came home from work, which meant Ping Pong in the basement between peeks at the forbidden stash of Playboys in a dusty alcove. It was there Kent saw something he didn’t expect. “During our game, I was facing the alcove,” Kent said. “At a certain point, something caught my attention.” Standing in the alcove was the shadow of a man wearing a fedora.
“It was creepy, and I had to pause,” Kent said. “I could not figure out how any combination of the boxes could cast such a shadow. Then it moved.”

Kent stood at the Ping Pong table, staring at dark figure watching him from the alcove. He then quickly looked at Jim who was looking at him. “He realized I had seem something,” Kent said. “I was struck by the realization that no man was casting a shadow on the wall, the Shadow was solid and was not attached to any object. I turned and scrambled up the stairs with Jim right behind me.” At the top of the stairs, their breath coming fast and heavy, Kent slammed and latched the basement door, then “looked at Jim with wide eyes.”

Jim denied seeing the Shadow man that day and for nearly thirty years after. As the two met for a long needed reunion, Kent mentioned the Shadow Man in his basement. “Jim sunk into his chair and spoke in a whisper, ‘I’ll never forget that hat.’ I was stunned,” Kent said. Then he asked the same question he’d asked three decades ago, did you see it? “Yes, I did,” Jim told him. “I was scared.”

But did this entity, this watcher, step into Kent’s life from a parallel universe?

Although some physicists entertain the idea of these multiple universes, physicist David Richardson isn’t eager to join them. “I hate to bring this up in this context, but if there were extra dimensions … (Shadow People) might actually be people,” he said. “I’m skeptical of that, but it’s possible. We’re just starting to figure out that sort of stuff.”

Ghost? Demon? Jinn? Sgili? Traveler? Regardless of the nature of these entities, regardless of their intentions, the advice for each encounter is the same – proceed with caution.

*Yes, this person’s name is actually Clark Kent. Although bearing the name of Superman’s alter ego may be a burden to some, Kent said his name has netted him many free bottles of beer from strangers at taverns. Who doesn’t want to buy a drink for the Last Son of Krypton?

Follow Jason on Twitter @TheJasonOffutt

The images used in this post are for illustration purposes only.

Throughout history, there have been a number of curious afflictions that show up repeatedly in various stories and traditions. These range from the common varieties that involve hexes, spells, and charms, to the more incredible types that incorporate transformation into ghastly forms and incredible creatures. Occasionally, we even see such things as affliction with odd ailments and dark states such as vampirism, zombification, or soul-slavery that arise from the use of wicked spellcraft and black magic aimed at the unsuspecting. 

These are all themes we expect to see in literature, and the wealth of pages adorning fiction tomes spanning the centuries incorporate such odd instances into their various mythologies. But pursuing the mysteries surrounding witchcraft, black arts, and ill fortune a bit more deeply, there occasionally arise a few curiosities that defy rationale altogether, ceasing to conform even to the typical precepts of spells and sorcery. Such things, at times, may involve how looks (or more specifically, certain kinds of staring) can kill, and even the use of magical practices to incite fear, paranoia, and even the disappearance of one’s unmentionables.

Yes, this quickly becomes uncertain territory indeed… but for sheer lack of having any better sense than to abstain, we’ll no doubt press onward, as usual…

One of the initial curiosities afforded us within the spheres of mysticism known as “the black arts” is comprised of something known as “the evil eye.” A variety of traditions incorporate this curse, which typically involves the superstition that gazing the wrong way at another individual can cause them ill fortune–either by accident, or by intention.

Recently, one of my listeners, Rosa, shared with me a story about “evil eye” traditions among the Mexican culture, which involve some curious headache remedies, among other things. “In Mexican tradition, the evil eye is a common diagnosis for small children getting ill,” Rosa described. “Typically it was thought to happen to charismatic or beautiful children. Sometimes it can also happen if someone is envious of the parents. It was not always a matter of envy or ill intent, sometimes its just something that happened when someone stared too long.” Rosa also recounted an interesting procedure that often used when she suffered migraines as a child, in which an egg yolk was used to “observe” the evil causing the painful manifestation:

I remember every so often I would get mysterious migraines and when other treatments would fail my mom or grandma would  do an egg cleansing. With an egg they would sweep the egg over my head and down my body and recite the apostles creed. After reciting it three times the egg would be broken and the white and yolk would be dropped into a half full glass of water. The glass would then be placed under the bed and i would take a short nap or fall asleep it was done at bed time. Once I would wake up the egg would be observed, and more often than none the yolk would take the shape of a red eye.  It is believed that the egg observed the evil. My grandma was careful about not looking at it directly over it; it should only  be viewed from the side or the evil eye would be transmitted.  The egg was then flushed down the toilet, and somehow my migraines would stop.

This is very similar to traditions that exist in other parts of the world, especially Greece, where strange manifestations appear as a result of staring over newborn children, etc. But sight and staring aren’t the only manifestations of strangeness that result in ill effects on the physiology. Indeed, when studying the claims of such things as “penis theft” and similar afflictions common in the cultures of Southeast Asia, one certainly will find even more curious (and sometimes hilarious) ways that cultural superstitions may arise. While I’ve read about the belief that black magic and witchcraft might be used in the “theft” of a targeted individual’s reproductive organs, I was unaware until recently that an entire book had been authored about this strange and unusual subject, titled The Great Singapore Penis Panic and the Future of American Mass Hysteria. According to the book’s product detail page at Amazon.com:

Forty-three years ago, a strange series of events unfolded on the island of Singapore. Hundreds of men rushed to the hospitals of the island with the terrifying belief that their penises were shrinking. Each feared that if his penis shrank away completely, he would die. Some came with lucky red strings tightly wrapped around their penises to prevent the lethal disappearance. Others had clamps holding their wayward organs in place. Most often it was a firm grasp of a hand, their own or a frightened family member’s, that prevented the shrinking penis from slipping away and taking their life with it. Oddly enough, about a dozen women also fell victim to the panic. This was the Great Singapore Penis Panic, or what doctors refer to as an epidemic of the psychiatric condition called Koro.

Indeed, Paul Deane addressed this curious curse-like affliction in his book Sex and the Paranormal, attributing the cause to being primarily rooted in mass hysteria. Other bouts with crowd-madness that have been prolific throughout parts of southern Asia involve sightings of various paranormal entities described as resembling monkey men, or even “grease devils” that cover themselves in oil so they can evade capture after terrorizing an unsuspecting populace. Encounters with these beings can also tend to have sexual overtones, where the phantom attacker may either sexually assault the victim in question, or act otherwise in a lewd fashion.

It is certainly curious how particular superstitions can tend to erupt around various cultural traditions, or how belief in bizarre magical afflictions can become so widespread. What are their underlying cause, and is it really possible (as the title of the book mentioned above seems to suggest) that widespread belief in superstitions like “penis thievery” and the evil-eye could really cause outbreaks in Western society too?

Located within California’s Mojave Desert, Death Valley is a most apt name for a place that resembles the rugged surface of some far away, battle-scarred planet and which holds the dubious honor of being home to the highest recorded temperature in the western world. An incredible 136° Fahrenheit, it was recorded on July 10, 1913, in the very appropriately named Furnace Creek.

It is somewhat ironic that, although Death Valley got its memorable moniker during the famous Gold Rush of 1849, only one death among all the prospectors eager to seek out gold was actually reported during that turbulent period. And although the name may be relatively new, the history of the area is most definitely not. For more than a thousand years the Timbisha Native Americans have lived in the harsh environs of Death Valley. And, in times both past and present, so have a whole range of things undeniably weird.

One of the strangest of all sagas relative to the mysteries of Death Valley erupted in the summer of 1947, the very same period in which the era of the Flying Saucer took the entire world by storm. In early August of that year, Howard E. Hill, of Los Angeles, spoke before the city’s Transportation Club and told a sensational story.

It was an extravagant tale that described the work of a certain Dr. F. Bruce Russell, a retired Cincinnati, Ohio physician, who claimed to have discovered, in 1931, a series of complex tunnels deep below Death Valley. Well, you may justifiably ask, so what?

[The images used in this post are used for illustration purposes only and are obviously photoshopped (except for the giant skull in the wheelbarrow, I took that one myself back in 1849) - MU]

After all, caves, caverns and underground grottos exist all around the world. They most certainly do. But, there was something very special and unique about these particular tunnels beneath Death Valley. According to the story told to Hill by Russell, the caves contained the skeletons of several gigantic men, each in the region of around nine feet in height, which Russell stumbled upon with a colleague, Dr. Daniel S. Bovee, who Russell had worked with on archaeological excavations in Mexico several years earlier.

And “stumbled upon” is highly apt terminology. Russell reportedly fell headlong into one of the caves when the surface soil gave way beneath him as he was in the middle of busily sinking a shaft for a mining claim. In Hill’s own words, spoken before the amazed and hushed audience of the Transportation Club, he said:

“These giants are clothed in garments consisting of a medium length jacket and trousers extending slightly below the knees. The texture of the material is said to resemble gray dyed sheepskin, but obviously it was taken from an animal unknown today.”

Upping the weird stakes even further, Hill said that while deep underground Russell and Bovee apparently came across what they described as a “ritual hall,” in which were found unspecified devices adorned with markings “similar to those now used by the Masonic order.” More bizarrely, the long-dead remains of both tigers and elephants – or, as was later suggested, and which was certainly far more plausible, the remnants of ancient saber-tooth tigers and mammoths – were also found strewn across the floor of the huge hall.

As for this fantastic, below-surface realm, we’re not talking about just a few, measly tunnels either. Hill revealed that then current estimates suggested there were at least thirty-two of them, and they ran for an amazing 180 square miles, covering whole swathes of Death Valley and certain parts of southern Nevada.

As for the era in which the bodies originated, while no explanation was given as to how Russell had come up with such a figure, he estimated they extended back an incredible 80,000 years, if not even longer, Hill told the crowd.

Hardly surprisingly, the local media of the day loudly cited the comments of certain, unnamed “professional archaeologists” who openly scoffed at such a story, assuring anyone and everyone who would listen that the tale simply had to be that and nothing else at all: a tall story of April Fools’ Day proportions.

Rather incredibly, but some might say predictably, no-one in the professional world of archeology would even dare take up the challenge to see the incredible evidence for his or herself – possibly fearful of being viewed as gullible and lacking in credibility.

The result: it was left up to Howard E. Hill to continue to speak on behalf of Dr. Russell – which he certainly did, until the story died a mysterious death, and Hill, Russell and Bovee mysteriously vanished into the shadows (or, perhaps, into the depths of those old caves), never, ever to return….

Back in the 1960s, a photograph, said to date from the late 1800s, appeared in the pages of a popular newsstand magazine of the day – possibly True, Saga, or Argosy – and displayed the deceased remains of a gigantic, monstrous bird, pinned to a pair of barn-doors somewhere in rural North America – the exact location is, just like the picture itself, a matter of some debate.

Numerous researchers, investigators and authors of a whole range of anomalies claim, with absolute unswerving certainty, that they personally saw the priceless picture when it was published. The big problem, today, however, is that despite the fact that the pages of all the above-magazines, and many others too, have been carefully and dutifully scoured – even to the point of near-obsession – the picture cannot be found, anywhere at all. It’s almost as if it never even existed in the first place.

What was the alleged winged nightmare? Possibly nothing less than a legendary Thunderbird. And, if you’re not acquainted with the phenomenon, I refer you to the words of my good friend – and fellow creature seeker and co-author with me on our Monsters of Texas book – Ken Gerhard, who says the following of the mighty, flying beasts:

“These creatures are likened to enormous eagles and are prominent in numerous, Native American folklores and totems. The name Thunderbird is derived from the sound that is apparently produced as a result of the thunderous beating of the mighty wings of the creature. Surprisingly, these mythological beasts are occasionally still reported flying around in our modern skies, and, incredibly, are described as having wingspans comparable to that of a small airplane.”

Well, in the same way that there is a distinct enigma surrounding the missing 1960s-era Thunderbird photograph, so there is  a similar aura of weirdness surrounding the photo of a Thunderbird that appears in my and Ken’s Monsters of Texas.

Like all authors, Ken and I wanted to ensure we had a good and varied selection of photos to accompany the text of the book. And that included, if possible, Thunderbird-themed imagery. But, we didn’t want to simply go down the easy and lazy path of just pulling pictures from Wikipedia or somewhere similar, or using images that were well-known and/or well-used. So, the hunt was on for something relevant and new. But, it was no easy task. Or, rather, for a while it wasn’t.

One afternoon, just a month or so before the book had to be submitted to the publisher, I was speaking on the phone with my dad, and he asked what I was up to. I told him that the writing of Monsters of Texas was coming to a close, but that we were having a hard time finding a Thunderbird photo. Given that my dad’s interest in Cryptozoology is  not exactly huge, he almost flummoxed me when he said, words to the effect of: “I can send you a picture; I have an old painting of a Thunderbird in my garage.”

This sounded almost too good to be true. Amazingly, it wasn’t. Like all young men his age in the early 1950s, my dad had to serve three years of what was then called National Service (or, in the U.S., the Draft). But, his stint in the British Royal Air Force aside, my dad spent his working career as a carpenter. In the late 1970s, the company he was then working for secured a contract to rebuild and renovate the lobbies of a well-known hotel chain in and around the London area.

When the work was completed, my dad and his colleagues were presented with gifts, as a sign of appreciation for the work. In my dad’s case, his gift was a circular piece of stone, on which had been painted a brightly colored Thunderbird catching a fish. I vaguely remembered seeing this as a young teenager, but didn’t realize the significance of it back then, and promptly forgot about it – chiefly because it was never on display in my parents’ home, and apparently remained buried amongst a mass of stuff in the garage for decades.

So, my dad dug out the circle of stone, dusted it off, and took a picture of it for me – the very one that accompanies this article. But, there’s something else, too. I find it very curious that while I was diligently searching – but ultimately failing – to find what I considered to be a good, previously unseen Thunderbird image for the book, I should finally get one from, of all people, my very own dad, all as a result of a chance conversation. Or, was it all down to chance?

I am a big believer in the phenomenon of Synchronicities – so-called “meaningful coincidences” that appear to be the result of something stranger than mere random actions. And, I’m very inclined to place this affair into that same category.

And, of course, I can’t ignore the fact that this represents two Thunderbird-connected photographs that seem to have distinctly Fortean overtones attached to them – one of which seemingly disappeared from the pages of one or more magazines years ago, and another that appears in Monsters of Texas! Maybe I should keep careful watch, just in case the latter picture starts to mysteriously disappear, too, from each and every copy of the book…

People occasionally ask me, as an author, what types of books I enjoy reading. Well, I’m a big fan of Jack Kerouac’s work (aside from his poetry, which I think is a collective, appalling, rambling mess), Hunter S. Thompson’s Gonzo-driven titles, and the UFO/paranormal-themed books of Gray Barker, John Keel, and my good mate, Jon Downes of the British Center for Fortean Zoology. However, most of the books I read tend to be biographies and autobiographies, mainly of actors, rock-stars, and various and sundry celebrity types (particularly of the bygone, Golden-years of Hollywood).

So, when Anomalist Books’ Patrick Huyghe sent me a review copy of their recently published title, Robert Cracknell’s The Lonely Sense: The Autobiography of a Psychic Detective, I knew this was going to be an interesting read. And it was!

With a Foreword from a true legend in the field of paranormal-themed research and writing – Colin Wilson, no less – The Lonely Sense tells the story of one Robert Cracknell, a man with extraordinary psychic skills, and one whose powers pushed him down some strange, bizarre and supernatural pathways. They even led him to extensive liaison with officialdom on unsolved murder cases. But, Cracknell’s book is far more than just that.

It’s a brutally honest, open and highly entertaining study of the author’s life, that takes the reader from its very beginnings, his time spent in the British Royal Air Force, and to a profound experience that occurred during that same time spent with the military that sent him on the road to becoming a definitive psychic detective. That’s when Cracknell’s life begins to change drastically.

Not surprisingly, Cracknell reveals that coming to grips with his surfacing powers of the psychic kind was not easy. In fact, parts of his story are downright traumatic as he struggles to understand and utilize the near-unique talents at his disposal, as well as how his awakening to a new, previously-uncharted world resulted in problems close to home, with family, friends, and work colleagues.

But, as The Lonely Sense demonstrates, like so many people who came before him – and doubtless like so many who will follow in his footsteps – Cracknell ultimately found himself elevated, empowered, and ready to make use of the skills given to, or developed by, him.

In fact, one could say Cracknell’s transformation and elevation eerily paralleled that of ancient Shamanic figures, who realized they were not quite like everyone else, but who used their differences to ensure positive change and results via means of a psychic, paranormal, and spiritual nature.

And it’s from this moment on that we see Cracknell plunged into a whole new world, one in which he is sought out by the public, the media, and even the British Police Force, on harrowing and distressing murder cases and much more.

Again, Cracknell is open and honest about the nature of those cases, and the effects that immersing himself in them had on his mind and soul. He also provides a fascinating, behind-the-scenes account of the time he met Uri Geller, which makes for interesting reading alone.

As the book comes to a close, we read of Cracknell’s retirement on Cyprus, of his studies of the Jack the Ripper saga, and of much more, too.

So, what we have with Robert Cracknell’s The Lonely Sense (it runs to just over 300-pages) is not just yet another study of psychic phenomena. Rather, it is a unique account of how one man found himself in a world that he did not ask to be plunged into, but who accepted the challenge – and both the good and the bad that came with that acceptance – and did something positive with the powers at his disposal.

The Lonely Sense is, then, a must-buy for those interested in psychic phenomena, life-after-death, and the mysterious abilities of the human mind. But, it’s also required reading for anyone who wants a deep, revealing insight not just into the world of psychic phenomena, but into the swirling, turbulent and emotion-filled heart of the psychic individual, too.

For years (decades, actually), rumors have circulated to the effect that government agencies – primarily those of Britain and the United States – have, since the 1980s, taken a deep and wholly secret interest in the Crop Circle phenomenon. And, there does seem to be evidence in support of this notion, as Colin Andrews’ 2009 book, Government Circles, makes very clear. There are, however, other, much earlier examples where it seems the British Government was actually quite disinterested in the phenomenon, even to the point of spending their hours, and tax-payers money, laughing about – and writing limericks in relation to – such affairs. Yes, really!

As many readers of Mysterious Universe will undoubtedly know, the British Government has, for a significant number of years now, been declassifying into the public domain its many and varied files on UFOs – chiefly under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act, and prior to that via the Thirty Year Ruling. One such file – covering more than three hundred pages and the period from 1963 to 1964 – includes a series of memoranda on the discovery of what might be termed an early Crop Circle.

As the file demonstrates, on 23 March 1964, T.E.T. Burbury, the Rector at Clifton Rectory, Penrith, Cumberland, wrote to the National Physical Laboratory at Teddington describing an encounter which had occurred some days previously. I quote from the rector’s letter: “Dear Sirs: Does an apparent column of blue light about 8-feet in diameter and about 15-feet high which disappears and leaves a mark of very slightly disturbed earth, the same diameter, mean anything to you? This occurred about 9.30 p.m. last Saturday night about 2 miles from here. It was seen by a person who is very short sighted who would have been unable to see anything, except the light, even if it had been present. “I examined the ground which is about 100 Yards from the nearest building and there are no pylons near. There was no sign of burning, either by sight or smell, the grass growing between the exposed ground appeared quite normal. There were no signs of bird tracks or droppings: the ground simply appeared to have been lightly raked over in an almost perfect circle. “For your information only, I told the farmer to have a sample of the earth collected and analysed for bacteria content, but don’t know whether he has done so. Yours faithfully: T.E.T. Burbury.” Note the words of the rector:  ”…the ground simply appeared to have been lightly raked over in an almost perfect circle.” Does this not sound somewhat familiar?

Furthermore, Burbury’s reference to “the farmer” strongly suggests that the circle was found on farmland. And: what of the column of blue light? Realizing that this was out of their jurisdiction, staff at the National Physical Laboratory forwarded a copy of the rector’s letter to the Meteorological Office at London Road, Bracknell. In turn, Mr. H.M. Race of the Meteorological Office advised Burbury that: “This does not appear to be a meteorological matter and we are therefore passing your letter to a London office who may be able to deal with it.” The “London office” to which Race was referring was an element of the old Air Ministry called S4.For its part, S4 seemed largely unconcerned, even amused, by the rector’s report, as the following opening words of memorandum of 16 April 1964 from R.A. Langton of S4 to a colleague, Flight Lieutenant A. Bardsley shows: “I should be grateful for your advice on the report in the attached correspondence. Could it be Will o’ the Wisp?”

The attached correspondence was, of course, Burbury’s letter. Two months later, Flight Lieutenant Bardsley stated the following in a good-humored reply to Langton: “This is quite a corker! The explanation could be one of several things, depending really, on the state of the investigator’s liver. One explanation could be aurora borealis. This phenomenon, however, is so unpredictable that it would be rather hopeless to expect someone to have seen the aurora at the same date/time as our short-sighted observer. Professor Paton at Edinburgh is an aurora expert, but I cannot really justify pestering him with this one.” Bardsley continued: “Again your ‘will o’ the wisp’ theory may be correct. However whilst following this line, the Royal Geographic Society confirmed that Penrith did not exist – at least in Bradshaw’s Gazetteer.

Further, information on the geological structure around Penrith again confirmed that there probably would not, but possibly could be, local ignitions of methane gas – absolutely no use these experts! Our myopic observer may possibly have seen car headlights shining up into a low cloud base. There is no mention of any sound in this report – could the observer be also deaf!” He concluded: ”One comment by the rector intrigues me: Could it be the rector thinks the object could be a phoenix? Finally: There once was a rector of Penrith, who reported that one of his Kith, saw blue light in the night, got a terrible fright, and the rector thinks it’s a ‘myth.’” Although Flight Lieutenant Bardsley signed off his reply in fine poetic style, he did not see fit to comment on the “almost perfect circle” reported by the rector, nor did he express an interest in following up on the rector’s suggestion to the farmer that a sample of earth should be collected for study.

Moreover, an examination of the Air Ministry file in question reveals no further reference to this particular case, and to the best of my knowledge, the entire matter appears to have been summarily dismissed. The 1980s-onwards accounts of secret government interest in Crop Circles are genuinely intriguing. It seems fairly safe to say, however, that for the British Air Ministry of 1964 such curious formations were of little interest, if no interest, at all…